3 THINGS I Learned From Moving

Yo! What is up, my friends! Hope that you guys are doing well. So, I'm in the midst of packing my whole life, you look behind me, there's all these U-Haul boxes, it's crazy, I'm getting ready to move. And I was thinking about what I wanted to talk about in this week's podcast. So, I'm gonna record it live with you guys here right now and I'm gonna share with you the three most important things that I've learned about moving and I think they're gonna surprise you. And so, I want you to hang out with me for a minute. I'm gonna tell you a story. I'm gonna teach you what I've learned about moving that has transformed my life forever, things that I don't think most people really think about.

So, I'll give you a little backstory before I jump into the three things. And I promise you these three things are gonna be really incredible. When I was young, there was a lot of moving that was happening. You know, we were deeply impoverished, we were homeless, my mom, because she was a drug addict, was spending all of our money on drugs. My stepdad, who was an over the trucker, was never home, they had their own issues with money, wasn't surprising to come home from school. And there's like the eviction notice on the door between eight to 12 years old, I live with 30 different families, three zero guys, like 30 different. It was crazy. I know some of you guys resonate with this. I know some of you guys understand what it's like to just get shuffled around place to place to place. And so, as a kid, I was just so used to moving all the time. Today as an adult, I still am very used to it, it's something I actually oddly enough, enjoy ‘cause I like the new experiences, I like the new things. And I've been lucky enough in the course of my life to be able now to have lived in multiple countries all over the world, extended periods of time, run my businesses from the internet, you know, do all these things.

And so, this all started though for me when I was about 11 or 12, 13 years old, sometime in that window. And I remember I was sitting in the living room with my grandmother at my grandmother's house and we were watching television. You remember those big squared RCA wooden cabinet TVs where it's 15 feet long, but it's actually like only this much screen. We had one of those kinds of TVs, if you remember those kinds of TVs, and we're watching Anthony Bourdain on Food Network or travel channel, whatever channel that was back then. And he is like traveling the world. I'm sitting here, I'm a little boy. I'm watching this show enamored like, oh my God, I want to travel. I cannot wait, one day I'm gonna go see the world. And I'm talking to my grandma and I look behind and she's sitting in her rocking chair and she has this like long gown thing on, you know, like grandma's wear and she's rocking back and forth, she's chain smoking a Misty Slim 100, you remember those grandma's cigarettes, they were like this long. So, she's chain smoking this Misty Slim 100 while drinking a Pabst Blue Ribbon and playing this video arcade poker game that she was obsessed with. And so, I'm watching this. I'm watching Anthony Bourdain. I'm looking at him traveling, eating these foods, having these amazing conversations with people, and she's back here rocking back and forth. I go, grandma, one day I'm gonna travel the whole world. I looked at her, I go, I'm going to travel the whole world. And what she said to me was, it was shocking, wven as a kid, it was shocking to me because what she said to me, she goes, you don't want to do that, the world is dangerous. You don't know what's out there. And what's really crazy, what's really crazy about that story is that my grandmother was giving me advice to travel the world, and she had never been on a freaking airplane, at least to my knowledge, I don't remember one time ever having a conversation where she was on an airplane. I don't remember any family members talking about travel, they were car travelers, they'd pack up the station wagon and go all around the Midwest. I don't even know that she ever left the Midwest, to be honest with you. And so, here I am, I'm talking about my dream and I'm like, I want to travel the world and she goes, ah, it's scary out there.

And today, like, so this is my passport holder guy right here. Here's my passport. It's full of stamps, blah, blah. This is a photo of my grandmother. I keep this photo in my freaking passport as a reminder every single time that I'm about to get on a plane to go and travel the world, to not listen to people who haven't done the thing you're trying to do. I know that's a crazy thing to say, especially about your own grandma, but like, do not listen to people who have never done the thing you're trying to do. My passport is full of stamp in fact, this thing's so full at this point like I gotta get new ones, like we gotta go get a new passport and I keep this picture of her right next to it because I always wanna remember that.

Now, here's where we're gonna start ‘cause I wanna share these three things with you again. Like my stuff's packed up, I'm getting ready to go to the next place, try something new, experience something new, put myself in an uncomfortable situation again. And so, I'm gonna share with you right now the three things that I've learned that about travel, about moving, about getting out of your space that have changed my life forever.

And this was really eye-opening to me because of what my grandmother had told me. She had always say, don't go into the world. It's scary out there. You don't want to do that. And so, I believe that until I went and I got out in the world.

• Number One

I want you to understand this and this is what I learned, is that the world is actually not that scary, mind blowing, right? You're like, whoa, mind blowing. I remember this crazy moment, crazy moment as I was traveling and I was in Obod? was it Obod or Chengdu, Indonesia ‘cuz I lived in Indonesia for like six or seven months. And so, I'm in Indonesia, I'm living in Indonesia, I'm just kind of like running my businesses, I'm doing my things and I got really sick, all of a sudden, got really sick. We had a bunch of friends. We went and had lunch or dinner at this restaurant, a day goes by like, you know, when you get food poisoning, something's just off and like something's off here. And I'm talking to my friend Aaron and he's like, yeah, something's off like I don't feel good either. And I'm like, man, I think we have food poisoning. I think we went to that restaurant and I start talking to my friend Aubrey and she's like, yo, everybody who ate at that restaurant the other day is sick. And I'm like, oh s***, I got food poisoning. And I was really sick, like beyond normal food poisoning sick, where like I was having this pain in my liver like it was like this shooting pain and I'm on Instagram and I'm just like chatting with someone I had met in Indonesia who is a local, and her and I having conversation, she's like, what's going on? How are you doing? I heard that a bunch of people you're having dinner with got sick and I was like, yeah, I'm in bed, I literally physically can't move. I'm exhausted. And I went to one hospital, I went to this one hospital up the road here and they basically sent me home, they were like, you are just sick, your food poisoned, go home, and I'm like, this feels worse. And so, I'm chatting with her and I'm like, something's wrong. And I don't know what to do here and she goes, I'm going to put you in contact with my doctor and she literally gets on the phone, this is a woman in Indonesia where I'm lying in bed, I have food poisoning. I go to another doctor. I can't get any help. I can't get any relief. I get sent home, I'm struggling, I'm in pain. I'm like, am I about to die. And she puts me in contact with her doctor. I go there an hour later. And he goes, man, we're putting you in the hospital right now like, you are in trouble, bro. And I was like, oh my God, what is happening right now? And turns out I had e-coli guys, e-coli, like, I'm so sick at this point. And my livers like pounding, my guts are killing me. I can't think straight. I'm sick. I'm scared. I'm alone. I'm in Indonesia. And this woman went out of her way to help me get connected with a doctor who helped me immediately. Immediately.

And so, you know, I remember my, grandmother being like, the world is scary, the world is scary. And I'm like, I have never witnessed anything but the goodness of people when I started moving, when I started traveling, when I started putting myself into situations, I was unfamiliar with and I didn't understand and that's the thing that you have to understand, it's like you have to go and trust; trust that the world is not as bad of a place as people want you to believe it.

• Number Two

And so, as of today, this passport is full. I've lived in a ton of different countries. I've traveled back and forth. I've done things that like, honestly, I never thought I was going to do, which is really incredible. And in that number two, I learned one of the most important things that I think you can learn by moving, by getting out of your place of comfort, by seeing the world, by getting on trains, planes, and automobiles, boats and ferries, that you have no idea where they're going, you learn to be self-sufficient.

And what I mean by that is when you're out in the world and you're in the unknown and you have maybe left your home, you grew up in Kansas and you go to New York City, or you grew up in Florida and you go to Seattle, or you grew up in Mexico and you moved to London, or you grew up in Indiana and you like I did, and then you move and you go live in Vietnam and Thailand and Malaysia, you learn how to be self-sufficient because there's this interesting thing that happens where you kind of start to realize a lot of what's happening in your life is on you. Like a lot of the things that are transpiring in your life, they're on you, like you have to figure out, where do I go to get electricity paid? Like in a lot of these places, like you have to go and pay your electricity physically at a location, right? You can't pay the electricity online. Where do I get the water service? You cannot. I'm telling you right now, you cannot drink tap water in Vietnam, not where I was anyway. Now, unless you want to get super sick, right?

And so, where's the grocery store? Where? How do I rent a motorbike? Where do I get the right helmet? Where's the gym? A lot of it too was like, where are the locals? Like how do I meet the people who are integrated, who already live here, who already have this whole thing figured out? Okay, cool, so I've gotta put myself in this position to go out there and find the things that I need, and that's being self-sufficient.

I don't wanna say there's no one to rely on, ‘cuz that's not true. But you have to find the people to rely on. When I landed in Vietnam, when I landed in Thailand, when I landed in Mexico, when I landed in London, I didn't know a soul, nobody. And now I have friends around the world, literally friends around the world. I can pick up my phone right now and I can call people in multiple countries around the world, but when I first got to these places, I didn't know anybody. And that's the same thing that happened when I moved to Denver, when I moved to Portland as I'm moving to Vegas right now, as I'm moving to whatever's after that, like you have to put yourself in a position and how do you do that? Join clubs. Join events. Go to go to local coffee shops, meet people, shake hands, introduce yourself. Say, Hey, my name is Michael and I just moved to town and I don't know anybody. Can you put me on? Can you tell me about what's happening in this community? The yoga community, the CrossFit community, the entrepreneur community, the coffee community, you know, where are these people who are like me that I can go connect with? And so, I try to teach my clients this all the time. I'm like, you've got to move, you've gotta pack up everything that you know, and you've got to move. You've gotta go discover who you are. And when you do that, you have, number two, you become self-sufficient because you're going to have to, if you want to be successful.

• Number Three

You have to learn and really you will become comfortable with the unknown. One of the things that we know as human beings better than anything is creating an environment of safety, which is massively important, however, can also hinder, cripple and handicap your potential because sometimes you're too safe. Sometimes you've spent your whole life in this little bubble you've never gotten out of it, you've never tried anything, you've never experienced anything, you never did anything that you didn't already know like even, I'll give you a crazy example. It's just like in relationships, because sometimes like you are dating your parent, like I know that's a mindblower for some people, but you might be dating your parents, somebody who's egotistical or narcissistic or doesn't take care of you, or whatever that thing is. And the idea of being with someone who's kind and loving and compassionate like that can be really scary, right? But when you're in the world and you go and you get into this new situation and you're uncomfortable, what happens is you build more resiliency. Like a lot of us are incredibly resilient like it's unbelievable how resilient you are. I talk to people every day and their stories are so crazy like their stories are so crap and like, how are you even here right now? How did you do this? Like it's incredible. And yet they're scared to leave the neighborhood they grew up in. And it's like, guys, let me tell you, if you want to know the real secret, like if you want to know the real trick to life to figuring out who you are, go get uncomfortable in a place you've never been. Some of you guys watching and listening to this right now, like you've never left your neighborhood, you never left your community, you live most people in America this is a real statistic, the vast majority of people, it's something like 85% of people. I might be screwing up that statistic ‘cuz I read it a couple of weeks ago, it was either 75 or 85% of people, all people in the United States live within 10 miles; 10 miles of where they, like we're only gonna just barely get on born, we're gonna move to the other zip code like, you're not going to find yourself there. And people always ask me, they're like, well, why do you move all the time? Where are you running from? And I'm like, I'm not running from anything ever. I'm running towards me. I'm trying to figure out at a deeper clip who I am. I'm trying to get into the crux of like, okay, if I go do this thing that I believe is going to set me up for success, I'm gonna learn something about myself. I'm like, okay, if I go push myself into the depths of what I don't know, what I'm not comfortable with, maybe there's something there for me. Maybe there's something there for me that not only helps my life become better, but helps me better understand myself.

And so, it's like every single time I put myself in a position and I wanna challenge you, like, I wanna invite you. If you're like, been on the cusp, you're like, man, only thing I ever want to do is like, get on that airplane one way ticket and see what happens. About six years ago now was it six, five or six years ago? I sold everything I owned. I had garage sales. I put it on offer up, I put it on Facebook marketplace, I put it on Craigslist, everything. I sold my truck, my clothes, my gym equipment. I sold my records, I sold everything. And I was like, yo, I'm gonna go get so uncomfortable that I'm buying a one-way ticket to Thailand and I'm gonna see what happens. And that's kind of what the thing is, like when you can come into any situation that you are not familiar with and understand one truth that you've already survived, stuff way more chaotic than this, then you're going to be good. Trust yourself. Like that's the thing I always want people to under, it's like, trust yourself. You're not going to be in danger as long as you trust in your gut the thing that you're trying to do, like right here is an opportunity for you.

Some of you guys are like, man, the only thing I ever want to do is I want to go to L.A. I want to go to Hollywood. I wanna try to be an actor. I want to go to New York City and I want to try to be a dancer. I want to like, whatever that thing is. It's like, go. Go do it. Face the fear of doing it because here's what's going to happen, that's that third thing you're gonna be able to become uncomfortable and comfortable in the unknown. It's both. It's simultaneous. You're gonna be uncomfortable and you're gonna learn how to be comfortable in the uncomfortable. So, it's this really, really beautiful experience that I hope that you all get to have.

So, my friends, those are the three things that I have learned from moving, from traveling, from hopping on planes. Again, I'll go through 'em one more time for you here just so we can recant it.

Number one, the world is not as scary as you think.

Number two, you will learn how to be self-sufficient.

And number three, you will learn how to be comfortable with the unknown.                                      If you want more guys, we do weekly coaching every single Monday.

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And Until Next Time.

My Friends, Be Unbroken.

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