About three years ago I was delivering a talk to a group of young professionals about pursuing that which fired you up. Whether it was a hobby, a business, learning a craft or musical instrument, my message was they should be pursuing something that they loved to do.
One attendee piped up in the middle of my talk and said, “but what if that isn’t possible?”
“Tell me more…” was my reply.
“Well, what if financially you just can’t afford to go do the things that fire you up inside?”
(This is obviously not an abnormal thing, for people to perceive the lack of money as the biggest obstacle to pursuing loves in their life.)
“So tell me what financially stands in the way of you pursuing your passion?”
“Well, for starters, I just leased a new car and am paying on a couch that I bought on credit…”
Her reasons for not pursuing what she most wanted (which was to travel extensively), largely stemmed from the fact that she was spending a great deal of her time working to pay for the stuff that she had acquired after graduation.
At the time, I didn’t know it, but I coined a phrase that has become central to my podcast, and many of my speaking events. I told the young lady that it seemed like she was building a big lifestyle, but not necessarily a bigger life.
“Perhaps you have it backwards. Build A Bigger Life, Not A Bigger Lifestyle.”
If the stuff that you’re acquiring isn’t getting you closer to joy, perhaps it’s time to rethink priorities from things to experiences. From stuff to simplicity.
This realization led me to start interviewing people who seemed like they had their shit together in relation to going after their highest priorities. The interviews were pumped out on iTunes and Stitcher as the Build A Bigger Life Podcast. And slowly but surely, an audience grew out of that podcast and people from all over began commenting about the messaging and how much it inspired them.
So much so that in 2018 I vowed to bring the podcast back. (There was a hiatus in programming from January 2016 to January 2018), but we’re launching the shows with new interviews, new insights, and a renewed passion to help people pursue their own passions. You can listen to the new shows HERE.
One of my favorite interviews in the newest batch is with a guy by the name of Tim Rose.
Tim is a full-time musician living on the island of Hawaii. He’s a regular guy who had a father with enough sense to tell Tim NOT to go to law school, and instead pursue music which was clearly a love of his.
Here’s the side story — Tim lives in a Chevy box van that he’s modernized into traveling living quarters. He realized, soon after moving to Hawaii to pursue music, that paying $1800 a month for an efficiency apartment wasn’t going to get him closer to his love. If nothing else, he was moving farther away from music and closer to working multiple jobs just to make ends meet.
That’s about the time that Tim realized he could trade in the truck he was driving around for a box van with a similar payment. Ditch the apartment, spruce up the mobile digs, and he was in business. Literally, his music business he operates from the van (and now a rented office space where he does live music shows broadcast online).
In my interview with Tim, you can hear how exceptionally happy this guy is. And why wouldn’t he be? He spends his mornings surfing, showers at the local beach or a friends’ place, then turns his attention towards creating the one thing that matters most to him — his music. He plays around 4-6 shows a week in Waikiki which makes him more than enough to cover the living expenses he’s grown accustomed to, plus the extra allows him to either blast away debt OR put money away to shoot some seriously high end music videos. And, Tim told me, he now has hope that he can one day purchase a home and support a family with his craft.
Tim Rose is absolutely building a bigger life for himself. It’s only a matter of time before the guy is clearing hundreds if not thousands or tens of thousands of dollars a month from music royalties. Only a matter of time before labels are reaching out to him to represent him. Only a matter of time before Ed Sheeran announces his opening act… none other than Tim Rose. And only a matter of time before his music is on the soundtrack of a new movie. This dude is that good. Hear for yourself…
What started for me as a passing comment to an attendee at one of my events, has grown into a bit of a movement. Tim mentions in the interview that what I said about leveraging income to it’s fullest extent made a huge difference in his life. But it is he who is making a difference — he’s living according to his highest values, is the architect of his own life, and loves what he does on a nightly basis.
Is sleeping in a van sometimes uncomfortable? No doubt it is. Tim says it was like sleeping in a microwave that first night.
The moral of the story may be… sometimes you have to get uncomfortable to get comfortable.
To download the Build A Bigger Life Blueprint, click HERE.
