Does your operating system run on hope?

If you are like me you if you don’t feel hopeful for your life, then you tend to feel depressed, hard on yourself, and you start to question your own worth.

“If there is hope in the future, there is power in the present” John Maxwell

The more and more I live my life, grow as a husband to my wife, and a dad to my three kids, I realize that without that hope in tomorrow, today can seem a lot harder than it really is.

As Veterans and now business owners you have a lot riding on you being able to figure things out. I am sure your team looks to you even for hope in tomorrow.

How do we peel back this onion and figure out what makes you feel hopeful?

Its easy first step, it starts with the question “How does this make me feel.”

I remember a few years back I would wake up in the summer and go for morning walks to as the sun was rising. Sunsets and sunrises have always had a big emotional impact on me. And I remember asking myself this question and instantly without much effort saying, “It makes me feel hopeful.”

I was like wow did that just happen? It made me realize that we are all a lot like Super Man where we derive our power from the sun. It can be freeing from the day before, and it’s a clear signal mentally that today is a brand-new day and its yours!

I then started asking myself that question in other areas of my life and kept finding answers all over the place. It wasn’t always hopeful as an answer, but it was feedback. Even after something like a doughnut I would ask myself this question and would answer “tired”. By asking ourselves “How does this make me feel” we can begin to train our brain that we don’t desire feeling that way.

Our brain is naturally wired to avoid things that make us feel bad; it’s just a matter of first recognizing how it makes us feel. Think of something you hate eating because of taste; it’s because you remember how it made you feel.

This breadcrumb of feeling hopeful in the morning has lead me to realize that the best place to create hope in tomorrow is to take actions today that will create a better tomorrow.

Back in March, I realized for what I have now declared the last time that my pants were getting too big (anyone relate?). So, I declared that I was going to fix this once and for all and started a 5 AM gym routine to change that. It wasn’t easy, and I haven’t worked out that early since leaving the military.

I tell this story because on the second day of working I realized a question I should have been asking myself but wasn’t.

“What is one thing you can do today, that will change every tomorrow?”

I realized for me if was the gym, it would literally make every tomorrow a stronger, better, healthier me.

Once I began to make daily investments in the bank of tomorrow, I started to see dividends being returned in hope.

As busy business owners, dads, husbands we can easily get caught up in serving others so much that we can forget to invest in ourselves.

“When you fill your own cup, you’ve got more to give to others”

How do you make time to show up for yourself first, so that you can show up later when your needed? I find in my life a direct correlation to sleep and personal time to the quality of my parenting and my relationships. I know that if I don’t invest time in me intentionally, and show myself intentional love first, its next to impossible to show intentional love for others.

It begins with realizing that we can’t outsource our hope to others around us, only we can drive the change in our life to create the hope that will power us through the future.

When you own your morning, invest in you first, you can own your day, and own your life! Several resources and books are out there that are great ways to invest in your mornings properly. Here are two books that have impacted me on my journey to create the extreme ownership that will generate the hope that you need for tomorrow and the rest of your life.

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