There was a person who told me, “Man is only as strong as his weakest link.” The reason I was offered this opinion is something for another time. However, where I am now and who I am as opposed to the person I was before is different. My eagerness to become strong is based from a different intention. Then again, I used to view strength very differently. I used to think strength was the person who walked into a gym and racked the machines or bench-pressed more than anyone else. I used to think strength was as simple as the weight a person could carry, which it is. Strength is the amount of weight a person can carry. 

I am a member of this machine that we call the working world. Of course, I am far from alone in this machine. None of us are. We work alongside millions of others and together, we are all the integral moving parts of an economic system that helps make the world go around. In fact, everyone is a part of this system, including the unemployed because somehow, the world has to function. Trains have to move. Planes have to fly. People need to eat and of course, investors have to be happy.

The truth is everything costs money. Food certainly costs money. Gas costs money. As it is, prices are going up across the board, yet we are finding ourselves at the corner of a new financial turn. We can’t go on like this forever. Remote learning cannot continue to damage the socialization of young students whose early interactions are necessary for their social education.

There was a professional coach I met who admittedly, was older and more experienced. He had more formal training and a higher level of education than myself. Our backgrounds were different and so was our experience. He was a big finance guy and I had been working in the blue collar section for a long time.

Our lives were different in more ways than one. We were generationally different. We were economically different. However, the one similarity that brought us together was that we both wanted to improve ourselves on both a personal and professional level.

I go back to the ideas we grew up with like things such as “Mom always knows best.” I go back to the ideas of the lessons we learned and think about the times when our parents would tell us what to do. I think about what parents say and how they preach about the way things were at their age. I think about this and how, of course, they were young once too.
I think about the way we look at our parents and how it is hard to consider them as humans who went through their teenage years. To us, they are a separate entity. Parents are not like other people.

I think about the ideas of when grownups tell kids, “You’re just a kid. You’ll understand when you’re older,” which may be true. At least, in some cases.
Then I think about the struggles of anxiety. I think about performance based disorders. I think about the separation and the isolated feelings that come with depression. And naturally, I think about the advice we receive from people and how they want to help, but yet, there is a difference. There is a degree of separation.  

Over the years, I have spent hours on long conversations with people in confusion, drunk, dazed, or halfway through a nod that left them almost dead. In some cases, death was inevitable. In other cases, changes occurred. I have listened to people talk at great lengths about their desire to change and yet, their changes were never met. I have met with people who lost everything. They lost wives, husbands, houses and family. I have met with  people who were unemployed and who, by their own standards, had nothing going for them and nothing to look forward to or live for. And yet, when offered a branch or offered help, they refused.

When you’re lost, you want to find something familiar. You want to be found or at least feel safe. I have an interest in the way the mind works. I’m interested in the way people sell things to me and how billion-dollar companies tap into the mind of their consumers.
I have an interest in reading a book entitled, The Human Animal. To be clear, I have an interest in anything that helps me understand why we think or why we feel or act. The emotional brain is interesting to me, which of course, I have my own reasons for wanting to understand. Know what I mean?

The reason why they call something a “personal best” is because it’s personal. The question becomes what has to happen for a person to be at their best? Is the answer as simple as eat well, exercise and sleep right? Or is it more? Is the answer deeper than step challenges, wellness seminars and nutritional programs?

Perhaps, for a person to be at their best, they would have to define what their best truly is. This means defining our skill sets, which means we have to understand the tools we keep in our tool box. We have to understand our resources and how to use them accordingly. To be the best means to be able to maintain and sustain the highest qualities of our life. This has nothing to do with anyone else or the way others rate good, better or best. This cannot be hinged upon anyone or anything. This is not hinged upon outcomes or outside circumstances. To be the best means to hold a personal level of proficiency and maintain this, regardless of the different intervals of achievement and success. And lastly, to brand ourselves as the best has to come from within. 

There is a story I once heard about a man that lost half of his leg in the war. After waking up from surgery, the man thanked the nurse for saving his leg. He said this because he swore it was still there. Unfortunately, the nurse was left with the chore to inform the soldier that he lost his leg from the knee down. However, the soldier was sure this was wrong. He even argued with the nurse. 
“But I can still feel it,” he said
“It still hurts.”
Could you imagine that?
Could you imagine feeling something that’s no longer there, attached, or even exists?

There isn’t much time left. No, wait, maybe I’m wrong about this. Maybe time is only an illusion. Maybe time is a personal limitation, like say, when we skip over an idea because the timeline is too long or too intimidating. Maybe this is why people stall on the idea of returning back to school when they’re older. Maybe this is why people balk at new endeavors because the investment of time seems too overwhelming.