One thing that I have learned over the years is that when it comes to achieving a goal, it takes a whole lot of work that you just don't feel like doing.
There are days when you will wake up and question everything, wonder why you do the things that you do, and debate whether or not you should just give up.
I question the things that I do on a regular basis...
I often question why I don't just get a regular 9-5 blue collar job where I know I could enjoy working and being useful and work my way up to making a decent living.
The problem that I have is that I simply cannot stand the thought of being average or doing what everyone else is doing for the same reasons they are doing them.
I have always been a loose cannon in this sense - always feeling like I need to live my own life and do my own thing. This is part of the reason why I have done so many different things in my life from sales, to live entertainment, to now training horses and working on a ranch.
I have learned that out of all the things I have done in my life, working with animals, working outside using my hands, and doing things that are physically demanding have brought me the most fulfillment.
I have a natural ability for certain things like entertainment because I have been entertaining people my entire life. Even from the time I was a kid, I always found joy in being able to make grown ups laugh.
My time on the live entertainment stage was fun! In fact, I just returned home after a week of being back on the stage when the last time I was on stage was a year ago.
Every once in awhile, I will get called back to help Chippendales when they need extra fill-ins due to their high demand.
It is always fun being able to go to work and have fun with my buddies - it is more of a comradery environment for me than anything.
The difference between entertainment for me and something like ranching or training horses is that the latter is much more of a challenge for me mentally and physically.
I realize that I could make a lot more money in entertainment for a fraction of the work, but I am one that finds fulfillment in being challenged.
Ranching is hard labor - it is physically demanding and sometimes can be mentally demanding when trying to figure out how to fix one of the million things that can go wrong working on a ranch.
Training horses is what presents me with the mental stimulation that I need because training horses can always present a challenge.
The interesting thing about horses is that they are all biologically hard-wired the same, but are all different in their own way - they each have personalities the same way that humans do.
The past two weeks while I was in Vegas filling in at Chippendales, I also found a horse out there that needed work and he needed a lot of work to say the absolute least...
Seriously, the first ride I put on this horse, he blew up and had a complete meltdown as soon as I picked up on the reins and he attempted to throw me into the side of a mountain.
Some people would probably read this and think that I am crazy for getting on a 1200lb animal that could kill me in an instant but the truth is, I respect horses for what they are and I understand why some horses are the way that they are the more time I spend with them.
By the end of my fifth ride on the Vegas horse, he was considerably more calm walking the trail than he was on my first ride - he just needed some TLC.
The process is what I love the most.
It is incredibly hard when trying to achieve something as it is, but having to start over is when the challenge really starts to bear its weight.
I have had to start over many times in my life and it seems that it gets harder the older that I get.
To me, I think it is because my goals and the things that I wish to achieve have become larger than they were in the past.
In the past, I had goals of being in entertainment so that I could eventually move to Hollywood and get into acting in movies and commercials.
So, I moved across the country, started my life over, and pursued that goal until I finally got into entertainment and realized that wasn't the sure path that I thought I wanted.
One could argue that shooting for Hollywood is a pretty big mountain to climb but once I got into entertainment, I realized that I wasn't fulfilled the way I thought I would be.
Doing what I do now is considerably harder than anything I could have ever done in entertainment.
It is more mentally and physically demanding than entertainment, it is much harder to make money in the horse business than it is in entertainment, and it is harder to get peoples attention.
All-in-all, the process of what I am doing now as a horse trainer has been the hardest mountain that I have had climb in my life and yet somehow, I am the most fulfilled.
Working with horses is one of the only things that bring me genuine peace and allow me to fully live in the present moment, even if they are trying to throw me into the side of a mountain.
The point I am making is, while this has been by far the hardest mountain that I have had to climb, I do not see giving up as an option.
I can see very clearly how I want my future to look and this is something I know in my soul that I need to be pursuing.
I have thought many times of moving back to Vegas and getting back into the entertainment business but I know moving back to a city that brought me no fulfillment wouldn't be the answer.
It is not to say that I wont eventually do something in entertainment part-time, but moving back to a city like Vegas isn't at the top of my list of priorities.
The entire point of this post was to show that while the process of getting where you want to go in life may be daunting, there is no reason to give up because at the end of the day, you have nothing to lose.
Things will always go horribly wrong before they get better and that is something that I have learned to understand and appreciate.
It is the things that go horribly wrong that humble you the most and remind you that you are still human.
Just because something that you want in life hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean that you give up on it.
The only thing we can do is continue to work towards the things we wish to achieve in life with pure intentions and the universe will eventually listen and teach us the most valuable lessons along the way.