Loving The Work

First, the sad news…

Earlier this year, we lost a close friend, advisor, and mentor, Clint Warren. He was a true professional in every sense of the word, and his death was a heartbreaking shock to me and everyone who knew him.

I knew Clint for about 4 years, starting when he asked to take me to lunch to “pick my brain” about getting freelance web design clients. Since then, we became close friends, collaborators, and business advisors to one another. For the last 2 years, we shared an office space, where we’d frequently collaborate and help each other out. At one point, we partnered to launch an agency, but shortly into it, I needed to back out to focus on my other businesses. He continued on and built Stacked Agency to well over five-figures per month in less than a year.

Sherry Walling was kind enough to invite me on her podcast, Zen Founder, to talk about Clint’s death and suicide among founders in general. I’m far from qualified to talk about this subject, but I’m glad she reached out. It provided the right venue for me to share some thoughts about Clint, the struggles he dealt with, and how losing him has impacted me and the many friends—both online and off—that were inspired by his unique story.

I encourage you to listen to my chat with Sherry, and also visit Clint’s blog, where he wrote about his truly inspiring turnaround from a battle with drugs and criminal background earlier in his life, to becoming a successful business owner, championship athlete, and personal mentor to so many who resonated with his story.

Chasing Big, Lofty Goals

I’d say the thing the defined my friendship with Clint was our mutual obsession with big, lofty goals. Setting them, chasing them, tracking our progress, and keeping each other accountable.

We had a standing lunch meeting the first Friday of every month, where we’d both bring our notebooks and talk through our goals for the month, and for the year, and the progress we’re making.

The last one of our accountability sessions was during our ride home from Big Snow Tiny Conf this past January, an annual ski/business retreat. During that talk, Clint shared with me his vision for what his ultimate “destination” was, or the big goal that he’s trying to achieve in his professional life.

“I want to be on stage, speaking to an audience of thousands, motivating and inspiring them to change their lives.”

This is what I always admired about Clint: He had this ability to craft an incredibly detailed vision for what achieving his goal would look like, and feel like. He related it in a way that made it seem like it was already a reality. For example, he’d describe these visions down to the details, like the color of his custom-fit shirt that he’d be wearing while speaking on stage.

Having such a clear view of what the future holds, makes it 1000x easier to execute a game plan to get there.  Clint did it time and time again, like when he set the vision for launching his WordPress training workshops, and 6 months later made it happen and built a business out of it.

There was no doubt in my mind he’d achieve his next big goal of becoming a motivational speaker and coach to thousands of people looking to turn their lives around the way he did.

Searching For a Goal

In that last talk with Clint, I asked for his feedback on a big decision that I was just starting to work through. I was trying to decide whether it’s time for me to move on from my current business, Restaurant Engine. And if so, what would my next project be?

He helped me think clearly about that decision to move on. This chat kicked off a period of several weeks where I thought long and hard about what my big, lofty goal for my professional life should actually be. I never was able to visualize it so clearly, the way Clint did.

At times, I let myself get inspired by what others are building, and I followed in their footsteps. Throughout the last 8 years, I went from being employed at a web agency, to freelancing, to building my own agency, to selling digital download products, SaaS products, educational products, podcasts, blogs, coaching and consulting. Do I regret any of it? Of course not. These were the most rewarding learning experiences of my life, so far.

But I keep coming back to this question: Where is all of this heading? And am I doing the right things to get me there?

To figure it out, I’ve been trying to nail down the things that I care most about. The things that drive me:

Money…

I came to terms with my relationship with money. I realized it doesn’t drive me as much as I thought it did. I’m only driven to earn enough money to gain financial freedom. Would I not enjoy owning a million-dollar business someday? Of course I would. But that’s just not a goal that I care heavily about.

My only goal as it relates to money is to be able to live comfortably with my family, and sustain our quality of life. A house that suits us. Nice vacations. My kids to grow up with the same opportunities I had. Whatever else on top of that is just gravy.

Autonomy

I think most founders can relate to this one. We want need to be our own boss. I’m no exception.

Do I enjoy collaborating with talented folks? You bet I do. And I always seek to surround myself with people more talented than myself to learn and push eachother.

But at the end of the day, I need to make my own decisions, on my own terms and timetable. I’ve had plenty of job offers which would pay many multiples more than what I earn now. I just can’t wrap my head around the idea of being employed anytime soon.

Creativity

I came from a background in music composition and production. This was my main creative outlet in my life, where I once devoted several hours per day to sitting alone in my studio, creating and polishing a track. These last few years, I channeled that energy into design and writing.

When I’m creating, I’m at my best. This is where I have the most to offer. Sales, analytics, biz dev, operations, marketing… These are all things that I managed to pick up and handle to a “good enough” level through the years. But it’s the creative aspect of building new things where I’m truly in my element and thrive.

When these long blocks of creative work are missing from my life, something isn’t right.

Learning & Teaching

I love learning as much as I love teaching. But I’ve never been a big reader of books or enjoyed going to school very much.

For me, I always learned best from doing the work. I like to do research, but only as a means to an end. I consume heavy amounts of content and learn whatever I need to in order to complete whatever project I’m working on. I love this cycle.

I believe real world case studies are the most valuable method of teaching. So I try to share my experiences and what I’ve learned, just as much as I try to bring out case studies of others.

I know that whatever I’m doing, learning and teaching through case studies will be part of it.

Loving The Work

This phrase, Loving The Work, has been rattling around my head every day in my search for that big, end goal.

There’s no point in hoping to enjoy every minute of every day in every project. That’s just not realistic. Some parts of the work just suck. We all deal with the mundane, challenging, tedious aspects of what we do.

But I believe the main thing that drives me is this:

I’d rather spend my working days today doing things I truly love doing than grind away years of my life just for an eventual payoff later. I believe that by digging into work that I love today, the payoff in the end will come as a byproduct, anyway. So I might as well have my cake and eat it too.

My challenge to you

For a long time, I modeled my plans and goals around the things that others have succeeded with. This has resulted in tons of inspiration and lessons learned.

But I’ve come to find the spots where I break off in my own direction, and my reasons why. It took years of testing and building all sorts of online businesses, and consulting with friends like my late buddy Clint, to finally realize how to figure out my big vision for where to go next.

So that’s my challenge to you:

Think about the people you follow and seek guidance from. Don’t discount the things you learn from them. But do look for areas where your path might veer off in a different direction from theirs. Question whether the things that drive them are the same things that drive you.

Then go from there.