Cities generally have the power to “regulate” - to tell people how they should do things - and that word has really stuck with me recently as I try to become find competency, credibility, & success in my life.

Regulation takes many forms - and many of the most important regulations are the ones we each put on ourselves. I certainly learned this the hard way.

When I was kidnapped & shipped off to a wilderness therapy program in Utah as a teenager, I learned a lot about “external regulation” - where choices were being made for me, because I hadn’t proven willing or able to make good ones for myself.

I didn’t get to choose to sleep in a bed in a house. I was made to slept on a mat & sleeping bag under a tarp I’d pitched. I didn’t get to choose to play video games. Instead, I was made to read a book about finding meaning in the holocaust.

It took a lot of demonstrated bad choices for me to get forced into such a situation.

Throwing what were basically big tantrums - as a 15-year old, mind you - had often helped me get my way at home. That didn’t really work as well in the middle of a desert, where nobody but program staff & my fellow campers could hear me scream.

I was no longer free to bully or demand or intimidate anyone, just because I was having a bad day. I had to learn how to deal with negative emotions in a healthier way.

Learning ways to reliably get a hold of myself & respond more calmly to difficult situations, instead of exploding in anger or collapsing into sadness has opened a lot of doors for me.

By learning to emotionally regulate my own temper, I became more suited to being an adult in a professional & social environment where the rule is “you’re not allowed to have emotional blow ups at people” - and that’s not to mention, I haven’t had to go to prison for impulsively committing some crime or another.

By setting & following certain standards, expectations, and rules for my own behavior, I can avoid or reduce being “punished” (socially, professionally, or legally) for the harmful or unpleasant things I might otherwise instinctively do.

I do have to take the initiative though - people will (quite reasonably) expect me to do, or at least attempt, all of the above without having to tell me.

The higher the standards I hold myself to, the more freedom and trust people and systems will grant me. My friends will let me borrow their car or join them at a party - because they know that I hold myself to a set of rules that will protect their interests.

Turns out, life is better when people trust you to do what you say & treat them right.

Perhaps one day - sooner or later - people around me will trust & respect me enough to regulate & govern a new city. Until then - and well after - my work will continue.

I hope you’re doing the same. Love you guys. Let’s go kick some ass this week.

Fritz

More on that project soon.

There’s a phrase you’ll notice me saying over and over again if you watch my social media videos long enough… “Here’s the plan”.

This is a very intentionally-picked string of words that reliably gets people to hear me out and keep watching my video about (Taking Over An Island / Running A Pirate Ship Brothel / Becoming Bounty Hunters For The Federal Government).

Subscribe now

I’ve gotten extremely good at pitching people to go undertake my plans on social media. My success at executing them in real life? Drastically less impressive.

This isn’t because I don’t intend to do these things.

I hate to admit it, but most (not all) of the plans I’ve pitched on social media then claimed were jokes were concepts I’ve explored quite seriously before losing interest and getting excited about something else for a while.

Over and over and over again, for years.

Every time I come up with an fun and promising idea, I do a bunch of research, and tell myself that “this is the one I’m committing to, for real, this time” - then don’t follow through because it starts requiring actual work and I find myself thinking “oh wow this new different idea is so much better”.

Following this awful pattern has done a ton to squander my potential while leaving me frustrated and broke. Every time I start over, I lose the momentum and the useful knowledge I’ve gained, along with credibility with other people - and even worse, credibility with myself. I lose the benefit of “compounding” on relationships, experience, and trust. It’s just a bad way to live.

A lot of this is unfortunately self-sustaining. If I don’t believe I can or will follow through, I’m simply not going to - and if I don’t, I won’t believe I can in the future.

The only way out of this vicious cycle is to defy my doubts, do the work, and start stacking wins - and “wins” here doesn’t even mean “success”, really - just doing the things I told myself I would.

The more I trust myself, the more others will trust me, and the more incredible possibilities will open up in my life. If I become able to commit to doing something for 90 days before deciding it’s not the right path forward, that’s *at least* 10x better than how things are for me now.

My life coach offered me a really helpful framework for making strides in this direction, rooted in the idea that idea that success and confidence can be built one day at a time.

I’ve spent 10 minutes every morning for the last week planning my day - both in time / schedule terms but also in terms of what I’m promising myself to do *that day*.

First, I start with three “rocks” that stay the same every day - big-picture goals that I intend to achieve in the next 90-180 days.

Right now, for instance, my rocks are:

• Build a sustainable / livable income stream from my social media content

• Get a consistent gym routine going that I can stick with in the long run

• Plan for the founding of the new city I seek to build in Texas.

Then, I use these to decide what my daily goals are and what specific tasks and items I need to complete to achieve those goals.

Finally, I lay out a schedule for the day to decide when I’ll complete those tasks, when I’ll relax, and when I’ll take time for myself. At the end of the day, I give myself a score for how I did at sticking to the plan that day.

Subscribe now

A week of doing this has … taught me a lot about myself.

Sticking to the plan I make is hard. I really enjoy the freedom of spending my time however I like at any given moment.

The problem with that, of course, is that just doing whatever I feel like makes me *less free*.

If I can’t credibly commit to simply doing things I might not want to but that I said I would, I won’t be able to make a decent (or great) living. I won’t be able to be the boyfriend or husband or father I aspire to be. My life will be a lot harder and worse.

There’s no freedom to be found in being a slave to my immediate desires.

So… I’ve gotta figure it out. The bad news is that this is a pattern of failure I’ve been stuck in for more than a decade.

The good news? I don’t need to fix it all at once. Getting 1% better every day will leave my capacity - my life - almost unrecognizable in a year.

So that’s what I’m going to make happen. One day at a time. I’m excited to have you along.

Fritz