I’m in between flights sitting in the LAX airport right now, on my way to Myrtle Beach for a weeklong golf vacation for my dad’s 60th birthday with a group of 30 other guys. 

While buying a very expensive bottle of water and even more wildly expensive yogurt and granola, the young man who worked the booth came over and started chatting me up.

Within a couple minutes he began to open up about his journey of moving from Michigan to L.A in pursuit of his dream to be a musician but is really struggling with the adjustment and hasn’t had any success yet – hence working at a booth in the LAX airport.

I could sense his defeat and lack of faith that he’d ever achieve his dream.

Orion, if you’re reading this – this is for you. For anyone else who has ever thought about giving up on their dream and settling for a less than fucking awesome existence – this is also for you.

DON’T DO IT! Don’t give up. Don’t ever give up on the thing you want more than anything in the world. Why? Because what could be more important than that!?

Sure we can make up all sorts of lame ass excuses for why it won’t work or why we’ll do it later, but eventually we’ll wind up depressed, bored, unhappy or worst.

If you’re on your own personal quest to freedom (whatever that means to you), do you honestly think that everything will be handed to you on a platter? Hell no!  If we want something in life then we’ve got to become the us we need to be to have it. Meaning, we have to work out asses off and dedicate our lives to it. 

If you want to be a musician and you’re not devoting all of your spare time to your craft, then you clearly don’t want it enough. You gotta master your craft by practicing everyday AND you’ve also gotta be your own biggest fan and get out there in the world and share that gift. Go to auditions, play at open mics, offer your voice at private functions, make youtube videos every week, go the unconventional route and do whatever it takes to do your thing and do it daily.

If we’re waiting for the world to hand us our dream, then we’re never going to make it happen. Ask anybody who has ever accomplished a dream how much hard work, struggle, emotion, focus, tears, blood (sometimes) and practice they put in before they finally had their breakthrough. There are no overnight successes.

I’ve put ten years of crazy passion into my business and I’m JUST starting to get my momentum growing to the point where I can finally do my dream which is to play Professional golf.

If you want something, then you have to put your whole heart, 100% of your focus and all your energy and passion into it. Let it take over. Become obsessively consumed by it.

If you’ve gotta get a job, then get something that somehow aligns with your dream so you can make connections, grow your craft and learn new skills that’ll support you down the road.

Often times (very often in my case) we will go through crazy periods of struggle, strife and hardship that would make most people give up. But we can’t be like most people. No! We must carry on and we mustn’t take our eye off the prize.

This is the test my friends. It is in these trying times that we are tested to see how much we want it, how willing we are to grow and how dedicated we are to our vision. We must stay focused or all will be lost.

I can’t tell you how many times I have met someone who says, I’ll just go get a 9-5 for a bit of time and pay off my debt. Months or years go by and they finally pay that debt and leave that job or get laid off and they’re still in the same spot as they were before getting the job. It’s like nothing happened and no progress was made towards their dream. But a shitload of time passed.

I know it can get scary. I’ve been months behind on rent before. I’ve had to overcome my own limitations and self doubt many times over – and I still do (almost everyday). We must keep the fire of passion strong, we must not waver in our vision and we must never give up on ourselves.

There will be nay-sayers who tell us to quit or say we’ll never do it. We must turn a blind eye at them because they do not understand the depths of who we are, the strength we have within us and the courage we’re willing to muster up in order to take our next step and then all the ones after that.

If we devote our lives, our energy, our resources, our time and our passion to something that matters to us, then success is inevitable. It might take years to achieve, but it will happen.

So whatever your passion is. Whether is being an entertainer, playing a sport professionally, being a writer who inspires millions of people or being a parent who raises amazing children – do it with all of your heart.

Align your passion with your lifestyle. Make them one and become the dream in every waking moment and every choice you make.

And remember, there are no free rides when it comes to achieving YOUR dream. You are the one who must do all the work, take all the steps, overcome all the fears and show up day-in and day-out until you are the manifestation of the thing desired.