Uncategorized – Ryan MacTaggart

The Battle for Love: An Introduction

I have been working on a new project behind the scenes for the last month or so. I played my hand at the social media, quick bite content, and to no one’s surprise, least of all my own, it’s not my spot. Sure social has its place, and feeding the ever-hungry beasts of distraction and superficial thinking is fun sometimes. But I have needed to take ownership of my authenticity as an old-sou lover of long-form work. So, I’m working on a book. No, I don’t have a publisher yet. No, I don’t know where the project will go. I do know that the topic matters and that I have some unique positioning to talk about it. So, without further adieu, I wanted to share the draft introduction with you. If it resonates, let me know. If it’s off the mark somewhere, let me know that too. If you hate it and wish for me to stop, you don’t have to share that. Alright, let’s get into love.

*Click play to listen to this piece

Love is under attack. Love is deemed trivial by everything from romantic comedies and sappy movies to graphic novels and the porn epidemic. As one of, if not the, most profound human conditions, love has been uprooted and left to wilt in the scorching sun of contempt, anger, fear, and distraction. Love is a word said to family members only because they’re family, not because it is fully understood. It is a word to describer everything from the nervous energy of a second date to the deep bond of a fiftieth wedding anniversary.

The uprooting of love in our modern society has not come without its scars. Just as a tree ripped from the ground brings rocks, dirt, and debris, to the surface, a society void of deep love has brought anger, frustration, division, and pain.

Love is, in many ways, at a pivotal moment. Such moments have come before. Times in history have passed where love seemed not only to be uprooted and laid to the side but destroyed altogether.

Such destruction is common in personal experiences and happening this very second all across the globe. Love is withered when a mother passes away, a father walks out, a spouse raises their hand in a weak fit of rage, and a friend moves across the country. Those small yet powerful moments can make love seem unreal in small towns and big cities everywhere. They leave an individual sitting in the darkness that is lost love and broken trust.

At times love seems to falter on a societal scale and can border on being impossible or simply fake and imagined. The horrors of the Holocaust, the scorched earth of Hiroshima, the genocide of Rwanda, the aftermath of the Somme, and so many other tragedies are tallies for the argument that love is nothing but a delusion. The news and social media highlight and magnify love’s setbacks to make it appear all the more artificial.

Yet, with perspective and experience, love always seems to reignite and rebuild.

How does love do that?

How does love rise from the ashes, get up from the canvas, and never stay down?

Not only does love win, but the moments that challenge love somehow only strengthen it. Is it the ultimate nod to the pop music of our day that, indeed, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger? Maybe, and maybe it is much more than that. Perhaps there is something deep in the human experience that honors, longs for, and builds love. The attacks on love from a culture focused on the self might be the secret training ground for love to grow. Maybe pain–the force that often uproots love–is the very force that strengthens it. It is the weapon used to break the spirit that heals it and the powerfully healed who become the powerful healers. The vice that nearly destroys a person turned into the medicine they use to heal others.

This book attempts to reorient us to love toward a brighter world. You may need to rethink the love in your life. It may require you to examine the love you have today and the love you have lost or that nearly destroyed you. For some, such reexamination could create new pain as you realize the person you casually say “love you” to as you hang up the phone doesn’t have your love but something different, something less.

This book will also lift others to new heights of giving and receiving love. It will offer a fresh perspective, reignite past wisdom, and envision a society where love reigns in genuine and meaningful ways. Love is the central principle of a good life, and I hope this book clarifies it.

I hope this book changes what has been a growing sentiment in modern western culture that love is weak or unnecessary to living well. I fear that we have forgotten the truth of love’s strength all around us. The man who will give his life to save his daughter, the stranger who donates an organ to save a life, and the son who steps between his mother and her abusive boyfriend are all obvious examples of love’s strength that we would all celebrate. Those are extraordinary acts of courage. Yet, there are thousands of everyday, seemingly insignificant feats of strength and love that we choose to ignore and instead put our focus on anger, hate, and division.

The attack on love is no longer taboo or hidden. Reality is quite the opposite, as the media immortalizes acts of violence and hate, and entire corporations are built to funnel anger to everyone. Culture has deconstructed and rearranged the idea of a family unit so many times that it is unrecognizable. Lies have been told, wars waged, and souls are broken in the name of selfish desire and at the cost of love. The mantra of our society could easily be, “get more, no matter what,” a statement that leaves no room for love or care for another.

The biggest lie of all has been that our pain, grief, fear, confusion, and personal needs are greater than our capacity for love. The false narrative is that somehow our own needs won’t be met, or our freedoms won’t be fully realized if we focus on love for others.

We can no longer fail to ignore the lies. Adults are giving their lives to careers and bank accounts instead of family and friends. People of all ages are more isolated today than they were even a decade ago, and our health epidemics are evidence of the toll. Young people who fail to know love’s strength are in dire straights. They fight in school hallways, gossip at the speed of their thumbs on the phone, seek help in substances, weaponize love through sex and porn, kill each other in acts of violence, and take their own lives when it all becomes too much.

Who is left standing to defend love in a world where people profit from our obsession with differences and bias toward contempt and contention?

I am. I hope you are too because the consequences of losing would be dire. But, make no mistake about it; this is a battle and not one that ever ends. It is a daily decision to walk the more challenging path and make choices of love over selfishness, desire, resentment, and fear.

The battle for love is also not one we march toward alone. Ancient wisdom from the Bible to the great philosophers walk alongside us, willing to fight. Love is not new. It is the central thread of the human condition. It is not that we need to rebuild love. We need to find it again amidst the rubble of brokenness, reclaim it as the foundation of life, and reignite it amidst anything that wishes to extinguish it.

Let’s go to battle.

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Resistance is a Two-Sided Coin: An Idea to Change Your Life One Coin Flip at a Time

2 Comments | Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

*Click play to listen to this article

Flip the coin. It lands heads. Resistance is coming.

“I can’t write like Ryan Holiday or John Mark Comber. I don’t have an audience anyway, no one reads it, and no one cares, so why should I? Plus, I’ll never get a publisher without a huge following, and self-publishing is a nightmare.”

Welcome to my mind as I sit, keyboard at the ready, a blank page in front of me.

I am a learner and sharer. But this blank page says I must not be any of these things, that, like it, I am empty.

Isn’t that how so many lies of resistance are? A reflection of someone or something else’s fears projected onto us so much that we begin to carry the same fear.

Resistance is a real and powerful force operating in opposition to who we are supposed to be. It is that voice that yells from the blank page or whispers from the depths of our minds that we aren’t enough, we don’t do enough, and even if we try, someone else is already better than us. It tells us to stay in slippers instead of running shoes. It reminds us of times we have struggled in the past and why that is sure to happen again. It is an old friend we know isn’t helping us move forward. It is a thought or behavior pattern we still have from when we were seven years old. The resistance exists in many forms, but it is a reality for everyone.

If we end the story of resistance there, we end hopeless.

Flip the coin again. This time it lands tails.

We can return resistance. Fight it with itself.

As Newton taught us, an object in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an external force. In the case of resistance to who we want to be, that external force is our resistance. It is the same in that it is a powerful force working against something. It is different in the direction in which it faces. It is the other side of the same coin.

This side of the coin is our ownership and agency to apply resistance against itself. This resistance is that of the single mother of three I met at the start line of Ironman Tulsa in 2021. Amidst voices all around me during my training that said, “once you have kids, you won’t do that,” or “if I didn’t have kids, I’d do an Ironman too,” here she was, at the start line of a 140.6-mile journey of endurance that many people set as a lifetime goal. With resolve, she proclaimed, “I’m finishing this so they know that they can do anything.” Her resistance was more potent than what the world could apply. Her kids, all under the age of 13, would be waiting at the finish line in about 15-hours to learn one of humanity’s best lessons: Yes. You. Can.

At a core level, James Clear’s work on habits is an ode to overcoming this resistance. “Every decision and action is a vote for the person you want to be,” says Clear. He advocates for stating small, with the first two minutes of a new habit being the most crucial. Don’t decide to run 10 miles. Decide to put on your shoes and walk outside. That is overcoming resistance.

Unlike a genuine coin with 50/50 odds of heads or tails, the coin of resistance weighs towards heads. Every once in a while, we get a tails moment or day when things seem easy, the words flow from our fingers, the weight goes up quickly, the strides synchronize to carry us forward. But, most often, we get resistance. The weather isn’t ideal; someone else wants our time and attention; our inner voice beats the crap out of us; our comforter feels too good; the news is all bad; we feel lost, worthless, or hopeless.

There is good news with the resistance coin, though: it doesn’t have to flip in the air like the start of a football game. You can flip it on a table like the cover of a new book. You turn it over on purpose, only to be reversed when you lose focus or need to move on.

You can flip the coin. I’m doing it with these very words. Later this morning, the weighted side will again prove victorious, and resistance will set back in, but for now, my resistance is stronger, and it is stopping the motion to give me a small but powerful space to create.

I hope that this resistance coin can change your life. I know that sounds grandiose, but it’s true. A simple mind shift of empowerment allows you to realize what resistance you face and how to overcome it with your resistance and resolve.

As Clear says, start small and build. Flip the coin over long enough to write a sentence or walk around the block. Let tails be up long enough to say “no” to that drink you know doesn’t serve you or to that person who treats you more like a punching bag than a friend.

The more often you apply your resistance back, the weaker the force against you gets. You can turn the coin over to tails more often and for extended periods. You’ll never have an “all-tails” life. That’s a lie of social media. As Jesus of Nazareth said, “you will have trouble in this world.” (reference).

Here are a few ideas to flip the coin today, even for a few minutes:

Flip it now. Decide to stop allowing resistance to win and prevent you from being who you want to be. Don’t decide tomorrow. Decide now.
Take a small action. Go for a 5-minute walk, write a sentence on a sticky note, make one brushstroke on the canvas, send a text to a friend, breathe deeply for 30 seconds, pet your dog for a minute. Whatever it is for you, make it small and do it now.
Have a reason to flip it. You won’t have the willpower to overcome resistance alone. Go for a walk because the dog needs it. Send that text to encourage someone else. Write the sentence to inspire a reader. Just as that mom in Tulsa taught us, the coin is easier to flip when serving others.

I have a quarter on my desk at home in front of me now. For the past 15-minutes, it has been on tails as I’ve written this. When I woke up today, it was heads up. It’s a Monday morning. My bed was warm; my wife was with me; life was perfect right where I was. But I knew I had to flip the coin to serve, provide, and create. You do too.

Resistance is strong, so are you.

Flip the coin.

Resistance is a Two-Sided Coin: An Idea to Change Your Life One Coin Flip at a Time Read More »

No Dark Hour Can Block Out an Eternity of Light: Ten Strategies for Battling Anxiety and Melancholy

Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

Last week I went to battle. Not physical battle across the ocean or as some metaphor for a workout. No. I deployed to a mental battle. This war has been raging for most of my life, with my best self entrenched across the field from lies of fear, inadequacy, and anxiety. My relationships and everything I love about life, stranded in no man’s land, waiting to see who the victor would be.

If you have experienced this type of battle or have a loved one who has, you appreciate the fighting metaphor.

Even a few years ago, the battle would have lasted much longer, and the victor would have been much more difficult to determine. Obviously, since I am still here, I have never lost the battle fully. Though, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to imagining that ultimate defeat once or twice.

Last week, after years of lessons learned and battles raged, the fight was shorter. It was equally as intense as the past, but the end was always drawing nearer, and the way to victory was always clear.

Over half of Americans will experience a mental battle like this in their lifetime. Many will be more intense than mine. Some will be less so. All will test the fighter. All will require a strategy. If you find yourself on the mental field of battle, struggling with pain or sadness, you can’t explain contemplating the dark thoughts of, “would people be better off without me?” or “is there really any hope in this whole thing?” I want to offer you my battle plan.

Please note I am not a licensed therapist, nor am I clinically diagnosed with mental illness at this point in my life. However, most people who struggle with what I do are like me. They live normal lives without medical intervention, but the battle is still real. If you are struggling with medical anxiety or depression, please get the help you need from a professional.

Here are ten mental battle strategies I employed this week that have taken me decades to articulate and implement:

Stay on the battlefield, don’t avoid it.
- In a battle with darkness, you must acknowledge the enemy with clarity. Running from him into a bottle, drug, gym, or screen only gives him more power to advance. Sit with it. Stare it down. Show your courage even if you don’t feel it.
Don’t talk about it (yet).
- For me, the battle feels like my emotional mind moving at the pace of a Formula 1 car while my rational brain is a 1995 Pinto stuck in neutral. The fix feels like it should be to get my thinking outside of my head, to match the pace of my mind with that of my words. I’ve learned, verbalizing my issues at a Daytona pace is not helpful in the moment. Instead of talking out loud about the battle, I write about it or pray silently. I face it where it is in my mind. Talking will come later once you’ve had a chance to understand it, seek the source of the feelings, and face them. Any earlier than that is venting or ranting and only creates more chaos.
Acknowledge it to those in your household or relationships.
- The only exception to the previous point is that you should acknowledge your battle to those who live in the closest relational proximity to you. This is not a rant or long-winded session. I will tell my wife, “Babe, I’m struggling with some anxiety or sadness today. Nothing you need or can do to fix it but I want you to know in case I seem to be acting differently.” That’s it. It is not her burden to carry, so I do not ask her to do so.
Don’t hope to solve it with a life hack.
- Anxiety and melancholy are most often deep-rooted issues hitting the surface. You didn’t life hack your way into the problem, you won’t life hack your way out. Some actions can help you deal with the symptoms, but don’t try to replace the hard work of facing the enemy with hoping to wash him away with cold water, eating a certain thing, or doing pushups. Do those to help with the symptoms btu recognize the real work to be done is intense and arduous.
Resist the lies of the “grind” culture.
- I’ve tried to work harder to get past anxiety and melancholy. Spoiler: it doesn’t work, at all. “Do more” and “work harder” are great for productivity gurus and when times are good. But in war, smarter work is always better and stillness is often the best offense. To find healing, don’t try to do more or hide in your work. Slow down and do less even for a few minutes and you’ll gain strength.
Lean into what you can.
- Doing less doesn’t mean do nothing. I find it helpful to maintain some sense of my rhythms and routines. Importantly, I lean into what I need instead of what might look good to others. I might still run but it is slower and easier than my plan. Or I can lift but I switch the days to focus on something easy instead of intensity. I may listen to a podcast instead of reading, or read a fiction book in place of a nonfiction one. Do what you need to, not what you think you should do.
Celebrate others.
- When I am in a dark place, it is helpful to find the light in the world around me. The best place I know to do this is to look to the people in my life. I am careful with who is in my circle so in my darkest hours, I know they offer light. I don’t always need them to speak to me directly, I just need to see them. I will often take to social media and celebrate someone publicly. I’ll share an accomplishment they’ve had or post something about how they have been a light in my life. Celebrating them reminds me that not all is dark and that the battle is raging but the war is already won.
Talk about it as reflection.
- Talking becomes incredibly valuable after you have faced the enemy. Once you can articulate exactly how you feel, where you think it originated, and the steps you have to move forward, then you can talk about it with a loved one. This allows them to understand your battle but not pick up the rifle next to you and join in with the real chance of emotional injury. If you need to talk before this, I suggest a good therapist as the place to go.
Give yourself grace.
- Grace is an undeserved yet full love. In my dark moments, I don’t feel like giving any love to myself. I’d rather tell myself how bad of a person I am or feel guilty for feeling anxious and low when I’ve been blessed with so much. That’s why grace is undeserved – you don’t earn it, you get it. Learn to love who you are even in the darkness.
Never give up.
- Last week, I was at my lowest on Wednesday morning but by Thursday morning, I was clearly leaving the battlefield. On Wednesday, I thought I would lose for sure but I knew to not give up. The war on the lies in your mind has already been won but if you give up in a battle you sacrifice the victory. In my case, the darkest thoughts come in two flavors. One is relational: “your family, friends, colleagues will be better off without you.” The second is valuation: “you don’t really add value anyway, no one will even notice if you lose this battle so why fight it?” Both of these have driven me to see checking out on my dreams, sabotaging my relationships, and, once, taking my own life as options. But through tragedies of loss in my life, I’ve learned that in no way will people be better off. Instead, they will carry the trauma and pain of loss with them forever on my account. I lost my dad suddenly in 2012 far before his time and I carry that pain every day even a decade later. I always will. I am not, at all, better off without him and no one in your life will be either if the enemy destroys your light. Have your dark hours but know that your light illuminates someone else’s dark hours and they need you.

In this battle of the mind, the enemy’s greatest weapons are lies, fear, and hate. Our greatest weapons are love, relationship, celebration, and conviction. The enemy has strong hours and days, but our victory is already assured into eternity.

In the times where the lies seem like truth and the enemy seems too strong to defeat, remember that no dark hour can block out an eternity of light.

No dark hour can block out an eternity of light.

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It’s Time to Clean The Mirror: Clearing the Dirt and Grime from the Reflection

Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

Have you ever disregarded cleaning your bathroom mirror for a while?

It makes no sense. That thing is at least a couple of feet away from you all the time. You never touch it. Yet, that thing gets nasty!

Simply leaving the mirror alone and living my life around it is enough to add dirt, grime, and little spots of who knows what all over it.

Yet, as it gets dirtier and dirtier, its purpose remains unchanged. Every time I walk by it, I look at it. I check my hair. Make sure my clothes are all good. And, let’s be honest, make sure my workouts are getting the results I want.

But there is something deeper happening. That quick look in the mirror is an assessment. It is an evaluation of myself. It’s a chance to remind myself of my greatness or see the shortfalls. That mirror has power.

Even through the dirt, its power remains. I don’t see something I don’t like and think, “damn, I gotta clean this mirror!” No. I think, “damn, I’m not what I could be.” I don’t think to clean the mirror; I assume it must be me bringing the dirt and grime.

This same phenomenon happens in the metaphorical mirror of life.

We all judge ourselves. We look at ourselves physically in the mirror and spiritually, mentally, and relationally in thousands of other ways.

Yet, just like that nasty bathroom mirror, we see ourselves through a lot of dirt and grime.

We try to see ourselves for who we truly are, but the grime obscures the reflection.

The mirror is covered in lies.

Lies of the world: You should be a millionaire. Your house isn’t big or grand enough. Your skin is the wrong color. You need to do more to be valuable. You need to have more. You need to be more. You are not enough. You do not measure up to that person or this person.

Lies of our own: If I want it, I should have it. I deserve to be rich. It’s my parent’s fault. If only the government would solve this. I’m a waste of space if I don’t make the “40 under 40” lists. I never was any good with relationships. I can’t meet the right people.

Lies of the past: Your parents were angry drunks; you will be too. You’ve always been an introvert so stay quiet. You were a bad kid. You were a troublemaker. You weren’t worth the coach’s time.

When I look in the mirror of life, I decide who I am, what I am capable of, and who I want to be. But the mirror is nasty. It needs cleaning before I use it to know myself.

But just like the bathroom mirror, I don’t think to clean it. Instead, I see the dirt and grime as a part of me to fix. Sometimes that is true. I do have things to improve. But because the mirror is so dirty, I can’t know what those things are, and I focus in the wrong places.

I am learning, slowly, to change that. When I hear that subtle inner voice tell me I’m not good enough to write or not fast enough to race, I remind myself that the dirt of lies covers that mirror. I am working hard to clean the mirror, but the grime is much stronger than what is on the bathroom mirror. Windex and paper towels won’t do the job here.

I’m learning to clean the mirror one layer at a time by applying resistance. I resist the lies with truth. I make sure to consume wisdom every day before I expose my mind to the lies of the world. I read the Bible before Instagram. I meditate on wholeness before starting my fractured schedule. I say “thank you, Lord” before asking for more. I lean on my brothers before believing what a stranger says. I say, “I love you,” and refuse to utter, “I hate you.” I give credit before taking it. I look for the best in my colleagues and highlight it for the world when I can. I stop for one full day a week to remind myself to be humble and wipe away any new dirt that may have landed on the mirror.

I’m not perfect, but my mirror is getting cleaner, and I’m getting to know who I really am.

It’s time to clean the mirror layer by layer. It’s hard work, but it’s worth it. When I was born, the mirror was pretty clean. Maybe it had some specks of dirt from my ancestors, but if I looked into it, I saw me.

Along the way, and in a million ways, from family, school, friends, religion, media, social media, sports, books, conversations, deaths, breakups, fears, and more, the mirror has gotten dirty.

Simply leaving the mirror alone and living my life around has been enough to add dirt, grime, and little spots of who knows what all over it. The default is a dirtier and dirtier mirror. The resistance is the clean reflection.

It’s time to clean. It’s time to see myself, for who and what I was created to be.

Have you disregarded cleaning your mirror for a while?

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Why Liberalism Failed: Thoughts and Questions Upon Reading

2 Comments | Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

*Click play to listen to this article (pardon the background static, the new mic wasn’t quite right yet)

Before you start, please note that liberalism in this context is not “liberal vs. conservative.” It is not an attack on the “left” but rather a narrative on the system of liberalism that exists above and beyond right and left.

Most books I read make me feel good because they say things I already believe. Not because I’m that smart but because I, like all humans, bias toward materials that confirm my ideas. Once in a while, I get a book that does something different.

Such a book might counter my beliefs altogether, or it may offer a new perspective I hadn’t considered about one aspect of life or another.

However, there is another type of book out there that carries real magic. These books open me to a whole new view of a piece of the world. They make me conscious of some of the water I swim in every day but rarely notice.

Why Liberalism Failed is such a book.

At times, this book made me feel inadequate. I am not often engaged in political philosophy. Still, I relished the chance to consider current issues through a higher lens than left vs. right, covidiots vs. covidians, and the rhetoric of hate and division. The complexity of the ideas was overwhelming at points, but the read was well worth it.

My Takeaways and Thoughts Right Now

Liberalism is a political ideology built to provide freedom but it has been tampered with. Liberalism is characerized by individuals who desire liberation to the greatest extent possible from any external constraints and limits. This kind of “freedom” sounds good on the surface, but we often neglect that liberalism was originally a means to promote self-governance and demphasize distant state governance. The goal then wasn’t personal freedom from everything as it has become so today. This shift in definition has created a state in which people claim to be powerless to overcome “oppressions” from anything that limits them – nature, biology, culture, norms, families, friends, responsibilities, accountability – and then rely on the state to remove those limits.The state readily complies, enlarges, and expands to “free” people, leading in turn to those same people experiencing more powerlessness. Liberalism does not give freedom, it takes it like a thief you threw a welcome party for before they stole your TV and left through the back door.
The United States is not a democracy and it was never designed to be. We are taught early on about the democracy created by Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, and their contemporaries. However, there was no intention from the founders to develop democracy. Publius – the collective pseudomonic author of the Federalist Papers – made clear in Federalist 10, that the views of the public are best passed through “the medium of a chosen body of citizens, whose wisdom may best discern the true interest of their country.” Remembering that democracy in which every person’s vote is needed and counts equally toward all decisions, was not the goal helps to enlighten a different conversation about governmental power in 2022 and how we got to a point of political elites who never leave office.
In many ways, the two-party system is a distraction from the real issues of western cultures hating limits. In the past couple of years people have begun to identify as democrat or republican with more zeal than they do with religion, hometowns, or even family. The ideology war is intense and relativly meaningless. Both modern liberals and conservatives are operating to strengthen liberalism, just in different ways. The central stance of both parties is asking the government to provide and protect the greatest possible sphere of individual liberty. For the left, they focus on limits of sexuality, diversity, culture, and self-expression. The right hones in on limits of the economic market, property ownership, and extended libertarian interpretations of “don’t tread on me.” Both sides are vying for any limits on human desire to be destroyed and both give the state more power to do so. For example, the sexual revolution and the calls for government interaction has provided the state the power to define human sexuality and biology instead of God, communities, or even individuals doing so. On the other side, political conservatives have consistently supported state protection from infringements on the free market and for government salvation when it goes awry, such as in 2008 when the limits of borrowing against nothing came to bear. In the greatest nobel lie of liberalism, the government is ready to destroy limits to this new definition of freedom for the good of the people while doing so actually makes the people more powerless. The question we argue about is, “what freedoms are most important to human flourishing and how will the state create and protect them?” but the real question is, “what limits are necessary for human flourishing and how do we honor them?” Hint: the answer is not, “no limits at all.”
The state in modern liberalism loves power and will do anything to keep it. Conspiracy theories about particular political elites and a deep state of global overlords are a dime a dozen. However, the truth might be much more straightforward than that. In the modern definition of liberalism, the state gets power as people shift identity away from families, communities, religions, and even genders and move toward political affiliations. The state is not designed to hand that power back. In a perfect example, Donald Trump ran for the presidency on the principle of smaller government and giving control back to the states and people. He failed to do so in part, because the system is much stronger than any individual and will not relent that power.
Our biggest failure is the sum of our reliance added to our selfishness. We live in a world where both “reliant” and “selfish” synonmously describe us. In contrast, classic liberalism required self-governance. This meant that people and local communities had to do what we now rely on Washington D.C. to do including: define and enforce social contracts; help people in need; create jobs and a local economy; uphold moral standards; and sacrifice for the common good. People were required to be selfless and reliant only upon themselves and those in their social circle. In modern liberalism, people have shifted their reliance to the state. We offloaded the duties of self-governance to a distant land of policymakers and asked for the liberal state to treat us as children to be cared for instead of adults to be consulted and relied upon. We have also become selfish with the outright goal of “me over we,” celebrating anything to make life more comfortable and prosperous for the individual with essential disregard for the wellbeing of others. By adding selfishness and reliance together, we have created the system we love to hate.
Our blindness to these issues is our fault. I believe more strongly everyday that many of the issues we see on the news are distractions from grander ones lurking through them all. Putting our face against the tree, we are blind to the forest surrounding it. Though when we become aware of our blindness, instead of thinking deeply and critically to examine complex systems and ideas, we scapegoat politicians. We are quick to blame someone or a political party for lying or keeping us in the dark. All the while, very few are willing to put in the effort to learn deep concepts on philosophy, governance, and sociology.
The hope is in the future, if we can keep it. The future of liberalism is bleak. We all have been a bit too comfortable giving up our deeply held values in the name of freedom from limits. The reality of life is that there are limits. There are limits of nature, society, faith, personality, and biology. As a general rule, most of us personally limit ourselves far before the natural limits but on a governmental level, we want too badly to not be limited by the past or other people. The hope is in remembering the limits and even being thankful for them. Hope is in remembering that the family unit has a strength of limits and that a community or neighborhood carries unique and important features for us to thrive. It is getting back to our roots and knowing that to best contribute is not to influence the millions on TikTok but to go next door and offer help to your neighbor shoveling the driveway after a big storm. The hope is in our ability to recognize that personal freedom is best expressed within the limits of community, nature, and a God who knows better than we do.

My Questions

Of course, like any good book, I leave with as many questions as I do ideas. Here are a few I’m wrestling with:

What can we not rely on community, family, and more local sources of governance to do? For example, could local communities in the 1950s South have led a movement to stop lynching? Maybe, but maybe not and I think we can all agree that lynching was not an acceptable practice for human flourishing in any way.
How can a world obsessed with limitlessness come to accept limits in a healthy way?
How can we delineate between limits of nature, God, and positive community and limits of greed, personal satisfaction, and power grabbing?
Is it possible for a wise group of chosen citizens to not become agents of modern liberalism? How does that happen?
Why was human nature essentially forgotten in the past 20 years of liberalism?

Should you read it?

Yes, if…you are ready to think deeply with a book, you are open to thinking beyond the left vs. right rhetoric, you care about the future of governance in the USA or other western cultures, or you are wondering about the massive division we face and how to start moving in a different direction.

No, if…you are in a season of life of needing to be working inward instead of outward (though this would be proof of the arguments in the book), you are set on your political framework and are not in the place for rethinking, your self-care is a priority over the political issues that have reigned anxiety on all of us, or you want to feel really smart (this book will break that).

Overall, I recommend Why Liberalism Failed. You will find appeal for both the left and right of modern politics but read beyond that. Use this book as a scalpel on the surgery to optimize your thinking about politics. See it as a chance to revisit ideas you long ago learned and haven’t reviewed for nuance since you were popping the collars of two different colored polos in 9th grade (or was that just me?).

Get the book here

Credit to the author Patrick J. Deneen and for the recommendation from the Bridgetown Church online bookstore

Why Liberalism Failed: Thoughts and Questions Upon Reading Read More »

Half Ironman After Action Report: A Goal Along the Path

Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

August 29, 2020

Overall: I had a good day. Prior to this, my longest endurance event was a 13-mile Spartan Race in summer 2019 so this was a leap. I was slower than I hoped with my final time of 6:36:43 so I need to train speed in the swim and bike for future races. However, for a self-supported race with transitions out of my truck and a bike route determined a bit on the fly, I can be happy with the learning experience. The weather could not have been more perfect so the heat was not the factor I had anticipated.

Race Day

Swim: 2,129 yd; 54:00; 2:32/100yd

Reflection: The swim felt good throughout. I paused twice to catch my breath after a bad breathing pattern for a stroke or two but otherwise it was smooth. No shoulder pain that I had been fighting on the right side for a couple weeks leading to it. I wore the Roka Sim Buoyancy short which was great – no wet suit yet.
Improvement Plan: swim specific training on form and technique. I could feel my legs not working, mostly pulling with my arms at multiple points of the swim. I can also feel my legs sinking as I fatigue. Targeted technique work would increase my pace to match how I felt cardio wise.

Transition 1: 11:46

Reflection: Easy transition. About 200 yard run to the truck and then changing in the back made it a bit awkward but I had practiced so it wasn’t all bad.
Improvement Plan: a tri suit will help with the need to change too much gear but I need to research transition tips and learn more

Bike: 56.05 miles; 3:24:24; 16.5 mph

Reflection: The bike felt great, just slower than I hoped. My aim was to be around 20mph but true to my training, I was between 16-17mph the whole time. Our route was thrown off by a closed road which costs us some time. Great to have Troy there to pace the ride throughout as I’m still learning pacing. We also did most of it on trails which kept a slower pace than when we were on roads. Overall, for getting the bike about 6 weeks ago, I am good with it for today.
Improvement Plan: Train more at the 20mph threshold to get a feel for it over time and get out to more hills for threshold work. Get the aero bars to give me another position option. Plan the route more meticulously ahead of time.

Transition 2: 10:08

Easy transition, no issues.

Run: 13.11mi; 1:56:19; 8:52/mi

Reflection: The run felt good for 11 miles. The last 2 miles required my mind to take over completely and just tell my body to keep going. I had to pause a few times for Gatorade as I was cramping in my right quad. No aid stations so I just took it from the guys when needed. Danny set the pace for the mid miles around 7:30 and it felt good – I think I backed off a little too much from miles 8-11. I was very happy to not experience any kind of blood sugar issue like I did at Spartan and my lower legs felt great. In the middle of the training cycle, I was barely walking with lower leg pain, so the strengthening and mobility really paid off
Improvement Plan: Train more. Prior to this cycle, I was running a few miles a week, so I just need more time out there. Maintain strength and mobility plan for the lower legs. Training longer mileage with intervals will be helpful (ie. 8 easy miles, 2 threshold, 1 easy) to experience pushing the pace under fatigue.

Training

Website link: https://www.triathlete.com/training/20-week-training-plan-first-70-3-triathlon/

I followed the plan above from week 12 to the race day. Overall, it was a helpful program. I think I was about 90% to the condition I would have wanted for peak performance. I wasn’t able to follow the swim protocol well without access to a pool and equipment so that will be a training improvement for the Ironman.

I shifted to do both of my brick style workouts on Saturday/Sunday since Friday’s didn’t have that kind of availability.

The taper week was difficult to follow – it felt like I wasn’t doing enough leading to such a big event – but I was sure to do and it paid off. I felt great on race day in much thanks to the taper.

Nutrition

Overall, I was very happy with the nutrition component of the race. The most anxiety I had going in was experiencing a crash because I have in almost anything over 3 hours in the past. I had no issues at all during the race beyond some mild cramping in the run. Very pleased.

Pre race

Day before, I ate pretty normal but I did get some pasta for dinner out with Katie. I used ot fear carbs so much and it was unhealthy. This time I embraced what I know to be true for myself and took in carbs the night before. Felt great the next morning.

Race day

4:30a – I had 2 pieces of Ezekiel toast with butter and Bagel seasoning plus a Oikos Triple Zero Greek yogurt.
5:30a – on the drive to the lake, I drank a BodyArmor slowly and ate half a banana.
Transition 1 – finished the BodyArmor from the drive
Bike
- Water bottles:
  - 1 with 2 scoops of G1M Sport (40g of carbs total) that I drank first. I took about 5g carbs every 20 minutes. I think I should have drank this one faster
  - 1 with 1 scoop of G1M Sport (20g carbs) and a scoop of BCAAs that I drank second. I took this one in within about 45 minutes of the transition to the run
- A banana at mile 20 and a Picky Bar protein bar at mile 40
Transition 2 – finished second G1M water bottle and ate 2 protein energy balls that Katie makes
Run
- Not much taken in at all. Just a few Gummy Bears along the way

Post-Race

Immediately at the Finish- A BodyArmor and a banana plus a small water bottle
30 minutes after – Bottle of water and a breakfast burrito
3 hours after- Red Robin cheeseburger
6 hours after – Dinner – I was feeling great by this point so everything was just eating normally

Hydration:

I drank a gallon and a half of water plus 2 small Gatorade Zero’s the day before the race. After the race, I drank 2 Gatorade Zero’s and about a gallon of water. Returned to gallon per day after that.

Electrolytes in the G1M Sport were essential to hydration as I’ve struggled with heat in the past.

Recovery:

I felt a little bit off in the immediate hour after finishing but then felt great the rest of the day. We stayed up later that night to celebrate Danny and Tory so I didn’t get to sleep until about 11:30p. Sunday, I took a long nap in the afternoon and felt pretty good. Monday morning was the oddest time – I felt like I had vertigo almost and felt sick but it subsided by that evening. In the future, I need to plan on the 48 hour slump and maybe take work off to recover through that time frame.

Lessons Learned:

People are the heart of all this – I trained alone but the LIFE Council, Eric, and Katie all showed up for me on race day. Katie supported this whole journey so much that I don’t think she even realizes it. Eric and Dan paddleboarded my swim to guide me, Troy and Dan completed the bike, and then Danny and Dan took on the run course and paced me. Darrie got there to finish the last 2 miles as a LIFE Council all together. The race is fun but having those guys be a part of it was the true magic.
I can do it – I went in fearful of the blood sugar issues I faced in the past but with planning and being smart throughout (not trusting how I felt so much) I overcame it. The hardest part was pushing to the finish but I never bonked out at all.
The mind has to win – the last two miles was all mind over body and we got through it

Next stop? Ironman 2021!!

Half Ironman After Action Report: A Goal Along the Path Read More »

Weekend Challenge #29: Four Ways to Build An Awesome LIFE Council Crew

Friday Thoughts, Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

It’s not a new idea, you hear it all the time, “you are the product of the five people closest to you.” However, I think there is something missing in this old piece of advice. A sort of nuance about how we know it to be true is worth exploration. Particularly worth it for the LIFE Council that quite literally survives on this very idea.

It is easy to say that we know something or someone. If you think about it, you’ll rarely be challenged on a statement of knowledge. “Oh, yea, I know him” or “Sure, I know that too” are more common than we realize because they are ordinary. We assume we know things we probably don’t and are fine when others do the same.

We assume we know things we probably don’t and are fine when others do the same.

But let’s pause on that assumption. What does it really mean to know? I’m not about to go all philosophical on you but it is interesting to note that the Greeks had multiple words for what we refer to as knowledge. Two that are relevant here are, “Ginosko” and “Oida”. Ginosko is to know something through experience, an intimate knowledge discerned in fullness. Oida is knowing through observation. In our world of social media and news coverage, we are 99% oida. We see one post about a new health craze and we are sudden experts on everything health and performance. But real understanding is in the depth of ginosko.

Here’s some Greece to get your mind in the right place.

If you are the product of the five people closest to you, then you should probably know who those people are on a ginosko level. These are the people who might beat you in the race, but while doing so, they make you faster than you were yesterday. The only way to know is through ginosko.

So, here are a few ways to get more ginosko in your LIFE:

It probably won’t be people you’ve known forever

I hate to start negative, but it must be said. There is an unfortunate reality that many people who have known you for a long time, see you only as your past and present self. They struggle to see you as the future person you are trying to become. As you change and improve, they will say things like, “why do you need to change, you were good as is.” Which is code for, “don’t get better, then I’ll feel bad about myself.” You don’t have to lose these friends, but you probably can’t rely on them to call you up and give you that ginosko of what it means to be pushed.

2. Join a gym with a purpose

Alright, you know my bias. Fitness, in my mind, is a key element to all-around excellence. It also happens to be an area of life where you can easily connect with others around a common interest. So, do some research around your area and find a gym with a purpose. Maybe its bodybuilding, powerlifting, endurance, yoga, or something else. If it isn’t a gym, find a running or cycling group, or a pickup basketball spot. The activity isn’t the point, it is to get around people who are chasing similar goals but are further along than you. The Globo gyms are fine places to work out but you’re a fish in a vast ocean; more oida than ginosko. Find the right people and get around them.

3. Use social media for good instead of evil

You can experience a lot through social media – comparison, greed, narcissism – all the good stuff. If you’re careful though, you can use social media to curate the right ginosko. You can experience pieces of people’s lives who might lift you up. Avoid anyone out to make themselves look like something they’re not. Find those who provide genuine glimpses into how they achieve success day-in and day-out. You can’t experience it the same way you would if you spent a day with them, but you can get close. I’ll put some people at the end of the article if you’re not sure where to start.

4. Seek arete

Arete, the Greek word for excellence. Excellence is literally the “E” of LIFE for the council but arete captures the essence of the word better than our definition. Arete is excellence in terms of an aggregate of virtue qualities. Arete is excellence in every aspect – physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional. As you start to be intentional about who you surround yourself with, I hope you keep your eyes and ears out for arete. Don’t just find the strongest person at the gym, find the one who has strength but also strong family life and career. Surround yourself with arete and you’ll certainly have ginosko of being called up to betterment

Now I get my chance for the shameless plug. This article is essentially why we started The LIFE Council. We knew we had to be intentional with who we allowed to influence us. As the saying goes, if you don’t control your life, someone else will. Your circle is no different. As you use these four tips to find people, use the LIFE principle of love, integrity, fellowship, and excellence to connect with them as a framework. And, if you get this group together, it’s a LIFE Council and I can get you the resources to build even stronger bonds and make each person better today than yesterday.

Weekend Challenge

This is going to get awkward for some of you. This weekend, I want you to have a conversation with someone you look up to. Bonus points if it’s someone you have only interacted with in passing. Maybe it’s the person at work who seems to have a great family life that you’ve said hi to but never dug further. This weekend send an email and ask them if they would grab lunch next week to talk more about life (yea, I know, COVID – whatever make it work). If it’s someone at the gym who always seems to be on track with their habits, ask if you could train with them for a day.

This is weird for some of us – me more than anyone – but it’s necessary to find ginosko of betterment. You’ll also be surprised at how grateful these folks will be to share what they’ve learned along the way. Chances are it was hard fought for them and they can’t wait to help others.

Happy weekend. Let me know here or on social media how you are seeking an intentional circle of influencers in your life.

Here are some people to start with on social media if you’re going that route (Instagram mostly):

Andy Frisella – founder of 1stPhorm and perhaps the most honest dude ever on Instagram
1. Nick Bare – founder of Bare Performance Nutrition, Army vet, and went from bodybuilder to Ironman in just 6 months. His social and YouTube are great resources
1. Dan Connell – a guy who lives the LIFE principles every day in all aspects and happen to be one of my best friends and Council brothers
1. Barbells & Brothers – Troy is a fitness minister on a mission to connect men to faith and fitness
1. Tony Reyes – A BPN athlete who has worked hard to lose 106 lbs to date and Go One More in every aspect of life.

Weekend Challenge #29: Four Ways to Build An Awesome LIFE Council Crew Read More »

Weekend Challenge #18: Fill the Dash: What Will Your LIFE be?

Friday Thoughts, Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

When it’s your time to go, what will your LIFE be worth?

It’s a morbid question and a sad way to think about things but it’s the ultimate undeniable truth – you are one day closer to the end of your life than you were yesterday.

Gary Vaynerchuk (or just Gary V), the familiar entrepreneur and general motivational leader, has said more than once that the biggest thing that motivates him is knowing he is going to die. The imminent reality that his time is limited, drives him to use it well. David Goggins, after turning from being overweight and working in pest control into a Navy SEAL and ultramarathon competitor, credits a fear of getting to Heaven and having God show him a list of all that he could have been but never went after, for his driven approach to life. The list of now famous and successful people who credit the reality of death knocking on their door as motivation, is striking.

The ancient Stoic, Seneca reminded us all, our time here is nearly over. The real problem though is not the shortness of life but the amount of time we waste on things that don’t truly matter. We place our energy into the meaningless at a professional level in 2020. I get it, I do it all the time.

I hope the message and lifestyle of the LIFE Council changes the script. I hope it helps us see the time and energy we waste and how to use it better so when our time here is over, we can confidently approach the throne to find ourselves welcomed as a good and faithful son or daughter.

The LIFE Council wasn’t created as a way to make money or bring me fame. Instead, it was created to make me a better man, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with those I knew could elevate my life. The LIFE Council is designed to make sure that time wasted is much smaller than time contributing to a greater good in an effort to make our lives all we want them to be (and maybe more for most of us).

Now that I am almost a decade removed from my father’s death in 2012, I see a new meaning in the pain and loss. He was 55 years old when he passed on. He wasn’t old and frail. He didn’t breathe his last in a hospital bed with everyone around him knowing it was his time. Instead, he lost a battle far too early and with so much life to live and wisdom to give.

I’m not God and I won’t pretend to understand the plan for my dad. But every day, when I think about him, I think about the fact that when he was my age, he was over half-way through life. He could never have known he had 25 years left when he was 30 and I can’t know when my time will come either.

On my dad’s funeral epitaph, like everyone I’ve seen, exists the smallest mark that indicates so much. Between his birthday in 1957 and his death in 2012 there is a “—“. That dash represents the life he lived. It notes his time as a son, brother, uncle, father, and husband. It carries his police officer badge and entrepreneurial spirit. Within, sits the wisdom to always be prepared, take care of those closest to you, and never let your emotions run your decisions. My dad did a lot in his 55 years and lived the LIFE principles before they were ever created.

For me, and I think for you, it’s a worthwhile motivator to think about how we will fill that little dash of our own life. I fully believe that in my death, there will be life with Christ. And I believe that God never designed us to walk around the earth aimlessly awaiting that day. We are meant to be people of action, people of purpose, and people of intention.

You must start the journey with principles to guide your decisions and life. If your emotions are your minute-to-minute guide, that dash will probably not contain all it could. Instead, you need a framework. You need reason to work and contribute even when you don’t feel like it. You need accountability. You need hope.

You’ll notice the LIFE Principles do not focus on a social definition of success. You could be filthy rich, dirt poor, or anywhere in the middle and operate by the principles. The social definition of success is an empty one – I’ve chased it and it goes nowhere. Let’s aim to live for something greater, to elevate others and leave a legacy on the world we can be excited about to fill the dash.

Try to operate this weekend with love for yourself and others. Maintain the integrity you need to do what you say you will do no matter how you feel. Quit making excuses and start building people up into fellowship with you. Take bold and immediate action toward excellence in all aspects of your day.

I can’t promise you that you will become great, rich, or famous. But I am confident enough to promise you that you will be more fulfilled, a better spouse, stronger parent, more capable leader, and true spiritual warrior.

You are on the way to death today. Sucks to think about. But for those who have stared death in the face with a loved one gone too early or having their own life on the line, we know that death is the constant reminder to make today count. Make this minute count. Make this hour count. Make this weekend count. Make your life count in the way you want it to.

Weekend Challenge – Write Your Ending

This weekend, I want you to do something that isn’t easy. You get one side of one blank piece of paper and a pencil. On that paper, you get to write your own eulogy. You get to speak at your own funeral.

Don’t be morbid enough to write it as if you die today. Write it assuming you’ll live to be 100. Whatever your age is today, will your eulogy even include what you’ve done so far or are your dreams all out ahead of you? Would you get to a point in life where you throw your hands up and say, “that’s good enough” and let the rest end quietly? I don’t think so.

Goal setting is a fun exercise but this one will really push you. What truly matters to you? What do you hope people would remember about you? Once you’re done, flip that page over and draw or write out a 6-month, 1-year, 5-year, and 10-year path to move yourself toward that person.

P.S. I’ll go ahead and guess that not a single person who does this will include the current balance of their checking account or stock investments. You probably won’t talk about all the things you bought. Maybe that’s something to start thinking about before you make those the priority of your existence…just an idea.

P.S.S. It’s Memorial Day on Monday. If thinking of your own end isn’t something you can or want to handle, think of the men and women who have already paid that price for you. When you remember that lives have been lost to give you the privileges you have to chase your dreams, it’s harder to take that day off or let your goals go unfulfilled. Thank you to those of you who have served – we owe you more than we often know.

Weekend Challenge #18: Fill the Dash: What Will Your LIFE be? Read More »

Friday Challenge #13: The Next Right Step

Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

The only way to truly reach your goal is by doing one thing – taking the next right step.

It has been said thousands of times by people from all walks of life. Books are devoted to it. Keynote speakers make thousands of dollars a year talking about it. YouTube could probably survive on the profits from it alone. Yet we don’t follow it. We hear it and get excited but we most often fail to put it into practice.

What is it? The sage advice to pursue excellence one step at a time.

Perhaps it’s the relationship we have with social media that most resembles the courting habits of birds of paradise. When it’s time to share ourselves with the world we transform for a brief moment into the most awe-inspiring form we can and then capture it to be our “forever and always” (if you haven’t seen this YouTube it or get your Planet Earth on and let the sweet voice of David Attenborough give you a tour). We know that 90% of the time we aren’t that most amazing person, but it sure is fun to make other people think it. When what we see of people is the 10% of their amazing, 100% of the time we get a sense that something must be wrong with us because “that person gets everything they want, whenever they want it.”

The problem is…they don’t at all. I can’t remember who said it but I think it’s true that when we see an “overnight success” and compare ourselves to it, we’re missing the iceberg of hard work they put in. We ignore the hours in the gym, missed nights with friends to write, compromises to get up earlier than everyone else. We fail to see how most of the people we look up to, consistently took the next right step and then at some point took one that showed the world their destination. We never ask what their walk looked like to get there. This vantage point hurts both parties. You struggle with comparison not knowing how to make the giant leap to your dreams, and they don’t get credit for the grind that they’ve been through.

Now, of course there are some true stories of overnight success but I’d bet they are far and few between. Let’s take a look at Abraham Lincoln for an example. Most people know him for the moments that would have gone viral if the internet was around for him to use – his 2^nd Inaugural address that reaffirmed a nation at war with itself or the Emancipation Proclamation where he changed the winds of history by declaring, “All persons held as slaves…shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free”, or maybe you memorized his famous words at Gettysburg, “that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” These are the moments of the 10% but they fail to account for all the times that he simply took the next right step.

One moment that is often forgot but shows the process of thought behind those famous statements came when he was a 28-year-old delegate to the Illinois General Assembly. He and another delegate, Dan Stone, responded to a vote taken 6-months prior that put restrictions on abolitionists from spreading their message. Lincoln and Stone claimed, “the institution of slavery is founded of both injustice and bad policy…”¹That was a bold move away from the popular 1837 opinion that slavery should at least be allowed where it already existed. That next right step would lead to his more famous statements that kids across the U.S. now put to memory.

There are tons of more present examples of this phenomenon as well. From Steve Jobs, Robert Iger, Mila Kunis, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, to Halle Berry and J.K. Rowling people who’s names we know but stories we don’t often care to actually look into. We see their movies, books, or companies and think, “wow, they just came out of nowhere”. They didn’t. They came from failures and setbacks. They came from lessons learned the hard way and easy way. They came from taking risks. They came from acting with faith over fear. They came from taking the next right step.

The fourth principle of the Brothers LIFE Council is to pursue excellence. The reason we say “pursue” is because it’s a journey not a destination. The pursuit of something excellent is an ongoing climb of next right steps. Want to be in excellent physical shape? It’s gong to start with a daily next step into the gym, onto a bike, or out the door for a walk. Want to pursue spiritual excellence? It’s going to be the next right step to make time every day for spiritual disciplines of reading, prayer, and conversation. If mental excellence is your pursuit, you better start with the next right step into a bookstore, onto TedTalks, or to get a journal.

I don’t know what your pursuit of excellence looks like right now. All I care about is that you have one. That you have goal you are pursuing, a reason to push through the quarantine. Maybe it’s simply to spend time with family and be present amidst the chaos. Take the next right step to put your phone away in the evening and be with them.

You have greatness within you. You can pursue excellence and fight isolation for yourself and the people in your life. That greatness won’t be reached with a leap to the top of the mountain and there is no helicopter to take you there. It will all be in the decisions you make each moment to take the next right step.

Weekend Challenge

This weekend, I think a two-part examination of the next right step is the best way to go!

Learn about someone you look up to. Choose someone you look up to, either that you know personally or that you follow on social media and take the time to learn their path of next right steps. I promise you’ll find one heck of a story behind their success that might look like it was instantaneous. I put some book/audiobook recommendations below if you want to go that route and learn about someone.
Figure out your own next right step. Pick one of your plans to pursue excellence. See the vision but then let it go and focus on today. Write out a plan for the next week on paper. At the bottom of the paper, write your big goal. Then next to each day, write what the next right step will be for that day. Maybe it’s to write a book and each day is to write 1,000 words. Or it’s to run a marathon and each day is to follow your program without fail.

Recommendations to see the journeys of next right steps:

Lincolns Virtues: An Ethical Biography by William Lee Miller
The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company by Robert Iger
The Measure of Our Lives by Toni Morrison
Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead by General Jim Mattis
25 Hours A Day: Going One More to Get What You Want (story of Nick Bare, owner of Bare Performance Nutrition and bodybuilder turned Ironman)
It Worked for Me: In Life and Leadership by Colin Powell
My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor

¹From Lincoln’s Virtues: An Ethical Biography by William Lee Miller, 2002, p.122

Friday Challenge #13: The Next Right Step Read More »

Friday Challenge #12: The Power of Public

Uncategorized | Ryan MacTaggart

At a time when we’re keeping our distance from one another, I hesitate to use the word “public” in a good way for this post but it’s my blog so I’ll go for it. Last week I had the privilege of being invited onto the Brothers & Barbells Podcast with Troy Ismir. He’s a man that I see as a mentor, a friend, and a serious force to be reckoned with in the fight for God. It came out this past Tuesday and I was able to listen to it during one of my ruck walks this week (did I mention I’m a week into the 75 Hard program from Andy Frisella?!)

Listening to your own voice for an hour is a bit weird but what a powerful way to check yourself on what you believe and how your actions line up. Most of what I said, I was proud of once I listened to it as it truly represented my approach to the world. But I’ll be honest – there was one thing about my morning routine that had actually been slipping since we got quarantined at home. Sure, my normal routine is to get up between 4:30 and 5:00 in the morning as I told Troy but in the week before the podcast, I had slept later nearly every day. Since the podcast came out and people have listened…I’ve been up on time to get after it. That switch leads me to why I wanted to write about my experience with the podcast and give you a challenge. It isn’t because I want to brag and promote it (although it would be cool for folks to listen). Instead it is because I learned firsthand, as I have with starting this blog, that there is serious power in going public with what you value.

I’m usually quick to bash social media for all the negativity and comparison it can bring but there’s always a balance. Social media is great for accountability. If you post that you’re going to run an Iron Man next year along with a bunch of videos with you working out but you never actually run the race, you lose integrity. If you share out you’re launching a company and then never make the website for it, everyone will see you differently. There’s nuance in this of course and the line between “annoying self-promotion” and “accountability” is a thin one, but the overall setting is useful.

Being on the Brothers & Barbells Podcast was a lesson in accountability for me. The podcast is on every social media outlet, I sent it to family and friends, and I shared it on my own site. If people listen to it, I want them to not be surprised by what I say. How I describe my life should be how I live my life and the same goes for you. If we are to maintain integrity toward living the LIFE Council creed then our walk and our talk have to align.

So, what’s this mean for you? It means that I think you should use the power of public to your advantage. Zach Mercurio, an author and speaker focused on purposeful work, who I consider a serious mentor of mine told me that “you have to ship it out or it’s just inventory costing you money” when I told him last year that I had a bunch of writing sitting in my “saved files”. The metaphor was clear, and it sparked this writing that I love. If we keep our values and our work to ourselves, they might be great, but they aren’t helping anyone else.

It’s intimidating to go public with things in our modern era. One scroll session on Instagram is enough to make you feel like the most inadequate person to ever walk the earth. But as scripture tells us more than anything else, “do not be afraid”. Patrick Sweeney brought the same point to bear in his recent book Fear Is Fuel. He said, “to be truly happy and successful you’ve got to recognize your fears and use them to power greatness…”. Your fear of inadequacy is real, but you can choose to control that fear and let it drive you to reach your goals.

It doesn’t have to be social media, even though that is the easiest outlet. If you don’t have social media or don’t want to use it that way, do it the old-fashioned way and tell someone. Pick up the phone or walk to another room and talk to a person for a real. The point is to use your fear as fuel, step out in public, and find accountability. At no other time can you be accountable to people all over the world who are doing the same things you are and driving as hard as you are. Use it.

Weekend Challenge

It’s simple this weekend. Make one of your values or goals public. Social media, a phone call, conversation, whatever. Make a goal or commitment and share it with at least one other person. Ideally this will be someone who you know will call you up to reaching the goal not someone who will validate any excuses you might come up with.

Oh and bonus…check out the podcast here (come on, I had to plug it a little bit)

Friday Challenge #12: The Power of Public Read More »