How A Marvel Superhero Saved My Week

No matter where you are in life, unpleasant feelings arise.

Any attempt to live in a way where the objective is to eliminate them is a fantasy, unattainable by anyone.

Take me for example:

I quit jobs I didn’t like to pursue building my dream life and businesses, and am currently doing so.

Wonderful? In many ways, yes… but I am still human, still subject to the complex evolutionary mechanisms unconsciously at work. Still wrestling with life as an evolved ape in the world of buttons and screens.

This past Monday started as a terrible day. Nothing in particular happened, but I nonetheless felt awful. Low, uninspired, unmotivated, anxious, fearful, the lot.

I am fortunate to be equipped with tools to undo these feelings and redirect myself, but before I could begin to enact them, I listened to a podcast that totally reoriented me.

Jeremy Renner, a Hollywood actor most famous for his role as Hawkeye in the Marvel movies, was on Joe Rogan’s podcast. I had no idea beforehand, but in December of 2023, Renner ran himself over with a snowplow and broke nearly 40 bones in his body.

By all accounts he should have died, or at the very least been bed ridden for life. You would look at him today and have nearly no idea he’d been through a horrific accident.

And while I could go on about all the wonderful things he said, my biggest takeaway was what happened to him, and how it reflected on my life.

We often want what we don’t have, and find ourselves in a cycle that never ends. When I was in Africa I wanted so badly to be able to do my local gym workout routine… but now that I’m home, some days I dread going to do it. How insane is that?

Key takeaway (both for you and I):

Be grateful for the opportunity to do the things you don’t want to do, because if it was taken away from you - all you would want is to have it back. Rinse and repeat that until the outlook is where it should be. Of course, this applies to those things that are going in the direction you want to go - aimless undesirable tasks need an end, not a coping mechanism.

There will always been things the lower self in us does not want to do. We get to choose whether we live within the higher frame of being grateful that we get to do them at all.

Get some.

Sincerely,

Jacob

P.S. Leaving for the UAE, Afghanistan, and Iraq next Sunday. First trip since Africa. Inshallah - I will prevail.