My wife walked out the door with tears in her eyes…again

When the seven layers of why materialize in plain site…

Photo Courtesy of Eric Ward

Here’s the “seven layers of why” in a nutshell:

You ask yourself what you want, why you want it, then why again, all the way down until you hit your core — about seven layers deep.

For me, I strive to be a provider for my family, but it’s not something I always live up to...

But, here’s the thing they don’t tell you about discovering your “why.” When you know your “why” and don’t act on it daily, every so often, it will hit you square in the face as a reminder.

Because you know what you should be doing but you also know you haven’t been doing it.

You haven’t been putting enough quality time on task — aka the right kind of work — to achieve the results your “why” demands.

But, this isn’t about the past. It’s about the present.

So let’s get past all of that for a moment and talk about impossible, improbable goals and how to achieve them, because that’s the reason for this exercise in the first place.

To stay on track today, I must complete the following…

• Publish Medium ✔️
• Schedule Email ✔️
• Landing page split test ✔️
• Record podcast interview ✔️
• Record new podcast intro(s) ✔️
• Pitch new client ✔️
• Begin run workout ✔️
• VRBO guest updates ✔️
• UpWork profile draft ✔️
• Start tomorrow’s post ✔️

Note: this is not a blog, but a continuum of field notes devoted to goals in writing, filmmaking, entrepreneurship, health, fatherhood and husbandhood. Checklists represent actionable steps and daily accountability.

Back to the story…my wife just walked out the door with tears in her eyes….again.

She’s a nurse at the hospital, so 2–3 days a week she leaves the house and I’m alone with our fifteen-month-old little girl.

This morning, as I shape this note, Stella’s green eyes look up at me as she sips on her cup of milk, just as Mom closes the door to begin her 14-hour day.

Meanwhile, I can work pretty much anywhere and I generally enjoy my work, but I’ve mainly focused on making “just enough” to cover the bills and making sure I have freedom in my day.

Freedom to watch the baby, go see a movie, go hiking, read, walk the dog, whatever.

Now, though, while I still want all of this freedom, I also want my wife to have the same freedom (and before you say it, I know we’re privileged and should be content, but that’s not what this is about — it’s about achieving things that seem impossible — so stick with me).

To accomplish this, I need to personally earn 4x my salary, or 2x our combined salary, so my wife can leave work and be with our growing family full time.

We’ve made the choice of time OR money for too long.

Like everyone, we want both (this has perhaps always been my “why,” but it’s historically been a tadpole and now feels like it’s grown into a a T-Rex).

So, to make sure there are no reasons for her to stay at work, or wait a little longer, or find the perfect time, or whatever, I believe we need to earn about $21,000 per month (she could quit sooner than this, but this makes it an absolute no-brainer for her to walk away).

Because of this goal, I can no longer think about dollars for hours.

I’ve been fortunate enough to build up my portfolio and earn up to $125 per hour on UpWork, working for companies like ClickFunnels and many high caliber influencers, but even that is not enough for this goal of time AND money.

(In fact, I even turned down a $90,000 job last week because it wasn’t in alignment with my goal — more on that in this free mindset training here.)

Basically, I have to get creative about how to make money or I’ll lose all my free time and bring in more headaches to our situation.

To do so, we have to think long and hard about this intriguing question from Peter Thiel…

“How can you achieve your 10 year plan in the next 6 months?”

This type of thinking is the only way to achieve impossible, improbable goals. You can’t keep doing more of the same because there aren’t enough hours in the day. You have to do something completely new, somewhat scary, and potentially insane.

Luckily I’ve thought about all of this for years and now simply need to take consistent action to achieve these goals (your job is to check in often and steal the secrets I’ve stolen from high achievers who are miles ahead of me in the land of time AND money).

So all of this leads me back to my daily affirmation…

“I, Brock Swinson, will earn $21,000 per month selling books, courses, and films by September 15, 2023.”

I’ll break all of this down more in future posts. And while affirmations alone sound like fortune cookies, they’re free, they’re simple, and they could change your life (just ask Dilbert creator Scott Adams).

Tune in to this continuum each week and I’ll share all of the details as I continue to aggressively pursue my impossible, improbable goals.

But, before I leave you to work on my Future Self, here’s the other hidden “why” that also hit me a moment later for the 1–2 knockout:

Having kids does change you but not the way you think. It’s not having a baby that starts your momentum, at least not the day they arrive. It’s when you notice that they really see you. Stella’s eyes are piercing. They see everything you do…and everything you don’t do.

Then, your why is real clear, and the impossible, improbable suddenly appears on the horizon, out of reach, but not out of sight.

What is the first thought that comes to your mind when you think about achieving 10 year goals in the next 6 months?

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Postscript: a few days ago, I dropped a free 4-part video series on why I turned down that $90,000 job and what it means to adopt the six figure freelancer mindset. You can watch it here.