Adversity Reveals Character

Count money, man.

Money, man.

Stacked riches.

I told him, I'm a beast, but...

What's up, gang?

Welcome back to another episode of The Grindcast.

Get ready.

It's a new day.

A couple of weeks ago, I started talking about some stuff that was inspired through me watching

a video with Inky Johnson.

And for those of you who don't know who that is, you know, he was unbelievable athlete,

played football, Tennessee.

He was supposed to get drafted, ends up random flute, hit, tackle, paralyzed arm,

lost all use of his arm, and, you know, his dream of being in the NFL and all that,

and ends up lifting himself up to be one of the top motivational speakers in the country.

And so, you know, one of the things that caught my attention, you know, he was talking about

adversity reveals your true character.

And I think somewhere along the lines in your life, you know, between where you're at

and where you want to go, big dreams, big devils.

You're going to have big, big adversities in your life.

You're going to have these hurdles and obstacles that you're going to have to go through

the higher that you want to climb.

And so, those are the things that are going to not only test in your character,

but they're going to reveal your character and build up your character.

So, the mindset is that the hard times test how bad you want it, they test that passion.

And then in my experience, you know, I wish I can get people to tap into what I'm thinking

when I'm trying to teach people this because I think it gets dismissed.

And some people look at it as excessive when I try to go through some of the things that I do with people.

And again, I just want to reiterate, I'm not saying I'm the toughest guy in the world.

I'm not saying that there isn't guys that can climb out Everest and swim miles in the ocean

or whatever better than me.

But what I do know is I go to war with myself almost every morning.

That I get up when I don't want to get up earlier than I want to get up typically.

Do a bunch of stuff I don't want to do, whether it's pushing myself harder in a workout or stretching

or standing in the sauna extra long or standing freezing cold water extra long.

There's a series of things that I do.

And the reason is I chalk that up to preparation for adversity because you're going to have to go through adversity.

But if you're already used to putting yourself through stress, through adversity,

getting comfortable being uncomfortable, that when the world puts you in an uncomfortable situation

all of a sudden you can survive there in your home.

I think the people that struggle at times when life hits them with some sort of major obstacle,

as that they haven't been putting themselves through the preparation for the training mentally

that life is going to pull at that moment because adversity exposes whether your words were real or just noise.

And I've had an opportunity to do that myself in life where I've looked at and said,

all right, hey buddy, this is your turn.

Simon, this is your turn.

The motivational guy to get on the grind and you've got to be able to handle adversity and obstacles.

Well, guess what?

Life taps you on the shoulder and said, this is your time.

Fair or not?

Ready or not?

Here we come.

And this is the opportunity when that comes.

This is your opportunity to put those words into action because character is what you do daily.

It's just like a makeup of who you are, not just when things are going your way.

Not just when everything is sunshine or rainbows.

You know, this is the whole thing where it's reputation is who people think you are.

Character is who you are when it counts.

Reputation is people is what people think you are.

And character is who you really are, who you are when it counts when it matters the most.

And you can't fake preparation.

In adversity, trust and believe those obstacles adversity life will expose everything.

Setbacks reveal your strengths.

When you have obstacles, when you have setbacks and you got to take a step back that now we start to reveal how strong are you?

Where are you strong?

That pressure to some pressure builds diamonds or pressure breaks glass.

Your mindset decides.

Truth like success when you're winning that don't always really build character.

Struggle I think is what builds character.

It's the obstacles.

It's the adversity is the hardships, the setbacks in life, the things that you got to struggle for that starts to build up your true character.

You know, you've heard the term that you don't rise to the occasion you fall back on your preparation, you fall back on your training.

That's what preparation is.

Is your training.

And you usually don't become great by accident.

You become great by what you repeatedly do.

And you become what you repeatedly do.

So if you want to be great, you got to repeatedly do things that are going to put you on the track to being great over and over and over again.

This is how people get worn out in the process.

That's why you'll hear people talk about you got to embrace the journey.

You got to fall in love with the process because some people haven't fallen in love with the process and learned to love the process.

So it's like, I'll do this in three weeks and if in three weeks, I don't get the result then I'm out of here.

I quit.

The process of greatness typically happens inches at a time.

It's a bunch of miles you got to drive. It's a bunch of sweat you got to give.

It's a bunch of tears you got to give for just a little bit of growth.

But that just compounds compounding interest and then all of a sudden it starts to grow and starts to grow and it starts to grow.

And people think that it happened overnight.

No, it's a bunch of obstacles that you had to keep climbing through a bunch of setbacks, a bunch of sacrifices, a bunch of failures.

And you realize that failure is only temporary failure isn't final.

The only quitting is final.

When you fail and you say, all right, I can't take it anymore. I quit.

That's what's final. But when you fail and you get back up and you keep on going, that's really the science behind winning.

And the greater you want to be, the greatness, your inner greatness is going to be proven.

Not in the moment of victory, but it's going to be proven and earned in the unseen and uncelebrated hours.

That public victory happens behind closed doors, private victories.

Don't look at the person that's winning, getting their hand raised, getting a belt strap, hoisting the trophy, whatever it is, getting that money, getting whatever it is that you want.

I want you to dig into what are they doing in the dark hours?

What are they doing in the moments for nobody's watching?

What are they doing in the process that is unglorious, the unglorious grind before they get to shine?

What are those things that they're doing? Because those are the habits you got to form to take it to the next level.

When it gets hard, when it gets tough, when things are down and out, there's not always a bunch of people you can lean on, a bunch of places that you could go.

It's going to take you out of that spot and take you to the next level.

Really, the only thing that's going to answer the call is your habits.

Not your feelings. When things get hard, I'm sad.

I'm stressed out. I'm hurt. This is unfair.

Okay, now what? So that's good. That's nice and all. That you're hurt.

You're sad. It's unfair. All that. But then what?

Because your feelings ain't going to help you. Your feelings don't take you to the next level. The feelings don't make that sad moment better.

Make that bad moment better. The only thing that's going to make it better is those habits.

The journey to greatness is lonely. But it feels, it builds the foundation that you could build greatness on.

You could build the foundation that you could build the habits of, oh man, how can I teach my family this?

How can I teach kids this? The journey to greatness is lonely one at times.

But the foundation that it causes you to build is why you just got to love the process.

You just got to love who it's bit. That's why it's more important to look at who you're becoming on the journey than what you currently have right now.

Because someday when you retire, you know, oh man, I'm running track or I'm playing football or whatever it is.

That day may end at 22 or 32. But who you've become on that journey is now the foundation that you build the rest of your life on.

Who is that that you who's the man or woman that you became in the process?

That's why you got to love that process. The process of greatness.

The process that gives you no love in the dark to get you all of the love when the lights are on.

But you got to do all that work behind the scenes. The process of greatness that you get an injury, you get a setback.

You got to rehabilitate yourself. You get knocked down. You got to get back up all that, that stuff, that character building stuff.

That's the foundation that you get to build the rest of your life on.

But if you form yourself into a quitter when the going gets tough, the tough get going, right?

It ain't when the going gets tough. The quitters, they get it cracking. The quitters get it rocking. No.

Quitters never win and winners never quit.

And so it's that foundational things that you start to build on that journey when things are difficult in sports and whatever.

Whatever it is, that's the platform that you get to build the rest of your life on.

All right? So let's go out there this week and focus on the right habits, the right things that we could do, that we could build upon in the dark.

Let's go ahead and strengthen our character and resolve. If you're going through a hard time, focus on all the things that you can control.

Understand that it's just a season. There might be a reason for the season. Even though you can't understand it, it's going to be gone.

It's not going to be there forever. Glory to God. How many people got it worse than you?

There's a bunch of people out there, circumstances that got it worse than you. Think about those things.

Try to find yourself in a spirit of gratitude even though things aren't maybe going your way.

What are all the things that you have to be grateful for?

And one of the best recipes for success is just to keep on going despite the adversity, just despite what happens to you.

Refuse the quit, refuse to give up and eventually you're going to find yourself in a winter circle.

Thank you guys again for always for joining in with us. If there's anybody that you know that we can help with this message, please take a couple of seconds out and share it with somebody that we can make an impact on.

And as always, we appreciate your time. Thanks for joining us on another episode of the Grindcast. Get ready.