you’ve figured out what the WHAT is. What you want to do and why you want to do it goes hand in hand. Your WHY is the motivating factor. It is the most important question of this book. If you have a strong WHY for what you want to do, then nothing can stop you. The saying, “where there is a will, there is a way” is powerfully true.
Think about it—who would you bet your money on:
1.The top fighter in the world who is going after $1 million in a fight
2.Or his opponent, who is an experienced fighter but is participating in the fight to win $100,000 to pay for a heart transplant for his mother who, otherwise, only has two weeks to live?
I know I would bet on fighter number two. Why? Because he will go all out to win no matter what. If both of his hands are broken during the fight, he will use his legs, if his legs were broken he would use his elbows, if his… you get the picture. That is how strong your WHY must be. It must be so strong, you will do whatever it takes to achieve your WHAT.
My WHAT drove me to go from a 2.1 GPA for most of high school to making straight As and one B+ during my senior year, but my WHY got me through college. That’s saying a lot about my WHY, because I had never written a paper over three pages and did not like to study. I did not do work outside of class. In addition, I did not completely understand or was not completely sold on the “college stuff.” However, I knew that if I failed there, I would probably end up back home and locked up like my older brother. I had to succeed.
What about you? What drives you? What is the WHY behind your what? If, after reading my story, you feel as though you do not have a strong WHY for your WHAT, don’t stress about it. You don’t have to come up fatherless in some desperate situation with crime and death at every turn. Anyone who had to live through that kind of struggle and has any sense is not trying to glamorize it. It ain’t cute.
If you do not have a strong WHY for your WHAT, then you may need to change your WHAT, that’s all. If you are going to succeed, if you are going to achieve things you could have never imagined for yourself, then you are going to have a strong reason that compels you to do it “by any means necessary.” Now when I say, “by any means necessary,” it is with the caveat of nothing immoral, unethical, or illegal. Criminality, for the sake of being lazy and not playing the game is not excused and is not cool. This is your life, not some “thugged-out” crime drama where you walk out of some club dressed in all Black with guns in both hands in slow motion while the building blows up behind you. This is not Hollywood.
Finding a better WHY means you will listen to whoever you have to listen to, read whatever you must read, do whatever you have to do…no matter what.
To figure out your “WHY,” look at your what and ask yourself, “Why do I want to do this?” Continue to ask yourself why until you find a reason that resonates with you. Write that down and look at your WHAT and WHY statements, then ask, “Am I willing to do whatever it takes to make this happen?” If you hesitate for a moment, or have any doubt, then you need to find a deeper why or change your what. If you say yes, then ask yourself WHY am I willing to do whatever it takes to make this happen? The first thing that comes to mind is your true WHY.
Most people’s WHY is usually associated with the way they were raised, their family, or immediate community. They have a reason to change, improve, or stop something from happening. What is this for you? Why is your WHAT important to any of the above?
Do not try to think hard about it. It is usually immediately apparent. You think about it almost all the time. It is what brings you to tears, stirs something inside of you, and energizes you. This is what your WHY does: it motivates you to DO something when other people would just shrug their shoulders. When you think about your WHY and any of those things happen, then lock on to that. Keep asking yourself WHAT and WHY until you find a combination that gives you power.
Just like when you crystallized your WHAT, when you identify your “WHY,” try to state it in one sentence. For example, what motivated me to do well in high school and accomplish so much in college was:
It is up to me; I am the only one in the family.
Simple as that. It was all on me. If I failed, my mother would be crushed, and my lil brother would not have any men in the family to show him a better life. So, I had to get As in every class and figure out a way to pay for school. Period.
My WHY stayed the same as my WHATs (see above) until school was paid for and I was achieving a bit of success. Then it became:
I must be the one to show, by example, my people (especially my lil brother and the men in my family and community), that since I can achieve greatness, so can they.
That WHY picked me up when I was knocked down. I was made to feel out of place quite a bit while in college. The other boys thought I was “ghetto” or unintelligent because of my strong, fast-talking country Miami slang. Many people couldn’t understand me. I’m groaning as I type this just reminiscing about how clueless I was about things. I did not know what Greek fraternities were; I did not know a lot of the “high” fashion brands (i.e. Banana Republic, Brooks Brothers, etc.), or even beverages like cappuccino.
It was like I was some “ghetto,” stereotypical character from some sitcom who had warped into the real word. Once, I was in a group and a young man walked up. Everyone was excited to see him and asked him what he did over the break. He said he went to Beijing. He must have seen the confusion on my face because he looked at me and said “China.”
I was like, “Oh!” I thought about it for a second and got excited. I jumped up and inquired, “Did you see Kung Fu in the streets?”
I proceeded to do a few Kung Fu moves and told him he didn’t have to go way over there to see it because I could show him a little something right then. He, and everyone, looked at me like I was the dummy of the year. He said, “I was with the Model UN debating the inflation of the yuan.” I looked dumbfounded. I didn’t have the slightest idea what in the world he was saying. Model UN? Inflation? Yuan? Again, he saw it on my face and said, “It’s economics.” I looked at him and the group who clearly thought it was hilarious, lowered my head, and walked away. Things like that were common. VERY common. Actually, sometimes things like that still happen. Luckily, I still let this fuel my WHY.
What is your WHY? I challenge you to figure it out before you go any further. It will sustain you through those face-melting embarrassments that would cause other people pack their bags and return to the comfortable ignorance and lack of ambition they know. It will dry your eyes when you outright, totally and utterly fail. It is the most important thing you can get from this book. It is most important thing to know in any endeavor you undertake.
Exercise F1.2 – Identify a Strong WHY
Get a notebook, a few sheets of paper, or open a new text document on your computer or phone. Take at least 30 minutes of your free time, distraction-free. Write your three responses from Exercise 1.1 at the top of the document. Review those responses and ask yourself:
1.Why do I want this?
Write what comes to mind. Take at least 5 minutes to ponder each response. Dig deep. Keep asking yourself “Why?” until you stumble upon an answer that stirs something in you. Once you arrive at that answer then ask yourself:
2.Am I willing to do whatever it takes to bring this into my life?
If you hesitate for even a moment, then rethink your WHAT. Redo Exercise 1.1 and then come back to this one.
