[Start Here] Why Perseverance, and Why Now?

It’s never been more important to share your work. Regardless of delays, injuries, and noise everywhere. In today’s 10-min solo episode, I go (deep) into what’s at stake, what life teaches us about perseverance— and the rewards, large and small.

Sorry not sorry: We begin with the Bangles’ angelic singer Susanna Hoffs, then take an epic trip to India, where the origins of this podcast began. It’s our year to get big things done. Are you ready? Full transcript follows. If you’re inspired, I’m giving away our guest Elena Brower’s incredible new book— Hold Nothing. Simply comment and/or share. Details below👇🏻 Our season officially launches March 3rd with Tom Bergeron: Meditator, Comedian, Host of Dancing with the Stars and AFV.

First Interview Drops Tuesday March 3rd

Until then, here’s a 10.5 minute taste of what we’re cooking up.

* Listen to the episode above, or wherever else 🎧 (10 min, 28 sec)

* The 1-min trailer is here 🎧

* Subscribe: on Spotify | Apple Podcasts | Or, wherever you listen

* Share it with someone who could use reminders to keep going.*Enter to win a free book in the mail with a personal note

Hazy Shade of Winter?

Like most young men, and many young women who grew up in the 1980s — I had a deep, abiding crush on Susanna Hoffs, singer for the Bangles. Their career launched in ‘86 with Manic Monday, which Prince originally wrote for his Purple Rain costar Apollonia. Later that year came their first #1, Walk Like An Egypshunnnnn. A generational crush on Susanna Hoffs started with her sideways glances in that video. Right, left, right.

Be still our tiny, prepubescent hearts.

Their next single was Hazy Shade of Winter, a cover of Simon and Garfunkel from 1966. Only 21 years earlier, the 60’s shelf-date made it feel like ancient history: my Mother Valerie’s music. The Bangles version was urgent, and cool. Produced by Rick Rubin, it had a pumped-up guitar riff and relentless snare-slapping back beat.

All the Bangles played and sang their asses off. I was too young for the coke-fueled film it was the soundtrack for: Less Than Zero. But the lyrics stuck with me. Paul Simon would become a favorite lyricist later, but, in 1987, it was through the vessel of MTV’s dreamiest Earth angel— Saint Susanna Hoffs — where the medicine was administered:

Look aroundLeaves are brownAnd the skyis a hazy shade of winterHang onto your hopes, my friendThat’s an easy thing to sayBut if your hopes should pass awaySimply pretendThat you can build them again

I hadn’t lived long enough to have lasting hopes, let alone lose them. But 12-year-old me filed those lyrics away and held them tightly — maybe sensing they could come in handy during tougher times?

We need to talk about Perseverance

We’re watching the snow accumulate all over again in the late February winter. A few years back, Ohio’s winter got cold enough to kill most of the rose bushes. Winter’s the season of retreat, of going dormant until blooms explode in the Spring.

Whatever your beliefs — from spiritual, to geo-political — can we agree it feels like humanity has entered some “hazy shade of winter”? We’re facing far-reaching, high-stakes threats to just about everything that once made us feel safe: our livelihoods, our food supply, our families, the earth we count on to provide for us. More chaos, disruption and division all around us. We stay glued to screens that amplify all of it.

What does the onslaught and repetition of images, accusations, and evidence of who and who not to trust… What does so much repetition tell us? That you ab re powerless. Keep your head down, take fewer chances to do the work, or live the life you’ve dreamed of. Just stay distracted waiting for the next shoe to drop. Be grateful this time, it wasn’t your kid’s school, your church, or your job, or your community’s water supply— this time.

I walked into last year staring down my 50th birthday. My 25-year marriage had just ended. I was living alone for the first time in my life. The divorce forced a reckoning with addiction I’d been outrunning for decades, and I surrendered into recovery.

Then, on a warm morning that fall, I hit a deer on my motorcycle going 60 miles per hour. Two days before Christmas, a drunk driver turned in front of me while I was going 55.

Each of us struggles. Life fires warning shots, and by Grace, when the big explosions eventually hit, we might get the chance to keep going. My career as an executive coach, author, and before that as a songwriter and touring performer — each chapter gave me tools to keep going. Or, not. One of the smartest things I did was book a 6-week pilgrimage tour to India. It was my reward for taking each of the brutal steps toward finalizing the divorce.

India deepened my fascination with perseverance. We were traveling during a once-every-144-years event, the peak intensity being the Maha Kumbh Mela in Prayagraj. Estimated crowds exceeded 1 million visitors per day, for the 34-day festival. It felt like most of India’s nearly 1.5 billion citizens were also moving by foot, rickshaw, rail, or bus. Being in crowds and traffic usually make me anxious, but this felt different. Throngs of people moved in massive swells with a consciousness that was nothing like the “me first” I was used to. It felt more like “As 1.”

From blasting rickshaw horns, to the silent lines of thousands patiently waiting all day in the hot sun for a moment to kneel in a temple. Anywhere we look in the West, we may hear the empty cheer of “you got this!” or someone trying to convince themselves: “I got this!”

Over and over, when we were able to surrender into those endless rivers of traffic, the message I felt was “We got this!” Like we are all fellow travelers along the Ganges River. We may not even get to the goal in this lifetime, but if we just keep going, we’ll find all the help we need. It becomes our duty and our joy to help fellow travelers.

Recovery meetings prove to me weekly that some Higher Power gives us healing through our service to one another. No service, no recovery. Do I permanently live in a state of service when I’m in a TSA checkpoint during domestic travel? Hardly. But it does remind me to practice. As Ram Dass said: “We are all just walking each other home.”

At my 50th birthday party I sang a song I wrote in India. The chorus wrote itself as I recorded it to my phone: “Love goes before us, holding the line / every one of us will persevere, in time.”

Perseverance originates from the Latin verb perseverare, meaning “to continue steadfastly, persist,” which is formed by combining per- (”very,” “thoroughly”) and severus (”severe, serious, strict”). Walt Disney called it “stick-to-it-ivity.” But Disney’s bouncy, sing-song version doesn’t mean that sticking it out, pushing through, persevering— is a given, or that it’s simple, or even fun. It’s both a spiritual quest, and a test.

The people who create the future aren’t the ones who never doubted. They’re the ones who kept going anyway. Hell Yeah You Will is a line from Neil Diamond’s late-career anthem “Hell Yeah” — also produced by Rick Rubin. “I hear you wondering out loud, are you ever gonna make it? / Will you ever work it out? Will you ever take a chance, and just believe you can? Hell Yeah You Will. You’re gonna be OK.”

And that line is the name of this podcast.

The Pilot Light is Purpose.

We have a hypothesis on this show. It’s that each of us has a purpose. And that purpose glows, down deep inside each of us. Like a pilot light left burning since we were children. All the noise and chaos of our world? That is the fuel to focus, and burn down obstacles. Perseverance, then, is the spiritual practice of returning to purpose as many times as necessary, despite all tests and trials — to deliver our unique medicine to a world in need.

Each episode, I’ll ask our guest for a passage or quote that kept them going when they almost quit.

My 6 weeks in India were spent walking the footsteps of my lineage of teachers. That lineage ended with Paramahansa Yogananda, author of the spiritual classic Autobiography of a Yogi.

This quote was given to me printed on a posterboard by one of my earliest coaching clients, Laura Vela. I was freshly ejected from my corporate career and completing a new home renovation with no job to support it. I’ve kept it in view and made it a practice to read it daily — often before I got out of bed during the toughest trials. Its meaning shifted dramatically, in seasons of all-time career highs.

My sponsor for my 12-step work is a year behind me on his divorce journey. I recently passed along my posterboard. It’s what he now reads each morning.

Paramahansa Yogananda said:

“When the winter of trials comes, some leaves of life fall away. This is normal. It doesn’t matter. Take it in your stride.

Say — ‘Never mind, summer is coming, and I shall blossom forth again.’

God has given inner strength for the tree to survive the harshest winters. You are no less endowed.

The wintertimes of life come not to destroy you, but to stimulate you to fresh enthusiasm and constructive effort, which will blossom forth in the spring of new opportunities that come to everyone.

You must say to yourself, ‘This wintertime of my life shall not last, I will get out of the grip of these trials, and I shall throw out new leaves and blossoms of improvements.

And once more the bird of paradise shall sit on the branches of my life.”

Look aroundleaves are brown And the sky is a hazy shade of winter Hang onto your hopes, my friend

I am guessing that like me, you have big things to create this year. Are you finding yourself stuck in the long middle? The desert between the big idea and big finish? I say good. Sure, that’s where most people quit. But it’s also where purpose comes into sharp focus. Whether it’s your next business, your new career, your screenplay, your happily ever after… This podcast exists because sooner or later, we all need the reminder:

Hell Yeah You Will.

Free Book Giveaway— Hold Nothing by Elena Brower

I’ve been so excited to share my interview with global yoga and meditation teacher, and author Elena Brower. To celebrate our Hell Yeah You Will episode release, I’m giving away an extra copy of her brand new, excellent book Hold Nothing— An Invitation to Let Go and come Home to Yourself. Enter to win by commenting, and/or restacking this post. Winner will be announced Wednesday, March 4th. Will ship with a personal note from me.