https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DHXZ25V5/
What inspired you to write Get Off the Ladder?
I worked with a lot of people and teams who felt like they were stuck. They didn’t feel as though they had done anything personally or professionally. Mind you, some of them had years of different accomplishments varying in size. But nothing that was considered a “big deal” to them. In their minds they hadn’t done anything worthy of being recognized and didn’t feel any fulfillment in their actions like they didn’t hit some ridiculously high target, they hadn’t reached the proverbial top yet. An arbitrary point set, sometimes by themselves, but usually by societal standards that can be impossible to reach.
This is pretty common thinking. That we can’t feel any satisfaction in our accomplishment until we reach the very top of whatever it is we are trying to do. And that final spot, that is success, and that is where we will find fulfillment. So in order to reach it we have to just keep on going. That we have to keep climbing this “ladder” and only when we reach the top can we be satisfied in what we have done and can we say we were successful. This leads to disillusionment. Because we might never actually reach the top, and we think it isn’t worth it and give up. All while missing the smaller accomplishments that make up life itself.
So, the idea came that we need to rethink this entire process. We need to get off the ladder, and rethink what it means to be successful and where we should derive satisfaction in life from. It isn’t one single grandiose accomplishment, it is all the different ones we can have through out entire lives. Because life isn’t a straight climb or linear process, it is a cyclical one we can follow again and again. It became the underlying idea for my dissertation, and was crafted to be more applicable to everyday life.
Can you share a personal experience that shaped your view on success and satisfaction?
When I was still in the Marines I set a goal to become a Marine Combat Instructor of Water Survival. That’s a mouthful, so they are known as MCIWS. It is not an easy certification to come by. Less than .1% of the Marine Corps hold this cert. Mainly because the course itself is so demanding. They have an attrition rate of 50%, and most dropouts are what’s called a DOR or “drop on request”. The training is so rigorous, mentally and physically, not many make it through. Its literally hours of swimming, treading water and drills that are all done to “drown proof” you. There was a lot of time spent at the bottom of the pool, lungs burning, wanting to come up for air, but you just had to finish the drill first.
A lot of people might look at this and say “no thank you”. I even got asked by some friends why go through all of that? To them, the long training days, physical effort and mental anguish just weren’t worth it. But to me it was everything. Getting that certification would be an ultimate success, and earning the title brought me immense satisfaction. Even more so when I took over the Water Survival School on Parris Island and starting running those courses myself.
It not only shaped my views, it also shaped what it takes to accomplish something. Work needs to be put in. Period. We can want something so badly, and try to “manifest” it into existence, but until we actually do the work and take action nothing will happen.
In your book, you discuss the concept of "Sisu." How did you come across this idea, and why is it important?
A lot of my study and work focused on inner resilience. On working through challenges as they arise and being able accomplish something regardless of how small it seems. No one seems to embody that quite like the people of Finland. Sisu is a Finnish term that has a wide meaning but is best described as willpower, determination and acting rationally in the face of adversity. It fit very well into the overall “Get Off the Ladder” concept because it is about more than just grinding through but being able to discern what is worth working on.
It isn’t about trying to do everything, it is about doing what matters most from an inner perspective. That the drive to accomplish something comes from within, and we decide what is worth the effort and what it will take to get it done. More importantly is that when we do get it done, there wont be a crowd cheering for us, or a million likes on social media. The reward isn’t praise or public recognition, the reward is in the accomplishment itself and the inner feeling it brings us.
That is what makes it so important. We aren’t going to have the cheering section for all our accomplishments, and most of them wont be highly visible to the public. Nor can we expect these same external factors to be our driver to actually accomplish anything. It needs to come from within. The desire to do something, the definition of what success will look like, and the satisfaction we feel when we are done all start and end with us.
You talk about redefining success; could you give an example from your own life where you had to do this? Why does redefining success matter?
For years I was a competitive triathlete. I competed on the Marine Corps triathlon team, multiple Ironman events, and wanted to reach “All World Athlete” status for Ironman. In 2019, I did just that, and was able to sit back and enjoy my accomplishment for a while. Thinking about the next race season and crafting a training plan I had to stop and ask myself what it was I wanted to do. Training for and competing in triathlons is a time consuming endeavor. I talk about “opportunity cost” in the book, and you have to be willing to give something up in order to do something else.
Living in Colorado, there are a variety of outdoor activities that I wanted to do more of. I’ve always enjoyed mountain biking, and fell in love with skiing too. The more time I spent with these activities, the less time I had to train for races. At that point, better race times didn’t really match what I wanted to do, so my definition of success changed. I opted to ride longer and more difficult trails on my mountain bike. This meant adjusting my training plans to get better balance and a different kind of stamina. It also meant more time exploring different parts of the state, and taking me out to Moab, Utah. Success now meant riding new, increasingly technical trails with greater elevation.
But that changed too. In 2024 my son was born, and having an infant meant less time spent on the bike. My definition of success changed again. Getting out to ride a new (albeit closer) trail became my definition of success for riding. Spending quality time with my family is what mattered most.
We are going to have to redefine success multiple times in our life. Not just with our personal preferences, also because life changes. Being able to adapt to these changes ensures we sustain our growth, and we continuously learn new things. Not only about what it is we are trying to accomplish, we also learn new things about ourselves in the process.
What are some common misconceptions people have about success that you wanted to challenge with this book?
There are a few I work to challenge like our perception of time and how we think working on something for just fifteen minutes a day isn’t a valuable use of time. When in reality, even if we just do fifteen minutes for five days a week, that turns out to be sixty five hours over the course of a year working on one thing which is probably worth it. I also challenge the idea that success is purely based on money or status. We can find success in activities or actions that have no monetary value or public recognition. In fact most endeavors we take on that we can find success in won’t have either. Success is in the accomplishment, and what we determine that to be. In almost every chapter of the book an idea we have come to accept as the norm gets challenged. All done with the goal to have people think differently.
The biggest one is that success and fulfillment are a single end point. That we need to work towards one grand accomplishment for our entire lives and only once we reach it can we feel a sense of satisfaction in our efforts. And until we reach this mythical end point, we can’t enjoy what we accomplish along the way. We can work for a lifetime and never reach this single accomplishment and feel the need to just “stay the course” even if we don’t feel a personal connection to it after years of effort. Instead we need to see success in every accomplishment, regardless of how small it is. We can feel satisfaction in the effort it took to do it, and be fulfilled by it. Life is made up of these moments, and if we work to find success and satisfaction throughout our lives, we can ensure that we have a lifetime worth of fulfillment.
You have a background in performance psychology. How did you get into that field and how has it influenced the advice and strategies you offer in the book?
Performance Psychology explores the mental and emotional factors that prevent us, and enable us, to perform at our best. Whether it is in an athletic setting, corporate world, or even artistic, there are countless areas in our life we look to perform well. It started when I was running the Water Survival School and wanted to better understand the reason so many top tier Marines would DOR. I worked to implement different strategies and mental interventions into the training so they could better deal with the emotional strain that came with the stressful environment they operated in. We actually saw a 20% drop in how many DOR’s each course had because of it.
It really shaped the different ideas for the book because so many of the reasons we accomplish something or give up are internal. Our negative self-talk, our reasoning for not trying something, or even our inability to succeed come down to us. The book looks to touch on the “why” but mostly focuses on the “how”. How to work through these different factors, and implement different methods to overcome them. It is less about the theory and more about the application to enable leaders to go from knowing to doing faster.
What do you hope readers take away from your book?
That they own the entire process. From defining what success looks like, to creating the plan and putting in the work. It ultimately comes down to them. We get used to people telling us what to do. In school we were told what assignments to do, readings to complete and tests to take in order to get a good grade and be successful. So when we enter adulthood, we wait for someone to tell us what success looks like and what it will take to get there. When we do this, we might be working towards a definition of success that we don’t have any internal drivers to work for. Whether it is in our professional life or personal we just wait for someone to tell us what we should be doing.
That’s the thing, no one is going to tell us. We need to decide what it is we want to do with our lives, create a plan to do it and start taking the necessary actions to do so. Which is exactly where the cyclical nature comes into play. We decide what success is, craft the plan to make it happen, put in the work and then reach it. Once we reach it, we can enjoy the fulfillment it brought us, and only once that feeling fades do we start the cycle over. Each time we cycle through, we decide what the new definition is, how it changes, and what that next accomplishment will be. Each time we cycle through it, we learn and grow. This ensures that our growth is continuous and varied. So we don’t stagnate in one spot forever, we are continuously doing more and becoming more.
What would success look like for you and this book? What result would bring you satisfaction with it being published?
When I first started this process I always said if one person reads this book and finds the information useful? I can call it a success and find satisfaction in that. After a few weeks of it being available, some readers reached out to me and said it really changed the way they think. Reviews starting coming in, and the sentiment was shared that they had the “aha” moments I was hoping for.
That met my needs. I could consider this a success and I still get a sense of fulfillment in what I have done because someone found it useful. Regardless of how many sales come through, or lists this book makes, to me I accomplished exactly what I set out to do.
What was the most challenging part of writing this book?
The actual process of publishing required some serious learning. I talk about that as a key step in the cycle, what do we need to learn in order to accomplish what we set out to do. There are multiple steps to the publishing process and each one got broken down into its own definition of success and cycle. From editing, to printing, to marketing, each one of these required me to learn something new, iterate on it, and allocate serious time to accomplishing. It was challenging for sure, but breaking each one down into its own cycle was effective and resulted in the book becoming available to readers everywhere.
I think that itself is a estimate to the effectiveness of the cycle. When writing a book, getting it published is the top of the ladder right? It can seem daunting to do, like it’s a far off point that might never come. And all the effort along the way is moot unless it gets accepted by a big publisher. However everything along the way was its own accomplishment. Finishing my first draft was a success, and brought me fulfillment. Sharing it with a select group for their initial thoughts was a success, and it was satisfying to make edits and have them re-read it. Getting the first printed proof, and having a tangible copy of my work was profoundly satisfying. Long before the book was for sale, I had already experiences satisfaction in my efforts and found success.
Are there any new projects or books you are currently working on that readers can look forward to?
I have a few ideas that are in various stages of work. One of them is a continuation of the cyclical concept from a leadership and team perspective, which is probably next up to really dig into based on the performance of “Get Off the Ladder”. An idea I am most excited about though focuses on nature. I’ve always been an avid outdoor lover, and spending quality time outside is always something I strive for. Just like with the idea of success though, we have come to view time spent in nature differently. Often times we abuse it, and go into nature with the wrong intentions. This book would challenge some of our accepted reasons for going into nature, and highlight the importance of its preservation as well as how we can get back to enjoying nature with the right intentions, and what we stand to gain from it. It is in the works right now, and most of the ideas are scattered through the pages of my notebook. For right now though, I am enjoying having the latest book available!
I really appreciate you taking the time for the questions and your subscribers enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed answering them!
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