I am a hustler. I hustle. 24/7/365. No matter what I am doing, I put every single thing I have into it.

I am not ashamed that I work hard. But it does make me very narrowed focus sometimes.

I focus on big pay offs, and if doesn’t net me something personally, 99.99% of the time I will ignore it.

In the past few years, I have really trimmed down my life to things that are relevent, things that push me further in life, and things that will benefit me and my family. Everything else I have dropped. Friends, stuff, job titles, all the things that won’t put me in a position to be successful are no longer in my life.

99.99% of the time.

Today, I was reminded of that .01%.

An Email From My Grandma

Most of the email I just breeze over and don’t even open. Again – the only way you will get an open from me is if there is something I will benefit from. That is just how I roll.

My grandma sends email all the time. Sometimes chain emails. Sometime jokes. Occasionally family news. All get opened (she is my grandma), most get a glance at best, and a majority ends up in the trash faster than I can say “Oh – grandma sent me an email”.

Today was different.

I received an email from my grandma. The subject was “Fwd: POPE FRANCIS”. I am not very religious. And not very catholic for the little bit of religious I am. So strike one already. The Fwd means it was like the 5th string coming around. Strike 2. The first line had about 29 blank spaces. Strike 3. I opened it (because it is grandma) scrolled down very quickly and hit the trash button.

As the next email came up, I realized I saw something in there that was intriguing.

Weep not for….

That is all I saw before I hit the trash button. I took a deep breath, slowed down, and went and retrieved the email out of the trash.

I scrolled down past the 29 blank spaces and past the information on why this email needs to keep being forward. And was struck in the gut like a right hook from Mike Tyson:

Weep not for what you have lost, fight for what you have.

Weep not for what is dead, fight for what was born in you.

Weep not for the one who abandoned you, fight for who is with you.

Weep not for those who hate you, fight for those who want you.

Weep not for your past, fight for your present struggle.

Weep not for your suffering, fight for your happiness.

With things that are happening to us, we begin to learn that nothing is impossible to solve, just move forward.

Go back up and read those again – just don’t skim. Read every single word and let them sink in with you. Here – I will do it for you. Email is in BOLD, my comments in italics.

Weep not for what you have lost, fight for what you have. What you have lost is in the past. All you have is the now – the right now – the people in your life. Fight for that. 

Weep not for what is dead, fight for what was born in you. No matter what we have in life, our grave is all the same size. What matters is what is inside you. What matters is who you are and what you leave behind that you cannot take to the grave with you. Fight for that. 

Weep not for the one who abandoned you, fight for who is with you. People come and people go. True friends, true family, true people stay in your life. Let the people who go – go. Keep the people that matter. Fight for that. 

Weep not for those who hate you, fight for those who want you. Haters hate. That is what they do. They try to bring you down. Disregard them. There are people who bring you up and that is who you need to focus on. Fight for that. 

Weep not for your past, fight for your present struggle. Wow – this one got me. The past is that past. It is gone. We cannot dwell on it. The future is unknown. We cannot control it. All we have is the present – the right now – the current struggle. Fight for that. 

Weep not for your suffering, fight for your happiness. Life is a tough son of a bitch. We all suffer. We all cry. We all have down falls. Forget those suffering and focus on happiness. Fight for that. 

With things that are happening to us, we begin to learn that nothing is impossible to solve, just move forward. Just move forward. No matter what – NO MATTER WHAT you are going through, the next step needs to be forward. Not backwards where you were. Not sideways to step around it. FORWARD.

I got goose bumps reading this again.

I share this for 2 reasons…

1 – never ignore emails from your grandma – you never know when one will motivate you.

2 – fight for positive, not for negative. I actually just recently wrote about this, instead of bashing what we hate we need to promote what we love. Pope Francis (not sure if he really wrote this, but we will give him credit) focuses on the same thing. Stop weeping for things that don’t matter and start fighting for what you have not – in the present.

That is one powerful message that I hope you will take with you tomorrow during your day – fight for the present, weep not for the past.

Thank you Grandma.