“The place to do your work, to live the good life, is here.”

This morning, a dead Roman philosopher called me out on my bullshit and held my favorite form of self-sabotage up to my face.

I'm in my third year of reading Ryan Holiday's The Daily Stoic. Though I am in a much better place than when I picked it up and started a daily reading habit, the value of the lessons have not lost their impact. And I can't imagine that will ever change.

There are times when I turn the page to kick off the day and the quote hits me. That happened this morning when I read today's entry titled The Good Life is Anywhere.

There are two takeaways from today's passage that I want to share with you and hopefully inspire and give you the smack upside the head that you might need—like I did.

The first is about the excuses that we too often employ for not starting an initiative or getting through the messy middle or achieving a goal. I've come across this so many times. For example, when I suggest to someone they should write and publish a blog or record a podcast, the most common excuse is that they need to finish creating a website first. Another is my own bullshit that leads to me continually falling off the exercise routine.

I used to do this all of the time myself until I got tired of my own bullshit and started to accept that no matter how much I succeed, there will always be something blocking the reality of my perfect scenario. That's why Ryan's wake up call for August 3rd resonates so deeply.

We tell ourselves that we need the right setup before we finally buckle down and get serious. Or we tell ourselves that some vacation or time alone will be good for a relationship or an ailment. This is self-deceit at its finest.

It's far better that we become pragmatic and adaptable—able to do what we need to do anywhere, anytime. The place to do your work, to live the good life, is here.

The second takeaway I get from today's message is literally about place. Putting off our happiness because of the discontent of where we are physically at the moment. Dude, I fight this all of the time, longing to live in another place that I imagine would be more inspiring than where I am today. Though I know the perfect place does not exist, there is something inside me that continually falls for the illusion of greener grass on the other side. This is partially why we have lived in so many places across the country—always chasing that mythical somewhere that would finally unlock everything.

The Data Scientist has helped me recognize my tendency to prepare for the future instead of living in the present. It's something I've focused on in the last couple of years and that shift in perspective has been amazing for my ability to see the good life that we have now, not the one I want us to have in some dream about the future. That profound shift has helped me see that living the life we want, creating art, and being fulfilled doesn't require perfect conditions.

The place to do your work, to live the good life, is here. Right where you are now. Stop waiting for the perfect setup. Stop chasing the perfect location. Start where you are, with what you have, today.