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Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride
Over Memorial Day Weekend in May of 2015, I found myself in Austin, Texas with people I didn’t know well. On one day in particular, the man leading the Mastermind I was in town to attend asked me if I’d like to see the bats under the Congress Avenue Bridge in the downtown Austin area. It was an opportunity for me to buy the ticket and take the ride and I was all in.
I smiled and nodded and followed him out of the hotel lobby and in to the street. The cacophony of sounds assaulted my brain initially. Then I leaned into it and moved closer to the center of the activity. At that moment I thought of Hunter S. Thompson when he said, “Buy the ticket, take the ride.”
At some point I began to question why I had been so eager to join this man, when I had other things that needed to be done and did not even find him particularly interesting. Creating or being involved in a situation that may get you in way over your head may sound like a good idea, but deciding that turning back part of the way in isn’t a viable option can have far-reaching effects on your life. It all comes down to one thing, at least in my thinking: Confidence.
No matter who you are, where you live, or what you’ve chosen as a career, life is stressful. Even the most successful people in the world have endured tough situations and they made the conscious decision to take control of…
