The Fundamentals of Life

People who know me know I love trying new things. A couple of years ago, I decided to try shaving with an "old school" straight razor. I bought a kit with a razor, lather brush, and cream. Before I did it, I watched a few instructional videos. One video said that you have to go very slow at first. You have to learn the shape of your face, the directions of your whiskers, etc. I've been shaving for over 30 years and didn't even know my face. Why? Because I learned with a safety razor and didn't know the proper fundamentals of shaving. I was fundamentally flawed; therefore, my face looked like I had gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson after my first shave. 

It hit me like a ton of bricks; this wasn't just a lesson in shaving but a life lesson. We have complicated our lives with so many conveniences that we have become fundamentally flawed. Most of us have no idea who we genuinely are; therefore, we don't know our weaknesses. This makes it virtually impossible to make improvements on being a human. Being a better human starts with understanding the direction of our whiskers. The quicker we learn the shape of our faces and the direction of our whiskers, the better off we will be.

In sports, we hear the word fundamentals quite often. You hear coaches talk about "the fundamentals" until they are blue in the face. Why is that? Because they are necessary. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, I trained in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. It was fairly new in the United States and extremely rare in my state. My friends and I would have to travel to seminars and schools in other states to train. No matter where we went, we constantly heard about the fundamentals. We wanted to learn the "cool stuff." We wanted the "secrets"; we wanted fancy submissions. But, what the instructors knew that we didn't realize was our fundamentals were not there. They were nice about it, but what they were trying to say was we sucked and needed to shut up and become fundamentally sound. Many times in life, we try to put our ties on before we put our shirts on.

Technology advances have made our lives convenient. It has put information about literally everything at our fingertips. That has made current and subsequent generations of young adults fundamentally flawed. I'm not generation-bashing at all. This generation has a lot of positives. The information being at their fingertips has contributed to them being extremely intelligent. But, fundamentally, many lack skills that technology has robbed them of. Their communication and social skills are lacking because texting has been the norm all of their lives. Social media is a good and bad thing; my opinion is social media was created and meant to be a positive thing. But, it has also made people comfortable with being rude and sometimes just straight cruel. Like Mike Tyson once said, social media has made people comfortable disrespecting others and not getting punched in the face. Amen, Iron Mike! Also, because of zero tolerance for fighting in most schools, many of the up-and-coming generation don't know the meaning of a "good ole friendly fight." I'm not promoting violence; I'm just stating facts. Nothing will reveal who you are fundamentally like a good fisticuff session. 

I sat down a few years ago, and over a few weeks, I established who I am fundamentally. Besides my religious beliefs, what do I believe in? What are my core values? If I wanted to survive this wild ride called life, I better become more fundamentally sound. I came up with six, wrote them down, and then read them twice a week, once at the beginning and once at the end. I read them at the beginning to remind me of who I am and what boundaries to stay in. At the end, I would do it as a debrief so I could see where I failed and where I could improve the following week.

As I said, I love trying new things and am always learning. This past year, I became hyper-focused on studying the Ancient Greek/Roman school of Stoicism. Stoicism was founded around 300 BC. The mission of the Stoics was simple: a well-lived life. After studying their philosophies through books and courses, there is no doubt I will be a lifelong practitioner and student. I added four fundamentals based on Stoic philosophies.

Over the next several weeks, I will share the ten fundamental principles that I try to live by. I'm by no means saying that my fundamentals need to be yours. I'm merely saying this:

• Figure out who you are fundamentally.

• Write these principles down.

• Try to live by them.

My hope is everyone concentrates on their fundamentals and experiences the same benefits as I have. The world doesn’t give a f..k about much, but they do care about knowing who you fundamentally are, not who you are surface level.