Right now, there is something you want to do. Something you want to achieve. Something you want to get.

Yet you’re not getting it. Instead, you’re sitting at your computer and reading this.

Maybe it’s for a good reason. Maybe someone has told you that your dreams are too big. Maybe you think you’re too young. Maybe your dreams feel too difficult to reach. Maybe you’ve faced failure so many times that you don’t want to risk it again. You may have encountered a hundred different reasons why you should not pursue your dreams right now, at this very moment…

But get this — not one of those things is keeping you from doing something great. Nothing is keeping you from seizing happiness.

You’re too young. You’re too inexperienced. You’re not smart enough. You don’t have enough money. You don’t have the right connections. All of those things simply speak to your perceived shortcomings. They are things which are solvable, things which you can overcome, and (more often than not) things which are not true. The world can (and will) attack you day after day, trying to convince you that you cannot reach your goals, that you are unworthy of them.

If that’s you, if you’re reading this cooped up in your small little corner of the world, separated from your passions, afraid to pursue your dreams, and you are sitting there, staring blankly at your computer screen — you are telling the world that it is right.

So believe me when I say this because I say it with my whole heart: There is nothing in all of this world that can rob you of your dreams. For they are YOUR dreams. And they are infinite.

You are worthy of happiness. So go get it.

I meander to the kitchen. Slowly pour some cereal. Sit back and eat while I watch the news. Shower. Get dressed. Brush teeth. Drive to school. Sit in class. Eat some more. Study some more. Sleep again. (Facebook also happens several more times throughout the day.)

When you boil down your day to its essence like that, life doesn’t seem very exciting does it? To me it seems downright depressing?

So what if there were another way? What if life didn’t have to seem so boring?

I propose a change. I think that we should live life as flamboyantly as possible. What do I mean? Here’s how your morning should go:

Jump out of bed. Sing a song while making breakfast. Sit outside and breathe in the fresh air. Shout out to God that you are happy to be alive and that you are thankful for today. Dance down the stairs. Smile at everyone you see. Go outside and learn something. Appreciate the beauty around you. Eat with people you love. And before you go to bed, revel in the glory of having lived another day.

Take a moment to think about that clichéd phrase: “Seize the day.” It doesn’t say “participate in the day” or “accept the day as it is.” It says seize the day. Grab the day and take it wherever you want it to go. Steer it towards happiness and joy and excitement. One of my favorite quotes from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe says, “Seize this very minute; what you can do, or dream you can, begin it; Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”

Try waking up that way tomorrow, even if tomorrow is the only day you do it. Choose to be happy. Choose to be bold. I must warn you, however – if you wake up that way once, you might never be able to stop.

I took the LSAT
It nearly killed my spirit; be glad
you didn’t take it.

If you ever become troubled with worry about your life, remember that there are people out there who are having a harder day than you. Today, those people took the LSAT.

All the time, I find myself making plans: I have a plan to start my own business, to write my own book, to run for office, etc. In fact, the most successful people in the world constantly make plans; preparation is necessary if you want to achieve greatness. In every self-help book out there (regardless of the title) you will find the central theme to be that single, insurmountable, immutable law of making more of yourself: planning.

Americans spend millions of dollars a year on, basically, that single paragraph of information. If some college kid can come up with that same advice, on the Internet, for free – then how valuable can it really be? (On that note: feel free to pay me millions of dollars after reading that.) Is planning really the most important rule of self-improvement? My answer: no. Not by a long shot.

Now don’t get me wrong, goal-setting is extremely important. That’s why I recommend it daily. But planning is not enough to turn your life from substandard into supernova. In fact it’s missing one important thing: action.

Planning is easy.

Acting is hard.

Ask yourself this question: “What dreams do I have that I haven’t acted upon?” Maybe you want to go to college; maybe you want to travel to a different country; maybe you want to start your own business. Whatever may be your dream, dreaming it is not enough. So here is a three step guide for turning your dreams into action.

Step One: Define your dream. Ambiguity is the killer of achievement. If your dream is to “make a difference,” and that’s all you have – you probably won’t see many results (if any at all). On the other hand if your dream is to “make a difference by tutoring at-risk middle schoolers every week,” then you will be 100% more likely to succeed. You can still dream big dreams – just make them specific.

Step Two: Give yourself a deadline. We’re all victims of the “I’ll do it later” strategy. After I graduate. After I settle down. After I get that promotion. After I retire. The key to getting anything done, I have found, is to give yourself a deadline, and preferably a short one at that. The only thing better than having a well-defined goal is having a timetable and a plan to achieve that goal.

Step Three: Tell EVERYONE. This is the most important step. People are generally nervous about revealing their ambitions. But whenever we tell people about our goals, it makes us work that much harder to achieve them so we can be spared the embarrassment of not succeeding. So whenever you come up with your specific goal and your specific deadline, let people know about it. I like to call this process “blackmailing yourself into success.” And it’s extremely effective.

You can plan and plan until you have the most perfect plan in all the world, but until you get up, get going, and actually do something, that’s all your dream will ever be: a plan. So start acting now. Start living with ferocity. Start striving for your dreams as though your life depended on it – because it does. But most importantly, never imagine even for a second that your dreams are beyond you. You are worthy of your dreams. And your dreams are worthy of action.

Ready. Set. Go.

Inspired by Jason Roberts.

Last Friday I gave a TED Talk at TEDxOU, which I have been preparing for over the past few months. Many TED organizers describe the ideal TED Talk as “the talk of your life,” something – a story, an argument, an invention – which is in some way novel and which lays out your soul bare for the world to see and consider. That’s a pretty tall order, isn’t it? Throughout my preparation I tried to think of what my story could be, what I have to offer the world. At times it was frustrating. What could I, a college student with barely any life experience under my belt, possibly have to tell the world?

I spent hours upon hours and days upon days working with this speech, pulling it apart and shaping it to tell my story just right. In fact I stayed up late into the night hours before my presentation, editing and practicing and editing some more until I was too tired to stay awake any longer. Despite all that practicing and editing, in all of the iterations of my speech, and in all of the times I rehearsed it, I never gave it quite like I gave it on stage in front of hundreds of people.

I don’t know why I wasn’t nervous, but I wasn’t. I hardly even noticed who was in the audience; I don’t remember the little nuances and variations that arise every time you give performance, because all I remember was that I was thinking about my life. I was thinking about the story I was telling and how just several weeks ago I didn’t even think I had one to tell. Yet there I was, on stage, sharing it with the world.

And then it hit me, a realization that for some reason I had never considered before. A realization so powerful and so profound that in the few days since it struck me, it has changed the way I view my existence. And it is this: Your story is worth telling because it is your story. No one in the whole world – no one in all of human history – has your story to tell; and no one can tell it quite like you. And whether or not people can relate to it, it is worth telling because it is unique. Because you are unique.

That is the power of story. Not only can it inspire others and give them permission to tell their stories, it can give you the perspective you need to see your life in full scope. I viewed my life as a collection of incidences, not yet full enough or long enough to warrant telling. But when I viewed it as a story, albeit one that I am still living out, I saw life a little differently. And it was all in the way I looked at things, all because I read my story. Maybe it’s time to read yours.

People don’t see enough of this type of statement in the world. They turn on the news and see death and dismay, heartbreak and hopelessness, but they don’t see faith. They don’t see unconquerable joy. And, in my opinion, that is one of the greatest tragedies of our time.

It is very easy to look at problems (be they yours or someone else’s) and complain, throw up your arms and say “I quit!” That sort of pecimism runs rampant in our society. But by putting these words on display for the whole world to see – you can reverse that trend. Everyday you have the opportunity to be positive, to be a bright and shining beacon to a world covered in darkness. That is your power. And it is also your responsibility.

I will leave you with one of my favorite quotes, by Carlos Castaneda: “The trick is in what one emphasizes. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same.”

Choose happiness, for yourself — and for the world. Call it a New Years resolution.

A wide array of stories dotted our newsscape this year: from Psy to Palestine, from Red Bull to Benghazi, from Obama to the Olympics – 2012 has been the year of big headlines. This has been the year of groundbreaking achievements – of never-before’s – of far-flung dreams becoming realities. This was the year of changing the world. (And on that note: 50+ easy ways YOU can change the world.)

At the end of every year I like to look back and see what I’ve accomplished. I like to see where I have succeeded, and I also like to see where I have failed. For me, this year has been about deciding on my future; it has been about dreaming big and doing big things; it has been about developing myself and figuring out where I fit in the world. On the other hand, I can also see many areas where I can improve – so many things I would like to change.

But this year I am going to do something different. Instead of figuring out what I would like to change for next year, I want to write down the lessons I have learned that I want to carry on into the future. I want to share these lessons with you – my time capsule for 2012.

1. Never stop meeting people. For a long time I never understood the social butterflies out there; I never understood why some people want to go out of their way to meet new people and just talk with them. Then two things happened: 1) I read a book called Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi, and 2) I started blogging. If you haven’t done either of those things, then do them ASAP. Both of them changed my views on the world and society at-large. I am by no means an extrovert, but I understand the importance of meeting new people – of hearing their stories – of sharing in life with them. That is the very essence of living.

2. Executing is even more important than organizing. This fall I was in charge of coordinating events for an arts festival taking place at my university in September. I spent the first six months of that journey learning as much as I could about festival-planning, a process which introduced me to many wonderful people and ideas, and organizing all of my thoughts and dreams into one solid vision. Before I knew it, the festival had arrived and all of my months of hard work and planning suddenly seemed so useless in comparison to the utter decisiveness of things like weather and other chaotic events. I had months of opportunities to plan for those mishaps, but I never took action. (Read about the importance of taking action in this article I wrote.) The arts festival was a hit, and I greatly enjoyed the process of planning it; however, I realized in that one weekend in September that it doesn’t matter how much you plan to succeed – it only matters how you actually do it.

3. Joy is more valuable than misery. I believe one of the greatest signs of maturity is the ability to forgo misery in favor of joy. There is some part of every one of us that, in many instances, merely wishes to grovel in our misfortunes; life has dragged us down and we don’t want to make the effort to stand up again. Yet, eventually (and inevitably), we get back on our horse and continue riding down our road in life. This year I made a concerted effort to never let life keep me down. Of course there were obstacles in my way, events of bad luck or bad timing that put a damper on my otherwise happy life. But for the first time I was able to see past those things and make a decision to be happy. You always have a choice. Choose joy. (You can see how I made that decision in my blog post “Getting Rid of the Hiccups“)

4. It’s never the end. December 21st was supposed to be the end of the world. It came and went and we are all still here. I predict I will be facing personal “end of the world” moments for the rest of my life, times when I feel that all hope is lost and that I am better off crawling into a cave waiting for the world to simply stop spinning. But this year I have come to realize that hope can always spring anew, even (and especially) from the most unlikely places. One of my favorite quotes goes, “Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, then it’s not the end.” Life goes on. Next year will bring challenges just as this year brought challenges. But there will always be something else right around the corner; there will always be life waiting for you to live.

2012 arrived as heralding the end of the world, and it leaves as merely the beginning of the rest of my life. 2012 was a great year. But 2013… now that’s going to be something special.

Reblogged from The Write Side of the Bed:

Perhaps the Mayans had their time zones confused. Or perhaps the end of the world will still come later in the day.

Nevertheless it begs the simple, oft-cliched question: If this were to be your last day on earth, what would you do?

Happy Writing!

He keepeth me from lying down when I should be studying.

He leadeth me beside the water cooler for a study break:

He restoreth my faith in study guides.

He leads me to better study habits

For my GPA’s sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of borderline grades,

I will not have a nervous breakdown:

For thou are with me.

My prayers and my friends, they comfort me.

Thou givest me answers in moments of blankness:

Thou anointest my head with understanding.

My test paper runneth over with questions I recognize.

Surely passing grades and flying colors shall follow me

All the days of my examinations.

And I shall not dwell in this university forever.