Eric "Brickwall" Decker

Pain isn’t punishment.

Pain is information.

It’s your body, your mind, your life tapping you on the shoulder saying:

This isn’t working.

Do something different.

Make a change.

Adjust your approach.

Ignore pain?

You drift.

You stagnate.

You repeat the same mistakes and hope for different outcomes.

Pain isn’t the enemy.

It’s the signal before the breakdown.

It’s the warning before the spiral.

It’s the knock at the door before life kicks it in.

Don’t drown it out.

Listen.

Adapt.

Grow.

Pain speaks.

Answer it.

You don’t have to think in hours.

Hours overwhelm you.

Hours make you hesitate.

Hours make you stall out and scroll.

Think smaller.

Think in minutes.

Think in five.

Five minutes of reading.

Five minutes of writing.

Five minutes of creating, strategizing, planning.

Five minutes of training.

Five minutes of cleaning your environment so your mind can breathe.

You don’t need a perfect window.

You just need a tiny opening.

Because five minutes is enough to flip the switch.

Enough to build momentum.

Enough to turn “I’ll do it later” into “I already started.”

Five minutes can be the spark.

And the spark is all you need to light the fuse.

Start small.

Start now.

Let the five carry you.

It’s high.

Higher than most realize.

Because every time you start over, you’re delaying.

Delaying your mission. Delaying your future. Delaying the impact you could’ve already been making.

And you don’t have much time. Your window closes a little more every day. This is a race against the clock, whether you admit it or not.

There is no perfect version. No flawless iteration. Nothing will ever be “just right.”

So stop scrapping the work. Stop rewriting your origin story. Stop resetting the clock.

Keep sending it. Keep going. Keep refining while in motion.

Adjust. Pivot. Course-correct.

But don’t start over. Starting over drains momentum—and momentum is your most valuable asset.

Build forward, not backward.

A holiday to give thanks. Be grateful. Even overindulge a little.

But gratitude isn’t just a day on the calendar.

It’s a practice. A posture. A way of walking through the world.

You don’t only give thanks for the good things.

You give thanks for the hard things.

The adversity that shaped you. The discipline that saved you. The setbacks that built your spine. The responsibilities that forced you to grow.

You give thanks for the weights on your back—because that’s how you get stronger.

So give thanks for it all. Today. And every other day.

You get to build.

And that alone is something to be incredibly grateful for.

Never take it for granted.

You can schedule all you want.

Color-code it. Block it. Organize it.

And for a moment, it feels good.

Orderly. Controlled. Optimistic.

But long-term consistency doesn’t come from calendars.

It comes from identity.

Do you just write?

Or are you a Story Builder?

Do you just go to the gym?

Or are you a Musclebuilder?

Do you just have kids?

Or are you a Dad?

When something becomes part of who you are, it stops being negotiable.

It stops depending on motivation.

It becomes automatic—woven into your wiring.

Identity anchors behavior.

Make the mission part of your DNA. Carve it into your spine.

Because schedules break.

Identity doesn’t.

Low-value food.

Junk information.

Off-mission people.

Poison in the system.

Body, mind, spirit…crushed.

Your inputs are the raw materials of your life.

What you consume becomes what you are.

Garbage in?

Garbage out.

Don’t leave your gates unguarded.

Filter.

Curate.

Protect the Forge.

Because who you are—and who you’re becoming—depends on the inputs.

Guard your gates.

Relentlessly.

In the past, you may have faded into the background.

You may have been nameless. Faceless.

You may have been a nobody—a minor character in someone else’s story.

No longer.

You’re at the front now.

You’re the lead.

You have a name. You have a face.

You’re the main character—the hero—of your own story…even the hero of other’s stories.

You don’t need permission. You don’t need to be crowned. You don’t need to be appointed.

You’re a Builder.

Go live like it.

Kids are incredible at one thing adults forgot how to do: reset fast.

A tantrum ends, and thirty seconds later they’re laughing.

A scraped knee ruins the moment…but not the day.

They don’t replay the mistake. They don’t spiral.

They reset.

But adults? We carry things.

Bad traffic infects the whole morning.

One missed workout convinces you you’re slipping.

One small mistake becomes a three-day funk.

The problem isn’t the situation—life will always throw something.

The problem is the lag: the time between the stumble and the reset.

World-class athletes are masters of the fast reset.

The fighter who gets dropped.

The quarterback who throws a pick.

The pitcher who gives up a bomb.

The goalie who gets scored on.

They don’t linger. They reset. Immediately.

Resetting is a skill.

And like all skills, it strengthens with practice.

No drama.

No self-punishment.

No rewriting your identity.

Just: Learn. Adjust. Forward.

You can’t move ahead if you’re stuck replaying what already happened.

Shorten the lag, and you unlock a stronger, calmer, more dangerous version of yourself.

Most people drift through life half-alive. Half-awake. Half-expressed. Half-in.

But every once in a while, you see someone who’s fully on.

I saw it at a concert.

The singer. The band.

Every one of them lit up from the inside.

Pouring their hearts out like it was their last night on earth.

Not phoning it in. Not coasting. Not giving “good enough.”

They were on.

Dialed. Present. Locked in.

Masters of their craft.

Sweating for it. Bleeding for it. Losing themselves in it.

And here’s the part that stuck with me:

When someone is on, you feel it in your chest. It hits your ribs. It shakes something loose inside you. It reminds you what a human can be when they stop holding back.

Most people never experience that version of themselves.

But here’s the truth:

We can show up that way, every day.

Not halfway. Not lukewarm. Not hiding your gifts. Not waiting for the perfect moment.

But fully alive. Fully engaged. Fully expressed. Fully on.

That’s where the magic is. That’s where the fire is. That’s where your life opens up.

You don’t need a stage.

You just need the day. The reps. The moments where you say:

“I’m done drifting. I’m flipping the switch.”

Because when you’re on?

People feel it. The world responds. And your life starts moving.

Turn it on.

The world’s waiting for your voltage.

What can you do?

Carry heavy things?

Sprint away from danger if life demanded it?

Walk long distances?

Break a fall, catch your kid, hold your ground?

But capability isn’t just physical.

It’s also emotional.

It’s also spiritual.

Can you keep faith when things look bleak?

Can you hold discipline when the world tests you?

Can you stay calm under pressure?

Can you take a hit, or two, or three, and keep moving forward?

Capability is the sum of a thousand small disciplines:

• The reps you log (in and out of the gym)
• The miles you walk (and run)
• The books you read
• The food you prepare
• The nights of sleep
• The habits you build
• The storms you endure

Capability is not a gift.

It’s not luck.

It’s not talent.

It’s built.

Choice by choice.

Day by day.

Brick by brick.

Build capability…not out of paranoia. Not out of fear.

But out of respect—for life, for responsibility, for the people who count on you.

When life ask you the question, “What are you prepared to do?”

Be capable of answering, “Anything that needs doing.”