One big gift I gave to myself. So can you!

When you watch, read, or listen to something interesting, what do you do with it? I am sharing with you this story, one of the beautiful things that happened in my life.

Yesterday marked my 2057th day on a challenge I took back on December 28th, 2018. I received a gift on that Christmas day out of nowhere. So my wife and I were on our daily running routine as usual. And five minutes before we left the house, I prepared the YouTube playlist so that I could run and learn something new at the same time. The playlist was long enough for a 60-minute run. And for some reason, we decided that morning to stay a little longer at the park just to enjoy the holiday season. Guess what? My playlist ended. And a new video was recommended. Time bending? Wow, interesting. So, I listened to it. That was the video I shared on my post yesterday. Ken Hughes shared his idea of how we could bend time with a 365-day-challenge of doing one new thing you never done before every day.

I watched it again and again on that Christmas. I shared it with my family, my staff, my clients, and the people in my social network. The idea was interesting, and the challenge seemed cool. But 365 days? Everyday? That's tough.

Here's the fun part. I couldn't watch anything else for the next two days but his TEDx Talk. I wrote down my feelings and tried to reason why his talk resonated so much to me and the situation I was in. I was in charge of a big and high performing team. We have been the biggest contributors to the growth of the business. But I wasn't happy. My global leaders left, and these were the people I truly admired. I saw the shift in our group's vision and mission, and such objectives were not something I loved doing. So, on December 28th, 2018, I took on his challenge. One new thing, everyday!

That's been a beautiful gift I gave to myself. On December 27th, 2019, I gave my second book that I wrote specifically as a gift to my oldest daughter on her birthday and as a farewell gift for her new journey to the US for high school on January 1st, 2020. We had a wonderful financial result as a startup just 6 months in the business. And that's the 365th day. The challenge was completed. So, what's next? Who says 365-day-challenge must end on the 365th day, right? So, I continued and that's led to my wonderful journey of learning, relearning, inventing, and reinventing. That's how I started the platform #InsightsSharing to connect with great thinkers around the world to interview and shared their insights and stories so people can listen, learn, and do something with that. That's the start for me and my wife to write our first book together and donated that book selling money to a very small and poor church in my grandparent's village, where my mother grew up to help them build the community center for so children in that village could come to play and learn at their free time. That's how my wife and I became the first Vietnamese who interviewed over 650 experts in 60 countries within the first 18 months of Covid-19 and until now more than 1000 amazing people were interviewed. That’s how we became the very few people on earth able to interview the youngest man who walked on the moon. Only twelve people ever walked on the Moon, four of them are still alive. We interviewed him, it was a wonderful conversation. And we look forward to interviewing his wife because her stories are also very interesting for anyone to listen to. Along that journey, we interviewed Ken Hughes himself. I took me more than 2 years to get him to agree to share his stories on our program, and that’s totally worth the effort and the waiting time. Here is the link to that wonderful conversation: https://youtu.be/9QTGklLlBnY

I am sharing this story here with the hope that for anyone who reads it will take a little time out of your busy day and rethink your journey. When was the last time you read, listened to, or watched something interesting? What did you want to do after that? Why didn’t you do it? And why not do something about it now? You will never know how the future will be but at least you give yourself permission to try. And hopefully it will lead you to something beautiful, to a great journey of your life.

Why wait? Why not now?