The Two Circles That Changed My Life
A difficult baseball game became the perfect opportunity to teach my son one of the most valuable Stoic lessons: focus your energy on what matters and what you can control.
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The Most Important Decision You’ll Ever Make
There’s something I tell my kids, and anyone else who will listen:
The single most important decision you’ll make in your life is who you marry.
Not where you go to school.
Not what career you choose.
Not where you live.
Who you marry.
Because no other person will influence the quality, feeling, and direction of your life more than the one you choose to build it with.
And here’s the thing I want my kids to understand:
When you fall in love, and it feels like maybe it’s time to settle down, and this person might be the one—stop and think hard.
Really hard.
Because you’re not just choosing a person to love.
You’re choosing a life partner.
You’re choosing the future mother or father of your children.
You’re choosing the person you’ll wake up next to for decades.
And here’s what I’ve learned:
- The little things you don’t like now will be the big things you hate later.
- If they’re trying to change you now, they’ll still be trying to change you later.
- Love is great—but love fades and changes.
- Ask yourself: would I want this person raising my kids?
If you think, oh, it’s not a big deal, trust me—it will be.
And that doesn’t get easier.
What matters more is whether this is someone you want to go through the hard stuff with. Someone who will be your teammate for life.
Because that’s what marriage really is—a partnership to grow a family together.
If you can’t picture this person teaching your children how to be good, kind, responsible humans—you need to rethink it.
It ain’t just about love. It’s about building a life.
And when it comes to that choice—take your damn time.
Choose carefully.
Because you and your spouse will shape the kind of people you send out into the world.
That’s your legacy. That’s what you leave behind.
And that matters more than just about anything else in this world.
“Know what’s enough. Build what matters.”
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