There's a quote that states, whatever you are, be a good one. The pride you take in your work

and the quality you're looking to obtain throughout, well, it's just as important as the direction

you are heading. And I spent some time thinking about this. It was recently on an 11-hour

flight home from Japan where, you know, I got to

see a lot. I learned a lot. A few things I want to share over the course of the next couple

weeks. But there was one that stood out to me above all, right? One that I felt I needed to inject into my personal life. And so,

let's start there. It's the apparent pride that the Japanese take in their culture. Now,

admittedly anecdotal, right, based on a relatively quick experience, I was only there for

about a week, but also it was the thing that was most evident, right, that jumped out at me.

It felt sacred from the way they talked about being Japanese, at least those few short conversations I was able to have,

to the cleanliness of the cities and buildings.

I mean, the subway in Tokyo was so clean that it felt like a simulation.

To every car that drove by being washed and waxed, and I mean every car,

I saw no trash on the street. There were no

homeless people out, which given that I was in the busiest part of Tokyo seems to be quite the

feat. The bottom line is, these folks across the board take tremendous pride in themselves

in their communities.

Now, I can't speak, nor am I going to attempt to speak to the socioeconomic impact of that type of standard.

But I can tell you that in many ways, from a personal standpoint, there was something powerful about it. I can tell you that my first

instinct was, again, to inject that mentality into as much of my own world as I can. That taking pride

in your surroundings and your outward appearance makes you feel better inside. That when your world is messy and cluttered, so is your mind.

That when you don't invest in your environment,

...