Recapping 2024: Life turned upside down, unlearning, learning, and figuring out who I am

Holy sh*t.

I remember telling Kristi at the end of 2023 that I wanted 2024 to be a year where we stabilized our life and it was the furthest thing from that.

From the beginning of the year till the very minute of writing this recap, it’s been a wild ride.

So…let’s dive in.

Life

Highlights

Had an off-site with Kristi. We went to Kingston, NY for an extended weekend, drank wine, ate great food, had deep conversations, and got clear on what we wanted from one another. I will remember this weekend for the rest of my life and the best part is that we stayed on a houseboat!
Started working with a life coach and high performance coach. Erica and Dan have changed my life. I started in September because I was feeling overwhelmed with my life. There was a lot on my plate from my family being torn apart to the gym build out going awry and trying to be an adult. Let’s just say crying while biking home on the Queensborough Bridge and listening ‘Look Up Child’ by Lauren Daigle soothed the soul but it wasn’t solving my problems.
Developed a better sense of spirituality. This is something that I struggled with in the previous year that I talked about and I think I have this new found appreciation for the “universe”. I don’t think I know exactly what that means yet but it feels like there is a higher purpose in all of our existence as we create things together as human beings. Feels woo-woo but I’ve been into woo-woo lately.
Starting to see that hard things happening to me are actually opportunities for me to grow in disguise. In 2023, I had a goal of being less emotionally reactive. In 2024, I got served a bunch of sh*t sandwiches. I was struggling but then I realized that was exactly what I asked for. I needed to learn under less favorable circumstances because that’s when you actually develop the skill, everything else is false confidence.

Lowlights

Family matters. Someone in my family got into more financial trouble than I would comfortably like to discuss. It bled in to not only my family but also my cousins, aunts, uncles, and friends. More unraveled every single week from the beginning of the year. I spent a lot of my breaks during the work week taking a walk around SoHo and straight up crying. I was mentally out of commission for the first three months.
Not home enough for dinner nor am I making it. Dang it, I did it again. While Kristi and I had a lot of awesome dates, she said that she really misses cooking together so we are bringing that back in 2025. There’s something special about preparing a meal together or preparing a meal for one another. The problem? We barely cook together and she prepares a lot of meals for me. I need to step up big time!
I took Oliver on more adventures but I wish I played with him more day-to-day instead of being on my phone. I made it an absolute mission to make sure this kid lives a good life and he is by most people’s standards but man…I’m struggling with balancing social media and being more present. A big goal for 2025 is to get off social so I’m not on my phone all the time. Part of it is work but I’d be lying if I said that it was all productive.

Lessons learned

I need to stop acting out of scarcity. I work extremely hard on myself because I was ashamed of the person that I was before and I am afraid to turn back into that person. I struggled with porn addiction, never applied myself in school, was an unreliable person, and frankly…I had no future. This was all from high school till the end of college. I shouldn’t be ashamed of my past and I should feel confident that I won’t get back there.
I need to learn to love myself and not feel imposter syndrome when I say it. Whether it’s saying “I love you” or “I am so proud of you“, both of those things feel so foreign to me. The problem is if I can’t say it to myself then I’m going to seek it externally which is not good.
Energy is everything. I have life coaching calls with Erica every week and she talks about energy. That’s all I’ve been thinking about for the past couple of months. Whatever you project is the energy that you’re going to receive. An example of this is when I don’t block out my own calendar and prioritize my time then I’m projecting to people that my time is not a priority to myself so why should it be to them?
Before you become the person you want to be, you need to feel what it’s like to be that person now. When I envision success, how does that feel? I feel well rested, consistently training, working on things that feel purposeful, never worried about things that I know I can handle, I feel free, I feel light, and I envision myself singing out when listening to music. Remember if I don’t say “I love you” to myself, I’ll seek it out externally? Well, if I can’t FEEL what it’s like the be the person I want to be…that feeling won’t come from external events in the future when I achieve “success“, it starts now.

Hanging out at the back of the house boat with Kristi and Oliver

Business

Highlights

Highest month of revenue that we’ve ever had in January. There’s no better feeling than experiencing this especially after losing a full-time employee in the September prior to that.
Traveled and hosted six different seminars. Los Angeles, New York City, Tyson’s Corner, Seattle, Denver, and Toronto. One of the highlights was Kristi and Oliver coming along for Los Angeles. The other highlight was Grace did the lower body lecture in Denver and it was really cool to see her step outside her comfort zone.
Opened a stand alone space in Midtown. This was a long time coming. One of the best moments of this year was having our massive windows open, sippin’ on a cold brew, and blasting Maxwell ‘Lake By The Ocean‘ super early in the morning before any patients came in.
Changed Defining Moment Coaching to Go Getters Coaching then collaborated with Peter to take it to the next level. Kristi and I knew we needed help so who better to ask than someone that we’ve been vibin’ with since the jump? Peter was in the same mastermind group as us and we’ve been growing together for a couple of years now.
Finally outsourced video editing and social media. I realized that I love content creation but I hate editing it and distributing it. We hired Jamil who has been helping us create and then distribute content to four Instagram accounts, two YouTube accounts, and one TikTok account.

Lowlights

Our second full-time employee left. This was tough. If I did not start working with Erica and Dan then this would have really crushed my self-esteem. I think Justin is a great guy and I am sad that he will be leaving our team. I realized a bit of what we could do differently in the future but this is part of being a small business owner. I’m sure it won’t be the last time people leave, it’s unrealistic to think so.
We were not consistent with The ‘AHA’ Moment Podcast. Podcasting is hard and it’s even more difficult when trying to get all the episodes in person. We actually launched The Go Getters Coaching Podcast which has been WAY easier to record because it’s through Riverside.fm with Peter every single week.
Contractor screwed us over during the build out. We were told that the space would be fully built out the week after our summer vacation but when we got back from vacation…it was far from finished. The flooring was not done, none of the equipment was built, and we were opening that Monday so we stayed in the gym for 12+ hours to make it presentable for our patients. To make matters worse? The contractor started building the power racks the following week and built them completely wrong so we had to do double the work in order to fix the issue. None of the custom pieces came on time, there were weeks where he’d never respond, and we ended up learning more about construction than I would like.
Did not create as much for Moment Education as I would have liked. A big part of this was the lack of creative juices when I went from navigating family to traveling for seminars, then figuring out the gym build and of course our Europe trip. By then, we went straight into the holidays! The truth is that I could have done better here by managing my time better but I’ll talk about that below.

Lessons learned

Commit to schedules. I told myself at the start of this year that I do not mind being in the clinic from 7AM-7PM from Tuesday to Thursday. This is when I’ll book all of my patients, meetings, podcast recording, etc. I always struggled with an assistant because the assistant never knew my calendar. Now, I’ve been able to actually utilize Calendly as a way to book things out without a ton of back and forth.
Timeblock to get deep work done. I created space now on Monday and Friday to be able to get deep work done. The goal is to focus on creating presentations and decks on Monday then spend Friday recording them. I’m also going to be utilizing Friday as a day to write newsletters for our businesses and do some leisurely writing as well.
Build out trainings that get 80% of the job done then refine it overtime. As people leave and new people onboard, we’ve realized repeating the same concepts are not a good use of our time. We need to create trainings to support our team that they can reference so that we are all on the same page. This is everything from sales training to clinical breakdowns to ensure quality of our service.

I ate mini muffins from Whole Foods for breakfast and crushed either Cava or Chipotle for dinner while skipping lunch during the clinic build out(*I was still seeing patients and launching a mentorship during this time*)

Fun

Highlights

Traveled for three weeks in Europe. It was a huge trip and part of our honeymoon since we took a short one last year. Kristi and I got to visit our favorite place in the world which is Paris and got to explore really neat new cities like Bologna.
Ran the NYC Marathon. I ran the United Half Marathon and had an absolute blast so I decided to sign up for the NYC Marathon. 80% of training consisted of either running to work or running home from work. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life and it felt so damn good to cross the finish line.
Was on a live segment for PIX11. I never thought I’d be on live television and for it to be a channel that is one of the prime outlets for NYC. It was an amazing experience and I’m so happy that I got to share that with Kristi.
A lot of time spent on the terrace singing, drinking wine, and vibin’ with Kristi and Oliver. This is on the vision board for myself because it’s one of the most peaceful things about the later spring, summer, and early fall. It’s a blessing and a curse. A blessing because we spend so much time on there. A curse because I don’t ever see us leaving this apartment because our terrace is so nice.
Decluttered my closet and finally starting a wardrobe that I’m excited about. There were so many things that had to go and none of it fit well anymore. I had a hard time donating clothes because some of it was barely worn. In order to get over that, I imagined a family shopping at Goodwill and stumbling upon these gems for the low low. That vision of someone being so happy after finding a steal made it so much easier to let go of stuff. My style is moving towards a mix of prep, menswear, and streetwear. I’m thinking Ivy League vibes with some nice Air Maxes or Jordans that really represent who I am as a person. I’m a cheeky professional 🙂

Lowlights

Very little time with family. A big part of it was the fact that my parents were in a terrible place and I did not know how to support them. My dad was always angry and my mom lost a ton of weight. It was difficult and I need to do better with the relationship this year but I don’t think I know how.
A lot of external events affecting my relationship with Kristi. There were arguments this year that eventually led us to both seeking help. We’re not doing marriage counseling just incase you were thinking that. We’re both actually seeing Erica haha. Our upbringings are so different and crossing cultural lines as a married couple was more difficult than expected. I’m glad that we are both getting help and our relationship is better because of it.

Lessons learned

I always win and we always win. I worry about a lot of sh*t but I always figure it out. It doesn’t matter what it is, the common theme in my life is that I always figure it out. That’s when I realized that I always win and I started to also say…we always win because I genuinely want those around to win as well. I’m bringing this energy heavy in 2025 and if you’re in my circle then you’re gonna get better by osmosis
I love myself and I am proud of the person I am. I f*cking teared up driving through the neighborhood where I grew up the other day. I was going to H-Mart on my Sunday grocery runs and I realized how much has changed. It was the first time that I said those two things to myself and I actually believed it.
Everything is happening for me. The things that I want to create, the opportunities that I want to have, and the life that I want to build…everything that happens to me is a step closer to that and I truly believe it now.