Sweat poured down my face while my teeth chattered like a cartoon character in a blizzard.

I was waiting for my final connecting flight after a brutal 10-hour journey home from Japan with salmonella poisoning (what should have been obvious: don't eat chicken sashimi on a dare).

While gripping the chair armrests for dear life, my pocket buzzed. I pulled out my phone and my stomach took a break from cartwheels and dropped to the floor.

It was a text from my colleague, Stephen, which read:

"Hey you're back in the office tomorrow right? I just booked you a demo with Nick Huber for 8 AM. Your calendar was free."

For those who don't know, Nick is a successful entrepreneur with a big following online. Back in 2023 he had launched multiple businesses and was growing super fast. His most recent venture: a business brokerage, a natural fit for his audience. This was a huge demo, as my company at the time was a software to automate the deal process for brokers.

I mustered up a reply that I'm pretty sure was just "okay" and then closed my eyes and leaned back in my chair, shivering into a half-sleep.

The next morning I woke up jet lagged and feeling just as bad (if not worse) than the day before, sprinting to the bathroom every 15 minutes. I had no idea how I was going to do this demo. But this is the closest I’ll ever get to MJ’s flu game.

Through fever-induced adrenaline, I guided Nick through our standard demo, fielding some tough questions and negotiating on pricing. I had started the morning with body chills, so I had thrown on a hoodie and sweatpants (terrible call). I ended up sweating through all three layers of my clothes and a literal puddle had started forming under my chair.

Nick, probably feeling sorry for how sweaty and ghost white I was on the call, agreed to move forward by the end of the demo.

I laugh at this story now, but it reinforced the power in doing hard things. Yeah, sure, I had a (very) valid reason to push the meeting a week. I could have told myself, 'oh you probably do a lot better on the call when you're feeling better, you HAVE to reschedule' when in reality maybe pushing a week wouldn't have worked with Nick's schedule and we would have never been able to connect.

All I know is that when you want something badly enough, putting your head down and refusing to make excuses (humanity's favorite pastime) is often the answer.

I've realized that entrepreneurship really comes down to sustained momentum with your team and clients. Driving constant progress is hard, otherwise everyone would do it. The moments that separate those who succeed from those who don't often come down to showing up when every part of you is screaming to stay home.

The WSJ just reported the highest price ever paid for modern art at auction.

While equities, gold, bitcoin hover near highs, the art market is showing signs of early recovery after one of the longest downturns since the 1990s.

Here’s where it gets interesting→

Each investing environment is unique, but after the dot com crash, contemporary and post-war art grew ~24% a year for a decade, and after 2008, it grew ~11% annually for 12 years.*

Overall, the segment has outpaced the S&P by 15 percent with near-zero correlation from 1995 to 2025.

Now, Masterworks lets you invest in shares of artworks featuring legends like Banksy, Basquiat, and Picasso. Since 2019, investors have deployed $1.25 billion across 500+ artworks.

Masterworks has sold 25 works with net annualized returns like 14.6%, 17.6%, and 17.8%.

Shares can sell quickly, but my subscribers skip the waitlist:

Skip waitlist

_{*Per Masterworks data. Investing involves risk. Past performance not indicative of future returns. Important Reg A disclosures: masterworks.com/cd}

credit: ideabrowser.com

Try these workouts out this weekend.

give one of these workouts a try this weekend

Complete 5 rounds:

5 sets of:

For time:

founders: your weekly reminder that finding founder fitness is essential to sustainable success.

I created a free guidebook for entrepreneurs called the Million Dollar Exit Guide. Know a fellow founder thinking about selling? They can download a free copy here.

every second counts