The Skills Are There. The Results Aren't. What's Wrong With Me?

And the 3-letter word my daughter learned that helps me keep going

I’m sitting here at my desk trying to figure out how to write this without sounding like I’m having a breakdown.

Maybe I am.

You know, I made $100K/year at 34. I lived in Thailand and then Nepal. I could do whatever I wanted because I had the money to do it.

Traveled all over Asia in business class. Had a job that when I told people where I worked, I got immediate respect.

I paid off like $80k in student loans in just a few years, and saved up a quarter million in my nest egg.

At least in that respect, life was good.

But I didn’t l love that job. It felt like my edges were getting rounded down.

So I left it, without a plan. (Not a great idea in hindsight.)

Then I decided to become an entrepreneur.

Fast forward 12 years.

Despite building a hotel in Colombia (that just got two freakin Michelin stars), and building six-figure funnels for clients, I’m stuck.

I can’t break $5K a month in my own business. Literal years at this level.

I’ve got all the skills and know how to be making 10x that. I know EXACTLY what to do.

And yet I can’t make it work.

My healthcare costs are about to double. Maybe triple. My wife’s here on a green card—legally, but that doesn’t seem to matter much these days. We buy insurance through the marketplace.

Both my daughters have Cystic Fibrosis. Luckily Medicaid covers their treatments, but our insurance premium is going to skyrocket because idiots in Congress and the White House would rather give tax breaks to billionaires than help the rest of us.

The bills don’t stop. The treatments don’t stop. The worry doesn’t stop.

And I’m out here telling people I help solopreneurs build sustainable businesses.

Here’s the thing that makes me want to put my fist through the wall: I’m good at this for OTHER people.

This week I wrote a Google Doc sales letter for a client in about an hour. She loved it. Said it was the perfect unlock she’d been looking for.

But when it comes to my own stuff?

Well. I’ve got a low ticket product that’s basically ready—need maybe an hour or two to finish it—and it’s been another week and I still haven’t done it.

Yesterday I was on a call with my day job. That’s what I’m calling it now—my day job. I’ve been working with them for five years. First four we focused on bulding a small business grant program.

Now we help businesses figure out franchising. I put together this incredible presentation with AI in 90 minutes. They were blown away. At the end, they asked if we could work together on another business they own.

I can do it for them. I can do it for my clients.

I can see exactly what someone else needs to do. I give them clarity. I help them untangle their positioning, their offers, their messaging. I do it all the effin time, and it works.

But I can’t do it for myself.

I’ve been trying to build a “solopreneur” thing for five years. After the hotel I knew I didn’t want to do the teams, the managing.

Except I only tried to build it something truly for myself off and on. Got some clients (who underpaid and overworked me) and I guess I just decided to just sell my self-esteem for a few bucks so stuck around on retainers.

A few months ago I started this publication and had the idea to call it Unscaled Solopreneur. Thought that was clever.

I like it as branding. And my whole idea was to share the real deal of building a solobusiness. That’s what I put in the bio: “Going from burned-out to breathing room with simple, profitable systems that run in under 20 hours a week.”

I branded myself that way because that’s what I wanted. That’s what I’ve been trying to build.

I’m making progress, but it’s slow.

And am only half-assing the part about sharing the real deal.

I end up posting the same kind of performative “I’m smart and got it figured out” posts that made me feel gross on Twitter and on previous versions of my publishing attempts.

When I asked Claude to critique my posts, it told me:

Your content reads like a really smart guy at a networking event who’s sharing deeply personal stories... but keeps checking over his shoulder to make sure his mom can’t hear him.

So, yeah. Got that going for me.

Obviously what’s going on is some deep stuff.

When you’ve got the skills to do something. Got the knowledge and experience to get a result. Are even taking action toward that result, but not getting the result, something’s rotten deep down in Denmark.

I just started reading Psycho-Cybernetics. The idea (I think) is you can’t manifest your way into anything if your self-image doesn’t match it.

And that…well, that would explain some things.

Because I keep trying to tell myself positive things. I’ve tried the manifesting and the affirmations.

I know, intellectually, all the sh*t I’ve done. All the things I’m capable of. All the ways I’ve helped people.

Built a hotel. Worked for UNICEF. Helped businesses scale. Write sales copy in an hour that clients love.

But it doesn’t translate. Not into the results I want. Not into the income I need. Not into finishing my own damn product.

I don’t have a lesson here. I don’t have a framework. I don’t have “3 things you should know” or “5 mistakes I made that you can avoid.”

I have this: I’m tired. I’m scared. And I don’t know how to fix what’s wrong with me.

Part of me feels pathetic even saying this out loud. Like, why would anyone want to work with the guy who admits he hasn’t figured it out? The guy who can help everyone else but can’t help himself?

But as my daughter learned in her first grade class last year, there’s one three-letter word you can add to any “I don’t know” or “I can’t” or “I’m not sure” sentence to change your entire perspective.

Y-E-T.

I don’t know how to fix what’s wrong with me—yet. (Yes, I’ll use an em dash. No, AI didn’t write this.)

I help people. I give them clarity. I can see what to do for them.

I just can’t get myself there—yet.

And it’s frustrating in a way I don’t even have words for.

So here I am. Still showing up. Still trying.

Still building this thing even though it hasn’t worked the way I need it to —yet.

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This where I am. Five years in, still figuring it out, still showing up even when I don’t know why it’s not working yet.

If you’ve got thoughts—or if you’re stuck in your own version of this—leave a comment, it’ll help me sleep better knowing I’m not the only one.

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