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I was in a mastermind in Atlanta with Jay Papasan, co-author of The ONE Thing, and I could not answer his question.

I have admired that book for years. I can recite the focusing question: what is the one thing I can do, such that by doing it, everything else becomes easier or unnecessary?

Ask me what my one thing was, though, and I had nothing real. I could have given you an answer that sounded convenient and logical. Coaching, but bigger. Consulting, but packaged. It would have been words. It was not part of who I am, and I did not believe it, so it filtered nothing. Every opportunity still looked like a yes.

Here is what I got wrong for years. I kept reading books like they were the fix, and I kept collecting energy with nowhere to put it.

I did not need another book. I needed a filtering question with something real behind it. A filter only works if the thing behind it is real.

With Hard or Wrong and Send It, it is real. So here is my focusing question now, and it is the whole strategy:

Does this help me make Send It a million-dollar brand by the end of 2027?

That is it. Every speaking engagement, every partnership call, every opportunity that lands in my inbox gets run through that one sentence. If it helps, we talk. If it does not, it is a no, however good it looks.

Once that sentence existed, a shelf of books I already loved started making sense. Not because the books changed. Because I finally had something to run them on.

10X Is Easier Than 2X (Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy). I read it while I was coaching and consulting, and the 10x move everyone pointed at was launch a course. I never wanted to launch a course, so the book sat there sounding smart and useless. With Send It, 10x is a different business, not more hours. I started selling a $7 deck to individuals. Now the same game is being pitched to companies for team sessions, played in rooms and at events, and built into talks. Rooms scale in a way my calendar never could, and it is more fun.

Be Your Future Self Now (Dr. Benjamin Hardy). Hardy says your future self should be the one giving the advice. Fine. But picture your future self when you cannot picture your future work. I used to do the vision exercises and go blank at the work part. I could see the house. I could not see the job, because there was no clear job to see. Now I can. End of 2027, Send It is a million-dollar brand, and the man running it has pretty specific advice for me about what to protect and what to drop.

Winning (Tim Grover). Grover teaches you to build the IDGAF muscle and go after the goal with everything you have. I read it and got all pumped up, and then I had absolutely nowhere to put the energy. Aggression without a target is just adrenaline. Now the target exists, and so does the thing worth not caring about other people's opinions over: a card game that tells adults to go do the hard thing.

Essentialism (Greg McKeown). Do less, but better. I loved that line and I could not use it, because I did not know what to do less of. Everything felt important, so I kept doing more of what was not working. Less is easy to name now. Less is whatever fails the filter. Better is getting really good at this one thing: a simple framework that delivers a real experience to everyone who touches it, in the game, at an event, on a stage, in your feed.

That is the whole model, by the way. People ask how I get paid for being me. This is it. One framework, one game, and every room I walk into runs through one question first.

So how do you find yours? Here is what worked for me, in the order it happened.

1. Throw out the convenient answers. If the sentence sounds good in a bio but you do not believe it on a tired Tuesday, it is not your one thing. A filter you do not believe in filters nothing.

2. Look at what you keep coming back to. Not what pays the most or photographs the best. The work you return to when nobody is assigning it. Mine was a decision check I could not stop using, and then a game I built around it and played with my own kids.

3. Run it through the Hard or Wrong check. Ask if you have been avoiding it because it is hard, or because it is wrong. Hard and real usually travel together. If it is wrong for your life, end it and keep looking. That is information too.

4. Say it with a number and a date. One sentence your future self could grade. "Make Send It a million-dollar brand by the end of 2027" is mine. If your sentence has no number and no date, it is a wish, not a filter.

5. Let it say no for one week. Run every opportunity through it before you answer. If nothing gets a no, the sentence is not sharp enough yet. Sharpen it and run the week again.

Card of the Week: FUTURE SELF (Posterity)

"Ask your future self: what advice would you give me right now? Write it down, then take the next step it points to."

Play it at the scale of this issue. Your future self is the version of you standing at the end of your one thing, done. Ask him what the one thing was. Write his answer as your focusing question: one sentence, with a number and a date in it. Keep it where you will see it before your next yes.

Here is your test for this week. Look at your current commitments and count how many of them would fail your own filter today. That count is the real work.

Run the biggest one through the check while you are at it. Is keeping it hard, or is it wrong? If it is wrong, end it this week and give the hours to the one thing.

Send It 🤙🏽

Terry

P.S. That is the whole goal of Send It: get clear on your one thing across all four categories. Physical. Professional. Personal. Posterity. Then take action on it: draw your first card free at terryrice.co/play. Want your team to find theirs together? The corporate version is here: terryrice.co/corporate

P.P.S. Hey, by the way: if you're a coach or consultant, I'm leading a free accelerator with EveryExpert where I walk you through how to book your first or next paid call. It starts this Thursday and runs Thursdays at noon ET. You can join any week, and every session is recorded. Register free here.