[Note: This is not a post by me (Clay).  It’s a post by Tracy, who I hired during the last Project Mojave launch.  Just so you know . . . Tracy is the only reason anything ever happens around here.  I hired Tracy because I was working for myself.  And I’m a shitty boss.  So I brought Tracy on (actually, she took me on) because I needed a supervisor.  She’s a damn good one.  Anyway, I take no responsibility for the nonsense below].

Clay asked me if I’d be willing to write for this blog occasionally. I wrote three posts so that he’d have a choice:

• Does a Bear S**t in the Woods (and what does that have to do with finding your purpose?)
• The Thrill and the Terror of Living in the Land of…. (you’ll have to wait for the rest of the title until this post is published).
• One Quick and Easy Way to F**k Up Your Mind and Your Life

The first post is almost done. It will see the light of day eventually.

The second one you’ll probably see once I twist Clay’s arm to co-author it with me and finish it off.

The third one I’m passionate about but it really has nothing to do with this blog, so I’ll publish it elsewhere.

And I tried like hell to finish a post called Cognac, a Hot Tub, and God, but it was way too weird for this blog. I didn’t want to freak you out before you even got to know me. There’s plenty of time for that later.

Then it hit me: What you want to read about is Clay, not my thoughts about cognac or bears. Often when we read someone’s blog and find their thoughts resonating with our own we want to know more about them. So, I thought I’d tell you a little bit about our relationship as a way to give you the inside scoop about who Clay is and what his heart is all about. I’ve no idea if he’ll let me post this, but I’m going to write it and fight with him about that later. If you’re reading this, I won.

I won’t let him edit it, either, because he’d only take out the parts that embarrass him.

I joined Project Mojave as a member in March 2009. I’d never heard of Clay prior to this, never read his blog, and knew nothing about him. I stumbled upon a web page around the time of his launch and ended up signing up early enough to be a lifetime member. That included a 30-minute call with Clay.

Little did I know that call was going to change my life.

You know when you talk to somebody for the first time and you sense that there’s an incredible connection there? I felt that right away. I’ll spare you the details of how our relationship developed and will fast forward to when we decided to explore the possibility of me working for Clay and Project Mojave.

It was an amazing process. I want to share this with you because while you know a little bit about Clay from what he posts, this will reveal him to you in ways he’d never write about himself. He has one of the most beautiful hearts I’ve ever encountered.

First, he never asked for my resume. He saw my heart and that was all he needed to know. Who does business like this?

Second, by the time we thought about working together we’d developed a deep friendship. (No reading between the lines here: I’m 20+ years older than Clay and I’ve been super-happily married for 25 years!) We talk on the phone just about every weekday and often on the weekends as well.

We both had fears about what working together would do to our friendship. So we talked about them. At length. At great length. At ridiculously great length.

Some of our calls were several hours long as we explored every fear and how to move forward from there. Tears were shed by both of us during several of these calls because we were hitting levels of gut-wrenching honesty (I couldn’t make this stuff up, truly). Who does business like this?

We both wanted to be absolutely sure this was the best thing for each of us and for Project Mojave.

Because I had worked for several other bosses who had asked me to lie for them (and I flat-out refused, which didn’t go over very well), I made it really clear to Clay that I would never lie for him no matter what. His response could have been a total deal breaker for me. Instead, here’s what he said: “Everything in Project Mojave has to be done in a squeaky clean manner. I’ll never ask you to lie for me and I want you to call me on it if you ever catch me lying.” I ask you again: Who does business like this?

In case you think I’m sugarcoating who Clay is, trying to paint him only in a favorable light, or that I am delusional and think that he is all sweetness, I’ll tell you that Clay has some very odd, quirky, and annoying habits. Very. Odd. He is absolutely brilliant and openhearted and he’s as deeply flawed as any person I’ve ever known. He owns up to all of it.

His VA Skyped me a few weeks ago with this:

“Do you ever feel like you’re part of Clay’s elaborate social experiment?”

I laughed for 10 minutes (responding with an emphatic “Yes!”). Clay is so innovative and creative, which sounds great unless you’re the one working for him trying to put systems in place. Then it’s just a giant pain in the ass. His mind never jumps off the creativity train, and he strives to do things with excellence. Everything is an iterative process for him. That translates into having to deal with constant change, trying new methods, and altering systems. A control freak would last about 10 minutes working with Clay.

You can’t control a cyclone. That’s the mantra that has kept me sane these past few months.

You know that picture of Einstein in his later years with his white hair flying all over the place, looking like a half-crazy dude even though you know he’s brilliant? That captures Clay perfectly on his hyper-iterative days.

Another quirk is his relationship with time. It doesn’t seem to mean to him what it does to most people.

While some people are colorblind, I think Clay is time-blind.

He will sometimes work all night long as if it’s what all normal people do. (I like to be asleep by 10 and up at 5, so you can imagine how I feel about the hours he keeps. Still, I must confess that some of our best chats have taken place at 3 o’clock in the morning.)

Back to the hiring process: The day came when there was nothing left to ask except, “When can you start?” So now I work with Clay to help make Project Mojave the best it can possibly be. I have no job title, no set hours. While he operates from the heart on a relational level, he doesn’t leave it there. He brings his heart fully into his business. He’s utterly fearless in plowing into new territory.

It really is amazing to watch a person possessed by purpose up close and in action. I’ve listened to him literally weep as he talks about people living dull, passionless lives.

Everything he does, he wants to do with an open, fearless heart. He lives with a fierceness and intensity I’ve rarely seen. He knows that only a person living from their passion is truly able to bring their greatest gift to the world. He craves seeing that happen in every person he meets. Clay hungers to help people create businesses that will enable them to pour the fullness of their hearts out every single day.

He aches with longing to help people live fearlessly into their purpose. This burns within him, day and night, and I feel joy that he has no possible way to escape it. This passion owns him in a beautiful way.

His heart is intense, focused, guileless and gorgeously open. He wants to wake people up from their slumbering lives so they can be vibrantly alive, living from the center of their hearts.

Our daily conversations continue, now a very strange mixture of friendship and business that somehow totally works. There is always much laughter, sometimes tears, and there is no real separation of “work” and “personal” topics. His purpose is not just “work” to him; it’s his life.

He invites total and absolute honesty from me, even when it means he needs to listen to criticism or be held accountable to something he said.

He invites me to speak into his life about any bullshit I see going on, and doesn’t get defensive when I do so. He has never once shut down when I’ve had to confront him, nor when we’ve had conflict. What a rare and amazing thing that is. Really: Who does business like this?

We plumb the depths of every topic imaginable.

We talk about social justice, business models, betrayals, money, keyword research, combating poverty, Internet marketing, our successes, market selection, our spiritual lives, sexuality, autoresponder software, our greatest fears, SEO, books we’re reading, our failures, personal development, and our hopes for the world.

Sometimes our conversations are so life changing that it feels almost obscene to not record them so that we could share them with others. I will often make him stop talking and not let him say another word until I’ve written down something profound that he just said. Seriously: Who does business like this?

His openheartedness wrecks me in the best way possible. It’s so rare to meet the real deal in the world of Internet marketing. There’s so much fake “authenticity” out there.

I want to close with some of the things he’s shared with me over the past six months so you can see the inner workings of his heart:

• “We want to dance in the light of our own creativity.  We want to work without limit, create without condition.”

• “Maturity comes when someone starts to take total responsibility for their lives, for all they say, for all their actions.”

• “We turn the fulfillment of our deficiencies into our savior.”

• “Your business is like a young brother born two years after you: it will never catch up in maturity.” 

Who does business like this? Only a man possessed by purpose, vision and passion, determined to live from the wide, open space of his heart.

Well, that’s your inside look at Clay’s heart from my perspective. Comments? I’d love to hear them. Questions? Ask away and I’ll answer them if I can.

I’d like to end with a question of my own for you, if you’d care to answer it: Are you a person possessed by purpose? If not, what’s holding you back? I’d seriously love to know.

–Tracy

Each month I fly out and spend a day with a selected Project Mojave member.  I spend time going over their business . . . or just hanging out and drinking beer (I buy dinner).  I really don’t care.

Here’s footage from last Month’s San Francisco visit.

[Note: It's been over 5 months since I've written a blog post and my blogging chops are rustier than an old junkyard Studebaker.  still, I'm putting this out because it's time.]

All right, I’m going to just cut to the chase and tell you . . .

Where the Hell I’ve Been for the Last 5 Months

I spent 3 months travelling around the world in a balloon while running an online business for 6 hours per week from a laptop (with a satellite internet connection).

I then spent the next two months travelling around China meeting with world leaders, running a consulting company from my iPhone, and writing a book (also on my iPhone) in Norwegian.

I am SO kidding.  I’m not that guy.

The last 5 months have involved very little in the way of lifestyle design stunts.

Although I did go on a solo backpacking trip to the North Shore of lake superior . . .

This is where I camped . . .

But the real story about where I’ve been is that — for the last 5 months — I’ve been busting my ass working on something I care very deeply about.

My Approach to Product Creation

There are a lot of approaches to product creation.  Many of them work well.

Some people throw together a 47-page ebook every month on one topic or another . . .

. . . my approach is to work on ONE main product for years (and hopefully decades) refining it with each evolution and incarnation.

And of course, responding to feedback, obsessing about user experience, and providing as much value as humanly possible.

That’s because . . .

Project Mojave is My Purpose

This is my purpose.

Fuck the Social Revolution

Most revolutions are created to manipulate others.

But true freedom exists inside you right now (with or without a revolution).  It’s always been there. And you don’t need a social movement, or a revolution, or twitter, or the blogosphere or ANYTHING except courage to claim the freedom that’s always existed inside you.

If you’re living your life to escape your work place, rebel, be unconventional, etc. then you’re living your life as a reaction (to your pain?) and totally missing the point.

Fuck the revolution.  You don’t need one.

You Are Your Only Captor

Escape implies a captor.  Militaristic revolution implies an enemy.  But on this front there is usually nothing to escape. No battle to be fought.  No world takeover necessary. No common enemy.

On this front, the best results usually come from looking deep within yourself, coming alive, and fearlessly doing what you’re compelled to do after you’ve seen the deeper reality of who you are.

Real freedom sprouts from an internal “victory” (over your fear).  A quiet victory.

A victory that — in all probability — no one will notice.  Except you.

You’ll notice it.

I’ve Recruited a Baby to Help Lighten Things Up

Below is Maverick, my new nephew.  He’s a precious kid who was born earlier this month, and I got to see him when I flew to California last weekend for my grandparents’ anniversary.

Man I love that guy.

Now that we’ve lightened things up, it’s time to get heavy again . . .