One to announce that the Upward Thought Foundation has officially been approved as a 501 C three nonprofit by the IRS. And I'm pretty happy about that. I had no idea if that was gonna work or not. Um I've never done that before. So, um so that's good if, if any of you are exceedingly wealthy, old people
who were waiting, who are waiting to see if that got approved before you donated your estate to me. Um No, I'm just kidding. Um But, but realistically, I know that there are people out there for whom that makes a big difference. And so it's all set up. Um It's on my list of things to do to update the
language on the website, but I can make a video and upload that much quicker than making those changes. So look for that on the website soon. But in until then, uh all the donation mechanisms at upward dot dot org slash donate um that connect to the foundation, those are all officially tax deductible
as far as the law allows for 501 C threes. And in case you're curious the, the, the letter, the decisions are always backdated to the um the date of the founding of the company. So if you were to look at the approval letter, it's backdated to the um when the, when the foundation was started. So anyone
who has donated to the foundation, um until now those, those all fall under the tax deduction laws as well. So that's good news. And uh while we're, while we're on the topic, I, I wanna thank everyone who has donated. Um I wa I was just praying in fact and, and thanking God for that. And um you know
, I, I, in, in that prayer, I, I said, Lord, I was asking for Him to bless all the people that have and uh explain that, that those donations come from people who are looking for a way to give back to God, not necessarily give to me. And uh I was asking that he bless each of you with, with double what
you've given in the currency that means the most to you and him. Now, that might sound complicated. But it didn't in my mind when I, when I prayed it, I hope you understand what I'm going for there. And I, I know that in all things, uh God blesses us. E every, every sacrifice we make for Him. That's
something that he ordains. Um And that, that's meaningful and sincere from us. He always exchanges that for things of much greater value. And that's a, that's a principle of what covenants are e essentially what, what God asks for us at the, from us at the end of the day is everything. But in exchange
for that, he gives us everything that he has. So it's everything we have for everything he has. And I, I not, please don't misinterpret this as me saying that you should therefore send me all of your money. That that's not at all what I'm saying, I'm talking about general principles. Uh, but specifically
, in this case, I also asked the Lord to help me be aware, uh, of ways that I could be a part of that if there are things that I can do. And I saw, um, the books I'm writing sort of flash before my eyes, you know, and maybe you don't know, they, that's what happened. And, um, and all the moments, the
many, many, many, many, many, many moments every day when I'm cranking away on, on these books. And I have been for many years now and I just keep going and it's like, uh, sometimes it's like crawling through. I don't know, I, I remember one time in, in the military and I was in a training situation
where we, we were, this is a basic training. We were low crawling through the field that had barbed wire just, just overhead, it was quite low to the ground, you know, maybe a foot off the ground and we had to crawl under that. So your face is in the sand. And we had been doing this all day. It was,
it was night time and it was hot. It was in the south in the summertime and we had full uniforms on long sleeve uniforms and just, there's sand everywhere. And, uh, you know, my elbows are bloody, my knees are bloody, not, not terrible. I mean, it wasn't, but, you know, it, it hurt and I just remember
thinking, what the heck am I doing here? Is this really what I wanna do? And I thought, yeah. Yeah, I'm all in, this is what I chose and I'm gonna do it. And so I switched off my brain and I just crawled my little buns out across this, this, you know, football field length of sand under this barbed wires
. People are shooting machine guns over your head and setting off fake artillery simulators and things and I got through it and whatever. Right. And since then I've gone through a million different, much harder things. But in a sense the writing is, it's like that where you just have to keep going, you
just have to keep crawling. And, um, I wish there were better ways that I could convey what that's like. But that's, that's what it's like. And it's amazing because I, if you, if, uh, because I've done this for so long, it's, it's not that it's any easier, but I'm quite accustomed to it and it's just
like OK, this is the grind, keep crawling and you never know. Uh, I, I think I described something similar to this to a friend of mine recently using an analogy of hitting a, hitting AAA boulder with a sledgehammer. And maybe you've had the displeasure of doing that. Um, I, I know I have did it the other
day, in fact, but sometimes you need to move a boulder and there's no other way to do it except hit it with a giant hammer until it cracks. Right. And the thing is, is with every blow, you don't have any idea whether it's gonna result with a fracture or not. You just have to hit it as hard as you can
again and again and again and again. And when you've decided that eee essentially that this, this boulder has become an existential purpose in your life, that this is what you're gonna do until the thing cracks or until you die trying, then it changes things, right? And it's, it's a huge blessing to
be able to live life with that kind of focus. But I think that that blessing is actually much more available to others than is used. I think that you could probably find your own boulder and maybe you should look for it. Uh This book that I have not officially announced on here yet, so this doesn't count
uh Joy on purpose. I actually published it over the weekend last weekend. Um So it's been out for almost a week now, maybe exactly a week now. And um I, I'm gonna do a full intro video on that, but I wanted a copy to hold and Amazon takes a sweet time sending books to us Montanans. So I ordered some
copies for my, my uh family, my, my mom and my siblings and she lives in Maryland right now and they got their yesterday. I think my copies are getting here on Monday. Anyway, not to draw on about that. But that, that book hopefully will help you find older to sledge in your life. Um, but, but this is
mine and, uh, it means a lot to me, uh, for you all to support my time to be able to do that. And so I'm gonna keep on marching. And as I was praying about this, the Lord was flashing the books in the moments in front of me, uh, into my memory from what, what, you know, all these, all this time that
I've logged on these things and the, the constant crawl that it's been, um, in his providence, the way he's arranged things is that these books are not gonna come out like once every 10 years. And I think, um, I tend to be overly optimistic about things like this as far as trying to predict a publication
pace. But, uh, I'm working on the other book, the next book already. Um, but, but these books are in various stages of done and there are about 24 of them right now. And so one thing I can promise you is that, except in very rare exceptions, I am going to publish these books faster than you can read
them. And that's really crazy to think about that. I'm going to write these books and publish them faster than you can read them. But in, in the Lord's wisdom, that's the way it's, it's going to be. And, um, that, that's why this book that's coming out. One of the things I hope really results from this
is, is massively more efficiency in your life. As you read those principles and live them, you're gonna find ways to be much more efficient and that's going to be important. So I wrote you a book so that you can have more time to read the other books. I'm gonna write you. I, I find that hilarious, but
that's just my sense of humor, I guess. Um, but it, it'll help you get much more out of life in all the ways that you find uh provide you value. So, uh thank you for your donations. Uh Officially the ones going to the 501 that to the foundation are now officially 501 C three donations. And for those
who, who are, who don't need the tax deduction, I, I continue to appreciate you sending that to the first section on the donate page which is directly to me as donations, those, the IRS gives you, I think 17,000 a year per person. So if you're a couple, you can double that uh, in gifts that you're allowed
per individual to, to, to an individual. I'm not saying that very well, 17,000 to each person. I think it might be higher than that in 2024. But you should always check those things out yourself and, or talk to an accountant or lawyer. Um, but, uh, I, I appreciate that. It, it, long story short, more
of it gets to what you're donating it to instead of getting scraped off with, uh, taxes. So, and that, that might be a funny thing for you to think about with how could that be less tax than sending it to a nonprofit? Uh, the way that money comes out is through paychecks, right? It paychecks to me. So
, so payroll tax still has to come out of that. Um, the, anyway. So that's, that's what that's all about. Um, but yeah, I think that covers the bases. I appreciate it. Thank you. And, um, let me know if you have any questions upper dot At gmail.com. Take care.