…my apologies for being out of touch with the group for 2-3 weeks now.  i feel like i owe an explanation.

i’m on a plane from Shanghai back to DFW now, i left DFW this past Sat morning — total time in Shanghai about 24 hours. i dropped off Ethan, our 2 year old, to grandparents to take care of until 3/1/15.  the last month or so has probably been the most demanding for me personally and professionally of my life.  the self awareness and DT awareness definitely helped me stay more grounded (admittedly i still ‘lost it’ more than a few times).  there were many nights where the only way to get things done was to work between 1am-7am.  my wife and i were not on the same page with how are kids should be taken care of (we have 2 year old son and 4 month old daughter) and my wife has 2 big projects coming due in the next 3-4 months — the stress of which has been building up since she has not been able to put in good hours since our daughter was born.  excellent care for the kids comes first for her, above everything else.  long story short we finally had a good discussion a couple weeks ago and believe that sending Ethan to China is the best decision for our family at this time.  ever since we made that decision, there’s some hope again.  on the professional side, in a roughly 30 day timespan, we are closing $60M+ in transactions (across 4 properties) — as you can imagine there is a lot to check and recheck, and has really stretched me and made me realize that we really need "more team”.  a fellow EOer told me a few months back it was easier to grow your company 10x vs 2x-3x, as in the latter case, you simply just work harder and put in more hours, but to grow 10x, you realize you can’t work 10 times more, so your mind then shifts to focusing on building team, process and structure.  this concept energizes me.

so, between these two big things happening in my life, i’ve had to consciously choose family and work, over ILP and personal growth.  now that our son is in good, loving care of my wife’s parents, my wife can rest easier, focus just on our daughter and allow her the time & space to create and do great work.  while i love my son to death, the fact is right now i cannot cut my work hours any more and ultimately this is a short term thing never to be repeated.

the big benefit to this decision, is that with my wife at peace and able to work, things should settle down at home, and i’ll have more time to support her, get our team and process built out at work, and more time for ILP!

time is precious.  i’ve made a promise to myself to make the most of it while Ethan is away.

stewart