Familiar with the fight
There’s a familiarity in the struggle that’s hard to explain unless you’ve been in it a long time.
To the point where small signs of success don’t feel normal. They feel foreign. A little uncomfortable, like they don’t quite belong yet. Most of my life has felt like going from the frying pan into the fire, and so far 2026 has delivered on both.
Even writing this has been a struggle. It’s about a month past due, and that’s me being generous with the timeline. I kept thinking I’d get to it when things settled down, but that hasn’t really been the case.
We’ve been busy, which I’m thankful for, but a lot of it has been triage. Labor’s tighter. Weather hasn’t cooperated. Breakdowns, transportation issues, all of it showed up at once in a pretty aggressive way. None of it is fun. All of it is gut wrenching. And the reality is, every piece depends on the one before it. One glitch in the system and I’m dumping vegetables. That’s the margin.
February had me back on a harvest machine at night. At 46 years old, running a harvester all hours of the night and then trying to function as a businessman during the day… that kind of sleep deprivation is kryptonite. And when you’re out there like that, exhausted, you start taking inventory whether you want to or not.
How did I end up back on the machine?
What decisions put me here?
You sit in it. You don’t get to avoid it. You’re in the shit, and you know it.
Success takes work. Hard work. And more often than not, the amount of work you put in outweighs the success you see on the other side of it. That’s probably why the struggle feels more familiar. You’ve spent more time there. It almost becomes comfortable, in a strange way, because you know it.
When I was younger, I thought success was linear. Always moving up and to the right. I thought the struggle was temporary. That hasn’t really been how it’s played out. If anything, it feels like I’m still paying tuition. And that saying, this too shall pass? I don’t know. I don’t buy it.
Nothing really passes. It evolves. It gets more complex. Sometimes harsher. It trades places with other problems, but it sticks around in some form. But there’s another side to that. Every time things evolve, there’s a bigger opportunity sitting somewhere behind it. The success hits different. Maybe a little sweeter. Maybe it feels like validation, or even a bit of vindication. Doors open that wouldn’t have opened otherwise. And none of that happens without the struggle.
The struggle teaches you how to survive. It forces fortitude, patience, perseverance. It makes you figure things out because you don’t have a choice. Necessity does what it always does. You learn to reflect. You learn appreciation. You get real clear on accountability and boundaries. You learn what you’re willing to sacrifice. You even pick up some mechanical skills along the way whether you planned to or not.
When you’re under the gun trying to get orders out and keep customers happy, there isn’t much time to sit around in self-doubt or think about quitting. You just keep moving. And if I’m being honest, I’m not sure there’s anything easier anyway.
So for anyone out there in it right now, really in it, feeling like it doesn’t let up, you’re not off track; you’re in the work. You’re learning the stuff that actually matters. You’re earning it.
Just keep going.