At some point, you realize the chains you’re waiting to be released from… were never locked in the first place.

I’m writing this from my flight home from Oaxaca.

Spent the weekend celebrating Val and Adan Perez — a wedding filled with legends, dreamers, doers.

I arrived alone — relaxed, content.
My wife was hosting her own event in Malibu (curious? psychedelicguidenetwork.com), but even when we’re apart, she’s still with me.

That wasn’t what made me feel free, though.

At the welcome dinner, I caught up with old friends and made some new ones too. Each person had a story about their work — the grind, the love, the hustle.

But something deeper stood out.

Each conversation hummed with a frequency.

If you don’t know how to listen for it, you’ll miss it — but once you’ve consciously shifted your own energy a few dozen times, it speaks louder than words.

You can “work hard” all you want.
Those are just words.

What’s underneath?
What’s the energy driving it?
Each word, each goal, each grind — it all translates into a feeling. An energetic frequency.

It’s not “woo.”
It’s human development 101.

Our first language was emotion.
Words just got layered on top later.

You know the catch-up script:

“What you been up to?”
“Working.”
“What you working on?”
Blah blah blah.

Now don’t get me wrong — my friends are doing badass things.

Earth healers, world changers, entrepreneurs across fitness, cosmetics, plant medicine, real estate, regenerative farming, and even building network states.

With our powers combined… we’re literally reshaping the world.

But… it doesn’t have to be hard.

And I felt it.

Some conversations carried the heavy energy of obligation… fear… over-responsibility.
Others?
There were a few men who were just free. Sitting in it. Breathing it.

(You’ll meet a couple of them soon on my new podcast — stay tuned.)

There wasn’t much that needed saying.
Just a quiet acknowledgment in frequency.

Here’s the paradox:
Most entrepreneurs start businesses to find freedom — only to recreate a prison even more stressful than their old job.

You begin fired up by passion.
Then slowly… obligation creeps in.

“Quotas to hit.”
“Payroll to meet.”
“Save the world.”

The pressure hijacks the purpose.

So you scramble to fill your day with podcasts, YouTube videos, motivation hacks — anything to grind through another day that feels… heavy.

But why does this happen?

You were raised on obligation.
You watched parents, teachers, mentors operate not from purpose, but from duty, guilt, fear.

And now you wonder:

“Can’t I have both? Purpose and obligation?”

No.

In the moment of now — the only place you actually exist — you can only experience one at a time.

• Purpose is calm, focused, open.
• Obligation is frantic, scattered, closed.

If you’re feeling pressure, contraction, tunnel vision…
That’s not purpose talking.

That’s the ghost of obligation — haunting your moment of now.

And the moment of now is all you ever truly have.
Your eternity is now.

The mind will argue, “Purpose will come later… once you hit your goals…”
But that’s just a carrot on a stick.

The truth is simple:
You can pick up your passion and purpose right now — but first you must put down the weight of obligation.

You are free to choose.
Right now.
Not later.
Now.

I invite you:
Come home to your purpose.
Work with ease.
Work with passion.
Not someday.
Today.

-Mike Bledsoe