Hey friend,

Neither is achievement.
Not even longevity.
My answer is LIFE.
But then I had to ask myself another question:
What exactly do I mean by that?
So I tried something.
I imagined myself at 90 years old.
Hopefully I’m there. 🙂
Maybe my hair is even whiter than it already is.
Maybe I’m still moving pretty well.
Maybe I’m sitting somewhere with my wife.
Our kids aren’t kids anymore.
Maybe there are grandkids running around.
And if I’m really fortunate…
maybe even great-grandkids.
The career I’ve spent so much of my life building is behind me.
There aren’t more appointments to get to.
No business problem waiting for me to solve it.
No accomplishment left that will somehow change what the previous 90 years meant.
And I imagined asking that version of myself one question:
“Joe…did you really LIVE?”
What would I hope the answer was?
I don’t think I’d start with the things I accomplished.
I don’t think I’d care much about how productive I was.
How many things I owned.
How busy I stayed.
How many people knew my name.

Or whether I successfully optimized every possible part of my life.
I think I’d look around.
Who’s there?
I hope my wife is.
I hope there’s a lifetime between us.
Not a perfect one.
A real one.
Years of loving each other.
Learning each other.
Disagreeing.
Forgiving.
Laughing.
Raising four VERY different kids together.
Doing hard things.
Celebrating.
Growing.
Changing.
Choosing each other over and over again.
And I hope there isn’t even a sliver of doubt in her mind that through all of it…
I loved her.
Especially when things were hard.
I hope my kids know the same thing.
I hope they know their dad loved them every single day that I knew them.
Not that I always loved them perfectly.
I’m sure they’ll have stories. 🙂
But I hope they never have to wonder:
“Did Dad love me?”
I hope they felt it.
I hope I learned each of them well enough to show it in ways they could receive.
I hope they remember me being there.
Playing.
Listening.
Teaching.
Apologizing.
Showing up.
Being ridiculous.
Having hard conversations.
Cheering for them.
Holding boundaries.

Letting them struggle when struggle was what they needed.
Helping when help was what they needed.
And hopefully becoming wise enough to know the difference more often than not.
I hope they remember that their dad dreamed.
That he worked.
That he served.
That he failed.
That he owned it.
That he got back up.
That he kept growing.
And that through every version of himself…
he loved them.
I hope there are friendships around me too.
The kind measured in decades instead of likes.
People who remember who I used to be.
People who watched me become who I am.
People whose weddings I celebrated.
Whose losses I grieved.
Whose kids I watched grow up.
People who celebrated with me when life was beautiful…
and walked beside me when it wasn’t.
I hope there are stories we’ve told so many times that everybody already knows how they end…
and we still laugh anyway.

That’s LIFE to me.
Relationship.
Love.
History.
Being known.
Knowing somebody else.
Walking alongside each other long enough that our stories start becoming intertwined.
And I hope at 90…
I’m still dreaming.
There’s an idea Matthew McConaughey shared years ago that I’ve always loved.
He talked about his hero being himself ten years into the future.
And when asked years later whether he’d finally become that hero, the answer was essentially:
Not yet.
Because the hero had moved another ten years down the road.
I love that.
Not because I want to spend my entire life dissatisfied with who I am.
Actually, I think the point is almost the opposite.
I want to love who I am today AND remain excited about who I can become tomorrow.
I hope when I’m 90, I’m still chasing the man my 80-year-old self hoped I could become.
Still learning.
Still growing.
Still curious.
Still dreaming.
Still asking better questions.
Still serving.
Still becoming.
Because that’s direction.
That’s movement.
That’s hope.

But there’s another side of that equation that matters just as much to me.
I don’t want to spend my entire life staring ten years down the road…
and miss the person standing right in front of me.
That’s the tension, isn’t it?
Dream about tomorrow.
Be here today.
Grow toward the person you hope to become.
Love the person you already are.
Build something meaningful.
Don’t miss bedtime.
Work toward a future.
Sit at the table.
Take care of your health.
Use that health to go LIVE.
Become better.
But don’t make everyone you love wait for the future version of you before they get the best of you.
I’m still learning that.
Probably always will be.
Because I can become so focused on where I’m going that I forget how much LIFE is happening on the way there.
And so much of it looks incredibly ordinary.
Breakfast.
Driving somebody to practice.
A conversation with my wife at lunch.
Wrestling with one of my boys.
Sitting in the sauna.
Laughing with someone at the office.
Dinner around a table.
Helping with something around the house.
Calling a friend.
Saying a prayer.
Listening.
Going to bed tired because the day was full.
Those moments don’t usually feel historic while they’re happening.
They’re just Tuesday.
But someday…
Tuesday might be exactly what I miss.
And I think that’s why I’ve become careful with this idea of “living every day to the fullest.”
I understand what people mean by it.
But I don’t think every day needs to be extraordinary.
That sounds exhausting. 🙂
Some days are boring.
Some days are hard.
Some days we’re tired.
Some days don’t go according to plan.
Some days the most productive thing we do is recover.
Some seasons aren’t about conquering anything.
They’re about hanging on to the people we love and walking through something together.
That’s LIFE too.

Living Better isn’t about squeezing every possible experience out of every second.
It’s not another standard we have to perform our way into.
For me…
Living Better means becoming more available for the moments that matter.
That’s why capacity matters.
Not so I can accomplish more.
So more of me is available.
Available to my wife.
Available to my kids.
Available to my friends.
Available to the people I serve.
Available to God.
Available to myself.
Available to the life happening right in front of me.
That’s why I care about my health.
That’s why I want to live a long time.
That’s why I train.
That’s why I work on myself.
That’s why I’ve learned to rest.
That’s why I ask questions.
That’s why I care about my nervous system.
That’s why I take ownership.
That’s why I surround myself with people I trust.
That’s why I Calm. Organize. Build.
I want to be available for LIFE.
And I hope I’m fortunate enough to get a lot of it.
You already know part of why.
I never knew either of my grandfathers.
They both passed from cancer before I was born.
There’s still something in me that longs for what I never got to experience with them.
And if it’s in the cards for me…
I want to be here long enough to watch my kids grow older.
I want to know their kids.
And maybe, if I’m really fortunate…
their kids too.
I want the years.
I’m going to work toward them.

But my grandmother taught me something equally important.
Years aren’t the whole equation.
She was one of my favorite people in the entire world.
Joyful.
Happy-go-lucky.
She loved people.
She loved her kids.
She loved her grandkids.
And COPD eventually limited what she could do.
There were things she wanted to experience with the people she loved that her health simply wouldn’t allow her to fully participate in.
I watched someone with so much LIFE inside of her sometimes have to sit on the sidelines of it.
That left a mark on me.
So yes…
I want years in my life.
But just as importantly…
I want LIFE in my years.
And I want that for you too.
There’s another part of my 90-year-old answer that’s much harder for me to put into words.
I hope I have peace.
Not because I made every right decision.
I won’t.
I’ve already eliminated that possibility. 🙂
I hope I can look back at the bad decisions too.
The mistakes.
The times I hurt somebody.
The opportunities I missed.
The times my ego got involved.
The times I pushed when I should have rested.
The times I reacted instead of listened.
And say:
I owned those too.
I learned.
I apologized when I needed to.
I changed when I could.
I allowed those experiences to teach me something.
I didn’t control everything that happened to me.
But I tried to take responsibility for what I did with it.
And I kept moving.
I think there’s peace in that.
Not perfection.
Peace.
My faith is part of that too.

Actually…
it’s impossible for me to separate my understanding of LIFE from my faith.
I’m not going to turn this email into a sermon.
That’s not why I’m writing to you.
But if you’ve wondered what ultimately sits underneath a lot of what I’m sharing…
that’s there.
I believe my life has meaning beyond myself.
I believe we’re called to love.
I believe we’re called to serve.
I believe there is Good News worth sharing.
And I hope I live in a way that opens doors for conversations about things much bigger than chiropractic…
and much bigger than me.
Not because I forced the conversation.
Because maybe somebody saw something.
Felt something.
Was loved well.
Was seen.
Asked a question.
And one day wanted to know:
“Why?”
I’d be grateful for the opportunity to sit down and have that conversation.
And maybe that’s what I hope most for the little boy I’ve told you about.
Remember him?
The kid who didn’t always fit in.
The kid who was bullied.
The kid who discovered sports could help him belong.
The kid who learned to pay attention to people because he needed to know who was safe.
The kid who wanted to be seen.
If I make it to 90…
I hope I can look back at him and be proud.
Not because he eventually proved everybody wrong.
Not because he accomplished enough.
Not because enough people finally knew his name.
I hope I’m proud because somehow…
the little boy who desperately wanted to be seen became a man who learned how important it is to SEE other people.
Maybe that’s part of his healing.
Taking something that hurt…
and allowing it to become something he could use to love somebody else.
To listen.
To ask another question.
To look beneath what’s obvious.
To help another person feel understood.
To let someone know:
“I see you.”
“You matter.”
“You’re loved.”
Maybe that’s a life I’d be proud of.

And friend, I don’t know what your 90-year-old answer looks like.
It shouldn’t look exactly like mine.
It’s your LIFE.
Maybe 90 isn’t even the number.
The truth is, none of us knows exactly how much time we get.
That’s not meant to be depressing.
I actually think there’s something beautiful about it.
Because today matters.
Not because we need to panic and squeeze everything possible out of it.
Because…
we get today.
We get another opportunity to love somebody.
To listen.
To apologize.
To play.
To work.
To rest.
To call someone.
To encourage someone.
To try again.
To dream.
To notice the person sitting across from us.
To be present.
To LIVE.
And then, hopefully, tomorrow…
we get another chance.
But there’s something I’ve realized as I’ve been writing all of this to you.
If I become healthier…
more present…
more loving…
more capable…
more intentional…
more willing to take ownership…
I’m not the only person who benefits.
My wife gets a different husband.
My kids get a different dad.
My friends get a different friend.
The people I serve get a different doctor.
The person I meet in the grocery store might get a different interaction.
And then those people walk back into their lives.
Their marriages.
Their families.
Their friendships.
Their schools.
Their workplaces.
Their communities.
Which means maybe the LIFE I’m building…
was never supposed to stop with me.
And neither is yours.
That’s where I want to finish this with you.
One last letter.
And this time…
we’re taking it outside these walls.

Dr. Joe

LIVE BETTER.