Week #32 of 2025 has arrived... a cool breeze is blowing across the Midwest, and I don’t ever think I have heard people be so thankful for 75° weather. 

Time to walk over to your 4K Weeks poster and fill in another square.  Done?

That’s an important thing to remember. Everything’s relative and there’s always something that you can find to be thankful for relative to some other situation.

I had a fairly traumatic week last week, more on that later, but I am so thankful today and I was so thankful then for the habit I have created of finding all the good things that are going on and not focusing on the bad things.

I hope you see the good in everything this week, because remember, that is a choice you can make. 

If you have a minute, forward this email to a friend, and subscribe and/or rate the podcast!

ON WEEK #32 OF 2009...

Kesha released her hit song, "Tik Tok", which became the Billboard Song of the Year in 2010.

She was 1.170.01 weeks or 22.45 years old.

WHAT I CONSUMED THIS WEEK

Hidden Brain, What is Your Life For?  This episode came across my feed thanks to Revisionist History.  I loved it, but it will probably make you cry...

Lately, as just a way of spending time with him, I’ve been sitting down in front of the TV with my son and watching YouTube videos of this guy repairing supercars. I don’t typically like to watch people do things, I like to do things... but this guy is really joyful and fun and there’s worse things I could be doing with my time then sitting on the couch, enjoying a fun video with my son. The whole Lamborghini Revolto saga had us locked in.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

"Problems are only opportunities with thorns on them." - Hugh Miller

What a fitting quote that Eli chose for this week.

I’ll keep this brief because the rest of the email is so long, but this week, as I was faced with some of the stiffest headwinds I have dealt with in a long time, I said out loud to myself and my wife, a couple of times: “I am grateful for this opportunity to test, under real world conditions, whether or not I am actually the man that I say that I am."

It doesn’t mean the opportunity wasn’t thorny, it doesn’t mean the opportunity didn’t hurt, it doesn’t mean I didn’t fall short of seizing the opportunity every once in a while, but the framework is important for how you view the world. 

WHAT I AM THINKING ABOUT THIS WEEK

So much! This is gonna be a long one, so buckle up! I didn’t want to leave you with a: to-be-continued. 

I’ve taken a note of 1 million different lessons over the last week. I’m sure some of them will come out later - it’s hard to appreciate each drop when you’re drinking from a fire hose!

TL:DR: I shattered my arm on Tuesday morning at basketball.

I’ve never broken a bone before, and not for lack of trying! In fact, when my dad had his hip replaced at 80, the surgeon, after a much longer surgery than we expected, said he had to go get a different sized hip replacement because my dad had the bone density of a 40-year-old. I’ve often been quoted  saying “Schubert’s don’t break bones”

Welp… it was early in the first game, I was on defense and the guy that I was guarding lost his handle on the ball. Suddenly a few of us were on the ground, scrambling for it. I got my hand on it (I take pride in my strength and ability to come up with loose balls), but then the 230 pound guy I was guarding flopped over onto my arm, shattering it. 

I heard it crack and immediately yelled “ahhh you broke my @&$:;!? arm!” and clutched it to my chest.  As I laid there on the ground, I remember thinking to myself (in between moments of bewilderment  . . . Schubert's don’t break bones) that “this is the moment I’ve been training for”.  I remember thinking that “the way I act now is who I am”. And so I sat up, took some deep breaths to steady myself and to make sure I wasn’t going into shock, and asked the guys if they could help me to the bench. Once on the bench, I asked if someone could go get me some ice, if they wouldn’t mind taping my arm and the ice to my body, and if somebody could take me to the hospital. 

I didn’t snap at anyone, I didn’t blame anybody for what was clearly an accident, but most importantly I didn’t try to travel into the future... I didn’t engage in any “woe-is-me-ism”.

I’m sure this isn’t surprising to most of you, but I use my right arm pretty dang regularly, and I consider it a high value property.  (For example, I’m having to voice-to-text this essay, and this is my side hustle!) I knew it was broken. I didn’t know how badly it was broken, I didn’t know if it was also my wrist or my elbow or just my forearm, but I knew the way i could feel it click when i moved my pinky wasn't right. The thing I am most proud of myself for is that I did not for one second entertain any thoughts of “oh my God this is gonna suck. It’s gonna ruin so many things”.

So I trudged my way out of the gym and down the stairs to Anthony’s truck. (Thanks Anthony!) and he drove me to the emergency room, about 10 minutes away.

Another thought occured to me as I was tolerating the slightly bumpy drive to the emergency room… "I’m gonna be the kindest, most pleasant, broken arm patient they’ve ever had." That was born of two things… number one, when injured, you often don’t know how serious things are, and nobody wants to be the person who is making a big deal out of a scratch. And number two in that situation being kind and pleasant and patient was something that was absolutely within my control. Sometimes when you find a situation that is largely outside of your control, focusing on one thing you CAN control is super helpful.

So they get me in a wheelchair (“thank you very much!”) wheel me in through the metal detectors, and get my license and insurance card at the desk. All sorts of small talk and banter through smiles and gritted teeth. And then they get me back to triage, where, because of the swelling, etc., the nurse is having trouble finding a pulse in my wrist. (I am still pleasant with her.) That gets me back into a room pretty quick and they call doctors in to take a look. At this point, my arm is still pretty straight. It’s swollen, but not "clearly" broken. On top of that, I am cracking jokes with everybody, being polite and pleasant, and just a generally sunny presence other than the obvious pain that I’m in.  I think they wern't sure it what to make of it.

So, they bring the x-ray machine into the little room. They take the first x-ray and they really can’t see anything crazy abnormal (everyone was being a bit cagey because nobody wanted to speak out of turn). Then they take the second x-ray, both of the x-ray techs' eyebrows go up and they say “oh!”. (You can see the x-ray in the “reward for reading this email” link. But it's not for the squeamish!) Suffice it to say, multiple fractures, and some tiny fragments. I will admit to being fairly relieved when they said that my elbow and wrist were “grossly normal”.  Two more things I am thankful for!

After that, with the IV and the occasional pain medicine, it’s kind of a blur. They got me into surgery that afternoon. It took about four hours, and now my right arm looks like Dr. Frankenstein opened it up on both sides and stuffed in a whole bunch of spare parts for a bicycle. 

There’s no question it’s not my preferred outcome. I would much rather have been fully productive this last week and a half. I would much rather not have a difficult rehab ahead of getting back to basketball in 3 to 6 months. I would much rather not be sitting here with my arm elevated, dictating this email into my phone.

But none of those things were for me to choose.

The only thing I get to choose is how I react. I have to say, choosing to try to find the opportunities in it and glossing over or ignoring the difficulties as much as I can manage has made it much much better. 

And anyhoo, I did really did need something to motivate me to work on my left-hand dribbling…

(Also just to get ahead of this, don’t send me an email with any form of condolences about my broken arm… I’ll assume you wish me well! I’m doing better than fine. But DO feel free to send me an email about some other interesting thing, or how you have made the most of an “opportunity.”)

Until next week!

Spencer,

Owner of 4KWeeks

P.S. Click on this reward if you feel like letting me know you read the whole newsletter: Here's a link to the x-ray of my arm, but be warned - it isn't for the faint-of-heart!