I hate rules.

Always have.

I remember when I was a kid my parents would send me to summer camp. It was called Brant Lake Camp in New York; it is a beautiful camp on Brant Lake.

I hated it.

I enjoyed certain things about it. I liked swimming. I liked playing football. I love tennis. I love baseball.

But I didn’t like playing soccer. I never liked soccer. I didn’t like playing basketball. These are certain things that I just did not like to do, but the problem is, in camp you had no choice.

They made you do things. They made you go play basketball. They made you go play soccer.

But I never did.

I would sit down and excuse myself. I would tell them that I didn’t enjoy it. I’d come up with excuses.

I was such a belligerent kid. I never liked to do my homework. I was the worst student in the entire world—a straight C student and damn proud of it.

I never could play by the rules—ever.

I remember when I got out of college. I got a few jobs, got fired from them all and each boss always told me the same exact thing:

“David, you have an attitude problem and you don’t play by the rules.”

I always took that as a compliment.

Life is too short. I never believed in playing by the rules. Now granted, I am not going to drive 100 miles an hour in a 50 mile an hour zone. I am not going to steal. I am not going to cheat. I am not going to lie.

But, I am not going to play by “the rules” of life, because you set your own rules; you determine how you’re going to live.

You determine who you’re going to hang with, you determine who your friends are going to be. You determine the job, you determine everything in life, and you set your own life rules.

I like creating my rules every day. I like living by my rules every day. It’s freeing. It’s empowering, and it makes me feel alive.

I’m going to ask you all a question, now, and I want all of you to really think about it before answering:

Who’s rules do you live your life by?

Be 100% honest here.

Who’s rules do you live your life by and for those of you that want to go even deeper today:

How many of you have rules that you would love to live your life by but for some reason or another, you stop yourself?

What are your excuses for not living your life by your own rules?

I want to hear from all of you today.