What Building a House Taught Me About Not Giving Up

Sometimes the breakthrough is five minutes after you want to quit.

August 2025

Ten days ago, my wife and I moved into our new home - a barndominium we spent the last five months building with our own hands. We started in July with nothing more than a metal building, a goal, and a willingness to learn every single thing along the way.

Kansas is full of these barndominiums - old machine sheds or new steel buildings that people transform into homes. I’d seen it done once when I was younger, and the idea stuck with me: take a blank metal structure and create a life inside it.

So when the opportunity came, we jumped.

We moved out of our duplex, borrowed money from family, emptied our savings… and got to work.

And when I say we, I mean it literally.

My wife. Her parents. My parents. We worked tirelessly - framing, wiring, insulating, drywalling, flooring, installing cabinets, hanging doors, painting trim. A friend of mine (Dalton - who writes UP with me) even flew in from Texas to help hang drywall with us for a week.

Me (left), my wife (back left), my brother (back right), Dalton (right)

Certain parts, like wiring in a new electrical box and pouring concrete for a sidewalk, we hired out. But 99% of this house exists because we showed up, rolled up our sleeves, and refused to quit.

---

Lesson #1: Keep Going When You Want to Quit

This has been one of the longest, most exhausting chapters of my life. I’d work my full-time job during the day, then head straight to the house to put in another four, five, six hours. Every night. Every weekend. For months.

And the whole time, I was learning.
Learning how to install studs.
How many screws drywall actually needs.
How to measure twice and still get it wrong.
How to fix the things you get wrong.

There’s a verse in Ecclesiastes that kept coming to mind:

“For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.” — Ecclesiastes 1:18 (KJV)

Learning makes you tired.
Learning makes you aware of how unprepared you are.
Learning exposes everything you don’t know.

And some nights, that was overwhelming.

There were so many moments I wanted to put the tools down and say, “I’ll deal with this tomorrow.”

But here’s what I learned:

Every breakthrough came five minutes after I wanted to quit.

When I kept going - even irritated, even exhausted, even doubting myself - something shifted.

A solution appeared.
A method clicked.
A technique finally made sense.

Cabinets I wanted to throw across the room ended up perfectly level.
Flooring that made me swear ended up seamless.
Drywall seams that looked impossible ended up disappearing beneath mud and sandpaper.

Me and my father in law

And somewhere along the way, I realized:

I can figure anything out.

Not because I’m special - but because I didn’t quit.

---

Lesson #2: You Become Capable by Being Willing

Five months ago, I was nervous to even start framing walls. Now, I can walk into a room, spot what needs fixing, pick up the tools, and do it.

Not because the tasks got easier.
But because I grew into someone who can handle them.

Now I’m building a six-foot fence on our property line, and it doesn’t scare me - I know I’ll figure it out, just like I figured out everything else.

That’s the wild part about life: confidence follows willingness.

If you’re willing to look stupid for a little while…
If you’re willing to learn slowly…
If you’re willing to fail publicly…

You become the kind of person who can do almost anything.

---

Lesson #3: Most People Quit Right Before the Gold

There’s a meme you’ve probably seen - a miner walking away from a wall of rock, unaware he’s inches from a massive pocket of diamonds.

That’s how most people live.

They quit:

Right before the clarity.
Right before the breakthrough.
Right before the skill clicks.
Right before the reward.

And the tragedy?
They never know how close they were.

Building this house taught me that if I push five minutes longer, something gives.

Something shifts.
Something opens.

Life works the same way.

---

Lesson #4: The Gym Was Training for This

Anyone who lifts knows the feeling: rep six or seven hits, the weight gets heavy, and your brain screams stop.

But rep eight - the one you didn’t want to attempt - is the rep that grows you.

That same principle showed up again and again during this build.

Push a little further.
Think a little harder.
Try one more angle.
Give it one more attempt.

That “one more” is where growth lives.

---

Lesson #5: You Won’t Know Victory if You Quit Early

At some point, we all hit the wall - in projects, in relationships, in faith, in business, in purpose.

And in that moment, you only have two choices:

Quit - and never know who you could’ve become.

or

Keep going - and meet the version of you that exists on the other side of difficulty.

Every time I pushed through the frustration, the exhaustion, the doubt - I gained a little more grit. A little more competence. A little more faith in what’s possible.

And now I’m sitting in a home I built with my own hands.
A home filled with lessons I didn’t expect to learn.

---

Final Thought

If you’re in the middle of something hard right now… something stretching you… something that makes you want to quit:

Take a breath.
Wipe the sweat.
Shake the frustration off.

And keep going.

Because the breakthrough you’re looking for might be inches away - hidden behind the moment you almost gave up.