CFI: About the 100 Challenge

The 100 Challenge is a life-long program pioneered by Chase Floyd that is designed to challenge oneself to learn, experience, and do 100 challenging new things that they could not do before and that most people have not accomplished. The 100 Challenge encourages you not to ask "why bother", but to instead ask "why not!" Life is full of new and interesting things that with a little hard work anyone can achieve. It is never too late to learn something new, even if you've tried it before and given up! Anyone can change the perceptions about themselves and conquer anything! Never again accept the idea that you have "failed" at something, because with hard work and determination you can change anything about yourself by taking up a challenge! If you have any personal weaknesses or regrets, simply take up the challenge to change things because it is never too late! If someone else can do something, so can you! You'll be amazed at how much you'll learn and change from doing a challenge! Learning something as simple as juggling can give someone the confidence to someday climb Mt. Everest! With the 100 Challenge one will always be evolving and striving to conquer the next challenge!

I wrote that preceding exercept years ago back when I began the 100 Challenge, and I still post it along with each new challenge video I create. I like it, and I think that it cuts no corners in fully describing how I felt then and still feel now about my 100 Challenge. How this all came to be is quite the story though and definitely worthy of its own page!

2011: The Idea is Born

For one to truly understand how the 100 Challenge came into existence, one must know a little about how CFI was born as well. I thus encourage readers to read about the history of ChaseFloydInc by clicking the "About" link on the CFI HomePage in order to get the complete picture. As I stated there, working on developing CFI really did open a lot of doors and without CFI's presence as a place to share videos and motivate the creation of them the 100 Challenge would not exist.

I first got the idea for the 100 Challenge in December of 2011. I still remember this moment in my life vividly, for it remains in my mind as the culminating apex to what was a very powerful year in my life. I began that year, 2011, as a high school senior who lacked any concrete direction in life but instead posessed an obsession with exercise and taking naps. I had not applied myself in school for years, becoming a student full of wasted potential. I had zero musical knowledge or ability, and aside from some cobbled together videos I had made for school projects nothing going on in the videography department. I did however at least have a part of me that possessed a burning desire to become something...anything...so long that it was "great". I ended that year as a college freshman with burgeoning piano skills, a ton of ideas for making good videos, and a 4.0 GPA. I also now had a VISION for where I wanted the newly created "ChaseFloydInc" to go, and by extension how I wanted my life to go. I was a changed man, for the better, and heck; I never stopped working out so I could still do 20 pull-ups to boot!

For much of the the second half of that senior year (2011), I still had a mindset that only people with some kind of latent, in-born "talent" could do things like play a musical instrument or display a proficiency in academic subjects like mathematics. I also thought that these people could only utilize their abilities if they had started practicing at a young age. I truly believed this, and it negatively affected my life by causing me to fear things like these and back away from them. This all changed though when some of my peers openly claimed that I "could not learn how to play an instrument". Hearing people say this out loud, something that I would never want to admit that I thought might be true, hit me like a ton of bricks. It angered me. I wanted to prove these people wrong. And by these people I do not just mean a few particular persons, but people who have this mindset in general. I just wanted to prove them all wrong...

Well, so what you might ask. I had this chip developing on my shoulder, but chips of this kind are useless unless you actually use them to DO something about what you might view as an insult to your spirit. I at least knew this so I thus sought to DO something about my current predicament. And that something, as you might imagine, was LEARNING how to play a musical instrument just to prove those guys wrong and to also prove it to MYSELF that it could be done. Sure, I held this notion that people without latent "talent" could not do certain things in life no matter what. I also thought that when it came to music (and math for that matter) that adults had "missed the window" to learn these things for they could only be mastered if one starts at a young age and had a knack for it. At this time I myself was 17 years old, essentially an adult, so part of me wondered what chance did I have? Despite all of this though I still felt something, something deep down inside of my soul, that told me that I had to try since "maybe, just maybe" this wasn't the case"...

After thinking all of this through and becoming determined to learn how to play a musical instrument, I first had to figure out which one I wanted to play. I was in the Jazz Band my senior year, but don't let this fool you into thinking I had any musical ability. I enrolled in this class as an easy elective, and aside from banging on the bongos I was pretty much just there for the show. Being there exposed me to the different types of instruments though, so in a way randomly taking this class has ended up being a crucial event in my development. Anywho, I thought the drums were cool, guitar seemed complex but worthwhile, and the saxophone reminded me of some good music from my youth. One instrukment stood out though, and it was this one that I knew was meant for me. This instrument, with its magical metallic clangs, was none other than the noble piano. Something about the piano just seemed right. It sounded so nice, and so many of my favorite songs utilized it despite my having never realized it. I knew I had found my match, so I began reading and researching a bit about it in an attempt to learn the basics. I had to actually have a piano to practice though, so for my birthday that year I asked my father for and received a Casio LK-100 keyboard. A basic machine, yes, but perfect for a beginner hungry to learn...

My birthday is in late April, but during the days it was in shipment I had already begun practicing some basic fingering on a print-out of a keyboard. The day I received the machine though I amped up (pun intended!) my work though and I began practicing furiously. Progress was slow at first, as it often is, but as I say "success breeds success" so before long I had begun to notice some improvements. By the end of the school year I was already beginning to play some basic songs in entirety, and I had begun recording them on the sound recorder my phone had to share my progress with others. By the time gradution rolled around I began noticing changes in my entire mood and outlook just from learning the little bit of piano that I had. This, the simple act of learning something new, had brought a lot of positivity into my life in a very short amount of time. I had not expected this, but I sure did like the feeling...

I was very excited for the following Summer, but I was also very worried about my future. College held so many unknowns, and I was loving my newfound musical life so much that I didn't want to have to leave. I kept on practicing piano that Summer, slowly but surely improving with each passing day, to the point where it has become a lifestyle. I kept up my exercising as well, focusing specifically on my Pull-Ups. Months ago during my training for that year's Physical Fitness Tests I had made it a goal to do 20 Pull-Ups, since if I posted a video of myself doing so I could get on the "Hall-of-Fame on a website called "Twentypullups.com". I really wanted to do this, and I had planned it out in my mind to upload the video to the YouTube account I had created to upload a few videos I had made for school projects called "ChaseFloydInc". I eventually did get those 20 Pull-Ups in late July, making the video and earning a spot on the website as well. I was so proud of myself for I had not only proven the notion wrong that "untalented adults" could not learn how to play a musical instrument, but I had also reached one of my big-time fitness goals.

I had a very strong desire to do more with videography though, since I felt that a lot of positivity could be spread with it, so not long after making the 20 Pull-Ups video I sought to create a few piano videos to share myself playing and how much I had improved. I did just that a few weeks later, recording a couple of piano covers and a medley, and I also made sure to upload them to ChaseFloydInc. It was during these weeks that I started to have a lot of ideas, a vision if you well, for where I wanted to take "my new company", "CFI". As I began compiling all of my video ideas I slowly created the "genre" schematic for CFI, christening "Music" and "Fitness" as the first two official genres due to the recent uploads I had created.

By the end of that magical 2011 Summer, I was on top of the world. I was in great shape, a beast at pull-ups, and I was also brimming with musical potential and the clear mind that playing music brings. Everything was about to come crumbling down though, or so I thought, since I had to leave everything behind and go to college. I could not bring my keyboard to college, since how on Earth would I ever be able to even find time to play it?! I also could not bring my workouts, since they were quite time consuming and very involved. I suppose I still had some "concreteness" left in my mind though, for I truly did believe that CFI was going to end here before it could really even begin...

Upon arrving at college I would soon find out how wrong I was. Freshman arrived a week earlier, giving them time to just explore the campus and the surrounding areas. I fully utilized this freedom, discovering a local abandoned playground that I and my workouts would soon call home. I also discovered "The Palace", which was what I called the university's music hall. This hall was, unbeknownst to almost all non-music majors, completely public and open to ALL students at ALL hours. When I found this out I just KNEW that I had to get in. I will never forget the first day I walked into that palacial building. The ivory walls, the whoosh of cool air; all of it remains with me. The walk up to my first practice room and its real upright piano, the first I had ever seen, is something that remains a part of me. Pressing those keys for the first time and hearing those amazing metallic vibrations fill the room was simply magical. Nothing, I mean NOTHING compares to hearing a real piano LIVE for the first time. Once I was in, I did not want to leave. I practiced for hours that day, refreshing my skills and re-learning the many songs that I had left behind. Every successive day, sometimes more than once per day, I'd go to that music hall to practice and learn more songs. I was in piano heaven...

With a place to exercise and play music, my life was "back on track" despite being far from home and alone on a large city campus. Neither of these things bothered me though, for the environment I situated myself in was ideal for my newfound mindset. Everyday I was improving, whether it was academically in the classroom (MATH UP), athletically over at the park, or musically at the palace. Naturally I wanted to get CFI back up and running, and thanks to my roommate Greg and his camera camcorder (I had left my camera back at home!) I did just that right around Halloween...

During my regular trips to play piano at the music hall, I first began by just refreshing the songs I had learned. I then learned some new songs, as you might expect, while also revving back up the many ideas I had in my mind for ChaseFloydInc. It was during this time that I fully set-up the genre-based setup for CFI, adding "Fun" and "Comedy" to round out the quartet. Music was my main focus though, so using Greg's camera camcorder I sought to record another piano cover, my very FIRST on a real piano!

This song, the Lavender Town Piano Cover, became CFI's very first hit video! I received very popular feedback from friends and strangers, and this "success" thus led to me desiring aka breeding even more! I continued to work on my music, arranging and recording a few more covers. I also had some good ideas for new Fitness, Fun, and Comedy videos. All was going really well with "ChaseFloydInc", but as the semester was beginning wind down "Chase Floyd" finally had his idea of a lifetime...

By late December of 2011, I had already begun referring to the present time in my life as a "renaissance" since it represented a "revival" of the person that I knew I always could be. The person that had long been locked away inside my mind as an idea. In just a handful of months I had learned and changed so much, for the better. College was also going well, and during finals week I spent my first set of several long days spent alone in my dorm room studying for finals. I was still working on my sleep schedule back then, so I remember taking a lot of "Edison Afternoon Naps" in between the review. One nap, on a day that felt like a Thursday but may have been a Tuesday, led to something profound. I always kinda "actively thought" as I slept, and this nap was no different. However, the thoughts I had definitely were. I remember thinking to myself how much FUN it flat out was the LEARN how to play the piano. All that went into it, the entire journey and process, was just a blast. Not only thought, it led to some epic VERTICAL GROWTH, along with the admiration of people around me. I then thought to myself how I wanted to do this again. I then, had some more thoughts...

My next few thoughts were about my father. Growing up, and even now, he was always just "good" at stuff. You name it. Darts, fishing, ping-pong, pool; even the most random, obscure stuff that he never spent much time practicing. He was always just able to jump in and excel. I guess he is what you would call a "natural". This confused me though. Why, I wondered to myself, was this the case? How does someone just "become" a "natural"? Are they just born with it? Well, I knew that couldn't be the case though since I just spent months DEBUNKING the MYTH that some people are just naturally better at certain things and there is nothing one can do to close that gap. I thus became very interested into this idea of being a "quick learner", or someone who "picks things up well".

After establishing myself as a piano player, I sorta already knew the answer to this; PRACTICE. I then thought to myself that maybe people who are good at a lot of things have, at some point in their life, had a lot of PRACTICE learning, doing, and experiencing many NEW and DIFFERENT things. I then thought further, and this question entered my mind; If I just went around LEARNING, DOING, and EXPERIENCING new and different things, could I too become skilled in picking things up quickly? All of these thoughts finally meshed with what I had already been doing with CFI and making videos and the culminiaton of all of this thinking had arrived. "A guy with a passion for life and positivity, who goes around learning, experiencing, and doing new and different things in a list-like fashion, while also making a video series to DOCUMENT his progress with each CHALLENGE." CHALLENGE, yes, with that one word everything became clear...

I would, no I HAD, to become this person. This was too good of an idea to just let die! The amount of positivity and inspiration that could be drawn from this idea was unmeasurable. I had to do this, no matter what. What just was "what" though, is something I soon wondered to myself. Sure, I just had this idea about doing "challenges", and I even began thinking about ways to film such things as part of a new, "5th genre" (CHALLENGE) for ChaseFloydInc. I even had a name for my idea, the "100 Challenge", since I figured that doing 100 challenging new things was a good number to aim for. Oh, and ideas for potential challenges began pouring in as well, with my roommate's girlfriend's sister's membership in a juggling club inspiring my 1st challenge and this random guy riding a unicyle outside of my dorm window UNI GUY PIC doing the same for my eventual 3rd challenge!

A few days passed after this day of MEGA-thought, and while I continued to study for my finals I worked out more of the details for the 100 Challenge during my breaks. I would do 100 challenges, with each challenge falling into one of three categories; "Learning", for learning something new and muscle-memory centric, "Doing", for doing something creative and artistic, and "Experiencing" for partaking in something that at its completion leaves you as a better, more enriched person overall. I even had the idea for my first challenge selected, "Learning How To Juggle", and I began practicing it with rolled up socks over my dorm-room bed. I felt such a mix of emotions during this time, from excitement at having the opportunity to be the person to do this to worry that if I failed, this great idea of mine would die as a result...

With my finals wrapped up, I returned home for the holiday break with only one main thought in my mind; DO or Idea DIE! It was that simple, since if I could not actually complete some of the challenges I had thought up then what chance would my idea have of surviving? I just HAD to do this; failure was simply not an option. I thus began taking steps to ensure that I would have no excuses for not being able to bring the 100 Challenge into life. I kept practicing my juggling every day for as much as I could, and I also chose my next challenge; Learn How To Play Guitar. This challenge really excited me since I had so much fun learning how to play the piano! I did not even have a guitar at the time though, but fortunately Christmas was right around the corner and I was very fortunate to receive one as a gift!

So there I was, Christmas Day, trying my best to get my arms to cooperate while juggling and my fingers to work while playing guitar. My juggling was going alright, with the main annoyance being having to pick up my socks so many times (beds help A LOT with this!). Guitar was a different story though. It caused me fingers to hurt so badly since they lacked the necessary calluses and nervous system adaptation. I also had trouble forming the basic chords right off the bat. The former really frustrated me a lot though since it meant that I literally had to stop practicing guitar, despite my desire to keep on pushing through it, due to the finger discomfort becoming an issue. I mustered on though, and I still remember watching Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve in between sets of juggling and guitar to ring in the New Year!

What a year it had been though, this year of 2011. As the seconds ticked away all I could do was think back to how incredibly different I not only was, but felt, after the many months of incredible, fundamental changes to my lifestyle and mindset. I went from being some typical teenager only interested in exercising, napping, and doing nothing. I had no real direction, my mind and daily routines were a mess, and everything just seemed negative. I was now a proud first semester survivor with budding musical skills, his own videography company, and most importantly of all the idea of a lifetime...

2012: A Life-Changing Renaissance

As I stated above, by late December of 2011 I had already begun referring to the present time in my life as a "renaissance" since it represented a "revival" of the person that I knew I always could be. The person that had long been locked away inside my mind as an idea. Little did I know at the time though that this "renaissance" was just beginning, for the year of 2012 would hold A LOT more development and progress than I could ever imagine. I began the year by continuing what I had already been doing, with my main focus being on completing a few challenges to ensure that my 100 Challenge could get off the ground. CFI was still a major focus as well though, and fortunately for me the four main genres I had already created (Music, Fitness, Comedy, and Fun) were filled with ideas for content.

Music was easy, since I never stopped practicing piano through all of this and I had several songs lined up to record. I knew that Music would be a great way to drive viewers towards my channel, so in my mind "CFI Music" was going to be the lifeblood of ChaseFloydInc. My other genre with existing content, "Fitness", had several ideas but one main one. This idea, a video sharing my city playground workout with the world, was something that I wanted to film immediately upon returning to college. The weather would end up delaying the production of this for several months until later that year though. The "Fun" genre was similar in that I had an EPIC idea for a video, but it was one that not only required nice weather buy my being at home. With it being January and a few weeks from the Spring Semester, this would have to wait as well. This frustrated me, but I chaneled that frustration into continuing work on my challenges and my music...

Who can forget about the Comedy genre though! I had one main idea for a video, an "interview" using clips of another person named Chase Floyd, that was pieced together into one. I wrote the script for this during these pre-Spring semester weeks in January, with a plan to film it upon my return for Spring Break. Aside from this though, working on my challenges was still the main focus. I was making good progress too, with my juggling improving by the day and my guitar getting better as well. I thus returned to college feeling a lot better about the state of CFI and the 100 Challenge, since with each passing day my idea seemed closer and closer to becoming a reality...

2013: Challenge Thy Name is Chase

2014: Perfection Gets In The Way

2015-2017: Struggling with Good and Good-Enough

2018: Positive Student Encouragement Paves the Way

2019: Back to Work

100 Challenge Timeline