Secrets to Staying Unshakable in the Middle of Crazy Town

This One is Short...But You Might Need It Right Now: How to Build Confidence When the World’s on Fire and Everyone’s Losing Their Minds

Denzel Washington walking and looking very confident in the 2004 movie, Man on Fire.

Secrets to Staying Unshakable in the Middle of Crazy Town

How to Build Confidence When the World’s on Fire and Everyone’s Losing Their Minds

The Jack Hopkins Now Newsletter #533: Tuesday, September 9th, 2025

Welcome to Crazy Town

Look around.

The rules don’t make sense anymore.
Institutions you thought were bedrock? Crumbling.
Leaders who swore an oath to protect you? Selling you out for a seat at the strongman’s table.
Media? Distracting you with shiny objects while the wiring burns under the floorboards.

If you’ve ever thought, “This place feels like Crazy Town”…congratulations…you’re not insane. You’re awake.

And here’s the kicker: Crazy Town isn’t going away.

The chaos is the new normal. The screaming headlines…the 2 a.m. executive orders… the scandals that would’ve ended a career 20 years ago but now vanish by Monday morning…this is the terrain.

So the real question isn’t: “When will it calm down?”
The real question is: “How do I stay unshakable in the middle of it?”

The Lie You’ve Been Sold

They’ve told you confidence is something you’re born with.

That belief in yourself is like eye color…fixed. Some people “just have it.”

That’s bullshit.

Confidence is built. Trained. Forged under fire.

And here’s the dirty secret: the people in charge don’t want you confident. They want you anxious…distracted…doubting yourself. Because an anxious citizen won’t fight. A confident citizen will.

That’s why the machine feeds you constant noise: the birthday card circus…the fake outrage…the “breaking news” that breaks nothing. It’s all designed to make you feel powerless.

So if you want to thrive in Crazy Town…the first step is to throw that lie in the trash.

Confidence isn’t a gift. It’s a skill. And you can build it.

Secret #1: Train for the Punches You Take

An old fighter was once asked how he managed to stay dangerous after decades of brutal matches. (You might have read this somewhere recently. Repetition is the mother of learning;)

He said: “Most men train for the punches they throw. I train for the punches I take.”

That’s the essence of real confidence.

Anybody can look tough when they’re winning…when the punches are landing…when the crowd’s cheering. But what about when you’re flat on your back? When life just put its boot on your chest?

That’s where most people fold.

True belief in yourself is built by conditioning your mind and body to take the hits and keep moving. To get up bloody…laugh at the punch that should’ve finished you…and swing back harder.

In Crazy Town…the hits will keep coming. The trick isn’t to dodge them all. It’s to trust that no matter how hard you get hit…you’ll rise.

Secret #2: Control the Voice in Your Head

You already know the outside world is chaos. But the real battle? It’s in the six inches between your ears.

Confidence dies in the echo chamber of self-doubt. And that echo chamber doesn’t build itself. It’s programmed…by propaganda…by media…by algorithms designed to make you feel small.

Every time you think “I can’t handle this,” ask yourself: “Whose voice is that?”

Is it yours? Or is it the voice of a system that profits when you feel weak?

The antidote is brutal clarity. Write your own script. Repeat it until it drowns out the noise. “I can take the hit. I can endure. I can outlast.”

That’s not a motivational poster. That’s rewiring your brain.

Secret #3: Anchor to History

People love to say, “We’ve never seen times like these.”

Nonsense.

This country has been through depressions…dust bowls…dictators…and world wars. Our grandparents survived bread lines and blackouts. Some of them stared down Hitler. Some of them buried children and still got up the next day to plow fields.

• During the Great Depression…families lost farms…jobs…and dignity…yet still scraped together meals out of flour and lard.

• In the Dust Bowl…entire towns disappeared under choking storms. People didn’t give up; they migrated…they rebuilt…they endured.

• In WWII…average 18-year-olds were storming beaches under machine gun fire. They weren’t fearless…they were conditioned by hardship to believe they could do the impossible.

• In the Civil Rights era…activists faced dogs…hoses…beatings…and imprisonment….and still marched.

Compared to that? Crazy Town is noisy, ugly…and dangerous…but survivable.

Anchoring yourself to history is how you build perspective. When you realize you come from people who’ve endured worse…you stop asking, “Can I handle this?” and start declaring, “I was built for this.”

Secret #4: Build a Tribe

Confidence is contagious. You can try to white-knuckle it alone…but nothing amplifies belief like standing shoulder-to-shoulder with people who refuse to fold.

That’s why community matters. It’s why you’re here, reading this.

Because in Crazy Town…you’ll be told you’re nuts for questioning the story…weak for feeling fear…reckless for wanting to fight back. Alone…you’ll start to wonder if they’re right.

But in a tribe…you see you’re not crazy. You’re clear-eyed. You’re not weak. You’re battle-tested. You’re not reckless. You’re the only sane one left.

And that multiplies your belief tenfold.

Secret #5: Practice “Small Wins Armor”

Here’s a trick the elites don’t want you to know:

You don’t build unshakable confidence by waiting for the big win. You build it by stacking small wins.

• Making your bed when you don’t feel like it.

• Finishing the workout even when the news cycle’s crushing your spirit.

• Writing the email…the letter…the call to your representative…even when you feel like it doesn’t matter.

Each one is proof. Proof that you can act…even when it’s hard. Proof that you’re not at the mercy of the chaos.

Confidence isn’t lightning…it’s bricks. Stack them every day and soon you’ve built a fortress.

Secret #6: Turn Pain Into Fuel

Here’s something most people won’t admit: pain is unavoidable.

The question is whether you’ll let it crush you….or turn it into energy.

The people who survived the Holocaust…the gulags…the killing fields…every story has the same thread: they found meaning in the suffering. They turned pain into something larger than themselves.

That’s the same formula in Crazy Town. Every hit you take can either be a scar that weakens you or a scar that reminds you: I can endure more than they thought.

That shift…pain as fuel…is the difference between collapse and steel.

The Shift

Most people waste their lives waiting for stability.

They think, “If things would just calm down, I could believe in myself again.”

But Crazy Town never calms down.

The sooner you embrace that…the sooner you’ll stop waiting and start building confidence for the world as it is.

Confidence isn’t knowing the storm will pass. It’s knowing you can walk straight into it and come out stronger.

That’s what makes you dangerous. That’s what makes you free.

Why This Matters Now

This isn’t just self-help fluff. This is survival strategy for authoritarian times.

Because here’s the truth: regimes thrive on fear. They count on you doubting yourself. They want you paralyzed…hopeless…scrolling in silence.

Confidence is rebellion.

Every act of belief in yourself…every refusal to fold…every demand for truth…every moment you decide I will not break….is a middle finger to the machine.

That’s why this matters. Not tomorrow. Not “someday.” Right now.

Final Word

Crazy Town isn’t a passing storm. It’s the world we live in.

But you don’t have to be broken by it. You can be forged in it.

And the secret isn’t waiting for calm. The secret is building belief so strong that chaos becomes your training ground.

When others panic…you’ll smile. When others fold…you’ll rise. When others whisper, “It’s too much,” you’ll roar, “Try me.”

That’s real confidence. That’s the kind of belief no system can destroy.

Back soon. If reading this just after I wrote it…or in the evening, period…sleep well tonight. You deserve it.

Best,

-Jack