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The Athlete's Mind part 1: The Curse
94 Plays5 years ago
Athletes are revered in our culture. As a society, we look to athletes as models for commitment, hard work, and success. But there is a darker side of truly being an athlete that I have personally struggled with my whole life. This episode introduces an archetype I have been working on for a few years: The Athlete's Mind.
The Athletes Mind is the all-consuming obsession one has with competing, performance, and being better.
There is a duality with The Athlete's Mind that we must discuss and this episode is the beginning of a deeper dive into this archetype.
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Transcript
Introduction and Mental Health Theme
00:00:02
Speaker
Hello. Hello. You have the eyelash on your, it's going to distract me. Do you want me to get it? All right. I want to distract you. Any other could be anything. It's true. It only takes a shiny object. All right. So what do we got today? So we're going to broach a topic that, um,
00:00:32
Speaker
We've been talking about for a while and haven't put it out there into the world. Writing about it, it would be way too long. Podcasts about it, we've covered other things.
00:00:47
Speaker
And it's best served in like a conversation. Um, and so I guess, yeah, now it's just like, we talk about mental health. I think, I think that's, you know, obviously that's always been with how between what between the years has served.
Understanding the Athlete's Mind
00:01:02
Speaker
Um, we might've known that less in previous times, but like, it's very clear that's what it's doing. Um, that's the work that it's doing and, you know, mental fitness, so to speak, isn't just.
00:01:19
Speaker
Working on your mental health doesn't mean you have some clinical diagnosis that you have a problem. It's the same thing with your fitness. You don't have to have a broken leg to work on your fitness. You just, whatever. The topic, this concept that's kind of near and dear to my heart is this notion of the athlete's mind and how it is often something that's revered and looked up to and esteemed.
00:01:46
Speaker
You know promoted by many consultants by many leadership coaches look at a lot of a model to aspire to yeah, this is every look at how yeah exactly and you look at like learning lessons from athletes oftentimes
00:02:01
Speaker
that were athletes, but weren't coaching. People coming out of the military. So, you know, special operations, big one with that, you know, it's all of an athlete. So just to define that term, not just sport, like the term athlete, as you're referring to, it's more like high performer, sure, like sports, fitness, athlete, military athlete, someone who is
00:02:27
Speaker
really, and you use the word obsessed before, but like, they are very focused in their pursuits. Yeah, they're focused, driven in obsession, sacrifice is
00:02:40
Speaker
Frankly, expected and demanded. Competition is never over. Sound like all consuming. Yeah, it is all consuming. This one dimension. Right. And the outcome is cut and dry. You win or you lost. Right.
00:03:02
Speaker
an athlete knows that, subscribes to that. Actually, they don't always know that and that's kind of why I feel strongly about this because the curse of the athlete's mind is something that we need to demystify and we need to say, look, this is an actual real problem and
00:03:23
Speaker
meaning we're we're recommending like we're touting this, but we have to identify some of the pitfalls and not just be pushing people this direction. Yeah, if you're gonna if you're gonna refer to athletes
00:03:38
Speaker
Then you need to refer to the whole picture.
Pressures of High Performers
00:03:42
Speaker
You need to be aware of the pros and the cons and have a no bullshit conversation about it. And as an athlete, my entire life playing at the highest levels of, you know, soccer at the time into college, transitioning that into special forces.
00:04:03
Speaker
there's a whole dark side to being a high performing athlete or aspiring to be a high performing athlete, um, that nobody sees. And the reason they don't see it is because people only look at athletes when they're under the lights at the game. And that's a big thing. Sure. A little bit of training or, or practice or, you know, different kinds of things. You don't only see the game.
00:04:29
Speaker
but nobody sees them before or after. Nobody sees them in the off season. Nobody sees them when they have to hang up their boots. And like over the winter, spring, I don't even remember when it was, when we watched the Michael Jordan series, like it was really interesting because I didn't obviously look up to Michael Jordan like you did. He was like a major, what would you call him?
00:04:57
Speaker
For me, he was a God. He was a hero, an icon. Yeah, for sure. But one of the things you did mention was just the lack of people being able to identify him as a human, because people only see what they want to see.
00:05:14
Speaker
in these athletes and that includes all the positives, all the accolades, all the shining lights and not the other. And I think that's an interesting sort of selective thing because that serves people in them being able to say, you know, oh, I'm going to follow that sort of, you know, what's the word?
00:05:35
Speaker
Not program, but that's that model I'm going to follow. This is part two, really, of the podcast we did before about pulling back a little bit of the honesty on what's really going on with this stuff.
00:05:57
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think that so if you look at like Michael Jordan as an example, you'd be like, Oh, well, he worked really hard. He got cut from the team, whatever all the kind of stories everybody knows. And that's about as deep as it goes.
00:06:11
Speaker
What I think that that documentary did an awesome job of was showing, like, he was a motherfucker to people. And because he knew what was required. And now he may have taken it to an extreme, but I'll tell you, like, anybody who's ever been on a high-performance team knows that there are those still, at the tip of the spear, there's still the tip of the spear within that, and there are people who push and push and push, and that's how they facilitate
00:06:41
Speaker
success or championships or whatever it might be but like it's not all glamour and there is a darkness to it and in many ways that's something that I don't think we're actually talking about. From a personality standpoint that's a whole different conversation.
00:07:01
Speaker
But your issue really is one, or not issue, but what you're highlighting is one, just as an athlete yourself, you obviously had that experience of having the quote unquote dark side, but two also that people can't really just be selective in like how as a culture we
00:07:19
Speaker
look to that model like I'm saying to like follow because I wasn't a high performing athlete but I think like you look at something like CrossFit and I know that's not like the main topic here but that is an example of
00:07:34
Speaker
You know, kind of a one-to-one, like people trying to aspire to that type of, I'm going to be like Matt Frazier, Tia Claire Toomey, and sort of the pitfalls of that because we're not seeing the whole picture. Well, and yes, and what I think people are missing, and I think it's innocent. It comes from innocence, and that's a fundamental belief that it's not like people aren't bad people.
00:07:55
Speaker
But you just don't know. And people are looking, let's just say, for crossfitters. People are looking at Matt Fraser, Tia Clare, Rich Froning, whomever. And they are just trying to mimic what they do. That's it. They are mimicking what Matt does, what Rich does, blah, blah, blah. How they eat, how many times they work out, whatever. Just what they do. Yeah.
00:08:17
Speaker
they are not mimicking who that person is. If who that person was is what the people who idolize these athletes, like if that's what they're doing, that would be very sobering.
00:08:35
Speaker
And then they would just realize, they would realize just how different they really are.
Lessons from Sports
00:08:42
Speaker
Cause you can mimic, you can kind of photocopy what people do and just chalk it up to, well, yeah, I'm at this level there at that level. But it's like, you completely skip over who that person is. And I think, which is, I mean, it seems so obvious to say that's more about how they're getting to that point. Of course it is. But we all just take the,
00:09:05
Speaker
the, the actions or the, the what, and think if we just put that on, then that will make us more into the who, which is absurd. Yeah. It's like, and again, it's fine. People, it's, it's an innocent thing. And sometimes it's just a function of not thinking so deeply or not having people who were at these high levels, but like we replicate the external and in doing so completely
00:09:33
Speaker
miss the internal and the internal is what makes these athletes fucking incredible. It's not the external.
00:09:40
Speaker
So for example though, so what would you say is like a positive? So in your experience, you as a who? Because this is kind of like, people will reference often like your military experience. And you've been very honest, like who you are is not because of your military experience. No. So, but there's gotta be, there is something people can take away like of your who that someone could learn from. So we kind of have it backwards.
00:10:11
Speaker
For example, people can't look at what you did. So you have a list of everything you did for the five years you were in the military. And what we're saying is someone could go do all those things, and they're not going to come out with you, the benefits of who you were, what you've learned, all that stuff.
00:10:30
Speaker
So what are the things that people could benefit from? Like what is the who then? Because obviously there's something to glean from people who are high performers, like high performing athletes. So what are you saying would be a positive for people to?
00:10:45
Speaker
When you embrace the athlete's mind and you recognize that you're volunteering to pursue something that means declining a lot of other things, there's an element of sacrifice for dedication. And I think that's something that is valuable for everybody.
00:11:11
Speaker
There's obviously hard work and consistency, adversity, tenacity, perseverance, grit, all of those kind of buzzwords, and you get to validate that.
00:11:25
Speaker
there's learning how to be a fucking team player. If you're on a team sport and like you better believe it, that's, that's it. There's humility. If you have the benefit of having someone better than you, there's, there's humility. If you're the best player on the field, there's also that element of like, you need to find a new field. There is also that component of
00:11:52
Speaker
there's an opportunity to handle loss and things that are outside of your control through sport and learn about that. And, and, and you really have to accept it. So there's a ton of value obviously. And those lessons are things that can be applied to not just the athletic field, but you know, whatever business pursuits you're doing in life too. So, you know, of course there are things and those are, those are all who things because the, what is you lost?
00:12:20
Speaker
The who is, can you handle that with some dignity? Can you accept your responsibility? Can you say, can you look at your teammates in the eye and say, we lost this game? Because at a critical moment, I fucked up.
The Struggle of Self-worth
00:12:33
Speaker
That's not easy. I remember vividly when I was in college, I think it was my sophomore, junior year.
00:12:40
Speaker
We were down the road, big game, night game, big crowd, and I think we were up or tied. It doesn't matter. And ball was up in the air, and I was like pretty good. I had confidence, this and that.
00:12:56
Speaker
There's like less than a minute or something. And instead of just like heading it or clearing it out and just basically sealing the game, I decided to bring it down because I could do that. Like the ball was like kind of like Velcro. So brought it down. I like tripped. I got lazy. Whatever somebody it was a battle then for the ball.
00:13:14
Speaker
they wound up I wound up giving it over they went down the field and like scored and I was like I had to tell my team like We did not win this game. I think we wound up time. We didn't win this game because I fucked up
00:13:29
Speaker
And that sucked, especially when you're, you know, quote unquote, one of the best players on the team and blah, blah, blah. Um, but you know what, like everybody looked and they're like, it's all right, man. Like we all, Hey, it's all good. And they, and they supported that. So, you know, there's a lot of positives that come from.
00:13:48
Speaker
Yeah, which is why it's so great for kids. But again, we have to talk about the other side and the curse of the athlete's mind is really what has me has had me. I've thought I've been thinking about a lot, you know, obviously more on the individual level with people digging into it more. And there's the darkness that comes about when when you are at that level and when that is what you volunteer to do and
00:14:18
Speaker
Yeah. So that is really like getting into that a little bit more, um, kind of in a nutshell from at least my observation, what it is is like nothing is ever good enough. Or like there's always this, I mean, how would you describe that? Because we've talked to many people who were former athletes who, and that mindset, you don't just kind of put away that mindset or that who, when you, as you say, like hang up your boots or,
00:14:48
Speaker
That game is over. Yeah. So then it trickles into life to your other pursuits. And like, how would you describe that curse in your own experience? Like now? Yeah. In my own experience, 100% nothing is ever good enough. Ever. And the fear is that if you accept something as being good enough, you're getting complacent. And the person with a different color Jersey is going to be better than you.
00:15:18
Speaker
So there's always room for improvement. And that's one of those things, like always having room for improvement is something that we look at as like a positive, but not to the point where it's just an endless pit that's almost self-deprecating. It's a yin and a yang. And there's so many positives that come out of athletics and sport and being on a team and having coaches.
00:15:47
Speaker
if you're fortunate to have them. Sadly, more people have dogshit coaches than real coaches. They have people who put people in, manage the clock, and yell the win. Thanks, you did absolutely nothing.
00:16:03
Speaker
But there's still then the victory and the joy and the nostalgia and the remembrance of, oh man, remember that? And there's kids who, you know, they never excel, go past high school. And that doesn't mean that they don't care greatly about their athletic performance in high school. It's still something they refer back to. And in many ways, it's probably something that they can look back to.
00:16:23
Speaker
And say, yeah, well, you know what? I remember my junior year, we had a coach and he was so pissed at us, he ran us until we threw up. And going into this busy season or going into this year end, I kind of channeled that kid again. And we got through and we rallied together. It's like right on. Yeah, you found that. You don't have to look very far to see that.
00:16:49
Speaker
The flip side to it, though, is also the same part of punishment, of not ever being good enough. There's just a lack of acceptance. There's such a lack of acceptance and worth. It challenges your worth. Every kid who played the sport knows
Personal Growth and Comparison
00:17:12
Speaker
Once you got to a certain level, it wasn't really all that high, but basically once you understood like really how the game worked versus babysitting the kids who thought they were the shit. Everybody hated them, but it's like, and I get it. There's cocky kids and there's ego and there's, Oh, that kid thinks they're so good. And, and, and, and yeah, that sure does exist. But like, there's this celebration and this reverence for.
00:17:40
Speaker
never being, like, never accepting good enough. You'd be the best player on the team, stuff's still not good enough, still not. And it's just, you're worth, you never actually accept your worth. And, you know, you fast forward or you go to the biggest things. I mean, LeBron James just signed a two year, 80 something million dollar deal. Like, you ask some people like, and that obviously gets to a whole separate level, but,
00:18:08
Speaker
Yeah, in my experience, one of the things that still plagues me. And I mean, it's going to take a long time, but it's because it's been 20 something years of it never being good enough. But I mean, I think that's why you, as we started this, like talking about like the athletes mind.
00:18:32
Speaker
you know, just so that, anyway, listening, like I, in my experience, I wasn't an athlete to the degree you were whatsoever, but I think you can have that same mindset and not to pick on it, because I know, but like, for me, like the most athletic I was, was like in CrossFit. That was like, for me, like, wow, okay, you know. Yeah, you reached a level as an individual,
00:18:59
Speaker
that many people said they wanted to, but you actually did it and you dedicated and you trained and you got coaching and you, you know, willingly put yourself through experiences that were not easy, that, you know, you did the inconvenient thing. You know, everybody likes to talk about doing the inconvenient thing. And it's like, well, just talk unless it happens. And, you know,
00:19:24
Speaker
Yeah. And the trick with that, and I think there's a lot of ex-athletes, one of the things that's tricky about CrossFit is it, as we know, there's a, people come to it like who were former athletes, high school, college, and this is this like, wow, I haven't felt like this since then. And that's a positive. However, there's a little bit of like a trap in that if we're not careful. And that's not just CrossFit, but like,
00:19:50
Speaker
We can quickly turn into that like not good enough. There's always a place to improve. And especially in CrossFit because there's so much numbers and data. It is right there all the time. And we know people.
00:20:04
Speaker
clients who've had that experience and it's this really tough thing because in one on one side there is a positive course to fitness and there's joy that comes from that but on the other side it becomes very much this self imprisonment of just kind of it's got to be better and it's better and it's better and you know even from a general population place like most of what people hear when they come to a CrossFit gym is like
00:20:32
Speaker
and the attitude is always improving, always improving. And I think that's where, as a society, to your point, that isn't something we probably wanna, there's a fine line there. I think it's interesting to look at how, if you were to tell people, yeah, you know what we do? We partner with people to have them content, to find contentment in their fitness.
00:21:00
Speaker
that it would be like, not maybe this is a judgment, but it's like, that'd be like, that's bullshit. Like, what do you mean? Like, where's the hard shit? And it's like, what's so funny about that is that it's a, it's a, it's a, it's, you can be content, like I'm content and I'm getting fitter. You're content and you're getting fitter. This is nothing about improvement. It's more about acceptance.
Fitness Obsession and Role Models
00:21:24
Speaker
Yeah. And for athletes,
00:21:29
Speaker
And yes, CrossFit is for many people the most athletic they can feel. Beautiful. That's a totally different thing than being an athlete. Just like somebody who can feel patriotic by doing something is different than listening to the military and saying, I'm a this. You know what I mean? And that's a really good comparison to make.
00:21:51
Speaker
Yeah, and so one of the things that I see commonly is people comparing themselves to what they were. And it's like we're going, that's like driving through the, that's like driving looking through the rear view mirror. We wanna be driving looking through the windshield and not necessarily to compare yourself to who you were or what you were, but like what about the person you're going to be? What about the person you aspire to be? And again, you're going to change, hopefully,
00:22:20
Speaker
compare yourself to that person right and allow that
00:22:25
Speaker
Allow that person you're gonna be in one, three, five years from now to be that person at the tip of the spear that pushes you and says, hey, we're growing. And I guarantee you that person who's seen some of the pitfalls and the turns up ahead will say like, look, it's okay if you're, you know, you gotta take a thing. Take a break or whatever. And I think the other thing just to highlight, because one of the reasons this topic is important to you is
00:22:53
Speaker
identifying the pitfalls of on like, onboarding this stuff in a vacuum, not understanding the whole picture. And one of those things we recently watched the was a documentary on like the Olympic athletes, and that really like resonated with you. And they were, I thought we thought it was a great
00:23:13
Speaker
know, peace where they were pointing out it was about mental health issues among athletes. But because that focus becomes so singular, you know, that value outside of that or what happens beyond that or, you know, it is really a dark side. And so just for us to be careful with
00:23:36
Speaker
that putting that on a pedestal and taking that piece in a vacuum and saying like, because what we see is people doing that. Like I'm going to commit to the gym every day. I'm going to go to the gym twice a day. I'm going to eat like this and to your point about like the what, but in many ways, even though that is just the what it's a slippery, it's not a healthy, that's not even a healthy what to onboard.
00:23:58
Speaker
So even when you know what I'm saying like even when we make the connections like a rich phroning and okay like the what that he's doing even though it's about the who the what isn't really that healthy either like
00:24:11
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, like, you know, and you know, only those willing to stand up and say, this has been my struggle. We'll ever have a glimpse of, you know, and, and, and who knows. And I know I can rattle off the top of my head. There's plenty of people who would say you guys are full of shit with what we're saying. It's not about this, it's that and blah, blah, blah. It's like, okay, we'll see. But why would you think they would say that? Because it's, because it's, um,
00:24:43
Speaker
because it challenges the entire kind of entry into the game. And it challenges the popular belief and. Well, so then the question is, well, if we're not going to aspire to, if we're not going to look up to these people, who, who do we look up to? Yeah. You know who I look up to among others, um, single fucking parents.
00:25:12
Speaker
Like to me, and that was always something that was, that was always something that blew me away about you was like, you were essentially a single parent, uh, during some crazy times and like, that is way more impressive to me than
00:25:36
Speaker
somebody really being super selfish and doing that. I mean, there's a lot of people that I looked up to, but my thing is, is like, well, what that is, and it's like, because you're basically a pussy if you don't go to fucking the absolute extremes. And if you're not trying to get better every day, one percent better every day, for fuck's sake, shut up, everybody, shut up.
00:25:58
Speaker
It is just echo chamber talk, and it is complete fucking nonsense. And I get, I obviously get fired up when I think about that, and because I've heard people, I've heard these coaches, and it's like, do you even know what you're doing to people?
Identity Beyond Athletics
00:26:16
Speaker
And here's the thing, and I'll continue to say it, especially in the CrossFit world, a lot of these people were never actually athletes. You were never actually an athlete. And there's that element of,
00:26:29
Speaker
Who are you when what you do goes away? Because this is the other part. As an athlete, that is going to happen. That is how this story ends. Unless you drop dead, middle of the game. Right, you're going to have to contend with it. When I was getting recruited by a bunch of colleges, I went to one of the visits.
00:26:57
Speaker
I'll never forget it because the coach that was like interviewing me or that was recruiting me said, so what do you want to do after school? And I was like, I don't know. I was this senior in high school and hadn't thought further than the next day. And he was like, well, the ball stops bouncing for everybody at a certain point. So you should probably start thinking about that.
00:27:25
Speaker
And this was a school that had a, you know, academic prestige and whatnot. And frankly, I didn't actually, I wasn't actually able to get in because my grades weren't good enough. So it was another major wake up call. But I was like, a ball stops bounce of everybody. You don't think about that when you're at the height of the game. You don't think about that when you hear the noise of the crowd. You don't think about that when you're, when you're training. There's so many things that you don't think about.
00:27:48
Speaker
And because it's it's sobering and it's like what do you who are you when what you do goes away and That is what we are in right now for a lot of people what they are doing is
00:28:05
Speaker
fitness, for example, where like, you know, people are hurting, right? And people are not going to the gym, and they're not doing this, it's like, because it was never baked into who you are, you never assumed that as your identity, it was just what you did. And when the opportunity to jettison that occurs, because of either situations outside of your control, or just the natural course of events, when what
00:28:28
Speaker
you do sort of goes away, then you have to express who you are. And if that isn't part of you, then yeah, during times of stress and crisis, you're going to prioritize the things that are important to you. So yeah, and there's also just the mere like we've all we've experienced if I mean, in my experience personally, and with other members or clients, like it's really sad when something that can be so positive like fitness,
00:28:58
Speaker
It does become this obsession in not a healthy way. And it's because that's what hard people do. That's what these tough people do. So I'm going to make this so much a part of my life. And then someone gets injured and it's the only thing that you really have. And now that's gone.
00:29:20
Speaker
It's really like, that should not be, that shouldn't, that's not a healthy approach. Right. And just like there's positives to the athlete's mind and negatives, there's positives to the getting better 1% of a day, working hard, whatever. And there's negatives to it. And so, you know, that's one of the things that I feel like is important when, at least when I maybe get fired up and go on a little bit of a rip.
00:29:44
Speaker
I'm not saying don't try to get better. You know what I mean? If you think that that's what I'm saying, you're not listening. And I don't think people who listen to this, they get that. But just generally speaking.
00:29:58
Speaker
I'd be much more interested in working with someone. And after they do something, they're like, I got worse today. It's like, great. Now we can learn. Cause if you're just tacking on win after win 1%, 1%, 1%, like you're in fucking La La land. That is not life. If you've never experienced the dip, you haven't climbed.
00:30:17
Speaker
Right, we'll be right because there's inevitably like the only way you're doing that is you're shutting off certain things. And that's what I feel like personally is what's happening currently is it's like I saw someone leaving a workout facility the other day still panting. Okay, like their heart rate was still like, like as if they just got off the bike. Yeah. And it made me think like, man, like there is no room for transitions. There's no stopping. There's no silence. There's no pause to be like,
Integrating Personal Values
00:30:47
Speaker
Like what am I doing? How's it going? People are like going to get up. And I experienced this for myself during the pandemic. It was like on, I'm like baking bread, doing this cold showers, coaching class, working out like, and then what, and then it all like goes very badly. It all kind of crumbles. And that's, I think some of this, like when you say that stuff, like the 1% better get up at 3AM, like at some point,
00:31:12
Speaker
That that's not going to work anymore. And yeah, sure. Maybe rich Froning, maybe it does work for him. But again, to your point, like that's who he is. And if we count the number of like amazing athletes on the planet, they're like, that's, that's not the norm. That's not human. But that's, but right. But that's the thing. Like, I don't know.
00:31:37
Speaker
I think that there's, there's the ideal or there's the idea of what these athletes do. And then there's the reality. There's what people see and then there's mostly what people don't see. And for many people, like how can you be the rich phroning of your, how can you, if you're, if we're using rich as an example, and he's a good one cause rich is an awesome dude.
00:32:04
Speaker
How can you actually be like Rich? Because you know what Rich does too? Like Rich loves his family. He is, he prioritizes them. And that's one of the major reasons he has to do individually more. Like there's, there's some wholesome stuff. There's, there's, um,
00:32:23
Speaker
opportunity to extract the essence of these athletes and learn. And even at that, you're never going to quite know. Right. You know what I mean? Unless you know them. But your point is bringing that into your own, making it personal for you. For you. Yeah. Yeah. And that's the thing where I get it, where it's tough to do that because of the glam and the fame the celebrity do. And we worship people that are in front of cameras and stuff.
00:32:54
Speaker
The bigger issue is when you are no longer necessary to the game. Your relevance. Yeah. When you are irrelevant, who are you? Right. And that is one of the things that is, that has plagued me. And I have seen former teammates. I've seen people I was in the military with. I've had plenty of conversations with people who were athletes be like,
00:33:24
Speaker
Yeah, life just sort of lost this luster once I stopped playing. And that is a reality of the athlete's mind. And that is part of the curse. To get to that level, you do sacrifice so much, you do focus on so much. The reason why, my suspicion and in my experience, the reason why I was dominant
00:33:55
Speaker
on the field was because I took everything personally.
00:34:00
Speaker
Mm hmm. Well, that was very much like the Michael Jordan thing. Exactly. And when he said I said fucking finally, you know, it's like, oh, don't take things personally. It's like, OK, you want to do hard shit? Take everything personally in your pursuit of that, because when it gets hard, when you are truly challenged and like and there's like, oh, when I when I think about this, there's always this this this experience in my mind of just and it's more so and it's not like, you know, bombs and explosions and stuff related, but it was in the pipeline at some point.
00:34:31
Speaker
I forget where and when it was and it might be a, you know, a combination of a lot of things, but there was a recurring thing of like, when I had to truly dig deep and when I was like, man, I'm like almost on the brink of not being sure if I can do this or not. And it is just like super hard physically, mentally, emotionally, all the bit.
00:34:52
Speaker
I found strength by taking it personally and by finding something within that mattered to me at a personal level far greater than the end state. So we've both listened to Andrew Huberman now on several podcasts. He's a neuroscientist.
00:35:16
Speaker
He was on Joe Rogan. I listened to him recently on ritual and he said, I don't think he listened to the ritual podcast. He literally said the same thing you said about, they were talking about endurance athletes and how like, I think ritual was saying in some of his endurance pursuits when he is like, I don't know if I can finish this, like run whatever it is. The, the only thing that like can really,
00:35:44
Speaker
have them continue is remembering like what it is. It's personal about this pursuit. Um, and that's really the, but I mean, what's funny is it's like the bumper sticker, like don't take it personally. I mean, I've heard that however many times, even in business and it's like, yeah, that would be really great and convenient for some things. Don't take it personally when whatever. But the reality is like, if you're really going to excel at something, yeah, you do take all of it personally and you have to, because otherwise it's just this,
00:36:15
Speaker
External yeah, I mean and I think in many ways that's sort of like it could be thought of like a Band-aid. Mm-hmm a little bit of a numbing agent. Hey, don't take a person. Oh, I feel better. Right. Thanks. And it's like well, that's an external. Yeah Yeah, and you know, I think that's one of the things with it Where and again when Michael Jordan was like and there's a meme on it now, but I was like, yes this is exactly and I didn't I wish that I mean it doesn't matter but I room and I told you like
00:36:47
Speaker
And I guess maybe this is a whole, maybe even next week we talk about the even deeper layers of it all, but like.
00:36:55
Speaker
there is absolutely a different gear that you shift into when it is fucking personal and talking about injury. And this is where I think kind of coming it all back. So the vector project, I think. It was a nine week for anybody not listening. Nine weeks training leading up to an event, but mostly focused on the process, not just let's get to the event. Right. But you had to find that out when you signed up.
00:37:23
Speaker
So it was a 12 mile ruck into a six mile run. People did it in person, people did it remotely. That looked different for everybody and the intent was different for everybody. But you would look at that and be like, okay, athletic event, physical event, heavy emphasis on the physical, right? But what you were able to discover about yourself
00:37:48
Speaker
not because I told you anything about you, because I don't know, through the coaching and through the exercises and through just the programs that are between the ears. People discovered and reconnected with something within themselves that was personal, that mattered, and that is what's gonna drive them forward. That's what's gonna propel them beyond the ruck and the run.
00:38:11
Speaker
And I was talking with Omar, who finished it, who was part of it, and like the week of, the week of sign up. Right, he broke his ankle. And he underwent a horrible injury. And I was texting with him last night, actually, I was like, you know, how did it help? And he's back, he's cleared, it's been months, but like been working, been diligent.
00:38:37
Speaker
And one of the exercises that we did, he referenced and it was like how, you know, healing was like the biggest goal. And it's like, oh man, like I got goosebumps. I was smiling. I was like, told him. I was like super proud of him for doing that because, you know, like he's got a, he's got a kid now too. He's got a young baby. His wife was taking a lot of the responsibility.
00:39:03
Speaker
And that matters personally, especially when you're, when, okay, when your wife just delivered, like really, it's just like, you're a cheerleader. I mean, I've never obviously been involved in this process, but like.
00:39:14
Speaker
You're kind of like, all right, dude, like, you don't, you're not really needed. Like she's got it. And then all of a sudden it's like, Oh good. I can help. I can do this. I can do that. And then boom, you're laid up. You can't even, you can't even really manage your own. You've got this horrible injury. Like how are we possibly supposed to say, Hey, don't take things personally. It's like, no, no, no. Take that shit personally and do something about it. And, and that's going to be, you know, and I would imagine that most of these athletes, I mean, you look at Tia.
00:39:41
Speaker
her shift that one year when she barely didn't make it and like just devastation. You can bet your ass she fucking took that personally and that drove her to be where she
Conclusion and Ongoing Discussion
00:39:54
Speaker
is now. Right. I mean the Vector Project started from when I did we talked about it in conjunction with the half Iron Man I did when you really like
00:40:03
Speaker
had me look at like, why are you doing this? And I don't honestly remember my exact time or anything. Like what I remember is struggling on that run, like being in fucking pain. And having to be like, why am I fucking doing this? Because like, who cares? I could walk like, what's it gonna fucking matter? And if that was what I decided I could, but yeah. So I think it's a, I do think this is a big topic because there's so many places to go with it, but I think it's a good,
00:40:33
Speaker
It was a good follow up to, to what we talked about a couple of weeks ago with the, and that's the thing when we talk about this stuff, it's like, how are we still not just like all understanding the connection of the body and the mind? I'm not really sure how that's still, you know, we're on the, we're part of the,
00:40:53
Speaker
movement. I said, yes. Yeah. And so I don't know. I don't know if that was succinct. I don't know if that was clear. I know it's not going to be the last time we talk about this, uh, because there's a whole, there's, there's a deeper layer, which is depression that I definitely want to talk about. Yeah. I think that's its own thing. Yeah. But I think in the takeaway for people to really spend some time, I thought that was really good that what you said, like really looking at,
00:41:22
Speaker
like the essence of the athlete and like what you can, looking at the whole picture, understanding you don't probably see the whole picture and not just onboarding the what in hopes that you're gonna change your who. But instead like looking at you as a who and what is really important and what you're looking to pursue. Yeah, and just like if you're gonna idolize and look up to athletes, not saying not to. If you're gonna idolize and look up to special operator, like I'm not gonna say not to.
00:41:50
Speaker
whatever that person might be, tightens a business. But just know that what you're also inviting in, there's some other things too. And as an athlete, as a high performer, when you never accept, when you cannot accept yourself and your worth is, when you constantly destroy your own worth, because that's how you're gonna build yourself up to beat somebody else, tell me that's not fucking disordered.
00:42:21
Speaker
Tell me that's not disordered. And then it's like the game goes away, and now what? Right. Well, and you still have that.
00:42:27
Speaker
mental process going on. Yeah. Yeah. And so there's a lot to look into. There's a lot to dig into. Um, and we'll definitely continue the conversation, but I think that might be good for good for today. So if you want to subscribe and leave a comment or a review or whatever, you can do that. If not, you can go. Bye.