EPISODE 3: Joshua Medcalf

After a brief hiatus, the UNF Leadership Podcast is back for a summer series of conversations with some of our favorite leaders. Episode 3 features renown author and sports psychologist, Joshua Medcalf. 

After playing college soccer at Vanderbilt and Duke University, Medcalf embarked on a fascinating journey, ranging from serving as the sports psychologist for national champion UCLA Women’s Basketball to living and working in a homeless shelter while his former classmates sought degrees at Ivy League universities. It’s a journey he details in our conversation and which led to the near-dozen books he has now authored. 

Many in Jacksonville know who Joshua is without knowing him. In addition to being a friend of Jon Gordon, last week’s guest on this podcast, Joshua’s book “Chop Wood, Carry Water” is regarded as an essential read by many in the sports business world. Jacksonville Jaguars wide receiver Parker Washington popularized the phrase and book after meeting Joshua at a golf event in Arizona in 2023. It’s how I first came to know of Joshua, and why I sought out connecting with him. 

This is “Voices of Leadership: Joshua Medcalf” 

#leadershipmatters #inspirechange #swoop

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to the Leadership Podcast. After a short hiatus, we're excited to bring you a summer's worth of conversations with some of our favorite leaders in the world of leadership. On today's episode, author and sports psychologist Joshua Metcalf. After playing college soccer at Vanderbilt and Duke University, Metcalf embarked on a fascinating journey, ranging from serving as the sports psychologist for National GMP and UCLA women's basketball to working in a whole bunch of shelters. It's a journey he details in our conversation and which led to the theater that doesn't look as now occurred. Many of you guys still know who Josh Wood is without knowing it. In addition to being a friend of John Ford in the last week, yes on this podcast, Josh Wood book John Wood Harry Potter. It's recorded as an exceptional reading by many in the world of sports and business. And why I thought I was connected with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

This is voicing leadership, Joshua Metcalf. The first thing I wrote down, Josh, now that I just babbled for five minutes, um, is who are you, Joshua Metcalf?

SPEAKER_02 1:13

Um in what context? Whichever context. I also wear a lot of a lot of hats.

SPEAKER_01 1:20

Then go for it. I just babbled for five minutes. So you can you can do this.

SPEAKER_02 1:23

I'll give you, yeah, I'll give you a short little bio. So I my my father grew up in a trailer park, dirt, dirt poor, um, and he had worked really hard to become an eye surgeon, but I was very he was very young when he had me. So I was born in Tulsa, but then was in Chicago, Detroit, and Akron until I was nine, bouncing around while he was trying to get into the ophthalmology program. And then when I was nine, we moved back to Tulsa, Oklahoma, and we were kind of living the American dream. And we had the house with the pool. It was we could see his office from the backyard. And then the American dream kind of turned into the American nightmare. My baby brother, who was my best friend, I didn't find out until I was like 32 or 33 that I was on the spectrum. And so that really colored a lot of my social experiences as a kid, and then bouncing around so many schools that didn't have a lot of stability in terms of social networks. And so my baby brother, who was six, seven years younger than me, was my best friend. And he was freakishly athletic, and tragedy struck when he pulled a we think that somehow he was trying to, he'd gotten a toy in the pool, or something happened like that. He climbed over a fence, uh, probably hit his head because he could swim. He was two and a half, but he was so athletic that we taught him how to swim. And um, but something happened, and uh we my mom screamed, and I just heard this guttural scream, and I knew he was in the pool. And so I sprinted and uh dove in headfirst, was the one that pulled him out of the pool, went through you know that crazy situation. Um, they were able to revive him uh slightly, but he lived for 30 more days and then passed away. And so a lot of my life has been colored by that experience. Then, you know, I played sports my whole life. Uh, I lost two coaches to prison um by the time I was 16. And then I ended up getting a soccer scholarship to play at Vanderbilt, a very small one that we only had 2.1 scholarships is a program. And um, and again, socially it was just tough. Then now academically it's tough. I had a 21 on my ACT, but now I'm at a school like Vanderbilt, and so I'm academically in over my head, I'm socially in over my head, but I was just really good at soccer. But so I ended up getting I say kicked off the team five times in two and a half years. That's exaggerating a little bit. I was suspended from the team five times in two and a half years, just with lots of different, you know, situations. Then they end up cutting the soccer program after my junior year at Christmas, and so I just hung up my cleats and I was focused on my education. It was really important to my dad that I had gone to a school like Vanderbilt. My dad and I had a terrible relationship, but the one thing he was like really proud of is the fact that you know he'd grown up in a trailer park and his firstborn son was attending Vanderbilt. And so I just focused on school and then I went out for the club soccer team like nine months after, and they end up cutting me. And so then, um, and mind you, I was like one of the best players on the varsity team. Uh, so then I get a call from Joe Germanice, who had gone to Duke immediately after uh the program got cut, and he was like, Hey, are you interested in playing at Duke? And I was like, Joe, uh, are they interested in me? I got kicked off the team five times in two and a half years. I had mediocre statistics, and uh, and the club team just cut me. And he's like, Yeah, I vouched for you, and we have a scholarship available. So somehow, by the grace of God, I ended up getting a full ride scholarship to play on the number one team in the country. But then when I got to Duke, there was things were really, really tough because now I'm playing with and against the best players in the country. And when we play pickup games, I was the last pick every time. And so my teammates, you know, it's easy when you can get mad at your coaches and be like, why don't they play me? But when your teammates say you are the worst out of 27 people on this team, you don't really have anyone to blame. And I was taking a sports psychology class with Greg Dale, and he asked everyone one day how much of sports we thought were mental. And, you know, you have these really smart kids, do you know, top three pinnacle of academic and athletic excellence, and they're going around the room, and most of the kids in the class were student athletes, and they were saying 70, 80, 90 percent. One girl was like, Greg, I think sports are 100% mental. And I was like, You guys are insane. Because if this is true, then why has nobody taught us how to train mentally? We have spent our entire lives on physical training, on technical training. You can't just say this is where the autistic side of my brain clicks in. Uh, you can't just say something is over 70% mental and have spent zero time training it. And so I was very frustrated. I was looking at Greg Dale, God bless his soul, and I was like, you're not an athlete either, by the way. Like, I know what an athlete looks like, and you're not one of us. Like when I walk in the room, people know that I'm an athlete. Like, we're easily recognized. You carry yourself differently, there's a different swag, there's a different the way you move, the way you dress. It doesn't always work that way. But for the most part, when an athlete walks in the room, you know, and especially in college, you're like, yeah, that that's an athlete. Um, and he wasn't that. And so it was very hard for me to trust him. But that's why I say it worked out really well for me. Because if I wasn't at rock bottom athletically, I wouldn't have listened. But because I was, I was like, well, might as well attempt to do what this, you know, little non-athlete is talking about. And it helped that he worked with people like Peyton Manning and Ichiro and banking leaders from around the world would fly in to work with him. But still, that didn't like our best player was Mike Grella. And Mike Grella thought that he was crazy. He didn't listen to him at all. And so I attempted to do what he talked about. And in a two-month period, I went from being the last pick on the team to finishing second in points to the best player in the country, who was Mike Grella. And um, was the ACC player of the week, Duke student athlete of the week. And I had this transformational experience that I couldn't deny. I'd never scored a goal with my head. I'm 6'3, and I scored two goals with my head after learning how to use visualization. And this is like like just trying, like, didn't really even know what I was doing. It was like, I'm gonna try and do this crazy thing that he talks about called visualization. So um, I couldn't deny what had happened, and then I got even more upset because I was like, why did I have to get to Duke to learn this? And so I made it my personal mission that I was gonna get it out to the masses, and I skipped scholarships to law school and I moved across the country into a homeless shelter. I lived and served in a homeless shelter for uh seven or eight months, and then I from there I moved into the closet of a gym. I had a guy ask me today, you said you lived in the closet of a gym, but like, what do you and I'm like, yeah, it was a closet. Like we rolled out trash cans and they cleaned it up, but it was a closet. And I lived in the closet as an apartment. We put a bed in there, obviously, and like a fridge, but there's like it's not meant for people to live in it, there's no windows, it's you know, it's not a tiny closet, but it's a closet of a gym. And so I lived there for nine months. I started going into the Watts housing projects and training the athletes in Imperial Courts. And then really, when my life changed, there were two things that happened. One, I met Anson Dorrance on an elevator and pitched him without even trying to. It just came out of like who works with your girls on sports psychology. And he's like, I do, I can read and write. And I'm like, Well, do you know who Barbara Frederickson is? And he's like, No, why should I? And I'm like, Well, her research on positivity shows your positivity ratio is around one to one, that forecast clinical depression, if it gets above two to one, that forecast languishing, it gets above three to one, that forecasts flourishing, doesn't matter if it's individually or collectively for teams. And she teaches at this little school, what's it called? Uh, yours. And he was like, Okay, you have my attention. And we became friends after that. He invited me out to be the second person ever uh in like 35 years to work with his program on mental training. I didn't know that at the time. I came to when I told him that I was the second, he didn't even remember that he had had another person. That's how long it had been. And so that that started to kind of change my life. But really, what happened was when Corey Close called at UCLA and John Wooden had just died. Wooden had mentored her for 15, 20 years, and um, so she was, I don't be my words, not hers, but I think she was feeling a little bit lost having lost her mentor from a coaching perspective. And I kind of fit a weird, you know, I'd worked in the housing project, so I had that background. We believed a lot of the same things at a foundational level. She believed in mental training. She is a genius when it comes to finding young talent and um creating culture in terms of like there's so many different things, like myself of people that she's brought in early that like are now on ESPN or do that, like she identifies young talent uh early really, really well. And when she gave me the position of director of mental training, that changed my life because then it was I didn't have a sports ecology degree, but I had a title that I was the director of mental training for UCLA women's basketball, and I was responsible for coaching somebody that was coached by John Wooden, and I basically stepped into Wooden's shoes in many ways, and so that was that was when things really started to change. And then fast forward to now, I had, you know, IMG had asked me to head up mental conditioning and leadership uh 11 years ago, and so I I knew that if I that told me that I was one of the top five people in the space in the world, uh and but there was no go-to book in sports psychology, so I was really nervous that if they hired me, they would own my work product. And so I went home. I didn't leave bed for almost 60 days, and when I say that, I mean like I would leave bed for like 20 minutes a day, you know, maybe shower, get a little bit of food, but I was just head down, I write all my books on my phone, and I was just writing, writing, writing. So I wrote two books. The first one was actually called Start Here Mental Training Finally Made Simple, which had a 45-page fable of Chop Wood Carry Water inside of it. And then John Gordon read the draft and said, throw the rest of that out, expand the fable, the fable's the book. And I, naive, arrogant, young, was like, I write real books, I don't write fables.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

And like you, John Gordon, who's a friend of us, by the way, at TLI, because of course he lives here.

SPEAKER_02 13:10

Yes. And so we thought about it for a couple weeks, and then finally I relented and I went all in on that. But simultaneously I wrote my memoir, Hustle. So I wrote two books because I was just trying to get as much content published as possible if I were to end up taking the job. I didn't end up taking the job. Uh, and then really when my life changed was with Chopwood, because Chopwood became the go-to book in sports psychology very quickly. And, you know, and it's funny, like I said, I live in a bubble, but I and I don't hear about these things often. So Jalen Brown's team reached out to me last year, and and they were like, Oh yeah, you're Jalen's favorite author, Chopwood Carrie Waters' favorite book. And so we had a meeting this summer, and I was like, So when did you read Chopwood? He's like, Oh, my freshman year at Cal. And I was like, that's like eight, nine years ago. He's like, Yeah, it was the foundation of my success. And but I'd never heard about that for eight years, and so um it's it's it's weird because that book has so much cultural influence and impact. I was at a wealth management thing for golf because I most of my free time is spent playing golf. And so uh at the end, I go up to the the guy who heads up wealth management, I won't say which firm it was, uh, for North America, and I hand him the book, and he's like, Oh, I love this book, you know, and he he like he goes off for like five minutes about it. Like, you know, Lou Holtz gave me this book, and I've given this book out to a hundred people, and and he just keeps talking about it. And finally I go, That's that's awesome. I just wanted you to have a signed copy though. And he goes, How did you get a signed copy? And I was like, Yeah, that's what I thought was happening. I was like, I wrote this book, and he goes, Oh my gosh. And so that that's kind of how my life, that's like a snippet into my life, though, that people like have read that book and maybe it changed their life, maybe it's one of their favorite books, but like, but they don't ever reach out to me. So I never hear about it. I hear about like 0.001% of the time, kind of like the Parker Washington thing. Like, if you hadn't reached out to me, I would have had no idea that that was going on.

SPEAKER_01 15:30

Which that in and of itself is something that I think I may be actually, I'm pretty sure. And our media market is small, to be fair, in Jacksonville. I think I'm the only one who's asked him. Like, when did you read the book? And he tells me this whole story of how he met you. No one in no one knew that Josh Dobbs is his cousin, which I was like, uh, that's on us. Like, we probably should have done a little bit of research there. Um, but again, I think a lot of this speaks to the idea of connectivity. So let's go back to the Antson Dorrance meeting in the elevator and this idea of pounding the stone, like I said, for me, pounding the stone is connectivity, networking, meeting new people for the sake of happiness is only real when shared with others. But for you, how much has that gotten you to where you are now?

SPEAKER_02 16:17

So I would encourage you, if you are open to it, to eliminate the word networking from your vocabulary. Uh, I I believe in just building relationships and adding value. And and it's fascinating. So much of the stuff I really try and work on with people is linguistics and linguistic intentionality, and that don't say positive if you mean encourage and things like that. Like just being really, really like what does that mean? If a coach tells their team to be positive, it's like, well, what like say what you mean? Like actually like flesh out. We have a really cool language, like use it, find the words that you really mean to express what you're trying to express, and don't make it kind of these superlatives of like, oh, well, just do this very generic thing. And so, even to the point, one of my there's a guy that does, I did an MBA pre-draft uh talk one time to a group of about 25 guys, and one of the MBA skill trainers had he printed out this book for them where he defined like 500 terms, and they were very basic terms, and I was so impressed by that. And he was like, dude, most of these kids, they don't actually know what these words mean. They get yelled at them, and they've been yelled these words and praises by coaches some of their life, but most of them were just really talented and were able to get by without knowing these things. So I want everybody to be on the same page of what the linguistics mean. Um, so yeah, that's just a little uh no, I agree with it.

SPEAKER_01 17:51

That's I mean, that's part of so another book I read last year besides yours was uh Go Giver, if you've read that one. And that was that was another one that cried on an airplane reading it. Um, just because this idea of it was given to me by a friend after everything went down. I was about to start at ESBN that Monday, and this idea of you've been doing this, and that's why you have a job, you're gonna have the full-time job, and you have spent 10 plus years building for this part-time job that's actually the career job, and by and that was just by purely building relationships without worrying about the transactional quality of that.

SPEAKER_02 18:25

Exactly. Because so, and be careful with Pound the Stone. I think I already told you that. But if you cry during Chopwood, you'll really cry during Pound the Stone because that one and Finish Empty both are they are they're very real. And with all the stuff that I've been through in my life, I I the my issue with Chopwood Carry Water, I'm very grateful for it, but that it's it gets taken by a lot of transactional people and they use it to to beat kids and people over the head with it. And so in the future of leadership, we talk about that if you just try and use strategies and you don't actually have an authentic heart posture shift, that it'll fall flat because people they may not know why, but they'll be like, Yeah, something just doesn't feel right about what you're doing. It feels, you know, like when you get that, like, oh, I just feel like they're sleazy, or I feel like they have ulterior motives. And so I I work really hard with people on like if you don't have an authentic heart posture shift, you can employ the same strategies, but they're not gonna work the same way because people can feel whether they can articulate it or not, they can feel when it's authentic and when it's a strategy. And so it doesn't mean that networking doesn't work, it doesn't mean that it's not powerful. It's just that when you and especially like one weird nuance to that is the more successful you become, and I use success loosely, right? Of like monetarily or you know, the way most of the world defines success, as you move up in rank, if you will, the more that you can be genuine and actually care about people, it is like 10 to 100fold the impact because that's when it becomes even more rare. And what like one of my favorite things about Anson was that like this flipped something on my head when I was young was when I emailed him, he got back to me within an hour. And for the most part, and which is weird, I hope somebody gets this to him because I've been trying to reach him, and since he retired, I don't have like he used to respond to every email I sent him within like 30 minutes. And now I haven't been able to get a hold of him the last few months. And I'm like, He's off the grid. Right. I'm like, I need I need his cell phone, somebody needs to tell him that Joshua Medcal wants to talk to him and he'll get back to me. But the thing that that was so special and what shifted my perspective was that I thought that people that were important, right, and that were that had a lot going on, like they wouldn't get back. They would, so I was always hesitant on getting back to people quickly because I thought that that would make me look like I didn't have a lot going on. And when Anson responded so quickly, I realized what it did for me and how it made me feel. And I went, that's what I want to try and do as much as possible. So on I I now have two phones. I have one phone that I carry with me, and I have the phone that's in the back of all the books. And that's only because I I'm so good or bad at responding that I will respond quickly. And the autistic side of my brain, like if you say something crazy, I will respond back, probably with a little bit of a mirror. That is also crazy. And I realized I should probably have some space from that phone so that I don't respond because I need to be very intentional in how I respond to people. But when you can respond quickly to people, again, as things elevate for you, the way like what it does for other people and responding to everything. They're always like, I'm sure this isn't actually Joshua Medcal. And I'm like, no, it's it's me. And but to me, I've just seen what that did for me when people did those things. And I so much of what I've tried to do, the podcast I was telling you about that I'm starting with Tanya Parr, you know, she's like, What should we call this? Because we just talk two or three times a day. And like I was saying, it's just like, let's try and let people peer in and hear some of these conversations that we have, because I think they would really impact a lot of people's lives. And but I said, I think we should just call it what we wish we we learned in school, because everything I've tried to create, every tool that I've tried to equip coaches with, leaders with, teachers with, people with, is what do I wish I had learned? What do I wish was taught in school and that's not being taught? And just really funnel through that lens. And so I was like, let's just call it what we wish we learned in school. And we'll get interesting people with interesting stories. And uh most of them are connected to me in one way or another. But I've never really wanted to have my own uh podcast. But I was like, if if it'll get Tanya Parr to do this, then then let's do it. But yeah, it just goes back to that. What do I wish that I had? And I feel like maybe it's some character flaw that I have, but so many times when I go through life, like we Maggie and I went into a store the other day to get a belt, and the way that this woman, I'm pretty sure her name is Pamela, the way that she treated us in that store, I was like, she's one of the best in the world that I've ever seen. And it's over a belt, like it's you know, it's nice belts from nice store, but like we go in nice stores all the time, and a lot of time they treat you really poorly. And I just am always confused by it. I'm like, you know that people are here to spend money, and like I I like why do you why do you do this? Like it's it doesn't make sense to me, and so it always goes back to that. Like, what do I wish would have happened? Like, what do you I what do I what do you not know about this? Because if you knew what I know, if you were equipped the way I've been equipped, I think you would handle this radically differently, and your life would literally transform for most people. And so so many of those encounters, I just try and like be the thing, create the thing. And and look, I'm like I always say that if you catch me in a professional setting, you'll probably love me. If you catch me in a in a real world setting, who knows? I amplify people's energy and put a mirror back up to them, and I don't even mean to. But like so much of what I've tried to create and equip people with is and are the tools and the things that it's like, hey, have you thought about it this way? Hey, have you like read this? I think this could really, really change a lot of your interactions. And so going all the way back to the networking thing, like I can feel when people just want to network, but when somebody is just genuine and wants to build a relationship, and like I'll give you credit with this of like, like, you just want to have conversations with people, you don't even have to hit record, like and in that type of um relationship, like there's a somebody that I I again I don't want to use certain names, but a person that's become very famous lately because he went through a lot of a crazy situation. And when I found out that my books had been really impactful to him, I reached out to him and I was like, Hey, I want to come and spend time with you. And he's like, Okay. And he turns out to be way more autistic than I am, and so I didn't know that at the time, I didn't find that out until I got there. And his wife and daughter were like, Do you know how autistic he is? And I was like, We're just meeting. This is this is interesting, but he's he's awesome. And so, like, but he kept kind of being like, So what are you gonna what are we gonna do when you're here? And like, well, we don't need to do anything, I just am gonna spend time with you. Like, uh obvious, like I'm doing what I what I wish if the roles were reversed that somebody would do. And and that's so like just by just doing that so often, I've seen um from an impact perspective what that ends up doing for people. It is so wild. And to me, it's just like, well, this is just what I would have wanted to be done for me. Like that is it's very simple. And but it it's sad to me because so rarely does it happen. Like, there's this proverb that my mom was uh my mom had me do very weird things when I was a kid. So like I was in preaching competitions when I was six years old, literal, like judged preaching competitions.

SPEAKER_01 27:32

Well, I mean, I I'm a uh state champion speech and debater, so don't worry, there's no judgment in this call.

SPEAKER_02 27:38

I could I can tell that you have that background. You're uh amazing at speech and I appreciate it. And so I, you know, I was doing all these like weird things as a as a kid, but like it's it's fascinating to me when I would read Proverbs, because it was like you know, it's 31 Proverbs, and just to read one every day based off the month. And when you would read, like, do you see any truly competent workers? They will serve kings rather than mere men. And when you read that, it's like that's the standard, like truly competent. It seems like a really low bar, but the truth is, it is so rare to find people that are truly competent. It is way more rare to find people that are truly competent, that pursue excellence, and that actually care about people as people. And if you can kind of hit that trifecta, you will go so far and above and beyond what you probably ever dreamed or imagined. Like some of the opportunities that I have in my life, I I'm blown away by them. And and it literally most of the time comes back to those three things of I just try and do that, and I fail. And again, there's tons of people. You can go to my golf club, and lots of people will tell you that uh I am the biggest blankety blank that they've ever met, and they really hate me, and they don't understand why anyone would listen to me and blah blah blah. Sure. There's definitely a demographic of people that feel that way. But what I'm so grateful for is that the the people that I've attracted in my life, the the Dave Hilfman's, the Tanya Pars, the Anson Dorrances, the Sue Inquists, the Corey Close's, uh, the Doris Burks, the like the Candace Parkers, like these people that that not by trying to do anything, just by doing those three things that people are like, Whoa. Like Candace was calling a game at UCLA, and I just said a quote to her, and she literally her head snapped, and she's like, What did you just say? And I I repeated it. I was like, Yeah, you know, like C.S. Lewis said, when you put first things first, secondary things aren't suppressed, they increase. And I believe in putting first things first. And it's not that the secondary things don't matter, it's just that I don't focus on those things because if I believe if I put these first things first, that the secondary things take care of themselves. And like, that's what built a relationship with Candace. Like, and and and to me, I just go like those are just such basic things, but you know, using Chopboard as the example of the the nine Michigan hospitals and washing their hands, like it's everybody knew that you should by by the 20th century, everyone knew that you should wash your hands before going into the OR. But did that mean people did it every time? Did that mean people you know were super methodical about it? No. And then when they actually implemented that and made sure that they did it every single time, oh, we saved $15 million, we save 1,500 lives, we decrease the infection rate by you know some massive percentage. And but again, it's just doing those basic things really well every single time, and then the impact and and outcomes tend to take care of themselves.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

So one of our big mantras in the Taylor Leadership Institute is this idea of everyone is a leader. But in the last few years, I know myself as well as Dr. Olsen have come to set kind of change that a little bit of everyone is a leader, but first we must lead ourselves. And obviously that's where Chopoid Carry Water really comes into play. And I know as we look at your books, that's kind of the foundational first one, you would argue, right? That that's kind of the one that sets the table for all of the others, this idea of trying to get to that competence level. If you can and do those three things you alluded to, if you can just keep it simple and do those things well, then everything else will fall into place from there. And I think with being a leader, I think a lot of that stems from that same idea of if you yourself are doing those things, you don't have to worry about projecting some sort of message. You yourself become the message.

SPEAKER_02 32:04

So one of my favorite leadership stories, I was out working with a program, and I had explained that I don't believe you should use fitness as a punishment. Because using fitness as a punishment makes zero sense if you really think about it. Like we all know that fitness is the one thing that can close a gap between a good team and a bad team faster than anything. And you want people to do it on their own, you want them to do it in the offseason, you want them to take it very seriously. So, why would you psychologically condition something that's so valuable to be a punishment and a negative thing? And so I'd explain that next day. We're at practice, and coach storms over to me and he's like, All right, so what am I supposed to do? You know, uh, they showed up with their shirts untucked, but you know, normally I'd have them do down and backs, but you say that the you know I can't use fitness as a punishment, so what am I supposed to do? And I was like, I don't mean to be rude or disrespectful, but look at you and every one of the coaches on your staff, and every single one of them had their shirt untucked, and they go, Listen, I I could care less about having their shirt tucked in. That is an insane thing to me. Um, but if you care about that, maybe you guys should take a look in the mirror and tuck your shirt in. And you know, I think the message was received, but like, but it's you know, so you know, I talk so often to leaders about like take a look in the mirror first, whatever you're upset about, whatever you're frustrated about, how are you modeling it? How are you creating it based off of what you're doing? And you know, it's very easy to look outside and go, man, that shit. I had a terrible experience uh a couple months ago flying and or trying to get onto a flight. And what I told my client afterwards was I said the thing that frustrated me the most was I had been traveling a lot. Like I'd gotten home at 9 p.m. the night before, and I needed to be at the airport at 5:30. And you know, not not a big deal, but I was assuming I was, you know, I had a first class ticket and I wasn't checking bags, and so typically my experience is very like show up, oh I don't have a boarding pass, I need a boarding pass, go like, can you print my boarding pass? And the way they looked at me, and it was just taken, and I was like, what's going on? And they're like, Oh, well, they actually um they they like bumped you, they gave your seat away. And I was like, I paid for a first class ticket. What do you mean they gave it away? Well, you didn't check in, and I'm like, well, it's 30 minutes before my flight, and I'm standing here asking for my boarding pass. But the reason why I was frustrated most frustrated is is because it spun quickly, and I went into, you know, my dad grew up in a trailer park. I am gonna do one of two things in in intense situations. I'm either gonna be really calm and probably more like a lover, or I'm gonna be your worst enemy and I'm gonna be a fighter. And most people that know me well would say he's probably gonna probably gonna lean towards fighting more than he is to loving if you mess up or you go at him. And and I was so like I was so frustrated internally because I was like, if I had put myself in a better heart posture mindset place before step, like I'm so good at making flipping those situations, but because I was kind of running on fumes and hadn't like prepared properly for the day, I got caught on my back foot. And as soon as I was on my back foot, I re reverted to childhood of like, all right, you want to fight? Cool, let's fight. And um, so it's you know, it's that look in the mirror of like, if I had had the energy to shift my internal energy first, I probably could have got them to fix it. But because I my energy wasn't right, I went to fight. And by that point, then I'm like, if I swing, it's like, well, I'm I'm not gonna not swing, and I'm not gonna apologize for swinging. So then I'm in a position where I'm like, all right, well, this now this next week of trips just got a lot tougher because now I'm not gonna get on a flight until 3 p.m. And I'm gonna have to do that. Like, but it's usually that, okay, if I take the hard look in the mirror, like they should have handled it differently. It's Delta, it's you have a first-class ticket, like you sort it out, you bumped me, and I paid for a ticket, you figure it out. But if I had shown up differently, then I probably could have greatly influenced that more in my favor. And so it's take that hard look in the mirror, and where's your shirt untocked?

SPEAKER_01 37:44

When did heart posture enter the lexicon and enter your stratosphere as a as a term as a term and as something that you've taught?

SPEAKER_02 37:53

Have you heard it anywhere else? No, yeah. So when I was living in LA, I've gone to this church. Uh, a guy named David Roos, who wrote a lot of songs, he was a songwriter, but also happened to be the pastor of that church. He talked about it. And as soon as he said it, it resonated in my soul in a way that I was like, that's it. That's the thing that that nobody's teaching, nobody's talking about. So many people are talking about strategies, and and no one is really talking about heart posture. And heart posture is what you can't fake, and people can feel it, and it's just it's one of those, you know, there's a lot of there's a lot of different language around it when it comes to energy and things like that, and stuff that I I I don't disagree with at all. But I think the most succinct way of being able to articulate it is whether you can consciously feel it, and you most likely never will feel it consciously. At a subconscious level, you can feel people's heart posture. And it is it is the greatest determining factor. Uh, one of my other favorite things that that I I think I came up with, I'm not sure, but I've I've also never heard it described this way, is that we create, attract, and repel the world that we experience based off of the deepest beliefs of our heart. So it's not just that you manifest, like it's manifestation, but the way most people talk about manifestation is is different. So it's I I just came up with that way of articulating it of we create, attract, and repel the world we experience based off the deepest beliefs of our heart. And you can try and manipulate like the way, oh, you should think differently, oh, you should act differently. But most of the time, it's like, what do we deeply believe in our heart about people? What do we believe about um women? What do we believe about men? What do we believe about teachers? What do we believe about politicians? What do we believe about our boss? What do we believe about uh uh one time uh a person said to me, Oh, I'm not a I'm not a I'm not first class people. And I said, Why would you ever say that? And like, and she just never thought about like how like I don't care if you fly first class, like but to say that phrase, that is, you know, I do again, a lot of what I believe comes from what I studied as a kid and from the abundance of the heart, the mouse speaks. To say something like that, like when I talk about self-talk, and I again I play a lot of competitive golf, I'm like, you might hear me blow up on the golf course, it's rare, but you might hear that. The one thing you will never hear me do, ever, is come at myself about something when it comes to my self-talk. I'll externalize it, but I won't ever say, you idiot, you stupid, da da da, why you're so never, ever. Like the one of the biggest things that Greg Dale taught me was to become my own best friend and my own best coach. And so, um, and I actually think that it's somewhat healthy to, you know, in when in the dark, Lucas had talked about venting the volcano and like allowing some of that stuff to come out. And I've even cautioned parents and teachers with kids, it's very rarely the kid that's like myself that might be more expressive about their frustrations that you have to really worry about. The one you have to worry about is the one that never expresses it, because that means that they're probably acting in. Right.

SPEAKER_01 41:59

Well, like Travis and uh and pound the stone.

SPEAKER_02 42:03

Yes, that's exactly it. It's that if you don't ever have a way to vent that volcano, and you don't ever externalize what's going on, then the likelihood of internal sabotage, self-harm increases significantly.

SPEAKER_01 42:28

I love the line about be your own best friend, because I think that goes back to that idea of everyone's a leader, sure, but you've got to lead yourself to actually become a great leader. And so you have to have that positive self-talk. And with us working with college students, and many of whom are listening to this right now, I think that that is becoming a little bit more commonplace to discuss, at least in the sports realm. Because I know for me, you know, I I graduated college 10 years ago and was in high school before then, and I don't know if it was actively talked about circa 2008 to 2011.

SPEAKER_02 43:03

No, it was it was very new. And and so again, the upgrade that I've tried to help in the sports psychology world, they like to say positive self-talk. So I don't have an issue per se with positive self-talk. I just think that there's something way more real and beneficial. And I say that it's beneficial and constructive self-talk. So the way that I and again, this is from my natural wiring. So my natural wiring is not to be a quote unquote positive person. And so positive people always I was very leery of them, like, oh, you're not realistic.

SPEAKER_01 43:47

You Which I should note too. John Gordon also doesn't identify as a naturally positive, naturally extroverted person either.

SPEAKER_02 43:54

He he does not. And he and I also have intense uh debates over. This exact subject that I'm about to share. So the most simple way of articulating this is if you were attached to another person in a potato sack and like a potato sack race, but you're on a highway and you have semi-trucks coming at you 90 miles an hour. Do you want to be in a potato sack with another person that is a positive thinker or a beneficial and constructive thinker?

SPEAKER_01 44:28

The beneficial constructive thinker, because you got to problem solve. And that's something that when you go through um Navy SEALs, Delta Force, I my fiance is really into that sort of mindset training. Um, and this is what he used to be a federal agent, so he's very into that sort of thing. But we just were watching one last night, and they said that the the the biggest trait that they look for when they're recruiting for those two groups is problem solving.

SPEAKER_02 44:54

It a positive person, like they get beneficial and constructive more naturally. They get the positive thing more naturally. The problem that you run into is people that aren't wired that way. Because, and this is what I I realize like most of the content I've created and and value that I've created has come from being in the trenches with with people. I didn't go get a PhD, I didn't go get a master's. I say that I had to have a PhD in results because if it didn't work, then I wouldn't get hired and I don't have anything to fall back on. And a person that's positive, you say, Oh, be more positive. They go, Yeah, yeah, you're right, you're right. Yep, I need to be more positive. You say that to somebody that is not a positive person, they're gonna want to or will punch you in the throat. So that means that it has shortcomings. I have not yet met somebody that if you ask them, is that the most beneficial and constructive thing that you can do or say, it eliminates anything else. It's it is not positive or negative, it is what is the most beneficial and constructive thing. And so I just think that there's a higher level of consciousness and mode of operating, which is beneficial and constructive self-talk, because it doesn't alienate anyone and no one can really fight it. I have not yet found someone that can really fight me on something better than, and if there is something better than beneficial and constructive, great, I'm I'm open to something deeper. But I think that that positive self-talk is only going to land for a certain demographic. And you can say, Oh, it's not gonna hurt that bad if the truck hits us, but you want to be in the potato sack with somebody that says, we got to move left now, we got to move right now. We got like in that it's beneficial and constructive that's attached to reality, it's not positive Pollyanna, well, it won't hurt too bad, we'll be okay. Like it you can ground it in what is the most beneficial and constructive thing to do, say, etc.

SPEAKER_01 47:10

So, real quick before I get to the last topic I've got written down, um, can you teach someone to have constructed constructive beneficial talk to themselves? Or is that something you're born with? It's part of your heart posture.

SPEAKER_02 47:24

Oh, it's it's it's 100% teachable. And most of the time, people self-talk, they it there's no such thing, I would argue, and I could be wrong, but that you're you're not born with self-talk. Your self-talk actually is a talk track that comes from what your parents said to you as a kid, and especially in highly uh emotional moments, and from what important leaders said to you and how they coached you. And that that's really what it comes down to. So much so, the example I would give is I've been on the golf course many times with people that when they start berating themselves, I stop them, and one thing I'll say is don't talk to my friend like that. And they're like, What? I was talking to myself, and I said, Don't talk to my friend like that. And the other thing that I will ask them is, Whose voice is that? Because usually it is the voice of a father or mother that spoke to them a certain way, and it's not even their voice, they don't hear their voice, they hear their father or their mother saying, You're an idiot, you're never gonna be anything, you're a blankety blank, you're a it's it's not even their voice, and so the your self-track, your self-talk track is usually a authority, influential figure from your life that beat things into your head and conditioned you in a certain way, and so yes, it is 100% reconditionable, but that takes time, energy, intentionality to rewire those beliefs in your heart. One technique and tool that I try and give people is that you know, I spent probably five years listening to things at a very low level that are almost imperceptible to hear while I was sleeping. Because when you're sleeping, your brain is still processing it, your subconscious is still processing it, and that's actually one of the easiest ways to slip things past your amygdala is while you're sleeping and you're just hearing it over and over and over again. And that's kind of what happened as a kid, is those things just without you realizing it were playing over and over and over and over and over and over again. And if you can go in and record yourself, listen to uh other others. I really like when people do it themselves and then put a um a music background that they like that's very soft and soft and soothing, and literally it is almost imperceptible, but our brains are processing 11 million bits of information per second. We're only conscious of 40 of those bits. So our subconscious is still processing all these things, and the more that we can just have that running in the background is actually trying to clean out inside of our heart and shift our heart posture, our the deepest beliefs of our heart. And that's one of the ways that you can kind of upgrade, if you will, and you know, like we we all do that, like you know, when's the last time you bought and upgraded your cell phone? Um last June. Exactly. And you've probably had about five to ten in the last 10 to 12 years, and so we do that all the time with that type of software and hardware, but most people are still using the same software that they were programmed with from the time that they were three years old till 10, and they've never upgraded their software, right? And that would be insane if you were walking around, not necessarily insane. There's some people and there's some value to it if you're walking around with a Nokia phone, but there's you know, there's gonna be a lot of limitations to a Nokia phone, and so it's learning how to. I mean, I the Navy SEALs kind of a lot of them consider Chopwood Carry Water to be their Bible, and um, you know, one of them that I worked with, uh I I had to stop it many times and be like, stop trying to tell me what you think about this. I you have a Nokia software operating system. I am trying to give you an Apple 12.0 software. I don't need you to understand it. I need you to hear what I'm saying and repeat what I'm saying over and over again until you understand it. Because your software is broken, old, outdated. And I'm trying to upgrade your software to benefit your life in the ways that it's only benefiting your life in these really teeny tiny areas. But your software is actually hurting your life in all these other areas because it hasn't been upgraded since you were a little kid, and all these emotional things happened with you and your father, and this has gotten you to a certain point, it's allowed you to excel in certain areas, but if you don't fix this, you are going to absolutely implode because you are trying to operate with a software that was given to you under these very emotionally uh duress moments in your life that aren't your heart posture either, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 53:03

That's somebody else's that's dictating it to you. Yes. Because at that point you were so young, which is a fantastic segue to chop wood carry water, and the idea of daily disciplines. And so that is something that we've talked about a lot through the Daily Coach, um, and then bringing some of that curriculum to UNF. This idea of chop wood, I mean, at the at the surface level, for those who haven't read the book, that's I think what it they take away from it. This idea of every day before the day could start had to chop wood and carry water as part of the samurai at schools. And so to that end, I ask you is yes, this constructive self-talk can be one of your daily disciplines, but what else are some daily disciplines that you've seen in your life that have transformed your software?

SPEAKER_02 53:54

Yeah, so I mean, personally, they're they're completely infused in all of the books that I've written. And I try and be very transparent about all of those things that have been really helpful for me. When I work with clients, the thing that I try and do is one, I I really try and be very careful and intentional about not pushing what I want for them or what I believe on them. So like I don't deal with right and wrong. I say, you know, what is most beneficial and constructive, but I I don't I try and ask them, you know, well, what are your priorities? And then when they tell me what their priorities are, then I say, okay, well, now let's look at where does your time go? And does that match to your priorities? The auditor's or yeah, or do you say that these things are important because that sounds good and you think those are the right answers? But then when you show me what you actually do with your time, so how do we deal with that? And then we come over and it's okay, so who are the people that you really admire? What do you think on your deathbed is going to be a you know, allow someone to live a truly successful life? What is a truly successful life look like? Who are the people that you admire? What does a truly successful life look like? Okay, now let's try and pull back and figure out what are the characteristics of a truly successful life. Okay, which of those, you know, let's let's put down three that you believe are going to lead to a truly successful life on your deathbed. Because, like what we talk about in Finnish Empty is that while life is about others, it also is a single-player game. And the controller is in our hand, and the number one regret of the dying is I wish I had had the courage to live a life true to myself and not one that was trying to live up to the expectations of others. And while that makes sense theoretically to most people, that is not at all how they live their life. So, you know, looking at my fingernails, like I have my fingernails painted, and that drives a lot of people crazy in a lot of the circles that I walk in. I'm like, why does he have his fingernails painted? Like one of the things at the golf club, that the the way they've nicknamed me is nails. And but part of that is that when I was in Japan a few years ago, I saw a lot of young kids that were painting their nails. And I saw, oh, well, this has kind of been hijacked in Western culture that this means that. And I remember when I was on the free throw line in seventh grade at Grace Fellowship Christian School, and I was shooting a free throw, and I looked down at my hands and I saw that my fingernails were painted, and I felt shame and self-conscious, and I never did it again. And so when I put all of that together, I went, oh shit. Um, this is pure to who I was as a kid before I was messed with by social cultural norms, and I have a responsibility to model for the young boys in my life what living an authentic life looks like. And so um, so much so, this was such an issue, not issue, but like the first thing I I coach a very high-profile CEO, and I received a very kind and gracious letter from a high-ranking uh person in the Senate uh inviting me to come and have lunch with a bunch of senators. And the first question that the CEO asked me is, are you gonna change are you gonna change your nails before you go? And I said, I've no, I've thought of a lot about it, and I know that it will be a lightning point. Um, but no, um I'm not going to. And because like it goes back to that, like on my deathbed, I want to know that I've lived a life true to myself. And more importantly than that, for the young kids and the young boys that I have influence over, I want them to see this. And they and they they're young, they look at it and they go, Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, why do you why do you paint your nails? Boys don't do that, like you're not like what girls paint their nails. Well, let's have a conversation about that. And I want to model for them what it looks like to live a life true to yourself, regardless of the social norms and expectations. And that's easy in theory. You go to some of the golf clubs that I go to in the Senate dining hall. If you get invited by Republicans, that is a the the it's it's very, very hard to walk that out. But those are the types of things that like that's the type of stuff that people can say whatever they want uh about me and they're they're believe both sides, right? Like the people that think I'm great, yeah, believe them. They probably have had those experiences. People that them shit, you should probably be careful with them, but you they probably got what they got. But for young people, I want them to see me model these types of things.

SPEAKER_01 59:42

Tuck your shirt in. It's the same thing as the tucking your shirt in. It's ironically, because I think the Republican senators would tell you to tuck your shirt in. Um, but ironically enough, this is your version of okay. Well, is yours tucked in?

SPEAKER_02 59:54

I'm gonna, yeah, I'm gonna mo I'm gonna model what is, you know, what what is pure from like there's a big difference between being childlike and being childish. And when I was a child, this was something that I like to do. I'm an artist. I didn't realize that until I was much older, but like my frustration in so many areas of the education system is I see the world differently. I'm an artist, I I can I can put my artistic spin on things, and that I have this brilliant artistic mind, but it I couldn't draw. So growing up in the Midwest, well, you can't draw, you're not an artist. And but this is something that was like very pure. And so now as an adult, when it's a comfortable, as a 40, I turn 41 tomorrow, uh, you know, as a 41-year-old, thank you, um, you know, male like that lives in California, there's a lot of things when people see this that they assume it means something else. And but to me, I want to to do my best to live out what was childlike in me and pure and model for young people. That what do you love and what do you care about? It doesn't matter what anybody else thinks about that. Like, who cares? You're gonna get made fun of. People are gonna, but just protect that, and you're probably gonna find, you know, I was winning preaching competitions when I was six years old, just like you did amazing at speech and debate.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:38

Like it was actually, you'll love, uh, it was uh the state championship uh speech or piece, I guess, was uh Lisa Coudro's commencement address at Vassar in Declamation.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:49

There's certain things that you're more wired from childhood. Like one of my best friends, uh his nephew is six years old. I think maybe now he's seven. And this kid is wired to be a deal guy, like he just is constantly negotiating and goes into the card store with us and is negotiating, he's negotiating deals with his friend, and you're like, Yeah, man, this kid's gonna be in, you know, MA and finance and do deal. Like, that's just that's just what like he is hardwired for this. And if he does something else, that's gonna be very strange because he is built for this. I've been talking my way in and out and convincing people of different things since I was seven, eight, nine years old. The reason why I wanted to go to law school is because I had people that were 50 years old when I was 10 that was like, I want you to represent me one day. You are going to be an amazing trial lawyer. And I'm grateful that I moved into a different space where I get to change the way people think, the same way that trial lawyers do, but in a space that's maybe more beneficial and constructive outside of the one or two people that they're representing. Um but you know, just going back to that, you know, purity of a childlike heart and what you care about and are passionate about as a kid. And, you know, a lot of people think, oh, you grow out of like your love of sports and balls, and that I was a kid, it was like a ball, ball, blah, blah, blah. I want to play, I want to play. I want no, I'm 41, and I still like if you know, I do physical therapy three times a week to be able to play competitive golf. Like, it's it's true to the core of who I am, and I want to keep focusing on and pursuing those things and shedding as much as possible. Like a lot of what I try and do with clients, especially ones that have reached these quote-unquote really high pinnacles of success, is like, let's shed the layers of things that you've added on that you're only doing these things because you think it's what successful people do. You don't even like going to that restaurant, you don't even like those clothes, you don't even like these things. It's just you believe that it projects a certain version of status to others, and it's not actually true. Like, what do you love and what do you hate?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:21

Like, what's and that's how your daily disciplines come from that. So, like for me, last year I committed to okay, my three daily disciplines are gonna be, I have, and part of this I think is also routine. And so I said, okay, I need to exercise in the morning. The day doesn't start till I exercise in the morning. I have to journal. And I got this nice little full focus planner, and it's become my little life guide over the last year plus. Um, and so I have to journal, and otherwise the day's not done. And I also have to read. And to your point, reading was something that as a child was very critical and very much at the core of who I was, and it's something that I've gotten out of in recent years, and naturally it's just become part of the routine. And so that's where for me, like I try we try to teach in the program this idea of those daily disciplines that keep you grounded, just because I I think there's value in that, but I agree. I don't think it's something that you can go to a CEO and say, Well, you need to journal, read, and exercise. And that's how you know the day is done. And it's not fair for me to say to students watching this that that's how you determine success. It has to be based off you and who your authentic self truly is.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:24

Yeah. Yeah. So just going back to, you know, like trying to customize, like it bothers some people, like in my coaching, but I always try and be very careful and I say no to like 99.9% of people that ask for it. I'm like, you like my books, you're not gonna like to be coached by me. Chris Cuomo calls me a combination of Rain Man and Bobby Knight. And I take that as a compliment, but you know, a lot of people wouldn't. You know, the Navy SEAL said, you know, beware, like, don't get confused by the paint on his nails. Coaching with him is tougher than nails. And, you know, but it's it's really trying to. figure out like what is who they are and what's important for them. So I might have two different clients that I tell to do two different things because they they care about two different things and they're wired completely differently. You know, Dave Hilfman is wired completely differently than most almost anybody else that I've ever met. You know, you two have lost the love of your life when you're 36, 37 years old and go through that. And he made a promise to Tracy when he saw how bad she wanted to live that I will never have a bad day. Ever. And I've never seen him have one. And I've pressed him and I in tournaments I can get very upset. And I have pushed him to and he never breaks. And so when I realized oh this isn't just positivity this is he made a commitment and discipline that I am going to have a great day every day and every spin I get around this planet because I made a commitment to Tracy that I would live every day for her and I would never have a bad day because I saw how bad she wanted to live. And you know so something I might try and help him with which I help him with very little but would be very different than somebody who's you know wired completely different than he is. So it's looking at you know I always say it's like a tailored suit like it's what what do you need not what does somebody else and that's going to be different for every unique individual because while we have more that makes us in common than separates us everybody is still unique and there are you know there are people who are wired very differently at their core than others and trying to have this one size fits all approach is is very naive because humans are still very unique individuals.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:02

This is the last one I promise and it's from Chopwood Carry Water. And I thought that this was a good way to kind of sum things up and we got look what we have a special guest appearance folks if you're wondering this come on now. I thought for our for our students I thought this was a good way to end uh Joshua which thank you again for your time is this idea of the ah shit ladder. For those who haven't read Chopwood Carry Water yet can you explain what that is and a parting message to the students listening to this as they try to lead themselves and find their way in this world.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:35

Yeah. So it's it's basically that you know being very careful about what building you have your ladder on and that you don't have to look that far. And one of my favorite things I don't like I don't like reading a lot of the books that are in my industry. I like reading a lot of autobiographies and biographies of people that I I call the greats just in the sense of you know I admire them and I respect you know some aspect of their life obviously you're gonna only see a a portion of it but that you start to see the same patterns over and over and over again and you want to be very careful about just following what society or what your teachers or what your coaches tell you that you should do and what's most important. And you really want to make sure that you have your ladder on a building that is sustainable and that is a a a ladder in a building that are going to matter on your deathbed because you can do everything you can win gold medals you can get to the top of the ladder and then go oh shit my ladder was on the wrong building and it usually happens way too late and you know you climb and you climb and you climb and you climb and you you do all the things that you're supposed to do and you know it's a it's a it's a little bit like there's a a quote in one of the books I can't remember but you know it's like thirsty people guzzling salt water that you it's only going to dehydrate you more. And the fallacy that we believe in is oh that true satisfaction and fulfillment are going to be somewhere higher up on the rung of the ladder of achievement or quote unquote success. And I you know the since it's it's the message for college kids to say you know Naira Fields was like my little sister at UCLA and she's an amazing kid. It's really cool. She's now um kind of doing a lot of the stuff that that I do but she was one of the first kids at UCLA that I really mentored and she was like my little sister and she was freakishly talented and freakishly athletic and but she was not equipped the way that I would have liked myself to be equipped or that I was equipped or you know that you would dream of somebody being equipped as they're growing up. And so you know she had kind of bought into a lot of what society tells you to buy into and she happened to play for Team Canada. Well team Canada happens to lose to Team USA a lot in competition. And so you know freshman year sophomore year multiple times a year she'd come back and she'd be so upset and so frustrated because they got bronze or silver and they lost to the US and I would always just make that noise and just be like nah listen winning gold is not going to do anything. I I know you think that it's gonna change things but it's not going to change anything. And I get that it sucks to lose and I am I've not met anyone in my whole life that's more competitive than I am. I understand and I hate losing so much it's not even funny. But winning can't do for you what you think it's gonna do. And sure enough her junior year summer she wins gold and I couldn't wait for her to get in the gym. And she walked in and my smile was bigger than it's ever been and I was like so and she was like you are right and I'm like yeah it just can't like you think that it's gonna do something for you. You think that that job that raise that place that that thing that we put on these pedestals that it's gonna do it. And this is why it's so important that we focus on the only two things that are important in any day is the impact I have on other people and who I become in the process. And if I focus on achievement if I focus on some arbitrary outcome based goal that that's that's not it. It can't give for me what I actually want and need there's not going to be there might be momentary and there usually will be momentary bouts of happiness and joy but it it can't give you true satisfaction and fulfillment and so again in uh the future of leadership we talk about this and we really got it from um the business secrets of the Trappist monks and how the monks you know they talk about the difference between transformation of circumstance and the transformation of being and what people really want is transformation of being and they fall for the fallacy that the transformation of circumstances if I could just achieve this then I'll have this transformation of being but that's not how it works. And oftentimes it actually gets the whole gets bigger because you it's oh if I can just win a national championship well then you you win one and it's well now I have to go win another one to prove that that one wasn't a fluke. And then I oh now I won two well when when is it it it it can't it can't do it. So yeah that's the OSHA ladder.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:04

I felt like that's a good way to end especially because so many of our students are talking about process overassignment these days and I am encouraged and I'm sure you are as well as somebody who again not your traditional quote unquote sports psychologist but someone who operates in that same ideal of hey we need to talk about these things whether we're an athlete someone in business a student because that's the only way that to your point Joshua we're going to give impact to others create impact for others and better ourselves is by having these sort of conversations.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:37

So yeah well thank you so much for having me Mia uh truly a pleasure and an honor to get to spend the time with you and I look forward to the next time that we get to do it.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:48

Absolutely thanks for listening to the Q Leadership podcast for more episodes like this be sure to subscribe to our YouTube and podcast channels. This has been a presentation of the Taylor Leadership Institute at the University of North Florida.