For Love of the Game with Sports Author David Smith

 How can  sports impart valuable life lessons?  In our latest episode of Language of the Soul, we're joined by multifaceted author and speaker, David Smith, who is also the proud owner of the United Racquet Club. Sharing his journey as a storyteller, David unveils the motivation behind writing his first book and his commitment to inspiring others to document their unique narratives.

Our conversation zigzags through the all-encompassing worlds of Disney books, sports, and the art of goal-setting. With David, we dissect the profound relationship between passion and storytelling, the art of character development, and how sports can be a treasure trove of life lessons. We draw from personal anecdotes about coaching and writing sports books, and delve into the transformative power of human connection, the significance of lifelong learning, and the concept of legacy. 

The latter part of our discussion underscores the sheer power of individual and collective creativity and how it can shape not just our lives but society at large. David's insights are nothing short of enlightening and inspiring. We wrap up with a touching reminder that life is, in essence, a story, and each one of us has the power to write our own unique song. With a promise of a future episode featuring David, we leave you with a sense of anticipation for more inspiring discussions. Tune in and let the journey begin!

Guest Bio: In addition to being the creator and author of the Disney Mysteries, "Hidden Mickey," author of top-rated tennis and golf instructional books, and many others, Dave Smith is a keynote speaker, hall of fame Inductee, a musician in two bands, a magician and is the owner of the United Racquet Club, the largest combined tennis & pickleball club in the U.S. He has appeared on multiple podcasts, webinars, and shows.

Dave's BODY of Work includes over 300 articles and ten published books (fiction and non-fiction), including relationship books, historical fiction, and best-selling instructional books. Titles include the 'Hidden Mickey 'Series, 'In the Shadow of the Matterhorn,' 'Tennis Mastery,' and 'Coaching Mastery,' among others.

Learn more about David Smith at the links below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0EdEG9thck
https://w

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:20

Hi guys and welcome to Language of the Soul podcast, where life is story. I've got a lot in common we just discovered during a little pre-interview with today's guest and by way of introduction, I'm going to read as bio. As usual, david, this is your opportunity to set me straight if I get anything wrong. Here's what I've got. In addition to being the creator and author of the Disney Mysteries, hidden Mickey, author of the top-rated tennis and golf instructional books and many others, dave Smith is a keynote speaker, hall of Fame inductee, a musician in two bands, a magician, and is the owner of the United Racquet Club, the largest combined tennis and picket sorry, pickleball club in the United States. He has appeared on multiple podcasts, webinars and shows. His body of work includes over 300 articles, 10 published books, fiction and nonfiction, including relationship books, historical fiction and best-selling instructional books. Some titles include the Hidden Mickey series. As I said, I've got one, two, three and five. Is that?

Speaker 2: 1:25

right. Yes, three of four were actually written by my co-author while I was writing book five, so we kind of separated into.

Speaker 1: 1:32

Yeah, I think I got that from Amazon somehow. The three you got in there, anyway, in the shadow of the Matterhorn tennis mastery, coaching mastery and others. So I'd like to start real general, but welcome, by the way, david I appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 1:46

Glad to be here with both of you guys. This is fun.

Speaker 1: 1:48

Yeah, I guess you guys are catching up. And Virginia, I forgot to introduce you in our last episode. I'm so sorry. This is, as always, our producer extraordinaire, but this week you're the Foxy nail lady, is that right?

Speaker 3: 2:02

Yep, I have Fox's on my nails this week.

Speaker 1: 2:06

Guilty, I'm guilty. Anyway, welcome to you as well. But, David, I want to start real general. I don't know if Virginia told you this in the pre-interview, but we get off topic quite easily and then I have to sort of get us back on track. So I want to start very much in the spirit of the podcast and just ask you you seem very multifaceted, You've got a pretty diverse background, but I'm guessing you identify to some degree as a storyteller. So I want to ask you why is that, among other things, your chosen craft?

Speaker 2: 2:37

Great question and certainly some things fall into our lap and some things we can plan for and look forward to. Certainly, the writing element sort of fell into my lap. I always wanted to write, was never formally trained, I didn't take some writing courses, but what happened was I the top rated tennis website had a thing where I write in and either offer a repubble to an article, whatever, and so I had sent in an article and they said love what you wrote, will you write five more? Okay, then they wanted me to write more and they started paying me a pretty good sum of money to write each month an article. They made me a senior editor and it just took off from there. I ended up publishing probably close to 300, 400 articles with the number one website in the world for tennis instruction. Just by because I reached out and I love to write, I feel like I'm an above average author. I certainly would not put myself up there with the grades, but I've enjoyed the writing experience and the adventure. But certainly writing gets better the more you do.

Speaker 2: 3:52

I know Virginia can be a good reason to have a role in it too, that the more we do something, whether it's a sport, whether it's a musical instrument, whether it's writing or a job we Well, kubrick has said you know you can learn all you want about the craft of writing, but until you put pen to paper it's all theoretical, right.

Speaker 1: 4:12

So yeah, we learn much more by doing, for sure.

Speaker 2: 4:16

Yeah, so that led me to write my first real book, which was a top selling book called Tennis Mastery, which was a tennis instructional book. And another motivating factor was my father, who was one of the top national tennis coaches in the country. He died when he was 55 years old, took me into his retirement, and while he created one of the most successful high school tennis teams in the country, he left nothing behind, and so one of my motivating factors was and realizing this for everyone that we all have a story to tell he told any stories of his experience and how he created success, and I wanted to do that.

Speaker 2: 4:56

So that motivated me to write the first book Tennis Mastery.

Speaker 1: 5:00

Let me make sure I sorry. I'm so sorry, virginia. I just wondered if you felt like you wanted to record his legacy. Was that what I heard?

Speaker 2: 5:08

Yes, part of it was to ensure I included, because I learned a lot from him. But I also learned a ton more through my own massive experience of coaching high school teams, moving on to clubs, moving on to owning academies, moving on to opening massive fitness facilities with tennis and those kind of things. So I brought into it my own experience, but it was definitely a motivating factor. In fact, I acknowledged my father by dedicating the book to him.

Speaker 1: 5:40

In that sense, Right, go ahead with your question, virginia. I had a follow up too.

Speaker 3: 5:45

Yeah. So I want to say you know, because I know that's you know a lot of what got you into writing, david. But I want to say from that too, from you know obviously us living in the same locale and being in the same writer's guild, and you know both doing speaking, too, in writer's conferences you're very supportive of people and sharing that legacy of story and I love you to kind of share, like, some of that experience of working with people to do that.

Speaker 2: 6:15

Great point I probably learned. My greatest motivating aspects that I enjoy is encouraging people to record their story, whether it's a fictional story that's in their head, whether it's their anecdotal story, whether it's a personal, biographical, autobiographical story, whether it's historical people. When we die I use this and you probably remember me speaking at conventions is when we die we leave basically two things behind we leave our children, and they eventually will pass on, and we leave what we write or record, meaning books, music, what have you. And so today's world is certainly geared to the ability for people to leave something behind much more easily than it was 100 years ago.

Speaker 1: 7:06

Saying Well, except that it's all digital. Unfortunately, there's nothing archival these days. That's my worry. One's legacy is in the ether, you know.

Speaker 2: 7:18

Yeah, and that's. It does make it both easier and harder, in fact, realm of we always say Virginia Vive said many times, easiest thing a person will do is write a book. The hardest part is marketing, promoting, selling, making it a successful book, and so the eventual world has made that easier. But at the same time you better be keen on how to utilize the digital world.

Speaker 1: 7:46

Yep, yeah, I feel like I think what you're hinting at is like I think there's more even playing field. You know, the big five used to have a monopoly on publishing and certain distributors had a monopoly on film distribution, and now it's. You know, anything's fair game. A kid can make a film in his garage and it actually stands the chance of finding distribution. The indie author self publishing realm is enormous now. So but I'm, just as an ironic side note, I do worry about, you know, I don't know book burnings and things like that, where you know our entire history could go up in a minute right with a I don't know a hacking of some sort. So I wish more people read physical books.

Speaker 2: 8:30

Right and I would agree 100%. There's still. You know, the digital book surpassed the printed book about, I'm going to say, 10 years ago or more in terms of sales, but there's still a large number of people who still like to read and hold.

Speaker 1: 8:50

Exactly, they're not here in LA. I know that I love a good bookstore. I love the smell and the feel of books and I hope that never goes away. Yeah, I agree. Anyway, virginia, did I cut you off? Do you have more questions?

Speaker 3: 9:02

No, you didn't cut me off, I was just waiting for you guys to wrap up. So, dave, the other thing too that I know, when you and I have been out and about in writing conferences and talking, is you will share kind of the background of you know what makes a successful story through that character. I'm just curious because I know, even though we've had our conversations, we've never really gotten in depth, you know, on the craft of writing. So where do you pull that inspiration from, like what's really been kind of like the thing that drives you to tell that story through those characters and those specific characters?

Speaker 2: 9:40

I think the first and foremost aspect for anybody to write a well-received book or a book that's wanted to be read is creating characters that people can relate to, whether it's through the character personality, whether it's what the character does, whether they have empathy, whether they have something that the reader can connect to. Obviously, our Disney books are kind of we're first of their kind and what our goal was was to create kind of historical fiction, meaning people can read the book and go. They see in the book we take them to Disneyland, we take them to Walt Disney's home territory of Marceline, missouri, where he grew up, and we take them to places where Walt actually had and did things and we brought in that history because we felt number one, a commercial success, a book should have something that people go. I didn't know that that is so cool. And we also take you to Disneyland in the books and so now people read the book and now they kind of know what's behind a certain door that says that cast members only or what's underground, because there is some parts of the park, especially in the Disney world, that our books all take place at Disneyland, but there are underground places that do exist that people are probably curious about Club 33, which is kind of an enigma for people who have heard about it but don't know what it is.

Speaker 2: 11:12

We incorporate that within the story. But back in the original question, virginia, the character development has to connect with the reader and I think you know that as well, but probably better than I do. That is such a key aspect and so we try to create character development through that window or that eyeglass, that magnifying glass of what the reader might be looking for. We can't know who the reader is, but there are generic things that everyone experiences and I think the focus what would you say?

Speaker 3: 11:52

I mean for you personally, what do you feel like are kind of those generic things that bring?

Speaker 1: 11:56

us together as you guys. Stop saying generic. Can we say universal? You get what I'm saying, right.

Speaker 2: 12:05

Yeah, I do Well there are basic universal emotions love, death, discovery, self discovery as well as you know the light bulb going on, discovery, kind of idea, self discovery of finding yourself through a story Sometimes there's illusions by the guy who wrote Richard Bach, who wrote Jonathan Lewis and Miko all the great people who call illusions that one really delved into personal introspection through a kind of religious context of history. So anyway, yeah, those are some of mine, but there's probably a number of other aspects that I'm not thinking of right now.

Speaker 1: 12:57

But I'm a big fan of Bach. I wonder if you are influenced by Mitch Album or even Paul Coelho's the Alchemist, those types of books, because they follow similar templates in the spiritual journey. Basically.

Speaker 2: 13:12

Yes, I think I've read. Oh man, yeah, the first bong.

Speaker 1: 13:18

Mitch Album he did like I think it's the five people you'll meet in heaven, or the seven people you'll meet in heaven.

Speaker 2: 13:23

I know my wife's read that. I've not read it, but those are the kind of things that I think have. Certainly I was more into the adventure novels of Dan Brown a more time, but certainly of who's the blank now on the. He wrote all the adventures, the dirt pit novels man, I'm blanking out, We'll edit this. Anyway. But the adventure, and so one of the book, the movie, National Treasure was which am I creating the hit Mickey? Because of the historical fictional aspects of that, as well as Da Vinci Code and other.

Speaker 1: 14:18

Yep, Well, again, Da Vinci Code, that sort of Odyssey. Paul Coelho's the Alchemist is similar. It's a yellow brick road journey, but it's very familiar milestones, universal milestones Anyway.

Speaker 3: 14:36

So yeah, sorry.

Speaker 1: 14:38

I love the Da Vinci Code yeah.

Speaker 3: 14:40

I do. I think Dan Brown did a good job with you. Know well what he did.

Speaker 3: 14:47

I know, obviously because you do do a lot with more of the sport side of writing and stuff. I know your dad's been a huge influence to you but you coach and I I feel like you know what we learn in ourselves. As a story too, can you kind of speak to being in that sports realm? And obviously because you have written books to help people understand their craft within golf, tennis, what do you kind of pass on to your students when you're working with you know those young athletes to help them understand who they are?

Speaker 2: 15:25

That's a yeah, the success in life the world of sport can be. It doesn't always be, but it can be a microcosm of life that we have. We set goals, we learn something we didn't know before and we master it or we get closer to mastery of it. We never, probably, really master anything to the ultimate perfection, but certainly we move closer and closer to that goal and sometimes we, how we move through that journey and the cliche of you know it's not the outcome, it's the journey that we've never heard.

Speaker 2: 16:02

And so my books focus a lot on two things. One is developing a passion for your sport. We create lifetime athletes by creating passion. Do the same thing when we talk to writing groups and we talk about the passion of writing. Learning a musical instrument I play both bass guitar and I'm passionate about playing extraordinarily good music within my whatever limitations I have in terms of I don't spend 24 hours a day playing music, so obviously I'm not involved in that as deeply as people who really master it. So with when I write a tennis books, I obviously cover the ways we've trained world class players from a raw beginner to world class performance. That path is different for everybody, but the one thing that connects that is creating a passion. Every player who reached high levels created a passion. They because they had a.

Speaker 2: 17:08

They weren't going to let anything prevent them from achieving that goal and that's the big secret to writing a book. You know, five, when we all write a book, the first book we write, we're like man, this, this, you know, I think, my first book to be two years. To write my last hit Mickey book, which was over 600 pages, took me three and a half weeks and that that showed me. You know, the first book is always a tough one in terms of can I really do this? And once it's done, you notice that many authors have dozens of books enlisted in their either the biographical section or you know books by page and in their book. And so once that author has achieved the goal of publishing or printing and distributing a book now gets easier because now they know they can do it.

Speaker 2: 18:01

And same thing with any sport and music. And play in two bands we play 10 to 15 shows a month and you know years when I first started learning the guitar base I never envisioned that, but I had a dream of it. I was like I'd love to be able to get up on stage to see to play, like. I saw people who I admired bands, either night clubs or big concerts and I looked up to them thinking, man, One day I'd love to do that. And I worked pretty hard to achieve a level of mastery within my limitations to be able to do that myself.

Speaker 2: 18:39

And so people have gotten getting that passion for what they want to achieve and then not let anything prevent them from reaching that goal. And I've had too many. And this goes right along with that belief or not believe. I've had way too many students who did not show any potential to be a championship tennis player and yet most of my state champions most by national ranked players and even some of my international ranked players started off as players that were like you know, I'm not sure this is really a sport you're going to master. You know, the hand I coordination wasn't revealed yet and so, but what we still did was we created the passion in them and they overcame whatever limitations. My daughter's a great example of an average athlete become a worldwide golfer because she had a passion to develop her game and compete and reach a very, very high level of within that sport.

Speaker 3: 19:41

Yeah, and it's. We were talking earlier with the guest and you would. You're talking about when you're you're passionate when you're writing your hidden, hidden Mickey series. How it took longer to write your first book, you know, three weeks to, you know, to do another one in the series.

Speaker 3: 19:57

I know that some people, like you, can lose passion to and and they always try and figure out how do I come back around to that. Or, at the same time, you know what, what can I learn in this new experience to move forward? And you know that's that's the one thing that I think story helps us do is find those passion, those driving points, and bring us, you know, that interconnectivity within our society as well. And I don't know if you feel this way, dave, but I know, dominic and I've had this conversation a few times where it feels like sometimes we're starting to not have that connection anymore because we're so focused on, you know, the minutiae of things versus you know the passions of what bring us together and the like mindness of thinking. I mean, do you? Are you seeing that as well, when, when you think about storytelling and how, how it's affecting society now?

Speaker 2: 20:55

Yes, I think what you're touching upon I would. The analogy would be burnout, or in writing, or you know we call writers block. Obviously, sometimes, most of most of those situations, whether it's burnout in the sport, is because you lost the focus of the goal. And writing, why my my fifth book of the making series took me three and a half weeks. Right, six hundred pages. Well, part of it is. I'm a very good type of, so I can write, you know, 75 words a minute and so my brain. I have a theory that your brain, if you can record which thoughts are pretty much the same speed you're thinking you're going to be much more successful and maintaining integrity through your writing process. It's when people get ahead, their thoughts get ahead of the writing and they lose track. Anyway, I digress the the passion and the burnout. Those two are kind of come contradictory terms. I've had very few test players ever burn out within my program. I've taught about 4500 students in my career and I would say minimally less than five players really exhibited a burnout and if they did, it was because they lost the focus of the goal. So in writing, whether it's learning an instrument, if you're not focused on the goal, you can let that minutiae just talked about Virginia bog you down and lose that sense of forward as well. As he would say keep moving forward versus letting something block you.

Speaker 2: 22:35

A lot of people are affected by what people say, both positively and negatively, and so they can start to buy into. You know, like Mike and Jordan, the great basketball player was told by his basketball coach he didn't make the top team I think it was barely JV as fresh. When you're in the team, he said you know, you're really not going to be that great of a player. He would use that as motivation, and so some other players might say Well, that's the coach. You must know what I'm talking about. I might I might as well go on and do something else.

Speaker 2: 23:07

So personal belief and having that passion to pursue it, despite setbacks, despite a person's telling you're not good enough, you'll never amount to anything. Those kind of negatives that we all experience, I don't care as much as society wants to create a utopian world of safe spaces and everyone is, is definitely needs to be safe, and when the trophy is not reality, you are always going to encounter failure. You're going to encounter people who don't see value in yourself. So we have to teach people to find value in themselves and not let that extrinsic person or that experience dictate them back, take them down a notch. And so that's just personal belief and the success of students who were literally told by others that you'll never be a good tennis player is completely false.

Speaker 2: 24:08

And so she started being a great golfer. She did not. She started late and was not a good hand I coordinated after. But her dedication or discipline, or desire to drive her determination to, I call it the five B use of success, you have those. You can overcome many factors that typically limit a person, and writing is no different. Learning instruments, learning to master skill, no different.

Speaker 3: 24:38

Okay, so I'll read you back, because you just mentioned the five, the five D, so I can. Can you share with those? Are with us.

Speaker 2: 24:43

Yes, I can always remember. I always get one of them determination, drive, you know, discipline, dedication. And there's one more you have to read my tennis book.

Speaker 1: 25:00

There's five of these.

Speaker 2: 25:02

And here's now here. Let me throw in one other thing that's really important, is a really important concept.

Speaker 2: 25:07

So, let's say you want to master a skill and you have the five D's. If you have the five D's, you're going to overcome a lot of those. But here's the other thing. People oftentimes say are you willing to make sacrifices to achieve your goal? And I always kind of rebuttal that, because if you have a five D's and you have a sincere goal, nothing is a sacrifice, nothing should be a sacrifice. Every opportunity to go practice that skill, to learn more about it, to read about it, to that you may give up going to a party because you want to go do the driving range and practice your golf swing. Or you give up going to the movies with your friends because you want to go practice your serve in tennis or practice your guitar or whatever.

Speaker 2: 25:56

People oftentimes I had a top ranked, nationally ranked player lose a match in a national event and she said well, I lost to a player, but that's all she does. You know that she was complaining that. Well, the girl, just all she does is play tennis. And I said well, young lady, I won't mention the name, but she's. I said did she beat you? And she goes? Yeah, she beat me. I said she's not missing out on anything, she's reaching the goals that she is setting for herself. You elect to go to a party or a beach party or do something, hang out, stay up late, drink whatever, and she chooses not to do that because she's reaching her goal. It's not a sacrifice for that young lady, because she just knocked you off your pedestal and is moving on in the tournament. So sacrifice should never be a sacrifice if your goal is intentional and sincere.

Speaker 3: 26:51

Yeah, and I agree with that because I know, for for me, when I set my goals, or I I even tell my kids, you know, aim for the stars and wherever you fall, after that you'll, you know, find success. But I also feel like in our failures we have so much to learn, because it is part of our story. It's a reachable moment in success and in failure, and I know for me, I think I become stronger in those trials and tribulations than if everything just keeps constantly being handed to me. I always call it the victim mentality, where you know every sits back and like licks the runes and complains about the negative that happened, versus looking at what maybe you know they gained in that experience that could turn things around.

Speaker 2: 27:37

Absolutely. The failures in life will happen, and if you're, if you've been so protected that you are emotionally drained from a failure, then you're going to fail in life in many aspects.

Speaker 1: 27:57

Virginia, is it a good time to tell the suck it up buttercup story?

Speaker 2: 28:02

I will afterwards, Okay. So, in that same light, I was speaking at a world conference in Florida and another speaker was was giving a lecture that I like to go listen to as many people that I value their input and I can learn from, and he said a person who loses a match and doesn't learn from it is a double loser. So that is. You know, when we lose, we learn more. If we're willing to accept the fact that we can learn from the loss, we can learn so much more. Why did we lose? How did a person if it was, if it's a sport, or we failed in a book, or we failed in learning a song all these different things that we want to achieve?

Speaker 2: 28:46

in life, because that's really a secret to life. If you want to lead a life, you should be wanting, in my opinion, to leave every day with being a better person than something. And it doesn't always happen every day, but the improvement sometimes is invisible, but it's still happening. And if we're not willing to learn, then we're not. We're not recognizing the things that we need to do to beat that person down the road or get better at what our craft is.

Speaker 1: 29:15

So that's mine.

Speaker 2: 29:16

I'd love to hear the second up.

Speaker 3: 29:19

Yeah, since it's dog brought up. Okay, so the second up buttercup story is actually with my 18 year old Ash. So she was playing soccer here in our soccer league in the Washington County area when she was in elementary school I think she was fourth grade, third or fourth grade Anyhow. She was playing the goalie position because you know, when they're younger, they always, you know, let the kids play all different positions to learn the sport and you know, parents get pretty aggressive.

Speaker 3: 29:48

I'm actually I'm not a soccer mom. Dave knows that and I know Dominic knows that too, but just so the audience does. I am not a soccer mom, but you know parents do get aggressive out there. So the ball comes at Ash and hits her literally right in the stomach and just total gut punch and she like doubles over, catches the ball so it doesn't make a goal, and so the whole team's cheering and she gets up and I can see their tears, like, like she wants to cry and I'm thinking like I know you're in pain, but you should be celebrating this moment Like you did something amazing, even though it really hurt. And so I yelled out at her and everybody just looked at me horrified. I'm like suck it up, buttercup.

Speaker 1: 30:24

Of course she's never let me live it down. She like does grandma, horrible mother, and I've now oppressed her emotions, but yeah, that came up for me when we were talking about the idea of you know everybody winning an award and how you know. You got to learn from your mistakes and different mentality.

Speaker 3: 30:41

And I learned as a mob and my mistake that you know, probably wasn't the best way of handling her emotional state at that point in time. So I became a better mother, but she also became a better player because she realized, you know it's, there's pain in everything and like, for example, now. So I'll just share something. So she's, she's studying to be an engineer. She likes mechanical engineering is probably where she's going to fall, but she's starting to have tendonitis in her hands, which is really scary for her just starting off in college and you know, to pursue this career.

Speaker 3: 31:14

And I was really worried that you know this might be something that could make her give up, because you know you're use your hands a lot in, you know, mechanical engineering. And she has decided to talk with a doctor and find out what she can do because she's not going to let that stop her dreams and goals. And I'm not going to say the second up buttercup thing is what was a motivating factor early in her life. But I know she learned from those experiences, starting from that moment, that you know, just like you're saying, dave, you, you know, to be successful in life you can't sit back and wait for, you know, the door success to come and you know and you knock on it. Sometimes you have to go knocking on it yourself and break it down.

Speaker 2: 31:54

Absolutely. I one of the coaching statements among all my Smithisms that all my players affected. Some of them made t-shirts with all my Smithisms. One of those was the you know, the harder you work, the luckier you get. And that concept of hard work doesn't and of course the great UCLA basketball coach, john Wooden I probably was may have coined that phrase first, but you know, the success is not always guaranteed, even if you hard work hard. But you will increase.

Speaker 2: 32:38

I call it the crystal ball mentality and what that crystal ball mentality is. Let's say you have a crystal ball that really works and I tell my students okay, if you have a crystal ball, and you ask it two ques, there's two uses of this and this can go with our writers and anything else. But if you had a crystal ball and it said you're going to learn new technique from Dave Smith that is the tennis academy and you're going to lose, and the question you asked the crystal ball how am I going to do after the first month? And the crystal ball says you're going to lose every match because technically, learning anything new is unfamiliar, it's uncomfortable, it's unfamiliar, everything is different. And so you ask the crystal ball the wrong question. If you ask the crystal ball how am I going to be as a tennis player a year from now? It's going to. The crystal ball is going to say you're going to win. People, be people. You've never beaten in your life and you're going to achieve so much higher levels of play, which the crystal ball called. Both correct answers. But if the player knows that that goal is achievable, they're going to work through those losses and understand that. And then the same crystal ball mentality has applied and I've seen this happen so many times.

Speaker 2: 33:55

It's scary, but I always say if you have a crystal ball that says you're going to lose the first set, six, oh, you're going to be down a love three in the second set. But the crystal ball says you're going to come back and win that match and you know that before you go into the match. Are you going to be upset when you're down 0603 in that match? And of course it says no, because I already know I'm going to win, because the crystal ball already predicted it. So how would you play? You're going to play with the idea that you're not scared, you're not nervous, you're not, you know you're going to win. And I said there you go. That's how you play every match is if you have that crystal ball and it tells you you're going to win.

Speaker 2: 34:37

And I've had 16 matches in my last four years as a head coach where my players were down match point and sometimes down. A great example was in the region finals. My girls were down in the doubles match 0603, exactly the same and I walked out there and I said the crystal ball mentality analogy. And sure enough, they came back, rocked it, beat them 7562 and went on to win state. So you know, everyone needs to realize that things don't always go in an upward trajectory. Things sometimes go down and if you believe in yourself and you believe that that luck will come your way through hard work, more likely than not it does.

Speaker 3: 35:24

Yeah, and I feel like you know that's one of the things, which is why I know you know, with you being both a bass guitar player and also an author that we see that trans, you know trans, my gosh transition into I don't even know what I'm trying to think of right now, but you know it does segue into those realms as well and one of the things that I've seen. So I'm going to talk about my younger daughter, sabrina. So she has Crohn's disease and we had her home school for three years while she was getting her treatments to get it under control and she really went internal and so I started having and gained a lot of social anxiety because she was, of course, not being out socializing with people as much, and so I started getting her more into reading, into literacy and stuff, to help her kind of come out of that shell. And this year she's back enrolled in in person school and I have seen from her that determination and finding that self worth because she has read stories of people who have overcome stuff, be that fictional stories or, you know, true life stories from people and I've seen such a blossoming in her in this teenage years now that she's in to come out and do things that you know before, she would say, you know I can't, I'm in pain. You know I can't because you know, because of what Crohn's does to my body. This is gonna, you know, I'm gonna be sitting in bed for the next three days because of it.

Speaker 3: 37:00

Now I see her push through a lot of that and I see her finding more worth in herself internally versus, I think, when people sit there and like pat you on the shoulder and say, hey, good job, and it's just it's been amazing to see in her that growth. And I'm just wondering with society. Sometimes I see my kids on TikTok. I'm going you're getting such a negative loop sometimes cause you're seeing all the positive stuff and they're going well, why don't I have this? Why isn't that happening for me? And I'm just, what would you say to somebody, be it someone you're coaching, or I'm sure you've had this conversation with your own two kids to kind of help get them to realize that there is self-worth in who they are beyond that super superficial, not super superficial, so persona that we see out there constantly? It's like that grass is greener on the other side. I just I feel like we're starting to see that again where everybody's always looking over the fence.

Speaker 2: 38:06

Yeah, I think social media has really created that very detrimental both from receiving and giving, projecting yourself out there and having to have that affirmation. We've fed that affirmation through societal changes in what we believe is good or bad. I'm not going to call it out, even though I believe I have personal beliefs in it, that we have created it through the trophy for everybody mentality, because it's not real life and eventually they start to discover they're not that good by telling people oh, you're great, you're great. It's like you know those authors who say, oh, everyone that's read my manuscript said it's great, and then they get destroyed by a publisher, you know, or an editor or whatever.

Speaker 2: 39:06

I don't think you can just tell people. I think it's part of the equation of getting people out of that detrimental mindset, an emotional mindset of false belief and false hope and losing track of what it takes to be successful. But it's sort of like I would show my tennis players I don't know if you guys are both probably familiar with Nick Viachek, the Australian guy who was born with no arms and no legs and he's a motivational speaker and he's just an amazing motivating factor to make people realize that, wow, here's a guy that really, I mean, was born with, you know, luckily, had eyesight in his voice, he's perfectly normal, the core of a person with no arms and legs, but yet what he's been able to achieve in his life and how he, you know, considered suicide early on when he was a kid, thinking that no one would ever marry him, he would never have kids, he would never amount to anything, because society said you'd need arms and legs to succeed in life, so to speak, and he, you know, moved. I don't know what his motivating factors were to overcome that, but he certainly has become a success. Now, that's an extreme, but I always tell my players I said you have two arms and two legs and eyes and ears and, for the most part, a fairly healthy physique, to become whatever you wanna become.

Speaker 2: 40:36

And so we have to convince people through actions, through words, through experiences and through failures that we both talked about Virginia and then saying how do we rise past that? How do we learn from it, first and foremost, and then how do we overcome it and make ourselves a better individual and hopefully not meet as much failure in the future? There's still gonna be failure, there's still gonna be people, and unless you're number one in the world and whatever it is you do there's somebody better than you. And even as number one in the world, there's people coming after you. And so I just think that we as a society, and certainly working with youth which is my greatest joy in life is to work with young kids, especially at the high school age, ninth grade and 12th grade to learn that these how many kids I have?

Speaker 2: 41:35

One parent come up to me years later and said you saved my daughter's life because you don't know this, dave, but she used to eat lunch in her sister's car at high school her freshman year because she had no friends, and you accepted her onto the tennis team. She actually came out late and I said no, she can still come out. I believe that she can still be a part of this team and her mom, in tears, told me that that saved her daughter's life. And how many stories are like that. And we don't always get to hear from a parent down the road like I did. I got here from this one and some of the letters I've received over the career of my coaching career of students maturing. A lot of kids are not mature enough to express that till later, but I can tell you that we as adults have an opportunity to reach out to kids of all ages.

Speaker 2: 42:34

And even adults. The Heritage Writers Guild we've both been part of. There's people in their 60s and 70s who are right in their first book and we want to encourage that.

Speaker 3: 42:45

No, I agree because I know, like you mentioned, the Heritage Writers Guild.

Speaker 3: 42:50

So, speaking to that, I mean, like Russell S Slack and I know he can sometimes be a little bit much because he's a very strong-willed guy, but I do learn a lot from him and I mean he's easily able to be my grandfather in age.

Speaker 3: 43:09

But and I think sometimes we forget that in society that we can learn stuff from people, no matter how different they are, be it age, be it whatever their orientation is, whatever their religious beliefs are I think sometimes we kind of forget that part and we forget that there's this human connection, that we all want to be a part of something and yet we also want to learn and grow and have a broader worldview of what life can give us. And I think sometimes we get kind of in that tunnel vision and can get ourselves narrow-minded a little bit and maybe a little too focused in on what our desires are and forget to look around us. And even in that it kind of speaks to what you're saying about. Maybe we touch somebody, but are we touching their life in a positive way or in a negative way, based on our behavior and actions toward them?

Speaker 2: 44:07

Yep, our ego can be our biggest enemy and if we believe we know everything, we've stopped what we stopped learning. We stopped growing, and so that's very, very true, and I've come across that, and especially in my industry of the tennis profession. There's so many pros who think they know everything. They don't read a single book. I have 117 books on tennis, I believe, and go to conferences and certainly speak at them, but my most enjoyment is getting to hear other coaches and sometimes I agree 100% with them.

Speaker 2: 44:43

Sometimes I don't, but they make me faint and they make me evaluate, they make me be objective and that's one of the biggest things is moving people from an objective mindset, moving them from a subjective mindset to an positive mindset, going from the emotional control of our actions and what we believe to an objective mindset of being open-minded and listening to another person, rather than just waiting for your turn to talk, as a cliche often is said. So those are some of the things that we, I think we've all discovered. I would say successful people tend to discover that earlier or some point in their career.

Speaker 3: 45:29

Now that makes sense and I know that's like one of the big things with why Dominic and I started this podcast, because I know Dominic you're probably better at talking about, because it's your book, but you know language of the soul. I mean that was a big thing for you is because you went into that introspection and kind of reevaluating things in your life.

Speaker 1: 45:48

Me yes you.

Speaker 1: 45:49

Well, I don't think I could ever be accused of not being introspective. I kind of came out of the womb with self-awareness, and you know I've always been, I've always reflected. But yeah, the pandemic and my health issues, absolutely, my brush with death, 100% put it on the front burner, and I think we all. It is a universal speaking of going from the subjective to the objective. You know, there's a universal milestone where one puts not just legacy on the front burner but purpose. Right, we're all here to serve. So I think when you are feeling your mortality, you're more likely to put that on the front burner.

Speaker 1: 46:29

But I feel so many parallels here, right, virginia, this couldn't be more in keeping with the concept. So throughout I've been wanting to follow up on almost everything that was said, because, a, you're speaking my language, right. But I think one theme that keeps coming up for me is, you know, the love of craft, and, virginia, you'd have an overview of this too. It's amazing how themes recur. Dave Zabosky talked about a love of craft above all else, that drives everything else. So, anyway, and then a lot of what's happening here in this conversation is about the nature of manifestation, right, how manifestation works.

Speaker 1: 47:07

So, to go with the sports metaphor I would say accepting the calling is a big you know, accepting your muse or your calling or your ministry or whatever it is. That's no different than developing your love of craft, right. But also they talk in sports about getting in the zone. Right, your subconscious mind knows how to make that basket. Even if you're just throwing away you know a paper towel from across the room, your subconscious knows exactly how to pull that off. What you're largely trying to do is quiet mind and ego, right, and allow your core essence to do its job. So I just love the parallels. The creative process is no different whether you're manifesting a book or, you know, trying to get the basket in that hoop or just life in general. That's my take.

Speaker 2: 47:57

Well, so there's a good parallel if you've ever read intergame of tennis, which is Timothy Gillway's book, and talking about self one and self two. Self one is the doer, self two is the talker, and you can talk yourself out of things and not like yeah, that's, that's what I was getting at.

Speaker 1: 48:14

Like you got to get yourself out of the way. Like there's doubters, there's all kinds of limitations, and I I heard that too earlier. Like I think we all, no matter what our dream is, whatever we're envisioning, you got to quiet the voices of doubt, whether it's societies, your parents, your own internalized right Limitations, and so, yeah, that is largely what my books about how human potential is limitless. If you write, take socialization with the grain of salt, you take the status quo with the grain of salt and all those voices of doubt that could stand in the way of your passion. It's a process for all of us.

Speaker 2: 48:53

Yep, there's no, there's no ironclad method to success. There are steps and tracks that lead us to success, and that, exactly what Dominic, you just said, is so critical to belief in yourself and and when you start letting other people create your happiness.

Speaker 1: 49:16

I think you're in trouble, because this is the word extrinsic came up earlier and I love that. We all have intrinsic value If we can stop adopting societal standards, which I would call you know internalizing external doubts, for example. I mean it's all interrelated, right, and I think the conversation about social media and how paralyzing it can be for these young people got to stop measuring yourself against society's standards and shift your own expectations. I also heard a theme, too, of inspired work versus drudgery. When you have a love of craft and you've accepted your calling, then work is always inspired, it's never drudgery.

Speaker 2: 49:55

Yep, it's not a sacrifice anymore, it's a work and you embrace. I love that concept because happiness, there's many forms of happiness and there's many forms of joy and people who've got to find their their to in tune with themselves and what it's that. But for most people happiness is self worth, it's accomplishment to a certain degree of anything, it's fulfilling some aspect of value, and that's key.

Speaker 1: 50:31

Go ahead being trunk, they say. Satisfaction, inner peace, tranquility, call it what you want. Contentment hinges on purposeful contribution. So, yeah, my brush with death put purposeful contribution on the front burner. But you know, it's so funny synchronicity, I was just listening to a podcast this morning, Lewis Howes and this, this idea of dopamine. But also is it epinephrine? So epinephrine is efforting, whereas dopamine is. You know what the reward is along the way? It's not the outcome, as was mentioned earlier, it's the joy along the way. So I don't know, it's, it's, it's all in, related to me.

Speaker 2: 51:15

Well, my kids, when I, at the end of the year, I have a huge banquet and I I never cut players, so I average 45 to 50 players every year when I was coaching and like as a director of tennis and owning a club, you know we do the same thing with large numbers in those environments and we go back and I do a slideshow and and it's to music, because music connects to emotions. It connects, of course, to both rhythm, melody and words can be critical and it just adds to that whole. My bands play for assisted living.

Speaker 1: 52:01

I was about to say there's a lot of great videos of Alzheimer's patients just really being present the minute you put that earphone in their ear. Anyway, go on, and specifically music from their youth, you know. Yes.

Speaker 2: 52:12

Yes, some of the they that is still in. And I've seen it when we play for these 70, 80, 90 year old people who have Alzheimer's, who have Parkinson's, who have very little. But when we start playing a song they're moving, their lips are moving to the words. And it's wonderful to see that In fact we, we play oftentimes for Legacy Village and we print the words out now, and so they can actually follow the words that they may, they, they can remember, but you know, it's not all right there.

Speaker 2: 52:45

So you know, that's a value that that brings back to their youth of the music era that they enjoy. But the back to the statement of the, the, the end of the year, the, the every. The funniest thing is the hundreds of letters I've gotten and the predominant themes is all the trips we took all the times with restaurants, the car rides, the practices, the hugs when we were down in the hugs when we won, and the journey of that is again universal. Back to our word, universal among all things. Everything is going to be a journey for us and we we have to be embrace that journey, how we seek the path that we choose on that journey.

Speaker 2: 53:38

Sometimes it's the wrong path, we have to change course, but all in all, we're learning along the way and learning as part of excuse me, part of that, and I hope that we can learn from that. Whether it's a concept, whether it's a musical tune that we wanted to learn to play and it took us months to master it, whether it's a sport, a shot, a skill, that is part of that journey and I hope everyone listening to this will really reevaluate where they are at and I hope that we can change is how we look at every day that we get out of bed and we move forward. Are we like you said? Are we changing a life for the better? Are we changing our life for the better? Those are, and writing things down how many times I've told people you have a story to tell Now. Is it going to be a commercial success? Well, probably not for many.

Speaker 1: 54:41

But, by the way, the first line in language of the soul, the book on which this podcast is based, literally the first line is we've all got a story to tell. And I said we've all heard it said we've all. And then Maya Angelou said there's nothing more agonizing than an untold story. You know, carrying around an untold story Right.

Speaker 2: 55:03

So we want to. We want to encourage people to seek out their own story, their own voice and preserve that for generations to come, whether it's for their own family, whether it's for others, whether it's inspiring down the road. You think of Nikola Tesla, who was basically a guy, a very poor man, to look at his value to society today and how his self, his worth to society is greatly.

Speaker 1: 55:32

And he's, you know he's being exonerated not exonerated, but he's being embraced more now because there are people that are written out of history or there are literally campaigns, like Edison, to kind of silence somebody's legacy. So earlier Lamarck came up and Darwin kind of overshadowed Lamarck and Edison overshadowed Tesla. But I love that, you know, that's one good thing I guess about revisionist history is we get to reembrace things that were kind of overlooked at the time.

Speaker 2: 56:00

And I just want people to always really realize that, while other people may have overridden like Westinghouse was another character in Edison Tesla, if you've read any of the books on those guys and their contributions but you know we I hate it when I hear somebody say something negative about somebody who was revealed and appeared, I should say, and then said, oh, but he did this or she did this, and so now they're erased.

Speaker 2: 56:32

And yeah, we're all guilty of sins, we are all guilty of a past that we're not proud of, perhaps, or that somebody.

Speaker 1: 56:41

Well, virginia and I have talked a little bit about how nuance is kind of a lost art, right? So we threw out the baby with the bathwater. I don't think I'm not going to say Gen Z years, but I don't think contemporary society is very capable of nuance. So, right you, it's very difficult to put things in cultural context and understand, you know, what they might have done something really beneficial to humankind, but they were also a product of the milieu in which they came up. It's really hard, you know. I remember the I've taught for 20 plus years college level and I remember the first time a student there was a picture of Madonna and Sean Penn. It's something silly. And he's like, oh my God, why'd you post that? And I'm like I don't know. I grew up with them, I like them, but to him it was a cardinal sin to post a picture of Sean Penn because there were allegations of abuse. Like, it's just silly to me.

Speaker 2: 57:41

Well, that's, you know, there's no. Unfortunately we don't have the answers to everything and we should not say too so that's why I always yes, I have my opinions about things, as we all do, but at the same time I tried to. I've learned over the years. I've been much more Virginia private members. I was probably more flamboyant in my opinions of things years ago, so I've kind of scaled that back because I've matured. But I've also recognized my own faults, my own, my own failings and obviously recognize that we're all a product of, of of a imperfect. We're all imperfect beings.

Speaker 1: 58:30

Well, I guess that's what I feel. The hubris is like that, that form of like when, when you've never really done anything ambitious, or you know, in youth, when you really haven't accomplished anything, it's really easy to judge, to go way back. It was the same moment when Martha Stewart was brought down by a 22 year old because they have no power in the world and it's really easy to judge people that actually get off their butt and do something. So I just think it's partially the nature of youth, you know. But now youth runs the show, unfortunately, probably more than ever before. I mean, Shakespeare would say they ran the show back in the day, but I think it's, it's getting worse. We're sucking the teeth of youth a little more than the normal.

Speaker 3: 59:12

Yeah, Dave, dave, because we're getting to to the top of our show. So did you buy a chance for that? Yeah, I can't talk today. Prepare an excerpt from your store from one of your books that you can share with us.

Speaker 2: 59:29

Yeah, actually I went through and tried to find something that was more applicable to to what you're, what I interpret, the meaning of what you're. You both are presenting and providing for people's listening pleasure.

Speaker 1: 59:47

We like to say listening and enlightenment.

Speaker 2: 59:50

I love it love. Hopefully people will stay on or stimulation, stimulation.

Speaker 2: 59:56

So from my last one of my three tennis books is this saying, and I record, I put in the preface that says there is a great saying that a journey is the journey of 1000 miles begins with a single step. And I liken that to another saying that says ask yourself if you are doing today, if what you are doing today is getting you closer to where you want to be tomorrow. Both of those sentiments deal with the idea of my favorite entertainer you all probably can guess who it is Once said famously keep moving forward. And so the, the goal of any instruction in anything has to understand that very sentiment of you have to take that proverbial first step and follow it with another step and then another step and another.

Speaker 2: 1:00:48

And if you remember the movie, one on one, the whole Robbie Benson movie, basketball movie, people don't realize Robbie Benson, who was very soft spoken in most of his movies. He was the voice of the beast and beauty and beauty. And anyway he did this movie when he was quite young about this basketball player. And his girlfriend asked him you know he would keep running this, the bleachers to push himself and push himself and push himself, and and she couldn't under, she wasn't an athlete per, say, jennifer Jenetto, tool, I think with who playing the part. But she said why do you? Why do you do this? Why do you keep pushing yourself so hard? And he said I'll never forget it was so dramatic. He said I take that step when my body says you cannot take another step, and I end up taking another step. I've won, I've beaten my own mind and I think that is a very pertinent statement to life in general.

Speaker 1: 1:01:56

Is that the excerpt or are you?

Speaker 2: 1:01:59

That was a.

Speaker 1: 1:02:00

I was like was he reading or was very short, All right.

Speaker 2: 1:02:05

Just reminded me. I talk off the top of my head.

Speaker 1: 1:02:07

I love that quote. I do love that quote.

Speaker 3: 1:02:11

It was all motivational statements, just to bring it to bring it around.

Speaker 1: 1:02:15

No, I just wasn't sure when you stopped reading and when it was just an anecdote, but I loved all of it. But to bring it full circle, you know Walt Disney, by the way, I quote him in my book and Ford, so that kind of brings in the Tesla thing. Just, I think the quote and I might be misattributing it, but the quote was whether you believe you can or whether you believe you can't.

Speaker 2: 1:02:36

You're right, I love that one too, and my dad would often say it's not the size of a boy in the fight, it's the size of a fight in the boy. Don't want to get violent, but that's kind of a true statement in life as well. One of my other things I wrote about in the introduction of my coaching mastery, which is considered one of the top 50 all time best kind of books I'm very proud to say, was I was speaking at the National Honor Society. I was a keynote speaker and I've mentioned this in the book. This is the quote in the book that says during my talk at the NHS members and their families, I brought up the scene from the first city slickers movie, and the city slicker movie is the part where Curly the old Wrangler is talking to you as a father to Mitch, who was played by Billy Crystal, and Curly asked Mitch if you knew the secret to life is when Mitch says he didn't know.

Speaker 2: 1:03:29

Curly held up one his index finger. He says one thing and Mitch asked what is that one thing? And Curly said that's what you have to find out. And so that's the quote in coaching mastery that you know. I think one of the greatest successes that I discovered was when I was being able to focus all my attention in the period of time that I was trying to achieve whatever writing a book or learning the song, or mastering coaching was that you've got to focus your attention completely In that period of time on that one thing. And of course, mitch found out later in the movie that his one thing was to be a successful husband, to be a successful business whatever the business was, I can't remember and to recognize those as successes and to focus on that one thing. And I've obviously focused on many things, and I wouldn't say I'm a master of any of them, but I've enjoyed the journey back to our journey in the analogy of each of these that brought in my understanding of each of the other things.

Speaker 2: 1:04:43

My world of tennis has helped me, my world of magic. Believe it or not, I do. I do magic between sets of music and people remember that. Why is our band so successful? It's a very average band. I wouldn't say we have any outstanding features. We do what we do well, but one of the things is I do magic and people wow, that was a fun band and that trick that he did was unbelievable. Again, creating memories and creating an opportunity for people to talk about you, to talk about what they experienced and make them want to see you again. Walt Disney again. Make sure whatever you do, you do it well enough that people will talk about it and they will want to tell people to come see you and do it again and again and again. And that's the history of Walt Disney and the nutshell, I think.

Speaker 1: 1:05:38

Beautiful. Well, we'll have to devote another, we'll have you on again and we'll talk more Disney, because of course we have that in common. I think there's a lot to talk about there. I learned a lot about Disney during my time there, of course, but I didn't really read the illusion of life as a child. I had no horse in the race, really. But I've come to really appreciate, despite any controversy, the aspirational content that really shaped culture. I just love yeah, I'll leave it at that the aspirational aspects and if you got a dream, it to make it happen it is manifestation. You've got to have a vision in order to manifest it and I feel like he was right the walking exemplification of that mindset.

Speaker 2: 1:06:28

That mindset. Yeah, here's it. Probably I'll sum it up and we can talk about it again later. But one thing Walt did he never got mad when people said he won't succeed. Disneyland was considered going to be a Hollywood failure, snow White was going to be a disaster or he sucked all his money into it. He never got mad. All the books I've read about Walt. He never got mad at these people who ditched him. He said they don't see it how he sees it. He's got that crystal ball mentality I mentioned earlier in the podcast.

Speaker 1: 1:07:04

Well, again, we are going to wrap it up, but I prepared some questions and some thoughts and I researched you as much as I could. One thing I really said to Virginia earlier is like coaching is tough, man, because everybody's different. One person like half of what I have manifested is in spite of the doubters and the haters. It's like I dug my heels in more when somebody told me I couldn't or, more accurately, if it was ego and I felt like, oh, that's just posturing for power, I'm just going to go above their head. I always did things in spite of the limitations imposed on me. So everybody's different. But I think, if you understand, that work can be inspired and it doesn't need to be drudgery. We do love to flog ourselves in Western European culture. It's a really tricky balance to inspire without shaming or discouraging.

Speaker 2: 1:08:01

And success is a result of how you position yourself in that world of diversity of students and giving them. Obviously, a very successful pro is able to use different analogies, different approaches, visual learning, auditory learning.

Speaker 1: 1:08:22

Oh yeah exactly. Well, yeah, being an educator, it's like I'm pretty well versed in sort of the different learning modes and the different types of learners, and coaching relies on all of that.

Speaker 2: 1:08:35

Yep, absolutely. And so what we've found is and I talk about this in my books and that is, when you teach a foundation that is based on what I call advanced technical skills, personality emerges. Now you can look at every professional golfer, tennis player, football player I don't care what sport you talk about or even musician. The foundation of their game can be looked at as identical or diverse. It depends on what you're looking at. If you're looking at the idiosyncrasies of personality, they're all different. If you're looking at the structure of the swing path of a golf swing, a tennis swing, they're identical within certain frameworks of the contact window, whether it's a golf swing, a tennis stroke, whether it's playing a musical instrument, the fingering, while there are fundamental patterns in correct fingering. If I were to teach you to play the piano dominant and I taught you only to use your two index fingers, would you ever master the piano to within your potential?

Speaker 1: 1:09:40

I type pretty good with just my index fingers.

Speaker 2: 1:09:43

And there's a lot of people who've never learned to type and I use that on Geolaw. And they type 30 words a minute.

Speaker 1: 1:09:49

Right.

Speaker 2: 1:09:52

I type 75 words a minute.

Speaker 1: 1:09:55

Well, I learned to ski on cross country skis which are literally twice my height, and then jumping boots which were an incline of like 45 degrees and cutting into my shins, and halfway through the day I was like skiing could not be this hard. So I spent the money to rent the proper equipment and I was good because I learned under the worst possible conditions.

Speaker 2: 1:10:17

Yeah, sometimes learning in a bad condition or bad or heavy, or back in or heavy.

Speaker 1: 1:10:23

you know, a bad guitar makes you appreciate the good equipment, certainly for a first or foremost, but you can sometimes but I guess what I'm, what I'm hinting at and to bring it back to the spirit of the book and the podcast a little bit and you guys have said it in so many ways, this theme has been throughout that, in a way, the story you tell yourself about an outcome right is what determines what you manifest moving forward.

Speaker 1: 1:10:50

So if you view a failure as a failure, then it's going to probably affect you negatively in terms of your future success, whereas if you view it as a learning experience, like Virginia hinted at, then it's the opposite. So that is a story you tell yourself, it's a lens you choose to swap out. Right, and I would argue too that, in terms of failures being opportunities or crises being opportunities, that you know again, one of the things I looked up in researching for this episode, the root of competition is not what we think of. Somebody wins or loses, right, you squelch the opponent in order to bring that trophy home. The original definition was everybody ups their game. Right, because it's like playing with a better tennis player You're up in your game whether you win or lose, so everybody actually wins.

Speaker 2: 1:11:44

That's a great point. And in every golf tournament and every tennis tournament, everybody but one person or doubles team will lose. If you've got 122, 120 players in a draw, 126 players in a draw, all will lose at some point except for one person. So we have to accept the fact that the odds are we are going to experience a loss. So we have to move forward from that and how we move forward with that, it's everything.

Speaker 1: 1:12:16

It's everything you're right, beautiful. Well, thank you so much, virginia. Is that a good note to end it on? I think we lost Virginia. How did that happen?

Speaker 2: 1:12:28

She's muted for a minute there. Well, I'm going to wrap it up.

Speaker 1: 1:12:31

I think she had the gooey dinner, I don't know.

Speaker 2: 1:12:34

Well, Dominic, I want to first and foremost say thank you for inviting me and having you know, allowing me to express some thoughts and ideas here, but I hope I've contributed something?

Speaker 1: 1:12:46

Absolutely no. You were very lucky to have you and I loved the little grains of wisdom and it was very inspiring stuff. So we'll have you on a second time because I really do want to talk about the whole Disney, the shared legacy. We might edit in the little anecdotes from earlier, but maybe not. Maybe we'll just have you on again if you're available.

Speaker 2: 1:13:05

You got it. Thank you so much. Thank you, you're an opportunity.

Speaker 1: 1:13:09

Awesome. Thanks so much. Take care, okay, bye, and to our listeners remember life is story and to mix metaphors. We can get our hands in the clay, individually and collectively. We can write our own song. See you next time.