[00:00] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Welcome to another episode of Success for the Athletic Minded Man. Real talk on harnessing your athletic drive for clarity, consistency, and focus in business and life. This is your host, Jim Harsha Jr. Today, I’m bringing you part two of a two part series about Olympians. We’re digging up some of these old interviews that I’ve done over the years.

[00:23] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Episode 467 that you’re listening to right now. So it’s mind blowing how many conversations I’ve had with amazing people. And, and so so many of these great conversations happened, some of them years ago, but there’s transformative lessons in these that we want to share, especially heading into the Paris Olympics, which is when I’m recording this right now.

[00:42] Jim Harshaw Jr.: The Paris Olympics are right around the corner. So in episode 465, you heard from some amazing Olympians. You heard their stories and some amazing lessons there. And today we’re bringing you a new set of Olympians who I’ve spoken with and some lessons directly from them. All right. So today we’re going to hear about three different.

[01:04] Jim Harshaw Jr.: And the lessons are this transformative encounters that these individuals had with coaches and or mentors, like pivot points, like these interactions they had that were life changing for them. Don’t you think about yourself as well? Who are you surrounding yourself? Who is in your corner? Who are the people that you’re interacting with and that you want to interact with more or maybe even less?

[01:24] Jim Harshaw Jr.: So that’s the first lesson. The second of three is about leveraging failure. for success. And you’re going to hear some incredible stories of failure and setback and adversity from these individuals. And then the third lesson is about redefining your personal identity after major life changes. And, and certainly think about a major life change of an Olympian retiring from sports, but you’re also going to hear from John Register.

[01:48] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Who was training as an Olympic hopeful and had a tragic accident where he had to have his leg amputated and he became a Paralympian. And as a matter of fact, a Paralympic silver medalist. So let me tell you the names and a quick background on, on the different Olympians you’re gonna hear from today. The first one is Lindsay Shoup.

[02:06] Jim Harshaw Jr.: She’s an Olympic champion rower. Fantastic interview with Lindsay. She’s a fellow UVA grad like me. Wahoo to Lindsay. The next is. Matt Linlin. Matt is an Olympic silver medalist wrestler, Greco Roman wrestler. He was the national team coach and we became friends over the years and had a great conversation with Matt.

[02:25] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Leah Amico is another one, Olympic gold medalist softball player. Devin Harris was an Olympian in the bobsled. Actually, he was on the Jamaican bobsled team, the captain of the Jamaican bobsled team. Yes, there’s a movie about that. There’s a real person, a real people behind that. And Devin Harris was the captain of that team.

[02:42] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Fascinating story. Fascinating lessons. Also Cameron Myler, who was an Olympian in the luge. Uh, I mentioned John Register, who is a Paralympic silver medalist, incredible guy, great friend. And lastly, Helen Maroulis, Olympic champion wrestler, first ever female Olympic gold medalist wrestler for the United States.

[03:02] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Okay. So we’ve got three amazing sort of sets of lessons that you’re going to hear from, from these different individuals. Let’s go ahead and get into the first one. We’re going to talk about transformative encounters, With coaches and mentors. So here we go. Let’s hear from Lindsey Shoup, Olympic gold medalist rower.

[03:20] Jim Harshaw Jr.: There’s a chance encounter that you happen to have, I think the next day or very shortly after that with coach Kevin Sauer, the head rowing coach of Virginia, who’s a good friend of mine, but the listener, I actually called Kevin prior to this interview. And Kevin told me, and you alluded to this in the book, Lindsey, that.

[03:39] Jim Harshaw Jr.: He learned about you because your mom is a hygienist and your mom is Kevin’s hygienist. And Kevin learned about you when you were in high school and, and he came and watched you in some of your sports. And he really was like, even recruiting you into rowing then. And, and so this was kind of on your radar.

[03:55] Jim Harshaw Jr.: And for the listener, I just want you to think like, you know, yeah, but Lindsay, I don’t want you to think this. I don’t want you to think, yeah, well, Lindsay had this chance encounter and. You know, what if that chance encounter never happens for me? The chance encounter only happened because you were open to it.

[04:10] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Like you had that chance encounter before, but you were open to it at this moment. And so you bump into coach Kevin Sauer at the swimming facility.

[04:20] Lindsay Shoop: Yeah. Yeah. At the school gym, you know, and he and I both had the gumption at this point. Cause when they’re just swimming, you know, first of all, he went there to look around, I’m sure.

[04:30] Lindsay Shoop: Cause he’s always. Looking for opportunity, you know, he loves the sport of rowing. He loves how life changing it can be. He loves the life lessons that it can teach. And so he’s always looking to share that with people. And I’m sure that’s what he was doing there at the swim meet. Like, Hey, uh, when you’re done with swim season, you know, I could picture him having this conversation, but he, you know, he and I had both had the gumption at this point.

[04:54] Lindsay Shoop: They had the pool itself blocked off from the rest of the gym, including the bathrooms by these like white. You know, temporary fence things that they install, you know, whenever you have events, I’m sure you’ve seen them. If you’ve ever been to an event, they’re about waist high. I hop over it to go use the restroom.

[05:10] Lindsay Shoop: He had done the same thing. We were both clearly in a place that we shouldn’t have been. And we were the only two people around and he stopped me. You know, I was on my way out. He was on his way in and he stopped me and said, hello. And the thing is, he could have just walked on by and been like, that’s that kid that I have tried to get to row.

[05:31] Lindsay Shoop: And no, that’s just not him. He’s like, Dad Nabbit, I’m going to keep asking, you know, because this is really meaningful and maybe she’ll say yes this time, you know, and, and I hadn’t seen him in a while, at least two or two and a half years. I don’t recall him talking to me for 2 or 2 and a half years. I actually found letters from Virginia rowing unopened under my bed at my parents house.

[05:57] Lindsay Shoop: Years later, you know, so apparently they had sent mail along the way. That’s how it turned off to it. And the fact that I don’t remember that happening just goes to show how closed off to that opportunity I was at the time.

[06:11] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Yeah. The teacher will appear when the student is ready.

[06:14] Lindsay Shoop: Yeah. You know, first thing he said was, Hey, Lindsay, it’s never too late to row.

[06:19] Lindsay Shoop: And I was just like, you know, I’d really like that. And I think he was shocked that I said that and he pulled out this like wrinkled business card, like he had been sitting on it in his wallet as if he had put it in there two and a half years prior just for me, you know, I had saved it that long. Gives it to me, said, Hey, give me a call.

[06:40] Lindsay Shoop: At this point, I could have still just been like, Oh, you know, and not followed up on that. So there was still room for me to be closed off to this opportunity. The ball was still in my court. So I had to still do something to pursue that opportunity. I had to reach out and call him and I called him up and in that moment, in that meeting, he told me that I would actually be meeting with a different coach, the novice coach, who would coach people that had never rode in college or potentially never rode before.

[07:11] Lindsay Shoop: But she was unavailable when I was available. So he went out of his way as the head coach of one of the top four or five women’s rowing programs in the country, in the history of women’s NCAA rowing. Right. This person went out of his way to meet with me, to show me around, to make sure that I really wanted to be a part of the team.

[07:32] Lindsay Shoop: So I did like, he took time out of his day to come and meet with me. Now

[07:36] Jim Harshaw Jr.: let’s hear from Olympic silver medalist, wrestler, Matt Lindland.

[07:40] Matt Lindland: One of my trainers, she was on a, an 80 Olympic team. She didn’t actually get to go compete cause those games were boycotted. But, uh, you know, so I, I was inspired about the Olympics early, but, uh, it was, it was in a completely different, uh, sport.

[07:54] Matt Lindland: And by the time I got, I got to the top in my state, I wanted to go to the, the regionals and then hopefully move on to the nationals. And my, my mother and father said, uh, That sport’s a little too expensive. You guys are, you’re gonna have to find something else to do. And, you know, you can still ride for fun, but we cannot afford to.

[08:13] Matt Lindland: Actually send you all over the country to compete at that level.

[08:17] Jim Harshaw Jr.: So that’s all, uh, so that’s how you got your start in wrestling, right?

[08:20] Matt Lindland: Well, uh, high school, uh, gym class, uh, our, our gym coach was, was the former wrestling coach. So he, uh, he always had a, You know, coincidentally, uh, like a six week section of wrestling before the season started.

[08:35] Matt Lindland: So basically you’d roll right from this PE class, right into your wrestling season. And, you know, they, it was just kind of their recruiting effort. They’re like, Hey man, you’re pretty good at this. You should try out. And I tried out and I, uh, I made the team at 98 pounds as a freshman.

[08:49] Jim Harshaw Jr.: So that was your first year wrestling as a freshman in high school.

[08:52] Matt Lindland: Yeah, my freshman year of high school and uh, I had some really good assistant coaches there that helped me along the way and you know, throughout all my career I’ve had just amazing coaches. Everywhere I’ve gone I’ve gotten blessed with really good coaching, but uh, I had one coach in high school that I wouldn’t say was a, A stellar coach, but he did one thing for me was he, he handed me the flyer about Roman Greco and, and freestyle and said, Hey, if you guys want to do this, the season’s over, I’m out.

[09:22] Matt Lindland: But, uh, here’s the information. So he, he gave us this flyer about the state freestyle. And as I found out, it was actually Greco Roman, but, uh, he sent me this flyer and I went, uh, 0 8 that weekend at the, uh, state tournament. I wrestled both cadets and junior level, didn’t win a single match. The next Monday I showed up at the club where, where most of the kids that were on the podium came from.

[09:48] Matt Lindland: And that’s kind of where I, I finished, uh, you know, I started, started my wrestling career really was, was that, uh, a club in Oregon that, uh, Mark Sprague was, was our head coach there. And the club was, uh, it was USA, Oregon or, or Cobra club back then.

[10:05] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Now let’s hear from Olympic gold medalist, softball player.

[10:09] Leah Amico: When I was at University of Arizona, we won three national championships. We were one of the few collegiate softball teams in the entire country who had a sports psychologist. Jeff Janssen was his name, and I’m going to tell you right now.

[10:21] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Jeff’s been on the podcast.

[10:23] Leah Amico: Um, yes, no, it was, it was huge to have that.

[10:26] Leah Amico: You know, I’ll tell you about Coach Candrea, who I played for at Arizona, was very big on. Giving access to all these people in their different areas and fields that were, um, authority figures and the experts. And he would like be like, okay, work with my team. I want everything available. And so the mindset, the unity, the team building that we did.

[10:47] Leah Amico: So on team USA, same thing. And the more freedom our head coach gave to these sports psychologists, I really believe the more it impacted us as athletes. And we were able to draw from them what we needed.

[11:01] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Quick interruption. If you like what you’re hearing here and you want to learn how you can implement this into your life, just go to Jim Harshaw, jr.

[11:08] Jim Harshaw Jr.: com slash apply to see how you can get a free one on one coaching session with me. That’s Jim Harshaw, jr. com slash apply. Now back to the show. Let’s hear from Jamaican Olympic bobsled team. Captain Devin Harris.

[11:24] Devon Harris: This idea of dreaming big, and I describe myself as fiercely Ambitious. And I just think that if there is this thing out there, that’s Jim has done, I’m thinking to myself, well, you know, that’s, that looks good.

[11:37] Devon Harris: Why can’t I do it too? And I want to do it because in my head, it’s going to make my life better, but it also on every dreamer experiences, right? It also opens you up to failure. There’s a good chance that you might fail, right? So we talk about, you know, and I know your program talks about failing and how you Succeed from that.

[11:56] Devon Harris: And so let’s talk about Sandhurst for a minute, because when I went to Sandhurst, my goal wasn’t to graduate. That was a given. My goal was to win the award as a top overseas student. I never did. I failed. I was young and foolish and I jumped from a plane and I broke my ankle. And that essentially took me out of the running.

[12:17] Devon Harris: You know, even though I was being considered at near the end, I didn’t feel like I deserved it, to be honest. But to me, that was a massive failure, man, because that was my one and primary focus to be named the top overseas student, it never happened. But. You know, the second prize was that I became an army officer.

[12:40] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Do you think you got further because you dreamed big, even though you failed at that one in particular?

[12:46] Devon Harris: You know, I have failed, you know, a number, obviously a number of times before that, but I think that for me, failure makes me more determined to work. And to succeed. And so, you know, whether it was that failure or, you know, prior failures, like, you know, we have to do these exams in Jamaica to go from elementary school to high school.

[13:07] Devon Harris: Dude, the first time I did the exam, I failed. You know, and I’m disappointed because we all will be not discouraged. You know, I already was just like, you know what? Work harder. I worked harder and I passed. Next time I went to a pretty good high school in Kingston. So yeah, you know, all of us, I think all dreamers, all anyone who has succeeded along the way, it’s impossible for them to have achieved success without having to deal with some failures.

[13:35] Devon Harris: And the ones that bounce back and keep on pushing, as I like to say, are the ones who go, okay, fine. You know, it didn’t work out this time, but I’m going after it again. And in fact, I’m going to go after this other bigger. Even bigger goal out there, you know, let’s, let’s see how it works.

[13:52] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Now let’s hear from Cameron Myler, Olympic luge athlete.

[13:56] Cameron Myler: My last year was 97, 98, and that culminated with the Olympics in Japan. I was going into the last world cup race. I was second in the overall standings for the world cup, the final. Race was on a track in Altenburg, Germany, which it’s about as far east in Germany as you can get. So it was in the, in the former East Germany.

[14:21] Cameron Myler: And I, I raced there when it was still communist East Germany. And I’d won on that track. I was the first non German to beat all of the Germans on that track. So I loved it. It was tough. It was a really fast and difficult run. But that year the Germans decided to That, uh, and I’ll also mention that it was a track when it was built, it was decided that it was, it was too fast.

[14:46] Cameron Myler: So the, the men which, uh, who normally go from one start and then the women and doubles go from, uh, another start, usually like two curves down the track. Um, they moved the starts down. So the, the men were racing from the women’s and double starts. Uh, and the women in doubles went from the junior start. Um, however, that year the Germans said, Oh, okay, we’re going to put everyone back up to the, we’re going to have everyone go up to the, uh, the original starts, except no one other than the Germans had training, uh, from those starts.

[15:19] Cameron Myler: Uh, yeah, so it was not particularly fair, uh, in, in all of our opinions. And I, I was the kind of athlete where I crashed, Like once a year, uh, and it, I would say one of my faults as an athlete was I probably thought a little bit too much and I wanted to be a little too much in, uh, in control. Uh, so. I, uh, on the last run from the old women’s start, I crashed and it happens, but I couldn’t figure out why I crashed.

[15:49] Cameron Myler: And then I had to move up to the men’s start and then you’re going 20 miles an hour faster. Everything comes a lot more quickly and that your timing has to be, you know, like right on, so I actually crashed then. Two more times in the next two days. So I, I crashed three times. It was really painful and I was afraid.

[16:09] Cameron Myler: I thought, Oh my gosh, like, I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. I don’t know how to fix it. I know that when I crash, it’s really painful. And the last time that I crashed. My sled got away from me and you try to hang on to your sled because if it’s if you crash and the sled gets away on its own it it might get damaged and they’re really difficult to fix and it’s a very you know highly technical piece of equipment so so I slid on my backside about Three curves stopped right in front of my coach.

[16:38] Cameron Myler: And I said, that’s it. Like, I’m not going to go. And he said, uh, and he’s from Liechtenstein. He said, yeah, but you must go. I was like, yeah, okay. You can go get on my sled. I don’t want to go. And I didn’t. And I had never experienced that before in my whole Lush career. And the other sort of complicating factor was.

[16:59] Cameron Myler: That, that year, the Germans had also, also changed the rules and you could not drop your worst World Cup race from the, the total results. So I had to race. I was second overall. I had to race. I had no confidence in myself. I was afraid to get on the sled and it was one of the most difficult things I’ve done.

[17:19] Cameron Myler: But I sort of had to dig down pretty deep and, uh, and, uh, Remember the like, okay, I like I’ve won on this track. I know this track I this is really more an issue of having faith in myself and uh, You know believing that I can do it, which I did, you know, I got on the sled I didn’t win. I was fifth in the race.

[17:40] Cameron Myler: I didn’t win a medal, but uh, I stayed in the top three overall So it was it was really difficult. Um, because that was like fear of you know, physically, uh injuring yourself But I think it requires you to have some faith in yourself and in your abilities. And I think that applies whether, you know, you’re talking about sport or as you said, public speaking or, you know, or whatever, um, it is in, uh, in the business context.

[18:05] Cameron Myler: Uh, faith in yourself is hugely important.

[18:08] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Alright, the third and final topic is about redefining your personal identity after major life changes. For you, that might be a career change that you have made or that you may want to make. And so we’re going to hear from a couple of amazing Olympians here.

[18:22] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Let’s hear from Paralympic silver medalist, John

[18:25] John Register: Register. You know, life can change with one wrong step and life can get back on track with One right step as well. But at, uh, on May 17th, 1994 at five 30 in the afternoon, I misstepped a hurdle in the 400 meter hurdles, landed awkwardly, dislocated my left knee, severed the artery behind my kneecap, and seven days later had the choice to make either keep my leg and use a walker or wheelchair for the rest of my life, or undergo an amputation and use a prosthesis.

[18:57] John Register: For the rest of my life, you know, what kind of choice is that? So we see things that happen in our lives. That’s instantly will change instantly will shift us. Uh, we might look at it in today’s terminologies of COVID, right? I say, everybody that went through COVID last year through this year, went through an amputation.

[19:16] John Register: It was really, the world stopped, uh, and we didn’t have control over it any longer. We thought what we had control over, we no longer did. We said things like, these are now uncertain times. And my challenge back to individuals and the, you know, the, the groups I speak with are, when do we ever have certainty?

[19:37] John Register: We never really had it. We had rituals. We had, we had, we had rhythms that we put in place that elevators to arise and create a result, but we never knew what was going to happen the next day. We never knew what happens in the future. Anything can change. And are we prepared for that? So when I had that injury on that day and in the hospital and the doctors there giving me this choice, I really wanted to get rid of the pain, right?

[20:00] John Register: It was, it was, the pain was so great that if I thought if I could just get rid of the leg, I’ll get rid of this pain. But when I talked to Dr. Mullins and I said, you know, just take it off. It was really because that’s what my male deductive reasoning had said. But when I woke up, I was in more pain than my male deductive reasoning had actually reasoned.

[20:18] John Register: And that’s kind of the whole kind of injury process of what I think we all go through this point of recognition. That something will not be the same any longer. And of course, doing an amputation, that’s a permanent. Now let’s hear from

[20:33] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Olympic champion wrestler, Helen Rurulis.

[20:36] Helen Maroulis: I just come on national team.

[20:38] Helen Maroulis: I just made the world team in 2011. I qualified the weight for the Olympics by, um, taking fifth at the world championships and I had won the national. So I was already in the finals of Olympic trials. So all I had to do was win two matches and I was going to be on the Olympic team.

[20:53] Jim Harshaw Jr.: Two out of three, right?

[20:54] Helen Maroulis: Yeah, two out of three. And so that was, you know, my, my dream. Um, and. I actually thought I was going to wrestle someone else. Um, the top two girls missed weight. And so the person I ended up wrestling, I, you know, I was confident and I was like, okay, I’m going to win. So there wasn’t anything where I didn’t, I didn’t believe I was going to win.

[21:14] Helen Maroulis: I mean, I really did. And I lost and, um, and I was. Really so devastated. I remember, and let me just put it into perspective. If the worst thing that happens in your life is losing the Olympic trials, like that’s not that bad, but I didn’t realize how much I made it a part of my identity and how much I think I felt that once I make this Olympic team, I’ll be worthy or I’ll be, you know, somebody like I just didn’t, you know, I was confident about my wrestling, but I wasn’t confident about myself as a person.

[21:44] Helen Maroulis: And I don’t think there was a lot of self love. And I don’t know if those were the direct things that affected the, if, you know, I don’t know. I think loss is, I think loss is mind, body, soul. So there’s wrestling things that I needed to fix and there’s mental things and there were, you know, soul things that I needed to fix.

[21:59] Helen Maroulis: I’ve said before, like when you give a hundred percent and you lose, you just have to own the fact that you weren’t good enough or whatever. And, and I was very negative at that time. So I thought, you know, it’s just not a good place for me to be. And I was depressed for months. I didn’t want to get out of bed.

[22:14] Helen Maroulis: I didn’t want to wrestle. And so I just remember, like, I’m like, I’m done with wrestling. Like I’m retiring. This doesn’t make me happy anymore. I’m tired of riding the highs of winning and the lows of losing. Like, I can’t be on this rollercoaster anymore. This, this doesn’t give me joy. It And so when I felt like God was like, Hey, come back and do it my way.

[22:30] Helen Maroulis: I didn’t say yes, because it was this exchange where if I do it your way, you’ll win the Olympics. I never, I mean, I didn’t really think I was going to win the Olympics at any point. Was I like super sure it was more just, you know, God, I’m going to do this. I’m giving this four more years. You have four years, whatever you tell me to do, I’ll do whatever you want me to do.

[22:46] Helen Maroulis: Whatever you want me to change about myself as a person. I’m giving you four years because I just don’t want to have regret. Like literally I was so broken on like four more years because I know if I just give everything four more years I can just live the rest of my life in peace. I just don’t want to look back and have regret.

[23:01] Helen Maroulis: So you know there were a lot of times through those four years I was like whoa wait a minute I think I might be able to win the Olympics or like hey you know what like I won worlds if I just keep going don’t don’t stop now keep pushing like I can win next year and and yeah Yoshida she’s almost unbeatable but but you know.

[23:17] Helen Maroulis: Anything’s possible. And so it was, um, never this total assurance, but you know, there were times where I got more excited and had more belief in myself, but by the, a month before Olympics, the 2016 Olympics, I actually was going to quit because I thought I wasn’t going to make weight. And, um, I had been working with a nutritionist, with a doctor.

[23:39] Helen Maroulis: It was really hard for me to go from 65 kilos to 53 kilos. And I was trying to do it in the healthiest way possible. I was monitoring every single like Down to the T, 24 hours a day was just monitored. And it was, it took a lot of discipline and we were at a camp in Spain and there, you know, seven out of my 16 competitors were there.

[24:00] Helen Maroulis: Not only was I like seven kilos heavier than everyone, but everyone beat me. And I just remember walking home. Back to the hotel from practice every day. Like bawling, like uncontrollably on the streets, like no shame, just bawling. And I was like, God, like you brought this far. And

[24:13] Jim Harshaw Jr.: shortly before the Olympics, you say?

[24:15] Helen Maroulis: Yeah, this is like four weeks before the Olympics and I’m crying and, you know, coach is like, all right, well, let’s just go walk a couple extra miles a day, put in some extra runs, like, you know, eat, eat a little bit. Let like, no matter what we tried, like nothing was, Nothing was working. And um, I got back to Colorado and I was like, look, I gotta go see my parents for a couple of days.

[24:36] Helen Maroulis: And I went home. And when I came back, you know, I just remember I was journaling and I was like, all right, God, if I could ask you for anything right now, I would ask you to just please let me start losing weight. And, and just, please let me just know that I can make this weight class. Like it’s so selfish to miss weight.

[24:51] Helen Maroulis: And there’s girls behind me that can wrestle and they can make weight. And like, I don’t want to go and not like that to me, that’s like, I can’t, like, that will devastate me. So I was like, please, if I just lose some kilos, like, please help me out, you know, and then I’ll be happy. And he’s like, okay, well, if I give you that, what will you ask for next?

[25:09] Helen Maroulis: And I’m like, well, if I lose weight, then I’m probably going to ask for my, you know, for my training to be ready. He’s like, okay, and if I give you that, then what? And I’m like, well, if my training’s ready and my weight’s good, then I’m going to ask for, I want the tournament to come already. The tournament can’t come already.

[25:22] Helen Maroulis: So I’m going to ask for, you know, just keep me relaxed while I’m waiting. And, you know, then when the tournament comes, because everything was going right, I’m going to want to win and ask for that. And then after that, I’m going to ask for a break and vacation. I’m on vacation, I’m going to miss wrestling and I’m going to ask to come back.

[25:36] Helen Maroulis: And so he kind of just showed me that you’ll. Beyond the cycle of constantly asking for things, or you keep thinking that when this changes, this will get better. And he’s like, I just need you to pause and, you know, be grateful and be in the moment. And so I would just journal, I would wake up an hour early every day.

[25:52] Helen Maroulis: And just, I was like, I can’t control how the way it’s going. I’m doing everything that I’m told I’m doing everything right. But obviously I can’t force it to go down at this point. And I’m like, but I can control this first hour of my day and I’m going to choose joy. And I’m going to choose. Gratitude and I’m going to choose to just be in a good, a good place.

[26:10] Helen Maroulis: And so I did that every day through and past the Olympics. But by the time the Olympics came around, you know, in those three weeks, it was kind of life altering because I mean, I would read my journal and I was like, man, God, you know, I thought that I always wanted this gold medal, but what I already got everything that I wanted out of this.

[26:29] Helen Maroulis: Like, I’m no different than the person that took silver. I mean, we both get the same things out of this sport. And, and I, I got the, you know, the perseverance and I got the work ethic and, and I got the lessons from going through these challenges and all these things that I’m going to use in my life. I already have.

[26:45] Helen Maroulis: And so I didn’t need to win at that point. It was more like, I’m just doing it to enjoy it.

[26:52] Jim Harshaw Jr.: These were amazing interviews, amazing conversations. I hope you go back and check out some of those actual episodes. We’ll have the list of what episodes I interviewed each of these Olympians. We’re going to have that list in the action plan.

[27:03] Jim Harshaw Jr.: So make sure you grab the action plan. Go to jimharshajr. com slash. Action. And I hope this brings these individuals down to earth. These are real people who had real struggles and real setbacks and real life experience just like you had. And just like I’ve had, and they have achieved incredible things.

[27:19] Jim Harshaw Jr.: And so can you figure out what your action items are from this episode? What are you going to do differently? What are you going to start doing, stop doing, or continue doing because of what you learned here today? So take action. Good luck.

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