October 12, 2020 • 45 mins
Olympic gold medalist and cancer survivor Scott Hamilton joins Brooks for an inspiring conversation about strength, health, happiness and success.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is How Men Think with brooks Like and Gavin
de grab and I heard radio podcast. Welcome to another
episode of How Men Think. My name is brooks Like,
and I am super excited about this show. The previous
couple of shows that we've had, we've talked about the
pursuit of excellence and the mastery of one one's craft
(00:21):
and the lifelong achievement of a person dedicated to a
certain things. So, um, we're gonna discover more of that
in today's episode. So the pursuit of excellence, the pursuit
of excellence, I love that, and honoring and mastering one's craft.
And we have a real distinguished guest. Somebody that can
speak to this may be better than anybody else because
(00:43):
of their history. And I love saying this. I very
rarely rarely say it, but we have a living legend
on us. I say it, I only ever say it.
I very reserved with my words with that. I think
legend is a term thrown around too often, but in
this case it's very true. He is the most recognized
(01:05):
male figure skater star in the world. He's won over
seventy titles, awards, honors, you name it. He's inducted into
the United States Olympic Hall of Fame, and he is
a member of the World Figure Skating Hall of Fame,
and he is an Olympic Gold medalist. Welcome to Mr Scott. Hell, Wow,
(01:25):
that was all so long ago. You know, it's just like, yeah,
it's still part of you. It's still so much a
part of you, and and all of that is still
I believe that was only the first part of your life.
That was the athletic part of your life. Your bio
is school long Scott. I want to tell you it's
awful because I'm old. No, it's not so much. Your
(01:47):
athletic accomplishments were so incredible. But what's what's amazing about
your story? And I followed your story for many many
years since I've known life existence, God, I followed your story. Um,
what's more incredible to me is actually your your resilience
and the things that you've overcome in your personal life,
the challenges that you've overcome in your life. Um, which
(02:07):
I'm sure your your resilience that you developed through sport
has helped you. Yeah, I mean on what you know.
It's it's like everything in sports is based on failure. Basically,
because when when you do anything, you know you're you're
probably not gonna be very good at it. Right. So
(02:28):
the idea is you're you're living with this like mountain
of failure, and you slowly start chipping away at it.
You know, so the same mistakes you made before, you're
you're really gonna try to eliminate those, you don't make
them again, right, And it's a learning process, you know.
Big part of skating is you fall down to get up.
You know. So I wrote a book called Finish First
(02:50):
a few years ago, and it's basically, you know, I've
fallen minimum, we figured six hundred times. Right. So the
thing is is when you fall down forty one thousand,
six hundred times, you get up forty one six hundred times.
So the idea is it's like you once you get up,
(03:10):
then then the failure takes out a different identity because
you just you know, you're just gonna get up. You know,
it's just okay, that didn't work, Gonna get up pretty soon.
That jump that you fell on a thousand times, like
you've gotten it to a point where you don't miss
it anymore. You know, it's like my you know, nationals
like first Nationals and the Novice Man's as a little
boys level. It was Janet Lynn's last competition US you know,
(03:36):
scating competition, and there was standing room only seventeen thousand,
five hundred people in that building, and they had a
little boys event as the event proceeding her company, so
there was it was sold out standing r moment and
I fell five times and I felt five times in
the performance, which is a three minute performance, and um, like,
(03:58):
how do you how do you have time to fall
down five times in three minutes? It's like, you know,
it's like that's how big a failure that was. So
the next year and I came in dead last obviously,
And next year I came back to Nationals, I only
felt twice and I still came in nine. But there's
ten guys there, so I beat one guy. And then
the next year I go up to juniors and um,
you know a little bit better just based on experience,
(04:21):
and I beat two guys. I'm going fire right, So
you know, it's it's like, you know, the whole idea
of of of anything is the more you do it,
and the more you do it with intention, it's like
it's not just enough to show up. Showing up is great,
and showing up is a big part of the equation,
but you gotta show up with the attention that you're
(04:41):
gonna be humble and hungry in the pursuit and you're
gonna get better. Right, You're you're gonna find Okay, I
did that, I keep doing that. I'm gonna figure out
a way not to do that anymore. It was funny
when when I talked about, you know, all those years
I competed on the senior level and I was on television,
Dick Button would always find something to say that wasn't complimentary.
(05:02):
That's what I said. He would criticize me harshly, as
I figured, well, I'm not gonna let him say that again.
So I'd work on it. And it would be one
of those things where I'd work on it, and i'd
work on it, and i'd work on it, and so
the next year you would criticize something else, and I go, Okay,
you couldn't say that one thing again, So now I'm
gonna work on that. So you start chipping away and
(05:25):
stuff like. Even to this day, I tell my kids
it's based out of that story. Is like the greatest
strength is what, and I'll go here we go again.
A lack of weakness, I go, right. So the greatest
strength is a lack of weakness. Right, So you chip
away at all those things that prevent you from being successful,
and then pretty soon you know you're pretty substantial. Right.
(05:48):
So I had to fail amountain of times, you know,
and I had, I just and a lot of it
was out of preparation. I just wasn't prepared and I
didn't train in a a that when I stepped on
the ice, I knew I was ready. I had way
too many And this is my thought going into the
eighty four Olympics, was when I stepped on the ice,
(06:10):
I don't want to would have, could have or should
have to be in my mind, I want to know
that I've done every single thing I can to be
prepared for this moment, and I'm gonna take whatever I get.
And in a way, you know, it stops you from
doing this right and it allows you to kind of
like do that. And you know, if you could approach
life with an open hand and not a clenched fist,
(06:33):
you're probably gonna be okay, you know. But a lot
of that is just preparation. And and and and working
out your failures. And you know, people go out, Failure
is is awful, Failure is painful. Failure is embarrassing. I go, Really,
if you're in professional baseball and you only failed two
(06:54):
out of three times, you're in the Hall of Fame, right,
Come on. Failure is information only. Failure is feedback. And
if if we're gonna look at failure as something to avoid,
then we missed the point. You know, we want to
we want to fail. We want to put ourselves in
positions to fail so we can get stronger. And that's
(07:16):
the only way we're going to get stronger. Yeah. I
remember hearing to quote about successful people. It said successful
people or winners are winners because they fail more often,
because they lose more often. And what that's saying is
that successful people they set their sights and their standards
so high. They chased this lofty, audacious goals that that
(07:36):
it's going to require them. Those standards are so high
what they're chasing that they are going to lose. Like
you said, your first year you finished dead. Last second
year you finished ninth, third year you finished eight. But
then you built up to become an Olympic champion in
Sarevo four. Well, crazy thing is is, you know, the
first year I committed to nationals, they had a big
(07:57):
celebration right um, and for the guy who won the
US men's national championship and invite everybody come. I actually
skated with him. So he's kind of like, I hear
a role model and everything else. So I'm sitting there
with another kid my age, and he goes, look there's
a big trait through of beers right there. Go grab
me a beer. And it's like we're fourteen years old.
(08:18):
It's like, no, grab your own beer. And he goes,
no, no no, no, I have something to lose, you don't.
And you know what, I've never forgotten that, and I
always thought it was that, really if I put myself
in a position where that's what people think of me,
and so you know, fast forward, you know, from that moment,
(08:39):
let's go forward seven years right, seven years later, um,
seven and a half years later, because now it's October
of night. Was the first competition I won where I
would never lose again for four years, and it's like
I look back on that, it's like, really, I must
have gotten really luck you a bunch of times because
(09:01):
it's like impossible, And then it really was. It just
came down to, you know, building that those muscles not
only in your body but in your in your heart
and your mind, that when you step on the ice,
you're able to deliver the goods consistently while still being
humble and hungry and and going after just keep looking
(09:23):
that way, you know, just take that rear view mirror,
throw it off, you know, through rip it off the
wind chill and throwing the back of the seat. And
you still you know, you're going that way. You're not
going back there, and you're not gonna like, I'm not
gonna protect this. I'm not protecting I'm just going that way,
you know. And you off here, man, you got fired
off now. But it's like how many guys win a
(09:44):
marathon by looking back? You know, you to lose speed,
just slow down. It's like, no, we're going that way.
I love that you touched on failure at the beginning
of this because it allows our audience to hear that,
to hear that Olympic champion A the most cell it
a skater and mail figure skating is talks about failure
in the massive amounts of failure that he experienced. I think,
(10:07):
I think it's so important. I think Michael Jordan missed
over nine thousand shots in his career. I think is
the stat like nine thousand times he shot and missed.
But like you said, continued forward, he wanted the ball
to shoot the next one, just the belief in the
next one. Um. And then I also love what you
said about how when you stepped on the ice and
four that it was just like, okay, let's go have
(10:29):
some fun. Because you had, you had none of the
shot could have Because you have, it wasn't really fun.
It's like the Olympics, you know, it's like stressful. I'm
like duding this, I'm sweating right through my outfit and
it's like this is this is like this is my
this is my only chance right now. But again the
(10:50):
main thought was no, would have snow kudos should have
Like I did everything I could have prepared for that moment.
It's still like you still gotta do your job. I
didn't skate as well as I trained, you know, I
go lean at that moment. I think I did like
sixty five or sixty four's clean run throughs going up
(11:10):
to that moment. You know, every day so I was
really prepared and I was like locked in muscle memory.
Everything was great. It's still one event, only one medal,
and if you don't do it, you gotta wait four years.
It's not like in swimming or track and field, where
it's like, oh man, I was a little off today,
but I got eight more races. It's now one. That's it.
(11:34):
So that's where in hockey we would talking about it.
Competition is literally just the expression of our practice, you know,
the pursuit of excellence. It's the expression of your practice,
the mastering of your craft. And it's then less about
it's it takes some of the stress off for me.
Because that's why losses were so Losses used to be
(11:56):
in the NHL. Losses used to be like life or death,
and now it's in information. Now, okay, thanks for this.
This loss was really helpful because it showed us that
we can't break out of our defensive zone as effectively
as we want to. So that information, right, Losses changed
from going to somebody's heart to being like, okay, this
is information. Like you said, with a commentator, he would
(12:18):
pick apart something of you. You're like, okay, i'll make
that better. Now we can't talk about that. Um. I
also want to tell you that I watched you skate
probably thousands of times. My sister, uh, figure skated, My
mom figure skated, and my mom told me, she said, Brooks,
(12:39):
if you want to be a hockey player, you're gonna
learn to skate properly figure skate before you play hockey.
And so I figure skated, right, So just for everybody listening,
figure skaters are where hockey players go to learn to skate. Yeah,
we haven't learned to skate with the predators, right, And
so many parents put, well, I want my kid to
play hockey, so I'm to put up with hockey skates.
(13:00):
It's like, you know, you really want to learn in
figure skates because let's get you move and let's get
you coordinateds get all those little muscles fired up, and
then when you need to go over to hockey skates,
it'll be like an afternoon. You know, you transitioned like
an hour, and you know it still takes some practice
to do it. But it's like, if you learn our
figure skates, they're flatter, there's a toe pick where you
(13:23):
can get yourself moving, and and they're just they're just
a little bit like the radius, and hockey skates are
like this year and very little bit of the blade
and it's harder to balance right, and so you know,
the parents are like when no, no no, we really want
to stay with hockey skates. It's like, okay, it's like
you're gonna be our customer a lot longer. So you know,
(13:43):
it's that it's like and we we try to you know,
it's like the NHL and when we use their UM
League Development Fund to build our ghost Skate program where
we scholarship, you know, young people under twelve years old
into our learning skate. At the end of the what
we buy them skates so that they can you know,
it's stickier, it's all that. And it's like, well, now
(14:04):
I have skates, I know, not a skate. I want
to be, you know, part of this. So we thought
that was a really good way to go. And then um,
the manager of the Ford Eye Centers, which are the
predator ranks, it comes up to me. He goes, can
you give me five reasons why, Um, we need to
buy figure skates for our skaters, and I'll give you
(14:24):
and he goes fives enough, and it was it was
like this you know, the ice sports or ice sports
and the rink is a community, and we want to
all be a part of this. However, we want to
be a part of it. And you know, again I
live with an open hand and not a clinched fist.
You know, I really am a peacemaker and I try
(14:44):
to allow a good environment for people to work in.
And and it's like it's that, It's like, no, we
want to meet people where they are now, where we
necessarily want to force them into a situation here and
and some the best hockey professional hockey players started off
in figure skates. You can see it. I can see
(15:06):
it instantly when I see an NHL player, because I
can see the way their hips open up and the
way they pivot and their edge work there especially every
any every NHL player is good on their inside edges,
but the figure skater, the the NHL player that has
figure skater is good on the exceptional on the outside
edge word to backward transition. The way they can open
their hips and pivot is world class. And you just
(15:29):
see that when I watch figure skaters. It is so graceful,
the amount of speed and power you guys can generate
with your edge work. And carry right, carry. We got
to carry the speed and a lot of people appreciate
that efferently carry that. It's silent. It's so great when
you when you see a good skater, whether their speed
or figure or hockey, and you can't hear the edge,
(15:52):
it's like, oh man, that's like heaven. It's like it's
so pure, it's so good. And that's like Billy Kids
said that about skiing. He goes, he goes, um, how
do you know they're a good skier? And he goes,
You close your eyes? What you close your eyes? And
how do you know if they're good? Scared? You close
your eyes because as you listen and you can hear
(16:13):
them carving into the snow, and you know, the quieter
you can hear, it's like a it's like and it's
just pure. And you know. There's a skater from Japan.
She was actually world champion nineteen eight and ninety four
and her name is Yukasado and her edge quality is spectacular.
(16:34):
Janet Lynn. When she skater, her edge quality was the
best in the world. And it just comes down to
it's just you know, you use less effort because you're
able to carry the speed you're not constantly grinding and working.
And we have a coach here at Nashville. It moved
here from New York and actually a skater with her.
When she was eight years old, she was a figure
(16:56):
skater that was an alter to the world team. At
age five oh fifty, she tried to make the US
Olympic speed skating team. And now her business is teaching
hockey skaters how to eskate, and that again that outside
edge and really loading up and being in the right
place and having your hips in the right place. She
(17:18):
is so tough and so on it that a lot
of the a lot of the kids go she scares me,
and it's like good, you know, it's good because you're
in a tough sport. You getting there, and so it's
really fun to kind of see that. You know that
you expressed that. And even like Terry Cris who's the
voice of the Predators, you know in the pre game
(17:40):
and postgame shows. You know, he said the biggest day
was when they're in Calgary and a figure skaters, a
woman showed up to teach about eskate and they're like,
all right, it shows tell you what I'll race you backwards. Yeah,
all right, but who's your fastest guy. I'll race some
backwards and if they beat me, I'll walk out. But
if they don't, you have to listen to every word
(18:01):
that I say. And and you know he said, you know,
she beat him by like blue line of blue line distance. Right,
it was like that, And then okay, I guess we
have a lot to learn here, you know. So it's
like we can all learn from each other, and we
can grow from each other, and we congest. I mean,
this world is so broad and so complex and so
(18:24):
rich in the experience that it's really fun to be
able to share these ideas and to be able to
learn from each other. It's a beautiful, beautiful art friend,
Like it is just I watched so many hours of
figure skating, um, and I want to pay you a
(18:45):
compliment because I watched you from the time I was
a kid. If hockey wasn't on, figure skating was on it,
that's great, that was fun. My target audience was men,
and yeah, I love it, Like no, it was because
you've got all these women in the audience and they're like,
oh yeah wait, and then these men and they're sitting
there going so yeah, so can I tell you what um,
(19:08):
what was really interesting and what I what's been awesome
to have you on the show is and here your
version of your career, in your pursuit of excellence, in
the amount of failure and the amount of resilience that
you've shown is I remember watching you when I was younger,
and I remember my mom and dad having conversations about you,
(19:29):
and and the word grit and resilience continued to come up.
And they always said, you could never bet against Scott
Hamilton's you could never bet against him. And so watching you,
you could see this. It's it's refreshing for me to
hear you speak about resilience and and failure and how
(19:51):
you overcame that and continued to pursue excellence, because that's
what I witnessed, That's what I witnessed in watching you skate,
and energetically witnessed that, and it was it's for myself.
When I played hockey, the scariest guys to play against
weren't the most talented, weren't the guys with the best
(20:11):
world class skills. They were the guys that I knew
would never quit. Yeah, those were the scariest. Well, I mean,
that's that's the head game of sports, right, And you
know when I was skating, especially towards the end, I
(20:31):
made sure that they never saw me miss a jump ever,
and in that they had to go, oh man, now, ah,
he's never gonna miss, so I can't miss. So instead
of instead of it going like I'm going this way,
and they're kind of like now stuck in their own space,
going all right, I under a lot of pressure. Now
I can't miss a jomp. I gotta do this right
(20:52):
because they're never gonna miss. And and it's that game
that games meanship that comes in and it's like, yeah,
I'm I'm I'm here, I'm prepared, and you know, I'm
never gonna quit and I'm gonna be on it and
you're just gonna have to worry about yourself. It's like
it really destroys people. You had an immense presence because
(21:13):
of that that that was five ft nothing right, thank you,
that's your presence was giant. Your presence was giant, Scott
because of that, Like there there was like there's a
tremendous amount because what that is ultimately, that's a that's
a massive form of respect if something like people because
like it transferred through the television screen watching this that
like kind of the whole group was watching, Like, what's
(21:34):
Scott gonna do? That's kind of the dude watched the
trust I sat and watched these petitions. My mom and
my sister, my dad would watch them like they were
on in our household all the time. So just from
one athlete to another, I just admire the way you
show up and and I think I know you now
on this podcast. I admire your approach to the sport,
(21:55):
which obviously has has led to fantastic success in Olympic
bold metal within it, but then more so I believe
has led to triumph in your personal life, overcoming multiple
um I don't even know what the word. I not traumas,
but like no, it's it's yeah, it's you know, you
(22:16):
get knocked down, you get up, you know, and it's like,
you know, I joke that I have a unique hobby
of collecting life threatening illness, right, So it's that, and
you know, you you deal with whatever is in front
of you, and and you you you just make the
best of every situation and you have to, you know,
learn and grow and and but at the same time,
(22:38):
you know, and I want to go back to that
whole kind of um, humble and hungry thing. Right. It's
like I've seen way too many athletes get to a
point where they feel like it's a destination. You know,
it's like, well I just wont whatever. You know, it's
like for a lot for a lot of years with
a lot of the kids at one and I was
(23:00):
last in the novice level, right, So a lot of
the kids that won, you know, there were really good skaters,
they're very talented, but it was almost like that when
created expectation, which created pressure, which created you know, kind
of like this protectionism. It's like, well I'm good enough now,
so I have to kind of stay there. I'm not
you know, I'm not criticizing them at all. It was
(23:20):
like there were products in their environment. And for me,
the whole coming in last thing was the greatest thing
that could have happened, because you're still you're still looking forward.
So it's humbling yourself to know that you know, there's
always there's always better, there's always more, there's always some
chicken your armor that you need to either polish or
shore up. And and you know you've got to be hungry,
(23:43):
and it's just like ambition, and you want to be
better than you were last year, and better than you were,
you know in your next year, gonna better than you
are this year. And it's always kind of like that,
that moving forward thing. And yeah, of course you're gonna
be aware of your surroundings, but you know it's you
can't settle, and you can't, um, you can't put yourself
(24:04):
in a position where now other skaters are going to
catch up. And you know it's a nature of the beast.
Because I got older, Um, you know, I was there
for a long time. Figure skating is based in opinion
in many respects that it was purely and you know,
flavor of the week is really tempting, you know, so
you've got to stay ahead of people. And when I
(24:24):
turned pro, there was really nothing for a skater like me,
so I had to kind of invent it, you know,
And I was lucky that, you know, the first two
years I was pro, I was in the Ice Capade,
so I learned a lot about production. I learned about,
you know, just how all the show things work. And
when they went through a sale and the new owner
didn't want men, I was given an opportunity because I
(24:47):
proved myself in that for him to be able to
start the Stars an Ice tour, and you know it
was I understood the opportunity. I understood how fragile those
opportunities were. So I just kept doing at It's like,
I gotta be I gotta be on it. I gotta
be um, I gotta keep my skills up. I gotta
be aware of marketing. I gotta be aware of uh,
(25:09):
you know, just perception. I gotta be aware of you
know that I'm here now, but I've got to learn
so many more things if I want to stick around.
And and it's funny because my role models weren't skaters,
real role models. I'm a big music guy. Okay. So
I love Neil Diamond because if you've ever seen him
(25:31):
on stage, man, he just loves loves loves, you know,
just his love of his craft. He's having the best
time on that stage as the audience is mirroring kind
of that whole joy that he's gotten. I go, okay,
I'm gonna learn from that. My other hero is Bruce Springsteen.
Bruce springstel blue collar guy, built an audience the old
(25:54):
fashioned way. He just oh, you're just delivered delivered, deliver
the goods everything the time. And then the third was
you know Um the lead singer for Led Zeppelin's guy
Robert Plant and as a solo artist, he was so
creative and he was so like worth. He was ready
to take every risk chance that he possibly could to
(26:19):
keep moving forward, right, and and being a little different,
a little and a difference the key. It's not so
much yeah, you want to be better than next year,
but when you're an entertainer, you've got to be different. Otherwise,
if you're writing the same song all the time, then
people go, Okay, seen it. You know it's been there,
(26:40):
done that. But it also allows you to kind of
get deeper, stronger and more versatile and your ability to
kind of like create longevity and the key destination is great,
but journey longevity is is really a key that any
amount of success you want to have. Yeah, And I
think I was having this conversation and the other day
(27:00):
with a friend of mine. We were talking about um
different kinds of greatness. And there is individual greatness. There
is like winning winning the Olympics in eighty four that
is singular individual greatness, and then there's also longevity greatness
of being one of the nest in the world for
(27:22):
fifteen years where your name is always mentioned as the
possible victor of this competition. So there's it's like a band.
A band can have a one hit wonder boom and greatness.
Let's not let's not discount that. That is greatness too.
But then the band that sticks around for like the
Rolling Stones five decades or what like those bands like
(27:44):
that longevity greatness. It's a testament to what you're talking about, Scott,
about the journey, the constant pursuit, right, the pursuit of excellence.
But then also um innovating, innovating in your arena, in
your sport, in your industry, whatever it is. And in
the term that I always like to say, parents ask
me about hockey, like what should my kid do? And
the thing I always say to them, don't tell your
(28:07):
kid he has to be the best right now. Um.
The biggest thing for me, I think in my professional
life was I felt I was the best at getting better. Yeah,
and that's what I hear you speak about it like
continually getting better and you never arrive. But if if
it's not about the destination, then it's a constant pursuit
(28:28):
of excellence. It's constant mastery of the craft and honoring
of the craft, versus saying I want to have this
to hold in my hand and then I'm done. Yeah,
And you know, and greatness too, you know, and you
Dick Button said it really well. He said, you can
only measure greatness, um, and like, let's say, in any
sport by the fact that because of that person's participation,
(28:53):
they left the sport better than it was before, right,
And I think about that, and it's really amazing to
think about. And when he said that to me, I go,
I want that. I want to be that guy. I
want to be that guy that is like you know,
and again I had nothing, you know, I was a
big old honking loser when I you know, I competed
(29:15):
at younger levels. But it turned into I want to
be that guy. I want to and I want to.
I want to keep being that guy and I want
to and until, you know, after a while, honestly, just
run out of gas, you know, And I did. After
my first son was born. I just sort of said, okay,
enough of this, all right, it's time for me to
move on. And I want to be a great father.
(29:36):
I want to be a great husband. I want to
I want to be involved. I want to, you know,
take this blessing, this incredible blessing, and and do it
as well as I possibly can, you know. And so
you know, there's the next there's always gonna be the
especially in sports, right and then you just take your
experience and you try to put it into the next
thing and the next thing and the next thing. And
(29:57):
I've been really lucky that has had, you know, and
some of them has come out of unfortunate circumstances. But
the fact that I work in cancer is because I
lost my mom to cancer and I survived cancer. So
I had to have it in order to truly understand
how to serve that community. And you know what, you
meeting scientists, and I'm the dumbest guy to ever give
to Ted talks like ever, and so I look at
(30:19):
that and it's like, Okay, now I have the ability
to reach people, and I have you know, I have
the ability to use that for good. You know. I
I meet so many I've seen so many um whatever
whatever they are, you know, uh, actors, entertainers, um, musicians, athletes,
(30:40):
politicians who kind of use their their pulpit and they
use it in negative ways, and it's like, dude, that
is so short lived. You know that is that is
not gonna that doesn't that you're you're you know, you're
you're sort of like if you remember you're remembered as
(31:00):
a train wreck, you know, you're not remembered as something
that brought good into the world and brought you know,
try to make the place maybe better than it was before,
you know. And and and that's always in there. It's like,
how can I do this life thing and and really
try to take everything I've been given and use it
(31:22):
to help other people. Um, and I love what you've
done with that. I mean, like the characteristics that you
carry from sport, your resilience, your grit, your willingness to
continue to learn, to innovate, to try new things has
immensely benefited you on the other side of sport in
becoming an analyst, a commentator and becoming a producer and
(31:43):
becoming a best selling author. Um, what you do, the
work you do with the Scott Hamilton's Cares Foundation, just
the the mindset to bring this to fruition, to even
have the concept and then bring it to fruition. Can
you tell our audience a little bit about that, because
that foundation is the work you do there is that
(32:03):
is legacy work. Well hopefully we're you know, we're really
it's it's again, it's just doing this and you know what,
and you know, with with anything I do with cares UM,
you know, I really it means a lot for me
to share with people that I I am the ultimate volunteer.
I don't cares is it's um. You know, my executive director,
(32:24):
Carry Morgan, she always talks about founder syndrome and it's like,
we got founder syndrome again. It's like, well we can
you know, let me leverage whatever I can in order
to make your job a little bit easier. And you know,
she talks about, you know, the whole founder thing. Because
I'm a volunteer. I won't take a penny for any
of the work I do with cares ever. I just
(32:44):
I never have and I never will. And we've raised
we've raised a lot of money over the years and
the sixteen years we've been around, we've probably raised about
forty million dollars, you know, and and and that's hard
to do. But it's like you look at it and
you go, well, how's it working? Wasn't doing and I
wasn't and we okay, we're helping people. And now we've
really focused in for the last six years to truly
(33:08):
just elevate and you know, therapy and super precision targeted
therapies to just let's just treat the cancertainly the rest
of the body alone. This collateral damage thing, it's it's
so over and it's it's so shortsighted. You know, we
just need to keep doing those things. So I work
as a volunteer UM. You know, I I may have
(33:29):
some authority, whatever I'm learning all the time, but again
it's part of that whatever we need to do in
order to make it better for the next patient. And
we've always done that through chemo Care dot com um
website that teaches people about chemotherapy, to the Fourth Angel
Mentoring program, which pairs newly diagnosed patients with survivors, to
(33:50):
the I don't even I've lost count of how many
research um UH programs we've funded over the years, and
and you know, it's just it's just whatever her I
can do to bring more people into the fold. And
and you know, again it's just their size and numbers,
you know, Danny Thomas said, I'd rather have a million
(34:11):
people give me one dollar than one person give me
a million dollars. And and honestly, I'm kind of good
both ways. You know, I don't really care. You know, however,
we can get the job done, right. So it's that
it's like, how do we do the work? How do
we do the work? Yeah? I love what you're doing there.
That's that's legacy work, that is that is lasting. And
for you probably you're equally as proud of that as
(34:34):
I mean, you can answer this, but as you're a
limpical mental in your success, well thank you. I I
just thought if I can find a proven treatment for
my mother's cancer that that destroyed her, then I'll know
I was born, you know. It's that type of thing.
It's it's you know, I was adopted at six weeks
of age. It's lucky to be here, period. I'm sure
(34:55):
my birth mother had other options. And so I look
at you know, how do I how do I do this?
And and what's the best way to engage and and
and and help the community, you know, and the communities
like the world, and so you know a lot of
you know, what I'm working on now is purely that.
(35:15):
It's like, you know, the Live your Days platform. Yeah,
get into that. Yeah, it's it. You know. It came
out of my third brain tumor diagnosis, and it was
one of those things where it's like um our bodies
are incredibly fragile but phenomenally resilient. Okay, you just said
(35:39):
something I want to I don't want to see your
third brain tumor diagnosis right here? How like for you
you said, it's so casually and easily like one like
for our for our listeners, like hearing that one, Like
if I hear that about myself, Like I couldn't imagine
what I would go through? Like what do you go through?
(36:00):
How do you persist through? Three of those? Well? The
first one was really scary and ignited my faith. Um,
I love love, love, my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
love love, love. I couldn't love more. Um. Second one
was like I kicked in the gut that one, And
it was a surgical situation. The first one was radiation,
(36:20):
second one was surgery. Surgery didn't go as well as
it should have could have, so I ended up having
nine more after that and aneurism and obliterating an aneurism
and all that stuff. It was kind of a tough summer.
And then when I came back again, Um, this time,
I'm getting all the doctors talking to me about treatment options,
(36:40):
and all I can hear in the back of my
mind was like, get strong, and I get strong? Why
what does that mean? Get strong? And I'm talking, I'm
having this conversation in my own mind. It's like physically
or mentally, or emotionally or virtually, you know, it's all
the above. And so you know, I've watched the tumor
grow and shrink and shrink and grow and shrink and
(37:03):
grow and grow and shrink and and um, so it's
just been for the last four years, I've just been
vigilant and just sort of living my life, trying to
get healthy and trying to get strong and and and
it was just the only choice I could make at
the time, because you know, surgery is problematic, you know,
since I've already had the surgery, so they have to
(37:24):
dismantle everything in there and kind of and I don't.
I'm not you know, it's not like I'm denying that
when I when I become symptomatic, you know, they found
it on on a on a schedule of m R I.
So it's there and it's doing this, you know, and
as long as it's doing that, especially that, then we'll
be good. So it's it's like, you know, it's like
(37:45):
we live, right, we just you know, And it's and
and it's a reminder, you know, going back to the
whole thing. It's like, I'm every day trying to get stronger,
trying to get better, trying to get a little deeper,
little richer in the experience. And is a way of
you know, pushing this thing back. And when the time
comes when I have to pull the trigger on treatment,
(38:07):
I'm ready to go, right, I mean, is I'm strong
and I'm sixty two years old, I'm healthy and I
can endure it, right, So you know, um, you know,
but I'm reminded we're fragile, we're very resilient, and we're temporary.
So knowing that that, like the Kickers were temporary, nobody
(38:31):
gets out of this thing alive. So knowing that our
days are numbered, how do we live? How are we
going to choose to use our days? And So when
I was had that third brain to where I did
an interview with People magazine. People dot com and I
basically let it out. I go, look, you know, it's
like these there are just things that happened, and you know,
(38:52):
I choose I want to live my days, and and
it caught the year of a marketing company here in Nashville,
and they go live your days. It's like like, it's
my the woman that runs at Shannon Lynton, it's her
kind of like mantra day to day mantra. It's like
live by I'm gonna live your days today, and all
the time it's in there. And so we she brought up,
(39:13):
you know, right after that interview went viral and what
was supposed to be about ten thousand people, you know,
being shared, you know whatever, that interview it is a
normal interview. It was seen over thirty five million times.
So she knew something was in there. But I go,
let's just tap the brakes here because it's not the
(39:33):
right time. And then COVID kicked in and she called
me and she goes now, and I go now, So
let's let's let's remind people that our days are precious
and the opportunities are limitless, and what we can do
with this life is a choice, no matter what our
condition and what no matter what we're up against, it's
(39:56):
like a breath is a breath, a day is a day,
a minute, a minute, and we can use those and
and not only for ourselves, but for our loved ones
and for for everyone else involved. So, you know, the
Liver Your Days platform and it started off to be
sort of encouragement digital encouragement platform and become a podcast
with that eight podcasts and phenomenal gas Robin Roberts will
(40:19):
be on next week and um, I my goodness, Kevin
Neil and Bart Millard, Christian mcgucci and all of them
have a story to tell of how they've built their lives,
you know, as a way of just sort of a
guide to inspire people and help them make those choices
to live their lives better, joyfully, productively, abundantly. Yeah. I
(40:39):
love that. One of your missions with Live your Days,
with the entire platform and the podcast is a call
to being present, really is what it is. I mean,
come on, how many times have you been so consumed
in your own thoughts that something happened right in front
of you and you missed it? You know it's like,
oh man, I can't do to replay? Yeah? Yeah, really
(41:03):
you know. It's like my wife. You know they have
they storm chasers, Ye, rainbow chaser. She's a rainbow chaser.
Rainbows fill her heart like nobody's business. And when there's
a big rainstorm, she'll get in the car and she'll
go out and she'll like find rainbows and it's like
it just takes her breath away. And I look at that.
That's it. That's the stuff. It's like we we look
(41:24):
for those like gonna find them, and we we can't
let our lives just pass us by. We've gotta do it.
We gotta live joyfully, productively, abbudantly. We gotta allow no
matter what our condition is, as long as we have
breath in our lungs and we we just we gotta,
we gotta, we gotta choose to live this life fully.
(41:47):
I love I love man, Scott. I could listen to
you talk for days. Man. This. I hope our community
jumps over and tunes into to live your days because
you've got me fired up. There's like thirty day challenge things,
the challenge, thirty day challenge. It's not like you know
we're gonna have you like climb mountains or run marathons.
It really is it's just to build those muscles of
(42:10):
awareness and contentment in our lives that really go wow,
like there's so much here that Yeah, okay, so I
just started doing it. I got a journal and we
even sell these. We even sell journals on thembe days
like com because all the merchen we sell their benefits
the Cures Foundation. Right. So the first one, um, happened
(42:31):
yesterday and it's just an example. Uh, it was three
things I'm most grateful for and kind of why and
so my three things were family, opportunity, and redemption. So
you know, the we we you know. The thing with
with with living your days and being in faith is
(42:51):
you know, there's there's kind of like four legs of
the chair, right and you're sitting on this. It's a
foundation of your life. And these four colors and one
is physical, one is is emotional, another one is intellectual,
and the other one is spiritual. And if any one
of those legs is missing, you're probably gonna fall down
(43:12):
and it might get hurt. Right. So you know, the
idea is, you know, we gotta fortify ourselves every way
we possibly can, and that's the get strong thing all
the above. Right, So, um, you know I hope people
go to live your Days dot com and join this
movement and we got to create some positivity and and
you know, we want them to share their thoughts and
their experiences and take the thirty day challenge and by
(43:36):
the merch that will fund cancer research and and enjoy
the podcast. That's so cool too that you put a
purpose behind the passion behind the mission. You know that
it funds cares and the money goes towards that because
they you're doing something that's impactful, meaningful, lights you up,
and you're giving to people, and then the cause of
it and where the money goes is then beneficial over here.
(43:57):
Um Scott, you are just like said at the top
of the show, you are a living legend. I'm living.
That's that's all that matters right now. I'm living. But
as an athlete, you're a living legend. As and as
a human being, as a humanitarian, you are a living legend,
my friend. So I think you know it's it's you know, uh,
(44:17):
thank you, you know, I've you know, like I mean,
you know, as as human beings, we make a lot
of mistakes and we just gotta keep moving forward. And
that's what I said. You know my three things I'm
most grateful for, you know, or my family, my my opportunities,
and you know, especially redemption. You know, it's like knowing
that my creator loves me unconditioning forever. That's a good
(44:42):
reason to get out of better every morning. Oh, my friend,
you are welcome on this podcast anytime. I know your family,
I know your boy. There's because calling you. Yeah, we
got an A on his English test today, so we're celebrating.
You picked up some food and we're gonna just munch
and now I gotta host a nationale Zoo fundraiser in
about an hour. And Okay, I'll thank you so much.
(45:04):
You've inspired me, You've inspired our audience. Go to Living
Thanks dot com, Live your Days dot com, where people
can check out for dot com. Mr Scott Hamilton, a
living legend. Thank you so much. Everybody else, thank you
for tuning into this episode. We'd love to have to
have you back on, Scott, you were so in big time.
Anytime until next week, guys, take care of one other,
(45:24):
love one another, and we'll see you back here for
another episode of How Men Think
This is How Men Think with brooks Like and Gavin
de grab and I heard radio podcast. Welcome to another
episode of How Men Think. My name is brooks Like,
and I am super excited about this show. The previous
couple of shows that we've had, we've talked about the
pursuit of excellence and the mastery of one one's craft
(00:21):
and the lifelong achievement of a person dedicated to a
certain things. So, um, we're gonna discover more of that
in today's episode. So the pursuit of excellence, the pursuit
of excellence, I love that, and honoring and mastering one's craft.
And we have a real distinguished guest. Somebody that can
speak to this may be better than anybody else because
(00:43):
of their history. And I love saying this. I very
rarely rarely say it, but we have a living legend
on us. I say it, I only ever say it.
I very reserved with my words with that. I think
legend is a term thrown around too often, but in
this case it's very true. He is the most recognized
(01:05):
male figure skater star in the world. He's won over
seventy titles, awards, honors, you name it. He's inducted into
the United States Olympic Hall of Fame, and he is
a member of the World Figure Skating Hall of Fame,
and he is an Olympic Gold medalist. Welcome to Mr Scott. Hell, Wow,
(01:25):
that was all so long ago. You know, it's just like, yeah,
it's still part of you. It's still so much a
part of you, and and all of that is still
I believe that was only the first part of your life.
That was the athletic part of your life. Your bio
is school long Scott. I want to tell you it's
awful because I'm old. No, it's not so much. Your
(01:47):
athletic accomplishments were so incredible. But what's what's amazing about
your story? And I followed your story for many many
years since I've known life existence, God, I followed your story. Um,
what's more incredible to me is actually your your resilience
and the things that you've overcome in your personal life,
the challenges that you've overcome in your life. Um, which
(02:07):
I'm sure your your resilience that you developed through sport
has helped you. Yeah, I mean on what you know.
It's it's like everything in sports is based on failure. Basically,
because when when you do anything, you know you're you're
probably not gonna be very good at it. Right. So
(02:28):
the idea is you're you're living with this like mountain
of failure, and you slowly start chipping away at it.
You know, so the same mistakes you made before, you're
you're really gonna try to eliminate those, you don't make
them again, right, And it's a learning process, you know.
Big part of skating is you fall down to get up.
You know. So I wrote a book called Finish First
(02:50):
a few years ago, and it's basically, you know, I've
fallen minimum, we figured six hundred times. Right. So the
thing is is when you fall down forty one thousand,
six hundred times, you get up forty one six hundred times.
So the idea is it's like you once you get up,
(03:10):
then then the failure takes out a different identity because
you just you know, you're just gonna get up. You know,
it's just okay, that didn't work, Gonna get up pretty soon.
That jump that you fell on a thousand times, like
you've gotten it to a point where you don't miss
it anymore. You know, it's like my you know, nationals
like first Nationals and the Novice Man's as a little
boys level. It was Janet Lynn's last competition US you know,
(03:36):
scating competition, and there was standing room only seventeen thousand,
five hundred people in that building, and they had a
little boys event as the event proceeding her company, so
there was it was sold out standing r moment and
I fell five times and I felt five times in
the performance, which is a three minute performance, and um, like,
(03:58):
how do you how do you have time to fall
down five times in three minutes? It's like, you know,
it's like that's how big a failure that was. So
the next year and I came in dead last obviously,
And next year I came back to Nationals, I only
felt twice and I still came in nine. But there's
ten guys there, so I beat one guy. And then
the next year I go up to juniors and um,
you know a little bit better just based on experience,
(04:21):
and I beat two guys. I'm going fire right, So
you know, it's it's like, you know, the whole idea
of of of anything is the more you do it,
and the more you do it with intention, it's like
it's not just enough to show up. Showing up is great,
and showing up is a big part of the equation,
but you gotta show up with the attention that you're
(04:41):
gonna be humble and hungry in the pursuit and you're
gonna get better. Right, You're you're gonna find Okay, I
did that, I keep doing that. I'm gonna figure out
a way not to do that anymore. It was funny
when when I talked about, you know, all those years
I competed on the senior level and I was on television,
Dick Button would always find something to say that wasn't complimentary.
(05:02):
That's what I said. He would criticize me harshly, as
I figured, well, I'm not gonna let him say that again.
So I'd work on it. And it would be one
of those things where I'd work on it, and i'd
work on it, and i'd work on it, and so
the next year you would criticize something else, and I go, Okay,
you couldn't say that one thing again, So now I'm
gonna work on that. So you start chipping away and
(05:25):
stuff like. Even to this day, I tell my kids
it's based out of that story. Is like the greatest
strength is what, and I'll go here we go again.
A lack of weakness, I go, right. So the greatest
strength is a lack of weakness. Right, So you chip
away at all those things that prevent you from being successful,
and then pretty soon you know you're pretty substantial. Right.
(05:48):
So I had to fail amountain of times, you know,
and I had, I just and a lot of it
was out of preparation. I just wasn't prepared and I
didn't train in a a that when I stepped on
the ice, I knew I was ready. I had way
too many And this is my thought going into the
eighty four Olympics, was when I stepped on the ice,
(06:10):
I don't want to would have, could have or should
have to be in my mind, I want to know
that I've done every single thing I can to be
prepared for this moment, and I'm gonna take whatever I get.
And in a way, you know, it stops you from
doing this right and it allows you to kind of
like do that. And you know, if you could approach
life with an open hand and not a clenched fist,
(06:33):
you're probably gonna be okay, you know. But a lot
of that is just preparation. And and and and working
out your failures. And you know, people go out, Failure
is is awful, Failure is painful. Failure is embarrassing. I go, Really,
if you're in professional baseball and you only failed two
(06:54):
out of three times, you're in the Hall of Fame, right,
Come on. Failure is information only. Failure is feedback. And
if if we're gonna look at failure as something to avoid,
then we missed the point. You know, we want to
we want to fail. We want to put ourselves in
positions to fail so we can get stronger. And that's
(07:16):
the only way we're going to get stronger. Yeah. I
remember hearing to quote about successful people. It said successful
people or winners are winners because they fail more often,
because they lose more often. And what that's saying is
that successful people they set their sights and their standards
so high. They chased this lofty, audacious goals that that
(07:36):
it's going to require them. Those standards are so high
what they're chasing that they are going to lose. Like
you said, your first year you finished dead. Last second
year you finished ninth, third year you finished eight. But
then you built up to become an Olympic champion in
Sarevo four. Well, crazy thing is is, you know, the
first year I committed to nationals, they had a big
(07:57):
celebration right um, and for the guy who won the
US men's national championship and invite everybody come. I actually
skated with him. So he's kind of like, I hear
a role model and everything else. So I'm sitting there
with another kid my age, and he goes, look there's
a big trait through of beers right there. Go grab
me a beer. And it's like we're fourteen years old.
(08:18):
It's like, no, grab your own beer. And he goes,
no, no no, no, I have something to lose, you don't.
And you know what, I've never forgotten that, and I
always thought it was that, really if I put myself
in a position where that's what people think of me,
and so you know, fast forward, you know, from that moment,
(08:39):
let's go forward seven years right, seven years later, um,
seven and a half years later, because now it's October
of night. Was the first competition I won where I
would never lose again for four years, and it's like
I look back on that, it's like, really, I must
have gotten really luck you a bunch of times because
(09:01):
it's like impossible, And then it really was. It just
came down to, you know, building that those muscles not
only in your body but in your in your heart
and your mind, that when you step on the ice,
you're able to deliver the goods consistently while still being
humble and hungry and and going after just keep looking
(09:23):
that way, you know, just take that rear view mirror,
throw it off, you know, through rip it off the
wind chill and throwing the back of the seat. And
you still you know, you're going that way. You're not
going back there, and you're not gonna like, I'm not
gonna protect this. I'm not protecting I'm just going that way,
you know. And you off here, man, you got fired
off now. But it's like how many guys win a
(09:44):
marathon by looking back? You know, you to lose speed,
just slow down. It's like, no, we're going that way.
I love that you touched on failure at the beginning
of this because it allows our audience to hear that,
to hear that Olympic champion A the most cell it
a skater and mail figure skating is talks about failure
in the massive amounts of failure that he experienced. I think,
(10:07):
I think it's so important. I think Michael Jordan missed
over nine thousand shots in his career. I think is
the stat like nine thousand times he shot and missed.
But like you said, continued forward, he wanted the ball
to shoot the next one, just the belief in the
next one. Um. And then I also love what you
said about how when you stepped on the ice and
four that it was just like, okay, let's go have
(10:29):
some fun. Because you had, you had none of the
shot could have Because you have, it wasn't really fun.
It's like the Olympics, you know, it's like stressful. I'm
like duding this, I'm sweating right through my outfit and
it's like this is this is like this is my
this is my only chance right now. But again the
(10:50):
main thought was no, would have snow kudos should have
Like I did everything I could have prepared for that moment.
It's still like you still gotta do your job. I
didn't skate as well as I trained, you know, I
go lean at that moment. I think I did like
sixty five or sixty four's clean run throughs going up
(11:10):
to that moment. You know, every day so I was
really prepared and I was like locked in muscle memory.
Everything was great. It's still one event, only one medal,
and if you don't do it, you gotta wait four years.
It's not like in swimming or track and field, where
it's like, oh man, I was a little off today,
but I got eight more races. It's now one. That's it.
(11:34):
So that's where in hockey we would talking about it.
Competition is literally just the expression of our practice, you know,
the pursuit of excellence. It's the expression of your practice,
the mastering of your craft. And it's then less about
it's it takes some of the stress off for me.
Because that's why losses were so Losses used to be
(11:56):
in the NHL. Losses used to be like life or death,
and now it's in information. Now, okay, thanks for this.
This loss was really helpful because it showed us that
we can't break out of our defensive zone as effectively
as we want to. So that information, right, Losses changed
from going to somebody's heart to being like, okay, this
is information. Like you said, with a commentator, he would
(12:18):
pick apart something of you. You're like, okay, i'll make
that better. Now we can't talk about that. Um. I
also want to tell you that I watched you skate
probably thousands of times. My sister, uh, figure skated, My
mom figure skated, and my mom told me, she said, Brooks,
(12:39):
if you want to be a hockey player, you're gonna
learn to skate properly figure skate before you play hockey.
And so I figure skated, right, So just for everybody listening,
figure skaters are where hockey players go to learn to skate. Yeah,
we haven't learned to skate with the predators, right, And
so many parents put, well, I want my kid to
play hockey, so I'm to put up with hockey skates.
(13:00):
It's like, you know, you really want to learn in
figure skates because let's get you move and let's get
you coordinateds get all those little muscles fired up, and
then when you need to go over to hockey skates,
it'll be like an afternoon. You know, you transitioned like
an hour, and you know it still takes some practice
to do it. But it's like, if you learn our
figure skates, they're flatter, there's a toe pick where you
(13:23):
can get yourself moving, and and they're just they're just
a little bit like the radius, and hockey skates are
like this year and very little bit of the blade
and it's harder to balance right, and so you know,
the parents are like when no, no no, we really want
to stay with hockey skates. It's like, okay, it's like
you're gonna be our customer a lot longer. So you know,
(13:43):
it's that it's like and we we try to you know,
it's like the NHL and when we use their UM
League Development Fund to build our ghost Skate program where
we scholarship, you know, young people under twelve years old
into our learning skate. At the end of the what
we buy them skates so that they can you know,
it's stickier, it's all that. And it's like, well, now
(14:04):
I have skates, I know, not a skate. I want
to be, you know, part of this. So we thought
that was a really good way to go. And then um,
the manager of the Ford Eye Centers, which are the
predator ranks, it comes up to me. He goes, can
you give me five reasons why, Um, we need to
buy figure skates for our skaters, and I'll give you
(14:24):
and he goes fives enough, and it was it was
like this you know, the ice sports or ice sports
and the rink is a community, and we want to
all be a part of this. However, we want to
be a part of it. And you know, again I
live with an open hand and not a clinched fist.
You know, I really am a peacemaker and I try
(14:44):
to allow a good environment for people to work in.
And and it's like it's that, It's like, no, we
want to meet people where they are now, where we
necessarily want to force them into a situation here and
and some the best hockey professional hockey players started off
in figure skates. You can see it. I can see
(15:06):
it instantly when I see an NHL player, because I
can see the way their hips open up and the
way they pivot and their edge work there especially every
any every NHL player is good on their inside edges,
but the figure skater, the the NHL player that has
figure skater is good on the exceptional on the outside
edge word to backward transition. The way they can open
their hips and pivot is world class. And you just
(15:29):
see that when I watch figure skaters. It is so graceful,
the amount of speed and power you guys can generate
with your edge work. And carry right, carry. We got
to carry the speed and a lot of people appreciate
that efferently carry that. It's silent. It's so great when
you when you see a good skater, whether their speed
or figure or hockey, and you can't hear the edge,
(15:52):
it's like, oh man, that's like heaven. It's like it's
so pure, it's so good. And that's like Billy Kids
said that about skiing. He goes, he goes, um, how
do you know they're a good skier? And he goes,
You close your eyes? What you close your eyes? And
how do you know if they're good? Scared? You close
your eyes because as you listen and you can hear
(16:13):
them carving into the snow, and you know, the quieter
you can hear, it's like a it's like and it's
just pure. And you know. There's a skater from Japan.
She was actually world champion nineteen eight and ninety four
and her name is Yukasado and her edge quality is spectacular.
(16:34):
Janet Lynn. When she skater, her edge quality was the
best in the world. And it just comes down to
it's just you know, you use less effort because you're
able to carry the speed you're not constantly grinding and working.
And we have a coach here at Nashville. It moved
here from New York and actually a skater with her.
When she was eight years old, she was a figure
(16:56):
skater that was an alter to the world team. At
age five oh fifty, she tried to make the US
Olympic speed skating team. And now her business is teaching
hockey skaters how to eskate, and that again that outside
edge and really loading up and being in the right
place and having your hips in the right place. She
(17:18):
is so tough and so on it that a lot
of the a lot of the kids go she scares me,
and it's like good, you know, it's good because you're
in a tough sport. You getting there, and so it's
really fun to kind of see that. You know that
you expressed that. And even like Terry Cris who's the
voice of the Predators, you know in the pre game
(17:40):
and postgame shows. You know, he said the biggest day
was when they're in Calgary and a figure skaters, a
woman showed up to teach about eskate and they're like,
all right, it shows tell you what I'll race you backwards. Yeah,
all right, but who's your fastest guy. I'll race some
backwards and if they beat me, I'll walk out. But
if they don't, you have to listen to every word
(18:01):
that I say. And and you know he said, you know,
she beat him by like blue line of blue line distance. Right,
it was like that, And then okay, I guess we
have a lot to learn here, you know. So it's
like we can all learn from each other, and we
can grow from each other, and we congest. I mean,
this world is so broad and so complex and so
(18:24):
rich in the experience that it's really fun to be
able to share these ideas and to be able to
learn from each other. It's a beautiful, beautiful art friend,
Like it is just I watched so many hours of
figure skating, um, and I want to pay you a
(18:45):
compliment because I watched you from the time I was
a kid. If hockey wasn't on, figure skating was on it,
that's great, that was fun. My target audience was men,
and yeah, I love it, Like no, it was because
you've got all these women in the audience and they're like,
oh yeah wait, and then these men and they're sitting
there going so yeah, so can I tell you what um,
(19:08):
what was really interesting and what I what's been awesome
to have you on the show is and here your
version of your career, in your pursuit of excellence, in
the amount of failure and the amount of resilience that
you've shown is I remember watching you when I was younger,
and I remember my mom and dad having conversations about you,
(19:29):
and and the word grit and resilience continued to come up.
And they always said, you could never bet against Scott
Hamilton's you could never bet against him. And so watching you,
you could see this. It's it's refreshing for me to
hear you speak about resilience and and failure and how
(19:51):
you overcame that and continued to pursue excellence, because that's
what I witnessed, That's what I witnessed in watching you skate,
and energetically witnessed that, and it was it's for myself.
When I played hockey, the scariest guys to play against
weren't the most talented, weren't the guys with the best
(20:11):
world class skills. They were the guys that I knew
would never quit. Yeah, those were the scariest. Well, I mean,
that's that's the head game of sports, right, And you
know when I was skating, especially towards the end, I
(20:31):
made sure that they never saw me miss a jump ever,
and in that they had to go, oh man, now, ah,
he's never gonna miss, so I can't miss. So instead
of instead of it going like I'm going this way,
and they're kind of like now stuck in their own space,
going all right, I under a lot of pressure. Now
I can't miss a jomp. I gotta do this right
(20:52):
because they're never gonna miss. And and it's that game
that games meanship that comes in and it's like, yeah,
I'm I'm I'm here, I'm prepared, and you know, I'm
never gonna quit and I'm gonna be on it and
you're just gonna have to worry about yourself. It's like
it really destroys people. You had an immense presence because
(21:13):
of that that that was five ft nothing right, thank you,
that's your presence was giant. Your presence was giant, Scott
because of that, Like there there was like there's a
tremendous amount because what that is ultimately, that's a that's
a massive form of respect if something like people because
like it transferred through the television screen watching this that
like kind of the whole group was watching, Like, what's
(21:34):
Scott gonna do? That's kind of the dude watched the
trust I sat and watched these petitions. My mom and
my sister, my dad would watch them like they were
on in our household all the time. So just from
one athlete to another, I just admire the way you
show up and and I think I know you now
on this podcast. I admire your approach to the sport,
(21:55):
which obviously has has led to fantastic success in Olympic
bold metal within it, but then more so I believe
has led to triumph in your personal life, overcoming multiple
um I don't even know what the word. I not traumas,
but like no, it's it's yeah, it's you know, you
(22:16):
get knocked down, you get up, you know, and it's like,
you know, I joke that I have a unique hobby
of collecting life threatening illness, right, So it's that, and
you know, you you deal with whatever is in front
of you, and and you you you just make the
best of every situation and you have to, you know,
learn and grow and and but at the same time,
(22:38):
you know, and I want to go back to that
whole kind of um, humble and hungry thing. Right. It's
like I've seen way too many athletes get to a
point where they feel like it's a destination. You know,
it's like, well I just wont whatever. You know, it's
like for a lot for a lot of years with
a lot of the kids at one and I was
(23:00):
last in the novice level, right, So a lot of
the kids that won, you know, there were really good skaters,
they're very talented, but it was almost like that when
created expectation, which created pressure, which created you know, kind
of like this protectionism. It's like, well I'm good enough now,
so I have to kind of stay there. I'm not
you know, I'm not criticizing them at all. It was
(23:20):
like there were products in their environment. And for me,
the whole coming in last thing was the greatest thing
that could have happened, because you're still you're still looking forward.
So it's humbling yourself to know that you know, there's
always there's always better, there's always more, there's always some
chicken your armor that you need to either polish or
shore up. And and you know you've got to be hungry,
(23:43):
and it's just like ambition, and you want to be
better than you were last year, and better than you were,
you know in your next year, gonna better than you
are this year. And it's always kind of like that,
that moving forward thing. And yeah, of course you're gonna
be aware of your surroundings, but you know it's you
can't settle, and you can't, um, you can't put yourself
(24:04):
in a position where now other skaters are going to
catch up. And you know it's a nature of the beast.
Because I got older, Um, you know, I was there
for a long time. Figure skating is based in opinion
in many respects that it was purely and you know,
flavor of the week is really tempting, you know, so
you've got to stay ahead of people. And when I
(24:24):
turned pro, there was really nothing for a skater like me,
so I had to kind of invent it, you know,
And I was lucky that, you know, the first two
years I was pro, I was in the Ice Capade,
so I learned a lot about production. I learned about,
you know, just how all the show things work. And
when they went through a sale and the new owner
didn't want men, I was given an opportunity because I
(24:47):
proved myself in that for him to be able to
start the Stars an Ice tour, and you know it
was I understood the opportunity. I understood how fragile those
opportunities were. So I just kept doing at It's like,
I gotta be I gotta be on it. I gotta
be um, I gotta keep my skills up. I gotta
be aware of marketing. I gotta be aware of uh,
(25:09):
you know, just perception. I gotta be aware of you
know that I'm here now, but I've got to learn
so many more things if I want to stick around.
And and it's funny because my role models weren't skaters,
real role models. I'm a big music guy. Okay. So
I love Neil Diamond because if you've ever seen him
(25:31):
on stage, man, he just loves loves loves, you know,
just his love of his craft. He's having the best
time on that stage as the audience is mirroring kind
of that whole joy that he's gotten. I go, okay,
I'm gonna learn from that. My other hero is Bruce Springsteen.
Bruce springstel blue collar guy, built an audience the old
(25:54):
fashioned way. He just oh, you're just delivered delivered, deliver
the goods everything the time. And then the third was
you know Um the lead singer for Led Zeppelin's guy
Robert Plant and as a solo artist, he was so
creative and he was so like worth. He was ready
to take every risk chance that he possibly could to
(26:19):
keep moving forward, right, and and being a little different,
a little and a difference the key. It's not so
much yeah, you want to be better than next year,
but when you're an entertainer, you've got to be different. Otherwise,
if you're writing the same song all the time, then
people go, Okay, seen it. You know it's been there,
(26:40):
done that. But it also allows you to kind of
get deeper, stronger and more versatile and your ability to
kind of like create longevity and the key destination is great,
but journey longevity is is really a key that any
amount of success you want to have. Yeah, And I
think I was having this conversation and the other day
(27:00):
with a friend of mine. We were talking about um
different kinds of greatness. And there is individual greatness. There
is like winning winning the Olympics in eighty four that
is singular individual greatness, and then there's also longevity greatness
of being one of the nest in the world for
(27:22):
fifteen years where your name is always mentioned as the
possible victor of this competition. So there's it's like a band.
A band can have a one hit wonder boom and greatness.
Let's not let's not discount that. That is greatness too.
But then the band that sticks around for like the
Rolling Stones five decades or what like those bands like
(27:44):
that longevity greatness. It's a testament to what you're talking about, Scott,
about the journey, the constant pursuit, right, the pursuit of excellence.
But then also um innovating, innovating in your arena, in
your sport, in your industry, whatever it is. And in
the term that I always like to say, parents ask
me about hockey, like what should my kid do? And
the thing I always say to them, don't tell your
(28:07):
kid he has to be the best right now. Um.
The biggest thing for me, I think in my professional
life was I felt I was the best at getting better. Yeah,
and that's what I hear you speak about it like
continually getting better and you never arrive. But if if
it's not about the destination, then it's a constant pursuit
(28:28):
of excellence. It's constant mastery of the craft and honoring
of the craft, versus saying I want to have this
to hold in my hand and then I'm done. Yeah,
And you know, and greatness too, you know, and you
Dick Button said it really well. He said, you can
only measure greatness, um, and like, let's say, in any
sport by the fact that because of that person's participation,
(28:53):
they left the sport better than it was before, right,
And I think about that, and it's really amazing to
think about. And when he said that to me, I go,
I want that. I want to be that guy. I
want to be that guy that is like you know,
and again I had nothing, you know, I was a
big old honking loser when I you know, I competed
(29:15):
at younger levels. But it turned into I want to
be that guy. I want to and I want to.
I want to keep being that guy and I want
to and until, you know, after a while, honestly, just
run out of gas, you know, And I did. After
my first son was born. I just sort of said, okay,
enough of this, all right, it's time for me to
move on. And I want to be a great father.
(29:36):
I want to be a great husband. I want to
I want to be involved. I want to, you know,
take this blessing, this incredible blessing, and and do it
as well as I possibly can, you know. And so
you know, there's the next there's always gonna be the
especially in sports, right and then you just take your
experience and you try to put it into the next
thing and the next thing and the next thing. And
(29:57):
I've been really lucky that has had, you know, and
some of them has come out of unfortunate circumstances. But
the fact that I work in cancer is because I
lost my mom to cancer and I survived cancer. So
I had to have it in order to truly understand
how to serve that community. And you know what, you
meeting scientists, and I'm the dumbest guy to ever give
to Ted talks like ever, and so I look at
(30:19):
that and it's like, Okay, now I have the ability
to reach people, and I have you know, I have
the ability to use that for good. You know. I
I meet so many I've seen so many um whatever
whatever they are, you know, uh, actors, entertainers, um, musicians, athletes,
(30:40):
politicians who kind of use their their pulpit and they
use it in negative ways, and it's like, dude, that
is so short lived. You know that is that is
not gonna that doesn't that you're you're you know, you're
you're sort of like if you remember you're remembered as
(31:00):
a train wreck, you know, you're not remembered as something
that brought good into the world and brought you know,
try to make the place maybe better than it was before,
you know. And and and that's always in there. It's like,
how can I do this life thing and and really
try to take everything I've been given and use it
(31:22):
to help other people. Um, and I love what you've
done with that. I mean, like the characteristics that you
carry from sport, your resilience, your grit, your willingness to
continue to learn, to innovate, to try new things has
immensely benefited you on the other side of sport in
becoming an analyst, a commentator and becoming a producer and
(31:43):
becoming a best selling author. Um, what you do, the
work you do with the Scott Hamilton's Cares Foundation, just
the the mindset to bring this to fruition, to even
have the concept and then bring it to fruition. Can
you tell our audience a little bit about that, because
that foundation is the work you do there is that
(32:03):
is legacy work. Well hopefully we're you know, we're really
it's it's again, it's just doing this and you know what,
and you know, with with anything I do with cares UM,
you know, I really it means a lot for me
to share with people that I I am the ultimate volunteer.
I don't cares is it's um. You know, my executive director,
(32:24):
Carry Morgan, she always talks about founder syndrome and it's like,
we got founder syndrome again. It's like, well we can
you know, let me leverage whatever I can in order
to make your job a little bit easier. And you know,
she talks about, you know, the whole founder thing. Because
I'm a volunteer. I won't take a penny for any
of the work I do with cares ever. I just
(32:44):
I never have and I never will. And we've raised
we've raised a lot of money over the years and
the sixteen years we've been around, we've probably raised about
forty million dollars, you know, and and and that's hard
to do. But it's like you look at it and
you go, well, how's it working? Wasn't doing and I
wasn't and we okay, we're helping people. And now we've
really focused in for the last six years to truly
(33:08):
just elevate and you know, therapy and super precision targeted
therapies to just let's just treat the cancertainly the rest
of the body alone. This collateral damage thing, it's it's
so over and it's it's so shortsighted. You know, we
just need to keep doing those things. So I work
as a volunteer UM. You know, I I may have
(33:29):
some authority, whatever I'm learning all the time, but again
it's part of that whatever we need to do in
order to make it better for the next patient. And
we've always done that through chemo Care dot com um
website that teaches people about chemotherapy, to the Fourth Angel
Mentoring program, which pairs newly diagnosed patients with survivors, to
(33:50):
the I don't even I've lost count of how many
research um UH programs we've funded over the years, and
and you know, it's just it's just whatever her I
can do to bring more people into the fold. And
and you know, again it's just their size and numbers,
you know, Danny Thomas said, I'd rather have a million
(34:11):
people give me one dollar than one person give me
a million dollars. And and honestly, I'm kind of good
both ways. You know, I don't really care. You know, however,
we can get the job done, right. So it's that
it's like, how do we do the work? How do
we do the work? Yeah? I love what you're doing there.
That's that's legacy work, that is that is lasting. And
for you probably you're equally as proud of that as
(34:34):
I mean, you can answer this, but as you're a
limpical mental in your success, well thank you. I I
just thought if I can find a proven treatment for
my mother's cancer that that destroyed her, then I'll know
I was born, you know. It's that type of thing.
It's it's you know, I was adopted at six weeks
of age. It's lucky to be here, period. I'm sure
(34:55):
my birth mother had other options. And so I look
at you know, how do I how do I do this?
And and what's the best way to engage and and
and and help the community, you know, and the communities
like the world, and so you know a lot of
you know, what I'm working on now is purely that.
(35:15):
It's like, you know, the Live your Days platform. Yeah,
get into that. Yeah, it's it. You know. It came
out of my third brain tumor diagnosis, and it was
one of those things where it's like um our bodies
are incredibly fragile but phenomenally resilient. Okay, you just said
(35:39):
something I want to I don't want to see your
third brain tumor diagnosis right here? How like for you
you said, it's so casually and easily like one like
for our for our listeners, like hearing that one, Like
if I hear that about myself, Like I couldn't imagine
what I would go through? Like what do you go through?
(36:00):
How do you persist through? Three of those? Well? The
first one was really scary and ignited my faith. Um,
I love love, love, my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
love love, love. I couldn't love more. Um. Second one
was like I kicked in the gut that one, And
it was a surgical situation. The first one was radiation,
(36:20):
second one was surgery. Surgery didn't go as well as
it should have could have, so I ended up having
nine more after that and aneurism and obliterating an aneurism
and all that stuff. It was kind of a tough summer.
And then when I came back again, Um, this time,
I'm getting all the doctors talking to me about treatment options,
(36:40):
and all I can hear in the back of my
mind was like, get strong, and I get strong? Why
what does that mean? Get strong? And I'm talking, I'm
having this conversation in my own mind. It's like physically
or mentally, or emotionally or virtually, you know, it's all
the above. And so you know, I've watched the tumor
grow and shrink and shrink and grow and shrink and
(37:03):
grow and grow and shrink and and um, so it's
just been for the last four years, I've just been
vigilant and just sort of living my life, trying to
get healthy and trying to get strong and and and
it was just the only choice I could make at
the time, because you know, surgery is problematic, you know,
since I've already had the surgery, so they have to
(37:24):
dismantle everything in there and kind of and I don't.
I'm not you know, it's not like I'm denying that
when I when I become symptomatic, you know, they found
it on on a on a schedule of m R I.
So it's there and it's doing this, you know, and
as long as it's doing that, especially that, then we'll
be good. So it's it's like, you know, it's like
(37:45):
we live, right, we just you know, And it's and
and it's a reminder, you know, going back to the
whole thing. It's like, I'm every day trying to get stronger,
trying to get better, trying to get a little deeper,
little richer in the experience. And is a way of
you know, pushing this thing back. And when the time
comes when I have to pull the trigger on treatment,
(38:07):
I'm ready to go, right, I mean, is I'm strong
and I'm sixty two years old, I'm healthy and I
can endure it, right, So you know, um, you know,
but I'm reminded we're fragile, we're very resilient, and we're temporary.
So knowing that that, like the Kickers were temporary, nobody
(38:31):
gets out of this thing alive. So knowing that our
days are numbered, how do we live? How are we
going to choose to use our days? And So when
I was had that third brain to where I did
an interview with People magazine. People dot com and I
basically let it out. I go, look, you know, it's
like these there are just things that happened, and you know,
(38:52):
I choose I want to live my days, and and
it caught the year of a marketing company here in Nashville,
and they go live your days. It's like like, it's
my the woman that runs at Shannon Lynton, it's her
kind of like mantra day to day mantra. It's like
live by I'm gonna live your days today, and all
the time it's in there. And so we she brought up,
(39:13):
you know, right after that interview went viral and what
was supposed to be about ten thousand people, you know,
being shared, you know whatever, that interview it is a
normal interview. It was seen over thirty five million times.
So she knew something was in there. But I go,
let's just tap the brakes here because it's not the
(39:33):
right time. And then COVID kicked in and she called
me and she goes now, and I go now, So
let's let's let's remind people that our days are precious
and the opportunities are limitless, and what we can do
with this life is a choice, no matter what our
condition and what no matter what we're up against, it's
(39:56):
like a breath is a breath, a day is a day,
a minute, a minute, and we can use those and
and not only for ourselves, but for our loved ones
and for for everyone else involved. So, you know, the
Liver Your Days platform and it started off to be
sort of encouragement digital encouragement platform and become a podcast
with that eight podcasts and phenomenal gas Robin Roberts will
(40:19):
be on next week and um, I my goodness, Kevin
Neil and Bart Millard, Christian mcgucci and all of them
have a story to tell of how they've built their lives,
you know, as a way of just sort of a
guide to inspire people and help them make those choices
to live their lives better, joyfully, productively, abundantly. Yeah. I
(40:39):
love that. One of your missions with Live your Days,
with the entire platform and the podcast is a call
to being present, really is what it is. I mean,
come on, how many times have you been so consumed
in your own thoughts that something happened right in front
of you and you missed it? You know it's like,
oh man, I can't do to replay? Yeah? Yeah, really
(41:03):
you know. It's like my wife. You know they have
they storm chasers, Ye, rainbow chaser. She's a rainbow chaser.
Rainbows fill her heart like nobody's business. And when there's
a big rainstorm, she'll get in the car and she'll
go out and she'll like find rainbows and it's like
it just takes her breath away. And I look at that.
That's it. That's the stuff. It's like we we look
(41:24):
for those like gonna find them, and we we can't
let our lives just pass us by. We've gotta do it.
We gotta live joyfully, productively, abbudantly. We gotta allow no
matter what our condition is, as long as we have
breath in our lungs and we we just we gotta,
we gotta, we gotta choose to live this life fully.
(41:47):
I love I love man, Scott. I could listen to
you talk for days. Man. This. I hope our community
jumps over and tunes into to live your days because
you've got me fired up. There's like thirty day challenge things,
the challenge, thirty day challenge. It's not like you know
we're gonna have you like climb mountains or run marathons.
It really is it's just to build those muscles of
(42:10):
awareness and contentment in our lives that really go wow,
like there's so much here that Yeah, okay, so I
just started doing it. I got a journal and we
even sell these. We even sell journals on thembe days
like com because all the merchen we sell their benefits
the Cures Foundation. Right. So the first one, um, happened
(42:31):
yesterday and it's just an example. Uh, it was three
things I'm most grateful for and kind of why and
so my three things were family, opportunity, and redemption. So
you know, the we we you know. The thing with
with with living your days and being in faith is
(42:51):
you know, there's there's kind of like four legs of
the chair, right and you're sitting on this. It's a
foundation of your life. And these four colors and one
is physical, one is is emotional, another one is intellectual,
and the other one is spiritual. And if any one
of those legs is missing, you're probably gonna fall down
(43:12):
and it might get hurt. Right. So you know, the
idea is, you know, we gotta fortify ourselves every way
we possibly can, and that's the get strong thing all
the above. Right, So, um, you know I hope people
go to live your Days dot com and join this
movement and we got to create some positivity and and
you know, we want them to share their thoughts and
their experiences and take the thirty day challenge and by
(43:36):
the merch that will fund cancer research and and enjoy
the podcast. That's so cool too that you put a
purpose behind the passion behind the mission. You know that
it funds cares and the money goes towards that because
they you're doing something that's impactful, meaningful, lights you up,
and you're giving to people, and then the cause of
it and where the money goes is then beneficial over here.
(43:57):
Um Scott, you are just like said at the top
of the show, you are a living legend. I'm living.
That's that's all that matters right now. I'm living. But
as an athlete, you're a living legend. As and as
a human being, as a humanitarian, you are a living legend,
my friend. So I think you know it's it's you know, uh,
(44:17):
thank you, you know, I've you know, like I mean,
you know, as as human beings, we make a lot
of mistakes and we just gotta keep moving forward. And
that's what I said. You know my three things I'm
most grateful for, you know, or my family, my my opportunities,
and you know, especially redemption. You know, it's like knowing
that my creator loves me unconditioning forever. That's a good
(44:42):
reason to get out of better every morning. Oh, my friend,
you are welcome on this podcast anytime. I know your family,
I know your boy. There's because calling you. Yeah, we
got an A on his English test today, so we're celebrating.
You picked up some food and we're gonna just munch
and now I gotta host a nationale Zoo fundraiser in
about an hour. And Okay, I'll thank you so much.
(45:04):
You've inspired me, You've inspired our audience. Go to Living
Thanks dot com, Live your Days dot com, where people
can check out for dot com. Mr Scott Hamilton, a
living legend. Thank you so much. Everybody else, thank you
for tuning into this episode. We'd love to have to
have you back on, Scott, you were so in big time.
Anytime until next week, guys, take care of one other,
(45:24):
love one another, and we'll see you back here for
another episode of How Men Think
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