May 6, 2025 • 43 mins
Andrew D. Thompson is a former professional athlete, hospitality executive, and high-performance coach who joins us to share his journey from professional squash player to battling and overcoming a severe health crisis, which inspired him to write 'A High Performing Mind.' The book explores the 12 attributes of high performance with actionable advice. Andrew delves into topics like resilience, discipline, mastering your craft, and overcoming adversity, offering listeners strategies to improve their lives despite any hardships they face.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I wanted people to know thatlike they have the opportunity
(00:03):
to live an incredible life.
And some people listening mightbe saying like, you haven't seen
my circumstances yet, andthey're right.
I haven't seen theircircumstances and I don't know
how hard their life is, but I doknow that they can improve their
life where they are.
(00:25):
Welcome to the Wayfinder Showwith Louis Hernandez, where
guests discussed the why and howof making changes that led them
down a more authentic path orallowed them to level up in some
areas of their life.
Our goal is to dig deep andprovide not only knowledge, but
actionable advice to help youget from where you are to where
you want to be.
(00:47):
Come join us and find a way toyour dream life.
Welcome back to the WayfinderShow.
I'm your host, Louis Hernandez.
And today we have the pleasureof hosting Andrew D.
(01:09):
Thompson.
Andrew is a former professionalathlete, hospitality industry
executive, and a highperformance coach.
Andrew is the author of a highperformance High performing
Mind, a book that delves intothe 12 attributes of high
performers, offering insights onstrengthening mental resilience.
And achieving personal goals.
(01:30):
With over 25 years ofexperience, he has dedicated his
career to empowering individualsto overcome adversity and
consistently perform at theirbest.
Andrew, welcome to the WayfinderShow.
Thanks, Luis.
A pleasure to be here.
Yeah, it's great to have youhere.
This you got.
Like one of our favorite topicsto talk about.
So this is great.
(01:51):
So I'm glad to hear it.
Yeah.
Before we get into it thoughlet's hear a little bit about
you your origin story, whereveryou wanna start, and let's take
it from there.
I.
You hit on some of those notesin your intro.
I started off as afteruniversity.
I played sport professionally,did that for a number of years.
I also coached at the same time'cause the sport that I chose is
a bit of a poverty sport,doesn't really pay at their
(02:13):
professionals that well.
So what sport was that?
It's called squash.
So it's a racket sport.
Some people are familiar withit.
Pretty popular in the northeastUS and growing pretty steadily
in the US actually.
So played that for a bunch ofyears.
Initially I started at myuniversity in Canada here and
then then I played on the worldtour and coached concurrently.
And I've got really into highperformance coaching quite
(02:33):
quickly'cause that was mypassion at the time.
And also something that I lovedworking with people on.
And that all went very well.
And then at the same time, thecoaching kind of took a bit of a
backseat to a career in thehospitality industry where I
eventually became an executiveand ran operations at, at a
facility.
And all along though, I alwayswas very passionate about the
(02:53):
high performance coaching andkept doing that, kept working
with some elite athletes andstuff like that.
Until one day in 2016, I had ahealth crisis, I guess you could
call it.
I basically was hospitalized inthe ICU and when I got home I
was so profoundly weak that ittook me, two and a half hours to
recover from climbing a flightof stairs.
(03:14):
Wow.
That I had to crawl up actually.
And then I was bedridden for thenext four and a half months, for
22 hours a day.
Just leaving basically to eatand go to the washroom, couldn't
really handle stairs and stufflike that.
So it was a pretty gruelingexperience.
And the reason I bring it up isbecause it's all of those things
that really led to the creationof a high performing mind.
And the whole reason for writingthe book was that I, when I went
(03:38):
through that crisis, I realizedit was the exact same tools and
mindsets and insights and.
Approaches that got me throughmy professional sport and
coaching high performanceathletes that I drew on to get
me through that life and thathealth crisis.
So what I realized is that thosethings could be incredibly
(03:58):
valuable to people who are alsogoing through serious adversity
or a crisis of some kind, oreven want to perform at their
best.
So the two worlds came together.
And and that's the whole purposeof writing the book, to be able
to share that with everybody andhopefully be helpful in some
way.
Wow.
Okay.
(04:19):
So what I'm curious, like duringthat time that you were down
with the injury and illness, Iwould imagine that also gave you
a lot of time to just reflectand think through and.
Was that already growing in yourmind during this time?
Like, all right, a highperformance mind, the coaching,
this is or were you alreadydoing that and this just gave
(04:40):
you a opportunity to improve onthat?
I was always doing it and myentire life I always wanted to
write a book, but.
The crisis that I went throughin 2016 really changed what that
book would end up being about.
The other book would've beenwritten towards high performance
athletes and really serviced avery small percentage of the, of
society.
But been very helpful, not justhigh performance athletes, I've
also obviously worked with highperformance business people and
(05:01):
stuff like that too.
So anybody who was interested inexcelling in their life.
The book would've been gearedtowards that, but now it also
encompasses the, that other endof the spectrum where you are
just trying to recover and crawlout of a dark place.
So it, like I said, the twoworlds came together and I
recognize that those same toolswould be helpful to people in
both circumstances.
Yeah, so it was all percolating,but then really came home and I
(05:23):
think became a much morerelatable book to a lot more
people.
And that's some of the feedbackthat I'm hearing is that people
are finding the stories withinit relatable.
And they can see themselves andfind, find things that they can
utilize to help them in whereverthey are in their life.
So yeah, your question was like,it's always been there that,
that learning that I alwayswanted to excel in my life and
(05:45):
figure out the things that wouldhelp me do that.
And going through that.
Dark period where like Icouldn't do anything.
It took me over a year and ahalf to get back to work, a full
day of work.
I'd start like an hour and ahalf a day after four and a half
months, then two hours a day andthen build it up slowly over a
year and a half.
So it took a long time and ittook me over five years to get
PO to the point where I was morenormal, except for still, I
(06:06):
still have to be careful withexercise.
So that's just something I'm, Iwill have to monitor a little
bit.
But so all those experiences arewhat created that, understanding
that there was a lot more tosome of those things that I was
learning and that they thinkcould be helpful to a much wider
range of people.
Yeah.
So the book has, it talks aboutthe 12 attributes of high
(06:27):
performance.
Did you already have a model forall of this?
Or did that all come togetherduring this period when you are
thinking through the book,during crisis and such?
Most of it, all of it is selflearned.
Yeah.
So I'm a big believer in learnyour own life, master your own
life.
Learn from your experiences,your failures, your setbacks.
(06:48):
And through observation, andobviously I've read books in my,
I.
Life too that have opened mymind to other perspectives.
So it is, it's all learnedthrough my life.
And the book goes through those12 attributes and they go, it
goes through'em in a particularorder.
So each one builds on the nextif you don't have attribute one,
you're not gonna be able to everget to the success that you want
(07:10):
to get to.
Got it.
And it's designed in such a wayso that you read chapter one,
you have some of the attributes,you be attributes that you'll
need to get.
Through chapter two and thenthree and so forth.
It gives you hopefully theresilience and the commitment to
the process and the desire tocomplete what you started to
find your way through to the endof the book.
And I'm not gonna lie and saythat the book is, it's an easy
(07:32):
read, but I also make it that.
I encourage people to do alittle bit of work along the way
to really ensure that they makechanges to themselves, that they
get those positive changes thatthey wanted when they bought the
book.
Not just read and go, yeah,that's very nice, and move on.
But to actually do it.
So at the end of every chapter Ihad a section where you kinda I
(07:52):
call make it stick.
So whatever it was in thechapter, you work through and
find examples in your own lifewhere you can apply it.
And I think that's the mostvaluable way to get lasting
change in your life.
So that's.
That was the intention of that.
Yeah.
That's great.
It always works best when youknow, you learn something and
you apply it.
And it sounds like that's whatyou're having people do so that
it really sticks.
(08:13):
Exactly.
Yeah.
So can we go through those 12attributes?
Sure.
Yeah, for sure.
So it all starts with thefoundation.
Of everything.
And that's desire the will, theintent, the purpose, right?
You need to have purpose and aand and a goal in mind in your
life.
What do you wanna do?
Do you wanna be a better friend?
Do you want to be a CEO?
(08:33):
Do you wanna be a national levelathlete?
Do you want to be a greatparent?
Whatever that starting point isfor you, you need to have
desire.
That's where it all starts.
And in order to createsomething, you have to have that
second attribute, which is thediscipline.
If you don't create on a dailybasis or close to it, then it'll
be take a really long time toachieve your goal, depending on,
(08:56):
how big that goal is.
So having the, discipline.
And I give people a startingpoint'cause I know discipline
can be hard for a lot of people.
So I coined a phrase, dirtydiscipline, and it's in the
book.
And basically what that means isit's going to be, for some
people, they just havediscipline, right?
And some people have what I calla warrior mentality.
They're just like, no matterwhat comes along, they're
getting through, they're gonnapush through on their bad days
(09:18):
no matter.
What the setback is, what thesize of the failure.
They're gonna get there.
They're gonna get there.
So that's a very smallpercentage of the population.
Then you have people who haveregular discipline, but then
there's a lot of people who alsostruggle with discipline.
Like, how do I get started?
Yeah.
And so that's why I came up withDirty Discipline'cause I really
wanted people to.
Succeed, no matter what.
So it just allows them tounderstand that it's gonna be
(09:41):
messy along the way.
You may have three good days andthen two bad ones, and maybe
you're gonna fall off for a weekand then get back to it.
But that's okay.
That's part of the process.
So that's a really importantconcept in the book.
And then from there, I.
Once you have those foundationalthings, your desire your purpose
and your discipline, you moveinto you have to be resilient,
right?
Because if you're not resilientthe first setback and failure,
(10:03):
that's it.
You're gonna be done.
You're gonna, you're gonna belike, oh my God, this isn't
working out.
I'm done this, I failed.
I guess I gotta move on tosomething else.
But you need to learn that'spart of the process.
So when you anticipate thatthings are gonna be difficult,
you're more resilient, and I getinto some of the techniques of
how to increase your resiliencefrom there.
The third attribute gets intoalways doing your best.
The mindset of always doing yourbest.
(10:25):
No matter if you're sweeping afloor, doing a presentation,
trying to compete in that bigmoment, you wanna always try to
do your best.
Having that attitude does somuch for you.
It makes sure that you'rebringing your best to the
equation, which increases yourchances of success, and it also
allows you to be more forgivingof yourself when things don't
(10:45):
necessarily work out.
Because you tried your best, I'msorry I failed.
It can happen to all of us.
So having that mindset is quiteliberating and important.
And from there, sometimes youneed to reflect on what are the
things that are holding youback, like we like to talk a lot
about.
I.
Focusing on our strengths, butthat thing that holds us back
(11:06):
can really be debilitating.
If you have a fear of publicspeaking and you know you need
to pitch certain concepts tocertain businesses to succeed,
that can really inhibit you.
So sometimes we need to take alook at the thing that's holding
us back or our biggest weakness.
I have a quote that I used andit says, if you Im improve your
biggest weakness, you get thegreatest amount of positive
(11:27):
change at the fastest possiblerate.
So it's just a.
Really good way to keep that inmind that there's a lot of
benefit from looking into thosedifficult things, so from there
once you have those foundationalthings and a willingness to look
at what could be holding youback, not, there's not always
something holding you back, butsometimes there is, and
sometimes there's somethingsmall.
Who knows?
You have to reflect and figureout what that may be.
(11:48):
And then you go into.
What can happen quite easily topeople is being discouraged by
others.
I can't tell you how many timesduring this book process doubts
came along, not only for me, butmaybe from people weren't sure
that it would poss potentiallywork out.
Are you not famous?
Will you know?
Will this go in a positive wayfor you or not?
So you have to not take whatpeople say and do personally and
(12:10):
stay enthusiastic about whatyou're trying to accomplish.
So that's a really key part of.
One of the attributes of of highperformers, they hear things.
And I can't tell you thatthere's been examples in my life
where I was coaching an athleteand someone would come along and
go, oh, you just don't have whatit takes.
Or, oh, you really need to fixthis, or it's gonna, something
(12:30):
negative.
And they had to learn to stayfocused on what they knew was
their path towards success.
So that's a really importantquality that sometimes we
underestimate.
And then from there once youhave that clarity.
On those initial steps, you haveto or it helps greatly, I should
say, to master your own craft.
(12:51):
So if you can distinguishyourself in some way with
greatness, right?
Who do you wanna work with?
Those who give you the bestcustomer service, or those who
it's a miserable customerservice when you walk through
their doors or or who do youwant on your team that.
Athlete who performs at a superhigh level all the time, or
someone who is hit and miss,right?
So that's a really critical partof the process is to excel at
(13:14):
what you do.
And when you excel at what youdo, that's when you get those
$200,000 a year jobopportunities, that's when you
get tapped for that promotion.
There's.
Value in that it's recognizedfrom other people.
Oh wait, this person's good.
We want them on our team kind ofthing.
Whatever your team may be.
So then these are obviouslypretty big topics, then I get
(13:35):
into things like that will helpyou succeed and be efficient in
your quest for achieving yourgoals.
And that is focusing on theprocess over the outcomes.
And we'll get into why that'simportant and some of the
attributes like, being patientand having self restraints in
your life, that those arevaluable qualities as well.
(13:55):
And other things that can knockyou off course.
We address those, like gettingstuck in negativity.
And how to replace negativethinking with constructive
positive actions, which are morepowerful.
I would say constructivepositive actions are more
powerful than negative thoughts.
And from there we move into howto manage your fear.
(14:16):
Then one key thing is how toperform at your best when it
counts.
Like when you walk in.
So it's different than always doyour best.
So you're always trying yourbest, right?
But then how do you get yourbest outta yourself when it
matters?
Like in that big game whenyou're doing that huge pitch for
that.
Million dollar business orwhatever it is, how do you get
your best performance, duringthose important conversations
(14:37):
and meetings.
So I detail all that you know,and they are obviously
attributes of a high performingmind.
And then it all wraps up with avery important thing, which is
I.
Having the courage to try again.
Because there are going to besetbacks and failures and
adversity along the way, and youhave to have the courage to try
again because failure isn't theend as part of the learning
(15:00):
process.
And it's really important tokeep that in mind.
Yeah, a lot, bit of a longanswer there, but it basically
gives you a bit of a frameworkfor what the book talks about.
Details how to achieve it.
And also, obviously, as Imentioned earlier, those,
there's those exercises in thebook to help you make sure that
you start doing it and startimplementing those changes
(15:21):
within yourself so that you dostart approaching your life
circumstances differently.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's, there's a lot there.
Let's revisit a little, a few ofthose, so Sure.
When you talk about improvingweaknesses, yeah.
I thought that was interesting.
'cause I think there's a coupledifferent schools of thought
around this, right?
(15:41):
I years ago and many timesthereafter, I've done a, that
book Strength Finders, and I'msure it's pretty well known,
right?
You take a, it's a little bookand you take a test in it and it
tells you what your strengthsare and you work off of that
and, what it's trying to say isyou figure out which are your
strengths and work off of thatrather than improving your
weakness.
(16:02):
Yeah.
But you take the oppositeapproach of that.
And I'm, I do, I take a bothapproach in a way.
Okay.
Look, you wanna.
Thrive in your strengths.
Like I've never been a goodartist and I've never been good
at music, so I was never, Inever gravitated to those
things.
Sure.
I was always a pretty goodnatural athlete from a young
age, and I gravitated in thatdirection, so that was natural.
(16:22):
So I went in the direction of mystrengths, but the points in the
high performing mind is that ifyou were trying to achieve
something and there's somethingbig in your way, there's an
obstacle, there's somethingthat's holding you back, or
there's something that you needto.
Develop and improve withinyourself to achieve it, then
you're gonna probably need to dothat to achieve your highest
level of success.
There's not really a way aroundit.
As I mentioned earlier, a fearof public speaking is just one
(16:43):
of the things that can hold youback, and back in my sporting
days.
There was a particular part ofmy game that wasn't very good
and it was obvi often a reasonfor not finding the success that
I wanted.
I had a lack of confidence inthat area, so I had to learn how
to develop the confidence inthat area.
Yes if you want to achieve yourhighest potential, then often
you will have to address thatthing that's holding you back
(17:05):
along the way.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's a good way to thinkabout it.
I'm, as you say that I'mthinking of Tom Brady and, when
he came outta college, he wasnot a very gifted quarterback.
He was selected, I think inclose to the last.
Quarterback taking that year.
And he came out and theyconsidered, even when he started
playing and winning, they justconsidered him a decent game
(17:26):
manager.
But he wasn't anybody who wasgonna beat you.
And he just kept working on allthose little things over the
years.
That were his weaknesses.
And over time he just became thegreatest of all time.
So I love that.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's a great story, Ithink and there's many of these,
right?
Michael Jordan was horrible atdefense and he just worked at it
off like crazy and became,incredible at it.
And now he's the greatest,right?
(17:46):
So I think all the people youstart with your strengths, like
you say, but then work, work onthe weaknesses and that's what
makes you almost like atranscendental athlete.
I totally agree with thatconcept.
Yeah, I think that's totally theway I see it.
I love the examples that youuse.
I didn't actually know thatabout either of those two.
But they're great ways toillustrate the point.
Yeah.
That when you address thoseweaknesses and things that are
(18:08):
holding you back, then you canreally take things to the next
level to your highest levelreally.
Totally.
So the other thing that caughtmy attention around mastering
your craft.
I'm curious, what are somestrategies there that we can use
to master our craft just ineveryday life?
Not, I think with athletes, weknow yeah.
(18:30):
Getting coaches and building ateam for you, but what, how does
that work?
Yeah.
So I, I think the title of thatparticular chapter is Explore.
Experiment and fail your way togreatness.
Or to excellence.
I think I used that word.
And so those are keyfoundational tools within that
framework of how to master yourcraft.
(18:52):
I'll give you an example.
Obviously I'm now in themarketing phase of my book.
And sometimes I'll try, okayI'll try this post on social
media and see how this goes overwith everybody.
And then boom, it doesn't getthe feedback, the positive
feedback that you're looking fordoesn't catch on as much as you
wanted.
So then I'm like, okay, thatdidn't work.
So I learned from my mistakes.
I experiment in a different waynext time.
(19:13):
I.
I might try a different pathforward and see if I can achieve
a little bit more success.
So having that willingness tolike, explore, experiment, and
fail is the path to excellencein my opinion.
So those are three foundationaltools.
And another one was made famousby I think Malcolm Gladwell who
talks about 10,000 hours.
And now I'm sure he justsimplified that in his book.
(19:34):
But I try to take that a littlebit deeper and so I have a
formula that I use and it'svolume times talent.
Equals greatness.
Then I say volume times notalent equals pretty darn good.
So it just illustrates that,like it's the volume that
matters, right?
So yes, 10,000 hours is a greatsort of general principle that's
(19:55):
what it takes to excel atsomething.
There's ways to accelerate that.
You're always gonna look,there's no shortcuts to mastery
in terms of those 10,000 hoursare probably, a minimum in a lot
of way.
But you can maximize that by,you've heard things like, to
practice in an optimal way or toexperiment in an optimal way, so
instead of giving half aneffort, giving your full effort,
(20:16):
and there's that old expression,perfect practice makes perfect.
So trying to always do thingsin, in, in the best way possible
with the best form of technique,those things are ways that are
gonna help you do better, right?
All those things come together,explore, experiment, and fail
your way to excellence, and thenobviously putting the time in
that you need realisticallyunderstanding that.
(20:37):
Greatness and excellence takestime and it's not gonna happen
overnight.
Someone, what's that joke?
It's it only took me 10 years tobecome an overnight success.
Yeah.
So it just, it makes youremember that yeah, we may not
see what Michael Jordan did inthe background and just boom,
there was this amazing20-year-old, whatever that
popped into the scene.
But there was like a decade ormore of hard work that went into
(21:00):
that, the scenes that nobodysaw.
My favorite iteration of thatquote is by Usain Bolt.
I saw his quote was I workedsomething like I, it took me 14
years to run nine seconds, whichI think is pretty powerful.
I love that.
That's so funny.
Yeah, he's great.
(21:21):
Yeah.
He recently said that he couldrun.
Eight years after retirementthat he could still run a 10.3
hundred meter.
And he says he is gonna trainfor the next three weeks to see
if he can break 10.3.
He just said that a few daysago, so I thought that was
actually Oh, wow.
Interesting.
Wow.
I'm looking forward to see if hecan do it.
That'd be very cool.
Yeah.
I hope he can.
Yeah, it would be cool.
He's awesome.
The I listened to a interviewrecently with Mr.
(21:44):
Beast.
Oh yeah, Jimmy, I forget hislast name.
And that guy talk about a highperformer.
That guy is just incredible,right?
Yes.
But and listening to him, you,wow.
It's, you can get so many now, Idon't even think he realizes
just, he's so young and sodriven.
I don't, I really don't thinkhe's set to reflect on just
(22:05):
what.
High performer he is, right.
But one of the things he saidaround that 10,000 hour rule,
he's 10,000 hours is nothinglike, I, you can do that in four
years or something like that atjust a part-time.
Or he's I'm in this, I'm not.
Everything he does, he looks atit as a lifetime pursuit and
that you should give everythingto and like all your time and
(22:27):
you should be, get that 10,000hours knocked out right away
just as a.
Payment of entry and it was justlike, whoa this guy's just
another level.
Yes.
And yeah, it depends how highyou want to take it, right?
So there's a lot, I've listenedto him as well, and yeah, he
just has so much understandingand knowledge about all the
little nuances, how to succeedwith a video like crazy.
(22:47):
Yeah.
And it's things you would neverthink of in a million years.
But yeah, there's a reason whyhe's been, as su success
successful as he has.
And I think 10,000 hours.
I don't want, I don't wannadiscourage people.
We trying to excel.
Let's start with 10,000 hours.
See how you're doing.
You'll be encouraged to keepgoing.
I sure if you get that good.
After 10,000 hours, you're gonnawant to keep going, totally.
Yeah, totally.
(23:08):
Let's talk about getting stuckin negativity, you, you talked
about that, how that's prettyeasy to do, right?
It really is.
Yeah.
How do we dig ourselves out ofthat?
So I'll give an example fromwhen I was bedridden in those
four and a half months.
It was really easy to go intodark places, depression,
despair, sure.
(23:28):
I wondered if I'd ever be ableto work again, support my
family.
I had children at the time.
I was so weak and I couldn'teven barely get outta bed.
I couldn't make it down thestairs to for my son's
3-year-old birthday, and thatwas devastating.
So I went into some really darkplaces and I don't think
there's.
It's realistic to say thatyou're not going to go into some
(23:48):
dark places when you go throughsomething that's as life
crushing, as something like thatcan be.
So I think it's important firstto give yourself the time to
grieve and to go through thosedark feelings and emotions and,
people are afraid of thosethings these days.
And I, for good reason, and Iunderstand why it's really hard,
but there's going to be light atthe end of the tunnel.
(24:08):
It's just a matter of when, Ialways say that positive actions
trump negative thinking.
And so first you gotta break outof the negativity.
So it's important to recognizethat there's gonna be that first
part that I talked about, thegrieving process, the despair,
the darkness, it's gonna happen.
You gotta afford yourself thetime to go through it, but
there's gonna come a point whereit can become.
(24:29):
A ha a habit in itself almost.
So you have to recognize whenit's time to move past that.
So you get to a point wherelook, I thought that I would
never be able to work again.
But then I'm like fricking, I'mgoing to bloody try, I'm gonna.
Do something, I gotta dosomething.
I can't just sit here every dayand wallow in this, like I've
got, you get to your breakingpoint where you're like, I'm not
gonna do, I'm not gonna justgive up.
(24:51):
Like I'm not gonna give up onmyself.
I'm not gonna give up on my wifeand children.
So there's that point whereyou're just like, I want to do
something about this.
So you can continue in negativethinking and go and and
sometimes you don't.
Feel like you have the choice,but if you can look for that
window, when you get fed up andyou want to change, that's your
(25:11):
opportunity.
And in that window is when youtake your first positive action
to change your circumstances.
And that's what I did.
I I.
I went to 10 doctors orspecialists or more, and nobody
was able to solve my problem,figure out what the solution was
and how I could extricate myselffrom this debilitating weakness
that I had.
(25:31):
And though they knew why ithappened, they just didn't know
what the solution was.
So I recognized that I had totake it upon myself to walk
myself out of this abyss, and Idid that by.
Using diet to heal my body, andI approached it like a computer
programmer does.
I basically ate the same 14things every day and I would
(25:53):
change one thing out and see howI felt.
Did I have more energy or lessenergy?
Was that worse or better?
And I would do that for a coupledays and then change one thing
out.
I did one at a time and madenotes, and slowly over time and
with a little bit of research, Icame up with a diet that.
Started to gimme my energy backand started to allow me to feel
(26:14):
a little bit more normal andeventually, as I mentioned, get
back to work for an hour a day,then two hours a day, then four
hours a day as I improved thisdiet, and I came up with a whole
regimen, a very.
Drift in specific regimen of howto eat to walk myself out.
And then I got back to, about ina full eight hour day after
about a year and a half.
(26:34):
It took a long time, but it wasmy only path.
I had no other choice at thetime.
Wow.
So I took that first step as myfirst positive action, and once
I did that, it trumps thenegative thinking that I was in.
It's more powerful and it helpsme continue on a path that would
eventually lead to healingmyself and getting outta that
situation.
Yeah.
(26:55):
Wow.
First of all, kudos to you forthat.
You that's really amazing.
I think when you're diggingyourself out like that, there's
also once you start to feel alittle something that starts to
work, I would imagine it givesyou some hope and curiosity
kicks in, Hey, what if I do moreof that or something?
And I would imagine if it keepsgoing and that starts to create
(27:17):
some positivity as well.
Am I right?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Once you get a little bit ofsuccess and you see that you're
moving in a direction that'sconstructive, it just empowers
you to keep going.
And you know what?
You might not even succeed yourfirst time.
I had a lot of failure at thebeginning, but I was determined
to not be like that for the restof my life.
So I had to do something.
And so I used that desire toimprove, like I said back at the
(27:37):
beginning of the interview andthe first of all, the attributes
is having that strong desire fora goal, and mine was.
To, heal myself and get back toa normal life.
And it was a very strong desire.
And so I had to go through eachof those attributes.
And so now you're starting tosee how it all comes together.
I had to have a little bit ofdiscipline to do something on a
(27:59):
daily basis to create that newreality that I was looking to
have, and then have theresilience and so on and so
forth, and address some of thethings that were holding me
back.
And it's it was all part ofthat.
And you can see how the wholebook, a high performing mind
comes together.
Is that I've actually walked thepath, right?
Yeah.
I walked the path out.
So I know it's it is a path thatwill help you get outta those
(28:19):
circumstances.
And at the same time, it's alsothe same path that I walked when
I was trying to be, the bestathlete I could be, or the best
high performance coach I couldbe, or the best executive I
could be.
So it was all similar and that'show the whole book came together
because of those parallels andwhat the attributes that were
needed to get to a good place.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's incredible.
(28:40):
I hate to go off topic a littlebit, but I gotta ask because I'm
Charlotte, our listeners arecurious too, when they hear this
what did that diet consist of?
So the diet.
So my illness was caused by mybody's inability to absorb
phosphate.
Oh.
Phosphate is a mineral that'sfound in almost all food, and it
is key in producing energy,higher levels of energy in
(29:03):
particular that help you dothings more quickly and have
energy to play sports and allthat kind of thing.
So that was my deficiency.
And the big question was like,why did my body in stop
absorbing that properly and howcould I get it to do that again?
So I started to come up with adiet, and basically what I did
was.
One of the first things was Ireversed dinner with breakfast.
(29:25):
So I basically started to havedinner for breakfast.
Huh.
And like chicken or whatever.
And I got all the heavy thingsbecause you don't realize how
much energy it takes to digestuntil you don't have enough to
do it.
Yeah.
So I started eating all theheavy things.
Things that were hard tometabolize early in the day
because I was upright.
And when you're upright and notlying down, your body is much
(29:46):
better at metabolizing anddigesting.
So I had to do that and that wascritical.
And then I learned to eat lightat night and by eating light at
night I was able to not tax mybody with trying to digest and
metabolize.
Elements that were harder tometabolize while I was lying
down.
And so then I would wake up witha lot more energy.
(30:07):
Yeah.
'cause my body was able to getthe energy from the earlier part
of the day and then it was justcreated a kind of this positive
cycle where the more I did thatsort of, the better, the
improvement.
And then there was some,obviously some specifics.
I ate a lot of, vegetables andcilantro and things that were
good at cleaning up kind oftoxins in your body and reducing
inflammation.
(30:28):
Yeah.
And I've identified some foodthat was good for reducing
inflammation and I stayed awayfrom sugar.
I didn't drink a drop ofalcohol, and I haven't ever
since.
I didn't eat processed sugar forfive years.
Not once.
And it was a real challenge.
But it I was desperate to get toa better place and so I was
willing to do whatever it wawhatever it took.
(30:48):
Wow.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
Sugar's such poison and I don'tthink we talk enough about it in
our society.
We look at all this other crapand sugar just causes so many
more problems than most of thestuff we talk about.
But I'm curious, did you seekhelp?
To come up with this plan, ordid you just start really
thinking about it from firstprinciples?
(31:08):
'cause you, when you weredescribing it, you asked
yourself some questions and I'mcurious if that's what led to
the evolution of you doing this,or if it was you just saw help
that advised you in that way.
No, I didn't get any help frompeople in the medical
establishment, unfortunately.
Like I did try, as I mentioned,I saw about 10 different
specialists, top in theirparticular disciplines.
(31:29):
But it was a combination of thatprocess I talked to you about
like changing one thing out at atime.
And also I did a little bit ofresearch and one, I didn't do a
lot of research, but one dietthat stood out to me was a diet
that people used for kidneydisease.
And I can't remember all thedetails of that particular diet
now, but it just.
(31:50):
Recognize that some things wereharder to metabolize for the
kidneys than others, and myillness was quite tied to my
kidneys.
Had a lot of kidney pain,debilitating pain and stuff like
that throughout.
So that's where I started.
Then I built on it from thereand I came up with my own kind
of unique diet as I describedsome of the things that I did
and that was really what helpedme recover basically.
(32:13):
That's amazing.
I asked this to tie it back intoyour book of a High Performance
Mind.
'cause I think that your processis ex.
Embodies that, right?
Like it really you probably did,you, you knew it was a kidney
problem.
You knew that you couldn'tabsorb phosphates and some
issues there.
But you go to specialists andthey all wanna, they're, it's
(32:34):
all about efficiency with them,they were gonna give you a
couple minutes and it can'tsolve it.
All right, move on.
But I'm sure being down and out,it gave you a lot of time for
reflection as well, and you wereable to really come through,
again, asking yourself the rightquestions from first principles
to start experimenting in a veryorganized way, and coming up
(32:56):
with your own solutions thatreally led to you becoming a
high performer again, right?
These are all things that we cando for ourselves, right?
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Everybody can do it.
And that's that was the maingoal of the book, was to give
people these tools that theycould use in any circumstance.
To get to where they want to go.
Yeah.
So whatever your goal is, yourgoal, like I said earlier, could
(33:17):
be to be number one in thecountry, at a particular sport
or be the CE in your company orwhatever it is.
Yeah.
These are tools.
Even if it is to get pastsomething horrible in your life,
these are the tools that canhelp you get there.
And that, that was the passionbehind the book and wanting to
be helpful to people.
And I really felt that thesesteps were so intimately
(33:37):
familiar to me.
And I've walked.
Athletes through that, thosesteps so many times previously,
'cause I was always coachinghigh performance athletes, and a
lot of'em went on to be numberone in the country, uhhuh in
their particular sport and stufflike that.
And then I started working withpeople who, in, in other sports
and applying the sameprinciples.
And I noticed that it was allthe same stuff.
(33:57):
Like people benefited from doingit.
They improved, they saw lastingchanges and improvements in
their life and lasting success.
So that's what all.
Caused me to be so passionateabout the topic and to wanna
share it with people.
Yeah.
I love it.
We're right around that timewhen we like to get into our
world.
Famous Wayfinder four.
(34:17):
You ready?
I'm ready.
Alright.
I hope so.
Andrew, give us a hack, like alife hack that you like to use.
Yep.
You might not love this answer,but I'm not, I don't love hacks
the concept of hacks.
So my hack is actually.
Focus on the process.
Like I don't like the idea of asilver bullet.
I used to have someone I coachedand he was always like, oh, I've
(34:40):
got it.
I know what it takes.
Now I know what it takes.
I've got it.
And I'm like, oh, we'll see youtomorrow when you figure out
that there's more to the picturethan just that one thing.
Yeah.
So yeah.
I don't love the whole hackconcept, like this really
pervasive in society these dayswhere people are like, oh,
what's the life hack for that?
Or what's the hack for that?
It's, and like the things thatare big and like.
Goals and stuff like that, thinkthey're bigger than just one
(35:01):
hack.
There's gonna be many hacksalong the way, like you're gonna
learn things and you're gonnanote them, but like it's
attending to that process, likethat whole process that's gonna
walk you towards where you wantto get to.
That for me, so what is my oneLife Hack?
Hack?
It's focused on the process.
I love that.
I absolutely love that, and Ithink you're right on, we, I
(35:21):
think we are in a hack societywhere we're just trying to find
that thing, but it's never justthat, yeah.
The things we can do to make ourlives easier.
Sure.
But really it is just thoselittle habits, that just add up
over time and create bigchanges.
I know with I, I have a realestate brokerage, and when I get
new agents, that's the firstthing I do is start working on.
Building their right habits,their to have the right process
(35:42):
every day and the resultsfollow, over time.
Oh, true.
Yeah.
So true.
So what about a favorite, thiscould be book show activity,
whatever.
I really like.
For podcasts.
Actually quite like Joe Rogan,because, yeah, I haven't
listened to his recent stuff,but in the past he was always
really good about being veryopen-minded and like listening
(36:05):
to people who had arguments fromboth sides of the equation.
And I really value that.
I've, in terms of podcasts, Ithink he'd probably be, up there
for me.
And in terms of books, it'sfunny, like this is an old book
that hardly anybody read, but Ijust recently found it when I
was clearing out a storagecabinet, and it's called.
Basketball Cybernetics by StanKelner.
Huh.
Beyond the Absolute Limit.
(36:25):
And I think it was based onPsycho-Cybernetics by Maxwell.
Oh, what was his last name?
Stoltz or something like that.
Anyway it is a amazing book.
And it really was the book thatkind of got me on the path,
thinking about like that themind was so pivotal.
In helping us change and livethat life that we wanted.
So that, that was really thebook that kind of started all
(36:47):
for me.
And obviously I went in a muchdifferent direction ultimately
with my book.
But yeah, that was that's one ofmy all time favorites for sure.
I.
Interesting.
Is it like Psycho-Cybernetics,but in a basketball theme or
what?
Yeah, I think he applied thoseconcepts to basketball and for
me, I wasn't even playingbasketball at the time, but I
recognized that the things inhis book could be applied to
anything.
Sure.
(37:07):
And so then I started to applyit to my own sports, some of the
concepts he had.
I had some great ideas.
So yeah, I really, I never, Ishould have written to'em, and
told'em what a great book itwas.
And like I looked the other dayand I think it only has eight
reviews after 40 years.
So I probably, it's not even inprint anymore, but wow.
That was the one that kicked itoff for me.
I'm gonna check that out.
Psychotics has come up a lot inmy life lately, and I have read
it I think like many years ago,but it's not an easy book, if I
(37:29):
remember.
And I would think when you havea good analogy, like basketball,
especially if you like thesport, I would imagine it'd be
much more digestible.
Yeah.
That's how I found it.
Like it, yeah.
So maybe stand at a really goodjob of actually making that
relatable for more people.
So give us a piece of advice foryour younger self.
I got one that's funny is thesedays I'm thinking have kids
before 40 just'cause my kids arelike, I'm older than 40.
(37:54):
I won't say how old, but, andI'm like, oh my God I wish I
started this five or 10 yearsearlier.
But you know what?
Life happens and you don'talways have that choice.
So that's just a bit of a joke.
But I think my advice for myyounger self.
Something that I was inclined todo a little bit, but just to
make sure is just like masteryourself.
(38:14):
Develop yourself.
Put that time in to yourselfwhen you're young.
And I see my, my, my kids doingthat now.
And particularly my younger guyfor sports, and he is.
I said to myself the other daylike, wow, I wish I did that
when I was 11 years old.
He'll train two hours a day, noproblem.
He'll wake up at six in themorning and go for a run.
All my neighbors see, me out mybike'cause I can't keep up with
(38:37):
him'cause he's so fast, runningor riding my bike behind this
kid as he runs around the blockand they're like, oh look at
that dad making that kid go fora run.
It's no, it's that kid makingthe dad get up in the morning
and ride behind him.
He's dad, let's go for a runtomorrow morning.
I'm like, oh God.
But of course I'm gonna do it.
Yeah, I just think that isamazing and I wish that I had
someone, I wish I had thatmotivation when I was young, so
(38:59):
maybe I would tell myself.
Put the extra hours in'causeit's so worth it.
It's so worth it.
It just makes your life so good,yeah.
Oh man.
I might need to if you everwanna put your kid up for
adoption, I'll volunteer.
'cause our listeners know.
I I I love to get up and runearly yeah.
This is good.
All right.
Being last one you choosehowever you wanna talk about
these how they resonate withyou.
(39:21):
Something around either a bigopportunity or a limiting
belief.
I think for me, like I.
An important message for me isthat I wanted people to know
that like they have theopportunity to live an
incredible life.
And some people listening mightbe saying like you haven't seen
my circumstances yet.
And they're right.
I haven't seen theircircumstances and I don't know
(39:42):
how hard their life is, but I doknow that they can improve their
life where they are.
Yeah.
So if someone finds themselves.
Paralyzed in a wheelchair andthinking that their life is
ruined.
It can never be good.
There are examples of people whohave made their life good and
even incredible, so just toencourage people that like you
can find light again and maybereally surprise yourself.
(40:04):
How much better your life can bethan when it's in, when you're
in those dark moments.
So just to hang in.
And I know things can getincredibly hard for people, much
harder than anything that I'veever been through.
Sure.
But to just persevere and buildthat, try to take positive,
constructive step towardsimproving your life.
And I truly, genuinely believeand feel that everybody can
(40:26):
improve their life no matterwhere they are.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's great.
And so true.
I nowadays, one of the greatthings about social media and
you know this there, it'sdebatable if there's any, but I
think is that we just see somany inspiring people who have
crazy circumstances that wecan't even imagine.
And somehow they overcome, Iforget who that influencer is
(40:46):
that has no legs in arms.
And he's still out there ohyeah.
I forget his name.
I see.
He's like very small, right?
Yeah.
I have his book actually.
He was incredibly inspiring tome.
I think I cried the first time Isaw his video.
He was.
Such an incredible speaker.
Wow.
Like he just blew me away.
So yeah he, yeah.
I wish I remembered his nameright now, but yeah, I know
exactly who you're talkingabout.
(41:06):
I heard him on another podcastonce and I was already like,
blown away with this guy.
He makes you want to jumpthrough walls and all this
stuff.
And then he said something that,that he didn't have arms, like
hinted at it and I went andlooked this guy up and I see it
and I'm like.
Oh my God, if this guy has thatkind of energy and he is doing
(41:27):
that well I have no excuse.
I gotta stop feeling bad formyself and get out there and
kick some ass.
Yeah, that dude is doing itright, so I totally agree.
Yeah, he's truly inspiring.
He embodies it.
He's amazing.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
Andrew this has been a lot offun, man.
If people wanna know a littlebit more about you, maybe get
your book, maybe hire you forsome coaching services, how can
(41:47):
you do that?
I.
Yeah, the book is called A HighPerforming Mind.
It's available probably on mostbookstores, Amazon, of course,
and my website, where you'llfind like a lot of different
resources all, all my socialmedia.
I've got pretty decent sizedYouTube channel now with all
previous not all my previouspodcast, but some of them and
some clips and stuff from there.
(42:07):
So you can certainly find thatthere.
But my website is.
Www, obviously Andrew d as indog thompson.com.
So andrew d thompson.com.
And yeah, you'll also if youfind me on like some of my
social media channels, therunning joke is that, like for
years I always found socialmedia distraction.
So I didn't have social mediaand now I'm an author and I'm
(42:28):
trying to get my book out thereand I'm like, oh, social media,
will you be my friend again?
Yeah.
And so yeah, if you find me onsocial media and you friend me,
I'll be very grateful'cause Icould use the support right.
Thank you.
We'll definitely do that andthis has been a lot of fun.
Andrew, thanks for coming on theshow.
I hope our listeners will goout, check out your book and
follow you on social media.
Thanks so much, Louis.
I really appreciate you havingme on.
(42:48):
Yeah, likewise.
We hope you've enjoyed theWayfinder Show.
If you've got value from thisepisode, please take a few
seconds to leave us a five starrating and review.
This will allow us to help morepeople find their way to live
more authentic and excitinglives.
We'll catch you on the nextepisode.
I wanted people to know thatlike they have the opportunity
(00:03):
to live an incredible life.
And some people listening mightbe saying like, you haven't seen
my circumstances yet, andthey're right.
I haven't seen theircircumstances and I don't know
how hard their life is, but I doknow that they can improve their
life where they are.
(00:25):
Welcome to the Wayfinder Showwith Louis Hernandez, where
guests discussed the why and howof making changes that led them
down a more authentic path orallowed them to level up in some
areas of their life.
Our goal is to dig deep andprovide not only knowledge, but
actionable advice to help youget from where you are to where
you want to be.
(00:47):
Come join us and find a way toyour dream life.
Welcome back to the WayfinderShow.
I'm your host, Louis Hernandez.
And today we have the pleasureof hosting Andrew D.
(01:09):
Thompson.
Andrew is a former professionalathlete, hospitality industry
executive, and a highperformance coach.
Andrew is the author of a highperformance High performing
Mind, a book that delves intothe 12 attributes of high
performers, offering insights onstrengthening mental resilience.
And achieving personal goals.
(01:30):
With over 25 years ofexperience, he has dedicated his
career to empowering individualsto overcome adversity and
consistently perform at theirbest.
Andrew, welcome to the WayfinderShow.
Thanks, Luis.
A pleasure to be here.
Yeah, it's great to have youhere.
This you got.
Like one of our favorite topicsto talk about.
So this is great.
(01:51):
So I'm glad to hear it.
Yeah.
Before we get into it thoughlet's hear a little bit about
you your origin story, whereveryou wanna start, and let's take
it from there.
I.
You hit on some of those notesin your intro.
I started off as afteruniversity.
I played sport professionally,did that for a number of years.
I also coached at the same time'cause the sport that I chose is
a bit of a poverty sport,doesn't really pay at their
(02:13):
professionals that well.
So what sport was that?
It's called squash.
So it's a racket sport.
Some people are familiar withit.
Pretty popular in the northeastUS and growing pretty steadily
in the US actually.
So played that for a bunch ofyears.
Initially I started at myuniversity in Canada here and
then then I played on the worldtour and coached concurrently.
And I've got really into highperformance coaching quite
(02:33):
quickly'cause that was mypassion at the time.
And also something that I lovedworking with people on.
And that all went very well.
And then at the same time, thecoaching kind of took a bit of a
backseat to a career in thehospitality industry where I
eventually became an executiveand ran operations at, at a
facility.
And all along though, I alwayswas very passionate about the
(02:53):
high performance coaching andkept doing that, kept working
with some elite athletes andstuff like that.
Until one day in 2016, I had ahealth crisis, I guess you could
call it.
I basically was hospitalized inthe ICU and when I got home I
was so profoundly weak that ittook me, two and a half hours to
recover from climbing a flightof stairs.
(03:14):
Wow.
That I had to crawl up actually.
And then I was bedridden for thenext four and a half months, for
22 hours a day.
Just leaving basically to eatand go to the washroom, couldn't
really handle stairs and stufflike that.
So it was a pretty gruelingexperience.
And the reason I bring it up isbecause it's all of those things
that really led to the creationof a high performing mind.
And the whole reason for writingthe book was that I, when I went
(03:38):
through that crisis, I realizedit was the exact same tools and
mindsets and insights and.
Approaches that got me throughmy professional sport and
coaching high performanceathletes that I drew on to get
me through that life and thathealth crisis.
So what I realized is that thosethings could be incredibly
(03:58):
valuable to people who are alsogoing through serious adversity
or a crisis of some kind, oreven want to perform at their
best.
So the two worlds came together.
And and that's the whole purposeof writing the book, to be able
to share that with everybody andhopefully be helpful in some
way.
Wow.
Okay.
(04:19):
So what I'm curious, like duringthat time that you were down
with the injury and illness, Iwould imagine that also gave you
a lot of time to just reflectand think through and.
Was that already growing in yourmind during this time?
Like, all right, a highperformance mind, the coaching,
this is or were you alreadydoing that and this just gave
(04:40):
you a opportunity to improve onthat?
I was always doing it and myentire life I always wanted to
write a book, but.
The crisis that I went throughin 2016 really changed what that
book would end up being about.
The other book would've beenwritten towards high performance
athletes and really serviced avery small percentage of the, of
society.
But been very helpful, not justhigh performance athletes, I've
also obviously worked with highperformance business people and
(05:01):
stuff like that too.
So anybody who was interested inexcelling in their life.
The book would've been gearedtowards that, but now it also
encompasses the, that other endof the spectrum where you are
just trying to recover and crawlout of a dark place.
So it, like I said, the twoworlds came together and I
recognize that those same toolswould be helpful to people in
both circumstances.
Yeah, so it was all percolating,but then really came home and I
(05:23):
think became a much morerelatable book to a lot more
people.
And that's some of the feedbackthat I'm hearing is that people
are finding the stories withinit relatable.
And they can see themselves andfind, find things that they can
utilize to help them in whereverthey are in their life.
So yeah, your question was like,it's always been there that,
that learning that I alwayswanted to excel in my life and
(05:45):
figure out the things that wouldhelp me do that.
And going through that.
Dark period where like Icouldn't do anything.
It took me over a year and ahalf to get back to work, a full
day of work.
I'd start like an hour and ahalf a day after four and a half
months, then two hours a day andthen build it up slowly over a
year and a half.
So it took a long time and ittook me over five years to get
PO to the point where I was morenormal, except for still, I
(06:06):
still have to be careful withexercise.
So that's just something I'm, Iwill have to monitor a little
bit.
But so all those experiences arewhat created that, understanding
that there was a lot more tosome of those things that I was
learning and that they thinkcould be helpful to a much wider
range of people.
Yeah.
So the book has, it talks aboutthe 12 attributes of high
(06:27):
performance.
Did you already have a model forall of this?
Or did that all come togetherduring this period when you are
thinking through the book,during crisis and such?
Most of it, all of it is selflearned.
Yeah.
So I'm a big believer in learnyour own life, master your own
life.
Learn from your experiences,your failures, your setbacks.
(06:48):
And through observation, andobviously I've read books in my,
I.
Life too that have opened mymind to other perspectives.
So it is, it's all learnedthrough my life.
And the book goes through those12 attributes and they go, it
goes through'em in a particularorder.
So each one builds on the nextif you don't have attribute one,
you're not gonna be able to everget to the success that you want
(07:10):
to get to.
Got it.
And it's designed in such a wayso that you read chapter one,
you have some of the attributes,you be attributes that you'll
need to get.
Through chapter two and thenthree and so forth.
It gives you hopefully theresilience and the commitment to
the process and the desire tocomplete what you started to
find your way through to the endof the book.
And I'm not gonna lie and saythat the book is, it's an easy
(07:32):
read, but I also make it that.
I encourage people to do alittle bit of work along the way
to really ensure that they makechanges to themselves, that they
get those positive changes thatthey wanted when they bought the
book.
Not just read and go, yeah,that's very nice, and move on.
But to actually do it.
So at the end of every chapter Ihad a section where you kinda I
(07:52):
call make it stick.
So whatever it was in thechapter, you work through and
find examples in your own lifewhere you can apply it.
And I think that's the mostvaluable way to get lasting
change in your life.
So that's.
That was the intention of that.
Yeah.
That's great.
It always works best when youknow, you learn something and
you apply it.
And it sounds like that's whatyou're having people do so that
it really sticks.
(08:13):
Exactly.
Yeah.
So can we go through those 12attributes?
Sure.
Yeah, for sure.
So it all starts with thefoundation.
Of everything.
And that's desire the will, theintent, the purpose, right?
You need to have purpose and aand and a goal in mind in your
life.
What do you wanna do?
Do you wanna be a better friend?
Do you want to be a CEO?
(08:33):
Do you wanna be a national levelathlete?
Do you want to be a greatparent?
Whatever that starting point isfor you, you need to have
desire.
That's where it all starts.
And in order to createsomething, you have to have that
second attribute, which is thediscipline.
If you don't create on a dailybasis or close to it, then it'll
be take a really long time toachieve your goal, depending on,
(08:56):
how big that goal is.
So having the, discipline.
And I give people a startingpoint'cause I know discipline
can be hard for a lot of people.
So I coined a phrase, dirtydiscipline, and it's in the
book.
And basically what that means isit's going to be, for some
people, they just havediscipline, right?
And some people have what I calla warrior mentality.
They're just like, no matterwhat comes along, they're
getting through, they're gonnapush through on their bad days
(09:18):
no matter.
What the setback is, what thesize of the failure.
They're gonna get there.
They're gonna get there.
So that's a very smallpercentage of the population.
Then you have people who haveregular discipline, but then
there's a lot of people who alsostruggle with discipline.
Like, how do I get started?
Yeah.
And so that's why I came up withDirty Discipline'cause I really
wanted people to.
Succeed, no matter what.
So it just allows them tounderstand that it's gonna be
(09:41):
messy along the way.
You may have three good days andthen two bad ones, and maybe
you're gonna fall off for a weekand then get back to it.
But that's okay.
That's part of the process.
So that's a really importantconcept in the book.
And then from there, I.
Once you have those foundationalthings, your desire your purpose
and your discipline, you moveinto you have to be resilient,
right?
Because if you're not resilientthe first setback and failure,
(10:03):
that's it.
You're gonna be done.
You're gonna, you're gonna belike, oh my God, this isn't
working out.
I'm done this, I failed.
I guess I gotta move on tosomething else.
But you need to learn that'spart of the process.
So when you anticipate thatthings are gonna be difficult,
you're more resilient, and I getinto some of the techniques of
how to increase your resiliencefrom there.
The third attribute gets intoalways doing your best.
The mindset of always doing yourbest.
(10:25):
No matter if you're sweeping afloor, doing a presentation,
trying to compete in that bigmoment, you wanna always try to
do your best.
Having that attitude does somuch for you.
It makes sure that you'rebringing your best to the
equation, which increases yourchances of success, and it also
allows you to be more forgivingof yourself when things don't
(10:45):
necessarily work out.
Because you tried your best, I'msorry I failed.
It can happen to all of us.
So having that mindset is quiteliberating and important.
And from there, sometimes youneed to reflect on what are the
things that are holding youback, like we like to talk a lot
about.
I.
Focusing on our strengths, butthat thing that holds us back
(11:06):
can really be debilitating.
If you have a fear of publicspeaking and you know you need
to pitch certain concepts tocertain businesses to succeed,
that can really inhibit you.
So sometimes we need to take alook at the thing that's holding
us back or our biggest weakness.
I have a quote that I used andit says, if you Im improve your
biggest weakness, you get thegreatest amount of positive
(11:27):
change at the fastest possiblerate.
So it's just a.
Really good way to keep that inmind that there's a lot of
benefit from looking into thosedifficult things, so from there
once you have those foundationalthings and a willingness to look
at what could be holding youback, not, there's not always
something holding you back, butsometimes there is, and
sometimes there's somethingsmall.
Who knows?
You have to reflect and figureout what that may be.
(11:48):
And then you go into.
What can happen quite easily topeople is being discouraged by
others.
I can't tell you how many timesduring this book process doubts
came along, not only for me, butmaybe from people weren't sure
that it would poss potentiallywork out.
Are you not famous?
Will you know?
Will this go in a positive wayfor you or not?
So you have to not take whatpeople say and do personally and
(12:10):
stay enthusiastic about whatyou're trying to accomplish.
So that's a really key part of.
One of the attributes of of highperformers, they hear things.
And I can't tell you thatthere's been examples in my life
where I was coaching an athleteand someone would come along and
go, oh, you just don't have whatit takes.
Or, oh, you really need to fixthis, or it's gonna, something
(12:30):
negative.
And they had to learn to stayfocused on what they knew was
their path towards success.
So that's a really importantquality that sometimes we
underestimate.
And then from there once youhave that clarity.
On those initial steps, you haveto or it helps greatly, I should
say, to master your own craft.
(12:51):
So if you can distinguishyourself in some way with
greatness, right?
Who do you wanna work with?
Those who give you the bestcustomer service, or those who
it's a miserable customerservice when you walk through
their doors or or who do youwant on your team that.
Athlete who performs at a superhigh level all the time, or
someone who is hit and miss,right?
So that's a really critical partof the process is to excel at
(13:14):
what you do.
And when you excel at what youdo, that's when you get those
$200,000 a year jobopportunities, that's when you
get tapped for that promotion.
There's.
Value in that it's recognizedfrom other people.
Oh wait, this person's good.
We want them on our team kind ofthing.
Whatever your team may be.
So then these are obviouslypretty big topics, then I get
(13:35):
into things like that will helpyou succeed and be efficient in
your quest for achieving yourgoals.
And that is focusing on theprocess over the outcomes.
And we'll get into why that'simportant and some of the
attributes like, being patientand having self restraints in
your life, that those arevaluable qualities as well.
(13:55):
And other things that can knockyou off course.
We address those, like gettingstuck in negativity.
And how to replace negativethinking with constructive
positive actions, which are morepowerful.
I would say constructivepositive actions are more
powerful than negative thoughts.
And from there we move into howto manage your fear.
(14:16):
Then one key thing is how toperform at your best when it
counts.
Like when you walk in.
So it's different than always doyour best.
So you're always trying yourbest, right?
But then how do you get yourbest outta yourself when it
matters?
Like in that big game whenyou're doing that huge pitch for
that.
Million dollar business orwhatever it is, how do you get
your best performance, duringthose important conversations
(14:37):
and meetings.
So I detail all that you know,and they are obviously
attributes of a high performingmind.
And then it all wraps up with avery important thing, which is
I.
Having the courage to try again.
Because there are going to besetbacks and failures and
adversity along the way, and youhave to have the courage to try
again because failure isn't theend as part of the learning
(15:00):
process.
And it's really important tokeep that in mind.
Yeah, a lot, bit of a longanswer there, but it basically
gives you a bit of a frameworkfor what the book talks about.
Details how to achieve it.
And also, obviously, as Imentioned earlier, those,
there's those exercises in thebook to help you make sure that
you start doing it and startimplementing those changes
(15:21):
within yourself so that you dostart approaching your life
circumstances differently.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's, there's a lot there.
Let's revisit a little, a few ofthose, so Sure.
When you talk about improvingweaknesses, yeah.
I thought that was interesting.
'cause I think there's a coupledifferent schools of thought
around this, right?
(15:41):
I years ago and many timesthereafter, I've done a, that
book Strength Finders, and I'msure it's pretty well known,
right?
You take a, it's a little bookand you take a test in it and it
tells you what your strengthsare and you work off of that
and, what it's trying to say isyou figure out which are your
strengths and work off of thatrather than improving your
weakness.
(16:02):
Yeah.
But you take the oppositeapproach of that.
And I'm, I do, I take a bothapproach in a way.
Okay.
Look, you wanna.
Thrive in your strengths.
Like I've never been a goodartist and I've never been good
at music, so I was never, Inever gravitated to those
things.
Sure.
I was always a pretty goodnatural athlete from a young
age, and I gravitated in thatdirection, so that was natural.
(16:22):
So I went in the direction of mystrengths, but the points in the
high performing mind is that ifyou were trying to achieve
something and there's somethingbig in your way, there's an
obstacle, there's somethingthat's holding you back, or
there's something that you needto.
Develop and improve withinyourself to achieve it, then
you're gonna probably need to dothat to achieve your highest
level of success.
There's not really a way aroundit.
As I mentioned earlier, a fearof public speaking is just one
(16:43):
of the things that can hold youback, and back in my sporting
days.
There was a particular part ofmy game that wasn't very good
and it was obvi often a reasonfor not finding the success that
I wanted.
I had a lack of confidence inthat area, so I had to learn how
to develop the confidence inthat area.
Yes if you want to achieve yourhighest potential, then often
you will have to address thatthing that's holding you back
(17:05):
along the way.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's a good way to thinkabout it.
I'm, as you say that I'mthinking of Tom Brady and, when
he came outta college, he wasnot a very gifted quarterback.
He was selected, I think inclose to the last.
Quarterback taking that year.
And he came out and theyconsidered, even when he started
playing and winning, they justconsidered him a decent game
(17:26):
manager.
But he wasn't anybody who wasgonna beat you.
And he just kept working on allthose little things over the
years.
That were his weaknesses.
And over time he just became thegreatest of all time.
So I love that.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's a great story, Ithink and there's many of these,
right?
Michael Jordan was horrible atdefense and he just worked at it
off like crazy and became,incredible at it.
And now he's the greatest,right?
(17:46):
So I think all the people youstart with your strengths, like
you say, but then work, work onthe weaknesses and that's what
makes you almost like atranscendental athlete.
I totally agree with thatconcept.
Yeah, I think that's totally theway I see it.
I love the examples that youuse.
I didn't actually know thatabout either of those two.
But they're great ways toillustrate the point.
Yeah.
That when you address thoseweaknesses and things that are
(18:08):
holding you back, then you canreally take things to the next
level to your highest levelreally.
Totally.
So the other thing that caughtmy attention around mastering
your craft.
I'm curious, what are somestrategies there that we can use
to master our craft just ineveryday life?
Not, I think with athletes, weknow yeah.
(18:30):
Getting coaches and building ateam for you, but what, how does
that work?
Yeah.
So I, I think the title of thatparticular chapter is Explore.
Experiment and fail your way togreatness.
Or to excellence.
I think I used that word.
And so those are keyfoundational tools within that
framework of how to master yourcraft.
(18:52):
I'll give you an example.
Obviously I'm now in themarketing phase of my book.
And sometimes I'll try, okayI'll try this post on social
media and see how this goes overwith everybody.
And then boom, it doesn't getthe feedback, the positive
feedback that you're looking fordoesn't catch on as much as you
wanted.
So then I'm like, okay, thatdidn't work.
So I learned from my mistakes.
I experiment in a different waynext time.
(19:13):
I.
I might try a different pathforward and see if I can achieve
a little bit more success.
So having that willingness tolike, explore, experiment, and
fail is the path to excellencein my opinion.
So those are three foundationaltools.
And another one was made famousby I think Malcolm Gladwell who
talks about 10,000 hours.
And now I'm sure he justsimplified that in his book.
(19:34):
But I try to take that a littlebit deeper and so I have a
formula that I use and it'svolume times talent.
Equals greatness.
Then I say volume times notalent equals pretty darn good.
So it just illustrates that,like it's the volume that
matters, right?
So yes, 10,000 hours is a greatsort of general principle that's
(19:55):
what it takes to excel atsomething.
There's ways to accelerate that.
You're always gonna look,there's no shortcuts to mastery
in terms of those 10,000 hoursare probably, a minimum in a lot
of way.
But you can maximize that by,you've heard things like, to
practice in an optimal way or toexperiment in an optimal way, so
instead of giving half aneffort, giving your full effort,
(20:16):
and there's that old expression,perfect practice makes perfect.
So trying to always do thingsin, in, in the best way possible
with the best form of technique,those things are ways that are
gonna help you do better, right?
All those things come together,explore, experiment, and fail
your way to excellence, and thenobviously putting the time in
that you need realisticallyunderstanding that.
(20:37):
Greatness and excellence takestime and it's not gonna happen
overnight.
Someone, what's that joke?
It's it only took me 10 years tobecome an overnight success.
Yeah.
So it just, it makes youremember that yeah, we may not
see what Michael Jordan did inthe background and just boom,
there was this amazing20-year-old, whatever that
popped into the scene.
But there was like a decade ormore of hard work that went into
(21:00):
that, the scenes that nobodysaw.
My favorite iteration of thatquote is by Usain Bolt.
I saw his quote was I workedsomething like I, it took me 14
years to run nine seconds, whichI think is pretty powerful.
I love that.
That's so funny.
Yeah, he's great.
(21:21):
Yeah.
He recently said that he couldrun.
Eight years after retirementthat he could still run a 10.3
hundred meter.
And he says he is gonna trainfor the next three weeks to see
if he can break 10.3.
He just said that a few daysago, so I thought that was
actually Oh, wow.
Interesting.
Wow.
I'm looking forward to see if hecan do it.
That'd be very cool.
Yeah.
I hope he can.
Yeah, it would be cool.
He's awesome.
The I listened to a interviewrecently with Mr.
(21:44):
Beast.
Oh yeah, Jimmy, I forget hislast name.
And that guy talk about a highperformer.
That guy is just incredible,right?
Yes.
But and listening to him, you,wow.
It's, you can get so many now, Idon't even think he realizes
just, he's so young and sodriven.
I don't, I really don't thinkhe's set to reflect on just
(22:05):
what.
High performer he is, right.
But one of the things he saidaround that 10,000 hour rule,
he's 10,000 hours is nothinglike, I, you can do that in four
years or something like that atjust a part-time.
Or he's I'm in this, I'm not.
Everything he does, he looks atit as a lifetime pursuit and
that you should give everythingto and like all your time and
(22:27):
you should be, get that 10,000hours knocked out right away
just as a.
Payment of entry and it was justlike, whoa this guy's just
another level.
Yes.
And yeah, it depends how highyou want to take it, right?
So there's a lot, I've listenedto him as well, and yeah, he
just has so much understandingand knowledge about all the
little nuances, how to succeedwith a video like crazy.
(22:47):
Yeah.
And it's things you would neverthink of in a million years.
But yeah, there's a reason whyhe's been, as su success
successful as he has.
And I think 10,000 hours.
I don't want, I don't wannadiscourage people.
We trying to excel.
Let's start with 10,000 hours.
See how you're doing.
You'll be encouraged to keepgoing.
I sure if you get that good.
After 10,000 hours, you're gonnawant to keep going, totally.
Yeah, totally.
(23:08):
Let's talk about getting stuckin negativity, you, you talked
about that, how that's prettyeasy to do, right?
It really is.
Yeah.
How do we dig ourselves out ofthat?
So I'll give an example fromwhen I was bedridden in those
four and a half months.
It was really easy to go intodark places, depression,
despair, sure.
(23:28):
I wondered if I'd ever be ableto work again, support my
family.
I had children at the time.
I was so weak and I couldn'teven barely get outta bed.
I couldn't make it down thestairs to for my son's
3-year-old birthday, and thatwas devastating.
So I went into some really darkplaces and I don't think
there's.
It's realistic to say thatyou're not going to go into some
(23:48):
dark places when you go throughsomething that's as life
crushing, as something like thatcan be.
So I think it's important firstto give yourself the time to
grieve and to go through thosedark feelings and emotions and,
people are afraid of thosethings these days.
And I, for good reason, and Iunderstand why it's really hard,
but there's going to be light atthe end of the tunnel.
(24:08):
It's just a matter of when, Ialways say that positive actions
trump negative thinking.
And so first you gotta break outof the negativity.
So it's important to recognizethat there's gonna be that first
part that I talked about, thegrieving process, the despair,
the darkness, it's gonna happen.
You gotta afford yourself thetime to go through it, but
there's gonna come a point whereit can become.
(24:29):
A ha a habit in itself almost.
So you have to recognize whenit's time to move past that.
So you get to a point wherelook, I thought that I would
never be able to work again.
But then I'm like fricking, I'mgoing to bloody try, I'm gonna.
Do something, I gotta dosomething.
I can't just sit here every dayand wallow in this, like I've
got, you get to your breakingpoint where you're like, I'm not
gonna do, I'm not gonna justgive up.
(24:51):
Like I'm not gonna give up onmyself.
I'm not gonna give up on my wifeand children.
So there's that point whereyou're just like, I want to do
something about this.
So you can continue in negativethinking and go and and
sometimes you don't.
Feel like you have the choice,but if you can look for that
window, when you get fed up andyou want to change, that's your
(25:11):
opportunity.
And in that window is when youtake your first positive action
to change your circumstances.
And that's what I did.
I I.
I went to 10 doctors orspecialists or more, and nobody
was able to solve my problem,figure out what the solution was
and how I could extricate myselffrom this debilitating weakness
that I had.
(25:31):
And though they knew why ithappened, they just didn't know
what the solution was.
So I recognized that I had totake it upon myself to walk
myself out of this abyss, and Idid that by.
Using diet to heal my body, andI approached it like a computer
programmer does.
I basically ate the same 14things every day and I would
(25:53):
change one thing out and see howI felt.
Did I have more energy or lessenergy?
Was that worse or better?
And I would do that for a coupledays and then change one thing
out.
I did one at a time and madenotes, and slowly over time and
with a little bit of research, Icame up with a diet that.
Started to gimme my energy backand started to allow me to feel
(26:14):
a little bit more normal andeventually, as I mentioned, get
back to work for an hour a day,then two hours a day, then four
hours a day as I improved thisdiet, and I came up with a whole
regimen, a very.
Drift in specific regimen of howto eat to walk myself out.
And then I got back to, about ina full eight hour day after
about a year and a half.
(26:34):
It took a long time, but it wasmy only path.
I had no other choice at thetime.
Wow.
So I took that first step as myfirst positive action, and once
I did that, it trumps thenegative thinking that I was in.
It's more powerful and it helpsme continue on a path that would
eventually lead to healingmyself and getting outta that
situation.
Yeah.
(26:55):
Wow.
First of all, kudos to you forthat.
You that's really amazing.
I think when you're diggingyourself out like that, there's
also once you start to feel alittle something that starts to
work, I would imagine it givesyou some hope and curiosity
kicks in, Hey, what if I do moreof that or something?
And I would imagine if it keepsgoing and that starts to create
(27:17):
some positivity as well.
Am I right?
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
Once you get a little bit ofsuccess and you see that you're
moving in a direction that'sconstructive, it just empowers
you to keep going.
And you know what?
You might not even succeed yourfirst time.
I had a lot of failure at thebeginning, but I was determined
to not be like that for the restof my life.
So I had to do something.
And so I used that desire toimprove, like I said back at the
(27:37):
beginning of the interview andthe first of all, the attributes
is having that strong desire fora goal, and mine was.
To, heal myself and get back toa normal life.
And it was a very strong desire.
And so I had to go through eachof those attributes.
And so now you're starting tosee how it all comes together.
I had to have a little bit ofdiscipline to do something on a
(27:59):
daily basis to create that newreality that I was looking to
have, and then have theresilience and so on and so
forth, and address some of thethings that were holding me
back.
And it's it was all part ofthat.
And you can see how the wholebook, a high performing mind
comes together.
Is that I've actually walked thepath, right?
Yeah.
I walked the path out.
So I know it's it is a path thatwill help you get outta those
(28:19):
circumstances.
And at the same time, it's alsothe same path that I walked when
I was trying to be, the bestathlete I could be, or the best
high performance coach I couldbe, or the best executive I
could be.
So it was all similar and that'show the whole book came together
because of those parallels andwhat the attributes that were
needed to get to a good place.
Yeah.
Wow.
That's incredible.
(28:40):
I hate to go off topic a littlebit, but I gotta ask because I'm
Charlotte, our listeners arecurious too, when they hear this
what did that diet consist of?
So the diet.
So my illness was caused by mybody's inability to absorb
phosphate.
Oh.
Phosphate is a mineral that'sfound in almost all food, and it
is key in producing energy,higher levels of energy in
(29:03):
particular that help you dothings more quickly and have
energy to play sports and allthat kind of thing.
So that was my deficiency.
And the big question was like,why did my body in stop
absorbing that properly and howcould I get it to do that again?
So I started to come up with adiet, and basically what I did
was.
One of the first things was Ireversed dinner with breakfast.
(29:25):
So I basically started to havedinner for breakfast.
Huh.
And like chicken or whatever.
And I got all the heavy thingsbecause you don't realize how
much energy it takes to digestuntil you don't have enough to
do it.
Yeah.
So I started eating all theheavy things.
Things that were hard tometabolize early in the day
because I was upright.
And when you're upright and notlying down, your body is much
(29:46):
better at metabolizing anddigesting.
So I had to do that and that wascritical.
And then I learned to eat lightat night and by eating light at
night I was able to not tax mybody with trying to digest and
metabolize.
Elements that were harder tometabolize while I was lying
down.
And so then I would wake up witha lot more energy.
(30:07):
Yeah.
'cause my body was able to getthe energy from the earlier part
of the day and then it was justcreated a kind of this positive
cycle where the more I did thatsort of, the better, the
improvement.
And then there was some,obviously some specifics.
I ate a lot of, vegetables andcilantro and things that were
good at cleaning up kind oftoxins in your body and reducing
inflammation.
(30:28):
Yeah.
And I've identified some foodthat was good for reducing
inflammation and I stayed awayfrom sugar.
I didn't drink a drop ofalcohol, and I haven't ever
since.
I didn't eat processed sugar forfive years.
Not once.
And it was a real challenge.
But it I was desperate to get toa better place and so I was
willing to do whatever it wawhatever it took.
(30:48):
Wow.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
Sugar's such poison and I don'tthink we talk enough about it in
our society.
We look at all this other crapand sugar just causes so many
more problems than most of thestuff we talk about.
But I'm curious, did you seekhelp?
To come up with this plan, ordid you just start really
thinking about it from firstprinciples?
(31:08):
'cause you, when you weredescribing it, you asked
yourself some questions and I'mcurious if that's what led to
the evolution of you doing this,or if it was you just saw help
that advised you in that way.
No, I didn't get any help frompeople in the medical
establishment, unfortunately.
Like I did try, as I mentioned,I saw about 10 different
specialists, top in theirparticular disciplines.
(31:29):
But it was a combination of thatprocess I talked to you about
like changing one thing out at atime.
And also I did a little bit ofresearch and one, I didn't do a
lot of research, but one dietthat stood out to me was a diet
that people used for kidneydisease.
And I can't remember all thedetails of that particular diet
now, but it just.
(31:50):
Recognize that some things wereharder to metabolize for the
kidneys than others, and myillness was quite tied to my
kidneys.
Had a lot of kidney pain,debilitating pain and stuff like
that throughout.
So that's where I started.
Then I built on it from thereand I came up with my own kind
of unique diet as I describedsome of the things that I did
and that was really what helpedme recover basically.
(32:13):
That's amazing.
I asked this to tie it back intoyour book of a High Performance
Mind.
'cause I think that your processis ex.
Embodies that, right?
Like it really you probably did,you, you knew it was a kidney
problem.
You knew that you couldn'tabsorb phosphates and some
issues there.
But you go to specialists andthey all wanna, they're, it's
(32:34):
all about efficiency with them,they were gonna give you a
couple minutes and it can'tsolve it.
All right, move on.
But I'm sure being down and out,it gave you a lot of time for
reflection as well, and you wereable to really come through,
again, asking yourself the rightquestions from first principles
to start experimenting in a veryorganized way, and coming up
(32:56):
with your own solutions thatreally led to you becoming a
high performer again, right?
These are all things that we cando for ourselves, right?
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Everybody can do it.
And that's that was the maingoal of the book, was to give
people these tools that theycould use in any circumstance.
To get to where they want to go.
Yeah.
So whatever your goal is, yourgoal, like I said earlier, could
(33:17):
be to be number one in thecountry, at a particular sport
or be the CE in your company orwhatever it is.
Yeah.
These are tools.
Even if it is to get pastsomething horrible in your life,
these are the tools that canhelp you get there.
And that, that was the passionbehind the book and wanting to
be helpful to people.
And I really felt that thesesteps were so intimately
(33:37):
familiar to me.
And I've walked.
Athletes through that, thosesteps so many times previously,
'cause I was always coachinghigh performance athletes, and a
lot of'em went on to be numberone in the country, uhhuh in
their particular sport and stufflike that.
And then I started working withpeople who, in, in other sports
and applying the sameprinciples.
And I noticed that it was allthe same stuff.
(33:57):
Like people benefited from doingit.
They improved, they saw lastingchanges and improvements in
their life and lasting success.
So that's what all.
Caused me to be so passionateabout the topic and to wanna
share it with people.
Yeah.
I love it.
We're right around that timewhen we like to get into our
world.
Famous Wayfinder four.
(34:17):
You ready?
I'm ready.
Alright.
I hope so.
Andrew, give us a hack, like alife hack that you like to use.
Yep.
You might not love this answer,but I'm not, I don't love hacks
the concept of hacks.
So my hack is actually.
Focus on the process.
Like I don't like the idea of asilver bullet.
I used to have someone I coachedand he was always like, oh, I've
(34:40):
got it.
I know what it takes.
Now I know what it takes.
I've got it.
And I'm like, oh, we'll see youtomorrow when you figure out
that there's more to the picturethan just that one thing.
Yeah.
So yeah.
I don't love the whole hackconcept, like this really
pervasive in society these dayswhere people are like, oh,
what's the life hack for that?
Or what's the hack for that?
It's, and like the things thatare big and like.
Goals and stuff like that, thinkthey're bigger than just one
(35:01):
hack.
There's gonna be many hacksalong the way, like you're gonna
learn things and you're gonnanote them, but like it's
attending to that process, likethat whole process that's gonna
walk you towards where you wantto get to.
That for me, so what is my oneLife Hack?
Hack?
It's focused on the process.
I love that.
I absolutely love that, and Ithink you're right on, we, I
(35:21):
think we are in a hack societywhere we're just trying to find
that thing, but it's never justthat, yeah.
The things we can do to make ourlives easier.
Sure.
But really it is just thoselittle habits, that just add up
over time and create bigchanges.
I know with I, I have a realestate brokerage, and when I get
new agents, that's the firstthing I do is start working on.
Building their right habits,their to have the right process
(35:42):
every day and the resultsfollow, over time.
Oh, true.
Yeah.
So true.
So what about a favorite, thiscould be book show activity,
whatever.
I really like.
For podcasts.
Actually quite like Joe Rogan,because, yeah, I haven't
listened to his recent stuff,but in the past he was always
really good about being veryopen-minded and like listening
(36:05):
to people who had arguments fromboth sides of the equation.
And I really value that.
I've, in terms of podcasts, Ithink he'd probably be, up there
for me.
And in terms of books, it'sfunny, like this is an old book
that hardly anybody read, but Ijust recently found it when I
was clearing out a storagecabinet, and it's called.
Basketball Cybernetics by StanKelner.
Huh.
Beyond the Absolute Limit.
(36:25):
And I think it was based onPsycho-Cybernetics by Maxwell.
Oh, what was his last name?
Stoltz or something like that.
Anyway it is a amazing book.
And it really was the book thatkind of got me on the path,
thinking about like that themind was so pivotal.
In helping us change and livethat life that we wanted.
So that, that was really thebook that kind of started all
(36:47):
for me.
And obviously I went in a muchdifferent direction ultimately
with my book.
But yeah, that was that's one ofmy all time favorites for sure.
I.
Interesting.
Is it like Psycho-Cybernetics,but in a basketball theme or
what?
Yeah, I think he applied thoseconcepts to basketball and for
me, I wasn't even playingbasketball at the time, but I
recognized that the things inhis book could be applied to
anything.
Sure.
(37:07):
And so then I started to applyit to my own sports, some of the
concepts he had.
I had some great ideas.
So yeah, I really, I never, Ishould have written to'em, and
told'em what a great book itwas.
And like I looked the other dayand I think it only has eight
reviews after 40 years.
So I probably, it's not even inprint anymore, but wow.
That was the one that kicked itoff for me.
I'm gonna check that out.
Psychotics has come up a lot inmy life lately, and I have read
it I think like many years ago,but it's not an easy book, if I
(37:29):
remember.
And I would think when you havea good analogy, like basketball,
especially if you like thesport, I would imagine it'd be
much more digestible.
Yeah.
That's how I found it.
Like it, yeah.
So maybe stand at a really goodjob of actually making that
relatable for more people.
So give us a piece of advice foryour younger self.
I got one that's funny is thesedays I'm thinking have kids
before 40 just'cause my kids arelike, I'm older than 40.
(37:54):
I won't say how old, but, andI'm like, oh my God I wish I
started this five or 10 yearsearlier.
But you know what?
Life happens and you don'talways have that choice.
So that's just a bit of a joke.
But I think my advice for myyounger self.
Something that I was inclined todo a little bit, but just to
make sure is just like masteryourself.
(38:14):
Develop yourself.
Put that time in to yourselfwhen you're young.
And I see my, my, my kids doingthat now.
And particularly my younger guyfor sports, and he is.
I said to myself the other daylike, wow, I wish I did that
when I was 11 years old.
He'll train two hours a day, noproblem.
He'll wake up at six in themorning and go for a run.
All my neighbors see, me out mybike'cause I can't keep up with
(38:37):
him'cause he's so fast, runningor riding my bike behind this
kid as he runs around the blockand they're like, oh look at
that dad making that kid go fora run.
It's no, it's that kid makingthe dad get up in the morning
and ride behind him.
He's dad, let's go for a runtomorrow morning.
I'm like, oh God.
But of course I'm gonna do it.
Yeah, I just think that isamazing and I wish that I had
someone, I wish I had thatmotivation when I was young, so
(38:59):
maybe I would tell myself.
Put the extra hours in'causeit's so worth it.
It's so worth it.
It just makes your life so good,yeah.
Oh man.
I might need to if you everwanna put your kid up for
adoption, I'll volunteer.
'cause our listeners know.
I I I love to get up and runearly yeah.
This is good.
All right.
Being last one you choosehowever you wanna talk about
these how they resonate withyou.
(39:21):
Something around either a bigopportunity or a limiting
belief.
I think for me, like I.
An important message for me isthat I wanted people to know
that like they have theopportunity to live an
incredible life.
And some people listening mightbe saying like you haven't seen
my circumstances yet.
And they're right.
I haven't seen theircircumstances and I don't know
(39:42):
how hard their life is, but I doknow that they can improve their
life where they are.
Yeah.
So if someone finds themselves.
Paralyzed in a wheelchair andthinking that their life is
ruined.
It can never be good.
There are examples of people whohave made their life good and
even incredible, so just toencourage people that like you
can find light again and maybereally surprise yourself.
(40:04):
How much better your life can bethan when it's in, when you're
in those dark moments.
So just to hang in.
And I know things can getincredibly hard for people, much
harder than anything that I'veever been through.
Sure.
But to just persevere and buildthat, try to take positive,
constructive step towardsimproving your life.
And I truly, genuinely believeand feel that everybody can
(40:26):
improve their life no matterwhere they are.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's great.
And so true.
I nowadays, one of the greatthings about social media and
you know this there, it'sdebatable if there's any, but I
think is that we just see somany inspiring people who have
crazy circumstances that wecan't even imagine.
And somehow they overcome, Iforget who that influencer is
(40:46):
that has no legs in arms.
And he's still out there ohyeah.
I forget his name.
I see.
He's like very small, right?
Yeah.
I have his book actually.
He was incredibly inspiring tome.
I think I cried the first time Isaw his video.
He was.
Such an incredible speaker.
Wow.
Like he just blew me away.
So yeah he, yeah.
I wish I remembered his nameright now, but yeah, I know
exactly who you're talkingabout.
(41:06):
I heard him on another podcastonce and I was already like,
blown away with this guy.
He makes you want to jumpthrough walls and all this
stuff.
And then he said something that,that he didn't have arms, like
hinted at it and I went andlooked this guy up and I see it
and I'm like.
Oh my God, if this guy has thatkind of energy and he is doing
(41:27):
that well I have no excuse.
I gotta stop feeling bad formyself and get out there and
kick some ass.
Yeah, that dude is doing itright, so I totally agree.
Yeah, he's truly inspiring.
He embodies it.
He's amazing.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
Andrew this has been a lot offun, man.
If people wanna know a littlebit more about you, maybe get
your book, maybe hire you forsome coaching services, how can
(41:47):
you do that?
I.
Yeah, the book is called A HighPerforming Mind.
It's available probably on mostbookstores, Amazon, of course,
and my website, where you'llfind like a lot of different
resources all, all my socialmedia.
I've got pretty decent sizedYouTube channel now with all
previous not all my previouspodcast, but some of them and
some clips and stuff from there.
(42:07):
So you can certainly find thatthere.
But my website is.
Www, obviously Andrew d as indog thompson.com.
So andrew d thompson.com.
And yeah, you'll also if youfind me on like some of my
social media channels, therunning joke is that, like for
years I always found socialmedia distraction.
So I didn't have social mediaand now I'm an author and I'm
(42:28):
trying to get my book out thereand I'm like, oh, social media,
will you be my friend again?
Yeah.
And so yeah, if you find me onsocial media and you friend me,
I'll be very grateful'cause Icould use the support right.
Thank you.
We'll definitely do that andthis has been a lot of fun.
Andrew, thanks for coming on theshow.
I hope our listeners will goout, check out your book and
follow you on social media.
Thanks so much, Louis.
I really appreciate you havingme on.
(42:48):
Yeah, likewise.
We hope you've enjoyed theWayfinder Show.
If you've got value from thisepisode, please take a few
seconds to leave us a five starrating and review.
This will allow us to help morepeople find their way to live
more authentic and excitinglives.
We'll catch you on the nextepisode.
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