Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - Annabel Anderson, 5x SUP World Champion

Episode Date: December 26, 2018

This week’s conversation is with Annabel Anderson, the world #1 female SUP athlete from 2012-2017.Annabel has won the biggest titles in the sport of stand up paddling multiple times – She’s a 5x world champion, has beaten the best men in the sport, and orchestrated the campaign that resulted for equal pay and opportunities for female athletes globally.She is also an elite cyclist & mountain biker, skier, sailor, and surfer.If there was ever anyone who lived up to the moniker of versatile – Annabel Anderson is it.Career ending injuries curtailed a promising ski racing and triathlon career as a young athlete resulting in 11 major surgeries by the age of 24.Versatility, adaptability, and a relentless pursuit for marginal gains became common themes.But maybe the greatest challenge lies yet. This past year, she's had multiple freak accidents resulting in an extremely broken body. The challenge is now to return to normal function and to face what ever the next chapter holds.This conversation cuts right to the center of how Annabel became the person she is today and what’s been behind her success.It’s not everyday we get to hear from someone who’s won as much as Annabel and I think you’ll be interested to learn her views on it:In Annabel’s words:“Winning is really fun the first or second time and then it becomes normal, and then it becomes expected. How do you raise and elevate and deal with the internal pressure and the expectations of others? When winning becomes the one dependent it’s not exactly a great game to be playing. It has a finite end.”I can't wait for you to learn from Annabel._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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All right, welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm Michael Gervais, and by trade and training, I'm a sport and performance psychologist, as well as the co-founder of Compete to Create. And the whole idea behind these conversations, behind this podcast, is to learn from people who are on the path of mastery. We want to understand what they're searching for, how they organize their internal world as well as their external life. Like how do they make sense of the world? And really what we're searching for there is what is their psychological framework?

How do they make sense of things? And then we also want to understand how they build and refine their craft by using very particular mental skills. Finding Mastery is brought to you by LinkedIn Sales Solutions. In any high-performing environment that I've been part of, from elite teams to executive boardrooms, one thing holds true. Meaningful relationships are at the center of sustained success. And building those relationships, it takes more than effort. It takes a real caring about your people. It takes the right tools,

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them so much I just want to kind of quickly put them on the spot. Stuart, I know you're listening. I think you might be the reason that we're running out of these bars so quickly. They're incredible, Mike. I love them. One a day. One a day. What do you mean one a day? There's way more than that happening here. Don't tell. Okay. All right, look, they're incredibly simple. They're effective. 28 grams of protein, just 150 calories and zero grams of sugar. It's rare to find something that fits so conveniently into a performance-based lifestyle and actually tastes good. Dr. Peter Attia, someone who's been on the show, it's a great episode by the way,

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value and 10% off for life when you head to davidprotein.com slash finding mastery. That's David D-A-V-I-D protein, P-R-O-T-E-I-N dot com slash finding mastery. Now this week's conversation is with Annabelle Anderson. She is world number one in her sport from 2012 to 2017. Think about that. Think about that for just a minute. World number one, best in the world at your sport from 2012 to 2017. That's five years. It's incredible. Her sport of choice is stand-up paddling. And she's won the biggest titles in the sport multiple times. And like I said, five world championships. And she's beaten the best men in the sport as well. And because of that, she orchestrated the campaign that resulted for equal pay and opportunities for female athletes globally in her sport. It's phenomenal. And she's also an elite cyclist and mountain biker and skier and sailor. And she has a great understanding of surfing as well. So this is an extraordinary human with an extraordinary life experience and rich, deep insight on how this works. So her winning is not by accident. This is not a genetic freak alone. She's got an incredible understanding of how, what goes into the process of being the best. And her mechanism is to be her best. And we get into the weeds of that for sure. And if there's ever anyone who's lived up to the moniker of versatile, Annabelle is that person. Okay. So versatility, adaptability, you know, this relentless pursuit

for marginal gains have become common themes for her, But maybe the greatest challenge that she has is what's ahead of her. So this last year, she's had multiple freak accidents resulting in an extremely busted up body. We get into that. It's heavy what she's gone through. But the challenge for her now is to return to normal function and then to be able to face whatever the next chapter holds for her now is to return to normal function and then to be able to face whatever the next chapter holds for her in her life. So it's this really unique time that we are able to sit down with Annabelle with this large body of work behind her and a very specific unknown set of rules for the future based on where she is in relationship to her body. And this conversation cuts right to the center of how Annabelle became the person she is today relationship to her body. And this conversation cuts right to the center

of how Annabelle became the person she is today. And it's not every day we get to learn from someone who has won as much as Annabelle. And I think you'll be interested to learn her views on success and winning and what goes into it. And in her words, this is how she captures it. Winning is really fun the first or second time, and then it becomes normal, and then it becomes expected.

And how do you raise and elevate and deal with the internal pressure and the expectations of others? When winning becomes the one dependent, it's not exactly a great game to be playing. It has a finite end. That's rich. There's a lot in her understanding of how people become their very best. And with that, I can't wait to introduce to you Annabelle Anderson, and let's jump right into this conversation. Annabelle. Michael.

You've got fire today. That's awesome. Okay. Now what you've done as a body of work is extraordinary. And I'm so stoked to be able to sit across from me and have this conversation because you know, you know how much I love the ocean, you know, how much, um, I'm interested in what you do. And so how many world titles have you won? Give or take, there's five or six. Oh, just, you've lost count. Come on. I just kept working on what was in front of me rather than looking backwards. Is that, okay, so we're starting off heavy already.

Is that how you see the world? Is that how you engage in the future, in life? I'm not good when I get tied up and wrapped up in the what's just happened and the looking backwards. My whole outlook is let's just keep moving forward. And when we're moving forward, we're gaining momentum and we're working towards things. I'm really terrible at the art of celebration and I wish I was better. So after a win, you don't celebrate? You don't find joy in the celebration?

I also want to know where you find joy. It would be a moment of, okay, job done, tick the box, on to the next thing because things have always been so stacked up with so many things going on. And because I've had to run everything and be logistics, planner, everything, I've never really been able to relax and go,

oh my goodness, that was actually quite amazing. And I've had that time to reflect in a forced way in the past few months because of injury because of injuries and accidents and it's rad the only thing that has really made me go back and go that was actually really cool is going and digging back through photos and then you get that that hint of the feeling and the emotion that's captured in that one moment and you remember what it felt like but when you've got so many things going on you've got the next five projects or and things of places that you're meant to be and events that you're meant to be doing and commitments it's if you take your eye off the ball it's like one's gonna drop and once you start

to drop a ball if you've been a bit of a one-man band like i've operated that's when things go wrong and that's like the classic dilemma for action adventure sport athletes, right? Is that it's not like you've got a big firm that's supporting you. You don't have executive assistants and you don't have brand managers and you don't, you are the entrepreneur and you're soulpreneur and you're driving the whole thing. And you've had multiple world championships, meaning be recognized, like clearly God being the best female, maybe athlete period in your sport for a long time. And so, okay, so let's do this. Let's go back to this crazy sounding New Zealand accent that you have, you know, cause you, you grew up in one of the most beautiful parts of the world. So can you take us way back to what roots were like for you?

So I grew up in a very rural, very isolated environment. I was, I was literally born in the snow in the high country and then my parents well my mom my mother is a really incredible person so you southern south island south island born and raised with a few periods of time in the north island in various different parts as well okay and then what was the main town? I've lived literally all over the country. So I'm planning a trip down to Queenstown at some point. I'm just over the hill. Are you?

Hell yeah. Yeah. So we'll spend some time hopefully. Okay. All right. So, all right. So were parents like hippies? No, my parents, uh, what I would call I would call typical, quite traditional,

like conservative South Island families. My mom's side of the family is the Scottish descent. They were high country farmers. They toiled the land. They pioneered the land. They pioneered the land. They built the land. But it also came as in from family succession with land. It always went to the boys.

Oh. Oh, yeah. So is that gender thing happens big time? Is that unique to your family structure or is that unique or is that something that happens in the south island that was very very typical of land succession in up until about our generation now okay it's only just starting to change okay so how did that impact you so how that impacted me or how it impacted my mother was she was like one of the first females to go through agricultural university she ran the family farm when her parents were overseas for a couple of years and her brothers were given other farms to go and manage um if wait, wait, wait, wait, mom was the first generation to be like a professional

stud in the family. Yeah. As a female. Yeah. And look at you. Oh, my hair is standing up. I mean, because that, okay. It's not lost on me. I want to understand that. Okay. And this is why it's easy to say it's not easy, but it feels easy when people throw around this thing best in the world. That is it is so outrageous to be one of seven billion in and one in I don't know however many million that you do your sport. But like it is a ridiculous statement and you've done it multiple times. So then I'm my hair standing up because early days you had a strong mentor that was your mom, female guiding and demonstrating to you the thinking patterns around like fill in the blanks, right? So what are those thinking patterns? What did you learn from mom from observing and from, you know, explicit instructions about life?

If something was broken, my mom could fix it. I can remember a story always being retold when she was with her alumni from Lincoln University, which were typically men, about how a tractor blew up and she was the one that was able to put it back together and this is just this is totally classic of there are so many of these stories that have come out over the years um if i wanted to rely on being able to fix something i would ask mom rather than dad so resourcefulness that's a trait that you and your family live. Yeah. She's just incredibly practical and there's always a solution. I'm never afraid to roll up his sleeves and

get amongst it and kind of get down and dirty. How does that show up in you when it comes to race day or competition or event day? Self-reliance. Or training even. So self-reliance is the word. What does that mean to you? The one and only person that I can absolutely categorically depend on is myself. So you have an intensity in your eyes when you say that. Yeah, that's right.

What does that mean if something is critical to success then I need to make sure that that is looked after so I can rely on it would you say that's your crown jewel of one of the reasons you're so special in the world of ocean events absolutely Absolutely. Okay. So if I look from the distance, it would sound something like, I don't know how she does it. She just figures it all out. It's outrageous how she does what she does. It's something like that is what people say about you.

I just learned to roll with the punches. But that's different. So self-reliance is different than resiliency. Rolling with the punches is like I flow with things. I make sense of it. I make it better. I don't get knocked down. I figure it out. If I get knocked down, I figure it out. handle multiple different variables changing that have a potential impact on me and i already have backup plans adf on how i'm going to deal with all those different scenarios what does adf mean a2f a2f it's kaiwa what is kaiwa kiwi okay is that kaiwa no okay so you're able to figure out how to adjust things where'd you learn that because mother nature will teach you that if you're open to it but also sounds like mom will i think it was i

would it's very much a product of how i grew up of you don't always have what you need when the nearest neighbor is 40 minutes away you know it's you learn how to fix things on the go you come up with different ways of using something instead of another and in new zealand we call it the number eight wire effect of the all the fences in new zealand are made of number eight wire number eight number eight wire and so it's called the number eight wow mentality or kiwi ingenuity which is like so what does the wire have to do with it it's it's part of the heritage of rural new zealand because you can fix a lot of things with a piece of number eight wire. Got it. So it's a little bit like duct tape, you know, like just, yeah. I can do a lot of things with a roll of duct tape.

Okay. I always travel with my tools. Do you? Yeah. All right. Now I get another sense when you're speaking that the cost of self-reliance could be loneliness or aloneness. Is there anything there for you as well or not? When you are, I think when you're a female,

when you've done something that's been relatively pioneering, when you've been incredibly self-reliant, it's very hard to be vulnerable around others because you have to be this pillar of strength that you can rely on if things go wrong and of which they actually frequently do those are all the things that you never hear about and you never see but you just absorb them. But if you start to become really vulnerable, then it's almost like there's a weakness in your armor. That's what it kind of feels like. I hear you say that. And I also know that to do what you've done has required incredible courage and courage doesn't happen without not knowing how it's going to go. Like there's no

courage if you know that you can step off the curb, right? Now, if, if I don't know, if you've never stepped off the curb before, then there's lots of courage, lots of risk, lots of unknown involved, which is essentially vulnerability. So you don't ever know if you're going to be successful. You may, I don't actually want to put that in your mouth like in your head is that true do you know when you at the start of the race that you're going to win I know you're that good and I'm not being funny about it no because I wish that I had I wish that I had the confidence that I see so many others project, but I don't, I'm not that person. The only thing that gives me confidence is knowing that I have been anal with process and execution of process.

And have I prepared for every single scenario that could play out? Have I, is, is my preparation going to allow me to, even on my worst day, be better than everyone else's best day? So when you show up, you don't know if it's going to work out. You don't have this uber confidence. What is it then? Like, what is your state prior to training? And I want to get, I'm going to backfill like, what is the process? You know, what, what do you do there? And I also want to get back to

vulnerability because I think that I really want to understand that for you, but I struggle with it with one, which one? Vulnerability. Okay. Let's start there then. Right to the jugular. We'll get to the starting line later. Okay. What is hard for you about vulnerability? Because I get the idea that you need to be this pillar and this rock of strength. And there's something unique about being a female that sounds like that's your model is that that makes it harder. I'll also tell you, it's hard to be vulnerable as a man too.

Oh yeah. You know, there's other hoops that we have to go through about, you know, so, so tell me what's hard for you about vulnerability. Letting your guard down. And what happens if you do? I think it's all tied up a little bit with trust. If like when you become vulnerable, you let people into that realm or circle of trust. And if people start to break or tear down some of that trust, it makes it incredibly difficult for you to be able to trust in similar situations again. And so how do we, you know,

it's almost like, how do we protect ourselves from this? Let's not quite make ourselves quite so vulnerable in that situation again. And it sounds like you've been burned. It sounds like you've been, I've definitely been burned a lot. Yeah. It sounds like you've been burned it sounds like you've been i've definitely been burned a lot yeah it sounds like you've been heartbroken though somewhere along the road where you develop this sense that has worked for you for performance wise like okay it doesn't translate into everyday human interaction what does that mean that's's interesting. As in, say, sometimes that pillar of strength that you bring to your game face, to your work environment, where you can have an incredible degree of empathy,

but it's like there's a gun click and it's on and then you're finished and then you go back to you know everyday life but in everyday life things are different you're you don't just like turn on and go hey um you know there's you know we're about to perform there's so many different factors that come into it and you kind of get a little bit hit from left field or you might get challenged on certain on things like i find it really difficult to deal with subjectivity i'm highly objective if someone goes you know tries to really like get in underneath around well how are you actually how are you how are you feeling what are you what are you angling at that was my next question

probably wasn't far from that at some point today yeah um and it's this thing of like i think it's been a self-protection mechanism of um i can i can handle bad news stories as long as I can deal with the objectivity of it the subjectivity side I think that's tied up with the vote that's tied up with the vulnerability and the the having been burnt in a bunch of situations in business and personal relationships and so you're just a little more guarded and I'm like, okay, this is a real area that we can like to work on because I am vulnerable. I literally am probably at one of my most vulnerable points right now. Yeah. You know, just talking about it actually forces you to be vulnerable, right? Like, and I know that there's something happening in this

phase of your life through the injuries that you're in, but even in this conversation, can you sense the vulnerability that you're actually demonstrating? The fact that I'm actually talking about it? I'd say that's a, that's probably like quite a big step in a forward direction. It's quite a big step in a forward direction it's a it's a say it again it's quite a big step in a forward direction is it yeah okay and then what is it okay so i really want to learn like what happens in your body when you feel vulnerable because it's you're in it right now yeah um like right now i'm not a pillar of strength. I'm not a pillar of physical strength. It's probably an emotional rawness. And then what are the thoughts like right now as you're in it,

in this conversation, what are the thoughts that are competing for attention in the back of our, of your conversation with me? That it that it's actually okay oh so you've got another model back there like hold on it's it's actually like i've been doing this other thing and i've had incredible world success but right now it's actually okay it's okay to be vulnerable and it's one of the probably like one of the big big gems that I'm pulling out of this whole situation in the last few months. In life that you're in right now. Yeah. And then what is it like in this conversation for you? It, it feels, it actually feels pretty normal and entrusted. Like I, I normally find these kinds of conversations quite difficult to have and to open up in,

but this feels like a, a very trusted situation environment that's safe. Yeah. How, how, why is that? Because, because like, okay, we, we know each other and there's a mutual respect and regard, but why did you do that? Because there's a conversation where there's two mics and we're talking about things and celebrating your unique path. So how did you do that? I've been going back through the process of why I feel as though I can trust in certain situations and be like,

have a degree of vulnerability and others I'm literally on lockdown. And I think it's when there is that previous, when I know people and I know that I can trust them and it's not going to come back to, you know, be used against me, come back to hurt me. Then it builds its building block for having that ability to take that step forward to be a little bit more brave. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentous. When it comes to high performance, whether you're leading a team, raising a family, pushing

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You know, I love the way that you just described that because you saw it or you captured it as an ability, right? And when we think of, let's say, vulnerability or courage, you know, as an ability, meaning that we have to train it, we have to cultivate, we have to work on it. And just like any ability, some of us are good at something, some of us are not good. And then we figure out what we want to invest in and get better at. And it sounds like you're saying, listen, okay, I've been doing this thing for a long time. Uh, I'm this pillar of strength, this model that I've had, I've won multiple world champions. I've been the best in the world. I've been grinding. And by the way, like you're so far ahead of the pack. It's ridiculous. And so many of your races, like it's, you know, when you watch a film on it, it's crazy. And then, then you're saying, okay, I had my world turned upside down from a series of injuries.

And now I am experiencing a different part of myself. Is that right? That's the phase that you're in. I've been forced to face a lot of stuff. And when I say face a lot of stuff, not like all the things that have happened to me since the middle of January this year, which is, you know, give it, give or take 11 months. They've all been freak.

Like they haven't been, Oh oh I did something categorically wrong at some point in time it has been freak accidents there is nothing that I should not have been doing at that point in time it's just it happened and then I've had to live and deal with the consequences of that okay so early was it a road bike accident that yeah was that the first one the first one was can you talk about these absolutely are you okay to talk yeah it's it's actually almost laughable like my way of being able to absorb it and to deal with it which is quite normal as well normal for me is to find humor in the situation because it's actually at the point that it's actually hilarious,

and as long as everyone can kind of get the joke and be able to laugh about it as well, then we're all good. It was early January, and I was meant to – I'd met some of my friends to go hike and fly paragliding and like five 30 in the morning. And I already knew like when I looked up that there was way too much cloud movement in the sky and we got to like a meeting point right beside the lake. And it was like, Hmm, this just doesn't feel right today. And we look up and yeah, there was heaps of wind shear. It was really windy, like, you know, sort of, you know, 12, between 12 and 1500 meters

up where we were going to hike up and launch from. So we bought it. All good. I go home and I, I turned training into a game. So one of my games that, you know, and it's, it's these little things, and this is sort of, I suppose, how I've motivated myself. I turn, try and turn the most mundane, boring things into as much fun as possible. And so I had rigged up a pull-up bar in the garage and I'm always going in and out of the garage, like through the garage. So the rule

of this particular game was that whenever I go through the garage, I have to bust out five pull-ups. That is one way of doing incidental pull-ups that everyone typically kind of hates to do. But I'm like, I might do like 30 in a day. I might have done, you know, like three sets of five if I had gone to the gym, but I live in paradise. It's really hard to go inside and indoors and plan the gym when the weather's really, really good. So this was my way of incidentally bringing fun to something that is highly functional to what I've been doing. And on pull up number five, the whole ceiling frame blew out of the ceiling,

like blew out of the framing. And I fell back and cracked my head on concrete. Concussion. Really badly. Yeah, that was the one that was pretty bad. Yeah. Yeah. really badly yeah that was the one that was pretty bad yeah yeah and I didn't quite realize how bad it was until I started getting all the very physiological symptoms um that didn't really

manifest themselves for about three to four weeks but I'd been roped into doing the like to doing the the half marathon for um half ironman triathlon because that's kind of what happens someone needs someone oh annabelle dutch she's always fit so i was like yeah and i have a i really struggle with saying no so i did is that is that a life thing like it's hard to say definitely really hard hard to say no. And that's because? People pleaser. Oh. Yeah. And that came from?

I don't know. Maybe the want to, maybe it's around a want to be accepted, a want to be embraced, liked. I've typically always been a bit of an outsider coming into a lot of situations um you know I went to many different schools um it was like what can I do for you rather than to make you happy because saying no doesn't really tend to make people that happy yeah okay and does was mom or dad an addict or whether whether it there drugs or like radical chaos in the family? No. I think it comes from a place of my way of dealing with,

I dealt with a huge amount of bullying through school, was self-protection was being the best. Self-protection was winning. Self-protection was being the best. Self-protection was winning. Self-protection was saying yes. Wow. Trying to be all things to all people. Trust me, it didn't work out that well for me. Well, okay.

Well, in some ways, yes. In some ways, no. Yeah. Okay. So bullying, what kind of bullying was that? By the way, you say I'm not very good at vulnerability. We're talking about bullying. We're talking about, you know, cracking your head open and from something we're making progress. We're actually doing it. You know, like, okay. You have a talent. I love your laugh, by the way. Like your, your laugh is,

yeah. Yeah. I hope that is infectious of anyone who's listening. So, okay, so go back to what was the type of bullying? Most of it was very much directed around jealousy. I went to a very small conservative all-girls day and boarding school. Does that mean like a really good school or is that what everybody does? Not, not everybody. Um, so parents were wealthy? No, I, my parents, they've always, I've always been given the foundations to then go and elevate from, but there was never huge amounts of money around. I've had to work and I've really known the value of a dollar since I was tiny. I've been through my parents, me feeling as though my parents

have lost everything three times over. I've stepped in and saved my parents and given away all my security. But they did give me incredibly strong foundations, especially from an upbringing, access to opportunities, education. And very strong values and very strong what are those core values that you off the top of your tongue or bottom of your heart you know like what are those core values for you probably the difference between right and wrong and if you're going if you say you're going to do something you follow through with it yeah okay so basic moral ethical decision making is high value you choose the moral and ethical more than the definitely sneaky cheaty whatever whatever that's why i think that's where a lot of the ability to trust is

compromised and this is one of the things i've learned over time of looking back on, like reflecting back on a lot of situations that I may have been in, is understanding that it probably failed because it was a misalignment of core values. Okay. Meaning that your high value for ethics and morals, other people don't always have that. So when don't quite know then you hold back hold back or if i fight if i it because if it becomes apparent that though someone else's value set is in conflict to what mine is it probably won't work. Okay. So back to bullying. Uh, they were jealous because you, I was, uh, I was a high achiever. I was, I was, I was a hard worker, but I realized that if I put work in and I tried hard and I, and I applied myself that I would get results. Physical or? Physical and academically. So you're smart and physically proud. I wouldn't say that I was naturally gifted or smart. I, I just, I, ever since I was probably about six or seven, I understood this whole thing that if I, if I work and I prepare

and I practice, then I might be okay at something, or I might get the result. And I am one of these people that I was born competitor. If I'm put in a competitive situation, I can't do, I just know not to put myself in socially competitive situations because I've just can't handle yourself. Well, no, I can. I've, I've learned that that was a joke, but I, but I think that you, you're such like you are an alpha competitor. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Right.

Like, okay. But when you put yourself in social settings, what happens? It's not always the best trait to bring to the party and i have a massive awareness of that because i see it manifest in other people and i'm kind of like okay this is this is this is meant to be fun um so i learned to like when it was when it was appropriate to turn the competitor on because for me it's something that's it's very innate it happens naturally and it it's and it and it comes and i can't necessarily switch it off cool good awareness like on that for sure and then but

you have if we go back just one more click here, is that hard work and genetic talent, like your hard work has allowed your genetic talent to be expressed. And it, there's no secret, right? Like that's part of the recipe, you know, for most people. Some people are just genetically so freaky that they don't really have to work. I only know a couple of them. I, I, I look at some of those people and I, Oh, that's the thing. You look at some of these people that are so gifted, they have so much raw talent, but then they don't have the want to work or the love to work. Yeah. Cause if you get that raw talent expressed too early and you're like, ah, I do whatever, then you don't know how to value

and you don't find the joy of working hard, you know? And so it's almost, there's, there's a benefit from early, I don't want to say pain, but like not it not working out well, right? When you really like something and you're like, oh, but I have to apply myself and you learn how to apply yourself. That's really incredible value. i think a lot of this stuff goes back to i grew up by myself with in a very very isolated rural environment where i had my ponies and animals as company so i became really okay and comfortable with my own company from a very young age. Do you know yourself well? I don't know.

Isn't that an interesting kind of thought? I don't know if I've ever asked it quite so bluntly. Yeah. But how well do you feel like you know you? I think because I've had to spend vast amounts of time by myself and with myself I've had to get to know myself pretty darn well in various different chapters of life and different environments scenarios come to grips with a lot of that stuff. Do you like the company you keep? The company as in the people that I'm around.

Meaning you? I think there's definitely been times when I haven't liked the company that I've kept with myself. But then I think as you get older, as you go through a few more of the rounds of that game of life, you start to learn to be a little more kind and accepting. Otherwise, what are you going to do? Hate yourself? That's going to be pretty miserable. We say that and we're both smiling and laughing because it's the obvious.

But, you know, and like you said, there's times some people do. They really struggle. They don't like the company they keep. They don't like the way that they feel about themselves. And it's really hard. So there's lots of cover ups to your point, like early day cover ups for you was achievement saying yes, you know, and even when you didn't want to say yes, like, you know, the people pleasing piece.

So there's there's funky compromises that we all, I do them too. Like there's things that I'm like, what am I doing? You know? And then I think part of the introspective nature of figuring out oneself is that we can be more authentic to ourself in. And then when we really master that inner domain, we can be ourselves anywhere we go right whether there's people wanting something and you don't want to give it hostile rugged calm environments there's a sense of peace and integration that can take place in any environment so okay so one of the one of the things that i got from living or being brought up and raised in those first five years of my life in a very isolated community

was being okay with myself. You know, like being – I could just go and entertain myself and be fine for hours. But then that – so I got joy from, I think joy and satisfaction from the going and the doing. So I can remember at about age or six, I used to take myself for runs. At age six? Age six to seven. You would take yourself for runs?

And what I, like when you, when I sort of like look. Yeah, I think. Do you want to go for runs and what I wear like when you when I sort of like yeah I think do you want I loved it yeah let's go Annabelle I loved it no seriously I loved it okay so and then you said something really cool just now sorry to interrupt which was how did you say it about the going and the doing yeah that is that is what stand-up paddling really is about some of these endurance type stuff well actually because okay so is what stand-up paddling really is about some of these endurance type stuff well actually because okay so the whole stand-up thing it was incidental and it was accidental and you just happened to be best in the world yeah that was that's just how that worked out but But I get the same feeling and the same, I suppose, joy from running, from hiking, from skiing, from sailing, from riding horses,

from doing, from surfing. It's the going and the doing. I just happened to finally crack it at one thing. Yeah, that one thing. Trust me, I tried a lot of different things to get to that point. Okay, so what does the going mean? I get the doing. I think it's the unraveling of my subconscious.

What does that mean? To me, it's like unraveling my thoughts. If I've got a problem, I just go and do. Okay, i that's interesting you say it that way because when i heard going i heard exploring when i heard doing i felt like it was in the amphitheater of the mountain or the river or the ocean like the actual figuring out in there but the going is like the actual setting out to go explore. And is, is that, that is, you just hit the nail on the head as to a large part of my why. Okay. Yeah. Keep pulling on that thread a little bit

because the ability to go and do and to the going and the stimulus from your environment, no matter what it is, there's, it's like you get lost in it. And it's, how often do you get lost in the doing? Cause that is what flow state is the science of the zone. Well, I seek it out like multiple times a day.

I've kind of been lacking a little on that one in the last couple of months. But I think that's what I've always been drawn towards. And I'm drawn towards that well before. If I never stepped on another start line or anything competitive in my life, I would not care because it's actually about the going and the doing. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned that recovery doesn't just happen when we sleep. It starts with how we transition and wind down. And that's why I've built intentional routines into the way that I close my day.

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Head to calderalab.com slash findingmastery and use the code findingmastery at checkout for 20% off your first order. That's calderalab, C-A-L-D-E-R-L-A-B.com slash finding mastery. Let's go back because that's a really powerful statement. Let's go back to what we didn't finish yet on that bullying piece. What did they say or do that hurt?

Oh, I was totally ostracized, totally isolated. And funnily enough, going back to all the vulnerability things right now, I had to go back and speak to this school about six weeks ago. And I had not, I left the school because of, I'd put up with it for five years. And for me, I felt that I'd outgrown it. Teachers were even saying to me, well, if you think you're going to have this much time off school for all these different, you know, sporting endeavors, you need to really reconsider like what you're doing. I'm like, i'm a scholar i just happen to do about five or six different sports at an incredibly high level and i have worked out how to manage it all so what grades are we talking about i was an a student no i'm sorry

what level like this is oh this is up until like age 16 age 16 so in the states that's like sophomore high school yeah something like that okay and i had been like for the five years that i'd been at the school i had been top of literally top of my year group um i'd been on representative teams across multiple different sports it was the athletics champion the cross-country champion the tennis champion you know i rode like equestrian like horses to a very very high level and i was ski racing so i had a lot going on no this is but then but this is why boarding school worked for me because if you give a human some structure and routine, you can pack a lot of stuff around that. So you're a fan of structure and routine?

I love it. I find it hard when it gets thrown out the window. the last, I would say eight, nine years of my life have been a real exercise and learning to adapt and to roll with the punches and to go, you can't put structure and routine around everything. Okay. What, there's two ways. I'm not sure where to take the conversation. Cause I want to learn about how you managed being ostracized and bullied and what it was like when you eventually came back to school. And I also want to learn about structure and like how you develop structures. Let's go to bullying and that stuff first and then we'll go to structure. Cool.

So what did they do and then how did you respond? Is it like a two-part question? They were just typical bitchy school girls. And unfortunately, and I, when I left that school, I went to an incredible, I got a scholarship to an incredible co-ed high school that accepted, um, girls for the last two years of high school. And it was like, it was a totally different environment. Excellence was celebrated.

It was applauded. It was, we will give you a platform and you go on rise. And it was the irony of the whole thing. It was like getting a scholarship to the school was, it meant something because I think at that point it was the most expensive private school in the country. And I got a full ride, but they were like, okay, well, if this is what you want to do,

just organize it with your Dean and you're responsible. Here is the ability to go and do things. But we had kids from New Wave, from Papua New Guinea. We had such a cross section of, I suppose, racial and cultural differences. But no one gave a rat's what you were from, what your family environment was like. It was like, oh, we go to school together.

Let's get on with it. Yeah, I found that to be a really interesting mix is that, so the phrase, the shorthand of that is game recognizes game. Yeah. And when you're around people that are highly driven, highly talented, very skilled, and, you know, it's like, okay, well that's what we do here. And in some environments though, it is ruthless. Like, I mean, you know, you can't get away with a thing. You can't get away with anything without being mocked or made fun of.

And at some level that is, and I don't want to sound too cavalier with this at some level, it's a welcoming, you know, if you can't get made fun of, you're not really part of it. And then, but what you're describing is it was highly driven people. There was an organizational thought, like we want to see if we can create structures for people to rise to your use your word okay that was a culture that this school had created and they had gone against the grain it was a very conservative private boys school that had started accepting girls that just does not happen oh so you're one of the few girls i was one of the first girls so i was like game on i'm just being treated like one of the boys and And so physically, academically, and that gave me this belief like, well, I do everything else with boys.

I train with, you know, boys across all the different sports that I do. I was just one of them. They were just brothers. And so I just always saw it was like that. And it wasn't until I came into like the, the standup paddling world that I saw the bitchy girls again. And it was rough. Oh, it triggered some old stuff.

Oh, no, no, no. Trust me. I had, when you are the girl that you didn't grow up paddling, definitely didn't grow up surfing because heck I was, I had, when you are the girl that didn't grow up paddling, definitely didn't grow up surfing because heck, I was a kid from the mountains,

and you start to turn up and win. By a lot. That doesn't go down that well. But what I see is like it was a threat, but those first, like probably three or four years, they were rough. It's what they said or what they did? Actions. It was actions.

So sticks and stones will break my bones, but names will never hurt me. But they still hurt. It's not true. No. It's just not true. And what were the types of things that you had to endure? It's one of those, I think it's one of those periods in time where I have probably locked it all in a box and thrown away the key. Um, because it's really painful to go back and it hurt so much.

I just became, it's one of the reasons why I ended up spending a lot of time here on the South Bay because I was embraced. I could trust everybody here and we rose above, but it was pretty ugly for quite a long time. And it took a long, it's funny how if people see one kind of behavior being done to something, it's almost as though that allows everyone else to jump on the bandwagon. And what was it like, were they saying, I don't know any of your stories here. Was it, what they were saying? Like you, uh, you can't, you, you must be cheating. You must be using drugs. to protest me or something for something or just niggle away in the background the online bullying was pretty rough um it was it was interesting it does taint it it sounds like deeply for you oh it it it really tainted it for me yeah it was what a drag it was like i some communities are really awful it was

it was rough and then but i think it's a lot of it stemmed from jealousy because i hadn't been given a leg up are you rude to people are you arrogant do you come off aloof i don't know you that way but i i i come across and this is where a lot of the getting to know yourself but comes in i know that in certain situations i will have a guard up and like but if i'm in a competitive if i'm coming into a competitive environment and my job is to tune up and perform. It is game face. We can be nice to everyone. Like we can have niceties and pleasantries and lots of laughs and banter and have a beer when it's all said and done.

But right now my job is what do I need to do to get the job done? And I know that that can probably come off as a little standoffish it can probably look a certain way to certain people you know when I hear you say it you know in today's climate I don't know if what I'm about to say is wrong but when I hear you say that I go oh that kind of sounds like how men compete. Now, I don't know. I don't know what it's like to be a woman. Okay. And I don't know what it's like to be in a woman's locker room. I've never been there. I've worked with women teams, but I'm not in the locker room because, you know, for obvious reasons. So, you know, when, I don't know, that

sounds a little bit like everyone I know on in men locker rooms. I think this is the difference between females and males. And men, it's just like they put their mask on and they go and do what they have to do. And then, God, they can have a few punch-ups and still hug and have a beer afterwards. girls it's the psyche is quite different um of no one's it's very difficult for i think it can be quite difficult for and i think this goes across both the business world as well as the sporting world of someone's know, like people are easily threatened because the way that I see it is that girls have typically had to fight to get to where they are. So rather than be the rising tide that floats all boats and to elevate and lift everyone along the way, which is kind of what men have been really good at doing for a long, you know, for decades and centuries, girls have kind of had to fight,

you know, so there's a, oh, I'll be nice to you to your face, but you're a threat. And you might take attention, which is potentially jobs or works or jobs or work or maybe sponsorship or promotions wait because there's only room there's only room for so many girls it's like one top dog the pet you know how they talk about the pecking order it's like you can tell when who is the dominant female when you walk into a room or into a group it's just like okay so just like slide into line goodness if you like upset the pecking order oh i did that well you had you had no choice i would

say well literally i did have no choice because you know like i but you think about it you were raised by ponies yeah literally you were running on you know, you're enjoying running five miles or whatever miles as a young kid. You were exceptional at what you did, self-reliant. Like think about your unique. It was very alpha. Like you had to figure it out. Mom was an alpha. Yeah.

She was a pioneer. But she's so soft as well. Okay. So you can be both. Yeah. But it can come across as being one. And then you're you're you're with a bunch of alpha competitors at high school like you got bullied by was it girls yeah

okay and then you go to an alpha whatever high achieving primarily boys school and you're like this is where i belong literally and that's why i've always been drawn to predominantly male environments this is not okay like what we're're describing, but it's really, it's lame, isn't it? It's so lame. Okay. So I want to hear from the best in the world multiple times over, how do we help the next generation of boys and girls create a more thriving, fulfilling, supporting and challenging environment for people to really find and become their best? What would you say from being in your unique, um, body and mind,

you know, like what would you suggest we do? When we all help each other, we are the rising tide that can float all boats and other people certain people will be good at some things they bring those skills to the table other people will be good at others you bring those you share learnings you rise together I think especially if you come from a say you're in a very challenger environment because because there's no point going out to the game or the competition or to a bigger marketplace unless you're prepared to step up and win. And so it's looking at what is going to help us drive what performance looks like in the field of performance where we're going to play. Okay. Now, great. Intellectually, I understand that. looks like in the field of performance where we're going to play okay now great intellectually

i understand that and what you we've just talked about for the last 30 minutes is that as a woman it's been really hard as a girl it was hard and as a woman there's been challenges so how do we help the next generation of females and males like do better like what what do you imagine because i've got a young 10 year old yeah and, he's cut from a different ilk than you are. Like he, he's not, he's not trying, he's more on the creative side than he is on like the athletic side. I'm laughing. Cause I'm wondering where, if he, he did not get that from me. Embrace, embrace the gift. I'm totally joking. Yeah. So like, how do we help them? I don't have the answer to try to help others navigate the path that they're on right now. And I think it's actually really different, different with

this teen generation right now, because what you and I knew as the landscape back then, it's totally different now. We just took everything that we knew and it got thrown out the window. That's how it feels. Right now. Yeah. Yeah, because of the landscape of technology. It's the landscape of technology, of society, the factors that they're absorbing, being impacted by it's i'm trying to key in and listen into them to get feedback to go

okay how can i take some of the tools that i've learned through the school of hard knocks to help you navigate this next little bump that you're going through? You know what I love about this conversation? One, your authenticity and how vulnerable you are and how much courage you have to put the words to some very hard times you've had, but you don't have a book to sell. You're not trying to do A, B, and C. You're flat out about progression, human progression. And here's a conversation that, you know, we happen to get to enjoy together, but there's no ulterior motive. There's nothing where it's like, yeah, you know, on the side, go to my website and buy my book. Like, no, that's not,

that's not what you're doing. This has been since I had these accidents this year, it's actually been my, and I knew this before these little freak moments happened. I felt like I had more to give than I had to gain on a lot of things. Oh.

You know, you say really powerful things and then you get quiet. So what happens for you? I think if I didn't say anything, we would just be looking at each other and you'd be feeling it. Where then you get quiet. So what happens for you? I mean, if I think if I didn't say anything, you would just be looking at each other and you'd be feeling it. Where do you feel all that? Probably in my heart. In your heart. It's real. What does that mean to you? When I say that I've got more in my heart or I've got more to gain than I have to give. More to give than to gain. More to give than I have to give. More to give than to gain. More to give than I have to gain.

Because I already went and did more than I ever thought was possible. Then I hit the bonus rounds. Then I played a whole bunch of games with myself to hit some more bonus rounds. And then it kind of got boring. Because how do you keep raising and elevating? Like winning is really fun the first or second time. And then it becomes normal and then it becomes expected.

And then how do you raise and elevate and can deal with like one, the internal pressure, but the perceived expectations of others, all these things when life starts throwing curveballs from every single direction like when winning becomes the the one dependent it's not exactly a great game to be playing well like you can't it's a it's a game that i think has a very finite has a finite end so i'm always around well how do we set the new challenge and how do we learn how do we play the game of life and how are we going to progress to the next thing that we're going to learn from because when

you do the same thing over again it's it's the same result okay hi smile for some photos other people will feel good like i had no sponsors to please by the time you know by this time last year what is that because they dropped you i didn't get dropped they They stopped paying my contract. Because, because your injury? No, because no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, This happened way, this happened like way back in 2015.

As in I had caught, I had a really good deal that I had spent a huge amount of time negotiating for, you know, a long foreseeable future. And this is when you realize that no matter how many, how much time you spent getting the paperwork right, if someone's going to renege on that handshake and pull back on what they, on their end of the bargain bargain and you've totally committed and put everything and that you can possibly do to make everything success and they are a success then when they pull the rug you're like what's going on how do you find yourself like what is

what is that i had to do some serious soul searching after that one yeah like i because every time i picked up one of those paddles sitting in the corner right now it brought all the emotions back because it was like wait are those what kind of emotions like are these oh it was mistrust it was kind of like a breakup yeah is that i think that's kind of about that time is that when we first yes it was it was ugly yeah right i was like how am i even like getting to the water of rita but this was the thing because i knew about like process the only thing i could ever fall back on was process so i just had to keep turning up and it was hard i had to play some serious games with my mind to get,

just to get the work done, to get through it. But then great things came from it. That's incredible. Yeah. And this too, literally, I think that's what I came up with. Just knowing like, and this too shall pass. Something will like give or break, or there will be a lull at some point and we'll

get through it okay um your head cracks open a couple months later it's not funny concussions are serious very very serious so you so you've got some symptoms it's hard you're training for a half iron man or something no no i was just um roped in to do that at short notice okay then what happens next so i'm out running and like i ever since i was on the new zealand olympic development team for triathlon all through university and so as part of that we did a lot of physiological testing. And so ever since about 19, I have innately known my heart rate levels, your intensity levels, et cetera, to train and perform to.

And so I know my body pretty well. I started running and my heart rate skyrockets, like literally to numbers that I have not seen before one, like one. And like it was up in the one nineties. Come on. No. And I, I have a really low heart rate. So we've got problems. I'm just like going, wow, what's going on? And I'm lethargic. I'm hardly, I was like, I'm'm hardly i feel like i'm hardly moving what was it it was just like so one of the physical symptoms of concussion or concussion and post concussion syndrome yeah is heart rate variability yeah okay so that was after yeah it was after oh god so you'll get

checked out that yeah and it was really everywhere I look because it was I think it was around the time of the Pyeongchang Olympics so where I'm from the New Zealand Winter Olympic program is based and so because of my history over the years like these are all the people that I know and trust that work with this program and they were all in Korea so I think I went I ended up going to the doctor and they're like oh yeah so there's this like concussion program but you know you probably should have come when you first came and I was like when I first had it like when I first did it I wasn't presenting with any of these things then I went went and raced mountain bike races for the next three weekends and then this is sort of the fallout that happened after each one

and now this happened. Something's not right. For me to say that something's really off and that I can't suck it up and get through it, I'm like something's really, really not right. Can you imagine being an advocate in the medical system but not having an intimate understanding of your body how hard is that and not having trusted teams it is really hard and over here in the states I have that very trusted network um of a very small group of people because I've spent so much time out of my home country.

I don't have that trusted network. And I think even then going back to the thing of trust, I can remember my last semester of university, I was doing Frisky National, like Big Mountain at Fr fresky nationals because it was a world tour qualifier you're a freak no you just really are like and big mountain when i get in the back country it scares them you know what i love it yeah i know like literally i feel like you know it feels okay so you surf yes check the book do you surf yeah yeah okay so you're probably better than i am stand up paddling

don't worry I only picked up surfing at 31 when I had to I got you beat there okay okay good and then stand up paddling like I'm really far behind and I love it it's good big mountain I'm really far behind and I love it you know it doesn't matter as long as you love it it's yeah I mean but I'm laughing because you're like I don't know all the things I love doing you're like 12 steps ahead I'm on every one of them no no I'm not mad about it I'm just laughing but I'm laughing because you're like, I don't know the things I love doing. You're like 12 steps ahead of every one of them. It doesn't matter though. No, no, I'm not mad about it. I'm just laughing because I'm just making a note to myself.

I learned early days. Like I really love surfing. I enjoy surfing early days in my profession. I got to work with all the top guys on the tour. Yeah. Almost all of them. And one day they took me out surfing. We're on the North shore.

Why? And they're like, Hey man, you push us a lot. You know, like, you know, in these conversations or whatever we're doing. So it's our turn. I have been in these situations. So I've learned. No, no, no. I'm not very good at anything. Because as soon as that happens, it's like it is bananas.

So we're not going skiing in the back no actually no we we'll get to that point okay but the irony of this whole thing was that this was a qualifier i was like i'd just fallen back in love with skiing again because i'd had i'd broken my legs super badly like four years earlier. Then I'd blown out my knee for the first time on my other leg, and I was finally able to ski again, and it was when twin tips and fat skis first came in, and I fell back in love with what I love to do.

And if there's something that's sort of one of those things where I'm just like, I literally light up like a Christmas tree about doing that was one of the first loves. And so I'll always go back to it in some way, shape or form. If I'm able to, I only needed to stand on my skis this day. And I probably would have won because technically like this was before everyone was hucking massive cliffs um my technical skills from growing up like from ski racing you can really arc a turn and pick lines at speed and pace um and be in control I'd just done the inspection run and I was going back down to the bottom of the lift and I hit a death cookie of ice and ACL gone again oh no so this is three four months after your first concussion no no no this is like when I was like in my final year of university oh this is way back this is way

back ACL is that what you said you did your Yeah. Okay. But I'd already had ACL repairs and it was, this is where I probably had a challenge around the trust thing because I went to the physiotherapist that basically said, and by, you've got to like, stop pulling like all these, you know, like this drama, et cetera. my knee was subluxating and no one believed me that my ACL was blown again. And it took until I'd been thrust into the corporate world, had to move to Auckland post-university. And I go and see the team, New Zealand, like sailing physiotherapist, and he goes, your knee's done. You need this fixed again. So when we look at these levels and layers of trust,

it comes from situations of where I thought I was able to trust and I haven't been able to. So there's been a lot of challenges around that to deal with over the years. Oh my goodness. I can only imagine. Okay. So back to just this last year, concussion. And then I know you did something on a bike. You did something on a mountain. Yeah. And then if I'm being just given the flow of the conversation, being completely open and vulnerable, and this is something that never gets talked about openly, basically my uterus took me down.

How does that happen? I don't know, but women's problems, women's health problems, are typically what I would refer to now as suffering in silence, and I knew that something was really wrong. You cannot lose that amount of blood and still perform, let alone the pain and the serious discomfort, especially at high physical outputs. And it took so long for me to get someone to believe that something was wrong.

And then I ended up seeing a gynecologist. And I was like, if there was one thing I was going to fix, like over that off season last year, I was like, I really have to sort out my insides. I cannot go on like this. Yeah, no kidding. And sure enough, so I had surgery as well. Okay. There you go. Okay. And so what is the surgery? I just had to have stuff taken off my uterus.

Yeah. Oh goodness. Yeah. And was that, it was showing up in excessive bleeding or? Yeah. Massive discomfort, huge amounts of pain. Yeah, okay. It was like in the scheme of all the pain that I've been through this year, that probably tops it. Like in the level, and I'm talking multiple fractures, multiple, you know, like blown joints, et cetera. That was probably the worst. And then what happens so i was in france riding a mountain bike stage race um through the french alps and i have been wanting to do this stuff for such a long time and i'm like it all came together to to do it and i'm like yes this is awesome

and it was for me it was actually a test of could I pull together a really big a logistically really intensive I suppose a you know trip at short notice in a country where I you know I speak a little bit of French but I don't know anyone I'm kind of I'm going into a situation that I have no idea about and pull it off post concussion. Post concussion and post surgery. Both. How many weeks or months?

I was like three. I think I was like three months post surgery. Okay. But that's, that's fine. Yeah. Okay. And then, okay okay big logistic undertaking yeah you figure it all out figure it all out get there all is good i think it was day

three we come off this really technical descent which and there was a huge, I can just remember it was a really rocky descent, but it was all covered with leaves. And we come out onto a piece of tarmac, just kind of like Pierre Avenue out here. And there was little balls of grit left on the road. Because we're in the high Alps. And all of a sudden I lose my front wheel. And I'm with like three other guys just rolling around this corner. Nothing should be a problem.

And all of a sudden I'm skating. I'm sliding. I stopped sliding. I picked myself up and like I've torn myself up. That's just, those are, those are tough stickers. I've got a lot of them. And I'm like, oh, that's not that great. I've got a lot of them. And I'm like, oh, that's not that great.

I got to pull my glove off. That's really not good. As I had fallen and I had lost my front wheel and my handlebars had gone over, I had landed and crushed my thumb. So thank God I had gloves on. Um, but when I picked up my bike, I was like, why is my tire completely flat? So I'd obviously burped air out of my tubeless tire. Um, so then I had to navigate again, being in a foreign country, something going wrong, everything like like that not knowing anyone um but i got through it tough stickers that's what you call like road rash burns scars scars tough

yeah and then your thumb is hanging off the side of your your hand oh no it was it it it didn't look that bad initially but it was when i went to move the joint, I was like, something's really wrong. And then you figure it out. You get somehow you get down the mountain on one tire. No, I got picked up by the medics. Straight to the hospital, figure that out. And then I don't think we're done. Is there one more?

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So then I end up backing you so it still takes about five days for like my travel insurance to decide oh actually that doesn't look that great we will send you back to New Zealand you you have to go back to New Zealand it wasn't until I got them to say I was just like I already have a plan which is and you're not giving me a concrete plan right now you're suggesting that I should do

something until you tell me exactly what I can do I'm working with multiple variables right now I have a plan what is it that you need me to do because you're not giving me anything to work with here and so this is where you become really cut and dried and somewhat crisis situations and they're like uh if you don't go back to new zealand you you will not be covered you there's a there's a strong possibility that you may not be covered in future like okay well we better go back to new zealand then so i go back to new zealand and i'm from the south island i flew back back into Auckland. I already had a doctor's appointment set up. I try and get into a specialist the next day. That specialist is on sabbatical,

so I go and hang out in the waiting room of Middlemore Hospital in South Auckland because that is where the hand unit is for the best part of two days. Get seen. So I think I had it operated on 14 14 days post-accident um and then I've got it wired I've got it screwed I'm in a cast I think 10 days later I was allowed to get it all unstitched and go back to New Zealand I go back to home and I'm like, this is awesome. I'm, I'm home and it's winter and I get to go skiing. Let's go find a glove that we can put this thumb into. Nice. It was great. I was like, I was stoked

and it's like, I, I never get like, I've given up winters for such a long time and I love the mountains like this is this is my people that I grew up doing amazing and fun things with and now there's like three generations of families you know at this place where we grew up and you have a fundamental view of like the world an optimistic lens that things work out it's going to be amazing just around the corner, stay in it. I definitely have a mantra at the moment of, I have no choice other than to be relentlessly optimistic. Because if I deviate from that, it's really not good. So there's some reality in there that's like financial struggles, physical struggles. I think right now if I didn't choose to be relentlessly optimistic, the bad news stories would get to me. And you're here, you came to the States for what reason?

For the last, since the end of 2014, I've been working with a doctor who's in Long Beach who, and it was so serendipitous that we're like how we met, what it ended up being. That is one of the very leading figures in regenerative medicine. medicine and at that point in 2014 i could barely stand on a beach for 20 minutes without my knee being feeling like a swollen tennis ball that wouldn't move and if you like you've done a fair amount of stand-up right now um and you know from surfing that if your knee, like it's really hard on your joints. There's so much tweaking and torque force that goes through the stabilization of your lower limbs. It's crazy how hard stand-up is on knees. It's really hard on knees.

And I think I've had like maybe 11 knee surgeries on the same knee. You're a mad person. You know that? Like seriously. But that is at some level what it takes. Yeah. on the same day you're a mad person you know that like seriously but that is at some level what it takes yeah um and not all acls you know like i think you only get three or maybe four of those but yeah we've we've there was a lot of doubt sorry it was two i probably i've probably had like nine on my right knee i um have had two surgeries on my left broken tibia um but i mean it's just it's all the scars just tell stories

they make you better you've got a lot of them don't you yeah so working with sean um he was like i think we can work with this what's the name of the doc uh sean tyranny and he was one of the he really took to what regenerative medicine could do for people but i think the the real gem in this is he's a guru in ultrasound sonography diagnosis so um he was able to tell me everything it was wrong we went on to like we've regrown my acl my mcl my lcl my pcl my meniscus my patella tendon you've regrown them yep from stem cells uh so we've used where i have literally been a human test case for a lot of these different techniques over the years so i think the first time we started off with using the the very first forms of prp where it's painful as heck it's

as painful as surgery it just gets 100% better every day it brings huge amount of inflammation to the joint and then we progress to a variant of platelet-rich plasma which you walk out of the clinic that day and you can go back to what you're doing to using stem cell exosomes to using placental growth matrices. So it just depends on what the tissue generation, sorry, what is most appropriate for the tissue regeneration. So this time, because I have quite a few fractures and quite a lot of joint damage,

we've used a lot of joint damage. We've used a lot of growth matrices. So I think it's a placental growth matrix. Actually, I think it comes from a company in El Segundo of all places, just around the corner, and opening up hydrodissection of nerves to relieve pain to get um movement that's been severely inhibited um they use a technique called a stellate ganglion block which is game changing for like concussions and tbis and stress and ptsd, it's been fascinating. Like I have, I, I, I am literally a kid in a candy shop, just asking questions and learning about how do we help the body regrow

itself? Cause I've done a fairly good job of smashing it. Oh my God. So I don't know him. Love to meet him. it sounds like he's and you are onto something special there i think he's just you know when you come across people that are incredibly vocational about what they do and actually want to help since he like since i had this latest accident i'm not normally this accident prone, I swear. Um, you know, twice a week he was on to me, you, when are you coming back? And so I just kept in touch. And the reality is it would have been very difficult for me to, to travel before now. Um, so I'm like, I'm like, don't worry. I always make it at some point point and i'm just incredibly grateful for the one

sponsor that has stuck through me and partner that stuck through me with all of this stuff um is an airline which airline it's a heady no way oh yeah of course that makes sense yeah so that that gives you the ability to get over here as well that and i think they they buy into the bigger picture yeah of what we're we're doing like it's there's only so many times you can stand on a podium it's like how do we my love for for the doing and the adventure and sharing that with other people that's infinite that will never stop um so and i think i knew you know over a year ago that the challenge was about how do you transition out of being the best in your game into whatever the next chapter you know is going to be and it's so confronting yeah Yeah. No, no, no joke about that.

So as you have had many scars and emotional scars as well as physical scars, what is next? Like, where do you have your heart set? And you don't have to answer it, but like, what, what are you imagining? Right now? I, I get a piece of paper very frequently and I write diagrams about what is everything that is a potential possibility. And I have a lot of conversations with people from various different fields because that's one of the things that i'm really stimulated by is having really solid conversations i just i can get really excited about really quite boring stuff and the the crux of it is is that i don't have anything holding me down or in one place like

most people normally do go oh i have to find something here because that's where my family is and that's but this is I'm like the world is pretty much my oyster I just don't know where that oyster is hiding or what it looks like what form it may take so I'm just like right let's look at let's try and look in the periphery like let's take the blinkers off and look at lots of possibilities and literally take that leap of faith like I did however many years ago like I think back in 2010 when it was this very much a set of sliding doors and I took a fork in the road and all this stuff happened I love that thought that I can get really exciting I can get really exciting. I can get really excited about little things, about boring things. Yeah. That's probably a big part of your process that's allowed

you to really exploit talent. I think like when you get excited about little things that cumulatively can make big differences over a period of time, then you're going to be able, you can handle the mundane, boring stuff that is just part of the work. How do you unlock talent? How do you unlock potential? Like what is your recipe, program, thinking strategy? Like how do you help other people do the same i think you have to have though first of all i think you have to be in a position where you can have a conversation

where people will open up but when it's when you see their eyes light up and they may it may not come out in the words but it might come out in their body language about what they're truly passionate about and what they love to do or what they may have a vocation for and you start pulling on that and just trying to understand a little bit, ask the questions, give you a little bit more information about why that sparks them. And then let's say somebody is in the thing that they love to do. How do you help what,

based on your life efforts and your understandings, how would you help them get better? Like, I think one that you, I don't know if you'd ever say it to them before or to somebody, but what you said is like fall in love with the boring. You've got to you've got to love doing the work because the highs are so momentary and they can be so few and far between that unless you love the boring and the mundane on the daily you better go find something else

that you actually do like because this for this, you know, maybe months or years in between, that's kind of really hard. So what is going to be fulfilling, you know, and then this is really just when or if success or great things do happen, it's just an elevation or the cherry on the top. I love it. You know, find something that you love and do it as best you possibly can, right? Yeah.

Not to oversimplify it. But I think then understand it. The one thing that I learned from my experience is that I had all the talent in the world when I was 16, 17, 18. And for some reason I had catastrophic outcomes that were career ending. And when you're 16, 17, 18, that's really hard, you know, especially when you're 18, you're just, you know, you're finishing school, the world's at your feet. It's really hard to deal with. But I'm really glad that I got dealt that set of cards that early when no one else was going through it because it gave me so many more tools to cope later.

But then when I reflect back, I'm like, everyone has a different path. And I work with, I don't work, but I spend a lot of time around a lot of emerging athletes. And it's really hard when people are in those formative years of their career, especially towards the end of high school, through university, and for some reason someone experiences success and someone else puts in all the work and it's they're really grinding and life just doesn't really give them a break and i'm like everyone has a different path and gets out a different set of cards but just stay true to what

stay true to your why and what you love it all comes down to right now patience and acceptance and then do do you define or articulate mastery we're all a work in progress golly the body knowledge that you hold inside of you i I feel like we could, we have to unpack this three, four or five more times. So don't go ski off 1400 foot. Do not go and ski off blind cliffs and fall another 1400 feet. Wait, we didn't, we didn't get to that bit. What happened? That was, that was three months ago. That's, that was the, that was the catastrophic. That was the kicker. What happened?

I was in the back country and I misjudged a contour in the snow above. I know where the motor tubber shoots are. And I knew that it would be really sketchy in there on this particular morning. And I was with a friend from the States who like has a place in Wanaka. And it was just a mellow day with mates. Like, let's go find all the statues of chalky goodness. And I know that place like the back of my hand. I've been skiing there since I was three.

And I got bluffed as I went to turn to pop up over a ridge. What does that mean? That means that I misjudged the contours of the snow and what I thought was a compression that I would absorb with my legs turned out to be a hundred-foot cliff. And I got knocked out on the first impact i think i blew my hip out on that impact and then i was a full yard sale for another 12 to 4 900 feet the helicopter came to me and i was held back this is how long ago? This was the 30th of August. That is why I'm here seeing Dr. Cheney. Trying to put myself back together and not have to have either a hip replacement

or incredibly major open hip surgery and a re-dislocation. That's a possibility. Oh, yeah. I've been faced with a lot of bad news stories recently. Relentless optimism, patience and acceptance. And don't worry, I did climb on a bike at four weeks. It's what you can do, not what you can't do. Annabelle, thank you for your time and your sharing and your expertise and the vulnerability to allow insight and understanding

to how you're so exceptional so thank you thank you for having me and I will say that when I did that crossing recently you you and knowing what you've been able to do was a big part of that so thank you that is not a problem I have definitely thrown myself in a few deep ends and i can remember the first one that i did which was i was literally thrown in the deep end with two days notice to paddle from ibiza back to spain from where ibiza back to spain how long is that it's about 120 kilometers how many miles oh goodness i'm not good with that maybe like neither like maybe like 70 to 80 um i literally had to nurse the people throughout but it became a a thing of like how do you elevate other people to achieve a common goal

okay we could do this for days thank you you. Thank you. Thank you. Where can people find you? On the gram, probably a bit of stalker book. I have a website with some cool photos. What is the Instagram handle? At Annabelle Anderson. Two N's? A-N-N-A-B-E-L Anderson, A-N-D-E-R-S-O-N. And then your same website, same thing? Yeah, Annabelle-Anderson.com.

Good. And Facebook, same thing? I'm pretty sure it's quite easy to find. If you type in Annabelle Anderson, there will be a page which gives the ghost away. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

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