Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - Cassidy Lichtman, U.S. Women's National Volleyball Team

Episode Date: April 4, 2018

This week’s conversation is with Cassidy Lichtman, a former member of the United States women’s national volleyball team.At the age of nine, Cassidy developed a chronic pain disorder in one of her legs and was told that she might never walk again.Imagine waking up one day with pain. Pain you didn’t understand. Pain that had no cure, no matter how many doctors you visited.On one side of the spectrum there is the physical pain.Over a short period of time, that is usually more manageable.Observe it, notice it, choose not to respond to it and focus on something else.But what about when you have to wake up with it again the next day and the next day and the day after that.Therein lies the mental pain.How would you respond when it feels like you’ve lost control over everything that once seemed to be such a certainty?Cassidy is a fighter and has persevered her whole life.Despite unsuccessful efforts to treat the pain she re-learned how to walk and then began playing volleyball. She went on to be a two-time All-American for Stanford and spent five years competing with the United States National Team.In this conversation, Cassidy shares her experiences overcoming this pain, making the best of the opportunities given to her, and choosing to live her life doing what she loves, not letting her life be dictated by her suffering.There is so much to learn from Cassidy. She has an incredible spirit, she has perspective on what matters most, and she’s competed at the highest level of her sport._________________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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And just for perspective, to make a national team roster is extraordinary. And so she's one of those folks that have been on the national team for a healthy amount of time. But what makes it more engaging is that at the age of nine, Cassidy developed a chronic pain disorder in one of her legs, and she was told that she might never walk again. Just imagine that for a minute. Imagine waking up one day with pain, pain you didn't understand, pain that apparently all the medical professionals had no cure for, no matter how many doctors they visited and really looked for answers.

There was more question marks than any type of guidance, really. Part of that equation is dealing with the physical pain. And not to be insensitive anyway, but over a short period of time, most of us can manage physical pain. But it's that chronic pain that gets really tricky. And more importantly, it's the emotional pieces that hang with that or are coupled with chronic pain that becomes really challenging. And I lived it myself. I had a little bit.

It compares nothing to what this conversation is about. If you have chronic pain, if you know somebody that has dealt with pain, you'll really want to dial into this conversation because what she's done is extraordinary. Cassidy is flat out a fighter. She has persevered her entire life. And despite unsuccessful efforts to treat the pain, she's relearned how to walk. I mean, that was part of her journey to relearn how to walk. And from that point, she began playing volleyball and getting re-engaged in sports all the way through all the hoops and challenges you can imagine to become one of the team members on the USA national team. Is that rad or what? I mean, to be able to do that is unbelievable. And in this conversation, Cassidy shares her experiences of overcoming pain, making the best of the opportunities given to her

and choosing to live her life doing what she loves, not letting her life being dictated by her pain. And in other words, not, and there's a fine line here I'm going to suggest, that there's a relationship between pain and suffering and the two are different. And so she is not suffering, but she has pain. There's so much to learn from Cassidy. She has an incredible spirit and that will jump out in the early part of this conversation that is obviously threaded throughout. But she's developed and earned a perspective of what matters most. And she's competed at the highest level of her sport.

So this is a rare conversation because she's one of the few people that I work with from a team setting, from a team perspective, but didn't do individual work. So this was more of an educational relationship that she and I had from the USA National Volleyball Program. So this is a unique perspective, and I think you'll enjoy the nuances of it. And with that, let's jump right into this week's conversation with Cassidy. Cassidy, how are you? I'm good. how are you? I'm good.

How are you? I'm doing great. This is going to, I think, be a very unique, a very different conversation. And usually I have a sense of where conversations might go, but with you, I don't know. I never go in a conversation with you, assuming a destination. Okay, good. So a little backstory. We've known each other a long time. You were a member of the women's national team for indoor volleyball for America, for the United States. And we had the pleasure of knowing each other for a handful of years while you were competing on the world stage. So that has led me to understand something that's really unique about you.

So one of the best in the world at what you do, indoor women's volleyball, to make the national team in the United States is a significant marker of command of craft. And I just want to ask you one question before I take that thought any further. What is your relationship with pain? I would say we have a very close relationship. I don't love it. But I think I've, I've come to a place in my life where I can, I can accept its presence. Okay. That's a big deal because you've lived with it for a long time. Chronic pain. Yeah. In a way that some of the brightest minds in medicine haven't figured out what's going on for you. And so can you walk us through early years and what that was like growing up just to set the context for what I think is an extraordinary commitment to be able to pursue whatever it is that you're pursuing, and in your case, volleyball, in context with incredible pain.

So just shape the early years. Yeah, so early years, pre-pain. Yeah, I was a really active kid. I think sports were always a part of our lives. I grew up with an older brother, which I think shaped a lot of my childhood because that older sibling often, he gets into a lot of my childhood because that older sibling often, he gets into a certain activity and then I'm going to do it too. So if he's playing Little League baseball, it's like, I'm going to play Little League baseball with the boys. And he's

going to be on the swim team, I'm going to be on the swim team, whatever it was. So I think I was this kind of very interesting mix of very kind of quiet and shy, but also very fearless in a lot of ways. You know, I would climb anything that was really high and I would go into little caves and play tackle football out in the front yard with all the kids in the neighborhood. And I was the youngest and the only girl, like that's the kid I was, but I was also really quiet. Um, didn't talk much. Uh, I feel like I was kind of observing and learning from the world around me for much

of my childhood. Um, so I listened a lot. I watched people and, um, and I read a lot of books. Um, so I think most of my childhood I would say was spent either somewhere reading a book or somewhere playing a game. We were outside a lot, playing anything at the pool, at the park, in our front yard. What part of the world did you grow up in? I was born in San Diego and then I moved to Houston.

And we lived there for seven years before moving back to San Diego after that. Okay. And then how did mom and dad spend their time? My dad at the time was in the oil business. He had been a geologist and then kind of segued into that, which I don't think was like his passion, but he did that. That's why we moved to Texas. And then we moved back and he's been involved in education ever since. And my mom is a volleyball coach. And she was, when I was really little, those were my first memories are just being in a gym at her practices when my dad had to work. And so my brother and I would tag along to practice and we would each,

you know, eat dinner and then we'd get a ball. And so it wasn't like we brought games with us or toys or movies to watch. It was finish eating, go play some volleyball. And this is when I was, you know, four, five, six years old. Okay. So like classic gym rat, you know, sport, stick and ball sport atmosphere. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

And then was it like that? Okay. So there's lots of different ways that the texture of what that can be. It can be like, you're going to go play volleyball or it's like, Hey, get out of my, get out of my hair. But the only thing that's around are volleyballs because mom was a volleyball or other balls. And then, um, or it can be like, Hey guys, I love it. What can I go do after dinner? And your parents are like, well, do anything you want. And you chose a volleyball, you know, what, and I'm sure

there's more options, but what was the texture of your relationship with volleyball at that young age? I loved it. I mean, I was excited to go to the gym with my mom. I think the hardest thing for her was keeping us off the court because I just wanted to go play with the 12 and 14 and 16 year olds when I was six. So she always tells a story. She told me that I could only come on the court if I passed the ball, if I could pass the ball to myself a hundred times in a row, which I know older kids who struggle with that a lot who currently play. And so she told me that thinking it would keep me occupied for

at least an hour or a few days or the next time. And so I went off and did it. And so I came back and said, okay, mom, I did it. Now I get to go on the court. Like that was the deal. So like, like bump passing. Yeah, exactly. Okay. So, and you're, you're okay. Well, that's an interesting model, right? Because it's like, no, it's, it's not, no, don't get on the court. You're not good enough. You're not old enough. Maybe there was some of that in there, but there was this metric of like, if I'm skilled enough, then I get to go play.

And your mom said, listen, anyone out here pretty much needs to be able to be at this minimum threshold. And I, I'm sure it was like, Hey, go away, kid. You know, like I'm trying to work here, hey, go away, kid. Like I'm trying to work here. But not disrespectful to our sons and daughters in that way. But so that's an interesting model to grow with. If I'm good enough, then I've earned the right to go compete. Exactly. And to give a reachable goal. I don't know that she thought it was reachable at the time. But I think I was

somewhat unusual in that most kids aren't going to go away and focus on a task like that for a long enough time. So I think what she thought would have happened was I go try it, I can't do it, I get bored and stop. What actually happened was I go off and I just pass the ball to myself hundreds of times and then come back and say, okay, I'm ready to go, which I think ended up being who I was as a player, right? But it definitely started at that age of, you know, I have this thing, I'm going to do it and I'm going to do it well. Look at that model still at play for you. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. So then zoom forward to some of the thoughts that your parents installed at a young age for you. And I'm just trying to get the framework stuff, you know, context like, okay,

growing up in San Diego, a warm climate, Houston, you know, pretty warm climate, outside a lot, inside in volleyball gyms, your parents were more about performance-based rather than limits otherwise. And what other thoughts did they install for you at a young age? And that's a weird word, right? Install? But just to be almost aggressive in that term. I think, I mean, a lot of what I remember is from when I was a little bit older, which I'm sure they started out when we were younger. I mean, a huge part of our childhood was just how you treat other people, following the golden rule and all of that. And then what I remember getting into sort of middle school and he's older than me. So he gets to, you know, the harder grades earlier.

And he got his first B. It was the first time either of us had gotten anything other than an A in school. And I remember thinking like, okay, what? What happens now? Like going home and being ready for whatever my parents were going to say and not knowing what the consequences for that are. Did you think that there was going to be a consequence? I just didn't know. I wasn't like worried about it.

It was just, okay, what's going to happen now? And I think my dad may have actually said it. He was like, hey, you worked really hard in this class, to my brother. You worked really hard in this class. And, you know, if you do your your best, that's what we want. And you do your best and you get a B, awesome. Congratulations. Well done. And I was like, oh, okay. And then second story that relates, I remember getting a little, I was probably a little bit older, maybe my freshman year. My mom picks me up from school and I said, hey,

I got my history test back today. And she's like, okay, great. How'd it go? How'd you do? I said, oh, mom, I got 103 on it. She's like, wow, you got all the problems right? And I said, well, no, I missed a couple, but there was five points extra credit. So I got 103 and she was like, well, why'd you miss those? I was like, hang on.

I just told you got over 100 on its test and you're asking me why I did it. And she goes, no, no, no. I was just wondering what happened. And I was a little bit exasperated at the time, like, mom, give me a break here. But it was genuinely a process question. It was like, could you have done better or did you do the best you could and you got 103 so the the lesson in my mind kind of always growing up was like hey if you you do the best you can and you get a b awesome but don't get 103 when you can get 105 right yeah okay and how did mom because that can create like a lot of stress for people like um as um, as an example, you got 103, what's wrong with you? Yeah. That's a, that's certainly critical, right? Like you, you 105 is in your capability. Why did

you get 105? And it doesn't sound like that was the tone. So was there a way that she asked those questions or, cause it's more than just that one story yeah is there a way that she would pull that out of you was it soft was it aggressive was it intense they were never I mean I was I was pretty self-motivated so I never really got that from my parents of like why aren't you doing better um self-motivated me I I did I mean I think they instilled these lessons in me in some other ways earlier on. And so that when I, when I went to school or whatever I did, um, I wanted, I wanted to do my best and I knew if I wasn't, you, you know, you know, if you're going in and you're, and you're not giving everything you have on something or, or if you got the test back and you're like I could have done more

so I think that was a personal kind of competitiveness or whatever it was in me to go I didn't want to get that one wrong I could have done it better so when she was asking those questions it genuinely was like you know should you have studied more and that's why you didn't get it or you just didn't know the answer and And, you know, as we're having this conversation, I go, no, I just didn't know the answer. So it's not like she's, they're asking me things that I'm not thinking of myself, right? Like I always wanted to get everything right, but not to the point where I was anxious about it. Just like, I want to do it right if I can do it right. Okay. And you really feel like it was self-driven as opposed to the ecosystem

helped to cultivate that from you? Well, they definitely, I mean, my parents helped cultivate that and that they taught me to be that way, I think. Okay. But it wasn't a driving force from the outside going, you shouldn't get questions wrong, or you need to get better grades, or you need to work harder or anything like that. It was just, I expect to do well. And so I have to put in the work to do that. What do you think of the word perfection? I don't think that we can reach it, but I think we should always strive to. And I, so, so I think to me, yeah, it's like, yeah, that's the goal, but it's not what I'm going to measure myself against. I'm going to measure myself against what I can do.

I had a conversation recently and he's been on the podcast, Alex Hinold, who is one of the great free soloist climbers, the greatest possibly in the world, just climbed 3000 foot El Capitan without a rope. And I asked him about how he organizes his principles in his life. And he said, they're very clear and loosely held. And I thought that that was really fascinating because it's his thought was that I'm really clear about how I want to behave and I'm very intentional about my thoughts and my words and what I do and for example he's a vegetarian and he says but when I'm in different places of the world and there's no food and someone's

cooking up a big you know roast I'm gonna eat it yeah you know so And he's a conscious eater. So it's not this rigid drive for perfection. And then I hear you say, perfection is the pursuit, but I'm not holding myself to that standard. I'm holding myself to something else. Yeah, exactly. Okay. All right. Then drop us right into where pain happened and that intersection in your life. Everything's going great. Yeah. That's a healthy, standard child. And then I went to bed one night, like a week and a half before Christmas when I was nine. And I woke up the next morning and there was just this shooting pain going down my left shin area. And I tried to stand up and that made it hurt worse.

And so I think I hobbled around a little bit, and then we got a pair of crutches for me. And it honestly wasn't that big a deal. We went to the doctors. I mean, kids get hurt, and I was, again, super active, like borderline reckless in some ways physically. So everyone just figured that I had fallen or hurt it in some way so I went to the doctors and we did some x-rays and nothing showed up but they thought it was probably a hairline fracture or something and those often don't show up on the x-rays

so then we did an MRI and this is over the course of a week or two or three. And we did a blood test and more x-rays. And so as we're going through these, it started to get a little bit more odd. And again, I'm nine years old. I'm in these rooms with doctors. I don't talk to many people, so I'm definitely not talking to them. But I assume that they're going to give me an answer because this is, that's how the world works, right? Like you get sick or you get hurt and then you go to the doctor and they fix you. And that's, that was how I understood the world at that time.

So was it fear based or hope based or a little bit of both? It was, it was pretty neutral. I was like, okay, there, I'm just going to go and then they're going to make it better, you know, in the same way that I get an ear infection, they give me medicine or, you know, I, I fell and cut myself and they gave me stitches. Like there'll be some, it's unfortunate that this hurts, but there'll be a fix and then it's, then we'll be fine. And then as we went through those appointments, I'm watching the doctors and their faces and the tone of voice and all of that. And it goes from, yeah, this is totally fine. This

is normal to they're a little bit confused. They don't have the answers. And now we're not really sure what we're doing. So I think as that progressed, I got a little uneasy and then we just kept going to more doctors. I mean, that was so more tests and more tests. How many doctors over the course of your life, how many specialists have you been to? I have no idea. A lot. I mean, in the course of that one year alone, it had to have been somewhere between 30 and 50. I don't even working. And so we ended up going up to Stanford.

I was just fortunate because my uncle was the head of pediatrics there, which is that's a good person to know if you have mysterious conditions. And so we went up there to see some doctors. And I remember counting and we saw 10 in one day um and i was just sitting in the waiting room for the last one wondering if there are people who go their whole lives seeing less doctors than that you know and we got to so this is months like probably two months later at least uh so i've been on crutches this whole time in pain that whole time. And we get- Scale of one to 10, like the level of pain, is this a five? Is this a eight?

Like, where are you on that scale? I put it usually like at a four. Okay. Four to five. So- And is that, that's relative to your tolerance of pain? Is that, do you think that that's the same for other people's? Other people's? Probably not.

Probably not. Okay, you would say... I would say I probably have a fairly high tolerance. Okay, all right, good. Given my life. So yeah, so we'll put it at a four. So I got into the very last appointment that day and we went and there were three doctors there. And they finally were like, like okay we think we know

what's wrong you have this kind of rare nerve disorder called at the time it was called reflex sympathetic dystrophy now it's called complex regional pain syndrome or crps so that i was they're like that's that's what you have and I was like wow you know we have diagnosis and then the next thing they said was and there's no cure I was like well that makes things more difficult so I I think everything for me just kind of stopped for a second I was like there's no what do you mean there's no cure for this but then they kept talking like all these there's these treatments you can try. And so I went very quickly from, you know, getting hit in the stomach to, oh, well, again, there are doctors and they have answers.

So I was still in that mode of they're going to fix it. So they laid out this whole. And again, you were nine at this? Yes. Okay. And so this is a really important, I think, segment of your story because that, what you just captured, that nine-year-old with hope and a little bit of fear and the range of emotions, but, oh, well, there's a plan and coming back to like an action and a hope. Like, I think that that's an experience that all of us, not all, that's too big. So many of us experience on a regular basis, like, oh, I just got bad information. Oh my God, I feel a certain way. And this is rollercoaster and it touches that young

person, if so to speak, inside of us, that younger experience, but you were in it at that time. But I think for folks listening, they're like, yeah, I know, I know, I know that thing that, that heart wrenching piece of information that maybe it's a loved one, uh, hasn't been faithful or, you know, something happened in the stock market that, you know, you've lost a lot of money or fill in the blanks. Yeah. And then the moment where you're looking around the room, like, I mean, for me in that moment, it was somebody else out here has to have the answer. And so I'm looking around the room like, here are adults and their doctors. These are authority figures. They're telling me there are these options.

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everything I was on medications, I was in physical therapy to keep my leg from atrophying. Cause I hadn't put it on my foot on the ground in months. And then everything down to like electrical stimulation, hypnosis, acupuncture, like ran the gamut, Eastern and Western medicine, whatever we could find. I was trying it. And so it was this kind of constant loop of try the treatment for a while. It doesn't work. Stop that one. Try the next treatment for a while. It doesn't work. Stop that one. Try the next treatment for a while. It doesn't work.

Stop. Do the next one. And that was the next few months. And so I think, I don't know that there was a moment, but I remember the realization coming that as we went into these doctor's offices and we checked off treatment after treatment, I understood that we were getting to the end of the list and that they, I don't know if someone said it, but there was a very clear understanding that, for me at least, that they didn't think I was going to be able to walk probably ever. And I feel it feels like I should have had more emotion around that. But I think it was just like, I don't know how to comprehend this information. Because how do you, you know, how did I go from being this, you know, incredibly active child to five months later, these experts thinking that this is it. Are you sad for you at that time? Like as an adult now, are you, when you're reliving it, are you sad? Are you, is it compassion? Are you still reliving it in any ways? Like, what is your experience now as an adult? Is it more surgical? Like, this is just the story,

I'm going to say it. And there's a procedure to my story. I think in some ways I'm sad for me. Not because I think I was incredibly sad then. I just think it's sad that that happens at all. I mean, I think it's sad when I meet kids now who are dealing with those kinds of things. And I'm also kind of sad for that child that I was, that that wasn't the end of it, you know, that it was going to go on. So, so almost as if I was looking back and it was, and it wasn't me, it's like a different version of me. But yeah, I, I don't think it's like a

surgical thing. I think, I think many, well, I'm trying not to tell it in a surgical way. I think many times when I do, like if somebody just asked me about my story, I often just tell it and it's essentially here's my medical history, right? Like this was what happened. These are tests that we ran and this is what we did. And I don't connect emotionally to it. But yeah, when you talk about that actual moment when it's like these people don't believe that I'm going to be able-bodied ever again. I mean, that's... Okay.

Jeez. Okay. And then what happens next? Then we essentially run out of treatments. And so I was in physical therapy still, but we didn't have a lot more to try. And I'm living in this moment where people think I'm not going to be able to walk and all of that. And I decide that I'm going to do it anyway. So what happened was this is now June.

So this started in December. It's been over six months, about six months. And I'm about to get out of school. I mean, it's the last week of fourth grade. And I decided that on the last day of fourth grade, I was going to walk. But I didn't decide that in April or May and let my physical therapist know and progress up to it or anything like that. I decided the week before. And I think I just, I think I just said it like kind of honestly, kind of on a whim. And then that was it. It was just, it was going to happen. So I was excited about it until the night before. And I like, you know, I went to bed that night

and then I, I think I maybe like a half hour later or something, I got up, went out, hopped out to the living room or whatever where my parents were. And they looked at me and were kind of like, what's going on? And I just lost it. Like just sobbing. And I can probably count on one hand and have fingers left over the number of times that I cried in that six month period when I was when I was on crutches like through all the doctor's visits and the tests and the blood draws and needles and everything like I was not like I said I was always kind of a stoic kid I I wasn't super emotional. So I think when I just started losing

it in the middle of the living room, my parents were like, whoa, what's happening? So I remember sitting on the couch between them and them going, you know, it's okay. You don't have to do this. You know, it's all going to be fine. Like just trying to calm me down. And I think in my head, there's a few, mostly I was just really scared. You know, I was scared because it was going to hurt. You know, there's a reason I wasn't walking. And I was scared because what if everyone was right? Up until now, I can say that someday I'm going to walk and you can't prove that wrong. But what happens if I try and then I can't do it? Then all of a sudden these people are right. That that's a massive insight

because that's one of the reasons that people pull back from trying hard. Yep. It's a self-esteem saving mechanism. And what we end up doing is faking it a little bit, trying less so we can reserve inside of our own head that we didn't put it all on the line. That's why like college kids might show up to the midterms or finals and hung over. Well, if I would have been fresh and studied, I could have done well on this test. And so that was the mechanism, right? To save some self-esteem as opposed to laying it all out there. And I think that this part of what I'm hearing right now, this part of your story is something that so many adults and aspiring adults, meaning adolescents,

I guess, can learn from. Like, that's a real fear. Yeah. Putting it all out there because what if it doesn't work? Exactly. And that playing it safe and playing it small is something that is, it's these golden handcuffs, these invisible, you know, well, we'll just keep that one, that one analogy. It's like a golden handcuff. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think there is a second, so I think, I think that was one of the biggest layers

to it where it was, if I don't try, then I can't prove them right. And if I try and I can't do it, then I have to accept that this is going to be my life. And I think the second layer was like the, it was almost kind of taking away the safety net. Because up until this point, I was like, somebody else is going to fix this. You know, the doctors know what they're doing and all the adults. And somebody's going to come and save me, essentially. And I was in that nice childhood uh worldview that all problems have answers we just you know somebody has them and so this was just kind of stepping out like just taking a

sledgehammer to my own worldview and just stepping out into this very unknown space of like what happens if somebody doesn't have the answer and then I don't and what happened what happens if I walk out here and I can't do it and I can't handle it what am I going to do then so I think it was kind of those two moments of like do I just step out into the void and hope that I can handle whatever comes next what did your parents say that I can handle whatever comes next. What did your parents say? Like I said, they were like, hey, you don't, I mean, I wasn't vocalizing these issues.

I was just crying. But they, no, they were like, you don't have to do this. You know, nobody's going to make you. It's fine if you're not ready. I think my parents were always, I think one of the best things that they did for me was that they've always let me make my choices, you know, and they, they're supportive, but not in the, you know, cheerleader way of like, you're amazing and everything you touch is gold. Just go off and be great. But like, they're very realistic about what, what is out there and what, if, you know, like, this is going to be really hard and laying out exactly what that choice means

and then saying, okay, you know, go ahead. I think the best, the best example going back just for a second to when I, when I was on crutches, uh, we, we went to, um, Yosemite in for like spring break or something. So while there was snow on the ground and we had had this trip planned for a while and my parents asked me, you know, do you, do you want to go on this? It's okay if you don't. I said, no, no, I want to go. So we went and you know, it's, it's an outdoorsy kind of place, like not ideal for a small child who can't walk. And we were going to go one day. They wanted to go hike Vernal Falls. So it's, you know, you're going up a mountain and it's not a super long hike, but it's kind of steep.

And again, up a mountain and I couldn't walk. And they were like, do you want to go on this you don't have to mom will stay back with you in the lodge or whatever that's totally fine and I said no I want to go and so we went and hiked up a mountain and I when I tell that story every once in a while when it comes up, I feel like the reaction from most people is like, why did you do that? And it always confused me. I was like, I don't understand. What do you mean? Why did I do that? Why does anyone hike a mountain? Because I wanted to. And just because I had one good leg to do it, I don't think that's a valid reason not to go on the hike. This is teaching about your relationship with pain as well.

Yeah. So, okay. All right, good. So we got some gems in here. And then go back to like the last day of school. Yeah. So I, you know, cry for a long time. My parents say, it's okay, you don't have to do this. And at some point I stopped crying or mostly stopped crying. And I said, no, I'm doing it. Because I hadn't, honestly, that wasn't, I wasn't sitting there deciding. I had already decided this was me dealing with that decision. So the next morning we get up and I'm ready.

And we go drive in the car to school I just didn't I just left my crutches at home I just didn't bring them and so like I remember stepping out of the car onto the sidewalk and putting my foot on the ground and it hurt um but I did it and then I did it again and this was not I was not walking this is this was like a very like a hop hobble kind of situation and I could hop for days at this point you know I was I had a very strong right leg. So I hobbled around school that day. But it was empowering, I think, in a lot of ways. Awful in some ways. But I did it. And that wasn't the end of the crutches. I mean, I still use them to get around.

But we started weaning off of them. And then I actually did go back to physical therapy and do kind of the more full progression, relearning how to walk properly and not hobble around and limp and everything. Do you think that it's pretty clear to you that if people want to change your life, it starts with a decision? Yeah. I don't think there's no moment when you're ready for something like that you know you can't just push a button and all of a sudden it's like yeah okay I'm ready to go I think so how do you how do you go from that state to playing volleyball again uh really quickly actually so I so I had started walking and then honestly it was probably a couple

months later like so this was it must have been four four or five months after that that I went back to try out for my first team so I I played on my first team when I was 10 years old and I don't, I don't know that I can say the exact progression. Like I went to physical therapy, I was walking again. And in my mind it was like, I can walk, I can play volleyball. That those two things went together. It didn't seem like more of a progression because I had always assumed that I was going to do that, that I was going to play. And this was just kind of an obstacle in my way that at one point I was physically unable. But as soon as I had both feet on the ground, it was like, Hey, that's the next step.

And was there pain at that point? Oh yeah. Um, there was never, there was never not pain. So since age nine and I don't know how old you are now, but, um, you know, 20 some years, like, um, what, what, how many days have you been pain-free or how many days, like, what does that picture look like for you? There isn't, there is no pain-free it's, um, there's a baseline level of pain that's, that's around that sort of three to four and that doesn't go away. And then it just goes up from there. So some things make it worse, like walking made it worse, standing on it for long periods

of time, anything where I'm on my feet, running, jumping, kind of all the things that we did in volleyball, really. And you're on the national team. Just to make it on the national team means you're probably one of the top, I don't know, 30 in the world. What was the level of pain there? Intermittent? Obviously chronic, but would it ebb and flow? Yeah.

So it just kind of spikes up from that baseline. So on any given day, if it's a you know a really good day then it's at that three or four if it's a really bad day then it's up it's up at like an eight if it's like the worst day ever it's maybe getting higher than an eight what is an eight what is a six six and eight feel like somewhere in that range? Yeah, I would say six is like, this is I'm having to really focus to get through. And eight is like, I'm having to really focus to walk. Like I have to, this is going to be weird, but sometimes I have to think about how to walk properly

if I'm tired and it hurts a lot, which is crazy. Cause I'm supposedly an elite athlete. Um, but, but that's the point where it gets to, right. It's like, um, like what, like I remember being in college one time and just looking at a set of stairs and like tearing up. Um, so, so yeah, on any any given day it could be anywhere in that range but you get out of when you get out of bed in the morning what does a three or four feel like that's that baseline like when you put your feet on the ground what's what does that feel like at honestly at this point i'm just it's just kind of there and annoying you know because it's just it's been that way for so long that i'm not like oh wow this hurts a lot it's um

it's kind of like I think I think it's kind of like when people have a ringing in their ears forever but you know obviously more painful so I would say like trying to think of the right imagery for it. Like a bruise, kind of, like a really bad bruise. Or like light shin splints is probably the most accurate thing just because it's in that area. So I would say that my general state is shin splints. And then it goes up from there to like, ah, I feel like I have a knife in my shin. Or sometimes it's a little bit blunter where it's like, ah, I feel like I have a knife in my shin. Or sometimes it's a little bit blunter where it's like, you know, imagine if somebody took a hammer and just hit you in the shin really hard, but like not that moment, but not that moment when they hit you, but like right

after that, when you have like the ache of it. How did you get through practice? Like how did you how did you get through practice like how did you do it um you know how i did it like breathing and focus just honestly it's just intense an ability to just intensely focus which come you know when i was three years old and had to pass 100 balls in a row or whatever it was but yeah i think there i think the secret is that pain doesn't require a response. So if I'm in the middle of practice or in the middle of weights or something, and all of a sudden the pain spikes up, I can just take that and notice it and say, wow, this is awful. But I'm busy right now. And I need to go do this other thing. And so I'm going to focus on my breathing. I'm going to focus on counting

the reps of these squats. I'm in practice, I'm going to focus on, you know, the ball and talking to my teammates, whatever it is. So that's, it's not like the pain's not there. It's just I'm in practice, I'm going to focus on, you know, the ball and talking to my teammates, whatever it is. So that's, it's not like the pain's not there. It's just, I'm, I'm holding it in a different space and like, I'll deal with this later. And I don't think that's something that you can do for an infinite amount of time. Like it takes, it's, it takes a lot of energy and it takes a toll. You know, I get out of practice and it it's amazing how I think my body knows like the moment that I'm done. And it kind of drops all of the walls and it's just like everything hits. And so, yeah, I get out of practice sometimes and just go back to my apartment and be like, I'm out.

I'm in my bed and I can't conceive of doing anything else. Like it's very difficult for me to think about what am I going to have for dinner. But for that fixed period of time, for that two hours or four hours or five hours that I'm in the gym, it's like I'm here to do this thing and the pain isn't allowed to interfere with that. 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. And Cozy Earth has become a new part of that. Their bedding, it's incredibly soft, like

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There's lots of career paths. There's lots of passions. You know, like there's things you can do. Like what? Why did I choose this one? Yes. I mean, volleyball is like incredible deep squats on a regular basis and jumping as high as you possibly can. Yeah.

So like why that sport? I love it. Of all the different ways. If you want to yeah so like what why that sport i love all the different if you wanted to be an athlete why not something else um yeah i don't know that there were a lot i mean maybe if like i was a swimmer that would help i've always i've loved volleyball forever i mean like i said my mom brought me in the gym when i was a baby probably and it's just something i i've always known about myself. This wasn't to have mom's approval. No. That's why I was asking early on, like, what, was there anything? Yeah. My parents never pushed me into it or my brother and, but we were around it. Right. And I was around, I was around other sports too.

We played other sports, but it was, it was just the thing that I always knew about myself is that I was going to do, I was going to do this. And, and I think as I grew up, it was just kind of more and more layers of, of reasons why I wanted to play. And I mean, I, I, I love all being a part of a team and all of that, which you can get in other sports, but, but this was the one that I, I always assumed. I mean, like I said, as soon as I started walking, I was like, Oh, of course. Even when I wasn't walking, I was playing. We would sit on the ground and set back and forth. So yeah, it's just always been a part of me. That's incredible. Okay. What are some takeaways that you have

about how to get through difficult things? I think that the easy ones that you just laid up here are observe it, notice it. You don't have to respond to it. Focus on something else, drive your attention somewhere else and, um, you know, lock into the most immediate task at hand. Okay. How do you deal with the other part about waking up in the morning and dealing with it again? What is that first thought? What are the other processes that you use? Yeah, I's yeah i think you're right there's two different sort of tracks one is one is how do you deal with the pain in this moment and the other thing is how do you deal with living with pain um which is a different a different animal in a lot of ways and i I think that I, I've gone through a lot of different places with that.

We kind of skipped over a little bit of college, which was probably when I had to deal with it the most. I think by the time I got the national team, like I was pretty well trained, not that it was easy, but I kind of knew what I was doing. And at that point in my life, it was pretty much only volleyball. I mean, I had friends and did all that, but I didn't have to go out and do anything else after. In college, it was different.

I'm also interested. How did you get to Stanford, one of the top universities in the world? Yeah. I don't know. It was amazing because it's one of the top universities. It was one of the top programs. And I was good when I was coming out of high school, but I wasn't like the top, top of my class. I was probably, you know, top 20 to 25 recruits in my year.

For context, how many championships in volleyball has in the last, I don't know, 10, 15 years has Stanford won? Well, we actually went, yeah, we've been in the finals a lot, in the final four a lot. We're tied for the most championships overall. I think we have seven tied with Penn State. At the time I came in, we went to our, I think, third final four in a row. We've made every NCAA tournament that's ever been held. Yeah, I mean, it's a monster of a thing. Yeah, it's amazing.

And you're not sure how you get in. Well, I, I mean, I, I, I always, you always have that question, right? Like the little, like a little bit of an imposter syndrome of like, why me out of all of these people? And I even asked my coach that after my senior season, I was like, I just want to, I just want to understand this. What, why would you choose me? But I think, you know, I just want to understand this. Why would you choose me? But I think I wasn't physically dominant as a player, so I didn't stand out as some other players do, and that was the case when I was on the national team also. I'm six feet tall, which is very tall for a normal person and not very tall for elite volleyball players.

I'm fairly athletic for normal person, but the people I played with, they're, you know, freak athletes. They're amazing. So I think really what it was is that I, I was a good volleyball player and not, I mean, that sense of the whole game, like I was a very, very unusual player. Actually, I went to college and ended up playing, I think, at least four positions, which is, I mean, it would be like a football player going to college and being like special teams the first year and then the quarterback and then a wide receiver and then defensive line. Like it's just like, that's essentially what I went and did, which is

fairly unheard of at that level of sport now. But so I think that's how I got there as a volleyball player. And then I did well in school. And so I wasn't taken off the list because of grades. So I think that that's helpful. And then I got there and I don't, I think what some people have told me is like the hardest part about Stanford is getting in so once you're there you can kind of choose the path that that works best for you and I ended up finishing pretty much in my third year and then getting a master's in my fourth year and obviously playing volleyball throughout so yeah but that, but it was a very different experience. I think it's a huge jump physically for anyone going from high school to college.

And I knew that it was going to be harder for me, and I don't think I knew how hard it was going to be. And so my first year, I got through season and it was fine. And the off season is really when you just get destroyed physically um and you're in weights all the time and conditioning and and all of that and i remember just getting to a point in the middle of my freshman year and going i don't i don't know what's going to happen next. Like, I think that there was, like I said, there was this just kind of baseline level of pain and then it'll spike up from there. But at this, at that point it was just like, it's had spiked up and then just stayed.

So it was like this whole kind of new, new baseline that was elevated. And that was, then it was spiking up from that new baseline. And all of a sudden it's like what if I call it the pain ladder so this wasn't a new thing for me it's like when I started walking it hurt more than when I wasn't walking and so then I adjusted to that and then I started playing volleyball and that hurts a little bit more and I adjust to that and then I get older and I'm lifting and playing at higher levels and that hurts more and I adjust to that. This was just like a big jump up to the next rung of this ladder. And I was looking up at the next step going, if I get to that one, I don't know if I can sustain that. So the choices that I saw in front of me were, hey, I can back off a little bit and it'll hurt less, but I won't be as good as I could have been. I'll never know how good I could have been as a volleyball player.

Or I can push through this and I'll be the best volleyball player I can be, but I don't know what's going to happen or if I can deal with that level of pain. And what if I can't? I don't really know where I go with that. And how would you work with that narrative in your head? That, what do you mean? How would you work with that narrative? I literally sat down and was like, okay, what, what am I kind of had a conversation with myself of like, which way do you want to go? I don't, and I search, like I searched for loopholes and how I could figure this out in another way. And

I got to the point where I was like, there are no loopholes. Which one is it? And what I decided was that I can't do it halfway. I can't walk into the gym every day and look at my teammates knowing that I'm not giving them everything that I have. I can't get to the end of the season. And we had, you know, my freshman year, we had just lost in the, in the national championship. I was like, I can't, I can't get to the end of the season and lose the last match like that. And then look back and say, oh, I could have done more, but I didn't because I was, I was afraid. What is the worst thing a coach or a parent or a teammate has said to you? I don't know. It wasn't about them though. It wasn't about what they were going to say.

I didn't, I, I honestly, I remember thinking this, I was like, they, they have no right to judge me for either of these choices because like, I don't think anyone has any right to judge me if i don't want to get out of the bed in the morning like i this hurts and it's real and the choices that i make are up to me but nobody can tell me that i'm not doing enough like i'm already doing more than i'm supposed to be so did you ever get second guess like if if it's real or not, like, Oh, she's making it up. Um, when I was, when I was little and first going to the doctors. Yeah. I didn't, I didn't enjoy those doctors. Um, but not, but never from my teammates or my coaches, mostly because I mean, honestly,

most of them didn't know about it until after they had known me for a while. Um, okay. And I've, I've played with people who never knew, not in college. didn't know about it until after they had known me for a while. Okay. And I've played with people who never knew. Not in college. Because you wouldn't talk about it. Yeah. Yeah. What is the most supportive types of things that people would say that did know about it?

One really important thing that somebody told me, one of my teammates, when I was actually going through this process, when I was trying to figure out what I was going to do she was a couple years older than me and and I had finally said something about it like hey I'm kind of struggling and she was like kind of off-handed like not even intending for it to be a deep thing but she was like hey you're not alone and and then kind of went on with the conversation and it was just like, Hey, you should go talk to the strength coach, you know, let them know, whatever. But in my mind,

it's just kind of like echoed because it didn't not that I, not that I didn't have a support system or anything like my parents were amazing. Everyone around me was great, but I didn't talk about myself. I was alone so that I could, so that I had to be the one to, to deal with it. And so in that moment, her telling me that I was like, Oh wow, I did. You're right. And I knew that, but I didn't know. Well, we haven't even gotten to the part where I got undiagnosed.

But I think that there's just like signals cross and I don't know where or how. But there's just a lot of confusing things about it that that don't follow the textbook i think that's the problem i think that my body is not the textbook and none of our bodies are but mine is especially not apparently um and so i don't i don't really know how to conceptualize it because i don't know where the issue is or enough about how brains work to figure out what's actually happening. Okay. But the way that they explained it to me that was most helpful, even when I was nine, was like, there's pain signals that are just being misfired constantly. And so I think now that pain has just become the default. And so my body just understands that pain is normal and I don't know how to convince it that it isn't. Wow. And what is the hardest part? I don't imagine it's the physical pain, but I don't want to assume that.

But what's the hardest part? It's not the physical pain at all. It's the helplessness, I think, and the lack of control over any of it. So I, and I dealt with, I, it's come up many times in my life, I think, but I remember my sophomore year in college getting to the point where it had gotten really, really bad. Um, and that's the point when I went back to the doctors, I hadn't, I hadn't gone to the doctors in like 10 years. Um, and I went back, but it was in that year, my junior year, where it kind of came to a head and I finally went to my coaches and said, hey, I need to take something out. We ended up taking out conditioning and some of the heavier lifting.

But that's not something that I did. Like I was very adamant that this wouldn't affect my, my life as much as, as much as it possibly could. Actually, that's an important moment. I, when I couldn't walk or right, maybe right when I started walking, I, I promised myself when I was, you know, 10 years old, this is going to affect my life as little as possible. how I walk up and down stairs and everything. But I think that I had sort of carved out volleyball as like the one thing that I had roped off. As, you know, you can touch everything else about my life, but you can't have this. And so the moment when it started to creep into that and I, and you know, it was threatening like, hey, maybe you're not going to do these drills. You're not going to do this part of the conditioning or whatever it was.

Like I, it kind of sent me spiraling a little bit where all of a sudden, all of those little things that I'd always just kind of thrown off as being part of this. It's like every one of them was just kind of another jab. And I felt really part of this. It's like every one of them was just kind of another jab. And I felt really out of control. So when you got that uppercut, and you're so put together, right? Like, it's just the way that you even speak about it and the clarity, like, where's the wild side? Where's the other side where it's like, and when you were spiraling, did you get wild? Did you get crazy? You know, was that a part of you that is not explored? It's just not, I don't know, it doesn't do anything for you. Like, what about that part of you? Well, I think, I think that it, like, take this moment, for example, I really, I get really out of control. And then i get really out of control and then and really out of control is

just like in my in my head i get i wild so wild yeah i'm not gonna i'm not gonna say why i don't know about wild but i got to the point where i was like i yeah like i felt like i was in a spiral like i don't know what's what's happening so it's like inner panic is what happens for you yeah but it's not but it's also not not. So I think the key is that probably the key to all of this is that I respond much more than I react to things. So in that moment when that started happening, somehow I found the presence of mind to step step out and go, okay, like let's evaluate this. So even in that moment where it's like I can feel my thoughts spiraling, like I don't have to go spiral with it. I can sort of observe the spiral for a second and be like, okay, what do we do next? How do I get out of this? I can't tell you like – I just can't tell you how often I think about the science and the practices of the entire field of psychology and probably much of the spiritual traditions.

And like that is it. You are not your thoughts. Yeah. Get to know them. Yeah. Well, think about – They're really important but you are not your thoughts yeah get to know them yeah well they're really important but you are not your thoughts yeah but consider and you're not your body exactly like it's the crazy exactly

and i don't know where this if this was just always how i was i kind of think it was but also you look at sort of the training almost of most of my life it's like how how would my life work if everything that i felt showed on my face you know or or i got caught up in every feeling like my my default feeling is pain you'd be tormented right exactly it's not funny because some people you look at their faces and you can tell. Yeah. You can see joy and happiness and you can see torment and angst. Yeah.

So it's not like I'm hiding things. It's just like, what am I going to choose to engage with, I guess? So in that moment when I was feeling really out of control, I, I was like, okay, let's, let's step back and think about this and like, you know, really game it out. Okay. What, what don't I have control over? I don't have control over the pain. I don't control how much it hurts or when it hurts worse. I can't make it stop, which is, which there's definitely like emotion tied to that. And there've been a lot of, a lot of moments throughout my life where it's like that, that exact feeling is takes over. But, but what I got to was, okay,

if those are the things I don't control, what do I control? And what I realized or re-realized in some ways was I, I can control what the pain does to me. Like it's going to affect who I am. It has affected who I am, I'm sure in many, many ways, but there's always a choice in that. So whether it makes me afraid or stronger, if it makes me a worse volleyball player or a better volleyball player and all better volleyball player, and all these different things. And so in that moment, it was like, I'm going to control my response to the situation. And that in and of itself kind of puts me back on steady ground. What is the message or the guiding thought that you would want to have for other people that are listening?

Like if you could send one message or you could send, um, you know, a handful of guiding thoughts, what would it be? I think there's two really key thoughts that have always, that have always stuck with me and, and are probably the reason that I got through any of anything that I went through. One was that, um, that I learned as I went was that I was going to be okay. You know, I, there were moments that were really, really difficult. I mean, I, I remember like a two week at least period when I was in college where every night I get back to my dorm and just cry. And not out of like, because I was upset, but I was just so overwhelmed by life and just doing all of this. But I think even in those, I think in that moment, it would have been really easy to keep spiraling downwards.

And there's, there are a lot of, there's a huge correlation, which I'm sure you know about between chronic pain and depression. And I somehow avoided that spiral. And I think a lot of it was because I, I watched myself go into sort of darker moments and then come out of them. And I realized that, that, that that was always going to be the, that I can't see it right now, but I'm going to smile again. I'm going to laugh again. I'm going to see my friends and I'm going to play volleyball and things are going to be good. And so I think that was a really, really key insight for me, like whether or not I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, it's there and I'm going to make it through um so that was the first thing

like whatever happens next I can handle it um and then the second thing and I don't know if if this came from my parents or who it came from but I think it it essentially boils down to gratitude but it's about perspective like there Like there are a thousand things every day that are going on in my life and most of them are wonderful. And if you ask me on my worst day, you know, mid breakdown, what I think, I'm going to tell you that my life is fantastic because I think I have the choice of what to look at. So, I mean, every day I get to wake up and go out and be who I want to be and create things and meet people and help people

and sometimes play volleyball and do all of these amazing things, and I hurt, and that sucks. But it's like if I can hold the pain in one hand and hold everything else in the other it's like I just have to learn how to how to fix my gaze cool thought is there a phrase that guides your life there's a few. The first is that I think about in regards to sort of this situation is like I want to openly and consciously love life. I think that's when I thought at some point I turned around and realized where I was. I think probably like just post-college of like, wait, I did that. How did, how did that work? And so I, I had a moment where I was like, how, how did I do it? How,

how did I get through the pain and get through all of that and, and enjoy myself? Like, I don't want to act like I was miserable or depressed. Like I loved college. I loved high school. I've loved all of my life. And I think a lot of it is because there is always going to be pain and there's always going to be love. And it's about choosing, consciously choosing, choosing love. And that's why I played volleyball to answer your earlier question. It's like, is this a thing that hurts me? Yeah. But it's also the thing I love to do more than anything in the world. And I think in my life, I want to build my life so that I end every day feeling like the love outweighed the pain.

And that's part of what volleyball did for me. And it's not just volleyball. It's the people that I love. It's doing other's not just volleyball. It's the people that I love. It's doing other things that I love. It's music. It's books. It's any of those things that you kind of let consume you enough that it really weighs on that scale of the love versus the pain. So I think that's always been a big thing for me of like how do I build my life around that and then the second the second phrase

that I think guides me right now is leave it better than you found it and it being everything like the the programs that I've been a part of you know at Stanford at USA the company that I'm at now the the people that you meet like I want them to leave feeling like they were better for having had that interaction. The world, once I leave it, whatever it is, I want anything that I touch to be better than it was before I interacted with it. If you were to have the chance to sit down with someone who is a master of their craft, what would be the one question that you would ask them? What I want to know. I want to know, like, what's the thing about what they do that is really, like, is the most difficult and that people won't that people wouldn't know

you know like it's not hey i'm going in the weight room and i'm doing squats that's hard but what's the thing that's most difficult and what's the thing that that you love the most that people wouldn't know about your your craft is that because you've kept your condition private for so long that you know that there's something inside you that most people don't know is that why you're interested in that or is there something else i think it's more i'm really interested in um like the things i think there's there's so many layers of things so like when when you watch a volleyball game it's different than when i went to volleyball game in the same way that would be different you know you having a conversation with someone and you have a conversation with someone like we're trained in different ways or if we both

went to a ballet like I don't know anything about that but if I sat next to a ballerina we would be having a different experience so it's it's almost like uncovering those layers like I want to know what people see out in the world I think there just, there's just endless amounts of beauty out there. And we only experience a part of it in the thing that we're really expert in. And so I think there's, there's beauty to be found in whatever craft the person that you're talking to is involved with that, that I just don't know enough to see. That's awesome. All of this is incredible. So I think I'd love if we could hit like some, some mindset principle questions in if the, yeah,

if there's a handful of mindset principles, calm, confidence, focus, imagery, routines, goal setting, you know, those types of bucket of basics, do you use them uh yeah yeah arousal regulation being a big one i would imagine i think yeah i think i i didn't know that i used them until i met you because let's be really clear on that like you and i didn't do like deep uh work like i worked with the team and so that was more psychoeducational in that way and but that was the first education i'd had on the subject and so and so when you taught us about those things in the context of of playing volleyball

i remember having a kind of volleyball moment of like wait i'd i'd know that i've done all these yeah like i did that when i was 10. That's how I learned. That's really cool. So if you were to help a 10 year old start their path towards some sort of inner command or mastery, would you say, hey, listen, little kid, it's really important that you get your confidence right? Or is it about arousal regulation? Or would you start them off on focus? Would you start them on imagination and imagery? Setting goals? I kind of doubt that. Yeah. Well, I think with little kids, I would probably start them on confidence because I think self-talk, there's just an epidemic of

just terrible self-talk. And that's having worked with a lot of little kids now that I coach some. But if we're talking about what's going to get you to the top level, all of them are obviously crucial. But to me, I would answer focus. And I think it's kind of cheating because I think focus gets you everywhere else. So if you look at all these other things, what disrupts the calm and the confidence and everything, it's not being present, right? It's worrying about the past and the future. What did I just do that was wrong? What was the mistake that I just made? Or what are people going to think if I don't do this right now?

So to me, that focus in the moment gets rid of all of those questions and just allows me to do what I'm doing. And then what's one way that you would suggest people train it? I mean, there's lots, obviously, but what would be the one that you would say hey start this way what would be the thing i i think um i don't know this is exactly what you're looking for but i think especially in sports it's like a reframing of uh the competitive mindset. I think to me, a lot of people think that being competitive is being the loudest or the angriest or whatever, having the biggest reaction to what just went wrong. And probably just given my nature, that's never been how I felt about it. I always felt like being competitive is doing the most that you can to win and that usually doesn't involve uh a lot of like

screaming and all these other things so it involves you know getting on to the next task as quickly as possible um so the way that i this is kind of specific to volleyball but i'm sure it can apply to other places the way that i framed it i remember being like, uh, probably 15. And this is around the time that, that blocking becomes a thing. Cause you're tall enough in volleyball and it, it's a big, uh, momentum shifter, like energy shifter in, in our sport. So that, I mean, you can imagine those things in, in other sports too. And like a sack in football, I think would probably be similar, like a defensive move that just shifts all the momentum. And so a sack in football, I think would probably be similar, like a defensive move that just shifts all the momentum. And so I remember watching that happen and then watching the faces

of the girls who just got blocked and the body language of them and seeing how it affected them one point or two points or three points later and the rest of their team. And I looked at that and went, I'm not going to do that. I want to, I want to figure out how to not do that. And so what I decided was that for any given point, there were really two points available. One was in the play that we just had. Okay. I hit a ball, um, and got blocked. We lost the point. The second point is that space right after that, if I let them see that it affected me, if I put my head down, if I walk away, if I get frustrated, I lose the point. But if I keep my head up, shoulders back, I walk back and I want the next ball, then I win that

point. And in that moment, it was just about blocking, but it became kind of how I thought about reacting within the game. Oh, the space between. It's the space between. It is, it's so good. Yeah, I just think there's this misconception that like the game, especially for us that exists, like once the whistle blows and then the whistle stops it, it's a start and stop thing. It's like, no, the game is three hours long. Plus, you know, including time before and a little bit

of time after. So I'm going to be in it that whole time. And so whether or not I just won the point that just happened, I'm going to be beating them at the game that they don't even know we're playing. I love it. It's so good. I mean mean you're just loaded with like really rich insights and that one i bet is like one that people are gonna be like oh i really like that one but let alone like all the 15 other things about how to orientate yourself to do difficult things it's like yeah yeah so awesome okay i want to give you some quick hits um street smart or analytical where do you index uh i think they're same. I think it's just about paying attention. Slow paced environment or fast paced environment for learning.

For learning fast paced. And then I want to go back and, and like get it set in my head on my own in a slower pace. Rule follower or risk taker? I, this one's, this one's hard for me because I think that there are some rules that you should follow because you know, it's like I get in a car and I put my seat belt on because that's a good rule and it's a stupid risk but I also was it was an elite athlete and had no business being one so I think it's like I think the way that I think about it is more what do I want to do it's what my parents taught me what What do you want to do? Look at what that actually means. And then is that risk something that I'm willing to give? And if so, then once I've committed to that, then I'm 100% in. Love it. Intellectually competitive or physically competitive?

You could be high on both, low on both, middle of the pack. Intellectually. I want to beat you because I outsmarted you. I wasn't physical enough to be physically competitive cool are you more self-critical or self-positive um a positive i i mean i self-honest but i never i never tell myself that i'm that i'm like awful or i or i suck or whatever i believe that yeah yeah i very i think i have very very honest but positive self-talk there's a there's a phrase that's um we a couple coaches have up the clc hawks with some players and and they're just the most amazing competitors like unbelievable competitors

and sometimes we come back and say um man he's so positive and some coaches will certainly come back and say he can't afford to be negative like he's you know he's he's physically not that gifted and somehow he's on our team like he's amazing amazing. Yeah, right, yeah. You just have to, like I think I always walk down to a corner, I guess now even, like I walk into a room and I never think that I'm the most talented or the smartest person there, but I always think that I can hang.

Love that. Okay, fast decisions or slow decisions? Probably slower. Optimistic or pessimistic? Optimistic or realistic realistic well you can be a realist in both you know like oh yeah i'm realistic optimistic okay anxiousness or depression if you had to choose one or if you're if there was um more opportunities to fall into one which one would you fall into i don't know i hold pretty steady i think i feel like i've had many opportunities to fall into depression and i haven't but i'm very decidedly not anxious so like i don't know awesome i figured that so much

for sure and and then do you have a high trust of others or low trust like strangers i would say like medium to high i think i trend towards more towards i think people are generally decent and then yourself high trust high trust and obviously introverted more than extroverted and you do what you think is right or feel is right i try to find where they align but i would take feel okay pressure comes from uh lack of conviction it all comes down to it all comes down to love love that of course i do the crossroad was um i think the two most important were obviously deciding to walk.

That was critical. And then that moment in college when I decided that I wasn't going to go halfway just because I was scared. Gosh. In some weird way, I hope that all people have those moments. I'm not wishing chronic pain. I'm not wishing any kind of condition on people that you know, have those, those moments, you know, I'm not wishing chronic pain. I'm not wishing, you know, any kind of condition on people that, you know, that you've had, but it's like those moments where there are a crossroad and you say, you know what? I either, I stepped through it and I, I tripped or I stepped, I didn't step through it and that's the worst thing. Or I stepped

through it finally. And I figured it out. Like, exactly out like exactly yeah yeah i think that yeah exactly you don't want to you don't want to wish anything bad on anyone but bad things are going to happen so are you how do you find the power are you familiar with harold kushner's work why bad things happen to good people yeah yeah legendary rabbi and um just just a great book you know it's yeah and it's it's a quick little read you might enjoy it yeah yeah i always just think of think of karch and who's the coach of our of the national team who you know well but he he just encouraged us to i don't know almost like greet adversity as a friend i think is how i framed it in my mind. And it was just so empowering. Like if you think about, if you think about how my day starts, right? Like I wake up and then I put both feet on the ground. And in that moment, I already did the thing that was not supposed to be possible.

And then I'm going to go about my day. Like what else is going to happen? That's going to be harder than that. What a framework. Oh my God. Okay. Um, extraordinary, really like really extraordinary. Okay. Uh, how do you define or articulate the concept of mastery? I think, I think it's, it's definitely sort of an infinite process that to me is at the intersection of a deep commitment to learning and the pure expression of yourself. Awesome. And that, that, that nexus is like a continual loop where sometimes I'm in the more learning phase. And sometimes there's,

it's easier for whatever reason to have authentic expression, but it's just like this great undulating orbiting looping process. I love those two that you picked. Cause you know that, I mean, we've all seen people who, who are excellent at what they do technically but you can't feel it you know like i've fought i know volleyball players who are you know the top players in the entire world who i watch play and

i'm like oh they're amazing but in my mind i'm not i wouldn't think of them as a master you know because they don't they aren't in it cool i love that all right um where can we find out what you're doing where can people follow along what you're doing i know you've got a new venture that you're into and yeah maybe you can share some of that but where can people um follow yeah what do I have? I'm on Twitter, at Cassidy Lichtman. Spell the whole thing. C-A-S-S-I-D-Y-L-I-C-H-T-M-A-N. I think I'm on Instagram as Cassidy Lichtman 7. I think Facebook's the same.

What else do I have? Oh, I have a blog. CassidyLichtman. I think Facebook's the same. What else do I, Oh, I have a blog. Cassidy Lichtman.blogspot.com. Love it. Very cool. Yeah. So quickly share with us what you're doing. Yeah. So I retired, um, probably a year and a half ago from the national team. Uh, went and coached really quick for a season at Stanford and then decided that's not what I was going to do with the rest of my life and went out in the world. So like earlier I said that I always knew I was going to play volleyball. And I think the only other thing I've ever known in my life was that I was at some point going to do something other than play volleyball. And so I just joined

a new company called Shift 7, which was co-founded by Megan Smith, who was the chief technology officer of the United States for Barack Obama. And before that, she was in Silicon Valley and was a VP at Google. And so she's really brilliant and started this company that's essentially looking at how do we start to tackle some of the biggest problems of our time. Like the earth and the environment and economic inequality and diversity and inclusion and representation in media. So it's a lot of different things. But the idea behind it is that nobody's going to do it on their own.

No one company or billionaire or whatever is going to come and solve these problems. It's about including everyone. So shift seven as in seven billion people in the world and seven continents and seven oceans. And if you hit shift and seven on the keyboard, it's the and sign. So it's this kind of radically collaborative, inclusive idea that if we go out and find all of the people who who are already honestly solving these problems because they're they are these solutions are everywhere and innovations are everywhere but they don't always get scaled because they're not in silicon valley or the person isn't the right gender or race or whatever it is.

So how do we find those and then connect them to the networks and resources that they need so that we can actually solve some really massive problems that we're facing? So good. I would expect exactly that. That's so good. Okay. So Cassidy, thank you for your time. Thank you for all that you've taught me and that I've been able to learn from you and

all that you're doing in the world. So phenomenal conversation and wishing you all the best. Yeah. Thanks, Mike. Yeah. Okay. All the best. Take care.

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