Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - No Regrets: Lessons from One of the Greatest Leaders in Pro Hockey | Zdeno Chara

Episode Date: July 3, 2024

If you’re familiar with professional hockey, you likely know the name Zdeno Chara (also known as, ‘Big Zee’). He’s the legendary 6-foot-9 defenseman, enforcer, and team captain of the Stanley Cup-winning Boston Bruins who was a dominant force in the NHL for an incredible 24-season career.He also represented his home country of Slovakia in numerous world championships and three Olympics.What you might not know is that humility, kindness, and leading by example are the cornerstones of his leadership philosophy. Not what you think when you consider his legendary status in the rough-and-tumble world of pro hockey.You also may not know that since retiring from the NHL, Zee has not slowed down – he’s competed in 8+ marathons, a half iron man, and a 50K race. Not typical for someone with Zee’s monstrous 6’9” build.  That’s the thing about Zee – he’s more than meets the eye.In our conversation we discuss how he puts his philosophy into practice:How good days as well as bad days are opportunities for learning and growthThe importance of an athlete’s schedule… even when you’re no longer in the gameUsing mental imagery for peak performanceHow giving up control is the key to great leadership…and much more!Zee surprised me with his insight and compassion – and I think we all have something to learn from the way he organizes his inner life, and executes at the highest level. I can’t wait for you to jump in and learn as much as I did about the real Zdeno Chara._________________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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Losing that game seven, that's when I kind of went down on my knees and I just, I broke down. I think that you drive to be perfect. Even in back of your mind, you know, it's not gonna be perfect. You're still driving for it. When you think about that commitment, like who set the standard, the world standard or your very best? This is a great question, Michael. Okay, welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm your host,

Dr. Michael Gervais, by trade and training, a high-performance psychologist. If you're familiar with professional hockey, you know the name Zdeno Chara, also known as Big Z. He's the legendary six foot nine intimidating defenseman and enforcer who as captain of the Boston Bruins led his team to three Stanley Cup finals and a win in 2011. And talk about longevity. Z played the game at the highest level for an incredible 24 seasons, not to mention representing his home country of Slovakia in numerous world championships and three Olympics. It's really amazing. From all of those accomplishments, you might think you have a pretty clear picture of Zee Chara. And yet he is so much more than the giant enforcer he was portrayed as in the league.

It's his unique psychology and his commitment to himself and others that makes him one of the best in the world. In our conversation today, Z shares his personal regimen for mental imagery, his unique leadership philosophy, and the relentless positive attitude that created a culture of excellence during his championship runs with the Bruins. We also talk about how he's maintained those values in retirement as he dives deep into endurance events like the Boston Marathon and the Ironman Triathlon. Can you imagine six foot nine Boston Marathon runner and triathlete? It's amazing when you think about it. For someone who is so intimidating on the ice, his ability to lead from the heart is remarkable.

So with that, let's dive right into this incredible conversation with Z Chara. Z, I am so stoked to have you on the Finding Mastery podcast. You are one of the best to ever step foot on the ice as a leader, as a defender, as a teammate. I know you won't say that, so I'm saying it for you, but countless have said it well before me. And needless to say, we are really excited to learn from you. And so the simple question I want to start with is like, how are you today? No, thank you so much for having me. First of all, Michael, I'm very humbled by your kind words and welcoming. Yeah, I'm doing great. It's a beautiful day in boston and uh yeah i had a great workout this morning and i'm very much looking forward to uh spend some time

chatting with you about uh anything that comes up so yeah let's do this all right cool so when you say a good day interesting and you talked about the weather, you talked about doing something physically, and then you talked about an optimistic framework of thinking about like what's coming that's exciting. Is that part of your operating system? Something physical, we all talk about like when the day starts, right? But this for me it starts kind of like when you are actually going to bed and you are finishing your day then you kind of prepare yourself mentally for that next day and that's when it kind of starts so one of the things i want to talk to you about is transitions because transitions in transitions out, whether it's in a career or it's a workday are really important. And you just dialed right into your transition from night, you know, from the evening into daytime. And if I have it right, it sounds like you don't think about discrete starts and stops, that there's a rolling experience throughout life for you evidence by at

the end of the day I think about how I want to show up you know tomorrow and I use a mental imagery or visualization to do that and do I have the framing right that it's not like a start stop it is a rolling experience which as you say it sounds so simple to understand you you have it very very you know I think nailed down to um really good explanation I think that a lot of times um we get caught in these um ups and downs um good days bad days um sometimes you hear people saying you know uh this ended for me and I was kind of searching and looking for a new beginning, a new start. But I think at the same time, you'll be always kind of hearing to like, keep going, just keep going. You know, I think that you can get through anything as long as you kind of like keep going and it's just kind of like keep rolling.

Eventually, you will find your path. You will find the way that you kind of what you're looking for, what you're kind of like keep rolling and eventually you will find your path it will find the way that you kind of what you're looking for what you're kind of driving for um as long as you don't get stuck mentally and also kind of like you know physically which you know obviously we know that mental part really affects your your your your state of mind affects your physical uh well-being if you don't get stuck in in doubt that hey everything is kind of bad or everything is uh not happening for me but you just keep going with with whatever is happening whatever the day comes and brings then you you kind of have that that rolling like you said like you explained the

rolling uh mindset that everything is gonna be okay just keep going On the topic of transitions, describe to me who you were on the ice and who you were off the ice. Was it the same? Was it different? Because it's hard for me to imagine you in this form on the ice, known as one of the great defensemen and enforcer at six foot nine, not including blades, that you were a force to be reckoned with. And even the great Wayne Gretzky has comments about playing with you and against you. And so help me understand the transition here on your mindset when you're on the ice and who you were off the ice. The thing that people don't realize, you're still obviously the same person,

but the responsibilities and the commitments are, you know, everybody's taken a little bit differently. You know, some players like to be loose. Some players like to have fun. They all like to always be smiling and just go with the flow. And for me, I was always very serious, very committed to every little detail. And I was really driven to

to be the best I could every single day, every single practice, probably a lot more in the practices, you know, than in games. You know, mistakes in the games, you know, they happen and then, you know, you just have to react to them. But, you know, in the practices, you know the drills. You know, you usually know what the drills are coming and what type of drills you do. And you kind of do pretty much the same drills the whole season.

But you try to be as perfect as possible and being a leader on a team you you you don't want to be showing too many errors and and things that that that um if you know that would be kind of a red flag so you always driving for perfection you always try to be the the best as you can and lead a team by by example so um for me was you know every day just show up and and be the hardest working guy always do lead by example and and uh you know basically you know i'll lead the team to to championship and to the success and uh um. Not that that would be completely off my personality or I would be faking it. I felt very comfortable in that role and very good that I'm

very fortunate and grateful that I was in that position to be a leader. But once I retired, I felt a sense of relief because as you know, Michael, you carry that load with you for a long time. It's not a bad weight, but it's still a weight that you've got to be always thinking about. How are you going to solve a problem, how you're going to figure out when a team is not playing well, how you're going to figure out to motivate the team with a speech and a lacrimal. There's so many things daily and every season is something new and you've got to find a way to solve it and to make it work.

When I retired, I felt that sense of a little bit of relief, uh, but not in a sense that I was, it was like, um, um, you know, pulling me down throughout the years. It was just one of those things that really that, you know what I did, did the best I could and I'm happy and I think I did fine. God, you say, you said so much in there. The relief of doing the relief of knowing that I actually did my very best. Yeah.

And no regrets basically. Yeah. It's just one of those. I, what I'm trying to say that I love carrying that weight. I love being in that spotlight and being the guy and leader. And at the end, I think that it's tiring. There's no doubt that

when you're in that role that you've been asked to lead and do so many other things to sacrifice for team and other things, then at the end, when you're kind then you know you you at the end when you kind of like hang your skates up or when you leave in a company and and you look back you know i think that it was some sort of like sense of relief in a you know being a proud to you know i i've been

very proud to listen like i i've done you know things that I was very, very happy with and things that I learned on the way and many, many people to be thankful to for their help. But it was just a sense of relief, you know, in a good way that I did the best I could and no regrets. 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,

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foods and when i'm traveling or in between meals on a demanding day, certainly I need something quick that will support the way that I feel and think and perform. And that's why I've been leaning on David protein bars. And so has the team here at Finding Mastery. In fact, our GM, Stuart, he loves 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.

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And a few of our teammates here at Finding Mastery have been loving the fudge brownie and peanut butter. I know, Stuart, you're still listening here. So getting enough protein matters. And that can't be understated, not just for strength, but for energy and focus, recovery, for longevity. And I love that David is making that easier. So if you're

trying to hit your daily protein goals with something seamless, I'd love for you to go check them out. Get a free variety pack, a $25 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.com slash finding mastery. Usually when people talk about relief, it's because they are relieved of anxiety. They're relieved of the conditions that they were in that were really hard and difficult. And so, so it wasn't anxiety it was a relief of the the relentless commitment to be your very best and to help other people be their very best is that do i have it right yeah you got it right i never mind it was not it was not anxiety no it wasn't anxiety at all okay i was

grateful for those opportunities and those you know challenges and and some of the hard times, if you want to call it. Everybody's going to have some ups and downs and the years when the team is not doing well or you are struggling as a player and all that stuff. But those are also the moments where you learn the most. And those are the ones that that kind of like shape you in a better of yourself because you learn the most from those those times so definitely not the anxiety or or you know some sort of depression or or you know um any of that type i was more like hey that was that was awesome you know i i was kind of like grateful and very very happy for for that i got to

do this for for that long and and um came came at the end out of it you know fairly fairly okay you know so as far as health health wise can you recall a time or share a story that marks or captures a really hard time for you as an NHL player, as a leader, as a captain, as somebody who's being heralded by the world for how great you are. Can you bring forward a hard time? Hard times are something that obviously you would love to control but you can't um no no no no i z i mean like really take me into a time or a phase or a moment or an actual experience i want to know what you were wearing i want to know where you were yeah the the hard time is when you when when we were playing um stanley cup finals um against uh chicago uh blackhawksks in 2013 we are in the finals

my grandma just passed away that thing was like game three so my mom told me that two days later and she's like I didn't want to be like you know telling you I know you in the finals and but But when I asked her about how was your mom doing, how was grandma doing, because I knew she was not doing well, she kind of paused. And she only said, I didn't want to tell you during the finals. So I knew that, okay, she passed away. But being banged up and then eventually losing in the finals, that was heartbreaking.

And same thing in 2019 to St. Louis. Really banged up. One of the hardest and the worst moments for me was when I was leaving for the Game 7. My boys were fairly still young. They were only three years old. But I promised them that I'll bring back a trophy, a big trophy. And I made them promise that when I get back, I'm going to bring this huge trophy.

You guys are going to be sitting in it. We're going to be all laughing. We're going gotta be celebrating and and and uh i i got so banged up the whole series i was so like at the end of my um you know the energy was just so low and and um and losing that game seven and walking back home and opening door in my suit, and I see my boys running towards me. And they were like, in their eyes, they're running and they're like waiting for that trophy to be handed to them. And I was empty handed.

And that's when I kind of went down on my knees and i just i i broke down and uh yeah that was tough that was tough i i yeah i i that was one of the lowest moments uh you know for me and it was like I didn't deliver what. What we kind of we all, you know, were we're going for as a team, as a player, and also I didn't deliver almost like that promises that. And when I literally I broke down like two tears, I was crying on the floor. Like I was just i was devastated do you cry is that part of how you express yourself yeah i mean i i did cry obviously that was that

was something because i was um physically just in just in general just in general yeah i do i do i i'm not ashamed of it when i see a movie and there's something really that i can relate to and and um the the movie is done so like well and you can picture yourself in that position of the of the situation yeah i mean i'm not ashamed of it like when when i see something i have tears like i think that's that's natural that's human and i'm not gonna be pushing back tears just because I'm six, nine and one of the strongest players that ever play. I'm not going to be holding back. I mean, I'm, I have feelings. It's okay. So there's, there's a strong connection,

I think between why you're so, why you were so good at hockey and this underlying current of not wanting to let others down not wanting to let your family down your boys down i wonder if you had that same feeling about boston about you know the full city not wanting to let your well actually your teammates, Boston is a city, um, your country, maybe a fan base. Is there a thread here about not wanting to let others down that rings true for you? Yeah, absolutely. Michael, I, I always feel like, um, I love that responsibility and, and, and have that... To be in that frame of mind that, hey, these people believe in me. I need to deliver.

I want to deliver. It's not like I'm being put in a position and being uncomfortable. I feel comfortable, but I don't want to be letting anybody down. I always felt that it's such an honor to be in that position, to be leading and to have that ability and that chance to make thousands of people happy and proud

and the reason to celebrate and call themselves bostonians for example or charas or friend of big z you know like it it doesn't matter there could be different groups different teams and different uh you know so um you know, I really felt like it's such a grateful position to be in, to be able to make people happy and relate to you and your success. And so, yeah. That to me sounds like a lot of pressure that you liked, that you appreciate billie jean king one of the greats ever says that pressure is a privilege and especially when it comes to sports here in the framing that she's talking about so let's open up how you worked with that pressure well how did you learn how did you manage it yeah i had to learn how to work with that i think at at early stages, I was trying to do too much.

I was under the spotlight when I became a captain in Boston. I was just trying to take care of everything, like in the locker room, what was happening outside the locker room, you know, it was just one of those things that I felt that I need to have pretty much something to say in everything that was happening, whether that was the meetings, plays on the ice, you know, talking to media. It was just like so much happening that I felt that that pressure was a little bit overwhelming. But then I learned that you need to spread that leadership, spread that pressure a little bit and be comfortable with that. And it was the best thing that ever happened because, you know, now you're welcoming more people in your circle of leadership and they having great skills as well and complementing your leadership and working together as a small group of leaders and always

you know talking about decision making and the process and and strategies and it was just uh it was great to sink in with other people as well. So early on, I took a lot on my shoulders, naturally. But later on, I was just so comfortable and grateful that I was surrounded by great people and leaders and we worked really well together. What a pivot that must have been to go from, I need to get this done to, wait, I can't do it alone. We need each other to be our very best that sounds like it was a pivot was there an experience that helps you with that transition

in your framing of leadership yeah of course I I was you know meeting a lot of people like a lot of uh different leaders from other sports and they all said the same thing leadership is something you share something that you you are not afraid you are not guarding you are not protecting the leadership you you have to spread out you have to share you have to um you know let other people to to kind of express their kind of leadership skills and let them grow as the leaders and um yeah i mean that shift just came naturally i think that by by meeting other great leaders and people that that i had great conversation with and um yeah i mean it just made a lot of sense and um but at the same time i i it took time for me because i became a captain my very first year.

I know. Like that's remarkable, by the way. Yeah. That is remarkable. And I didn't know the personalities as well, all the players. So it took me full year to kind of like get to know them.

And then I knew that, okay, like I see who are the leaders, who are the more vocal guys, who are the guys who always kind of like saying the right things, acting, you know, in the right way, doing the right things on and off the ice. So naturally first year was kind of like more like guarded for me.

And second, and from that on, it was more like I spread out and shared it. And it was great to have those guys with me. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentous. When it comes to high performance, whether you're leading a team, raising a family, pushing physical limits, or simply trying to be better today

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and use the code findingmastery20 at checkout. Again, that's Felix Gray. You spell it F-E-L-I-X-G-R-A-Y.com and use the code FindingMastery20 at FelixGray.com for 20% off. Who comes to mind when you think about other great leaders that have influenced you um i had great conversation with al arbor um the you know the uh coach when new york islanders uh won four stanley cup championships uh we lived very close to each other in florida in my kind of like summer house uh had great conversation with uh um dick hoyt um um so that was that was remarkable um you know i had some conversation with uh george hincapie a little bit like lance armstrong you know i i i tom brady was uh unbelievable when i speak to him about um different things and leadership and teams.

So I had conversations with people that really made huge impact and positive impact in sports and in general and other things. So, yeah. What did you learn from Tom Brady? What was that exchange like? It was great. Tom was so kind um you know i i kind of reached out to him and didn't know what to expect um obviously one of the most recognizable figures and most successful

quarterbacks ever uh you know in nfl and um and he got back to me and I just called him and I don't recall exactly the conversation. But the way he talked to me and he found a time and he never came from his side that, okay, I have to go see. Great talking to you. He was willing to talk to me for as long as I wanted to talk and just that itself to find a time and always be kind of willing to respond and share it was for me was a great you know such a great example and experience so yeah that that was, that was something that I always cherish. Yeah. But I mean, at Boston, in Boston, at the same time, you were the captain of your team.

He was the captain of his team. Both of you were, you know, on a, on a tear, like really pushing your teams to new levels. And so that must have been a really fun moment being in Boston, having a connection with him, knowing that you're both trying to be better leaders, you know, and, and, and it sounds like you're mutually learning from each other, but you didn't want to say that, but, um, it sounds like, you know, it was a mutual learning or sharing. Yeah, I think so. But I, I, I felt that all the sports in Boston are so connected. I think that at one point, the Boston sports had, I don't know how many championships between Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics and us. It was just a parade pretty much every other year in Boston. So, there was a really true happiness

for each other but at the same time it was kind of like internal competition like, okay, Celtics won, okay, it's our turn,

okay, Red Sox won, Patriots is going to be the next. Like, it was just one of those things that we were very happy,

supportive for each other but internally we want to be the next championship team too. So yeah. Okay. So let me go, let me circle back around a couple of things. You earlier had said it was a commitment to be your very best and I'm adding to it. The reason that you felt relief is because that was so hard to do day in and day out, to fundamentally

commit to being my very best. And it's like a heavy bag to carry, right? Like that type of fundamental commitment. There are very heavy bags in this world. This is not the heaviest bag to carry, but it is hard to renew that commitment every day. But you said something that has just stuck with me because you also threw the word in perfection, that you were pursuing perfection. So how do you square those two? I think that you drive to be perfect and even in back of your mind,

you know it's not gonna be perfect. You're still driving for it. And I don't know if I'm explaining myself in a really understandable way, but you always try to go a notch up or be even better than last time. And you're driving to be perfect, but you know it's not going to be probably happening because there's always going to be something happening that's not going to allow you to be perfect. But for me, it's it was like the satisfying than getting the recognition and validations.

At the end, I think I was benefiting from years of this kind of commitment, dedication and of hard work and consistency, investing into that hard work and willingness to listen and learn from my own experiences. I think, yeah, I think that just the process is just something that daily, daily, you're driving yourself to be the best you can, even knowing that you're probably not going to reach it, but you just keep doing that. When you think about that commitment, were you driving towards your highest standards, your personal best, or were you driving toward the world standard? Like who set the standard that you were competing against the world standard or your very best?

This is a great question,ael because both because you you watching something that that might affect your standards to go way higher than you thought for example like um you know lance armstrong like you're seeing how he started dominating the cycling and and his his desire and his drive, and you're seeing it and you kind of like, I remember watching those DVDs and seeing how he trained and how he was like competing and had that killer instinct when he was winning stages and defending his titles.

Then you realize like, okay, I need to push it even more. Then you're watching Chicago bulls era and and you know i love you know i don't know who are your favorite uh teams but i remember when i was in my teenager years and chicago bulls were were uh winning those championships i loved the way you know like they played and they were like such a great team. And obviously Michael was, uh, you know, the, the driving force, but you see like how they were like dialed in and those eyes and,

you know, later on, you know, that whole, um, uh, documentary came out about Chicago Bulls and, and you kind of like seeing how they're talking about how they were pushing

each other, how not everything was red roses, how Michael said, I had to push my teammates to be better. I had to criticize my teammates. I had to be this. And, but that's what it takes,

you know, to be champions. Then you kind of like following that and you, you, you setting yourself for yourself, the, the, the goals.

But then I think naturally when you see something happening outside of the world then you gotta raise the level because if you stay on the same level you're gonna be behind so you gotta be kind of like walking with with with with the rest of the world okay so let's imagine we have a hundred casino chips and you can place them in one or two quadrants. You can place it or one or two buckets. I'm going to place my chips on driving toward the world standard, or I'm going to place my chips on driving towards my personal best. How do you allocate those 100 chips? Well, I think that

if you put it in a bucket with world standards, you might not reach your personal best because you don't know what's your limit. That's right. So in that case, world standards might be a delimiter. It might reduce... So that's why I'm asking you, when you're paying attention,

because you're committed to getting better, right? And so when you're paying attention, are you attending to what it takes for me to be my very best today or for us to be our very best today? Or are you paying attention to what the world standard is? I'm pushing myself to be the very best, but Michael, but I think that in many cases, people are just being complacent.

What I was talking about, like they just get complacent to be like, oh, I did my best, but they don't realize that, hey, like if he did it, I can do it too. I just got to push myself harder. That my best has to be a little bit higher than what I see my best or what it could be my best.

Oh, that's interesting. Okay, because that's what I think great teammates, great friends, great Oh, that's interesting. Okay. Because that's what I think great teammates, great friends, great supervisors, great coaches do is there's this calibration between, let's say you and I are teammates in some respect and you say, Mike, what are you trying to do here? And I say, I'm trying to fill in the blanks, whatever my big vision or big goals are. And then we calibrate. So we're on the same page.

And then you might say, oh, wait, you're just trying to get to the All-Star Game once? Wow. I think if you really applied yourself, you might find that you can win some championships that if the team is good enough, but you could do this and this and this. You could set a standard that is higher for another person and maybe help them swallow that pill to see something that they couldn't see, to metabolize it in a way that feels believable. And I think it's one of the great ways that we can show up for each other

is helping raise standards. I think, yeah, you explained great because I think a lot of times the minds are just limiting us a little bit. Like I think that in your mind, you can say, I'm going to be my best. And you get like to the point where like, oh, I did my best,

but then you don't realize you just need a little bit like a friend talk to you or or seeing a highlight or or read about something that you never thought would be done and all the sudden you like oh wait a minute like this is possible I never knew this would be possible or this record will be broken or something and then you realize like holy moly i think if he did it i can do it if that's been done oh that could be done repeated again like i think that sometimes we we we limit ourselves just a little bit by our mind that okay i'm doing my best but but there's uh like you said the world's best or standard that that we we kind of see here read and and you know and and we forget that it's it's always being pushed it's

always being raised um yeah you know i think with uh you know nobody thought the run of marathon would be run you know under two hours ever and then boom we have it nobody thought that uh something could be done and people keep doing it they keep uh breaking records nobody thought that a six nine athlete could could play 24 seasons and run how many marathons have you run so far uh nine i believe nine yeah no no yeah so okay so this is this is probably the heart of it for there's so much more i want to ask you and thank you for this conversation no thank you michael we started by you saying that i don't see transitions as discrete moments, but more like a rolling life experience,

including the way I go to bed. And before I go to bed, I use my imagination and I see myself being great tomorrow, how I would like to experience tomorrow. Two-part question. How often would you actually use mental imagery at night before you went to bed? And what would you actually see? And how long, three part, and how long was the imagery, quote unquote, session or training session? I would probably say that imagery is every night. Like I every night see myself the next day, at least for some short period of time.

Like, okay, tomorrow I'm waking up this. And you're pre-planning, right? You're setting whatever you need to be ready for. You're preparing your stuff or your drinks or your snacks or your paperwork or, you know, I'm recording podcasts. So I want to be ready. I'll make a short note. So you're visualizing that, okay, this is going to be happening. I need to be ready and have your mind locked in already before you go to bed and that way i think when you wake up

in the morning and throughout the night your mind your body is already preparing without you even kind of like have to say that be ready because when you start thinking about it when you start preparing yourself automatically your mind your your body is getting ready um so for me uh sometimes could be as short as you know i don't know maybe a few few seconds uh because you were you already went through that preparation so you don't need to be thinking about it anymore. You just know it's happening. But other times, you know, when you, let's say I'm running a marathon next day, I'm trying to visualize sometimes certain sections or parts of a feeling, what it's going to be like with a crowd. So it might take a little bit longer.

That's why sometimes, you know, you probably don't fall asleep right away. But yeah. I'm glad you brought that up because when I do imagery or I work with athletes or executives to do imagery at night, there's a couple of things that take place. One is when you really do it, you turn on your central nervous system. So this is not something to do at night in bed, because if you're really involved in this beautiful movie that is amazing in your mind, you turn on. So this is not ideal before going right to sleep. And most people, most undisciplined people say, oh, imagery, yeah, I do that before

the game. Yeah, but you play a game once a week or twice a week, or in your case, sometimes three times a week. What about the other nights? No, no, no, no. I kind of do it before games. But you're saying, no, I would do it every day. So that hits me. And then you said sometimes it's just a handful of seconds. Sometimes it's a little bit longer, I would imagine. Would it travel into like 10 minutes, 30 minutes, somewhere in there? Probably not as long. Then we're talking about visualization of something differently. I would probably do that probably 5 to 10 minutes during my playing career

when I would wake up from a nap and then you're literally visualizing, you know, certain player play games or certain line or something that will be happening. So you kind of getting really ready, like into detail and lock it in. So it almost become those actions becomes automatic when they happen. It's because you already visualizing them.

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and then after napping, which is really clever. And I want to get into the weeds here and I want to play with this because this is an underutilized skill that most of us have, not everybody, but most of us have the ability to imagine in our mind's eye. And it's really so powerful. The research on it is quite ridiculous how strong it is, but you would use it post napping. What's clever about that Z is that coming out of a nap we tend to go we're to tend to be in that theta brain wave which is a very relaxed state it means that you're quite open to use your imagination and i don't know if somebody taught that to you or you figured out on your own but that is remarkable that you would do it there did someone teach it to you or is that

you figured it out on your own i kind of became like um just a habit i i nobody really told me told me like hey you should be doing that i kind of woke up from a nap and during my uh playing days and and um you know start kind of like visualizing and getting ready i didn't have those naps very long naps maybe that's why as well for me it was usually 45 minutes to hour 15 hour hour and a half the max some guys like to sleep two two and a half hours for me maybe it was because it was shorter so i had much more time to get myself ready and get dressed and get to the snack before the game so i had time and i you know while i was you know in a room or hotel or at home

i kind of like started really really imagining like what the specific situation would be and scenarios and literally like if they or most of the time they do happen during the course of the game it was just an automatic reaction i didn't even have to even think because i was already playing that same situation that i play in my mind, you know, in the afternoon. Let's go into 2011. You won the Stanley Cup. And can you go into the night before one of the games? Can you recall the imagery and how you did it at that time? Yeah, i still remember i was going in a bed and i was so calm and so relaxed it was like i had different feeling than some of the nights before i was very calm very confident and i was falling asleep with a visualizing and seeing myself lift

in a cup and that was it that was just like hey I'm gonna be lifting a cup tomorrow I just knew like it was just like tomorrow get ready like you're not lifting a cup for the whole team and for the whole city and for all the fans and it's gonna be unbelievable you're all good like just realize have a good night's sleep it was like that it was like I didn't have to imagine much more it was just I was very calm then I had actually a really good nap too. And again, when I woke up from a nap, I just visualized certain situations and I was in peace of mind.

It was, yeah, it was like, I just felt it would be happening. And if you were to add up all of your imagery sessions across your entire playing career and life let's just do playing career did you spend most of your time seeing the success at the end or seeing yourself being great or solving challenges during during game match or during gameplay um it's it's performance imagery versus outcome imagery is what I'm asking about. Yeah.

Um, as much as you, you, you like to sometimes, um, seeing yourself always on a good end or that winning side at times I did have, um, you know, uh, it was, it was interrupted. I knew, but it would be something that was just in conflict. It was like I was thinking something in my head and it was not happening. I wanted to imagine all the great things and it was like, it's going to be kind of like, yeah, you get that why. It's hard to explain. I guess it was just something happening that I couldn't explain,

but I just didn't have the same feelings, I guess. So let's go to 2013. This is the one that you were referencing earlier that you broke down with your kids on your knees crying. Yeah, 2019. That was 2019. Yeah. Okay.

And did you, during that series, did you play with multiple jaw fractures? Yeah, I mean, it was, I kind of had a bad luck throughout the whole playoffs. I had tearing my groin. I separated my shoulder. I was, at that time, I didn't know I had tearing my groin, I separated my shoulder. I was, at that time, I didn't know I had broken elbow and then my jaw, I got shot, you know, in the jaw.

So I was so banged up. I was physically so like hurting and not being, not close to be a hundred percent. It was frustrating because as much as I wanted to contribute as much as I was used to physically I couldn't do it as much as I wanted to and that was kind of frustrating for me so then then that visual side sorry Michael then then you imagine things and you you you are used to imagine things like how you can skate out of the corner how you can make this play how you can do that but knowing now that hey you are not gonna you

are not 100 you have to adjust that play to this play or moving the puck through you know a lot quicker because you are not gonna be able to skate that fast because you are hurting and all these things. You know, somebody's coming to hit you. You got to turn quickly to the good shoulder because you don't want to get like the other shoulder. So you just... You said not 100%.

Like, I mean, you just went through a list of real injuries. I mean, you're like 10%, you know, like amazing. Like it really is like listening to you just casually say it. I'm like on the other side of this, like, okay, toughness is part of the DNA here. And I don't actually, maybe just to give you some context, emotional pain and physical pain work on the same circuitry. And so you had a ton of physical pain and then you had the emotional pain of loss. And so it's like you got a two-four, like a two-four in that, in 2019. And then if you, if you had the loss in 2013 and you had physical pain and you lost your, your grandmother, that would be like three X.

And so that's a pretty heavy overall feeling of loss. And so I just want to kind of add some color to that, that it's exponential in how it's felt. It's not just, oh, I lost the game or the series. And it's not just, I lost my loved one, my grandmother. They stack on top of each other and they override that same circuitry. So I just want to note, I see you in that Z, and that must have been incredibly hard. Well, thank you for understanding. Yeah, but you know what?

We all go through these players' injuries and different challenges, so I'm not the only one. There's plenty of guys who deal with this before and plenty will be doing the same thing after me just I think it's just the nature of the sport and and of course everybody has different limits um maybe I had you know other limits than somebody else would be um be able to play with with the injuries but for most part i think we all as a hockey players athletes push ourselves to you know through the pains through the injury so i i can't be you know sitting here and just taking all the credit i mean there's i've seen teammates with with uh you know

puncture lungs and broken bones and broken legs and keep playing. And it just, yeah. So that's how much you wanna win. You wanna put everything online. You wanna sacrifice everything for that moment of lifting a trophy and then be on top of the world, as you say.

But yeah, it comes at cost sometimes cost sometimes yeah so in preparation for this conversation um i i called sydney crosby to um who i've known for a long time and i asked him like if you have one question for z and he takes back and he's like, oh man, there's so much I'd like to ask him. And so obviously you guys know each other, but so I want to give you the question from Sydney, okay? Okay. And so for the listener, Sydney is one of the greatest to ever play the game as well.

Like Sydney is, I don't know, how do you describe Sydney? I describe him as one of the best ever. Yeah, absolutely. He's one of the best ever. Yeah, absolutely. He's one of the best ever. He made such a positive impact on the game. He's a champion. He's a leader. One of the best ever played the game.

Really caring, really humble guy, and always willing to help, talk to his teammates. Yeah, I never got to play with him but the the few times we spoke is always very kind and obviously we had some battles over the years but that just bothered with we've been both uh leaders of the teams and uh I mean that's when you earn the respect uh from each other I think that you just you just you just battle, go, go out there and just try to win. So from one captain to the next, he says, besides your work ethic, what else would you attribute to your longevity? What were your challenges from, from early to late in your career and how did you approach change?

Oh, they're deep questions now yeah i mean there is like three questions questions in that one so let's but let's go for one by one right here besides your work ethic so he's already saying you're one of the hardest grinders you know what else would you attribute to your longevity believing i think believing in yourself that you can still play, you can still contribute, you can still get better. I think that's, to me, believing in yourself is so important. There's going to be times when there's going to be doubts, especially towards the end of your career. And it's not pretty because then you start noticing that people are looking at you differently. They talk to you differently.

They're just lowering your ice time. They are not putting you on a first power play, maybe second power play. All of a sudden, you are not on power play. It's just like your role is getting um more and more diminished but with that happening you gotta still believe in your abilities and you still gotta believe that i can still play and still get better and even if it's hard to even um seeing yourself to be faster or being stronger or being um quicker you still can play the game

faster you don't have to be faster but you can still play it faster you can move the puck quicker you can you can um because the puck doesn't know your age all right so so you can still make these adjustments and changes so that's going to be maybe answering that other question or the part of the the question that you can still make it work and be very very effective that so you know what i are you just saying that because you're talking to a sports psychologist no i'm just i'm just saying that because you're talking to a sports psychologist? No, I'm just saying that because I spoke to other people and I read a lot of things and I started thinking about things. I always wanted to... Oh my God, look at this, Michael.

I have a bird on my window. I'm sorry. I don't want to be like... You see that bird? No, your thumb is over the camera now. Oh, sorry. Yeah, yeah. And he's trying to get in.

I don't know what's going on. Sorry, this is going to probably, we can cut this out, but look. Oh, yeah. No, let me see it. Oh, oh, geez. Yeah. I don't know. He's trying to get in.

Should I open the window? That would be an adventure. I'm sorry. I just, I was like, somebody's knocking on the window. I was like, it's a bird. He's trying to get in. So I don't know how to continue with this. I'm so sorry.

I kind of like, no, no, no, no, no, no. So anyway, so you wait, wait, this is what, this is what I'm, I'm, I'm marking is that when Sydney asked you about longevity, you didn't say, oh, it's because diet or my fitness routine or something, something tangible, you went to the intangible, you went to the invisible. You went to your belief system. And it's a belief that you can continue to get better. It wasn't a belief that you're going to win the cup. It was a belief that you could continue to improve. And then the insight, maybe you're a step slower, but that doesn't mean that you have to play slower. There's other ways

that you work the system. And so Z, I totally appreciate that answer because you're way upstream working on the invisible part of life that has tangible, real, impactful, physical outputs. So you're working at the mental level to have a better physical experience in life and i see one of the reasons why i love this question from sydney and i see why you played so long and at such a high level i mean physically physically physically you can have uh i mean anybody can just be doing a work like there's there's so much out there that you can watch and read and see about physical workouts like there's there's so much material on on youtube or books or whatever it might be but i think it's gonna happen internally i think

internally you gotta make that make that kind of like that belief in yourself um when nobody else does anymore i mean you gotta be you know you gotta be on different um levels and you when you do that then amazing things happen physically because you just you just you're going to unlock so much potential that you don't even never knew that existed. Finding Mastery is brought to you by iRestore. When it comes to my health, I try to approach things with a proactive mindset. It's not about avoiding poor health. This is about creating the conditions for growth. Now, hair health is one of those areas that often gets overlooked

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an extra $50 on us because quality sleep is just too important to leave to chance. How do you teach or how would you teach a 15-year-old about confidence? Well, I would like to first get to know him. I mean, I had many parents came up to me and

asked me if I could help them train their kid. And I would be, I always get me question why. And they, well, because you'll be playing. But I'm like, why is your son? Does your son want to train with me? I understand you want me to train your son because you are a parent. But I always like to have those questions and conversations

with the person you know himself um i want to understand what what what the what the kid for example now we're talking about 15 i want to know what he's thinking what is what his goals are what his interests are you know i think that you know because then you you might realize everybody could be different right like some some might be already overconfident and you're gonna have to actually teach him to be more humble and others might be be so humble that they're actually it's not good to be that humble you need to have some more confidence to go into things so you know i think that you just got to know the person you know yourself and read by by what you what you see

what you hear um so i would probably just listen and first i would like to get to know the the 15 before I would make any suggestions or, you know, any type of advice. It's beautiful. Do you feel, as being 6'9", that you're understood? Or I have an insight that kids that were tall, they have a very different experience in life. They're not hugged as often as kids that are shorter. They, because like adults don't quite know what to do with your height. They expect more. They treat you like you're older. There's almost a robbing of the innocence. And then you walk around literally a foot or two above most other people. So you can't hide and you can't kind of fall into the crack somewhere.

You're always seen. And so do you go back to that's the preamble to do you feel understood as a as a person i think that i i have to you know when i have when i look back i totally agree when you grow up especially when you're growing up i think that you are experiencing experiencing what you just said that you are being much taller and you're being looked at differently. You know, you've been probably made fun of because of your height. You are not as mobile.

You are not as coordinated because it takes time for your body to fill in, to be feeling comfortable in your own skin. I think that the posture, the size itself does sometimes speak for yourself before even you open your mouth. It's just because the body language when you walk into the room just creates probably a little bit more more demand a little bit more respect because you're you're you're big you're tall but i i really believe that it's all about especially

now like i think it's all about about how you how you act how you how you treat people how you talk to people how you being around and with people that that never really uh were you know professional athletes or celebrities or and you have conversation with them and you are happy to have conversation with them and that's when they they first they you know what i'm from my experience is they always felt feeling like overwhelmed when they talked to me. They're like, oh my God, I cannot believe I'm talking to you. Or, oh my God, you and so-and-so, I didn't know. But I'm like, hey, I'm just a regular guy.

I love that you followed me and were big fans. And I really appreciate it. But I'm here just me. I'm not wearing the C, I'm not wearing the 33, I'm not wearing the jersey, I'm not having trophies around myself. I just, I wear my casual T-shirt and, hey, let's talk, let's have a conversation. I think that that goes a long ways.

I think that, you know know I think what we do as athletes and what we accomplish it's a it's a great thing but

once that that's over I think your life your life continues and you

gotta you gotta realize that yes you build yourself some really respect respected way

your name and what you accomplish and but you can't be walking around with uh with that attitude that hey i'm so and so and and you know everybody else is not nothing i mean it's just i think you gotta realize that everybody deserves to be treated same and with respect and somebody asks you something you you know, I think you should be talking to them like you talk to anybody else. It's just the way I like to do it that way.

When you think about leadership, do you personally lead with your heart, a la lead with emotions? Do you lead with your body? I think you're going to say no, like your physical presence. Do you lead with your mind? Do you lead with your spirit? And you can have any combination thereof and certainly add anything. But when you think about how you lead, does it come from your heart, your spirit, your mind, or your body? For me, it has to come natural. It has to come from my heart, from how I feel about a certain situation. And that's, for me, it's always about to do small things right. And be really humble. I always feel like when you're humble and when you you know always thinking like how would you like to be you know seen or how you would like to be treated i think you always kind of like then i think most of the time or very very rarely you do something wrong. You probably do a lot of times the right thing.

So you're a big, large, intimidating, defensive body. And you're an enforcer. So you're leading with your heart. And then on the ice, the world saw you as the tough guy. tell me how you were able to navigate those two different parts of yourself yeah i mean you you at times you gotta you gotta do what you gotta do you gotta play you know that intimidating part and and you gotta physically physically uh you, be a force. I mean, it's just the way it is. I mean, as much as you have a good heart and you want to be a nice guy, it's a war.

Like, it's something that, you know, out there, when you go out there, you've got to, sometimes you've got to push the buttons. And I guess you've got to be a little bit uncomfortable to do that, but you've got to be of that it's neat to be, you know, you have to be intimidating to give yourself a little bit more room and your team more confidence. So you are not just doing it because you want to be, you know,

just showing off that you're strong and all that. You want to use it in the right places at the right times. You don't want to be obviously doing it all the time, but I think at the right time and for the right reasons, you've got to be there for your teammates and for yourself to be also physically intimidating because it's just the way it is. Once in a while you just you just got to do what you got to do to to to make that impact that hey we have we have also

muscle on our teams and and we can play that way too part of leadership is influencing or and or co-building or co-creating a culture. And you put a tall flag in the ground when you said first-year players, we're not hazing. We are not hazing first-year players. And you're quoted by saying, how can you expect something out of a young player on the ice when you treat him differently off the ice? Can you expand on that? Yeah, well, that's something that happened a little bit at my early age growing up in Slovakia.

It was kind of like a common thing that when teams got combined multiple year, you know, guys, or different birth years, guys got kind of like combined in the same team when you start playing juniors. And the older guys always do kind of like for granted that, hey, like, you know, we have these younger guys that got to be kind of picking up the pucks. They got to be, you know, cleaning up the locker rooms

and doing all these things so it got, you know, almost like every year it got to a different level, they became almost bullying and so I didn't like it when we were on the same team and then, you know, you being

treated by all the guys differently off the ice and then you come on the ice and they were like, hey, pass me a puck or you know go battle over there and then i'll be here like i just felt like there's some disconnection and the dysfunctionality of the team and i i just um i told myself if i ever have a position or if i ever be able to make that impact or change, I'll just do it. And it just became very obvious to me that that word rookie, and it was just like, it didn't rain well in my ears. I just didn't like it.

I didn't like the wording. It's not a bad word. It's just the way it sounded when it was being said by older veteran guys hey rookies hey rookies do that hey rookies come over here I just didn't like the way it sounded and uh that's why I just didn't want to get rid of it and I made it clear that everybody's gonna be treated the same way yes they, there are going to be some obligations that the first-year players will be picking up pucks, but we had veteran guys picking up pucks with them.

So they would not feel like, oh, it's always only us. If first-year guys didn't get to play much in those first years in the games, they get that much ice time, I would sit on a bike next to them and ride after the games and ride bike with them. Even I played 30 minutes. So they would see that, hey, like, it's okay. I'm right here with you. I played 30 minutes, they would see that hey like it's it's okay i'm right here with you i played 30 minutes you played 10 i'm gonna do the same bike ride as you have to do the bike ride because you

didn't play as much and i think that goes a long way when you start doing things like that that they feel like we are part of it we are the same team there was no like sitting on the bus that all the first year guys had to sit up front on the bus that all the first-year guys had to sit up front on the bus and all the veterans could sit back. We would, you know, we would mix it up. We would have, you know, for lunches, the guys would, like the first-year guys would always stand and last in the line. I said, no, go get the food.

Like, don't have to wait till everybody else gets the food. Like, little things like that that I hope I help to make more positive impact and change that really made everybody the same and equal. I mean, yes, you play more games, you have more experiences, but he will be playing with you. He can make you better and you can make him better. And together we can make the team better. So let's do that. I read a quote that you said that you want to help these people so that they can do good things for the betterment of the team.

You said, I just believe that's the humanity of teams. What do you mean by humanity of teams? Meaning that, that, you know, we all athletes, but, and we all want to win and we all want to perform and understand the sports. It's also a business, but at the end of the day we're all humans like we all want to be living by certain standards and acting by certain standards so it doesn't mean that you put the uniform on and you just become a robot and just be like oh i'm a professional athlete i don't have to do this because i have the uniform on no you got to be still acting and behaving like a human being and

thinking yeah okay like i i gotta you know i'm a professional athlete but i'm also doing things right for right reasons all right z i've just had this overwhelming kind of sense that people in your life are better because of you. And I'm not saying you're not flawed and don't have things that you're working on, but what a great teammate in life. You must be. And so thank you for your time. Thank you for the way that you chose the words that you chose

and all the work that went into a a really rich conversation so i just want to say thank you no thank you michael it was been a lot of fun i just i'm glad i could share some of my uh experiences my thoughts and uh yeah i'm just a regular guy i just uh yeah i just like to be uh i actually don't think there's much that's regular about you. I think there's a lot that's pretty extraordinary, but can I give you some quick hits, just a handful, like a, give you a, um, a quick little sentence and then you finish it with one or two words. Okay. Sure. Okay. It all comes down to... Your mind. Living the good life is marked by...

Your behavior. Mental toughness is... Your strength. Success is... When you're happy. The key to success is? Self-discipline. My vision is?

Unlimited. If you could sit with a true master and you had one question to ask them, who would that master of craft or master of self be? And where would you want to sit with them? And what would be the one question? I would like to sit with them somewhere in a very peaceful nature. What that question would be. And who is the person? I don't know.

You called me off guard right now because there's a lot going on like in my head that I'm thinking about all these very very successful people but it's almost like I would like to sit there with a younger me

me as an older but the younger me and asking or maybe the opposite me younger being talking to older me and asking questions i guess maybe like it's just uh i know it's weird right yeah that's cool no that's cool and if there was one question that comes up for you right now that you'd want to ask then i would i would ask like what you change? What would you do differently? Right?

Like you're asking yourself, maybe like, obviously you can roll back or you can roll forward. But I guess it's maybe a little deeper. What wrongs do you want to be set right? I think that there are some wrongs that you look back and maybe things you did, said, but I think in a way that the wrongs are going to happen. Sometimes you do wrongs without you knowing that you're doing wrongs. You just don't know like, oh, it was wrong, but you just didn't know. And then you realize that happened because now you should you know

how to do those wrongs right so i guess unless it's super super obvious yeah uh but i think sometimes or most of the times we all do wrongs because we just don't know there are wrongs we just do them and then those wrongs are part of those rights. Last question. What's one thing that you used to value, but you don't anymore? I'll tell you which one I will always value. Friendships.

I mean, that's something that you always, you always value the friendships and the true friendships. But I don't know, Michael, what do you think? What is yours? I think it's a really hard question. I love what you just did with that. You said, let me just actually not think about the negative. Let me go straight to the positive.

I adore friendships. I think I learned more in how you just did that than what you actually said, but like how you did it speaks volumes to me. And then you, and then you said, I don't know. And you asked like, how would you do yours? Like all of that is really cool. Well, thank you, Michael. I, you try to think like, you know, like what's not, and I, I like to think what,

what is important, like what's valid, like i like to think what what is important like what's value like to me like you know like you look back like i said like the career and the stats and trophies yeah but at the end like that's just a part of your life that's like okay for some people maybe or athletes five years some 10 some really good ones 20 or but then like the friends the true friends are not there for five then they're there for the whole your life so that's to me that's the most important like your friends your family like your your closest ones as as we're just rounding out here would say no if you don't like this but could i would you be open for me to share with you how i understand you yeah go ahead yeah no no no no for real no would you really like that or is that like

no this is too awkward no michael Michael, I think it's fine. If you share how you see me, I would like to hear that. Really open to ideas, experiences, highly conscientious. You're not burdened by being agreeable with others because you have your own ideas and you express them. You are fundamentally positive and optimistic in the way that you approach conversations and situations. You are incredibly psychologically agile. You accept what is. You're not trying to change it. You're trying to be better the next time it comes around. I think you're driven by

values. You're highly committed. You've made fundamental commitments in your life and you've stuck with those. And you've got this convergence that takes place where you've lined up your thoughts, words, and actions over consistency, even in hard situations. So you're highly trustworthy by others. They feel around you that you're in it for them as well, that your ability and logic stands up because of the hard work that you've done. And that overall, you have the ability to shift your attention to be able to meet the demands of a moment. You don't get stuck in a cognitive focused way. And you have this gregarious outgoing way, but there's a private part of you that is where the real Z lives. And I think you probably have a pretty small inner circle of people know the deeper part

of you, but at the level of what we just, we just express like you're open. So it's not closed off, but there's a deep private part of you. That's beautiful and amazing. I think that you are a fantastic teammate to others and they don't just need to be teammates, but you stand for them. You see them, you commit to them in the same way that you've committed to your life efforts as well. And I think you have just enough neuroticism underneath to go that extra edge to do the hard work, which probably fueled you in a lot of ways,

but I don't see you as being fueled by anxiety. I don't see you as being intolerant and frustrated. However, the standard of excellence that you would hold yourself and others to is not rainbows and butterflies. You'd get in there and you would hold the standard and you would support and challenge each other along the way. So that's in essence how I see you. Well, thank you. Appreciate that, in essence how I see you. Well, thank you. Appreciate that, Michael. Thank you so much. Did I get any of that right or wrong?

No, you got probably most of it right. Yeah, I mean, I was listening. I was like trying to soak everything in. Z, thank you. And I'm honored to have you on this podcast and share your insight and wisdom with our community. So thank you. No, thank you so much, Michael, for having me.

And it's been a lot of fun. And yeah, appreciate it. Awesome. Awesome. All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast

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