Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - The Man Behind the Voice | Hall of Fame Broadcaster, Jim Nantz

Episode Date: October 27, 2021

This week’s conversation is with Jim Nantz, an American sportscaster who has worked on telecasts of the NFL, NCAA Division I men’s basketball, the Olympics, the NBA and the PGA Tour for CBS Sports since the 1980s. Jim is an absolute legend in the field.If you’re a sports fan, you know his voice. He has anchored CBS’s coverage of the Masters Tournament since 1989 and been the play-by-play announcer on CBS’s top NFL game since 2004.In this conversation, we discuss how he made his way up through the ranks… how he struggled with anxiety the first two years of his career and how he used deliberate practice, a committed practice of imagery and perspective shifting, to work his way through it._________________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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as a batting average. But when you're the 300th episode of Finding Mastery with Dr. Mike, it's a really big deal. What an honor. I hope you enjoy the episode. All right. Welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm Michael Gervais and by trade and training, I'm a sport and performance psychologist. I'm fortunate to work with some of the most extraordinary thinkers and doers across the planet. And the whole idea behind this podcast, behind these conversations is to learn from people, to pull back the curtain, to explore how they've committed to mastering both their craft and their minds.

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linkedin.com slash deal. That's linkedin.com slash deal. For two full months for free, terms and conditions apply. Finding Mastery is brought to you by David Protein. I'm pretty intentional about what I eat, and the majority of my nutrition comes from whole 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

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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. That's David D-A-V-I-D protein P-R-O-T-E-I-N dot com slash finding mastery. Now this week's conversation is with Jim Nance. He's an American sport broadcaster and if you've listened to sports in the last two or three decades, you know his voice. And maybe more importantly, you know his skill of pulling you into the unfolding drama, the action, if you will, that happens within sport. He's worked on telecasts for the NFL, NCAA, Division I men's basketball, the Olympics, the NBA, and the PGA Tour for CBS Sports since the 1980s.

Jim is, I mean, I say this word a lot, and he stands up to this word. He's a legend in the field. He's anchored CBS's coverage of the Masters Tournament since 1989 and has been the play-by-play announcer on CBS's top NFL games since 2004. In this conversation,

we discuss how he made his way up through the ranks, the way that he's able to stay deeply focused for an extended period of time. And that's a skill. So we can train that skill of being deeply focused. And it is a foundational skill. And then also how he struggled with anxiety the first two years of his career. And then more importantly, how he used deliberate practice, a committed practice of imagery, and then perspective shifting to work his way through it.

And in his words, I just love this. I know this, he says, repetition and success through difficult times through choppy waters strengthens you. And after you say, well, if I can get through that, I can get through anything. I love it. He speaks from a place where he knows what he's talking about. There's no BS here. And I really love this conversation. He is amazing. His authenticity, his honesty, and his commitment to growth is evident. And I sincerely hope that you find it as rewarding as I did, as enjoyable as I did. And then maybe as you work your way through this conversation, you find one thing that you can commit to in your life to improve. Just one thing. Write it down. Commit to practicing it daily, track your progress to know if you're

getting better at it or not, to be an honest human, to really reflect against it. That's why we track things. And then maybe, maybe over time, just maybe you'll inspire somebody else to do the same with you. With that, let's jump right into this week's conversation with the legend, Jim Nance. Jim, how are you? I'm well. I've been looking forward to this little chat with you, Mike. So all I can say is hello, friend. It's good to be with you. Oh, look at that. You're bringing the heat already. I'm so excited to spend time with you.

You have shaped so many events that I have watched in know, watched in sport. And you've done that for millions of people. And so I can't wait to learn how you orientate yourself, you know, to be fully enthralled in the moment because your energy, like you come from a place, but then you don't take over. It's this really eloquent, you know, masterful way of storytelling and narrating that I can't wait to learn from you. Well, you're awfully kind. And trust me, I'm very excited to be able to sit down and talk with someone that has

such big credentials as you do, Mike. And maybe I'll even find out a little bit more about what I'm doing by just talking to you. So this is all great. That's good. Now, were you born with that voice? I mean that your voice, like, or did you work on it? Is that part of your training? I had no training, never had anyone train me, except I can say this fifth, sixth and seventh

grade. I went to a speech therapist in grammar school because I couldn't roll my L's. So they clearly were not working with my voice for one day down the road being able to use it professionally. It was just, I couldn't say anything with an L, came out as a wah. So I love you, you know, and that was a problem. And I had to stay after school a couple of days a week And that's it. My voice is my dad's voice. My dad's been gone since 2008. Sound exactly like my dad. He never used his voice at all for any professional purposes, but I just count it as a blessing because people make a fuss about my voice. I don't get it. I don't think it's anything special, but I'm grateful that people do feel that way. And it's, I credit my dad and the man upstairs. You know, what's interesting is the science of listening to our own voice.

Most people listen to their voice and they're like, what is that? I don't sound like that, do I? But when we listen to ourselves, it resonates in our head and it does sound differently than what anyone else will hear. So do you have a critique about your voice or is it just matter of fact, like, no, that's just kind of, you know, I don't, I don't quite get it, but I'm glad that it resonates well with others. Well, I just learned something right there from you. So I'd never heard that before about the feedback you get when you listen to yourself. I know that when I go back and hear a clip, I cringe a little bit because it sounds a little bit awkward to me, to be honest.

Again, I don't do anything by design. I'm not sitting back trying to figure out a way to tweak my voice or sound like it has a little bit more depth or anything like that. I just want to be conversational the great majority of the time I'm broadcasting. I want to be me. I don't want to trick it up and sound like a broadcaster. Sometimes I sense there are those in sports broadcasting that have it in their head. They're supposed to sound a certain way. So they go on the air and whatever. They get overly excited or a little deeper than maybe it comes naturally for them. And they sound like a guy that could be spinning records on a radio station

because you know what they sound like off the air. I do believe this, the voice is a weapon in our business. Now I'm telling you, I don't use any methods to try to create something. I try to blend with the moment. If it's a golf tournament, my voice needs to be at a level that's appropriate for being in the arena at a golf event. A lot of people say, why do you whisper at a golf tournament? Because the players are right next to you. In golf, it's just whatever. It's been grandfathered in for years that in golf, it's a quiet sport and you don't distract someone by talking

during their swing. So that is the purest form of conversational speak in sports broadcasting, I believe, is in golf. But when you're calling a football game, like I'm in football season right now, or a basketball game, there's an energy wave that's up against your voice. That makes sense, Mike? So you can't see it, but you can hear it. You know what's there. That's that constant undercurrent of energy. And you have to take your voice over that or you get drowned out. And you also can be diluted a little bit, your voice, if you're going to talk at a level that's not cutting through, you have to be just a little notch above it and play with it. I talked to Tony Romo about this just last week at Dan.

He talks about it like it's a river that's flowing and where the river's flowing, you go with it. He was saying that to me, which I really appreciate it. If the crowd is rising, my voice is going to find a way to flow with it just above it. But again, that's not a trick. That just kind of comes naturally. If we were sitting side by side at a football game,

I couldn't whisper in your ear. You wouldn't hear me. So naturally, you have to pitch your voice to a level that I know you can hear me. And that's the same thing I'm trying to do for the audience, trying to make sure my voice is just above that, all that energy and all that noise where it's breaking through. So there's two things. One is like a social emotional intelligence where you are able to fit in and then also rise above. So it's not like you're getting, fitting in and getting lost in, but you're rising above just a bit. And the other is you're coming from a place of authenticity. And both of those authenticity

is harder than that word sounds. And people throw it around like it's casual or it's a North Star, but it requires an incredible amount of discipline and work and intention and training. And you've said that you don't do training for your voice, but I do want to understand how you've become the man that you've become to be authentic in environments where some people want to be the hype, want to be something other than maybe what they normally are or what they are at their center is maybe a better way of saying that. And not to be esoteric. Like for me, psychology is invisible and it's challenging because it's invisible. And I want to make it as, I want to put handles on it so we know what we're talking about. And sometimes we use words like center or whatever it sounds. But I don't want to put handles on it so we know what we're talking about. And sometimes we use words like center or whatever. It sounds woo-woo, but I don't want to do that. I want to actually go back.

I know your dad is so important to you. And I'd love to learn a little bit about how he shaped authenticity and how you've developed this ability to be authentic in other ways other than your dad? My dad, I think a lot of people would feel this way, but I just looked up to him so much as a man of high integrity, the highest integrity. And he had nothing but friends. I know people say that after you lose someone, oh, he never said a bad word about anyone. That truly was my dad. He was just kind of a happy-go-lucky probably isn't the right way to frame it, but he just believed in people.

So he had a natural gear where I'm going to ride with you. I'm going to take everything you say, and I'm going to believe in you. There's an old saying, I learned it years ago, then I first heard it from John Wooden. And I went to visit him at his home in Encino. And I did this several times. And I really couldn't quite do it the way you're doing it right now because it's already genius listening to you kind of break some of this down but I was looking for some psychological background on how coach Wooden dealt with his players and how he dealt with an interface with people and he was a quiet reserved high integrity classy guy, never wanted the attention to be about him. Anyway, he coached during a turbulent time in the 60s and 70s, and he was winning national championships. He said something that I thought, that's my dad. I would rather believe in someone and be disappointed some of the time than to never believe in someone and be disappointed all the time.

It's an interesting thing. It sounds so simple. all going to occasionally run into someone that took advantage of us or someone that that just had other ulterior motives and that's going to happen but that's not going to happen all the time so I'm going to be above that I'm going to believe in people I'm going to have great relationships as opposed to going in with a jaundiced eye and looking at people and saying I'm not going to believe in people saying, I'm not going to believe in people. I'm not going to believe in people and I'll be disappointed all the time, which I believe that second part of it. There are a lot of people who approach life that way. I don't. I got that from my dad. I believe in people. I do. And I saw that quality in him. He never, we talked about his voice earlier, Mike.

He never was interviewed. He was never on television, ever. No media attention whatsoever. He was just a hardworking guy who tried to make life better for his family. He took a big leap too. He was from a small town in North Carolina called Mount Holly, where his father, my grandfather, and our namesake, Jim Nance Sr., I'm the third, was the postmaster of this little mill town in North Carolina.

My dad got an education through sport. He was an athlete at Guilford College, and he took that opportunity, that education, and got a very good job in the business world that transferred him and his young family to New Orleans, to the Bay Area, eventually to the New York area in New Jersey, and then down to Houston. We got to see the world, the greatest cultural experience of all for a young mind is being able to see different cultures, different ways that people live. But my dad took that giant leap and he bettered himself. And all the while, it was all about trying to give us a better life. My sister Nancy and I, we were the beneficiaries of that. And he had a curious mind.

I think curious mind is a good thing to have. I think it's really helped me a lot in my business. I like to learn about people, places, and things, and cultures. I like to have this area edition about all things, whether I can use it on the air or not. But for an example, when we were living in the East Bay area in a little town called Moraga, California, my folks, led by my dad's initiative, would take us on weekend trips for experiences to open our minds. We went to the wine country. I was 10 years old and being toured around Mondavia States. Now, obviously, I wasn't tasting, but I was experiencing what it's like

from the ground up to produce wine. I learned the whole process as he did. I went right along with him. Now I'm in the wine business all these years later. We went down to the Carmel area and several times, and he loved to walk around Ocean Avenue in the streets of Carmel by the sea and see the art galleries. Again, he wanted us to see all of this, other interests that people had. Later, I would settle right there a mile from Carmel in Beville Beach, California, because it made such an indelible impression on me. But a curious mind and an open heart and a belief in people, that was my dad. And I'd like to think that I carry those same traits because I learned from the best. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentous.

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All of that, all of that is powerful. And then if you could drill right into what it was like, because what, okay, hold on. I have a question loaded, but I don't want to just jump into it because I want to know about your dinner table. But what you're describing is optimism. What you're describing is a beginner's mind. What you're describing is a zest for people. So a relationship based approach, you're describing high trust. And when you trust yourself, and, and then you extend that trust to others, basically comes from this, knowing that when it doesn't go well, you have what it takes internally to figure that out, too. So you can drop your shoulders and go in, you know, curiously, unprotected into relationships and environments. And so when you, it's evidence of low anxiety. And so anxiety is a big deal for people right now. I'm not sure it is for you, but before I go to the dinner table, do you have anxiety? Do you have any rattling, an internal rattling about the excessive worry about what happens if it goes wrong?

I think I'll lay it on the table here. Early in my career, I dealt with anxiety. I was hired by the network when I was 26 years old. I'm 62 now. So I'm in my 37th year. And it all happened so fast. I mean, here I was basically three and a half years removed from graduation from the University of Houston. And this was the childhood dream. Sounds like good copy, as they say today. But everyone who knows me knows that since I was a little boy, I talked about being a storyteller. I wanted to be a sports commentator. I wanted to be one of those voices that came into my living room on weekends.

We didn't have Monday through Sunday 24-hour coverage like we do these days. I lived for those weekends to hear the voices. I always wanted to be one of those voices to inform, educate, see the world and share it with other people. So I got hired after an audition with four other candidates that were all summoned to New York. I won the audition. I was put right into the studio within a matter of weeks to host the college football studio show with Pat Hayden, who to this day remains a very dear friend. And he was incredibly helpful to me back then as I was just a young kid. And now suddenly I'm in the big leagues. So the first year we went through it, I was just riding on such a high that I don't know.

I didn't think much about the enormity of it. You know, I'm hosting a studio operation sitting in the same chair that Brent Musburger would sit in the following day after the college show on Sunday. He would come in and anchor the NFL Today from the same desk, same chair that had Brent's name on the back of it. After that, I was suddenly launched into the college basketball world with CBS, and I was hosting the Final Four. I was still 26 years old. And after that, I was at the Masters, and Jack Nicklaus wins his historic sixth green jacket was still 26 years old it was an amazing ride for about nine months that summer I was working golf events here and there and getting ready to go into my second year and for whatever reason something got in my head that this is wow you know this't easy. Well, that wouldn't be right.

The margin, if you screw up, you know, it's, there's a big audience out there. And the gravity of it wore me down a little bit. In that second year, I dealt with anxiety, big time. I mean, I really lost some confidence in myself, which was foreign to me, was then, is now, because I've never lacked for belief, not overconfident, but enough belief that I can stand up and talk in front of people. So that was a trying time for me. That was probably the hardest time of my career. I was, for some reason reason obsessing over what could go wrong instead of what was going right and um you know i was able to make my way through it and you know i know this

repetition and success through through difficult times through choppy waters strengthens you and after you say well i got through that, I can get through anything. I got through the final four live, sitting on a set by myself, taking us on and off the air. Well, that's a layer of confidence. Not that it hardens you, it just gives you a foundation where you know you've already defeated that you've already grown past that and the second anxiety point for me was in 92 at the masters when fred couples won the masters we were uh we were at the university of houston together we shared a four-person suite from day one so we were roommates um and he always wanted to win the Masters, always wanted to broadcast

the Masters. And now April the 12th, 1992 rolls around and he's on his way to winning it. And I'm hosting it. It's my seventh Masters and he's going to win the green jacket. And now we have to go conduct the green jacket ceremony for the world to watch. Why is that significant? Because we used to practice that in our dorm room. We used to sit around and actually play act like grownups. He's the champion. I'm hosting it for CBS. And I even would tape it into a little audio cassette player. We practiced the green jackets. I'm not talking about 30 times. We did it a couple of times, play acted like we were big shots. We had fulfilled our dreams. So now you fast forward to a few years later, we're still young. We're still at that point, 32 years old. And it happens, except now this isn't in your dorm room and it's not make-believe.

This is happening all across the United States and 206 countries around the world that take the Butler Cabin feed of the coronation of the Masters tournament. And I have to tell you, I felt anxiety there. I did. I felt it that weekend. I knew he was going to win that Sunday. I didn't feel like myself. I began to just, again, it started to creep into, wow, this could get messy. I began to worry about whether, it started to creep into, wow, this could get messy. I began to worry about whether I could hold it together, that I might get so emotional that I couldn't get the words out. But we got through it. And I got to tell you, it was again, it was a. It was a watershed moment for me because I thought that's about as difficult as it gets for me to be personally

invested in that moment with one of your best buddies winning the master's tournament. And if I can get through that, I felt like I could get through just about anything. So you've earned that right to say to yourself, I can do hard things. And that comes from you doing different, stepping outside of your comfort zone on a regular basis. If you go right before that, do you use mental imagery? Do you use any sort of visualization or seeing and feeling and experience before it unfolds? Or do you show up with this high trust, which is, okay, I'm going to be with the moment and I'm going to flow

with it just like the river that you were describing earlier? Or do you spend time? And I know you prepare. There's no chance you don't prepare, but I'm wondering if you prepare mentally and emotionally using imagery or visualization as well. Again, no one's ever asked me this before, so I appreciate it. But I will often, almost every single time before I leave a hotel room to go to a game site or a tournament site, I will spend an extra 30 minutes just going through in my room through all the imagery of what could potentially happen that day. I don't script anything. In fact, I'm the last guy in the world that likes to sit down and have a written script. I say this all the time. I would rather be conversational and choppy and lost for the

right word, pausing maybe sometimes a little longer than I should, like I am right now, to get my message across or get the words out the feel the moment then to be written out and to be clean and letter perfect I don't want that I don't want to sound so clean and perfect and the delivery that it's what's scripted um so when I say taking your words the imagery of it I I like to I like to actually sit down and go through the lineups. Let's take a pro football game. So I can make sure, okay, at left tackle, okay, at Tyron Smith. And I go right through, you know, the entire offensive line.

Backups, tight end position. I see my board that I've worked on all week I actually see it you know I can kind of like relate to it I know where the names are on the board flip it over take the other team's defense I'll go position by position I'll think about stories that are in the back of my mind that I've compartmentalized about each individual on each roster and I just I just kind of go through it it's a good 30-minute exercise and then you sometimes just think about certain scenarios what happens if if Tom Brady today throws his third touchdown and that gives him yet another all-time record

what's that moment going to feel like what's it going to look like i'm not going to script it but i want to kind of like have already seen it do you know that when i audition i mentioned a while back that i auditioned with four others i went into the studio in new york the broadcast center there were two prospects that were from from los ang Angeles that were auditioning. One from Washington, D.C., and one from the affiliate in New York. And I was coming from Salt Lake City, from KSL station that was a CBS affiliate at that time. Now it's an NBC affiliate. But I was from a smaller market by a mile. I was also the youngest guy by quite a bit that was auditioning. But I had been in that studio so many times in my head since I was 11 years old. I never missed the NFL today. I could hear the music. I could feel the studio, if that makes any sense. So when I walked in,

it was my turn to go audition. I was fifth five to audition i walked in it looked like i'd been in there in my mind felt like i've been there a hundred times they walked me over to the chair i sat down looked at the camera said hello to everybody and you know give me about a minute before they were going to say go and it was maybe i don't strange some people might call it but it was so comfortable with me I had been there that's not overcome it's not coming from a place of overconfidence it's coming from a place of massive imagery almost borderline I know you're gonna hate this word almost obsessed about it almost obsessively had thought about it for years that when I got into that studio, I felt like I owned it. I felt like I'd done this show already. And I just got to go through the perfunctory routine of delivering what I know I can do. So imagery is a big part of what I do.

Yes. Very cool. And no, you say this, you say obsessive, you know, and it's just part of it. And unfortunately, there is a dark side to becoming masterful. There is a part that I'm not sure we're really ready to talk about publicly. So I'm not going to ask you necessarily to go there, but there is a cost to being one of the best, if not the best in the world at anything, the sacrifice, the strain, the commitment, the obsessiveness, um, the failures that publicly usually that come with it are taxing and hard. And so do you want to double dip in any of that? Like, you know, some of the hardships that come because there's there's this belief that your overnight success you know not you you know but people are overnight success

or it comes easy or you know the the instagram celebrityness of things like so i know better you know better that there's a dark side and um no i don't know anyone that's escaped it and so i don't know if you want to um put a little color to that for yourself. Well, I think there's two parts. There's the dark side of being obsessive about something before you get it. And then there's the dark side of once you get it and you have public failures, which we all do because we're dealing with an animal called live television. There are no second takes. It's right there out in front of you.

So I'll take the first part. When you obsess about something to the degree that I did, and I already told you, it happened since I was 11 years old. I think I sacrificed, in some respects, some normalcy to particularly my college years. I don't really remember ever doing anything like attending a party. I never went to a single party in college. Well, somebody might be listening to say, well, who would invite you to a party anyway? Maybe they're right. But my story was in college, I wanted to do anything that could possibly lead to one day being discovered by CBS.

That was a network I wanted to work for. CBS broadcast the Masters, and I loved the way that he presented the NFL. So I obsessed about it. Jim, did it feel like a sacrifice at the time? Not at all. That's right. It felt like stepping stones. I felt like, okay, this is another notch. And I mean, I volunteered, I've had this great arrangement for people.

I would like to come work for free, for free. Yeah. I'll go figure out how to make a little bit of change on the side, waiting tables and things like that. But I just want to get in the door. I want to watch how you guys do it. So alas, I worked for the CBS radio affiliate in Houston, maybe 40, 50 hours a week for free. And I just thought it was still beneficial to be behind the scenes and watch guys like Jerry Truppiano and Dave Barrett and Dave Courtney and these guys that were all putting shows together, doing sports talk radio. And I tried to help any way I could volunteer to do anything that they needed.

Just a runner position, basically glorified runner. No internship. There were no credit hours given back over at the university. It was all on my own. But at the time, I just loved all of these opportunities. I remember my, when I graduated from college, I looked it up because I keep everything in a journal. I document in a daily planner, my days. I've been doing it for 30 something. Every day I can tell you,

I can go back and I have them all. I can tell you where I had dinner with whom I had dinner, what the highlights of my day were. I'm regimented and organized like that. I have it all. Why do you do that, Jim? You know, I kind of like to know, just most of the time, I like to know how I can better myself. If I'm doing something too much, I will write down how many days. So I know at the end of the year, how many days I worked out, how many days I was at home. That's really key for me. I want to know how much traveling I'm doing. And I think it helps shape me a little bit better. I mean, I keep a little side log about how much I do a little bit of this, a little bit of that, how many times I drank in a

week. I can tell you the last five years exactly how many times I had a cocktail or a glass of wine. And, you know, I just at some point I said, I don't want to just automatically sit down and order a beer. Because I don't even know if I had a beer or a glass of wine, five straight nights, 10 straight nights. What's it look like? Am I developing bad habits? Have I worked out in the last five days? Oh, you know what? I haven't. Like I really wanted to know what I'm doing. So I'm staying on a plan and I don't think it's crazy. I mean, I look at a guy like Tom Brady. I think Tom's got his life kind of figured out what he's doing right and wrong and, and maximizes the things that make him better.

So he knows how much of that effort is going into his overall plan to try to be the best quarterback. So I've always done that. Do you have a structure to it? Like, does each page look the same or is it more free flowing where it's a reflection of the day or is it an intention? You know, it sounds like where it's a reflection of the day or is it an intention you know it sounds like it would be a reflection of the day it's pretty much all it is it's it's condensed to three or four sentences maybe maybe a paragraph of what each day was like and it gets

back to my point when i was in college when i graduated i can't exactly recall the number but it was like 560 something straight days I had worked when I graduated. So I was always working for someone, a radio station, a TV station, a cable station, being another enterprising 20-year-old who was maybe going to work a little bit harder than I was. I wasn't going to let that happen. I figured there were others out there. We think it's competitive today, and it is, to try to land in the sports broadcasting universe. When I came out of college, there wasn't the plethora of programming. There wasn't all of this content that's out there today. So there should be more jobs.

It seems like though there are more candidates for fewer opportunities, but I can only relate to my time. And I just wanted to make sure that at that time and place, 20, 21, 22, I kind of felt like maybe I was doing things that no one else in the country was doing as far as trying to advance to one day get to a network. I was anchoring on the CBS TV affiliate in Houston at the age of 20. I was doing the sports on weekends, on a fill-in basis. And I would think, I wonder how many 20-year-olds there are in the top 25 market right now that are getting the opportunity to be on the air. And that was always the race, was to try to do things ahead of schedule so that one day that schedule would intersect with CBS's needs. CBS might be looking for somebody.

And by some miracle, maybe I would show up CBS's needs. CBS might be looking for somebody. And by some miracle, maybe I would show up on their radar. And thankfully, mercifully, I did. How did that happen? How did you get called by CBS? There was a headhunter in San Francisco who would move local anchors around. His name was Don Fitzpatrick. He's gone now. but he would take on, I don't know how many clients, maybe 100, 200, maybe more. And he would be aware there's a weekend sports opening in Cincinnati. And you would sign some sort of agreement that if he landed you that opportunity as a headhunter, he would represent you in that deal. My tape ended up somehow in the hands of the brass at CBS Sports in 1985.

Now, I'd only been at this station in Salt Lake Castle for two years. He had already given me an opportunity to be a weekend sports anchor in L.A. Didn't want it because it didn't include play-by-play. I figured play-by-play was going to be my opportunity to get to the network. I wanted to call games. I didn't figure studio hosting would get me the job of my dreams. I needed to call games. So when an independent station in LA offered me a lot more money, triple the money,

and of course, the second biggest market in the country, I turned it down. I turned down opportunities back in Houston, Philadelphia, Denver. I mentioned Cincinnati. These were all opportunities this gentleman presented to me. And they included flying in and being interviewed. I turned them all down because in Salt Lake, I was calling BYU football and basketball games on TV. And more importantly, I was doing the Utah Jazz games with Hot Rod Hundley. I was doing games as well as anchoring. And I thought the games one

day would be the ticket to the network to be discovered. So my tape ended up, thanks to this gentleman, in the hands of the brass at CBS. And I was a late addition to their interviewing process. I got called the day before they were bringing everybody to New York. It was a last second edition. Somebody said, I found out later on, let's bring the kid in from Salt Lake City. What do we have to lose? Let's fly him in. So I did. I got a call one night at 10 o'clock in Utah. And the next morning, eight o'clock, I was on a flight to JFK. And the day after that, I was in the broadcast center auditioning for the job of my dreams. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned

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And what keeps me coming back, it's really simple. Their products are simple. And they reflect the kind of intentional living that I want to build into every part of my day. And they make my morning routine really easy. They've got some great new products I think you'll be interested in. A shampoo, conditioner, and a hair serum. With Caldera Lab, it's not about adding more. It's about choosing better. And when your day demands clarity and energy and presence, the way you prepare for it matters. If you're looking for high quality personal care products

that elevate your routine without complicating it, I'd love for you to check them out. Head to calderalab.com slash finding mastery and use the code finding mastery at checkout for 20% off your first order. That's calderalab, C-A-L-D-E-R-L-A-B.com slash finding mastery. Okay. 37 years later in the, in the career, what are you searching for now? Well, I have never stopped appreciating what I have. I mean, I, I, I, I walk into the booth every single time with a grateful heart, never taken this, this gift, this opportunity to work for CBS, never taken it lightly. Um, the process of getting ready for broadcast. I still love to this day, reading and talking to people and learning so that I can in turn help document whatever the show might be. But now I'm at a point where it's about longevity for me, Mike. I've done all the events. I broadcast all the events that are kind of important to me that I feel qualified to do.

You mentioned the word authenticity. Maybe that gets overused, but I only wanted to be associated with sports that I knew and that I love, that I was naturally passionate about. A couple of times in my career, I got assigned to do some sports that were a little out of my comfort zone. And I never wanted to go there again. So the NFL, golf, college basketball happen to be my three favorites. And again, thankfully, they are all a major part of what CBS Sports is doing. I want to do this. It sounds like, OK, you've mapped this out an awful lot, Jim. And it is true.

I go back again to my youth, to the network that I wanted to work for. And I would like to, if I could write the script, God willing, I would like to work until 2036. It's going to sound a little bizarre maybe to you, but in 2036, the Masters will be played for the 100th time. For whatever reason, that's important to me. I would like to be there for the 100th playing of the Masters tournament. That would be my 51st Masters. So that would be, at that point, I would have done more than half the Masters Tournaments ever played.

It would be the 100th tournament. And to me, that feels like about the right goal to have. I don't want anything. I've been given everything I could ever want professionally. You've got this really interesting blend between going with the tide, you know, with the river of a moment. And at the same time, you think ahead. And so you've got this intersection, this nexus between being intentional, thinking ahead, using imagery, and also, you know, planning forward at the same time, not being constricted by it.

And so I think that when I'm listening, I'm like, okay, he's masterful at, and what are the sub capabilities to be able to be great at it? And certainly we've mentioned some of them. I think this is another one, is that it's that toggling back and forth. And then you have this ability to settle into the present moment. And the present moment, as you would recognize, is where high performance takes place. It's also where joy, happiness, you know, all the good things are experienced. It's also where wisdom is revealed.

And it sounds like you have an uncanny ability, almost as if sport is a forcing function for to force you into the present moment. But I think it's bigger than sport. I think it's the relationship with the unfolding environment that is what has fascinated you. And I think you're really open to an experiences period and you're optimistic, meaning that you look forward to the future. You believe in people just like your dad taught you. We didn't get to the dinner table, but I'm imagining that it was conversational. I'm imagining your parents would pour into you rather than be critics of you. Could you wave me off if I'm wrong there?

No, you're 100% correct. They were believers in their children and they built you up. And I think that's such a powerful thing as a father of three is to make your children believe they're capable of doing things and giving them encouragement instead of criticism. Yes. And the dinner table for us, and this is something that I really believe in, and I even want to do a better job of it as a family. I believe that that dinner table environment is so important.

The world is so fast and people are moving in different directions. And two of my three children are very young and we're running between baseball practice, soccer practice. And how do you sit down and just have that setting for four of us around the table? Caroline, my oldest, is a USC graduate, and she would say the same thing. I love to be able to sit down and just talk about the day as a family. I think that's highly valuable. You said something a moment ago about joy. You used the word joy. If you ask some people that have known me a long time at CBS, they'll kind of laugh about it a little bit, but they know I'm serious. When you get ready to do a big show, and it's not exclusive to CBS,

this is part of the business, what do people say to you right before you go live? Just have fun. Just go have fun. Hey, all right, guys, are you ready? Yeah, I'm ready. Good. Go have fun. Well, it's the Super Bowl. I'm going to go call the Super Bowl. Just go that's my eighth Super Bowl broadcast this past

February what my idea is fun might be different than what someone else's idea is fun you know if I was in the middle of the Super Bowl decided on camera to just for the fun of it take my shirt off wait a minute what are you doing I'm just trying to have fun you guys told me to have fun right I thought it's supposed to be fun are you crazy call the game so so fun no one would want to see that trust me but the word i would always want to sub for that and and again people know me from having repeated this through the years internally is do it with joy no no when they say with 10 seconds ago, all right, 10, nine, have fun. Eight, seven.

No, no, no. Do it with joy. It's a big difference. Joy is something that's real. It's in your soul. It's in your core. It's who you are. It's that enthusiasm, that wonder and awe that you are here calling the Super Bowl,

the Masters, the Final Four, that childhood joy of being able to even attend a game like that if we were ever lucky enough, which I wasn't. But to be able to see one of these events, you'd walk into the arena and you'd be overcome with just pure joy. You'd be holding your father's hand like I did when the Saints played their first ever game in 1967. We had standing room only seats and we actually sat in the aisles.

That was the most joyful moment in sports in my life. That's what I want when I come on the air. I want joy because this game at home is joy to people. They're giving up whatever it is they could be doing on a weekend or at night. They're sitting down getting experience on a game. They're watching it for joy. And I need to relate that joy. I need to feel that same joy that I'm actually living out my dream. That's joy. That's not fun. I feel like you just brought me in. That is what I feel. That's what I didn't understand when I've listened to you for, for so long. That's what I didn't understand. It's remember at the top,

when I said you come from a place and that place is joy. And so Jim, I could stop right now because like, honestly, what a, what a, thank you. And I want to, I want to I want to in my part here I've got so many more questions like I wanted to learn about you know what you've learned from George W Bush what you've learned from Tony Dungy what you've learned from Tom Brady or Arnold Palmer or legends like I wanted to know that but I more importantly, you're coming from joy is what you've taught me more than anything. And so fantastic. And I want to share a small little story to relate to is that I was about to go on stage.

It was probably about 6,000 people and which is a, you know, that's a crowded room for a talk. It's not 26 or 64,000 or 6 billion that you speak to, I think. But it was an intimate room with very learned people. And somebody that I really respected as I was about to go out could see that I was feeling it. And I was in a good vibe. I had just that right amount of internal energy. And he leaned over to me and he said, give him your heart.

I looked back and I thought, oh shit, that's what I'm missing. I had all the mind stuff. I had all the smart stuff I wanted to kind of convey and work through and wrestle with together. And there was going to be a smart Q&A at the end of it. And he leaned in and he said, give him your heart. At that moment, I was like, I've been missing that. And so that changed me.

And so I think when I hear that, when I remember that, that's an important part for me. And when I hear you say come from joy, it feels like there's some similarity that maybe we both work from. And maybe that's why, as I'm talking out loud, that I've resonated with your work so much because you're coming from joy. Well, I appreciate how fast you can distill all of this. We've never met in person. I look forward to that occasion.

Hopefully the next time I'm out on the West Coast, that will happen because I want to take a deeper dive into all this because you have absolutely gotten in my head really quickly and kind of understand me, which I think is an incredible gift that you have. And when you say from the heart, and you're about to stand up and speak in front of everyone, the heart will always lead you to a very good place i believe um professionally personally mike shishefsky someone i admire quite a bit and he wrote a book a few years ago called leading with the heart new york times bestseller and it resonated with me quite a bit because when i broadcast an event, we talked about joy, particularly golf. In football and basketball, I have these spotting boards, shot charts, whatever people would want to call.

Every broadcaster has them. You work on them all week long. You read reams of material. And 2% of what you actually study for maybe gets on the air but you're prepared and i love that process of preparation but when i get to golf i don't have a spotting board matter of fact i don't have anything in front of me and people say well how do you do that well in golf it's not as transient a sport. You can have a 25-year career. A guy like Phil Mickelson, I've been covering him since he turned professional back in the early 90s, or Tiger, or any one of the big names. You cover them for a long time.

You interact with them a lot. Oftentimes, you stay at the same hotels. You're traveling the same circuit slash circus that they are. I have been given the gift of a great memory. And I can kind of compartmentalize, catalog all these in my head. And if I have to, given a certain scenario, I can dial up a story about any one of the premier players in golf. But I always say this.

When I broadcast the Masters Tournament, I broadcast right here, right from the heart. That to me is the ultimate sporting event. It's the ultimate storytelling event because it's longer form. In a game, it's moving so quickly, you can't delve into a 45-second story. You don't have the chance to do that. It's on to the next play. It's on to the next possession. But that tournament on that canvas, there was something lyrical or poetic about it. And I love broadcasting that event. And I broadcast it every single time we come on the air from right here from the heart I let my heart speak I'm so over the top thrilled to be there there's so much joy in my heart that I'm there I let it speak I think I let it speak more there than anything else that I do PGA championship too

it's another major championship that we have but that's how I broadcast it speak more there than anything else that I do. PGA Championship, too. It's another major championship that we have. But that's how I broadcast it. It comes from the heart. And I got to tell you, I feel like it produces whatever the optimum I want to try to be like as a broadcaster. And I still got a long way to go. I'm still trying to protect. I'm still trying to perfect my craft. But that's when I feel like I'm in my sweet spot is when I'm talking from my heart at that turn. What a gem. And Jim, you know what I'd like to do?

I'd like to do a part two, if you'd be open to it some other time where we talk about like without using names, but you've seen the best in the world intimately. You've seen their practices and how they develop. You also have your practice of developing. And so it'd be really fun to talk about like the patterns and the practices that you've seen that allow people to become mapped against your process. And I could share some of mine. And then on the other side, like why things are so go so terribly wrong. And when there's this cresting for people and you've seen people unravel, you know, in dramatic ways in intimate moments, as well as like a career unraveling, it'd be,

it would be fun to be on both sides of that with you just to talk about. And again, not to use names and call people out, but patterns of why, why people unravel and how they become. I'd love to do that with you at some point. I'm, uh, I, I sign up for that whenever you want to do it, Mike, anytime. It'd be my pleasure. Here's the thing. I feel like in a weird way, uh, when I had this, this, this crazy notion in my head that this is what I wanted, I wanted to be one of those voices. At that time, I didn't have the worldview that you have when you're 62 years old. Really, if you boil down what the job is that CBS asked me to do, is I'm a paid observer. They pay me to observe a sporting event and tell people

at home what it is that I see. I'm not there to spew numbers and statistics. They can put those on the screen. I'm there to tell people about the subjects that are competing in that game and what's in their heart and what's in their head. So observing others is really, in a weird way, it's kind of like your job. Yes. You're observing others. You have an incredible ability to figure out how the mind works and how each individual mind works. And for me, much, much lower scale, I'm there to observe people's actions and tell people what they're doing or what they're not doing. More of the time, I'm not being the analyst like Tony or Nick Faldo or Bill Raftery or Grant Hill, my analyst on my primary sports.

I'm there to tell the overall general themes and stories about the subjects we're covering. And I come from a very positive place. We discussed earlier with my dad. I'm not really there to try to make anyone look bad on the broadcast. I'm there to tell their story. The great, great, great majority of the time, I'm there to build people up. I believe in the positive in people and um that's why i like my position as a host play-by-play broadcaster i'm there to give the overall perspective of the moment

the story of the moment but i'm i'm not having to be judgmental i'm there to most of the moment, but I'm not having to be judgmental. I'm there to, most of the time, tell something about what's in the subject's heart and why this moment's important. And I'll leave you with this. Someone's walking up the 18th fairway Sunday at the Masters tournament. Do you know how many times, imagery-wise, they have thought of that moment? Hundreds, if not thousands of times. Every one of them have bathed in that moment. The spotlight is on them. They're on their way to winning the Masters. This is to win the Open Championship. This is to win the PGA. Whatever it might be, they played those mind games their whole life. What are they saying about me on TV? In this moment, as I'm about to embrace the dream, how are people describing what it means to me? I've worked my whole life for this.

Is that guy up in the booth representing me well? Is he doing justice to my story? Does that guy have any idea how hard I worked to get here? Does he have any idea the effort, the sweat that went in to be able to walk into this moment, put out, and win a major championship? I've worked my whole life for this. That guy up in the booth, I hope he knows. I hope he knows what's in my head and what's in my heart. I hope he knows the efforting that went in for this moment. I feel a great sense of responsibility, actually, Michael, when you get down to it. I feel like that I need to frame that moment. And I will talk to subjects. Tom Brady won his seventh Super Bowl on our air in

February. It's a big moment. I've had 101 Tom Brady games now. After a while, you run out of things to say that you haven't said before about Tom. He's exceptional. Same thing with Tiger. The great majority, 57 of Tiger's 82 wins were on CBS. Nine of his 15 majors puts a real demand on the storyteller to try to keep it fresh. But I know this. I will get certain little anecdotal background pieces on these players, and I will file them away. And I will save that for the ultimate moment that may or may not come. When that guy's walking up 18, I will always have something loaded up at that tournament especially that no one's ever heard before

because that moment is so big. And I want to represent them well. I feel the responsibility to do justice to their effort and their dream, to be able to be the voice behind it. It's clear why you're great at what you do. You said something during our talk here that you're trying to figure out where I was coming from.

And then, but it's almost like when the event, I'm living for that moment where the event takes place. I mean, I feel like sometimes there's repetitiveness, which again, I love it, but I can stand up on a whim and I could deliver a 30-minute talk without any prep. I can deliver a message in one take to somebody I don't know well. If you turn me on, I can do it, ad lib it, and figure it out and bring it up from the heart. So you talked about being in that arena. I know how to like tap into that.

I don't know. I'm not articulating it very well, but I've had enough experiences where I know how to get into that moment. Sometimes I wish I could deal with better getting out of it. And by that, I mean, Sunday ends, finish calling whatever the event might be. It's a travel day back home. But Mondays, I'm just almost a zombie mentally because I'm so locked in laser focus on the game. Monday's a hard day. I can't figure out how to get my mind feeling like anything other than just a bowl of Jell- you know what's taking place is um i think one is you

probably don't know the science here but i bet you get into flow state you probably heard the zone and all that you know what that is right but that's the scientific term is called flow state and i bet you're in flow state more than most people and because your flow state happens when your skills and the challenge come together, and then you are in the unfolding moment. And it's called flow state because it's so fluid, the zone. Musicians call it being in the pocket. And so there's a deep struggle to get to that place. That place is magical, is wonderful,'s addicting and then and then there's a come down so that your neurochemistry up there there's this dopamine serotonin adrenaline that's just

flooding your brain like no other time really and then there's a come down i bet monday's a come down from you not that different than a drug addict, you know, that you just, you had this thing and then there's the downside. So I think it's probably part of your cycle that is a bit of the dark side like that. And then I would say your work is to make sure that you've got your recovery practices in place so that you can rebound faster than maybe you'd like to. But there is going to be a downswing that takes place from that type of brain chemistry experience. Feel it every week. It's there every week. And so what happens for people- It's not that dark. It's not like I'm irritable and you can't be around me. I just-

For some people, it is. Yeah. I'm just not the same guy. I mean, I'm just, I'm fatigued. I'm mentally fatigued. It's hard to kind of get moving. I'm a high energy, want to keep moving kind of a guy. I would honor that, what your body is telling you to do and not kind of fight against it. I wouldn't do that. I would go like, oh, part of wisdom is like my body's saying, chill. Mondays, I'm going to be down.

I'm going to do some light work, if you will, on Mondays, and I'm going to enjoy family if you can. And if you, if you're on a Monday night game, a Monday night football game or whatever, I don't know if you're on Monday nights, but obviously you couldn't do it there. Sometimes you do get the back to back things in two or three days. That's, that's good. Just to know not to fight it. I mean, that just, I just, they're just hard. They're really hard on me. They're really hard. I used to call it a blue funk. Live television is

just to make sure you get it right. Don't make a misstep. It's three hours. Nobody's writing it for you and your reactions are so fast. That is so fast. You have to be super super what did you call it before well the focus is not it but yeah all those things that are flow state is what

you call it flow yeah the science is moving so fast that the next day there has to be a price to pay all of that adrenaline rush has to come down. That's exactly it. Yeah, that's exactly it. And I would listen to your body and, and then it would be probably smart to make sure, have you done a high performance blood panel, like a nutrition panel? Yes, I have been about a year. I've done that several times. Yeah. Yeah. So I would, I would stay on that once a year and make sure that the choices you're making on nutrition are helping you with that recovery process. You know, there's like, and it's not a blood panel you get from your GP. This would be from a nutritional expert. And that's what you're doing?

Yes. Yeah, perfect. Okay, great. So making sure that you're doing that well, making sure that you're getting your sleep done, you know, like you probably need between seven and nine hours of sleep on a regular basis. Make sure that's dialed up. Hydration's good. Take care of the basic, you know, table stakes on recovery, which will help you. But the big one is the psychological battle, which is like, am I missing a step? What's going on now? It's normal. It's totally normal. Hey, Jim. Hey,

listen, I feel like I've known you for a long time. And so, um, thank you after just one, one hour with you. So it's been great. Thanks, man. I really appreciate it. But we'll hopefully we'll do it again. Thank you for your time, your insight. Thank you for coming from your heart and sharing how you've become and what you hope others will become as well. Thank you. Thank you, Michael. All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community. And if you're enjoying the show,

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