Finding Peak w/ Ryan Hanley - What He Learned Climbing the World's Tallest Peaks

Episode Date: October 28, 2024

Spartan philosophy, built in the black-ops lab of business: https://www.findingpeak.comFinding Peak podcast: https://linktr.ee/ryan_hanley Extreme sports enthusiast and philanthropist Matt Dawson takes us on a riveting journey from the Naval Academy to the peaks of the world's tallest mountains and beyond.Connect with Matt DawsonWebsite: https://dawsonspeak.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dawsonspeak/Foundation: https://dawsonspeakfoundation.org/Overcoming bilateral compartmental syndrome was a pivotal moment in Matt's life, transforming what could have been a setback into a launchpad for personal growth and high achievement.His experiences, including skiing to the South Pole, reveal the relentless mindset needed to conquer both physical and mental obstacles, offering listeners a glimpse into the resilience that defines true performance.We unravel the complexities of maintaining high personal standards while balancing self-compassion. Through Matt's insights, we discuss the importance of community support and how quality triumphs over quantity in pursuing personal and professional goals.Delving deep into the internal struggles that high achievers face, we explore how self-awareness and grace can illuminate the path to self-correction and authenticity.Matt’s compelling perspectives highlight the importance of understanding one's impact on others and how personal growth can redefine one's identity within their community.Sponsors: Get a FREE trial of unlimited access and an additional 20% discount on Shortform through my special link: https://shortform.com/ryanhanley Take your podcasting journey to new heights. Get booked on high-influence podcasts with That 1 Agency: https://bit.ly/that1podcasttour Episodes You Might Enjoy: From $2 Million Loss to World-Class Entrepreneur: https://lnk.to/delk From One Man Shop to $200M in Revenue: https://lnk.to/tommymello Is Psilocybin the Gateway to Self-Mastery? https://lnk.to/80upZ9  Get in Touch: https://linktr.ee/ryan_hanley--Recommended Tools for GrowthOpusClip: #1 AI video clipping and editing tool: https://link.ryanhanley.com/opusRiverside: HD Podcast & Video Software | Free Recording & Editing: https://link.ryanhanley.com/riversideWhisperFlow: Never waste time typing on your keyboard again: https://link.ryanhanley.com/whisperflowCaptionsApp: One app for all your social media video creation: https://link.ryanhanley.com/captionsappGoHighLevel: It's time to take your business workflow to the Next Level: https://link.ryanhanley.com/gohighlevelPerspective.co: The #1 funnel builder for lead generation: https://link.ryanhanley.com/perspective--Episodes You Might Enjoy:From $2 Million Loss to World-Class Entrepreneur: https://lnk.to/delkFrom One Man Shop to $200M in Revenue: https://lnk.to/tommymelloIs Psilocybin the Gateway to Self-Mastery? https://lnk.to/80upZ9This show is part of the Unplugged Studios Network — the infrastructure layer for serious creators. 👉 Learn more at https://unpluggedstudios.fm.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Happy holidays. Want to give your host a gift? Consider subscribing, rating, and reviewing the show this holiday season. It really helps the show grow. From all of us at Believe, have a Merry Christmas, everyone, and a happy holiday. I think today we're losing, kind of setting a standard for ourselves and maintaining that standard. And people now are either consciously or, I think, more often subconsciously, looking for a free lunch. Let's go.

Yeah, make a look. Make a look. The Ryan Hanley Show shares the original ideas, habits, and mindsets of world-class original thinkers you can use to produce extraordinary results in your life and business. This is the way. Before we get going, everyone, I just want to let you know that I have messed this up five times now, this intro, and that is a new record. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the show.

We have a tremendous conversation for you today with Matt Dawson, former Naval Academy graduate, graduated from the Wharton School as well, Division I football player, highly successful M&A investment banker, turned extreme sports enthusiasts and philanthropist. Matt took on the challenge of climbing the tallest peak on each of the seven continents. He has skied to the South Pole as well as many other extreme challenges and his foundation supports athletes that create the continuation of purpose in people's lives. Matt's an incredible guy with an extraordinary viewpoint on what high performance looks like,

what it takes to get there, and we spend not our time in the tactics and strategies of high performance, but in the mentality of high performance. What did he have to go through to be able to climb some of the tallest mountains in the world? what was going on in his head? How did he deal with the isolation? How did he deal with the pain? What was it that drove him through those moments where every particle in his body was screaming for him to stop?

And then how can we bringing that all the way down to our day-to-day lives? How can we do that with the activities in our lives that we have to deal with, the challenges that come in our lives? How do we overcome those, those small micro-decisions, that keep us from becoming the best version of ourselves. It's an awesome conversation. Matt is an incredible guy. You are going to love this.

He has this quote that I'm going to share with you right now just because it just pulled on me. Our true selves are revealed in the margins. I love that. My friends, I give you Matt Dawson. Matt, dude, incredibly excited to have you on the show and just appreciate you taking the time. Hey, thank you.

I've been looking forward to this. And I tell you, all my good friends, all the people that know me call me Dawson so please you know call me Dawson it is and as you can see on my riverside those watching on YouTube won't and certainly the listeners won't but most people end up calling me Hanley so we can just go by last names um all right i want to start in what might be considered an odd place but it was one of the parts of your story that jumped out to me the most you are obviously a driven individual um naval academy you're trying to become a pro football player you're obviously having a successful career there and then you get injured and it's not just like

a little injury that has a set timetable that you're going to be back from this kind of takes you off the board for a while and forces you to have a long-term recovery and rehab and that becomes an excuse for most people a scenario like that a a life-changing injury to your current moment in time becomes an excuse for most people. The vast majority of the people would lean on that injury and say, this is why I can't get ahead. This is why I'm relegated to not achieving this initial dream that I had.

And you didn't do that, right? You maybe not right away, and I'd love for you to explain that, but you have pushed through that and are now doing things physically that most people wouldn't even consider. I'm just so interested in, what it was, what your thought process was,

what you had to go through, what demons you had to fight, to say to yourself, this isn't going to be, this injury isn't going to define what I'm able to do as a person and the goals that I set for myself. And maybe you could talk through that a little bit. Yeah, no, it's certainly, it's interesting, is that,

it's interesting to me that, that initial question. I just, I appreciate that, you know, it's just kind of taken it in a different direction. And, you know, I've had so many injuries. It's, it's tough to kind of, you know, kind of figuring out. I think the one you're referring to is the bilateral compartmental syndrome, right? I haven't had the surgery. And, you know, it's funny is that it played such an important role in my life and continues

on, literally on a daily basis, even decades later. But it's something that I don't get a chance to really talk, you know, that much about. So I love this topic. Is that so when I started at, I started playing football at U.S. Naval Academy, I was a quarterback. and then after my plea year, which is freshman year, is I transferred to the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, went to a strong safety. But between those two institutions is I had to have bilateral compartmental release surgery

because I had compartmental syndrome in both my lower legs. And what that is is around all our muscles, we have a connective protective tissue called fascia. It's basically a bag that supports your muscles. And in both of my lower legs, because of all the exercise I was doing all the plyometrics is the muscles kind of essentially just got so big, is that it created all this pressure to where it would shut down my deep nerve and my foot would drop and I couldn't pick it up. Like literally, I literally, you know, now I'm out climbing mountains and doing all this kind of stuff.

I literally could not walk up a flight of stairs without being bent over in pain, almost in tears. It hurts so bad. And so between Navy and Penn is I had to have surgery, And they released all four compartments in both lower legs to where now does have two compartments instead of four. Long story short, is that I lost probably, you know, 30 percent, 40 percent of my speed and power. I mean, it was just gone. And as much as I, as much as my mind and body wanted to go, it's like, hey, explode here and pop there and do this and do that and jump and run, I physically just couldn't do it. and that led to a significant decline in performance.

I went to UPenn. And, you know, after just a single season of playing there is I quit the team. And it was because I was going through just some different, you know, mental emotional stuff at the time. But then my inability to perform just, you know, just stacked on top of that. And I'm just like, I'm not the person I used to be. I'm not the athlete I used to be. And it took literally years for me to come back from that. So I ended up only playing two years of college football.

and then trained on my own for three or four more years in order to finally get my speed and power back. And it wasn't until like my early 20s, you know, 22, 23 when I was training full time in Dallas, you know, after college to play pro football, that I eventually got that back. And it just, it taught me a level of just patience and perseverance, you know, that just that when I look back on it's I'm grateful for now because it made me a better person. It expanded my understanding and appreciation of what this stuff can look like and sometimes it can turn into long term. But, you know, it's still something I struggle with on a daily basis is I still have, you know, pitting a demon in my legs where I just, the, the, the, the fluid retention in both lower legs is still pretty bad. And I've had multiple surgical procedures

to cauterize veins and, you know, move things around and flush things out. But it's, I'm out there, running, you know, whatever, 100 miles a week and climbing all these mountains and this and that, but I'm still having to deal with this stuff on a daily basis. It just, it reminds me is that, you know, sometimes you can work on something and you get it, you know, handled and you get it behind you. And sometimes it becomes part of your life. And you just have to make that decision of, am I going to allow this to, to negate my ability to perform, or am I going to find some way to work around it or to work with it and still perform the best of my capabilities? Is there a life philosophy?

It could be religion, relationship with God, it could be stoicism, it could be just a philosophy that you developed on your own. Because I'm intrigued by people that don't let the obstacles that the universe throws at them stop them from achieving whatever the thing is that they want to do, be it physical, be it, you know, something in work, something, you know, they're creative, whatever. Like, I, you know, I played college baseball, Division III, but had plenty of friends play in different levels. And so many of them have injuries. It's the nature of sports, right? And just staying in the sports and physical frame for a sec, very few who incurred injuries to the level that you did that would cost you years of a career in sports. So few of them come back from that. Most of them are now dad bod, great guys, just dad bod, kind of overweight, making the same

excuses that most people make for just kind of trying to get through life. And they never reclaim that physicality or even a portion of the physicality they had. And for, you know, having done this show for as long as I have and talked to amazing people like yourself, there's usually something behind it. And for everyone, it's different. And I'm just interested in, what is that, was there a quote you held on to, a philosophy? Was there a mentor that you could lean on or someone that helped you work through that? Because left on our own oftentimes, we can become, you know, with no, with no anchor point to grab onto in the storm, we often get blown away.

Yeah. And I'm interested in what that was for you. Man, I think that that's a great question. It just brings up so many different angles, you know, it just, I mean, I think that that's a question. We could spend hours and hours just talking about that. that single question alone. And what I really find interesting about that is it's drawn in other people or other influences, which I think is critical to understand because none of us do this stuff

alone. And even when I'm out saying I'm doing something solo and unsupported, I'm really not unsupported. You know, it's because there's so many people that have come together to create the opportunity that I now have, you know, to pursue. So whether it's that or what you're talking about is we don't do. any of this stuff alone. And I think the way that I look at it is I examine my life not in quantity or you know, not in longevity of I'm not looking to be around for for 80 years or 100

years or whatever just to have that that time under my belt is I look at it more of quality and in performance. So I'm much more interested is I'd rather be around a short. Are you tired of endless follow-ups and missed opportunities in your sales process? Casing leads is a losing game. That's why I created the one-call closed system, a battle-tested sales system that uses behavioral psychology to close deals in just one call. No more, let me think about it.

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all while watching your revenue skyrocket. Ready to stop chasing leads and start closing, visit masteroftheclose.com today. Close twice as many deals this time next week. Visit master of theclose.com to learn how. A shorter time and a higher performance and a longer time and a lower performance. And I don't mean just physical. I mean, you know, physical, emotional, psychological, you know,

everything kind of tied together. If I had to think about it, and I'm also very big on quotes, is I love when people can just really take things down and make them succinct and just make them resonate with you. I think that's a very special, it's a special thing. And one that I've got that actually my parents gave to me when I was 16 years old, they gave me a plaque. It's actually here in my office is it says that bullshit is only skin deep,

or beauty is only skin deep, but bullshit goes clear to the bone. and it just it's just it's a very simple thing it's kind of crude i admit but it's it just reminds me is that we have the decision at every single point whether we're going to kind of just kind of you know skip across the surface of something and just maybe get it done and maybe it looks good or it sounds good or or it presents well or it's good enough but we all know deep down if we gave it our true earnest honest effort and that's just i've looked at this thing literally every single day almost since I was 16 years old. And that's something I'm constantly asking myself.

I'm like, am I just being, you know, beautiful here, you know, in a, in a, you know, theoretical sense? Or am I, you know, BS in myself right now in this performance? And it's just, I try to set that standard of whatever, whatever it is, you know, whatever, however I perform, it's just in that honest effort where I'm satisfied where the outcome is not as important to me. but it's the quality of the of the input, you know, and the, you know, that I'm putting into it. Yeah.

That's, so I have two young boys, 10 and 8, and both play sports and do different things at school. And, you know, that message that you just related to me, I think, is one that seemingly feels like it's being lost today, especially in new sports. You know, I bang them over the head with outcome doesn't matter, its attitude and effort. outcome is a derivative of your attitude and effort. Like you have to be there. You have to be present and work as hard as you can and be proud of your performance. You know, I, you know, I, I said I'm all the time. I'm your dad.

I'm going to be proud of you regardless. You know what I mean? I'm going to love you regardless. But you got to walk off that feel proud or you're going to have something inside you that feels a little off, right? It's attitude and effort, attitude and effort. And we've become so outcome driven that, you know, that's where you get like these Instagram channels where people are renting sports cars and doing all the cleats

nonsensical things to show a life that doesn't actually exist because that's what they think that outcome is what they really want to present, not what it actually takes to get to that place. And it's why I like, especially with individuals like you've done incredible things and we're going to talk about those incredible things in a minute. But like so few people do the shit that you do, right? And I'm, and I love trying to dig into like that, that idea of what, what do you hold on to. And I guess my question coming out of what you just said is even high achievers have moments where they find themselves in that, you know, that bullshit spot, right? I'm, you know, I, I let a tough

day with a lot of stress lead into maybe a few drinks on a Tuesday night and I wake up and now I'm hung over on a Wednesday. I know I shouldn't do that. It's not who I am. But, you know, I had a now, now, now I'm losing a Wednesday because of bad decisions. May on Tuesday and, and again, going back to kind of kind of same crux as my original question, some people will either not be aware that that decision was bad. Some people will just plow through it and go, ah, you know, it's just one day. And then that leads to more of those bad days. And other people's correct themselves and go, you know what, that was a bad decision?

I'm okay. I'm going to move forward. How do you, how do you talk to me a little bit about your awareness of, of your actions and their impact on you and how you self-correct when you realize maybe you've allowed a bad habit or a negative habit to leak into your life that isn't putting you on the path to the goals that you want to be there. Yeah, it's, this is something that,

that I think about a lot. And I have this, this, this same, literally the same conversation with, with a lot of people, you know, that,

that I trust and respect and, in my network that I, that I admire about, you know, what they're doing. and I think today is look it's very important to show ourselves grace is that you know but at the same time it's I think today we're losing kind of setting a standard for ourselves and maintaining that standard and people now are either consciously or I think more

often subconsciously looking for a free lunch and all I can say is that one of the biggest things I've learned in my life is nothing is free. Is that everything has a cost, everything. I don't care. Each success has a cost, failure has a cost. And what I try to do is to set a standard in my life and I meet that standard or I attempt to meet that standard and I don't care about anything else in the sense that it's, yeah, it hurts.

It's supposed to hurt. I'm setting a standard because I want it to hurt because that hurt and that pain is going to help me connect with myself and understand myself, you know, into growth. And I think that's what it is where most people are just kind of, and look, I fail all the time is I'll set a standard and I'm like, I want to do this day or I want to be this person. I want to hit this time or whatever. And I'm telling you is I fail on a daily basis. But it's just as long as I know that I'm putting everything that I can, you know, into this thing.

but if I do get a little sidetracked, is having that ability to kind of step back and to and to not allow myself to repeat that same habit or that same action over and over and over again, you know, something like that. And I think it's a combination of understanding is that we are going to fail every single day, allowing ourselves to have that grace because we have to understand what our ultimate goal is. and are our actions and thoughts taking us toward that goal or away from that goal? So if you fail to meet some standard or fail to perform in some way and you just start beating the shit out of yourself and driving yourself down into this shame hole, is that going to help you achieve what you're looking to achieve? And the answer is no.

And sometimes we need to punish or adjust ourselves in a certain way, but to do it in a sense ultimately that's going to help us achieve our goals. So I think it's kind of walking that narrow line of, you know, how you bring yourself back out of it. So it's just, you know, showing yourself grace, but at the same time not giving yourself too much leniency. Because I think, you know, today people are a little bit probably too easy on themselves in a lot of regards. And it's fine in that line because, like you mentioned, you go on Instagram or you go on social media or you watch a commercial. And it's like, oh, it's okay. It's okay to do this or it's okay not to do this. It's okay.

and just, you know, buy my product, buy my service, buy my this, you'll feel better. And it's, you know, it's kind of getting us a little too far afield from where we need to be. You know, it's funny. I had a conversation with one of the parents I coached my older son's baseball team. And I was, there was a kid on the team who's very talented. He's a, he's a good kid. But he's completely willing to take entire half a game off because he, Mr. Grounder or struck out and he'll just literally just give away three innings. Head down,

you know, standing wherever he is and we'll just give it away. And, and I'll ride him on that particular aspect. I try to be constructive with it. And, you know, I'm not like yelling at him because they don't listen to you when you yell. But, you know, I'm on him. I'm on him about it. I'm reminding him. And his mom pulls me aside after one of the games and she's like, why don't you like my kid? You know, blah, blah. And I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. The reason that I am on your kid about this particular aspect of his game is because I like him. Right. Like, because I want him to be successful, because I think he's a good ballplayer, because I think

he's a good kid, that's why I'm on him about this particular aspect of his game, of his personality that is keeping him from being as good as he wants, as he, as I know he wants to be. If I was just letting him do it, that would be me not liking him. And it's like, it was an eye-opened. experience for me. It happened just this last summer because it's to your point. Like, like, we've, I remember being coached and like my coaches in football, I played high school football would, like, I mean, they would be spitting out of you through your face mess. They'd be so

raging mad to get. And my thought, and this is, this is the big difference, right? My thought and, you know, I'm sure you was like, oh, you know, I deserve to get yelled at. I did, you know, miss that tackle. I did I did, you know, I did play the wrong assignment. You know what I mean? Like, yeah, I deserve to be yelled at. Today it's, well, why are you yelling at me? Why are you yelling at my son? I'm yelling at your kid because he struck out,

put his hand, put his head down while he was in the field and let a grounder go right by him because he wasn't paying attention because he was so, you know, so in a, like you said, a shame spiral about this one thing that happened that happens multiple times, dozens of times throughout the course of a season.

And, you know, I mean, like, it, it is a shift. And before we really, I want to really get into the meat and potatoes of the stuff you have going on. But, hey, I'm sorry. Let me, let's start. If I can just jump in for one second for. Yeah, yeah, please, please. It's, it's, I'm just, I'm thinking back to, you know, high school football, college and, you know, and even, even after college, right.

I mean, I've had coaches, you know, damn near ripped my head off. Like, literally, yeah. Grab my face mask and being here and bit on me and everything else. But it's, it's, I haven't thought about that in a while. while is one thing I think that that's very important to understand the distinction of is when we talk about, say, performance, and you know, talking about that kid, you know, striking out, then putting his head down, missing grounders and this and that, is that is not to tie our self-worth and self-love to performance. And this is what I found, you know, when I was coming up through is I inadvertently

and subconsciously tied my sense of self-worth and my worth, my feeling of deserving love and of being worthy to my performance. So it's like I, you know, I sought to achieve in order to prove that I was worthy of being loved or that I was, you know, important or that I mattered. And it took me literally almost four decades to figure out what I was doing and why that was wrong and how that was hurting me in many ways and hindering me. me in many ways. And what I came to understand was it's not a matter of earning self-love and self-worth. It's a matter of demonstrating self-love and self-worth. And that's a huge, huge

distinction. And that helps to alleviate or, you know, us of shame and guilt when we fail to perform. And that's what it's, you know, like these kids need to understand is, is, you know, you keep your head up and you keep pushing and you keep trying because you're showing yourself, hey, I'm worth this effort. We're all worth this effort. And when I get out there and I'm training for, you know, a thousand hours a year alone in the mountains and, you know, on the roads and in the gym and I'm bleeding and hurting and or on expedition or whatever,

is I'm telling myself, you know, sometimes I'm like, why the hell am I doing this? Like this is tough. I don't want to be here. I want to be doing, I want to eat, you know, eat Cheetos and sit on the couch right now. And I'm like, listen, man, you're out here because I love you and you're worth the effort. And that's why we're doing this. And I think when people look at it in that way, it helps to, you know, maybe approach it in a different way. And for me, it's been a much more beneficial way.

Yeah, I love that. And I think you just made a great point, too. There's like this, there's this, I think, misunderstanding by the vast majority of people that someone who achieves at a high level, they don't struggle with the same, like, desire for comfort or crappy food. or, you know, a beer or something, like, like they do, right? Like, it's every high achiever I've ever spent time with in my own moments of, of my highest achievement, there's always that part of your brain that's like, you know what it would be great right now?

Yeah. To pop a beer and watch the football game and just veg out for five hours. You know what I mean? Like, I would love that. But, you know, you know, like everyone fights with these battles and it's a choice. And I love your feedback and just where you would take this. But like that, it's like, it's like people who haven't gotten there yet.

And I believe everyone's capable. Like they haven't gotten there. They've never really been at their peak, peak achievement level. They feel like, well, I'm just not driven like that. Or, you know, I really like to relax. Or, you know, they feel like somehow they have this. Yeah.

Yeah, they have this draw to comfort that someone like you who's climbing, you know, the highest mountains in the entire world on every count. You don't have that draw, right? You just, you were blessed with, you know, some lack of desire for comfort and fun stuff. And that you're, that's, you're just like predisposed to do this crazy shit. And I've never found that to be the case, right? Like, you know, world class athletes, you know, entrepreneurs who've run incredible companies, like, they're making a decision every day.

Cheetos on the couch or go get this shit done that I told myself I wanted to get done. And one, do you agree with that? and two, like, how do you, when that desire hits you, right? So you're, you're, you wake up in the morning and you're like, okay, I'm going to go for a big run today. I got a time I want to hit. I got to go for a big run. And then, then your brain, because we all have this inside of us, right? We're, we're our soul, not our body or our brain.

Our brain, well, at least that's what I believe. Our brain says to us, you know what, Matt? We haven't relaxed in a while. Yeah. Just pour yourself a cup of coffee. turn on sports center, chill out, you don't need to go for the run. You went for a long run yesterday. You don't need to do it today.

In that moment, right, where you really get a strong pull, right? Some days you wake up, you're ready to go. In those days when you get that pull to just, man, that cow just calling my name, how do you get past that? How do you, what's your process for making sure that you stay committed to the task that you set yourself to? Yeah, I love that. And it was funny.

I was actually thinking about this on Tuesday because I had a, a big leg workout on Tuesday. And I call it the bargaining. First of all, let me tell you this, is that every single day I face this question. Because there's certain parts of every single day where I'm like, I know I need to be doing this, but, but this over here looks a little more, you know, easier or interesting or whatever. But when I talk about the bargaining is there's always a part in everything we do that's demanding where there's going to be some piece of you that's trying to get you

to do something easier. Or it's like, you know, maybe my glute is just a little tweak today. Or maybe my heart rate's a little low. So maybe I didn't sleep quite as well. Maybe I'm a little bit tired so I can take, you know, a couple heart rate off this run

or maybe I'll stop at 20 minutes earlier. Maybe I'll stop the set three reps sooner. And I just laugh because I call it the bargaining. And it's like I've been doing this long enough that I look for it because I know it's coming. And I still, again, I still do it on a daily basis, you know. And it's like when I was going through this leg workout the other day, you know, this thing was 750 reps per leg.

So you're talking 1,500 total reps. And when I, you know, when I was walking in there, I'm like, oh, I'm going to tear this thing a new asshole and I'm ready to go and I'm motivated. And about halfway in it, I'm like, you know, it made my glutes a little tweaked. Maybe I can stop this set. You know, so it's like I even face it. But what I think. about is that my life is not just about me.

It's more importantly, it's the role that I play in the world, and it's the role that I play in the lives of others. And this ties back to what we were talking about earlier is about setting a standard. And I know that if I set a standard and I fail to meet that standard, I'm not only letting myself down, but more importantly, I'm letting others down that are depending on me. And these are people that maybe just, you know, in my direct everyday lives, or these may be people that never meet me, but because I honestly believe that everything we do will eventually impact everybody else, I feel like I'm letting them down as well. And what I think about is when I'm telling people that are close to me, hey, I love you, and I'm here for you, and I will help you in any way that I can, it's like what person is standing behind that pledge? you know what capabilities is that person have and it's like if if i'm you know if i'm you know

if i'm you know with a bunch of friends on christmas morning opening up presents what person is sitting there is that person the one that that fought through all those days to be the best version of themselves for everyone or did that person give up every single day and now i'm sitting there a shell of the person i could possibly be for them and i know that that's kind of you know gets a little heading and gets a little intense but honestly that's how i think about it is when I understand that this is I'm not just doing this for me I'm doing this for everyone and that helps to kind of increase my perspective and you know get through a lot of it yeah no there's there's a lot in there and dude go heady as much as you want because I think

the surface level shit doesn't matter right this this this underlying stuff is what really in my mind and why do this show I do this show not for tactics tricks tricks and strategies because we can chat GPT that shit today, right? I want to know, like, how, you know, it's the deeper questions that keep us there. I have this, I have this TEDx talk that I'm working on that, that right now is scheduled for the spring of 2025. That is all about the idea of status, right?

So, you're climbing mountains and skiing to the South Pole and, you know, you played football at a high level. You've been, you know, an M&A investment banker. You've done incredible things that some of which, you know, individually would be a life's achievement and you've done multiple of them. And that sets you apart as a different kind of person than most people we bump into in our lives. And I have a philosophy or a theory, we'll put it as a theory, and this is where I want your feedback, that a large, there is a large pull on people. not to achieve their highest goal because of the change in status that they will experience in achieving that thing, right?

If you want to go climb even one of the highest peaks in the world, you have to dedicate yourself. You have to put months, if not years of work in, training, equipment, time away from family, time away from friends, right? You can't go get a beer or 10 beers on a Friday with your buddies watching college basketball if you're trying to get to this next level physical goal, which starts to change your status in a community. All of a sudden, you're not one of the beer drinking buddies. You're like this fitness guy. And it's these status changes, I believe status changes up

actually restrain us more than the potential for a status change down. We're like, we can explain away or excuse away or justify away a status change down and people will come around us and you're okay and we're here for you. But it's the status change up, I think, that creates the most fear because it takes you out of a community that you know really well and puts you into that you become someone different. And one, do you agree with that? And two, in your own life, have you had you had to deal with that and now have you? Yeah, I think that's a fantastic point. And I haven't thought about it in that context, but you know, just kind of think about it as you're speaking through it. I think it was, I think it's very well said. I think

you've got a great basis there for that talk. And I'd love to hear that once it finally kicks off. But it's, and that, that is something that I have, I was going to say struggled with, but I don't want to say that. It's something that I have dealt with. And I think it's even my closest friends, you know, here in L.A. And I've been very fortunate to build a great network of people that love me tremendously and they're there for me and I'm there for them.

And I'm very fortunate in that regard. But when I started making a lot of these friends, friends is back when I was in my party days when I was going out four or five nights a week. And I wasn't training. I was out, you know, getting drunk, doing drugs, you know, partying and traveling and, you know, all this kind of stuff. And, you know, when I moved away from that, and I finally found a sense of purpose in my life for the first time, I found a better sense of direction. I started moving to that is I was naturally, you know, starting to disconnect more more from those people. And it was a, it was a challenging time. It was a confusing time. And what I found

at work for me was, is I wasn't asking them what they thought about it or what they thought about me or about any of that kind of stuff. It's, I simply determined the direction that I felt was the most authentic in my life at that time that was going to create the best version of myself. And they just, I knew, once you kind of start to get on that path, you can just, you can feel it. And I'm not saying you're going to have total clarity, but you feel a greater sense of just of understanding and connection and ease. And once I had that, it's that felt so good to me and it felt so right to me that I was willing to risk anything and everything in order to start to move in that direction. And to that point is, is I stopped seeing people that I saw that I would see, you know,

once a week. Now I see them once a year, literally, you know, stuff like that. And it's just like we're talking about earlier is every single thing in life has a cost is you can't do everything all the time so you just have to understand you know what's what is most important to you in that you know i've lost certain people out of my life but now i've also gained certain people in my life and maybe i have a little bit less of total elements in my life but the things i have now are more substantive and they mean more to me so it's a little more austere of a lifestyle but i enjoy it so much more it makes me a better person. And I think it's just, you know, you just have to understand that, you know, things have costs. Yeah. There's a quote by Ralph Waldermanson that has been,

since the first time I read it, it has been a driving principle. And at some point, I'll have it tattooed on my arm. I'm working on a sleeve on my left arm. And it's, God will not make manifest the work of cowards. And for some reason, that quote just, like the first time I read those words, it just like imprinted on my brain this idea that we know the cowardly decision. And a lot of people don't like that word because it feels very harsh. I don't necessarily care. I think we need that type of language in our lives.

But we know we can feel it, right? And we're choosing a lesser version of ourselves every time we make those decisions. We all make them and that's why we give grace. but that idea that the cowardly decision does not lead you to that, to that promise land, to whatever that is for you. It could be, I want to be an incredible dad,

right? That could be your goal. I want to be there for my kids and be the, awesome. So don't do the things that take you away. That could be scrolling on your phone. It could be taking a work phone call at dinner. You know what I mean?

Like it doesn't all have to be high achievement that gets you national recognition. I feel like we misconstrue what living, in your terms, an authentic life is, right? Like everyone's authentic, you know, dialed in peak version of themselves doesn't have to be something that the national news media wants to cover or that monster wants to sponsor, right? It doesn't have to be that.

It can be whatever that thing is. I want to be, you know, the best accountant in my town. I want, you know what I mean? Or I want to be able to work on this type of deal or I want to be an incredible spouse or partner or whatever. Like these goals, the achievement, of a goal doesn't have to accrue you recognition to be worthy of the pursuit. And I think that's such an important thing to talk about.

And I just, as you're talking, that's like, I just love your mindset. So, okay, so I want to transition into some of the things that you probably expected me to ask you when you logged in today and we were starting to talk about. But you had an experience. I want to take first a quick stop in 2016 and then I want to fast forward to 2021 and the things you've done past there. So 2016, you have two kind of, uh, maybe. major negative impacts in your life.

You lose your mom. You have a hard breakup. And then you go on and start doing solo training. And correct me if I have some of the timeline wrong. But very interested in this idea of solo training. And I'll give you my experience to why I found this so intriguing that I really want you to expand on it. I made the very simple decision. I do ruck walks, right?

I actually have the 5-1-1 ruck vests. I do 40-pound ruck walks almost every day. and I used to wear ear pods and listen to podcasts and stuff. And then one day I just walked out of the house by accident. I was thinking about a couple different things, put my vest on, boom, out the house I went. I got 10 minutes into my walk and realized I didn't have the ear pods in. And I had all these things going. Yeah.

Yeah. And all of a sudden, I'm like, well, I'm not going back now, right? So I did the hour long. I do hour. So I go out, you know, whatever, 30 minutes out, 30 minutes back. And I came back and I was like, the, the ideas that crept into my mind, the good, the bad, you know, I started, you know,

hey, hey, you got to, you haven't followed up with this person or, you know, you're slacking on this, like, sorry, I apologize to everyone, decided to, uh, take in a, sorry. So, um, what is it about solo training in particular? And as you state in, in a lot of your work, uh, distraction free solo training, that you found to be so captivating and that became such a part of your life. Yeah, it's so 100% to this point

is 100% of my daily training as I do alone. And for me, it's been a critical element to my success. And it's, I look at, you know, why am I doing what I'm doing? And I'm doing it for a variety of reasons. Because obviously I'm going out there on a physical front to increase my physical capabilities, to increase my technical skills,

you know, all that kind of stuff. But more importantly, this training and this physical exertion is I see it as a tool of self, of introspection and self-reflection. It's simply a tool. And that's why I choose to train alone. Number one is to make sure that I'm not being motivated by some exterior force or presence because you never know when you're going to be alone. You never know when you're going to have someone there.

And I can tell you, in a lot of your hardest moments in life, life, whether it be actually on a mountain or sitting alone in your bedroom or in the car and you need to make a decision or you need to do something is you're going to be alone. And so I think, you know, in those times, it's critically important to me to prove to myself that I have the ability to perform and I don't need some sense of exterior motivation, you know, to do so. But also it's, you want to say that it's a tool and it allows me to connect with myself and reflect on certain elements about myself is when you get out there and you get in these

stressful situations and you don't have that external stimuli. So I'm not hearing the theme tractor Rocky, you know, in my head, or I'm not hearing some motivational speaker telling me how I can, you know, adapt and overcome and push through the suck and all this stuff, is you'll feel that when the more you get towards your limits, the more on comfort, on discomfort that, that we experience is our minds tend to speed up. And they tend to get noisier. And the more you push, the harder you go, the more they speed up and the noisier they get, and it's almost like you're moving through an hourglass is kind of how I like to think about it. So in the beginning, there's all this room,

there's no pressure, it's nice and easy, but as you kind of get down to that final funnel point and your mind is just absolutely screaming and it's wanting you to stop and it's wanting just to come out with every excuse to get out of it, if you can just push through, just in that in that moment, recognize what's going on, force yourself to get quiet, to get comfortable in it, to release into it, not to be scared of it. And if you can just hang on for sometimes, it's literally just a few seconds. And I mean that literally a few seconds. Sometimes it's hours, sometimes it's days, but you can get through to what I call the other side. And I'm telling you, things just open up. Your life opens up. Your mind opens up. Your understanding opens up. Everything you can possibly

imagine just opens up to this deeper, this deeper, greater understanding. And I've experienced that time and time and time again, when I finally break my personal gravitational field and I get through to the other side and my awareness opens up, my capabilities opens up. It's just, not to sound cheesy, it's just, it's a magical feeling. And it's something that you just become, you know, aware of and almost addicted to where I know where I'm trying to get. And that training alone enables me to get to that point more effectively. Yeah. I was listening to Stephen Kotler, who's a flow researcher and he he different words similar he said the you know one of the things he said is you have to go through what you just described that sped up noisy you know your your body's

screaming you know i'm gonna fall apart your mind screaming fear and doubt and all these things and like you said if you can get to the other side that's where flow lives yeah and like you've heard every major athlete and i'm sure you've experienced as well where like when you can get through that moment, it's like the world slows down, like the doves come out and you're just like, it's like you can see and predict and move and do things that you didn't even know you were capable of doing. But it is, it's like into your exact point, like there's a cost to getting to flow, right? Like people try to do it with drugs. People try to do it with all these different techniques. And at the end of the day, you just have to paddle through the tumult to get to the ease.

It's just to get there. Like it's just, it's impossible. And when your mind is filled with music or someone else's words, you're not, what you're not going to get is the tumult, right? Those are like keeping you from getting to all that stuff because it's keeping your brain occupied on less than 100% on the full task. Yeah. Yeah. No, you said that very well.

And just in this one point I think is important to understand the distinction is that it doesn't have to necessarily be physical. You know, this can be just, you know, psychological, emotional stuff, or maybe you're going to have a conversation with your, you know, with your partner, your husband, your wife, your business partner, you know, whatever it is, or, you know, maybe you're going to have, you know, there's something that you've been putting off, you know, that you've, something internal that you need to deal with that you've been putting off. So it's like, it doesn't just have to be physical is we can find these, these moments and a lot

of different challenges, you know, that we face in life. but the key is, and this, you know, this ties into, you know, the book and a lot of the concepts I talk about of strength and surrender, is this ties into surrender. And what I mean by surrender is not giving up and giving in and going along, but it's, it's moving towards your greatest fears and trepidations and challenges and allowing yourself to experience them to the absolute fullest and not running from them, you know, and not fighting them. because when you fight them is you feed them, but allowing yourself to feel the magnitude of whatever challenge it is you're facing, that is the only true way to effectively surrender. And in my opinion, the only real way to get to that other side,

you know, fully and authentically as you possibly can. Yeah, right? We've heard the quote a thousand times, but the only way out is through. Okay, fast forward to 2021. you decide that you're going to start actually putting real legitimate fear of death into your life. You're going to start doing some extreme activities. Talk to me about maybe just explain for the audience, like some of these things that you have done,

the challenge that you set for yourself, and then let's get into why you actually decided to take this on. Yeah. So just a quick overview. And I apologize because there's a lot of detail here. I'll do my best to scale it down. But it's so in 2018, a very good friend of mine, Jay Gibbonsky and I started Dawson's Peak Foundation, which is a 501C3 that we have,

is that our mission is to inspire the discovery and pursuit of individual purpose, to get people to understand that we're all capable of living greater lives, not only for ourselves, but for others, the benefit of others, to move from self-centered to service-centered. And the way that we do that is we create

large-scale global expeditions. sponsor athletes, where viewers could draw parallels between themselves and the athletes and to say, you know, if this person is doing X, Y, and Z, I can find something comparable in my life, whether it be a physical pursuit or an emotional pursuit, professional pursuit, whatever it is, and I can try to achieve that. So in a nutshell, that's kind of who we are and what we do. And the current project we have is called Seven for Soldiers, where I'm essentially the guinea pig, you know, for it. And the original intent was to set seven world records in 12 months. So from, May 2021 to May 22, where I would climb, or I'd complete the Explorer's Grand Slam,

which is climbing the highest peak on each continent and then ski into the North Pole and the South Pole. I was attempting to be the fifth person to ever do that in a single year. And then trekking solo unsupported across the Mojave Desert and Death Valley and rowing a boat across the Atlantic Ocean and then finally flying a plane around the world. And we were able to accomplish everything that we set out to within those 12 months. except for the North Pole, which got closed down for the fourth or fifth year in a row, this time because Russia invaded Ukraine and that shut that region down.

And also the flight unfortunately got postponed because the costs associated with, you know, renting aircraft and logistics and in fuel because of COVID and Russia, Ukraine went up four or fivefold. So we decided to postpone that to us a little bit more of a manageable cost for us. But like I said, within those first 12 months, we're able to achieve everything else we set out to. which of those not necessarily was the most challenging but which brought you the most joy and sense of accomplishment and fulfillment of maybe the individual treks or expeditions i like that question because i haven't i don't think i've gotten that question normally it's what was the most you know what was the most challenging like where was the most painful part and all this kind of stuff so i love you're coming out from a slightly different angle i think the one that that brought me the most

most satisfaction or sense of contentment was Akincagua, which is the highest peak in South America. And reason being is that that was actually my second attempt on that mountain is I tried to climb it back in 2017 before the concept of Dawson's Peak Foundation was even around before we started anything. And at that point, I just learned about big mountain climbing. And I was just, you know, trying to go around and figure out what I liked and didn't like and things like that.

And at that time, as I failed to summit with my entire team, because the weather was so bad that everybody got turned around and no one could summit. But that was my first failure on a mountain. And I mean, granted, I was just getting started. But, you know, I'm not used to failing a lot in my life. I mean, look, I fail all the time. But I try to, like we said, hold myself to a standard. And when I failed to summit in 17, it lit something inside of me that was just,

it was just this inferno that just continued to grow to where years later it might be on a random Tuesday at three in the morning, I'd wake up just thinking about not summiting. Like it bothered me. And I used that as a fuel in my training where I might want to cut a set, you know, a rep short. I might not want to go that extra mile or climb that extra 500 feet. And I was just thought back to failing on Aconcagua. And when I finally got the chance to climb it again and,

20 early 22. I'd just been down in Antarctica for an entire month. So I was no longer climatized. COVID was rampant on the mountain. So I had to take a helicopter into base camp. So I mean, I went from from sea level to nearly 23,000 feet in three days. And that the final 500, 600 feet of that climb, I was in rough, rough shape. I was experiencing, you know, high altitude cerebral edema. my vision was going in and out. I had really bad diarrhea, really bad dehydration. Like, arms and legs are going numb. Like, I mean, I was just, I was on the verge of really falling to pieces.

And it took something special, you know, to find something special to myself to get that done, where I was literally finding, you know, a rock into snow or, you know, whatever it was, that was maybe 10 feet away. I'm like, just make it that 10 feet. Then we'll figure it out. And I did that for hour after. hour after hour and finally got to the top. And as I was joking with my climbing partner, I was like, this is probably the best and

worst I've ever felt in my life, you know? Yeah. That meant so much to me because where I thought my limits were, it just showed me again that there's so much further out there or farther out there than we think that they are. And look, I'm nothing special in that regard is we look in the distance and we're like, okay, there's my limit. If I can just get there. but when we get there, it's like we can put our hand through the cloud.

It looks like a cement wall, but it's just a cloud. And you're like, well, maybe it's not here. Okay, it's over there. Then you get there and you're like, you continue to understand these limits are not real things for the most part. And that was just a good example of it for me. Yeah. Isn't it interesting that your most joyful moment was accompanied by your most painful moment. Oh, yeah.

Seems like exactly the way that it should be, right? that sense of achievement in that grind. So I have to ask about Antarctica. I'm very intrigued by that mass that's down there. What is that like? What is the Antarctica? I think people just think, you know, you see the penguins and they're near the shore. And I think that's probably most people's exposure to what Antarctica is.

But it's an enormous, it's an enormous mass. and like what you know what is that environment like what is what did it take to get to the actual south pole what is that experience like because i think it's probably you know people can imagine they've seen high mountains you've seen people climb i'm not that they've been there but they can maybe picture themselves in that place i think anarchist seems like like a like another planet i think and we know you know i think as a regular people we get so little information what what is that environment like and what are the unique challenges of say skiing something like Antarctica versus a climb obviously of altitude but you know what are those how do you how do you

mash skill sets from a climb to a ski and managing those different environments yeah it's it's an arctica is a very interesting place and i've heard described by different people in different ways all the way back you know to the early 1900s where it's you know some people call it the great white everywhere or the great white everything is that when you get down there, you know, especially when you say, you know, because there are, there are mountain ranges in Antarctica.

And Mount Vincent, the highest peak there is something that had the opportunity to climb. And to your point is there's life around the edges. But once you get into the interior part of the continent, up on the, up on the plateau, I mean, there's nothing.

When you talk about no life, I don't mean, I mean, there may be some fungi or, you know, some roundworm or ringworm or, you know, something like that.

other than that, there is, I mean, nothing for hundreds or possibly thousands of miles, you know, except for the station that's at the South Pole. And when you get in that environment, you know, when people talk about, say, colonizing Mars and people get excited about this, I'm like, you don't understand when you say there's a deprivation and absence of life. And down there, you start to understand what that really means. And the best way I can think to describe it is, you know, I was skiing for, you know, 12, 13 hours a day, you know, trying to get to the South Pole. And just think about being on, take a big treadmill, put it in a freezer that's 30 or 40 below, and put it in front of a white wall and just stare at that, you know, put your face a couple inches from that wall

and do that for 12, 13 hours a day while pulling a sled. And that's essentially what it's like to ski down there. I mean, there's just, it's just sensory deprivation in so many regards. that it forces you, if you're going to deal with it effectively, it just forces you to kind of go to a special place or to a deeper place. And, you know, a lot of people take, you know, like we were talking about earlier, you know, music for podcasts or listen, you know, they want to listen to something. And I didn't take anything because I wanted that, I wanted that additional challenge

of being so alone with myself. And it was just, it was a very special place and it was a tremendous experience. but it's it's it's it can be lonely and isolating if you're not careful and it can be you know kind of like a lot of things it can be destructive if you're not careful but if you can use it in a conscientious way it just helps you to have a more full and enriching experience because it enables you to connect with yourself on a deeper level yeah yeah there's there's so many movies that have been created around the concept of of deprivation of loneliness you know isolation and the impact of the impact of the that it has on people, you know, there's, there, it feels to me like it would be very easy to spin off the planet in that moment. Maybe a couple, I know, you know, how many days in, how many hours in, you look around and you're like, am I ever going to get packed? Will I ever, you know, have another, you know, just the stuff that, that, that seeps into

your mind as it's saying, we shouldn't be here, you know, what are you doing? Why did you take us to this place, right? Is there, you know, how did you deal with that, that? that sense of, of isolation and come out of it in a productive way and not let it start to eat at you. And, and as you said, start to make excuses or, hey, I, today I can go for, I'm just going to go for 10 hours today and we'll take a few more days of camp because, you know, I, I deserve it or whatever. Like, how do you fight through those nudges when you don't have that, you know, a podcast or motivation in your ear telling you to keep going? Yeah, I think a lot of it, and this ties into a lot of

things that we've been talking about with life is it's a matter of perspective. And, you know, too often when we face challenging times, whether it be on a, you know, daily basis or, you know, psychological or professional or even, you know, physical, is our world, we have a tendency to make our worlds just very small. And sometimes it's an important, and it's actually a critical tool to make our world small, but we can simultaneously have our world small, but our perspective, enlarge our perspective in a greater sense. So when I always, was going down there is I had a chance before I went, and even when I was down there preparing, to read a lot of stories about people that had faced those same challenges, but even to a

harsher degree. Like Amundsen, when he was the first to get to the South Pole, Scott, Shackleton, Maori from Australia, and I read about what these men faced. When they were out there for weeks on end or months on end, or they would have to winter over. And, you know, you know, just all these things that they faced when I was out there, it literally took me, you know, a week to ski 70 miles, you know, the last degree. And it just, I was just thinking about, I'm out here, you know, for a week. It's a very challenging environment. It could be very dangerous and, I mean, life threatening, certainly. And things can change in a moment's notice.

But when I thought about in a greater context of what these men had been through, what they were capable of is it showed me what I was capable of as well. because I felt like if these guys can do it, you know, I can do it. If they can go to that level of challenge, you know, I can do the same. So it helped me to have a better sense of perspective of what I was facing might be extremely difficult in a moment, but that I was capable of so much more that I just need to find a way to get quiet to figure this thing out to push through it. And then I was more than, you know, that I was able to do it. Matt Dawson, my friend's absolutely incredible.

If people want to get more from you, dive deeper into your world, follow with your journey. What are the places that they should go? And guys, wherever Matt wants us to go, we'll have them linked up in the show notes as well so that you can find it very easily. But where are those places that they can get more from you? Yeah, I think the biggest thing is my first book is coming out. I'm very excited about it. It will be released January 7, 2025. It's called Strengthened Surrender.

I actually just got one of the copies here. So just we're just proofing it out right now. So, but it'd be available for pre-order before that time, but it'll be the audio book, paperback, and the e-book. And that literally everything that we've talked about is in there and just so much more. So whether someone's interested in just, you know, reading about the mountains and all the training and it was, you know, this tall in the packweight this much and it was 100 degrees and all that, like all that's in there. But more importantly, it's about the story of the human experience. about my personal redemption from being lost to a place of feeling better from, you know,

having a life of self-centered to service-centered, all the things that I've learned, like the biggest things I've learned from strength and surrender. And it's just, I wanted to create a visceral experience that people, it's not just a book, but just an experience where people could take it on a different way. So that's coming out.

And then Instagram is just at Dawson's Peak, P-E-A-K, and then finally the website is just Dawson's Peak. com and that's my personal website it links to our foundation and the last thing i'll say is is i mentioned a little bit earlier but project seven for soldiers is 100% of our net proceeds that we raise are benefiting our chair our veteran partners on this which is hope for the warriors and gary sannie's foundation so i'm not making a dime on anything that gets donated so please get involved 100% of the net proceeds are going to those two groups yeah we have a big uh this this audience is big supporters of our military and things like that.

So guys, head over wonderful organizations. Appreciate the hell out of you, the work you do. And certainly the time that you spent with us today, Matt. Thank you so much. No, listen, I really appreciate it. I've truly enjoyed this. I love that you came at it from a different angle. You asked some interesting questions.

And also, I appreciate your insights. So thank you very much for having me on. Let's go. Yeah, make it look. Make a look. Make a look. Leave us a comment or review wherever you listen to podcasts. Ain't any thing for me.

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