Motivation Daily by Motiversity - JOB'S NOT FINISHED - Kobe Bryant Motivational Speech Compilation

Episode Date: October 24, 2025

MAMBA MENTALITY: THE JOB'S NOT FINISHED, YOU HAVE WORK TO DO Special thanks to:Lewis HowesValuetainmentTom Bilyeu Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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The link is in the description. You're up too old. What's the story? Are you not happy or you're only half happy? Instead of it be happy about. You're up too old. Jobs not finished. Job finished?

I don't think so. You want first place, come play with me. You want second place to go somewhere else. What a performance. What an action. I remember asking him why he could just sit a game out because he was hurting. He said, what about the fans that saved up to watch me play just once? He never forgot about his fans.

He loved you all so much. I scored not a free throw, not a nothing, not a lucky shot, not a breakaway layup, zero points. I wasn't going to catch these kids in a week. I wasn't going to catch them a year, right? That's when I sat down and said, okay, this is going to take some thought. From there, I just went to work. I just stayed with it. I kept practicing, kept practicing, can practice, and can practice.

How the hell do you tolerate that kind of pain? You'd suck it up and play. I play games with the flu. I play games with 102-degree fever, man. Power. You can't do that for you can't. That's so powerful, you got to be on, man. We were playing against the Lakers, Tom.

I said, no, I'm going to get there at 3 o'clock. Who do I see? I see Kobe Bryant, already working out. So I worked out for a good hour, hour and a half. And when I came off, after I was done, I sat down, and of course I still heard the ball bouncing. I'm like, this guy's still working out. He was working out. Like, it looks like he was in a dead sweat when I got here.

And he's still going. He's doing like game moves. I'm like, I want to see how long this goes. So I sit up there and watch. That game, he drops 40 on us. And after the game is over, I'm like, I have to ask this guy. I have to understand. So after the games, I'm like, hey, Cove, like, why are you in the gym for so long?

He's like, because I saw you come in. And I wanted you to know that it doesn't matter how hard you work, that I'm willing to work harder than you. Wow. Just like the shot clock run out, I would guess. And it's right at the spot where Kobe Bryant passed Michael Jordan. So Andrew gets the honor of putting it down where Kobe Bryant scored those two free throws days. I wanted to be one of the best basketball players to ever play.

Anything else that was outside of that lane, I didn't have time for. I play games with the flu. I play games with a 102 degree fever, man. This obstacle cannot define me. It's not going to cripple me. It's not going to be responsible for me stepping away for the game that I love.

I'm going to step away on my own turn. Because when I retire, I didn't want to have to say, I wish I would have done more. I would watch Magic play. I'd watch Michael play. And I would see them do these unbelievable things. I'd say, you know, can I get to that level? I don't know, but let's find out.

Who would Shaq be if he had your work ethic? He'd be the greatest of all time. If Shaq had your work? He'd be the greatest of all time. For sure. He'd be the first to tell you that. For sure. I mean, this guy was a force.

Like, I have never seen. I mean, it was crazy. You know, a guy at that size. Generally, guys at that size are a little timid, and they don't want to. be tall. They don't want to be big. Man, this dude was, he did not care. He was mean. He was nasty. He was competitive. He was vindictive. I mean, he was, yeah, I wish he was in a gym. I would have had 12 rings. Yeah. Because I listen, I don't, I don't deal with people that don't commit

at that level, but then act as if they do. I don't deal with that. I don't. I don't. You know, he would say, okay, Kobe's not throwing me the ball. And, you know, media would take it and run with it and all this stuff. And I'm like, well, bro, if you were in shape, by the time I run down on a fast break and run back and then run down, you're still coming down the first time, bro. Like, what the hell do you want me to do? Right? So a lot of our contention came from that, came from that.

And even though he was older, you were still confronting him. You didn't care. Oh, I didn't care. Man, listen. From day one, bro. From day one. I knew for sure. Rick Fox, my teammates, they all thought I was absolutely crazy the day me and Shaq got in the fist fight.

After that day, they were like, okay, Kobe, you're certifiable. Fist fight. I'm not backing down. Listen. I know. You know, there's a level of respect. And for Shaq, too, by the way. I know he's told me that that day.

was a big turning point for him because it was like, you know, he's generally used to talking trash and saying what he wants and nobody really stepping up and challenging him on that. And when he saw me challenge him on that, he was like, this kid's crazy. All right, I can win with that. So at 13 years old, I had a kill list. And so, you know, they used to do these rankings. It was Street and Smith basketball rankings. And I was nowhere to be found because I was like 6-4, scrawny, like 160 pounds soaking wet.

So I was like 57 on the list. And so I will look at 56, 55, all the way up to number one, who these players are, what club teams they played for. So when we go on an AAU travel circuit, I got to hunt them down. Right? And so that became my mission in high school is to check off every other person, all those 56 other names, hunt them. them down and knock them down.

So like at 13 years old, I played the longer game because my game wasn't about being better than you at 13. It was to be better than you when the chips are really on the line. So when we played at 13, I would size you up and see what your strengths and weaknesses are. How do you approach the game? Are you silly about it? Are you goofy about it?

Are you good at it just because you're bigger and stronger than everybody else? Or is there actually thought and skill that you put into it? And when I'd play, I'd play to my weaknesses. I went and played in my strengths. I'd play to my weaknesses. Because when you're playing summer basketball, there's so many games. So there's not a lot of skill work being done. So when are you going to get better?

When you're playing in competition situations, you're only playing to your strengths. Why? Because you want to win. So what I would do, I always work on the things during those games that I was weak at. Left hand, pull up jump shot, post game. So I have a strategy. And so then fast forward to when I'm, I'm 17 and my game is completely well-rounded and that player at 13 that I saw at 13 is still

doing the same shit at 17 now you got a problem right okay I shot five airballs on national TV in front of millions of people that cost us the series and I'm 18 I'm fine dude well you know it's you got to look at the reality of the situation you know like for me it's not you know You kind of got to get over yourself. It's not about you, man. Like, okay, you feel embarrassed. You're not that important. Get over yourself.

That's where you go. Get over yourself, right? Like you're worried about how people may perceive you and, like, you're walking around, and it's embarrassing because you shot five air balls. Get over yourself. Right? And then after that, it's okay, well, why did those air balls happen?

Got it. High school, year before, we play 35 games. Max, right? Week in between, spaced out. plenty of time to rest. In the NBA, it's back to back, to back, to back, to back, to back. I didn't have the legs. So you look at the shot, every shot was online, every shot was online, but every shot was short.

I got to get stronger. I got to train differently. The weight training program that I'm doing, I got to tailor it for an 82 game season so that when the playoffs come around, my legs are stronger and that ball gets there. So I look at it with rationale and say, okay, well, the reason why I shot airball is because my legs aren't there. I got on next year they'll be there. That was it.

Done. Done. We had a game against Toronto in 2000. And Vince was tearing the league up. My back was jacked. Jacked. But like the perception of that, like what? Kobe's missing a game against Toronto and Vince Carter because my back was really spasming.

But people would be like, what? Oh, he's ducking Vince. excuse me? No, I don't think so. So I would be in a layup line like, okay, there's a lot of days where, you know, you can rest and recover. Today ain't one of them.

Your back can bother you any other day. That's shit ain't bothering me today. We're going to, he's going to have to see me today. Amen. Yeah. Amen. You're playing against the Golden State Warriors. Score is 107, 109.

You guys are close to getting into the playoffs. You know exactly what happens in the game. You go up, you're about to take your shot, and then all of a sudden, boom, Achilles happens, right? Friend of mine, Nima, he is here just to listen to. He played ball. And he told me, he says, Patrick, I don't think you understand. He says, when I tore my Achilles in high school,

he says, four friends of mine dragged me to my husband. I was crying from there straight to the hospital. He says, I have no clue. How the hell this guy. I did it. He went and hit the free throws and then you walked off the stage. Yeah. And then you got the surgery got. Yeah.

How the hell do you tolerate that kind of pain? You know, I tell this example, and I think this is the best way to explain it. You know, you have a hamstring injury, you pull your hamstring really, really badly. You can barely walk, right? Let alone play anything. soccer, basketball, volleyball, whatever it is, you can't do anything. You're at home, all of a sudden a fire breaks out in the home. Your kids are upstairs, you know, wife is, wherever she may be, you know, it's going down.

All right? I'm willing to bet that you're going to forget about your hamstring. You're going to sprint upstairs. You're going to grab your kids. You'll make sure your wife's good. You're getting out of that house. The lives of your family are more important than the injury of your hamstring. And so when the game is more important than the injury itself, you don't feel that.

But you go into the locker room. And then one of the reporters comes up to you and he says to you, Kobe, are you convinced that they told you it's probably torn Achilles? They're going to do an MRI. Are you pretty convinced that's what it is? And your answer is, yeah. Then one of the reporters says, but if anyone is going to get through this, it's probably you, right? you put your head down and you say, oh man,

wow. The Achilles were like the kiss of death, athletes. Like, I don't know if I can do this. I don't know. There's so many factors. There's the surgery that has to take place. The surgery has to go well. And then just, it's a tendon.

I'm not dealing with anything that's muscular or things that I can control. I can't control a tendon. You know what I'm saying? So like, I don't know. And then thinking about what that process of recovery is going to look. like it's a long one do I want to do that shit I don't I don't know if I want to do it I don't know so that was the hardest part you don't know if you want to do it

or you don't know if you are gonna be able to come back from it both like I don't know if I can do it I don't know if I want to do it got it miss it's a long long process but like when I went in the trainers room my kids are in there and you know they're looking at you and stuff and I'm looking at them and I'm like you know it's all right dad's gonna be all right it would be fine It'll be all right. It'll be all right. It'll be all right. As a parent, you've got to set the example. You got to set the example.

This is another obstacle. This obstacle cannot define me. It's not going to cripple me. It's not going to be responsible for me stepping away for the game that I love. I'm going to step away on my own terms. And that's when the decision was made that, you know what? I'm doing it. You're a freaking beast guy.

Hey, hey. The day could be today. that your career is over. Now what you do? I said, I better get to work. Rest at the end, not in the middle. And that's something I always live by. I'm not going to rest,

and I'm going to keep on pushing out. There are a lot of answers that I don't have. There are even questions that I don't have. I'm just going to keep going. I'm just going to keep going, and I'll figure these things out as you go, right? And you just continue to build that way. So I try to live by that all the time.

Have a dream, sacrifice for it, and never, ever rest in the middle. I came into the NBA. I was like, baby's school is really don't work that hard. One of the things I would do is everybody would be at the cafeteria, work, eating and doing all sorts of stuff. I'd just go back to the job.

I go back to the gym. How can I show you that? No, I have you. Well, you do it through training, right? So when I get up in the morning, my daughter goes with me. 4 a.m.? 4 a.m. My 15-year-old goes with me.

She goes with me before school, and it becomes a daddy daughter thing. That's cool. Through that process, she understands the value of heart. And so it's through those behaviors is where I find the motivation. I think the definition of greatness is to inspire the people next to you. I think that's what greatness is or should be. It's not something that lives and dies with one person.

It's how can you inspire a person to then in turn inspire another person that then inspires another person? And that's how you create something that I think lasts forever. It's not sit around and all, it's all happy, your lucky type. If you're leader, your job is to get the best out of you. You gotta deal with it. Face it, learn from it. It's exciting when you win.

It's exciting when you lose because the process should be exactly the same. But the hardest thing is to face that stuff. But what if today is the day that you, that's it. Now what you do? Can I say, mom by hour? My parents were great. You know, growing up, you know, they instilled in me the importance of the imagination of curiosity, understanding that, okay, if you want to accomplish something, I'm not

just going to sit here and say, yes, you can do whatever you want. Yes, you can, but you have to also put in the work to get there. Right. So they taught me that at a really early age, man. And when you grow up as a kid thinking that the world is your oyster, all things are possible if you put in the work to do it, you know, you grow up having that fundamental belief. Who was more influential for you, your father or mother? Both were influential at different points. My mom was there on a daily basis. My father was really influential at a really critical time

where I had a summer where I played basketball when I was like 10 or 11 years old. And here I come playing, and I don't score one point the entire summer. Not one. You didn't score once, not one. Were you in the game? I was in the game.

How did you not score? Because I was terrible. Not a free throw, not a nothing. Not a lucky shot, not a break. we lay up zero points. And I remember crying about it, being upset about it. My father's getting me a hug and say, listen, whether you score zero or score 60,

I'm going to love you in the matter of all. Wow. Now, that is the most important thing as you can say to each other. Because from there, I was like, okay, that gives me all the confidence in the world to feel. I have the security there. But the hell with that, I'm scoring 60.

Let's go. Right, right. And from there, I just went to work. I just stayed with it. I kept practicing, kept practicing. I think that's when the idea of understanding a long-term view became important. Because I wasn't going to catch these kids in a week. I wasn't going to catch a year.

So that's when I sat down and said, okay, this is going to take some thought. All right, we don't want to work on first. All right, shooting. All right, let's knock this out. Let's focus on this half a year, six months, do nothing but shoot. After that, all right, creating your own shot. So I started creating a menu of things. When I came back the next summer, I was a little bit better.

I was a little bit better. And then 14 came around, back half of 13, 14 years old, and then I was just killing everyone. And it happened in two years. And I wasn't expected to happen in two years, but it did because what I had to do was work on the basics and the fundamentals. But they relied on athleticism and their natural ability.

And because I stick to the fundamentals, it just caught up to me. And then my body, you know, my knees stopped hurting. I grew into my frame. And then your athleticism, once you have the fundamentals, the hard work, the mindset, and you tack on the athletic, it's game. Then it was game. Wow.

The love of the game, the challenge. Like I would watch Magic play, I'd watch Michael play, and I would see them do these unbelievable things and I'd say, you know, can I get to that level? I don't know, but let's find out. Let's find out. And so that curiosity to see where I could push this thing led me down that path, I think. With the 13th pick in the 1996 NBA draft, the Charlotte Hornets select Kobe Bryant from Lower Marion High School in Pennsylvania.

Greatness lies ahead to this young man. Well, I learned that you have to work hard and you have to approach the game with a serious mindset. There was a stretch in 03 where Shaq was out with an injury. And Phil called me up to his office and said, okay, we need you to really. turned on the afterburn to start scoring about free after the way. So I did and I wind up scoring I think it was nine straight games for 40 plus points. Nine straight? Nine straight games and then Shaq comes back

second to last game with that. And then Phil called into his office so cold. Okay, I need you to dial it back. I'm like, why? Like we're winning. I don't understand. It's because our goal is to win a championship. But if you continue to do this, we'll lose Shaq. We'll lose His motivation, his excitement. What triggers him, right? So I need you to pull back so we can pull Shaq forward for June.

Wow. That was the big challenge, is you move from, you know, being the single dominant player to understanding, okay, I have to help these other guys. Oh, I lift everyone else up. It's tough. It's more like you put yourself to the side, and you put yourself in their shoes and understand what they're feeling. And then you have to make certain decisions,

decisions of okay what buttons do I need to push for this player to get them to the next level so it's never it's not sit around and all it's all happy your lucky time the leader your job is to get the best out even if they may not like it at their time he was very demanding because he expected everyone to put in the same effort as he was and that was unrealistic you're not behind me you're not in front of me you're right there right there parallel with me practice was very competitive right away You know how Kobe is. We was drawing, we had it gone sometimes. He didn't let me slip a lot.

Times where I get ejected or about to get a technical foul or going off the deep end, he would be there to set me straight a lot, which helped me a lot. So we're getting the timeout, he's like, hey, hey, I'm open. Like, okay. So we go out and say, then, come, hey, hey, I'm open. Okay, here you go. Come back in.

Hey dude, you got to throw me the ball. I said, man, fuck that. Get it off the rebound if I miss, bro. Listen, I don't deal with people that don't commit at that level, but then act as if they do. The running joke, or he doesn't pass and all, so that crap. That's okay, you know, but I'll take those five. I'll take five.

Those times when you get up early and you work hard, those times when you stay up late, you work hard, those times when you don't feel like working, you're too tired, you don't want to push yourself, but you do it anyway. That is actually the dream. That's the dream. It's not the destination. It's the journey.

And if you guys, if you guys can understand that, then what you'll see happen is that you won't accomplish your dreams. Your dreams won't come true. Something greater will. It's an amazing thing about passion. If you love something, maybe you have a strong passion for something, you would go to the extreme to try to understand or try to get it. Whatever you have a love for, if you have to walk, you would go get it. If you have to beg someone, you would go.

I don't think you guys understand how present you guys were with me. You know, you guys were there with me at 5.30 in the morning when I was running the track and I was midway through my workout. and I didn't know if I could make it through. And I thought about the expectations you guys have for me and you have for our team. And it pushed me through. It got me through those eight-hundreds and four-hundreds and one-hundredths at 5.30 in the morning.

So I thank you. We're not on this stage just because of talent or ability. We're up here because of 4 a.8.m. We're up here because of 2 a days. We're 5 a day. We're up here because we had a dream and let nothing stand in our way. If anything tried to bring us down,

We used it to make us strong. We were never satisfied, never finished, will never be retired. My high school English teacher, Mr. Fisk, he had this beautiful quote, and it read, rest at the end, not in the middle. And I took that to heart. I believe there's time for resting at the end, but for me, that time is not now. Thank you for this tremendous honor in acknowledging my basketball career, but I'll be far from done. My next dream is to be honored one day for inspiring the next generation of athletes to have a dream, sacrifice for it, and never ever rest in the middle.

Rest at the end, not in the middle. Where does that come from? I can understand that, and I'm doing my job as a father. Thank you guys so much. I love you. Mamba out. If you play with the fear of failing, you'll have the pressure on yourself to play, you know, to capitulate to that fear. If you play with a sense of I want to win, I want to win, then you have the fear of what.

What happens if you don't. But if you find common ground in the middle, in the center, then it doesn't matter. You're unfazed by either, right? And that enables you to really just stay in the moment, stay connected to it, and not feel anything other than what's in front of you. So I try to just be dead center.

Start with what do you want your game to be? What would make your game most unstoppable or hard to deal with? And now you work backwards from there. And you start building it one piece at a time, one move at a time, one move at a time, encounter at time. Who would Shaq be if he had your work ethic? He'd be the greatest of all time. If Shaq had your work? He'd be the greatest of all time by the moment. He'd be the first to tell you that. For sure. I mean, this guy was a force. Like, I have never seen. It was crazy.

You know, a guy at that size, generally guys at that size are a little timid and they don't want to be tall. They don't want to be big. Man, this dude was, he's a He did not care. He was mean. He was nasty. He was competitive. He was vindictive. I mean, he was, yeah.

I wish he was in a gym. I would have had 12 rings. He had the work ethic. My God, yeah. Way and be close. If you're lazy, man, I don't want to talk to you. I want to deal with you. You don't make me feel dumber.

You know, you're going to lower my level. I don't think so. You can go over there. There's plenty of teams in here where you'll fit right in. I don't deal with people that don't commit at that level, but then act as if they do. I don't deal with that. I don't. It's real shit.

I mean, listen. So, like, we used to getting this stuff all the time because it was like, you know, he would say, okay, Kobe's not throwing me the ball. You know, media would take it and run with it and all this stuff. And I'm like, well, bruh, if you were in shape, by the time I run, you know, he would say, you down on a fast break and run back and then run down, you're still coming down the first time, bro? Like, what the hell do you want me to do? Right? So a lot of our contention came from that, came from that. And even though he was older, you were still confronting him. You didn't,

you didn't care. Oh, I didn't care. Man, listen, bro, from day one. I knew for sure, Rick Fox, my teammates, they all thought I was absolutely crazy the day me and Shack got in the fist fight. After that day, they were like, okay, Kobe, you're certifiable. Fist fight. Oh, yeah. Fist fight. I'm not backing down. Listen, either you want to work my ass or we want to have a night.

But, you know, there's a level of respect. And for Shaq, too, by the way. I know he's told me that that day was a big turning point for him because it was like, you know, he's generally used to. talking trash and saying what he wants and nobody really stepping up and challenging him on that and when he saw me challenge him on that he was like this kid's crazy all right i can win with that you know and so that's kind of the beginning of our relationship i think that's probably never happened to him that's probably not something that's common to him no i mean seven feet tall since

he's old or something right there was all this is all coming back to me right now it's also a came in Phoenix, my first year we were playing, and he kept posting up. But they kept fouling him, so he kept going on the free throw line and kept missing him. And so he threw the ball out to me. I'm not throwing that in there. So I kept shooting him, right?

So we get into Tom Mountain, he's like, hey, hey, I'm open. I'm like, okay. And so we go out and same thing. Come in, hey, hey, hey, I'm open. Okay. Come back in. Hey dude, you got to throw me the ball. I said, man, fuck that.

Get it off the rebound if I miss, bro. You told them this. First year. 18 years old, man. 18 years old. I must have been out of my damn mind. The story continues. The story continues.

So if you fail on Monday, the only way it's a failure on Monday is if you decide to not progress from that. Right? So to me, that's why failure is not existing. Because, you know, if I feel today, okay, I'm going to learn something from that failure and I'm going to try again on Tuesday. Those times when you don't feel like working, you're too tired, you don't want to push yourself, but you do it anyway. That's the dream. It's not the destination, it's the journey.