Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Paul Rabil on How You Master the Way of a Champion EP 451

Starting point is 00:00:00 Coming up next on Passion Strike. As athletes, we always dream about playing in a national championship game, sold out at Gillette Stadium. 70,000 people there, overtime, ball in our stick, game on the line, chance to win it for our alma mater. That's the dream. But to get there, you have to spend countless hours on your own in empty stadiums doing the tedious monotonous work that is skill development, that is running sprints, that is doing squats and push-ups that has to be what you fall in love with such that you can experience that moment that you dream of. And the athletes that fall in love with the process, that get into the detail during practice, that understand that they actually

Starting point is 00:00:47 improve the most when they practice away from practice, especially team sports. You hear whether it's Larry Bird's story or Michael Jordan's story. So practicing away from practice, when you're on your own in the quiet, the early morning hours, the late night hours, that's where the best end up rising to the top.

Starting point is 00:01:05 Welcome to Passion Struck. Hi, I'm your host, John R. Miles. And on the show, we decipher the secrets, tips and guidance of the world's most inspiring people and turn their wisdom into practical advice for you and those around you. Our mission is to help you unlock the power of intentionality so that you can become the best version of yourself.

Starting point is 00:01:27 If you're new to the show, I offer advice and answer listener questions on Fridays. We have long form interviews the rest of the week with guests ranging from astronauts to authors, CEOs, creators, innovators, scientists, military leaders, visionaries, and athletes. Now let's go out there and become passion struck. Hello everyone and welcome back to episode 451 of passion struck. Consistently ranked is the number one alternative health podcast. A heartfelt thank you to each and every one of you who return to the show every week, eager to listen, learn, and discover new ways to live better, to be better, and to most importantly make a meaningful impact in the world.

Starting point is 00:02:06 If you're new to the show, thank you so much for being here. Or you simply want to introduce us to friends or family members, and we so appreciate it when you do that. We have episodes Starter Packs, which are collections of our fans' favorite episodes that we organize in a convenient playlist that give any new listener a great way to get acclimated to everything that we do here on the show. Either go to Spotify or passionstruck.com slash starter packs to get started. I am so excited to announce that my new book Passion Struck is a finalist for the Eric

Starting point is 00:02:33 Hoffer Grand Prize Award for best book of the year. And you can find it at Amazon or on the Passion Struck website. In case you missed it, last week I had three phenomenal interviews with astronaut Steve Bowen, New York Times bestselling author Bronnie Ware, and Jerry Hussey, the number one peak performance coach in Ireland. In my interview with Steve Bowen, we explored the critical moments and decisions that propelled Steve's career into the stratosphere. He'll share how he tackled self-doubt and the unexpected twists on his path to the stars. In my interview with Bronnie Ware, author of the internationally best-selling

Starting point is 00:03:05 book, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying, she shares powerful stories and lessons about living without regrets, embracing authenticity, and finding true fulfillment. And lastly, in my interview with Jerry Hussey, Ireland's premier health and performance coach, we discussed his transformative approach to achieving sustainable high performance while nurturing health and wellbeing. Jerry goes into his journey from preparing Olympic athletes for the world stage to writing his acclaimed books, Awaken Your Power Within and The Freedom Within. And if you liked any of those previous episodes or today's, we would so appreciate you giving

Starting point is 00:03:38 it a five-star review. They go such a long way into strengthening the PassageStruck community and I know we and our guests love to hear your feedback. Today, I am absolutely thrilled to be joined by a true Titan of lacrosse and a visionary entrepreneur, Paul Rable. Paul Rable's 14-year career as a professional lacrosse player in the United States

Starting point is 00:03:57 is marked by extraordinary achievements and groundbreaking milestones. In 2019, while still an active player, Paul co-founded the Premier Lacrosse League, where he continued to compete for the final three seasons of his illustrious career before retiring in 2021. His accolades include winning two World Lacrosse Championship gold medals and earning the title of a ten-time All-Star in Major League Lacrosse, where he also

Starting point is 00:04:20 secured two league championships. Often referred to as the Michael Jordan or Wayne Gretzky of lacrosse, Paul's rise from a determined young athlete to becoming the sport's first million dollar man and the founder of the PLL has cemented his legacy as a legendary figure in the world of sports. But Paul's path wasn't just about athletic prowess. It was about creating a manual for greatness. A manual he meticulously compiled through conversations with icons like Bill Belichick, Steph Curry, and Sue Bird. In his new book, The Way of the Champion, Pain, Persistence, and the

Starting point is 00:04:50 Path Forward, he delves into this journey, offering a blueprint that transcends sports and applies to the boardroom and beyond. Today, in our interview, Paul will share the profound lessons from his incredible journey. From tackling personal challenges like auditory processing disorder to overcoming professional hurdles such as losing a world championship and enduring a public divorce. He'll reveal how embracing vulnerability, building relationships with world-class talents, and maintaining a rigorous mindset shaped him into the champion he is today. We'll explore how the principles of the way of the champion can empower you to excel in adversity, set ambitious goals, and discover your strengths. Whether you're an athlete, an entrepreneur, or anyone with a dream,

Starting point is 00:05:32 Paul's insights will help you navigate your path to success. So get ready to be inspired, to learn, and perhaps to start writing your own manual for greatness. Thank you for choosing Passion Struck and choosing me to be your host and guide on your journey to creating an intentional life. Now, let that journey begin. I am absolutely thrilled and honored to have Paul Rabel join us on Passion Struck. Welcome Paul. Hey, thanks for having me, John.

Starting point is 00:06:02 Excited to be here. When I do these interviews, I'd like to start off by giving the audience some context of who I'm interviewing. And for you, I wanted to do that by exploring your childhood a little bit. It turns out that you and I have a few things in common. And like you, I also faced an auditory processing disorder growing up. So I know firsthand what it's like to experience that. How did having to overcome that learning difference

Starting point is 00:06:29 and also ADHD shape your approach to overcoming adversity? Well, it's nice to hear we have that in common. I view our learning differences, our challenges in life as one that can ultimately render itself as a gift. So for me, growing up and struggling in the classroom because I just learned differently required me to study more, study harder, develop mnemonic devices as techniques to retain information, learn how to storytell, make sense of things through alternative narratives. That extra workload made its way onto the field as I developed

Starting point is 00:07:13 into a high school, college, and then professional athlete. I just noticed that I worked harder than everyone else. And I think it was ingrained in me because that was how I assimilated to the traditional education system If we're lucky enough in life to progress and develop a sense of perspective We realize that our greatest challenges were ultimately the biggest avenues of growth It's very interesting because my daughter inherited the auditory processing dysfunction as well. And just seeing how hard she's had

Starting point is 00:07:48 to work to achieve what she's achieved, but also how much fulfillment it's brought her is really interesting from the eyes of a parent. When I think about learning and processing, you hear it on the athletic field all the time where a coach will get mad at his player, and he'll say, you're not listening.

Starting point is 00:08:05 And you sit back and you go, I am listening, what? And it becomes an emotional thing. That's how relationships end up in Rowell's. I've learned through the educational process for me that first consuming the information, whether it's through reading or listening, viewing, the second is then writing it down. So I've been keeping journals for 25 years.

Starting point is 00:08:28 I fill them up every quarter and I would always take notes in class. The third is actually the one most left off and that's teaching the material or at least attempting to verbalize it to someone else. And I learned that in an R&D class I took when I was younger and I feel it now, especially as a coach to a lot of the younger next generation lacrosse players,

Starting point is 00:08:51 is it's difficult when you first give it a go. That's why we should always practice ahead of our oral presentations. But the process of sharing the information that you just learned and wrote down completes a full loop for me, stored into long-term memory. I found I have to do the same exact thing. And people would always ask me, you just write constantly

Starting point is 00:09:12 during these meetings. And for me, it was the way that my mind worked. I had to write it down if I wanted to retain it. And then even if I was in a meeting, I tried to ask questions back to the people who were in the meeting, basically reiterating what they were saying. So what you were taught, it seems was the same thing that I was taught. A hundred percent.

Starting point is 00:09:34 I want to jump into defining greatness because you want it to be great from a young age. How do you define greatness for yourself? And how has that define greatness for yourself? And how has that definition evolved over time? It's a great question. I think it first starts with the eye of the beholder and the lessons that I have learned from my peers and going through the process on my own of trying to be the best lacrosse player in the world

Starting point is 00:10:04 and win championships and MVPs is that you first have to dream big. You have to set the biggest goals for yourself. That's the way to first test what your human potential is. Going back to the full circle of how we discussed storing new information in the long-term memory. I also believe that having the vulnerability to step into the spotlight and profess that you want to be the greatest is also part of the manifestation trend. And then after all that big dreaming is done,

Starting point is 00:10:36 we have to act small. And that means every single day, having the discipline, having the focus, having the level of commitment, a lot of it's critical thought, that will lay the groundwork to your improvement over a long period of time. There is no such thing as an overnight success. Companies that reach success starting from the startup phase

Starting point is 00:11:00 often takes them 10 years, athletes it will take them 20. So you have to commit to the small steps for the long haul. I love that. And similar to you writing your first book, which we're going to be talking more about today, I just released my first book in February. And one of my chapters was called The Bee and Turtle

Starting point is 00:11:20 Effect. And what I'm trying to explain to people is that you have to be like the turtle who thinks about things from the long-term perspective and is willing to be slow and methodical about the journey, but you also need to be like the bee and active in the everyday moments where you're trying to do tasks that get you closer to your long-term ambitions and aspirations. So very much aligns to what I talk about. So for the audience who might not be familiar with you, you are often referred to as the Michael Jordan or Tom Brady

Starting point is 00:11:54 or Wayne Gretzky of lacrosse, which really speaks volumes about your impact on the sport. However, a lot of listeners might not be from the East Coast and might not really understand the game of lacrosse. And it was interesting for me to learn as I was doing my research, that it actually dates back to the 17th century. Could you provide a little bit of background for listeners on what are some aspects of lacrosse that make it so distinct and exciting?

Starting point is 00:12:24 Yeah. And probably further back, so 17th century discovered by colonists that came over from France and England. This is a Native American game. It's the first sport of North America. It goes back thousands of years, early documentation in 11 and 1200 AD. Now, the Native Americans played it in two ways. One, which comes from the Haudenosaunee people, which represent the six nations, is through what they would call ceremony or their longhouse. And that is the version of the game they call Medicine Game. And so it was very much played to celebrate the creator and it was a spiritual practice.

Starting point is 00:13:02 The other version that they called Dehhunti Guajes is essentially what that also means is they bump hips was a version of the game that was meant for recreational purposes and to solve conflict. And that version of lacrosse was sometimes over fields that stretched miles long with hundreds of players per side, no time, no boundaries. And it was sport or the game in its truest essence. So then comes over a Frenchman who ended up being French Canadian.

Starting point is 00:13:35 His name was George Beers. And he saw a native nation called the Kanakawe playing the game. He spent time with their leaders to figure out how to essentially build the first rule book. And for a long time, it was the national sport of Canada because of George Beers. And he along with the Kanakaway, so the Montreal Lacrosse Club and the Kanakaway would tour not only North America, but they went over to the UK to play lacrosse and share the game. From there,

Starting point is 00:14:02 it made its way into New York, where Manhattan College and NYU were the first universities to play in the 1800s. And then Johns Hopkins, my alma mater, played against Maryland in 1895, which is considered the rivalry in college sports, the North Carolina versus Duke basketball. And it has made its way through the youth high school,

Starting point is 00:14:22 college into the international level over the last two centuries. It was once an Olympic sport in 1904 and 1908. And then as the Olympics began their commercial approach to the international games every four years, they had some requirements like having governing bodies out there where lacrosse fell off. Cut to when we announced the build of our league that I oversee called the Premier Lacrosse League in 2019.

Starting point is 00:14:50 One of our outside the box efforts was getting lacrosse back into the Olympics. And we announced this past November, alongside Casey Wasserman in the LA 2028 folks that lacrosse will indeed be back in the Olympics come 28 in Los Angeles. So a crazy story. It's a really wild story that's unknown by many.

Starting point is 00:15:12 No, I think it's fantastic because my son played lacrosse. We were living in North Carolina where it was a pretty big sport. And I loved it because it kind of fuses hockey, which I loved playing soccer, football, kind of into one sport with elements of each. Because it's predominantly played in Eastern States, we moved from North Carolina to Austin, Texas, where it was actually still being played. They just weren't as good at it. And then unfortunately we moved to where I live now in the Tampa Bay region and they weren't as good at it. And then unfortunately, we moved to where I live now

Starting point is 00:15:46 in the Tampa Bay region, and they weren't playing it at all. And the only way that my son could have played was by joining a traveling team. And this is something I wanted to ask you about, because there's a concern that I often hear about that the demands of travel sports are negatively impacting American families. And for people who don't live in the regions where lacrosse is played the most, that's their only option. How do you think people who find themselves in this situation can maintain a healthy balance when a child's involvement

Starting point is 00:16:20 in travel sports can sometimes become too central to the family's overall life? Yeah, yeah it's a great question. So a couple of things. First is that James Naismith who started basketball was also Canadian and he took those peach baskets and the idea of a ball. He played lacrosse before basketball and lacrosse truly is I think an amalgamation of the big four sports that we see today. See of the endurance of soccer, the contact of football, the agility and hand-eye coordination of basketball and baseball.

Starting point is 00:16:50 It really is the best of all, is the way that I feel. And really, I think a reason why if a lacrosse player in your neighborhood, they are so passionate about it, it really fulfills the wider range of skill sets and even artisanship. The reason why it was for a long time, mostly played in the Northeast is that's where it was created as we discussed with the Haudenosaunee making its way from New York down to Maryland. And then the other two areas is there just wasn't greater leadership over the last 100

Starting point is 00:17:19 years that was both lobbying publicly and investing privately in the game's growth out west. And that's what sort of football, basketball, and baseball in America had. So there's the coaching component that's really important. And then the other piece is lacrosse, because it's an equipment sport, is more like hockey and golf than it is like basketball and soccer, meaning it requires an expensive upfront payment, if not otherwise covered by your local rec and town program. And that inherently creates a barrier to playing anything. I study youth sports

Starting point is 00:17:55 quite a bit. And for us to make an investment as parents and players, I think often is led by a love or passion for whatever it is that we want to invest in. And with equipment sports that cost money and are not funded by your local town and rec, you're essentially asking a family to invest before they know if they love. That's why I also love getting your question, the purity of rec sports and town play versus the threat of privatized club and travel leagues. Now, just like in any industry, there is a benefit to being able to, if you choose as a family, to go play travel lacrosse. For the same reasons that there are perceived benefits,

Starting point is 00:18:41 if you want to play AAU basketball or club soccer, oftentimes it requires some fundraising and the other time a lot of travel, which can be expensive for households. I think for similar reasons, as we had discussed in the first chapter of this conversation, thinking big and acting small as a society, we struggle with holding space for two things that might actually feel like they oppose each other, but can both be true at the same time. Meaning we can have a really good public sports environment, which is our rec and town, and also have private club and travel options for certain families or players that desire that. Now what we don't want, and this is the trend we see over

Starting point is 00:19:22 the last 10 years, is that because private and club sports have gotten so big that town and rec deteriorates. And the primary reason it's deteriorating is because kids who get cut from the club team are no longer playing town and rec because it's perceived as not cool. So it's incumbent on leadership to make town and rec feel cool, right? It's like Pop Warner football. That was named off of a famous football coach. And there is a vibe and a brand that is associated with it, the Little League World Series.

Starting point is 00:19:53 So I think that it's incumbent on operators to continue to invest in rec sports. Now, the recommendation that I'll give to parents that are deciding whether or not to invest in private sports for their kids or sports specialized, which has also been a trend over the last 10 years, meaning fewer kids today are playing multiple sports and they're choosing one sport to play year round at a very early age. That's not part of my generation or my parents' generation.

Starting point is 00:20:22 My parents' generation guided me to playing four sports a year until my sophomore year in high school when we looked at data and my emotional commitment to lacrosse to say okay I'm gonna stop playing basketball, soccer, track and field. So here's the deal. I understand the viewpoint of parents and kids who want to sports specialized because the route to getting a college scholarship is pretty linear. You're going to know by the time you're 18. So if you're just doing the math and saying, well, I'd rather play for four seasons a year when I'm 12

Starting point is 00:20:53 so that I have six years of runway to getting the most time in the calendar to develop my skill at the highest level such that I can achieve a scholarship, I understand that skill acquisition. The other side of it as an athlete more widely, your muscle agility, your emotional agility, the exposure to different teammates and coaches, different sport disciplines actually make you a more well-rounded athlete with greater potential. So threading the needle is I think all kids should play as many sports as they

Starting point is 00:21:26 want to, should they be able to afford or get into the programs locally. And then if they really want to specialize, the parents and the kids need to balance the timing of doing such. And I believe that there's more data to support the decision than meets the eye. Parents and players are going to be biased. They often, and I was, and my parents were, think that we're better than we are. But you can look at the stat sheet. You can look at, is your kid a starter? Are they practicing when they're not being told to practice?

Starting point is 00:21:58 I think that's important. Are they the best player in their team? Do they become the best player in the league, the best player in the city and state? We have to remind ourselves that it's really difficult to play college sports and extraordinarily difficult to make it into the pros. So this has to be a mindset that's backed by performance data to suggest that, okay, let's go all in.

Starting point is 00:22:21 Thank you for really answering that in a comprehensive way. And I've seen this play out firsthand because my nephew Thank you for really answering that in a comprehensive way. And I've seen this play out firsthand because my nephew was a really good soccer player and for him in Chattanooga, Tennessee, they were limited by how many teams they could play. only ticket to potentially playing professionally or in college. But I remember my brother one week he's in Tennessee, the next week he's in North Carolina, the next week he's in Virginia, the next week it's hard. It is Paul, let's talk about your new book, the way of the champion pain persistence and the path forward. Congratulations. Thank you.

Starting point is 00:23:01 I went to the Naval Academy. I should say I graduated from the Naval Academy. And that's where I first really became familiar with lacrosse because so many of my friends played and back then the Academy was a top 10 team. But I bet, not many of the listeners know that Bill Belichick spent much of his life on the Naval Academy grounds from the age of four on. His father, for those of you who don't know it was an assistant football coach for 33 years. In fact, a couple of my classmates were able to send me a picture that his parents are actually buried on the Academy grounds. I bring this all up because Bill wrote the foreword for your book and I wanted you to tell the story of how you met him and then how he actually recruited you to be a safety for the Patriots. Yeah so Coach is a dear friend he's been a mentor I've known him

Starting point is 00:23:57 for about 20 years now he grew up playing lacrosse it's one of his primary loves he keeps sticks in his office like I do back here. And whenever we get together, we try to go have a catch and a shot on net. He used to watch his father study film at the Naval Academy. And that's why he became such a great student of football, cut to winning eight Super Bowls. Coach Belichick has a level of curiosity and humility, unlike anyone I've ever met that is at the top of their game. And the way that comes to life is he is always

Starting point is 00:24:38 asking questions, he's asking for help, he's looking across the aisle at his peers in other industries to try to learn. In this case, my head coach at Johns Hopkins, Dave Petromala, became friendly with Coach Belichick because Coach Belichick wanted to understand how this team in Baltimore had been the number one

Starting point is 00:24:58 team in the country for six straight years and gone to six straight Final Fours and won two national championships. So he met with Coach Petro, asked if he could come to a practice when I heard that coach Belichick my junior year was coming to one of our practices, I asked as a captain, my coach if I could get 10 minutes of time with him. So he asked coach Belichick, Bill said, sure. After practice, I sat in an office with him and probably pelted him with 20 questions of my own.

Starting point is 00:25:26 So the two of us built a bond and then a friendship over those next two years, I think around our shared curiosity. That ties into a lot of the lessons that I share in the book. I would say if you look at the best athletes, entrepreneurs and entertainers in the world, they're all incredibly curious. And that's why they develop at a rate that they do.

Starting point is 00:25:47 That's why they have so much resilience. That's why they are able to respond from loss so well, is they comprehend, they understand, and they ask questions. So I finished my career at Johns Hopkins, began playing professional lacrosse, was on the national team my second year out of graduating. And Coach Belichick and I would try

Starting point is 00:26:08 to get in the habit of going to dinner a couple times a year. And he would invite me out to watch the Patriots play. And at one of our dinners, he had asked if I had ever thought about playing in the NFL. And I told him yes. I told him that I was interested in being a receiver. He thought I'd be a better strong safety. We left the conversation saying, hey, let's think about next summer coming to OTAs and giving this thing a receiver. He thought I'd be a better strong safety. We left the conversation

Starting point is 00:26:25 saying, hey, let's think about next summer, coming to OTAs and giving this thing a shot. So I started working with the Traction and Editioning Coach. This was before, by the way, Chris Hogan made the crossover who was also a college lacrosse midfielder like me. He went to Penn State and he ended up trying out in the NFL. Five years later, Bill Belichick takes Chris Hogan to be a receiver on the Patriots and Chris ended up winning three Super Bowls. It's weird how life comes full circle when Chris retired from the NFL. He came back and played in our league, the PLL, for a season and was my teammate for my last season playing. Going backwards, Bill and I decided together Going backwards, Bill and I decided together that the more daring path for me would be to stay in lacrosse and try to pursue greatness, to your first question, John. He knew that I had just come off

Starting point is 00:27:15 an MVP campaign. I was a starting midfielder for Team USA and that I wanted to play for the next 15 years of my life. And while I could have grinded it out as a practice roster player, then broken a roster, worked my way up, having the courage to build something from scratch when many were telling us that we couldn't was where we arrived. And that began my professional career as a lacrosse player, then entrepreneur.

Starting point is 00:27:49 Thank you for sharing that. I was recently watching the Netflix documentary on John Elway's draft pick. And I bring it up given the draft was last night. And it was so interesting to me that he did not want to play for a certain team. And therefore, he was leveraging Major League baseball as much as he possibly could. But I look at these situations, whether it's him or Bo Jackson or Deion Sanders or even

Starting point is 00:28:14 Tom Brady could have played. And I think trying to play two professional sports, even Michael Jordan, dilutes your abilities because I think that the skill set that you need in one sport can be drastically different than how you have to train yourself for another sport. But we don't have to explore more of that. That's just my personal thought. No, I write about having singular focus if you want to achieve a championship career and strive for greatness. You have to be so singularly focused on your discipline where sacrifice becomes easy. And I think when you are doing two things that are extraordinarily difficult at the same time, you will not

Starting point is 00:28:59 reach your potential in either. I think it's a great point and people have told me since I launched the podcast, why aren't you building all these courses out and why haven't you been doing all this consulting and why aren't you doing more keynotes and things like that? And I figured to be an expert in being a podcaster, that should be my focus. And once I got closer to that, then I would start branching out, which I'm now doing with the book and speaking. But the results speak for itself. Yesterday, I was ranked the number two health podcast in the world. Amazing. Ahead of Jay Shetty, ahead of Lewis Howes. And I wouldn't have gotten there, I think, if I were diluting

Starting point is 00:29:43 my time, so to speak. So I completely agree with your point there. Yeah, and I think it's a mindset too, because John, I'm sure you do other things, right? And there's a lot of people out there that are probably singularly focused on their career and then have a family. So it's also understanding how to manage time and manage your energy and pursue hobbies that you frame are hobbies, right? Like I love to paint. I love to play music. Those were things that I was able to compartmentalize. I might do this once a month.

Starting point is 00:30:15 I am not aiming to be one of the greatest artists of the 21st century by any stretch. So it is very possible to be singularly focused in my case on being the greatest lacrosse player in the world and also pursue these other hobbies of interest and not hold that bar to yourself, right? We are our own biggest critics. And so to have a conversation with yourself around where everything falls

Starting point is 00:30:41 in a range of priorities is important. So one of my favorite things that I talk about is something that Stephen Covey actually brought up and he says the main thing about the main thing is keeping the main thing and it sounds so easy but it is so hard to do. And the other thing I say all the time is the greatest person you ever meet in your life is the person who stares back at you in the mirror. But the biggest critic that you'll ever meet in your life is that person who stares back at you in the mirror. And you really have to learn how to overcome becoming your own visionary arsonist to achieve the things that you want in life.

Starting point is 00:31:20 Yep. And that's when you start implementing process. And going back to Bill Belichick, his famous phrase that everyone knows is do your job. He was so good at saying, okay, we have these big ambitions. We want to win multiple Super Bowls in a row. We're bringing in new draftees. We're making big trades. People have families. There's distractions.

Starting point is 00:31:43 How do I get everyone to just focus on the process? And I think that's really important. So once we have these ideas and these visions and we wanna go execute is always getting down to, okay, what do I need to do now? How do I do my best ability? And how am I planning for what I'm gonna do next? Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up

Starting point is 00:32:04 because I interviewed Sean Springs on this show a couple of years ago. Oh, I'm glad you brought that up because I interviewed Sean Springs on the show a couple years ago. I love Sean. Yeah. Yeah. If people don't know who he is, Sean played for the Seahawks, then he played for the Redskins, now the National, now whatever they're going to call themselves. The commanders.

Starting point is 00:32:18 Yeah. And if that even sticks and then the Patriots. And I asked him, what made the Patriots so much different? Could he actually feel a difference and he said it was completely the system. He said there were no excuses You everyone came in there to do a job and you were expected To come and show up every single day and to treat practice just as you would treat a game So it definitely is a mentality and I think I love that interview with them because it showed just how different each team was.

Starting point is 00:32:50 Yeah, I mean, I can share a story through Marty Bennett, who's a friend of mine. And one of the great receiving tight ends was on the Patriots team, the year they made that heroic comeback against the Atlanta Falcons in the Super Bowl. And Marty got traded over the Patriots and said that exact thing that Sean Spring says, man, the culture was crazy.

Starting point is 00:33:10 You get into training camp and it is about the Super Bowl. And believe it or not, there is this misconception that if you're playing professional sports, that your level of commitment and discipline, the playbooks is so high, the playbooks are so dense, every team believes that they're gonna win. That's not true. Some athletes out there that are in the pros have gotten there by talent mostly.

Starting point is 00:33:34 It's rare to find the Tom Brady that has the entire package, that commitment, that discipline, that competitive fire. And then the Patriots is just truly an organization that is embedded in winning. So getting back to Marty, as they won the AFC Championship, he came in the locker room and was celebrating and everyone's sitting in their locker room and in their lockers, looking at him like he had three heads. And he was like, what's the deal? They were like, we're here to win a Super Bowl, not an AFC Championship. And he was floored by that.

Starting point is 00:34:00 Cut to the Super Bowl and why the Patriots are so thoughtful this even ties into Bill Belichick, is Super Bowl week prep, Bill actually builds in 30 minute breaks to their practice to embody the elongated Super Bowl halftime show. That's super nuanced, but a lot of people don't think, oh gosh, an athlete is going in the locker room and hanging out for 30 minutes before they go play the second half of the biggest game of their life.

Starting point is 00:34:29 So he creates that simulation. You get to the game, they're down 21 to three, 24 to three, whatever it was at halftime. Marty comes in to the locker room, he said, everyone was focused on their job. There wasn't like, oh, how do we get here? We're playing so poorly. We're not gonna be able to come back and win. Everyone was focused on their job. There wasn't like, oh, how do we get here? We're playing so poorly. We're not going to be able to come back and win.

Starting point is 00:34:47 Everyone was focused on their job. And then one of the assistant coaches came over to him and said, hey, this second half, we're going to ask you to chip block, not go out for passes. And he was leading the league and touchdown receptions as a tight end. He didn't come over there to chip block, but he goes, right, okay, I'll do it. And he said he chip blocked the shit out of everyone the second half and we all know the story of the Patriots coming back And winning so it talks about culture that that lesson is in culture in preparation in humility and then an execution Yeah, I'm a huge Eagles fan and I thought we blew it two Super Bowls ago

Starting point is 00:35:23 But when you I would hate it to have been an Atlanta Falcons fan during that Super Bowl because Wow Who would ever thought that come back? well Something I wanted to tie into here is last year on the podcast I had Alan Stein who you might know and Sally Jenkins the journalist on the show and Earlier this morning. I was talking to my friend, David Nurse, who's a former NBA player. And we were talking about your interview and this whole concept that they all talk about, which is the unseen hours, those moments of hard work behind the scenes that elevate great athletes to elite status,

Starting point is 00:36:01 which is what you were just talking about with Bill Belichick and how he approaches this. How has you doing this work in the Unseen Hours transformed your performance and what should a listener learn about from this concept? Well, it's actually interesting because the cover of the book was designed to try to encapsulate exactly what you're talking about. You'll see the print, the way of the champion,

Starting point is 00:36:24 and then it's an empty stadium, and there's a picture of me running stairs. encapsulate exactly what you're talking about. You'll see the print, the way of the champion, and then it's an empty stadium, and there's a picture of me running stairs. Because as athletes, we always dream about playing in a national championship game, sold out at Gillette Stadium, 70,000 people there, overtime, ball in our stick, game on the line, chance to win it for our alma mater.

Starting point is 00:36:44 That's the dream. But to get there, you have to spend countless hours on your own in empty stadiums doing the tedious monotonous work that is skill development, that is running sprints, that is doing squats and push-ups. That has to be what you fall in love with such that you can experience that moment that you dream of. And the athletes that fall in love with the process, that get into the detail during practice, that understand that they actually improve the most when they practice away from practice,

Starting point is 00:37:23 especially team sports. If you are a skill position player in lacrosse and you go to your team practice every day, at most you're going to take 20 shots. And that's going to, most of the time, live during shooting drills. But when you're out on your own, you can get 100 shots up in 30 minutes, 200 shots.

Starting point is 00:37:42 And so you hear whether it's Larry Bird's story or Michael Jordan's story. So practicing away from practice, when you're on your own in the quiet, the early morning hours, the late night hours, that's where the best end up rising to the top. In the book, in addition to Bill Belichick, you highlight stories from some of the greatest athletes

Starting point is 00:38:06 and coaches in the world. And I wanted to talk about one of them. I could talk about a lot of them. But you write about Steph Curry, who's renowned for his long-range three-pointers. But I think what people don't understand, I'm going to share another story, and then I'll share the one that you had in the book book is that he practices almost more with his non

Starting point is 00:38:28 dominant hand than he does with his dominant hand because he didn't want there to be a difference between the two when he needed to execute a play. But he also emphasizes that he doesn't start by practicing those long three pointers,inters. He starts by going close to the basket and even as great as he is focusing on form and mechanics. How does this methodical approach to skill development influence your performance and mindset in games? And what could the audience learn from this example?

Starting point is 00:39:03 Yeah, I always think about it from a sports skill standpoint, is you can't do the extraordinary until you master the ordinary and the ordinary's fundamentals. And Steph Toll has told me time and again, and also tell my own experience growing up, that he starts in the paint. That's the name of one of our chapters, is start in the paint.

Starting point is 00:39:24 And so when we see Steph on television knocking down 40 foot jumpers, it always starts with him shooting from four feet. And in close, in tight in lacrosse is where we can actually continue to hone in on our fundamentals and master our form. So I think Steph is an embodiment of an artist who paints all over the canvas, but had to establish the canvas first. So when you're out there as a young athlete or even a professional, you have to maintain that mindset. Don't show up on a lacrosse field

Starting point is 00:40:03 and begin your shooting workout from two point range. Don't show up on a lacrosse field and begin your shooting workout from two point range. Don't show up on a basketball court and start chucking up threes. Start in tight, build repetition, muscle memory, consistency, then step out. And the personal story is Morgan Wooten is one of the greatest coaches in basketball history, was the coach at my high school, DeMatha. And before I ever knew who Steph Curry was, then met him down the road, and I suspect his father, Dell, was either taught this from a Morgan Wooten or someone like that,

Starting point is 00:40:38 is everyone at practice had to start directly under the rim, make 10 swishes in a row, then step back, another 10, then step back, another 10. However, this was with full form. So that means a gooseneck follow through, the ball goes up and down. It's not a touch shot from one foot out to the basket. So you're really working on your fundamentals

Starting point is 00:41:03 no matter how close you are. I then took that drill and added it to lacrosse. In over 20 years, my first set of reps were always at the island, which we call just five and five, five yards outside the post and five yards up. I got made fun of a lot because, Paul, you're never gonna shoot from there in a game, which was mostly true. But they didn't realize I was honing in on my fundamentals. Such an important topic and thank you for sharing that. Another thing that I've heard you describe yourself as is a competitive compromiser. Can you elaborate on how you balance the need for competitiveness with the necessity for kindness and empathy? That's a great question. I will zoom out and first explain

Starting point is 00:41:45 the structure of the book. The book's called The Way of the Champion. The subtitle is Pain, Persistence, and the Path Forward, which I tend to get along with. The only two things we can count on in life, and especially in sports, is pain and patience. We've talked about playing the long game. Pain, you will lose.

Starting point is 00:42:03 The greats all lose. And actually, counterintuitive to what people think winning comes easy to them. They've actually lost more than most. They've built resilience and through that resilience, they succeed. So understanding that we talked about the cover of the book and then the book is broken into three parts, amateur, professional, then beyond the game. Some of the lessons that I've pulled and shared are reoccurring, but others evolve. And in the beyond the game portion of our lives,

Starting point is 00:42:32 when we retire or no longer play, it becomes about service. What I learned in my version of beyond the game and starting the PLL is that, oh, to be successful in a boardroom means working with your partners, working with others. The greatest partnerships allow the greatest businesses to grow. In sport, you're trying to take out your competitor. You're not looking to bring other people in.

Starting point is 00:43:00 It's your locker room versus the rest of the world. And it is the hardest worker in the room, the team with the greatest chemistry, and those that don't let up whether they're winning or losing. In business, it's about compromise. If you enter a partnership where you're getting a leg up in the negotiation, assume that partnership's not going to renew. So I talk about competitive compromise as the third portion of my book evolves and the lessons then transmit into our careers, into our romantic lives, into our family and friends,

Starting point is 00:43:36 into our community service. I think compromise becomes very underrated, is often misunderstood, and it's a key to success. becomes very underrated, is often misunderstood, and is a key to success. After hearing about our Secretary of State's visit to China today and reading the news, it seems to me like competitive compromise is something that might work well in that relationship.

Starting point is 00:43:59 My last question for you is, you have achieved so much in sports, in the PLL, in all the businesses that you've started. What new mountains are you looking to climb in the coming years? Well, right now, in the spirit of our singular focus discussion is making lacrosse a top five sport in North America. And the vessel of which I'm working day to day on is through the Premier Lacrosse League. So how do we become a top five sports league

Starting point is 00:44:27 in North America? But to become a bigger league, we need more participants at the grassroots level. We need more nations playing the game. We need accessibility to increase. So a lot of my time spent in this mountain that I'm climbing is around getting sticks in hands, goals on field, attention on the cross, educating people on the history of the game. It is

Starting point is 00:44:51 an enormous mountain, but it's one that I'm uniquely positioned to climb given that I've played for almost 30 years of my life, and it's a game that I feel not only spiritually connected to, but really love as a former athlete. Paul, it was such an honor to have you on passion struck today. Thank you so much for joining us and congratulations, not only on your book, but what you're doing with the PLL. Appreciate you, John. Thanks for having me.

Starting point is 00:45:17 It was a great conversation. What an incredible honor that was to interview Paul Rabil and what an awesome interview it turned out to be. I wanted to thank Paul and Penguin Random House for the privilege and honor of coming on today's show. Links to all things Paul will be in the show notes at passionstruck.com. Please use our website links if you purchase any of the books from the guests that we feature here on the show. Videos you can go check out on our YouTube channels at either John R. Miles or Passionstruck clips and join over 250,000 other subscribers who tune in weekly

Starting point is 00:45:45 advertiser deals and discount codes are in one convenient place at passionstruck.com deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. I encourage you to join up for our passion struck challenge where you get to try out your courage muscle. You do it by signing up for a newsletter live intentional. And you can do that at passionstruck.com or my personal website at johnrmiles.com. And if you want to hear more daily doses of Passion Struck wisdom, then follow me on all the social platforms at John R. Miles. Are you curious to find out where you stand on the path to becoming Passion Struck? Dive into our engaging Passion Struck quiz. Crafted to reflect the core principles from my book,

Starting point is 00:46:21 Passion Struck, it offers you a fantastic way to gauge your progress on the Passion Struck continuum. Just head over to passionstruck.com. It's right there on Struck. It offers you a fantastic way to gauge your progress on the Passion Struck continuum. Just head over to passionstruck.com. It's right there on the homepage. It consists of 20 questions and will only take you about 10 minutes to complete. Take the quiz today. You're about to hear a preview

Starting point is 00:46:35 of the Passion Struck podcast that I did with Dr. Jim Dottie, a renowned neurosurgeon and bestselling author. In this deeply moving episode, Dr. Dottie shares his insights on the intersection of neuroscience and compassion. He explores how our brains and hearts can be trained to heal not only ourselves, but the world around us. When we look through the lens of what I want, this is about acquiring things.

Starting point is 00:46:59 And the problem is that when that is your focus, those things become very important because that defines who you are, you believe. And it results in only a very shallow sense of happiness and one that's quite transitory. You have to keep feeding that machine versus eudaemonic happiness, which I believe most people want to aspire to. And that is having a sense of purpose and meaning in your life that drives your behavior. And that is a type of happiness.

Starting point is 00:47:34 It's not as exhilarating necessarily as hedonic happiness, but it is very deep. And it is one that supports you in the sense that when you just think about who you are as a human being, what you have accomplished, what you've done to improve other people's lives, it gives this very warm, deep, calming feeling. And I think that's what everyone ultimately strives for. Remember that we rise by lifting others, so share the show with those that you love and care about.

Starting point is 00:48:03 And if you found the words of Paul Rabel inspirational, then definitely share it with someone who could use his wisdom. The greatest compliment that you can give us is to share the show with those that you love and care about. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on the show so that you can live what you listen.

Starting point is 00:48:17 Until next time, go out there and become passion struck. strong.

Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Paul Rabil on How You Master the Way of a Champion EP 451

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