The Daily Stoic - Bob Bowman on Coaching Champions | Michael Phelps, Discipline, and Self Mastery

Episode Date: January 18, 2025

Bob Bowman is the coach behind 23-time Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps and Paris Olympics swimming superstar Léon Marchand. Today, Bob joins Ryan in The Daily Stoic Podcast studio to discuss the pressures of success, the role of mastery, and the importance of maintaining passion and balance in highly driven athletes. He also shares his coaching philosophies and the leadership lessons he has learned while coaching some of the world’s greatest swimmers.Bob Bowman is the Director of Swimming and Diving at University of Texas and the author of The Golden Rules.📚 Pick up a signed copy of The Golden Rules at The Painted Porch: https://www.thepaintedporch.com/You can follow Bob Bowman on Instagram and X @Coach_Bowman 🎙️Listen to The Hobby That Changed Ryan Holiday’s Life on Apple Podcasts and Spotify🎙️ Follow The Daily Stoic Podcast on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dailystoicpodcast🎥 Watch top moments from The Daily Stoic Podcast on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dailystoicpodcast✉️ Want Stoic wisdom delivered to your inbox daily? Sign up for the FREE Daily Stoic email at https://dailystoic.com/dailyemail🏛 Get Stoic inspired books, medallions, and prints to remember these lessons at the Daily Stoic Store: https://store.dailystoic.com/📱 Follow us:  Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, and FacebookSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to the daily Stoic early and ad free right now. Just join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. When I travel with my family, I almost always stay in an Airbnb. I want my kids to have their own room. I want my wife and I to have a little privacy. You know, maybe we'll cook or at the very least we'll use a refrigerator. Sometimes I'm bringing my in-laws around with me or I need an extra room just to write in. Airbnbs give you the flavor of actually being in the place you are. I feel like I've lived in all these places that I've stayed for a week or two or even a night or two. There's flexibility in size and location. When you're searching you can

look at guest favorites or even find like historical or really coolest things. It's my choice when we're traveling as a family. Some of my favorite memories are in Airbnb's we've stayed at. I've recorded episodes of a podcast in Airbnb. I've written books. One of the very first Airbnbs I ever stayed in was in Santa Barbara, California while I was finishing up what was my first book,

Trust Me I'm Lying. If you haven't checked it out, I highly recommend you check out Airbnb for your next trip. On January 5th, 2024, an Alaska Airlines door plug tore away mid-flight, leaving a gaping hole in the side of a plane that carried 171 passengers. This heart-stopping incident was just the latest in a string of crises surrounding

the aviation manufacturing giant, Boeing. In the past decade, Boeing has been involved in a series of damning scandals and deadly crashes that have chipped away at its once sterling reputation. At the center of it all, the 737 MAX, the latest season of business wars, explores how Boeing, once the gold standard of aviation engineering, descended into a nightmare of safety concerns and public mistrust, the decisions, denials, and devastating consequences bringing the Titan to its knees, and what, if anything, can save the company's reputation now.

Follow Business Wars on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge Business Wars, The Unraveling of Boeing, early and ad-free right now on Wondery Plots. And then here on the weekend, we take a deeper dive into those same topics. We interview stoic philosophers. We explore at length how these stoic ideas can be applied to our actual lives and the challenging issues of our time. Here on the weekend, when you have a little bit more space,

when things have slowed down, be sure to take some time to think, to go for a walk, to sit with your journal, and most importantly to prepare for what the week ahead may bring. Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome to another episode of the Daily Stoke Podcast. As you know, where I combine a hobby and love is in swimming and travel. When I travel, I like to find places to swim. I just spent a couple weeks down here on the Gulf of Mexico. Just reading soon to be the Gulf of America.

Jesus Christ. I didn't swim too much in the ocean. I went paddle boarding a couple of times and then I just fell in about two hours ago and it was like 48 degrees out. So it's taken a while for me to get my body temperature up. But I'm pretty good at cold temperatures swimming. This summer, which was the winter in Australia,

I swim a bunch in those rock pools in Australia, swim in the ocean a bunch. I swim in Barton Springs most mornings and then I'm driving with the family down to Orlando tomorrow morning. And I'm gonna try to convince them there are these couple natural springs that I've seen on Instagram a bunch of times

that I've always wanted to visit. That's partly why we're driving instead of flying. The one I really wanted to swim at, the temperature is like 71 degrees, which is the same temperature as Barton Springs. I called the park ranger to ask if it was open and he said, no, it's not open. This is where the manatees spend the winter. So now I'm going to have an argument in the car tomorrow. Do we go to a natural springs we can actually swim in or do we go to a natural springs

with manatees? One of the things that you lose when you have kids is some of your freedom. So do your hobbies exactly the way you want them. But my kids have picked it up. They love swimming. There's a picture on Instagram of, I got my son to jump into this really cool one that we did in Dublin back in November.

So anyways, I'll keep you posted if I get in the water. But this was something I nerded out with about, with today's guest guest because he is a recent Austin transplant and one of the books he left the painted porch with was one of my favorite books. One of the reasons I live in Texas. This is a book called The Swimming Holes of Texas and I've checked off a good chunk of them. We're planning another trip to Big Bend in the spring and I want to go to Palmore. As I said, I like to do Barton Springs.

This isn't the kind of swimming that my guest today specializes in. Bob Bowman is one of the best known coaches in the history of swimming. He's the coach of 23-time Olympic gold medalist, Michael Phelps. I first interviewed him back virtually in 2021 because I noticed he had been quoting the obstacles away

and he goes, he has this board that he puts up in the pool and there's like a quote of the day. And back then I believe he was at Arizona and now he is the director of swimming and diving at the University of Texas. So he's in my backyard. And I wanted to talk to him about performance, about discipline, about balance,

because I think that's one of the fascinating things about Michael Phelps' story. Here you have one of the most driven people in the world, but that drive led to burnout and probably cost him a few, maybe one other Olympics. I don't know. It certainly cost him a lot personally and almost took him away from the sport that he loves.

And I really like this conversation. Bob is the author of a great book for anyone interested in elite performance called The Golden Rules. We've got signed copies at the Painted Porch. I'll link to that in today's show notes. And I'll link to a solo episode I did a few months ago about how swimming has changed my life.

You can follow Bob on Instagram and Twitter at Coach underscore Bowman, B-O-W-M-A-N. This was a great interview. It was cool to see him at the painted porch. Texas is just a powerhouse, man. I was in Australia during the Olympics and I was watching it and they were pointing out that if Texas was its own country, the golds that the school won alone would put it way

up there in the rankings. Like, Texas and the University of Texas get more gold medals than whole countries. So it's pretty nuts and we talk about all that in today's episode. So enjoy. Here's me and Bob Bowman talking performance and my love of swimming. And I'll let you know, if I get in the water in Orlando, probably not with the manatees, I'd probably get in trouble. Welcome to Texas.

You like it? I do. You've been out here? No, first time. The only thing is there's like no good swimming pools out here. Really? Yes.

Like none of the high schools have swimming pools that I know about. Like Austin has all these amazing pools. Yeah, right. Barton Springs, Betty. There's one in the state park that was built in the thirties but it's only open like four or five months of the year. Jeez.

So where do you swim? I usually go into Austin. Oh really? I have a pool in my backyard, but it's only nine yards. So I swam yesterday and it's like, you can't get in the rhythm, you know? Right, yeah, just turn, all turn. Yeah, no, I don't do the turn.

Oh, you just kind of just do, oh right. I feel it uses up the whole thing. Yeah, exactly, you wouldn't do it. So I just, yeah, I can't get in the rhythm of it. Texas is weird. I don't think, when people think of Texas, I don't think they think of swimming. Not just, I don't mean in the rhythm of it. Texas is weird. I don't think when people think of Texas, I don't think they think of swimming. Not just, I don't mean the University of Texas.

You're not like, you're like, oh Texas, lots of natural water holes that you would go swimming in. It's just not what you would think. But there are a lot. I know. I haven't been to Deep Eddy. I've been to Barton a couple of times.

I swam at Deep Eddy on Friday. I was reading someone, they were like, name one other place in the world that you can swim in. Fresh water, lifeguards all year round. It's like a wonder of the earth. I know, it's crazy. Deep Eddy's pretty good too though. Okay, yeah, I'll try that.

I wanna go there, because they have lane lines, right? So it's barking, you're kind of like open watering. So it's like swimming in the ocean, but you don't have to worry about waves or, you know. Yeah, that's my favorite. I was just in Australia. Natural pools, Australia's number one, and then Austin's number two.

Oh, great. Yeah. Did you swim in any there? Did you go to icebergs? I did all of them. Oh, wow. The Bronte was closed, but I did all the other ones. Oh, nice. Yeah.

The other crazy one, maybe take your swimmers there sometimes, there's one called Balmore. It's like four hours from here. And it's like Barton, but maybe three times bigger. Oh, wow. And it's in the middle of nowhere. Like it's awesome, you're like, oh, they built this place in the middle of a big city or whatever, that's awesome.

But it's like middle of nowhere, Texas. But it has this crazy spring and it just comes up. And the crazy thing about it is it's been there now so long. It's like, they're all like a hundred years old because they build all this stuff during the Depression. It has an endangered species of fish that that's the only place in the world that it exists. Yeah.

Because like the environment, we don't take care of it. So all the other places are gone. But in this pool. In that one place. There is this, I think it's called the Comanche pupfish. It's like the only place that it exists. Wow. That's nuts. I know. Yeah. I'd like to visit there.

And then have you done the San Marcos river, like at Texas state? So that's the other, like, this is my, I'm nerdy about pools. No, it's good. The river basically goes through the campus in San Marcos. Okay. And they like, they did the same thing at Barton

where they just like paved the sides of it. Oh, wow. The river starts next to the campus cause it just comes out of the ground. So this whole river just, you can see the part where it starts. And then, but so it just kind of curves through and it's got this really fast current.

It's kind of like those, what are the pools, the treadmill pools, like you swim in? Oh yeah, yeah, like a spa, swim spa kind of thing. It's like that, but it's real. Like you're just swimming against the current of the water just coming up. It too has this some form of grass that doesn but it's real. Like you're just swimming against the current of the water just coming up. It too has this some form of grass that doesn't exist anywhere else.

That's all, Texas is crazy. It is crazy. Yeah. I'm just learning. Yeah, I've only been here since April. I spent the whole time focused on the Olympics and trying to get this job going. So it's been a little. What's it like to change?

I mean, you were there in Arizona for so long and so established. It must be like, I don't know, like Calipari going to Arkansas. How does it feel to not start over, but to build your program at a new place at this stage in your career? It's awesome. I loved it.

It's really kind of why I took the job. I felt like at ASU, it was a very long and fulfilling, certainly process to get to a championship with that program and to kind of take them from really nowhere to there. And then I was looking at a couple things just for myself. You know, I feel like I have enough time for like one more really big challenge in me. So this was, and this came up and I'm probably uniquely positioned to kind of follow Eddie Reese because I just kind of do my thing and I'm cool with it. So, and I feel like I have to live up to something

because I could never really live up to that. I could just do my thing and I think it could be good. But it's been great to kind of come into a place that has the resources of Texas, the history, and just be able to kind of start another chapter in that. And I think that's what's most appealing. It's probably something you share with the athletes. Cause I mean, one argument would be like,

you got a good thing going. Why change? Why not just keep doing it the way that you're doing? There's something both inspiring and then a little insane about like, no, no, no, you gotta go for the next thing. Exactly. I've always done that. I've never really, you know, I've moved

and kind of look for different challenges and different things. And my feeling about ASU was, it was twofold. You know, I had a very good assistant there that I've always thought would be the long-term answer for them. And he went to, Herbie Bame, he went to ASU. He's a wonderful coach.

And this was an opportunity for him to do that. So that I was kind of planning, you know, ASU is like my baby, I wanted to kind of, so that fit well, I fit well at Texas. So that was part of it, you know, just kind of long-terming these things a little bit. You know, I kind of like to plant a tree and then let somebody else sit under the shade.

Yeah, that's what it's all about. I imagine there's something uncertain about trying something new because like a golfer that decides to reinvent their swing or a coach that goes to a new program, like it could end terribly. And a lot of people are motivated by just not risking embarrassment.

Sure. I don't feel like a Texas would be embarrassment or I'll just retire. You know, I'm there, I could do that today. But tell you the thing that helped me make this decision is kind of crazy, but it's something I saw online, Dr. Ellen Langer, you know her from Harvard? She's an amazing psychologist.

She studies a lot of different things, but she had a thing with Rich Rolls. She was on his podcast. I was just texting him before. And it was just texting him before. And it was just a blurb, but it was like, instead of stressing about making the right decision, make the decision right. Because nobody has enough, you can't live two lives. You can only live your life, right? So let's say I decided to stay at ASU and not go to Texas.

I have no way of knowing if that's better, worse, the same. Same thing if I go to Texas. I have no way of knowing if it's better, worse, the same. So it's kind of mindless to kind of go through all these things where I know I have enough information that Texas is gonna be great for swimming and I'm gonna be able to do some things there and I'll just make it right.

That's just how I approached it and it just made it, it's just better. Well, I remember I was reading this as an article that was talking about football coaches and like they should go for it on fourth down more often than they do, or they should kick onside kicks more often than they do. I don't know if that's changed now

with the new rules and stuff, but they should take risks more often than they do. They just don't because like everyone else, they watch, you know, sports center They just don't because like everyone else, they watch, you know, Sports Center and they don't wanna be the idiot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what they-

They tried it and it didn't work. They don't wanna have to answer about it in the press conference after. So you do the safer thing, even though statistically, it's actually the more dangerous thing. And so I think a lot of us, yeah, moves, career changes, trying something out of the box, we're often motivated not to do that because of not because we think it

won't work. But because it not working, actually, the consequences aren't that significant. But it's the not working and then seeming stupid. Exactly. For having tried it. Well, I've looked stupid for many years now. So that doesn't bother me at all. I'm sure there are plenty of people that think I don't know what I'm doing, but yeah, I have always, I'm not very risk averse.

I just go for it. Yeah. I was kind of raised that way. But that's the other interesting thing that you should be, when you have objectively accomplished so many things, you should become less risk averse because you've already proven everything there is to prove. And I think we tell ourselves,

hey, I'm going to become, once I secure myself financially, once I do X, Y, Z, then I'll be able to, but the opposite happens. We become less risk averse because we don't wanna lose what we're about. Lose all that yag. And we don't wanna be the idiot who lost what we had.

You know, like, again, I'm not saying. No, no, I got it. No, I totally understand. I see that a lot. Yeah, to still be rolling the dice is an impressive thing, I think not saying, I totally understand. I see that a lot. Yeah, to still be rolling the dice is an impressive thing, I think. Oh, thank you. I've just like done it enough in my life

that it almost always works out well. Maybe a couple of times doesn't, but you know, you learn and then do better the next time. And for me, it's like I told the people at Texas, I'm like, look, I can walk out this door and never coach another minute of my life and I am good. I feel good about it. I've achieved some things.

I'm doing this because I want to just see how far I could push myself and work with more people and help them do their thing. I read this article a couple of years ago that was like looking at the careers of ex senators and how like happy most of them were. Not being a senator is not a fun job, but the point was like, none of these people,

while they have the job, not only do they not wanna retire, but they're reluctant to take any stands because they don't wanna become an ex senator. But what they've not done is thought through, like how are the ex senators doing? How are they doing? They're doing great. Like they're usually more financially successful.

They're happy. They pursue things. Maybe they take some different job in government. But even though everything that's good in our life came from some sort of change, or in many cases, some sort of unpleasant ending, like we got dumped or we got fired or whatever, then we have something and we're like, I have to keep it this way or I will die. Right. But we wouldn't have gotten that way without something getting us not that way.

Yeah, exactly. You know, I go back to the parable and I'm sure I can't remember it, but I'm sure it's in one of your books about the ancient Chinese parable where like the wild horse shows up and the guy gets it and he's like, oh, what a great thing. Maybe Sun gets on it, breaks his leg.

Oh, terrible thing, maybe. Sun doesn't have to go fight the war. I think about that all the time. Yeah, I think it's a we'll see. Yeah, yeah. Because you don't know. Yeah, yeah, we'll see, yeah. It takes a while for the results

or the consequences of something to be made clear. Exactly. So because you think you know, you either fight against them or you have really strong opinions about them. Really, yeah, the kind of the ability to roll with those punches is so important. Yeah, the thing that I do now that drives people

I work with absolutely insane is don't have opinion on stuff. Yes. Again, from your teachings, the daily stoic, all that kind of thing. It's very freeing and they'll be like, well, you have to think something like, no, I don't, I do not.

But that takes a lot of discipline. It does, no, it does. And I was like, I understand both sides. I have no opinion. Doesn't affect me or I'm not gonna get into it. So, but yeah, I have some people that work with me and they can't stand it when I do that. I think Mark Sturlus' line was,

remember you always have the power to have no opinion about something. Exactly. And he says, things are not asking to be judged by you. Which is the same as that Eastern parable of, we'll see. And so you're not saying it's positive or negative. You're saying that me having an opinion about it isn't the determining factor

as to whether this is good or bad or not. Exactly. And it's hard for me because my Myers-Briggs is INTJ, right? That was long before I started reading into this stuff. So yeah, so it's been good for me to sort of discipline myself that way, that I don't have to weigh in on everything.

Yes. I think maybe there's some magical Zen place you can get to where you actually don't have opinions. Yeah. But I think an easier first step for people is to stop verbalizing so many opinions. Yeah, exactly. I don't have to say it.

Even if I have one, I don't have to tell you my opinion because you do yours. Yes. Yeah, I think as you get older, if you're not becoming less judgmental and more live and let live, and also like that expression,

I don't yuck other people's yum. Like, I just like, if you like that, go for it. I guess it's good to you, you know? Whereas I think there's a younger, more insecure version of us where it's like, no, no, no, not only do I have my opinion, but I need you to have my opinion

because you having a separate opinion is an indictment of my opinion and I can't handle that. But coaches are supposed to have strong opinions on everything. Well, I have some opinions on some things, not everything, but some things. Yeah. I guess that probably gives the opinions you do have more weight.

So if you're not like the sort of tyrant micromanaging coach. I started out like that. Yeah. And now I got away from that. And everybody's doing way better. Sure, because they probably listen to you because when you say something, it means something. And then also maybe if the job

and most of the athletes you work with are younger, although swimmers are getting older and older, but I imagine that there's some part of every athlete that wants to rebel against the coach, right? So if you're giving them so many things, they're gonna rebel against more things. There's so many things I can control. And I finally learned the ones that I do control and the ones that I don't. And I used to try to control everything because you want the

outcome to be a certain way. And you just, you know, and when I started, that was very effective because, you know, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. So I just did that. And it's very effective at changing the behavior in the short term, not in the long term, but you could get some results and then you just kind of double down on it. And after a while I was like, this is exhausting and I'm not sure it's really good for these kids. It's not, it's all ways that it was not.

Michael, good example, right? So by the end, we were kind of working together much more and he was taking ownership. And I remember there are times that later in Michael's career and I'll give him some credit cause he's like raised to think the coach is always right. Which sometimes we are, but this is like Michael after three or four Olympics, hey, what events do you want to swim in this next meet?

You're the coach, you decide. I'm like, dude, you're like 28 years old. Yeah, right. Okay, I'm like, dude, you're like 28 years old. Yeah, right. Okay, I'm deciding, don't complain about it. But you know, I think that when they're doing that younger and they realize that they're, you know, they can make a mistake. Yeah.

It's a pick the wrong event, who cares? There's a meet next month. Right. You know what? Those sort of things, they grow better. We have a much better relationship and I can guide them much better than I can drive them somewhere. Well, I've been thinking about that with my kids.

It would be easier if they listened to me all the time, if they were afraid of me and so. You know, like if, like, when I say something, they do that thing. If I have an opinion, they agree with that opinion. Everything would be easier in children at my house. But I don't want a 28-year year old to get sucked into a cult. I don't want them to marry or get in a relationship

with a person that dominates them. I don't want them to get sucked into working for a boss that takes advantage of them or get in an industry where their own moral compass is overwhelmed. So like you want as an adult, an independent thinker with their own strong values, their own sense of what's right and wrong. Like you're gonna want them to think for themselves.

You don't just, that's not a switch you magically turn on in your twenties. And in fact, if your whole childhood, you were made to not exercise that ability, you're actually gonna be incredibly susceptible to those kinds of influences when they're older. And just not very flexible, adaptable, anything. Somebody just has, it has to be this way.

No, it can be a lot of different ways. And that's what I've tried to, you know, I think Leon Martian is a great example of someone raised in a great family. Both his parents were Olympic swimmers, but not one of, either one pushed him to swim. He didn't even swim for a while because it was too cold. He didn't like cold water.

And then he came back and started to swim and he did a little bit better. And then he kind of made the Olympics the year before he came to ASU and then kind of knew he could do well. But the thing I love about Leon is he is very much knows who he is and how he wants to approach it. I'm able to give him a training program,

maybe some tips on how to swim the things, you know, all those kinds of things, and kind of just work with him so that he can do what he wants to do. It's not me like, you know, do this, this, this, this, this. And he just says, yes, sorry, yes, sorry, kind of does it. And he doesn't fight me either.

We just work together. And sometimes they're gonna say, that didn't seem very good. I'm like, no, we should try this, right? Or he'll be like, I really like doing that. Why don't we do that again? And I feel like that's the way it works best because he's in Shanghai right now,

some in the World Cup, so I haven't seen him in two months and he's doing great. And that's my job to teach him to do that. Yeah, there's like a self-sufficiency to that. I think the most successful, well, people, everybody are ones who are equipped to be independent, live their own life, make their own decisions, do their thing.

And as coaches, you know, we're almost wired to make all these decisions for them. And I think in a team sport is probably different because you're doing these strategies and all this. But in swimming, we're training them to do something. We're teaching them some skills, but they have to step up on the blocks. I'm not up there. New year, new resolutions. And this year on the Best Idea Yet podcast, we're revealing the untold origin stories of the products you're obsessed with, and we promise you have never heard these before.

Ever wonder how the iconic Reese's Peanut Butter Cup was invented? Because it was by accident. H.B. Reese, a former frog salesman, stumbled upon the idea after accidentally burning a batch of peanuts. Classic. Proving that sometimes our best ideas arise from what seem like our biggest mistakes. And Jack, did you know there's a scientific explanation why humans crave that surprising

combo of peanut butter and chocolate? I didn't, but it sounds delicious. It is delicious. So if you're looking to get inspired and creative this year, tune in to the best idea yet. You can find us on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you're looking for more podcasts to help you start this year off right, check out New Year, New Mindset on the Wondery app. Who knows your next great idea could be an accident that you burned. This is Nick and this is Jack and we'll see you on the best idea yet. On January 5th, 2024, an Alaska Airlines door plug tore away mid-flight, leaving a gaping hole in the side of a plane that carried 171 passengers.

This heart-stopping incident was just the latest in a string of crises surrounding the aviation manufacturing giant, Boeing. In the past decade, Boeing has been involved in a series of damning scandals and deadly crashes that have chipped away at its once sterling reputation. At the center of it all, the 737 MAX. The latest season of Business Wars explores how Boeing, once the gold standard of aviation engineering, descended into a nightmare of safety concerns and public mistrust, the decisions, denials and devastating consequences bringing the Titan to its knees and what if anything can save the company's reputation

now. Follow Business Wars on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge Business Wars, The Unraveling of Boeing early and ad free right now on Wondery Plus. It's interesting the misconceptions we have, right? Because I think from sports, we have the sense of this sort of tyrannical top-down coach that's there the boss, everyone else is just rowing the oars. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And yet, like, that's not how it works in most creative industries. That's not how it works in tech.

Like, actually, there is, as you said, sort of a collaboration between leadership and the sort of superstar talent in the organization. And then even in the military, which we think is so top-down, the core success of the American military, what is the envy of all other nations, is the sort of middle of the, what they call the NCOs, like is our ability to have small unit leadership,

where you have these independent thinkers who have this set of values and skills and then firepower to do what they need to do in their individual scenario. It's not this tyrannical top-down system. And what the boss's job is now is to create an environment where these people can thrive, right? And sometimes there are parameters you're setting up

and sometimes you have to correct some things and there are all of those issues. But in general, my job is to create an environment where somebody comes in and buys into what we're selling, sometimes there are parameters you're setting up and sometimes you have to correct some things and there are all of those issues. But in general, my job is to create an environment where somebody comes in and buys into what we're selling, their success will be inevitable. It's just it flows from what we're doing. It's weird, I've seen you post a bunch,

what's the little aphorism you have? It's like, do the work. Do your work. Do your work. It's so, I guess, it's not that it's unsatisfying. It's interesting to me because you would think that coach would have this like incredible like leadership philosophy, these complex things.

This is the system. And then somehow like what the most physically gifted, you know, psychologically motivated and then financially incentivized people in all sports. You're telling me Kobe Bryant just needed to hear like, do your work? 100%. And somehow that is, it doesn't make any sense.

I'll tell you how I even got on that. Okay. It had nothing to do with the swimming. I was in Colorado Springs and one summer, our pool was being resurfaced at ASU. So I spent like six or eight weeks at Colorado Springs, which is the most boring place in the world, training center, Olympic training center.

So we're training our guys up there. And my assistant, Logan Hurko, was with me. And it was really the two of us and the kids for a very long time. And pretty much the only thing we would do is work out and then coach practice. And we'd go in the weight room and work out. And there was one day, I don't even know,

I was so tired for some reason. And I was talking to Logan, and we were both kind of feeling that way, and we'd been there a long time, and I was like, dang, I don't even know if I wanna go to the weight room today. I don't know, maybe I'll just take a nap. Yeah.

And Logan's like, well, I'm just gonna do my work. I was like, damn you. So then I went, of course, and I felt good after. You know, it was just every day, it just turned into a thing, it was, well, let's go do our work. And then it became a thing with the kids. We'd be like, coach, I don't feel this or that,

or I'm not, I'm like, hey, just do your work. Just get in and do your work. And then it became this thing with the team, cause I kept putting on the workouts, and I was like, what do you do when you've never felt better in your life, when you come to prize? Do your work. What do you do if you feel terrible and you can't, you're not motivated and you just don't

know what to do? Do your work. If you're uncertain, do your work. Just come in every day, do a little something, whatever that is. And that's the meaning of it is that these incremental, just consistently mind numbingly boring, consistent, everyday, you know, deposits in your bank account are what makes the big changes later. And that's where that came from.

Yeah, and writing, it's like two crappy pages a day. And so if you just do that thing, eventually you get to an editable manuscript. And once you have an editable manuscript, you can get to a published manuscript. And if you publish it, it can potentially do well. Exactly. So that seems like low standards, but that low standards is a way to get to a published manuscript. And if you publish it, it can potentially do well. Exactly. So that seems like low standards,

but that low standards is a way to get to the place where you have high standards. Exactly, I just saw the War of Art out there, right? And that's an amazing book about this same topic. It's like this resistance to whatever you're trying to do. And the way you fight it is you just show up and do. Whatever you can do that day, you do it. It's just put your ass where your heart wants it.

100%. If you're not in the pool, you can't have a good workout. Exactly. Yeah. But you just do it even when you don't want to. Yeah. And I go back to some other things in my career. After Michael swam in Beijing

and had this amazing thing, right? And afterwards you're just like, well, what the hell do we do now? That's a big part of his, he struggled after. We both did. And he's missing practices a lot. Of course, I handled it as bad as I could handle it. I was just like, you're throwing your life away

and disappointing everybody. Like I did everything wrong that I could do. And my agent, Peter Carlisle, I was Michael's agent as well, he said, I want you to read this book, Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle. And I did. And he said, you can't control what Michael does what he thinks when he shows up at practice what you can control is every time he shows up at practice just give

him the best practice you can give him that day and I did it and he kept showing up the more I did that the more he kept coming and you know so that's it's another one of these things it's like stop trying to control everything show up every day and do a little bit. And he ended up actually finishing his career out pretty well. But it's back to this whole concept of be in the now, do what you can do today. Don't worry about tomorrow or yesterday.

And that's where the magic happens in pretty much everything, not just sports, but certainly in swimming. Show up today, do your best right now in this set for the next 30 minutes, and then we'll take on whatever's next. And if you can focus on that, that's how you're gonna end up going where you wanna go.

Well, we do talk a lot, and it makes sense about the sort of injuries, setbacks, you know, that kind of adversity. But there is something incredibly destabilizing about success. For sure. That is its own kind of obstacle. The most difficult thing I've dealt with

is the people who actually achieve. What do we do next? Because usually there's a very long buildup to that, right? And you've spent a lot of time and effort. And even like in Beijing, like this is crazy. And I'm not in any way equating myself to Herb Brooks. But you know, in Miracle, when they win and he goes into parking lot by himself,

I did that right after. And I wasn't even thinking about, I was just like, my God, this actually happened. Like when you're doing it, I was like, he'll probably win six or seven, but we're gonna pretend like it's eight and be prepared and be ready. And all these things are gonna have to fall in place.

And then all of a sudden it all fell into place. And afterwards you're like, well, what the hell do we do now? Right. And it, cause you can't replicate it. Yeah. It has, you have to find different terms. And for Michael, it was, let's break the record for most medals ever or something. You know, there were things that you could work towards, but surviving success is by far the hardest part. And Leon's having a little bit of that right now.

He had six weeks of star treatment after the Olympics and he's back to swimming. He's like, I'm not very good. I'm like, yeah, the training is important. I have to find it. You got plenty of time. But I think in general, all of us, and you don't learn anything from that, right? You just pat yourself on the back. It's when you fail, it's when you get all the learning.

So that's the second piece of that, I think. Second part of it. Yeah, there's a formula in Mark Cirulis' meditations. He says to accept it without arrogance and let it go with indifference. And to me, that's both ends of the spectrum. So it's like you had this heartbreaking failure, this loss or this very narrow defeat.

And can you let that go? It is what it is. And then can you also take all the gold medals or the best seller lists or the front page of X, Y, or Z and go, that doesn't say anything about me either. And when do you come back to it? You have to come back to the work, the thing. Just do that thing.

And that keeps you, not only is it, on one hand it keeps you humble, and then the other, it keeps you busy instead of dwelling and spiraling and feeling awful. You have something to do. Yes. Yeah, you know, it's like one of my strong mentors was John Urbanczek, right? Famous coach died in May and his celebration of life was in Ann Arbor this weekend. So it was great to see all the people and they were asking me, I got interviewed and they said, what is something that he would say

that you remember now? And one of the things he would always say was, it's like ice cream, good while it lasts. And I was like, we're talking about a Gallipit gold medal, right, or something like that, or a world record. And that's true. And I try to always keep that philosophy going. It's like, yeah, hey, this is like ice cream, it's great right now.

But what we're gonna have is what we've always had. We had it before, we had it after, the work. And these things kind of flow from that. There's something too, I think that can be destabilizing about success because you told yourself it would mean something or do something for you. And that was a very powerful motivational force,

but it wasn't true. 100%. You know, we got back from Beijing, I still had to pay my bills, I had to do all this stuff. All my problems were the same. Yeah. All Michael's problems were the same. Yeah, he would tell you that too. Despite all this other, all my problems were the same. Yeah. All Michael's problems were the same. He would tell you that too,

despite all this other wonderful stuff. And you know, probably there are more doors open for us to do things like this and other things. But in general, yeah, I think that's a key element of that. It's like, you know, even though that motivates you, in the end, you're gonna find out that's not gonna work. I think it's interesting, right? Like we're obviously talking a lot with athletes now,

they're sort of trying to be more balanced, mentally healthy, they're working on stuff. Is that a luxury of success or can you actually achieve? Like it seems like so many greats are motivated by some kind of wound or anger or whatever. And it's obviously super powerful. And then they kind of get it and they go, oh, maybe that wasn't the best way to be.

But are they only able to see that and say that because they're looking down from the metal podium? Or can you be motivated and driven and great from some other fuel? Uncertain. I think they're definitely, almost every outlier is driven by that. Because it's not enough just to have the other stuff, right?

Yeah, I think that's a tough one for me. I've tried to put the focus on mastery. That's what we're here to do. Let's see how far you can take this as opposed to as opposed to some, some extrinsic thing that you're trying to work out through your swimming. You know, how good can you be at this? How far can you take this event? What do you think you could do in terms of this? And I think that helps it. I don't know that it solves it all, but it definitely helps it.

Yeah, because that's always in your control. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, the process. Yes. Sorry, Nick Saban, I use that, but I try not to call it the process, but that's what we are.

What we control is what we focus on. The outcomes flow from that, and we have very little control over those, right? Because that's what other people do, is the outcome is largely in swimming based on what other people do. We have no control over that, only what we do. Right.

Yeah, was it the best performance you were capable of? And I imagine you have to deal with that because what's interesting about swimming is, sometimes they're on the same team, but mostly you kind of have a stable of athletes that are training together and then at times competing with each other. But it must be clear to you that some are better than others, right? They all have different ceiling or different skill sets.

And so they're probably all equally driven or all want success at some level, but what you expect out of some is different than what you expect out of others, like probabilistically. And so that's a hard thing for someone to have to come to terms with. They're like, hey, you have all this stuff, but you don't have this variable, so chances are this is where your ceiling is,

and this person's ceiling is here. You're gonna have to accept that and deal with that. Yeah, I had to do that. I was a terrible swimmer. Sure. And I probably thought about it more than anybody ever thought about swimming and tried and worked and worked and worked.

And I'm only gonna be so good because that's just how I'm made. And the background, I had all these things, right? I do think everybody has a path and I can help them as far along that path as they can go. That's the key. And really the things that they learn while doing that are the things that really matter in the end, right?

The lessons that you learn. I know it sounds cliche, but it's really true. You know, the way that we approach our work, the way that we keep coming back when we get knocked down because you're going to be, the way that you learn to work with other people, how you live in an environment where people are more talented than you.

Yeah. You know, and in a certain thing. But you know, guess what? When they go out in the other world, this kid who's like a super great engineer, but maybe not the best swimmer on my team, everything's gonna be reversed when these guys get out in the real world.

So it's- Well, I also think about the ceilings on spaces, right? So you get called to swim, to be a swim coach, and you can reach the heights of that profession. But the contract for the world's greatest swim coach is going to be less than probably a mediocre college football coach or whatever. For certain. And so I try to remind myself that too. It's like, hey, look, you got called to, and then you chose

to accept the assignment of writing about an obscure school of ancient philosophy. You've been more successful at it than anyone could have reasonably expected. But it's not, I don't know, sales. Writing about sales is gonna have a bigger market than this, right? Or my friends who write different books about slightly larger topics,

they're gonna have a bigger potential market than I am. And that sort of comparison, if you're like, hey, look, this is what I'm doing. I want to be the best that it's capable for a person to be in that space. Then you have some hope at happiness. If you have to be the most out of everyone, you better hope that the wheel spun around and everything lined up for you. Because otherwise what you want is not possible. Right, no, I agree.

Yeah. No, I know all about that. People are like, you're an expert in your field. I was like, you know, Niels Bohr said an expert's a person that's made every mistake possible in their field. And mine is, my field is this big and I have made every mistake. So I'm probably there.

I'm probably an expert in my little narrow field. But sometimes I think it's great to even think about it that way because it just keeps you — because you know, in swimming, like a lot of the guys on my team now, when I come in, they're just like afraid of me because, oh my gosh, you're going to — or they think I'm just going to do the dust and they're going to swim. And in general, I'm just a guy trying to help you do your thing and create an environment where you can learn about yourself, about excellence. And I'm happy with that, super happy with it.

I feel like if you're being driven by some place of emptiness, like you think that, hey, if I do this, then I'll feel good, then I'll feel full. That's a real fragile place to come at it. And there are, yeah, to me, mastery is a fuller, healthier place to try to come to like, hey, I love this. I want to explore all the places that can go

as opposed to, you know, if I become really famous and rich, then my dad will love me. Yeah, exactly. Many of those. Yes. And the hard part is it clearly does work. Oh yeah. It's just, it doesn't work out that great

as a whole for that person. After, yeah. You notice in what's next, and then you don't know what's next. The same things are next that you had before. Just there's this great achievement in between, and maybe you have some money, and maybe you have all these other things,

but I think mastery, you're just developing your skillset. You are doing something that you love and learning how to do it in a healthy way. And then it's also in a way that's building your resilience and all these other things so that when, if you do succeed, you're able to handle all that stuff. Well, and here, if you say that, a mastery of a domain or a game, a space,

what that also allows is the flexibility that your type of mastery or your role in that space changes. So if you just love winning races, that's great as long as you can keep swimming, right? Or as long as I keep, right. But if you're like, no, no, no, I wanna figure out publishing or I wanna figure out swimming, then you can more easily transition from the athlete

to the coach, to the announcer, to the agent, you know, or what you can just participate in the thing as a whole, as opposed to, no, I'm only interested. It's like an actor who has to be the movie star is going to have a much narrower career than someone who just loves being a part of great material because you can be the up and comer and then the movie star and then the character actor

and then the person who made, oh, I can't believe so-and-so was in that minor role. And then you can produce stuff or open up doors for other people. If you have this more expansive definition of participating in the thing, because what you're trying to do is just master all facets of it.

You could have a more sustainable, longer career than if you would just have to be the main character. For sure. And really what you're ultimately doing is mastering yourself, right? Yes. Back to Marcus Aurelius, right? That's what you're trying to do.

Yes. And one of the things that I've always done is if you see on the practices, I put a quote on the end, some kind of quote at the bottom of every practice. And we started a new thing in Texas. We didn't do it at ASU, but I'll pick one person and they do a dramatic reading of the quote

before we start. And there are always a lot of them, yours, I had one from you the other day. But I think that the key element while we're doing all this stuff is that they are learning about themselves and how to manage those things. Because those ultimately give you the performances, right?

It's how do you approach your swimming? How do you approach difficulties? How do you approach frustration? How do you handle these things? What do you expect from yourself? All of these sort of things. And I believe that's part of mastery as well. No, totally.

I think people think that the coach has some secret, you said the magic, but it's also, no, you have this playbook. And if anyone has access to the playbook, they're gonna be great, right? And actually it's just, it's so fascinating to me getting to meet all these different coaches. And what they're actually doing is helping someone bounce

back from a disappointing performance. Or again, the simplicity of it, it seems almost anticlimactic. Like, no, no, wait, I thought there was like an Xs and Os thing that you do or some secret workout formula you have. And it's like, no, we read a motivational quote before practice. They work hard.

I have some reasons behind why we do, but I share that with everybody. Like everything. Why would you share Michael's work? I'm like, if they're not Michael, they're not getting the same, they can do whatever they want with it, but maybe they'll learn something.

So I feel like, yeah, that's a part of it, which it's just so simple. I'm reading this book now, David Yeager, it's called 10 to 25. You like it when you're talking about your kids, right? They're about to, in that age, they're starting to get there. And it's just talking about how you motivate

that age range now in our current environment. I talk about the mentor's dilemma. The mentor's dilemma is you wanna have high standards, right, you wanna coach these kids to have high standards. But today, most kids, if you give them some criticism, they just see that as you're not thinking they're good enough. I'm just not good enough. He just told me I wasn't good enough to do it. No, the way you couch it's very important. You have to have the high standards, but then you have to support it in a certain way. So you might say, you know, I have very high

standards here, but I know you can meet them. That's why I'm asking you to do this. I wouldn't ask you to do this if you couldn't. So I'm trying to work on ways to know you can meet them. That's why I'm asking you to do this. I wouldn't ask you to do this if you couldn't. So I'm trying to work on ways to do that with these guys. That's where the magic happens. Because I can set out some super hard set and the best people will be able to do it and the lower end will struggle to do it. But if I can get people to just reach beyond

where they are now and start thinking a little better, then they're gonna be able to do this stuff. And if they do the higher level training, they have the higher level race. UFO lands in Suffolk and that's official, said the News of the World. But what really happened across two nights in December 1980, when US servicemen saw mysterious lights in the forest near RAF Woodbridge and claimed to have had a close encounter with an actual craft.

Encounters, a new podcast available exclusively on Wondery Plus, takes a deep dive into one of the most famous and still unresolved UFO encounters to ever take place in the UK. Featuring shocking testimony from first-hand witnesses, hosts, journalist, podcaster and UFO researcher Andy McGillan, that's me, and producer Elle Scott take us back to the nights in question and examine all of the evidence and conflicting theories about what was encountered in the middle of a snowy Suffolk forest 40 years ago. Are we alone? Encounters is a podcast which is going to find out.

Listen to Encounters exclusively in ad free on Wondry+. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or in Apple podcasts. Parenting can bring up many unexpected challenges and there's so much advice out there it can be hard to know where to find real help. I'm Janet Lansbury, host of Unruffled, a podcast with answers to the questions that arise when raising children. I've worked with children and parents for over 25 years, and I'm eager to share all that I've learned with you and, most of all, encourage you to trust yourself.

In each episode, I address listeners' questions through the lens of my respectful parenting approach. From advice for how to address toddler meltdowns, encourage them to develop their skills naturally and joyfully through self-directed play, for helping when our kids are scared, and so much more. I aim to offer you thoughtful advice that will shift your perspective on challenging topics, making them far less intimidating and overwhelming, and free you of the need for scripts and tricks.

We can do this. Follow Unruffled on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Listen to Unruffled ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Are there super talented people that are not trying hard enough and don't care enough? A hundred percent. So many. But it's probably more common though

that the athlete cares too much and is too intense and too fragile because they put too much on it. And so that, but those are very different. Those require very different approaches from a- A hundred percent. So it's all individual once you get into that part of it. Cause there are people, you know, I have some guys on my team who they're legitimate

world record holder types, but they're also super type A and they are going for it every day. And they get very upset if they can't do something. And I'm like, I'm not even a big golfer, man, but I don't think their percentages are very high. These guys that win the masters, they miss a lot more shots than they ever hit, right? Baseball, my gosh. So you're not going to be be 100% on all these,

but what you have to do is know that you gave full effort on every one of these. If you're doing that, things will start to, and we'll find ways to tweak your technique or do whatever or make it, you know. And I just try to, for those guys, I will sometimes when I see like things are going good and I can push them to another level,

hey, okay, now you can really do this. But most of the time I'm just letting them do it and saying, hey, nice job on that, could be better. Try to keep it pretty objective because they're already pushing so hard. And I think that perspective is good. I think on the other end, the talented and unmotivated people,

you don't get anywhere pushing them. What I do is try to put the carrot out there. Yeah, you'd probably be pretty good if you did this, or maybe this could happen if you do that. And just try to sort of lead them that way. And then as soon as they do something that moves in that, dude, that was awesome. That's what we're trying to do here.

There's clearly some reason if they are incredibly talented that they're not wanting to. So it's the kind of reverse psychology of like how you- Take the pressure off it, because that's probably what they don't want. And so that's where I spend the majority of my time. Yeah.

I put out a practice and I can do that, and we can kind of manage those and kind of plan a season, but the things that are meaningful are in the practices or outside the practices when we're interacting with these guys and just trying to help them find what their mastery is. Yeah. And what their path to that is. It is quite different.

Yeah, I think among elite performers, probably too much discipline is the problem than not enough discipline. 100%. And especially when you get into the realm of overtraining or not being strategic about when they go all in and not, it's like mastery over your own discipline-ness or your own ambition and drive

is a kind of self-awareness meta-skill that you have to have. It's like, hey, like you're working on this book for the next two years. So sweating every minute is not sustainable and also not how you should measure this project. Do you know what I mean? You gotta be more relaxed or you're gonna burn out

and you're not gonna make it through the two years. Or you're not gonna be able to sustain the level of performance that you need if you're- For sure not. Kicking yourself because there was traffic on the way to the office. 100%. Yeah.

That we'll see thing comes in handy. Yes. We'll see. Yeah, maybe some idea popped into your head while you were in traffic and you needed it. Yeah. That we'll see thing comes in handy. Yes. We'll see. Yeah, maybe some idea popped in your head while you were in traffic, you needed it. Yeah. And I think in general, everybody tends to be too hard on themselves, particularly when you get to the kind of high end of sports,

everybody wants it for the most part. It's not like people are there and just, you're gonna have to drive them into it. They wanna do it. Yeah. What are the obstacles? What's holding you back? I thought it was interesting when I took this job at Texas,

which you know, Chris Delconte, he's a pretty empowered guy. He's the best. He's great. I started this process in the beginning. I had no idea that I was even, they just called me. Yeah. And I thought they wanted me to recommend somebody. They're going to run their candidates by me, right?

I'm like, no, we want to talk to you. Yeah. I'm like, well, OK. But the only thing that they really asked me through this process was, what's holding you back from doing this? What would be the, what's holding me back? And I think about that with these kids.

I'm like, what's holding you back from taking the next step in this swimming? And then I can say, well, can I go back to Arizona and see my grandkids? Oh, sure, you can, okay, well, let's check and do that. So I think that's how it works in sports and how it works in anything. You can just make, if you,

and I don't even know that sometimes that's the resistance. It's just a fear of something or, or just a, you're tired or whatever it is. What's holding you back from doing what you really know that you could do or want to do? No, that's a, I think an underrated part of leadership. Like I think the leader thinks that everyone works for them. And it's actually the opposite.

And the job of the leader is to go around and go, what do you need? What's holding you back for sure? What are you spending a lot of your time on? Like in a work, guys, this is a little bit of sports, but what's an enormous time slot? Because oftentimes what will happen is a set of responsibilities or obligations will fall on a person

or they'll have interpreted a request in a certain way, and they think, oh, my boss wants me to do this. But like, their boss wants you to do that thing, but the boss wasn't going, hey, please waste a lot of the time that I'm paying for on something that I don't care that much about. And it's only in that conversation of if you think your job is to alleviate burdens

and solve problems for the people that work for you, then those things are gonna resurface and you're gonna go, oh, I actually don't care about that at all. That's like way low and I would stop doing that. Let's find someone else whose time is less valuable to do that thing. And yeah, your job is to find out what's holding people back.

Exactly. But that requires a kind of an empathy, I think, that sometimes leaders don't have or disinterest. For me, I have to be careful. I don't spend time on stuff that's not important. I have staff of guys. This is my Eric Poske, my associate coach. We work together in North Baltimore.

He knows me inside and out. And if you ever think that I ever worked hard in my life, he works twice as hard. And there is no, he said, well, I don't have an officer, Jim Lee, you need to find me. Yeah. Because a lot of my job is about being perceptive and being able to be in a mind state

where I can communicate with people and see what's going on and do it. And if I am, you know, tied up in a hundred things, you just can't do it. So that's part, I try to protect that part. And I do try to get off the things that I can not do and make the program function. I'm happy to delegate those to people.

But I do think that's a big part of my job is making sure I'm even just in the place where I can do that. Yeah, I think about like my rule is like, is this something that only I can do? I should be doing those things. Exactly. And then the job of a coach, for instance,

is like, what are all the things that our athletes are spending time on that we wanna take off their plate? Like I spoke at Kentucky right before Calipari left. And it was fascinating to go in like the dorms that he had set up and just like everything you could imagine that would take up one ounce of brain power of one of these athletes is taken care of.

So they're like, basketball school, that's all that I do. Right, right. Like your job is to remove the impediments that are costing performance out of the people that you're supposed to get performance out of. Yeah, for sure. I was curious too, that some of the balance stuff might be interesting in the sense of like,

if in the old days, a swimmer might have a two year career or a five year career, but now you can compete at an elite level for longer, it actually does become more important to be a bit more balanced. Like I think about it as a writer, like because there isn't unlike even music where it's like, no, we only accept a 30 and under, you know?

Like, but now he's Robert Caro's in his, almost his nineties and he's performing on an elite level. You can do it forever. So it actually does become more important to kind of get your shit together and figure out a more sustainable. And we're doing that now. I did it with Leon.

That's why I just said, take six weeks, do whatever you want to do. Reagan Smith did well in the Olympics, right? Got, I don't know, two gold, three silver, whatever. And she's even relatively younger, but she is like very focused and intense all the time. And we both agreed it would be better for her to have a period after these Olympics

where she was none of those things. And she actually stayed in Arizona. She has great friends there, did a very light training program. She's trained one time a day for a long time. She's doing these world cups now for fun. She's swimming okay, but not amazing and who cares? The point was, let's have four or five months

where you get to be you, you get to see what it was like if you had swum in college, have a life, sleep in if you want to, do whatever. And I think it's gonna pay huge dividends down the road. Cause when she comes back, she will get into this mode, but you just can't do that forever. It's not sustainable. Yeah. With Michael, obviously he managed to kind of

write this ship and have a nice conclusion, but it could have gone the other way. It could have just been done. And then, and then all- Disaster. So, so that drivenness would have come at a cost. Like that imbalance would have cost him a huge cost.

additional performance down the road. And who knows, four years is such a long time. Maybe there could have even been more had he... So there's kind of an element of going, yeah, hey, if that band had taken a year off between albums, might they have had one or two other out? Could the Beatles have lasted together longer had they not gone so hard for such a short period of time?

Well, and see, I think with Michael too, it was like he was so far over here on the focus dedication spectrum, like well beyond normal that when he went the other way, he was over here. We had been a little closer, probably everything could have been, and you see people like that. I have some people on my team, I was like, you know, this guy, it can just be great. And as long as he's on the track, everything is awesome. But when he gets off track, it's way over here and it almost takes forever to come back.

So let's just do what we can to keep him. It's still gonna be hard. It's gonna be hard. But let's just try to keep him moving here. And that requires more effort from us to kind of check in on him, to kind of see how he's doing, to kind of make sure that if we see something, hey, I noticed this about it.

How are you feeling about this? Maybe we could do this. Maybe take a morning off or just do whatever, right? To kind of make those things happen. So I do think it's a lot. When you operate in one extreme, you're bound to go to the other extreme to kind of balance it.

Yeah, it's like, you've talked, I think Michael Phelps was like 365 for like five or six years. Six years, yeah. And in retrospect, six Christmases were not the difference between those things. So it's the day-to-dayness, but it doesn't, there can be exceptions, but the tricky part, I think,

it almost takes more discipline, that middle ground, because to go like, oh, I don't feel like it, so I'm not gonna do it, that's an attitude that doesn't make one successful. And then the, I don't feel like it, I'm gonna do it anyway, is also an attitude that if taken too far for too long, you burn out. And so it takes the discipline to go like,

okay, these are the days off I'm taking. This is the balance. These are the boundaries I'm setting. Maybe we're gonna do this. Maybe you're gonna take a week after every season, which that was like, no, I'm not doing that. Never do that. And that whole thing with Michael was interesting

because it started quite benignly. He was 12, I think, yeah. I started working with him. And at MBAC, because we had limited pool space, like every club in America, right? The group that he was in practiced one time per day, and then they practiced on Sundays. That was the best attend of practice.

Everybody would come, Saturday morning, everybody thinks, oh my God, it's terrible. And there were people in the group who would, Wednesdays was the day off for them when he started. And then he got good and I was like, well yeah, Michael needs to be challenged. So he'd come on Wednesdays and he was just going seven days. But it was like an hour and a half.

It wasn't some big deal. And he would go play lacrosse and all that stuff. And then he moved into my group and we were still going seven days. And we did that till he was 12, 13, 14, because he was only training one time per day. He wasn't training like, you know, a lot. So then we started doing a little bit more.

We put in two doubles a week and stayed on the Sundays because we were just doing it. And we went on a national team trip, one of his very first ones. One of the older guys were on their bus, and I don't even know how we got into this. They're like, hey Phelps, I bet you even, you train every day, do you train every day?

He's like, yeah, like he didn't know any different. I remember just like, he was like, do you even, do you train on Christmas? And he was like, yeah. And on Christmas, literally they came in and swam for 30 minutes and we played water polo. It wasn't like a big deal, but it was just enough to kind of keep it going.

And the guys were like, gave him this look that I knew that that was a huge psychological advantage. Yeah. And Michael's like, we're going to keep doing this. They were then terrified of him at that point. And then he just kept going. And you know, you can make the case that those 52 days a year that other people aren't training, you do that for six years, picked up six months or whatever it is. But that's how it kind of, it became, and then by the end, of course, we would do stuff to keep it going.

I gotta get my wisdom teeth out. Okay, well, can you go on a board the afternoon after the thing, we'll just go for like, kick 500 on the board and call it a practice. Just stuff like that. It wasn't like he was going 8,000 hard every time. So it took on a life of its own. Yeah, and that sort of positive inclination

or that bit of discipline can become kind of an addiction. For sure. And then you can't turn it off. No. And then you wake up one day and you hate what you do. Cause you sucked all the fun and the joy out of it. Exactly, and I've had, honestly, to do that again, probably would have insisted on one day off a week

or something, you know, it wouldn't have hurt his progress, I don't think, but good for me. Yeah. You know, there's a lot of things that went into that. And so it was very hard when he came back after Beijing and we were doing this stuff, I started to realize that I can't do this 24 seven, right? So I was, I would take a day or two off

and he would just get, are you soft now? Are you going to really get serious about it? I'm like, dude, I think maybe we could rethink how we do all this. And he never really got to that point. Even now, like I'm going to Phoenix on Friday, I'm coming back on Monday, I'm just to see the grandkids, visit Michael and those guys. And he'll be like, whoa, taking a vacation, I guess you don't really care about it. He'll definitely say something like that. And I'm like, nope, I'm just going to keep doing this and enjoying it and be good at it. The guys here are fine with it. Everybody's

fine with it. It's fine with it. It's just like, I do think when you get into some of those modes where it's just like, we are doing everything we can possibly do to make this happen, you get the positive feedback because it does happen, but then you just can't keep making it happen. That's the key.

Yeah, and you can sometimes, yeah, sometimes like other people can be the canary in the coal mine. So it's like, you're burning out your coach, it's probably a sign that you're burning yourself out. You just don't feel it. 100%. And yeah, if no one's able to keep up with you

over and over and over again, it's probably not a humanly sustainable pace. And yeah, if you wanna do it for a long time, if you wanna be around for like, sometimes really driven people are also bad at that just delayed gratification. All you're thinking is, hey, one more goal, or one more win, or a little more writing time is great.

But then, you know, if that's how you lose your family, or why your knees don't work when you're 45, you know, you're just not able to see the opportunity costs of some of the decisions you're making because you have this tunnel vision of whatever. And that's, you need just, you not only need coaches, but you need those mentors of people who have been where you've been and now have experienced other phases of life and they can help you maybe set up

for being a slightly more well-integrated individual. For sure. It's hard though. It's hard to turn it off. If it was easy to turn it off, you would have turned it off already. You know what I mean? You know, I think about like Michael and like the kids,

he and I are the same in so many ways because like everything in that house with these four little boys is like a world record or a gold medal. Like, I won the gold medal. You got bronze. That's it with disdain. Like, you know, it's kind of like everything's competitive.

Everything's trying to do this, try to win, be your best. Ding it is, dad, can I, you know, I beat him in this. And it's like, okay, it's all great, but let's just have a little fun with it as we do it, right? And I think that, you know, some of that stuff just gets ingrained in kids and families. And that's having kids also helps, like, sometimes when you're successful at something, I think that some of that stuff just gets ingrained in kids and families. Having kids also helps.

Sometimes when you're successful at something, you give yourself a lot of credit for it, right? And then you have kids and you go, oh, this is just a thing. This is a thing that's just in me. They have it too. And like my son, I just interviewed the guy who's the host of this podcast,

but my son got obsessed with this podcast about Greek history. And he's listened, not just to all like 500 episodes, but we're now like going through it again. Awesome. And it's driving me insane, because like, I don't wanna hear it. But I'm like, where could he have gotten this interest

in ancient philosophy, and then this compulsion to like drain every drop out of the well until he's wrapped his head around. It's like, oh, we just both have this thing. Yeah, right. You know? And if pointed at something positive, it can be adaptive.

And if pointed at something negative, it can be real dangerous. No, for sure. You know, I love it. We're in the backyard a little bit, a while ago, and the boys were doing this thing where they were running and they would run off this ramp

and see how far they could jump. It was like a little tiny little, you know, we'd raise your car up and they're like, grandpa, you're the coach. You stand right here and tell us what we can do better. So I love that they think that's what a coach does. But yeah, and they want to be coached. So they realize all these things.

And so there's some positive things that come out of it. But I was like, sometimes I wonder if like everything has to have a winner or a loser, like, maybe we just had fun doing it, let's just play for fun. Right. I would wonder though, if that's like the most important skill

that a person who's pursuing mastery can have, which is that being coachable. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Or an interest in being coached. 100%. Like that might be the thing that separates the winners from the losers at some level. Cause that's what they all ask for it.

The best ones, they all want to be coached. Really? For sure. Without question. It'll be like, Leon, every time he swims, I feel like I could do a little bit better on this, this, this, what do you think? Or what do you think about that?

I feel like that was good. And this is after the gold medals in, you know, Paris. That last wall, I probably could take in one more kick or something. And then they start to coach themselves, which is how Michael was by the end. By the end, he would come up and just give me the full rundown.

I'd be like, yeah, I don't even have to do it. He knows what's going on. They're very aware of what they're going. But I do think all high performers have this desire to get that feedback because they know that's how they get better. Yeah, it's hard because one of the things that success affords you is the freedom

to not be coached, right? Like I'm going through this now, like basically like my editors are sort of let me do whatever I want, which is nice on one level. And then definitely not how you get the best out of yourself. Like, you know that. So it's this trade off between what's pleasant

and then what you know you need to do your best. But you definitely have people, right? Yeah, but the lower part of yourself can create the environment that gets what it wants and that higher part of yourself has to go, no, no, no, I'm sending this in, I want edits. Like give me the coaching. Don't try to avoid offending me or upsetting me

or you think I'm gonna push back, so you're just not gonna do it. You have to sort of, there's the two- Oh no, I get it. To take it back to swimming, I was thinking today, somebody asked me, what's the difference at ASU? How do they go from being this program that's kind of not that good to win the thing?

And we decided probably three years before we won the championship, we had this coaches meeting, and we just kind of felt like we were doing okay, but we weren't really going where we wanted to go. And one of the guys is like, I think that we're just kind of, which is odd for me, because at the time I'm known for pushing people, it's like, I think we just give them a practice so they can have a good practice, not so necessarily they're challenged. And it was so true. And I started thinking, yeah, I'm giving these practices that I know that they can do, so they'll feel good about

what they do. And then I can try to inch them that way. But what I really need to do is give them the practice they need to be doing and see how what the difference is. And that's what we started doing. And not every day, right? But a couple of times a week, I give them one that's like clearly beyond what they had done before or could do,

and you just be shocked at how many people would do it. You just have to have somebody who's willing to ask you for that, right? And to say, hey, this is okay, but you can really do this. And it was kind of systemic. And then I was like, okay, now I know where we got to go with this. Because I was always kind of like, I just felt like the kids, they weren't as talented, they weren't as successful as, you know, other people I work with. So I was just going to try to inch them along through it. And at some point you just can't do that. You have to ask them to take a leap and go.

And then we started getting more talented people and then it all just kind of fed into each other. But I often think about that as like, am I doing this practice to really help challenge them today and have a specific thing that they can get better at or learn from if they fail? And don't be afraid to let them fail on it sometimes. I think that's the other part. Just don't write every practice

so nobody fails in a practice. It's easier, again, easier for me, but that's where they'll learn everything that they need to learn about how to get better. I'm just doing this book now. Do you know who George Raffling is? Yeah. I'm doing a book for him.

Oh, awesome. And so we just went into the publisher. It's gonna come out, I think, in March. But, and then the publisher's like, I know we're almost done, but like, we just wanted this one thing. And like, my initial impulse was like all the reasons why that's not possible or whatever, or I already tried.

And then I was like, then I sit on it a little bit. I'm like, am I saying that because it's true or am I saying this because I just don't wanna do it? Right, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's always that battle between, and this is what a coach helps you with, is like, I think it's as good as it could be

or I wouldn't have turned it in. Exactly. I've thought of this. I also, it's obvious to what what a book should be, but then the person who won't accept the excuse or pushes a little bit more, that's how you get to that next level. And that's why coaches are so important. That's why the best people have to have coaches. Absolutely. I'm excited. I'll send it to you and stuff. I'd love to read it. Yeah, he's great. I've listened to some of his podcasts. You wanna go check out some books in the bookstore? Sure, that'd be great. Let's do it. Let's do it.

["Spring Day in the Bookstore"] Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on iTunes, that would mean so much to us and it would really help the show. We appreciate it. And I'll see you next episode.

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