The Daily Stoic - Texas Rangers' Josh Jung: "The Moment You Overthink, You’ve Already Lost"

Episode Date: March 26, 2025

How do the best athletes push through self-doubt, turn failure into fuel, and avoid getting lost in the details? Josh Jung, professional baseball player for the Texas Rangers, joins Ryan to discuss his mental and physical routines, the game-changing effects of the pitch clock, and what can make or break an elite athlete's long-term success. Josh Jung is a professional baseball player for the Texas Rangers as a third baseman. A former star for the Texas Tech Red Raiders, he was selected by the Rangers in the first round of the 2019 MLB Draft.Follow Josh Jung on Instagram and X @Josh6Jung⚾️ Grab tickets to watch Josh and the Texas Rangers here🎙️ 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.

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Hiring Indeed is all you need. Welcome to the Daily Stoic Podcast where each weekday we bring you a meditation inspired by the ancient Stoics, a short passage of ancient wisdom designed to help you find strength and insight here in everyday life. And on Wednesdays, we talk to some of our fellow students of ancient philosophy, well known and obscure, fascinating and powerful. With them, we discuss the strategies and habits that have helped them become who they are, and also to find peace and wisdom in their lives. Hey, it's Ryan. Welcome back to the Daily Stoic Podcast. There's something about sports where you're watching,

you know, the human condition on hyperdrive, right? The aging process, the competition, what's in our control, what's not in our control, mastery, all this stuff. I love sports. So that brings us to today's guest, Josh Jung. He's the third baseman for the Texas Rangers. In college he played for the Red Raiders at Texas Tech.

He was drafted in the first round in the 2019 draft and he is the second player in Rangers history in 50 plus years to hit a home run in his first major league at bat. Like how insane must that have been? What that must have felt like. I don't want to say it's all downhill from there, but like, I mean, in your wildest dreams, you go, Hey, I want to play professional baseball.

I want to play college. Like just how far down the line it is to be like, yeah, the first time I step up to the plate, first time I do what is effectively the hardest thing to do in professional sports, you hit a home run. Oh man, insane. But I think what philosophy is, what great sports psychologists teach you is how do you wipe that clean

and then go to the next at that, right? I guess I have some experience in that. You know, I put out my first book when I was 25. I debuted on the bestseller list. I've had some of those successes, but you know, it doesn't help you the next time as you're starting over. And in some ways it's harder the next time, right?

Because you can get in your own head about it. And then also the people you're competing with, they're learning and growing and changing too. And it gets tougher to do it each time. This is why so few teams pull off back to back titles. It's why there's few back to back home runs or back to back anything hard in sports. Cause it's hard to do it unaided. And then it's hard to do when your competition is learning

but that is life you got to figure it out you have to figure out how to always be growing and developing getting better as you go because if you're not getting better you are getting worse well this week is opening week so I wanted to bring you my interview with Josh. And I think you're really gonna like it. I think it was a great interview. He was awesome, clearly a really thoughtful dude. When he was at the bookstore, he was like, I see you guys have a book club. Can I be a part of that? And I was like, yeah, dude, you can come to the book club anytime you want. Or you just read books and we could text about it. That's cool too. You can follow him on Instagram and Twitter,

josh6jung, J-U-N-G. Anyways, let's get after it. So last time I saw you, you left with like 20 books. Have you read them all yet? Oh no, I'm a slow reader. I'm in the middle of Intergame of Tennis right now. What do you think? It's so true and like dissecting my game

and some of the thoughts I've had this off season about slowing down everything, especially self-talk. Yeah. Trying to be positive and not self-constructive, especially like pitch to pitch when I'm hitting. Cause it's like, you're doing something that's really hard. Yes. And the pitcher can throw 87 different pitches at different velocities. And when you swing and miss, it's not the end of the world.

Right. But it's so easy to get so frustrated with that. Well, some people think that's the hardest thing in sports, that hitting a baseball is the hardest act, like single act in any of sports. Like in golf, I mean, obviously the different shots are hard but the ball is sitting there. You know, in basketball hitting a three point shot is hard, under pressure it's hard,

but like you're not like defying physics, you know? Like I think it's like 400 milliseconds or something from like the release of a ball to when you have, like it's not actually possible to do that consciously. Yeah. At some level you are acting on pure instinct and training. You're not like, this is a really good pitch. I'm going to do this swing here because you don't literally, you can't do that. You don't have time.

It's kind of like the zone. I think I'm a chapter like five, but it's like the zone you get into where it's like that balance. But like you're able to just go and focus on the external, which is the ball. But as soon as you think, oh, my back elbow needs to do this, or I need to do this with my front leg,

it's like you lose. You don't have time. Don't have time. Yeah, and you're, by thinking of that, you're actually taking, it's like you're taking power away from the wheels that are supposed to be gripping, you know, so that must be strange. I mean, when you see the pitcher start to go into a windup,

like what are you thinking? I mean, I try to have like little phrases for myself when I step into the box. Yeah. And then when he moves, I try to turn like little phrases for myself when I step into the box. And then when he moves, I try to turn it off. I try to. Sometimes it's hard. Does the pitch clock make it easier? Oh, it's worse.

It's worse? I guess I would have guessed that it would make it easier because there's less time to think and you can't step out. It puts a, this is it. You got to do it in here. Oh yeah. For me, I really focus on breathing. And the more time I have, the more I can control my breath

and kind of tune it out. Where the pitch clocker, I call it the shot clock. It's just inconsistent where you play. And so you'll look up and you have to be in the box with your eyes on the pitcher at nine seconds and you'll look up and it's like 11 and you're like, oh gosh, get in, hurry. So your whole playing career up until,

I mean, when did the clock start and when did you start? That would have been in 22 in the minor leagues and then in 23 in the big leagues. So my whole life it was no. You had unlimited time and then suddenly you don't have unlimited time. And then just jumped in and I don't know how they came up with 15 and 19 seconds for us. And now I think it's 15, 18. No idea how they came up with those numbers.

Well, they probably just said, hey, if we do this, it'll make the game this long. And if we do this, it'll make the game on average this long. And they're just trying to fit the thing into a tighter window. Yeah. I mean, I understand why they did it, right? Like the attention span's not as long as it used to be. And the shorter the game, like, I don't know if blue sales are gonna go down that much because it's a 30 to 40 minute difference. Like, I don't think. It's also, it's like, if you're saying that stepping out

and having unlimited time makes you better at what you do, well, of course, every person is gonna take the maximum amount of time to do the thing. And so everyone is pursuing their individual optimization that's coming at the expense of the overall optimization of the experience. But like, yeah, I just wondered if it's like, no, because sometimes there are some things where it's like, look, you got 10 seconds to choose. You'll just choose. Yeah, I did that with my kids sometimes.

I'm like, look, we can walk through this gift shop for two minutes. You pick something, you can have it, but we're not doing this 45 minute thing, you know? Yeah, definitely. And they're actually happier because they didn't torture themselves for 45 minutes, like weighing every option 500 times.

I mean, yeah, that does make sense. Especially when you're going well, you're like, oh, get me back in the box. Oh, right. When you're going bad, that's when you're like, okay, time out, because you get one time out. And like for me, I like to pick up the dirt and throw it. That's kind of like my physical release.

You touch it? Yeah, I'll like pick up some dirt and throw it. And it's like my physical release to where it's like, okay, it's out of my head. How did you get that habit? Trials, tribulations. I work with a guy named Brian Kane. He's like my middle performance coach

and I've done all kinds of things. But with the pitch clock, I've had to learn and adjust and adapt. And I actually saw Aaron Judge do it when we played against him, I think in 22, before he broke the AL record. Yeah. And I was like, oh, I like that.

That's cool. Oh, he does that. Yeah. Interesting. He'll like pick up dirt when he's struggling or like two in his head and throw it. And I was like, ooh, I kind of like that. And that was just something. Someone sent me this thing once.

It's something these monks use. It's like an incense. It's like a little, like a little bottle and you put this powder in your hand, you go like this. And then it's kind of like the Lebron James thing because with the thing. But you're sniffing this kind of incense powder and it's kind of like a ritual of sort of like clean, a scent, and then it's gone. And then you do whatever you're supposed to do. I think they would do it like before prayers or something. But there's something about those kind of little rituals that sort of start a

process or end a process that can be kind of mentally clarifying. Yeah. So it's just, for me, it's just been identifying what those are going to be and sticking to them. But you have less time. But you have less time. Yeah. So I can only do that once in a bat maybe. Yeah. Because I try to call time out because you only get one time out. Per at do that once at that bat maybe. Cause I try to call time out. Cause you only get one time out. Per at bat? Per at bat. Okay. Yeah. There's a fine line between ritual and OCD, right?

Definitely. And so I do imagine if you're like, well, this one works. Let me add another one. All of a sudden you're like, you got 30 rituals that you do before you go do the thing. And then the thing that was designed to get you out of your head is now making you very, very in your own head.

Right, you're like, if I don't do this, I'm not gonna perform. Yes. And it's like, no. And that's where, I wonder if it was you talking about it. It's like, we can't go into a game based on feelings. You can't do anything based on feelings because no matter what you do that day, you could

feel great and you could feel terrible. But at the end of the day, you got to go do what you do. And just because you feel great does not mean positive success. And just because you feel terrible doesn't mean terrible success. Some of the best games I've ever played, it was like my worst batting practice or worst pregame routines. And it's like somehow that turns my brain off and it's like, well, no expectations today. And you just go succeed.

Well, and also though, like the rituals can become, can make you very fragile or the totems or whatever. Like I wear this necklace. Like I have these rings that I wear. I have this ring that it's like from ancient Rome. So it's like, you know, 2000 years old. It was like a ring that a person wore and it's got like a little sort of,

sort of Roman insignia on it. And I usually wear it when I do talk. And like I did a talk here on Wednesday or something in Austin, and it's usually, I keep it in like my medicine bag, because I do all my talks on the road. And so it was here, like since it was here, I didn't have my medicine bag, right? Because it's like in my suitcase.

And it wasn't until I was like driving to the place that I was like, oh shit, I don't have like the thing. That's part, cause I like, I'll spin it or whatever. I just, and I was like, I tried to say to myself, this is actually good because obviously the ring doesn't do anything. It's a silly superstition. And by not doing it and getting practice not doing it, that's

a resilience that I need anyway, because the more you get in your head like, hey, I need to wear these lucky socks. Or if I don't like, you know, touch the dirt or, you know, tap home plate three times, I won't be able to do what I do. And so the thing that was supposed to get you more in a good headspace actually becomes this kind of fragility where if you don't do it, you're a mess. Right. Like I, through college, was known for like, I would stare at a focal point on my bat, and I would repeat the same phrase to myself with the pitch clock. I can't do that. But I've tried to develop to where like I still have like two or three things I tell myself. But when you look up and the pitch clocks at nine or whatever and you got

to jump in and you don't do that, that's where I'm still trying to learn like it's okay. And that's where the journey this off season has been kind of revitalizing for me is because it's like, it doesn't really matter at all, but you have to separate from that and not give it weight. And that's where the intergame attendance, like don't be judgmental about events or whatever. It's like, who cares? Well, yeah. And the thing I took from that book is that, and I think about it.

Actually, I was just in here with Matthew McConaughey, we were talking about self-consciousness is the enemy. Anytime you were thinking about what you are doing, you are spending less time doing the enemy. Anytime you were thinking about what you are doing, you are spending less time doing the thing. Like anytime you're thinking about, hey, if I'm not standing how I normally stand, that's a problem. Anytime you're thinking like, hey, if I whiff this pitch people are going to laugh at me or if I don't get this in a time, these people are going to be mad at me or they're going to be surprised. But anytime you're thinking about what other people are gonna be thinking about what you're doing,

that's a problem too. You wanna be in it as much as possible, thinking as little as possible, just as connected and present as you can be. That's like a funny thing like even doing these, you make notes, but the more you're looking at the notes, probably the worse it's going. And I think there's an Eisenhower line where he says like,

plans are worthless, but planning is everything. You wanna have trained it a million times, you wanna know all the mechanics, and then you wanna immediately like throw it all out and just be doing the thing. Right. Yeah. And that's the journey for me right now too, is like learning to separate. Yeah. Separate. And I've always been one Yeah. And that's the journey for me right now too, is like learning to separate.

Yeah. Separate. And I've always been one of those guys that's like, the ego of me was like, I'm gonna be the first one to the field, I'm gonna be the last one to leave. But it's like, that's actually a detriment because I'm in the thing way too long. And there's no separation between Josh

and the baseball player. It's like, he's always the baseball player. We are planning a family trip to Greece this summer. I want to see some of the sites that I've talked about in my books. I want to do some research. And as we were looking at different hotels, I thought, you know what, let's just stay in an Airbnb.

Let's pick a bunch of different Airbnbs to stay in. We'll drive from one to the other. We'll get a sense of what it is actually like to be and live there. And we don't all wanna be on top of each other, two double beds in a hotel room or God forbid, you have to buy some super expensive suite. So we're really excited to do that.

And that's how we do most of our vacations because from cozy cabins to luxurious villas, Airbnb offers the chance to live like a local, to actually see and experience what that place is like, what it has to offer. And sometimes you meet cool hosts. Sometimes you meet your neighbors. So if you're planning a trip

and the idea of staying in a hotel doesn't sound like exciting, authentic experience, give living like a local a try and check out Airbnb. Every big moment starts with a big dream. But what happens when that big dream turns out to be a big flop. From Wondery and Atwill Media, I'm Misha Brown, and this is The Big Flop. Every week, comedians join me to chronicle the biggest flubs, fails, and blunders of all time, like Quibi. It's kind of like when you give yourself your own nickname

and you try to get other people to do it. And the 2019 movie adaptation of Cats. Like, if I'm watching the dancing and I'm noticing the feet aren't touching the ground, there's something wrong with the movie. Find out what happens when massive hype turns into major fiasco. Enjoy The Big Flop on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to The Big Flop early and ad free on Wondery Plus. Get started with your free trial at Wondery.com slash plus. And if you're like, hey, I work out a lot or I am doing this thing until it needs to be done,

that's a good place. If you're like, no, no, no, I have to wait for this guy to leave so then I can leave after him. Now, like form is leading function rather than the other way around. Like you're acting the part rather than like doing the part. You're trying to be seen as the thing. Like I've said this before, I bet like, you know, like coaches are notorious for like leave work in these insane hours.

I bet if all the, if there was like a union negotiation and coaches, like in college sports, like you can only, you only have this many workouts, whatever. If, if coaches were enforced rules like that, no fan would notice in a deterioration. It's just a persona of the coach who's, you know, whatever. Their families would notice because they'd actually be around, but I don't think they would suddenly like not be coaching as well. It's mostly an illusion.

Yeah, because I just like reflecting on the past season, I was injured a bunch, so I missed a lot of time, but for a seven o'clock game at home, I'd get to the field at 1130. Yeah. I'd do my route to my hitting routine at like 1.30. It's like, bro, you still got six and a half hours. You've been on for hours. On the whole day. Yeah, which, and I do think the younger you are,

you just have enough energy to just do that. But as you get older and you get more and more concentrated and potent in what you do, I do think you get in a place of sort of like conservation of energy. Like this talk I did on Wednesday, actually, it was funny, like they were like, get here at this time to go on.

And usually, and this is like one of the few areas I'm deliberately not punctual, like I'm a pretty punctual person, but they're always like, get here at 3.30, because you're going on at 4.30 or whatever. And then you actually go on at 4.45 and then you have to kind of sit around and like entertain these people backstage.

It's not like the trajectory I wanna be on like emotionally and energy wise. So I have to like consciously like be late even though I wanna be on time. But anyways, like this was an unusual one. There was a band playing, and then there was an awards ceremony. It was all this stuff beforehand.

And then I let them put the mic on too early, and then I had to go to the bathroom again. It was just like, I could just feel that the clock had started, but my performance wasn't, you want the clock starting in your performance to be relatively aligned. But I can imagine with your like anxiety

and your desire to like be seen as the good athlete, what you're doing is hitting start on the clock, like eight hours before you go in front of the crowd and do the thing. And that's a lot to ask of your mental acuity to say nothing of your physical acuity. Right. Was that Churchill that said conservation of energy? Yeah, his quote was, never stand when you can sit, never sit when you can lay down.

I actually just read that this morning when I was kind of preparing a little bit for this. But yeah, it's like if I get to the field three hours later, it's not like I'm gonna be less intentional or have less time to get my stuff in. But when I am there that early, it does create that sense of like, okay, what are you here for? Are you here for people to see you?

Do your routine early? Are you here for people to see you? Watching film for an hour? Like, are you actually getting better? Are you just wasting time and creating more anxiety within yourself now the game starts and you're like, oh gosh, I'm kind of tired because I've been on all day.

Well, and this is knowing whether you're an introvert or an extrovert, like the best definition I heard of this is like an introvert loses energy around people and extrovert gains energy around people. So if you're someone who finds social situations more draining than not, if you have to go do an extroverted thing, which is like a performance athletic or otherwise,

then knowing like, hey, I gotta protect this thing. So I'm spending the energy where I'm paid to spend the energy, not on the other shit. Right. It's like you and McConaughey were talking about, I think in his actor sense, like being unimpressive or like writing, he was talking about his writing being unimpressive.

It's like, how do I show up on a daily basis and try to be unimpressive to those around me? Because for so long, it's been ingrained in my head, like you have to do X, Y, and Z so people can see it and that's what's gonna make you a good player. Yeah, some football player told me once that he loves the videos that players start posting in the off season of their like impressive beach workouts

or whatever. And he's like, those are the guys I'm not worried about because the rest of us have been working out all season. All off season, you're just suddenly posting you running with a parachute at the beach or whatever. That's like performative training and not actual training. But yeah, how are you doing the thing as opposed to looking like you're doing the thing? And then I think some of us, it's like, we hear, oh, so-and-so did this.

So I'll just make that my thing. And maybe that's not. And it's not who you are. So what do you say, be uniquely yourself? Is that what McConaughey said? Yeah. So it's like how, first off, define who you wanna be. Like if my career, like we talked about last time

we talked, Memento Amore, like if my career ended, how do I wanna be defined? Yeah. Okay, I'll just live that way every day. Yeah. Don't worry about all the other nonsense. Like just live that like today. Can't worry about yesterday, can't worry about tomorrow,

I'll just do it today. And then as you stack those days, like you'll eventually be exactly what you want. Yeah, yeah. And there, I mean, there are certain things that play better and look better. Like, yeah, being the first one there, the last one to leave. But if that's not and look better, like yeah, being the first one there, the last one to leave.

But if that's not actually what is, asking yourself, is this moving the needle for me? Is this actually making a positive difference or is it affect? And then having the discipline to shut down some of that discipline is like a weird kind of paradoxical thing. But you have to go like, no, no, no,

I'm gonna stay home and do this or I'm going to rest or I'm going to recover. I'm not just going to subject myself to sort of these other obligations so I can do the thing that I, there's kind of an arrogance too, almost in thinking like, oh, I have an unlimited amount of resources to draw on here because you don't, you have a finite amount. And ideally you want to spend it where it makes the most difference. Yeah, and that's where you don't need to be there to myself. You don't need to be there 12 hours today.

Like you don't, you really don't. You got to perform at seven o'clock. So whatever you need to do beforehand, starting at 1130, like I find myself just wasting so much time. And that's the buildup. And so once you get to the game, you've worked it up so much that it's kind of life and death when it's like, even if I go 0-4 with 4Ks tonight,

I have tomorrow, it's okay. But like we talked about, I always thought it was my edge to be there for so long. But it's really, looking back on it, it becomes a detriment. Does it work sometimes? Absolutely. Yeah.

But more than not, baseball is a game of failure. It's not gonna work. So it's like, why do you continuously do something, especially reflecting on it, why do you continuously do something when you can find a new hobby that just like potentially clears your mind throughout the morning. And then when you could find a new hobby that just potentially clears your mind throughout the morning.

And then when you get to the field, it's like, okay, now I flip the switch. It's not wake up. You could have been playing pool at your house or reading or doing anything. I remember I was in this one radio host once when I was a kid and he did a two hour radio show like four days a week. And he was like, they asked me to get here like 30 minutes before the show each day. And he's like, I told him if I have to get here 30 minutes before the show every day, that's like doing an extra hour of the show one day a week that, you know, he's like,

I'll get here five minutes before the show starts. And like, it is funny because you're arguing over such a small amount of time. But it's like, if what you do is hard and requires all of you, knowing what that is, and then kind of, I think the larger lesson, if you're not, is what is the main thing that you're paid to do? And then basically everything else is superfluous. If it helps you do that thing better, you should do it.

And if it doesn't, you have to have the discipline to kind of say no to that. Because you gotta protect the thing, because it's really hard. Yeah, and that's where I know it's gonna be a challenge for me, because once spring, like it's great to think about this right now, but as soon as spring training starts, it's like, am I getting up at 5.30 to get there at six?

Like, what am I gonna be doing? But that is where the discipline's gonna have to come in. And that's where we were talking about the coffee shop. That's become something that I love to do because it gets me out of the house and it gets me into this head space where it's like, okay, I can just tune the world out and just kind of throw myself into reading

or writing or something. And that 30 minutes, that hour that I spend there, it's like, oh, that was so beautiful. And it was for me, it wasn't for anything else. The problem for me is it's like, when I'm with my family, like I still mentally have to leave, right? So like, I know, hey, if I get there at the time they say I'm supposed to get here,

or if I just even get there when I wanna get there, it won't lead to like sort of peak performance. But I can't just be regular here. So I have to like leave. I have to find some transition process that allows me to kill time, but just not in the green room of the thing or whatever. Getting into the zone,

everyone has a weird way of doing it. There's no normal ways to get into the zone. You kind of like ease yourself into it. It's like a thing you're kind of slipping into like a cold pool or something. Right. Yeah, I mean, you see it in a locker room, there's 10 guys gonna start that night

and all 10 of them have a different way to be ready to perform at seven o'clock. Yeah. They're all about to do the same thing. Literally. At the same time, but they have to work their way into it differently. They all prepare differently.

And that's what is so unique about a locker room and I'm sure it's unique in all sports, is how guys do it. And once failure sets in, because that's inevitable, how do they change? Or are they the same? And that's where you'll see the veterans,

like some of the vets we have, they're very steady. And that leads to more steady performance. But guys like me that are younger, we start failing and we're like, oh, we've got to change this, this, this, this, this. That I guess the changing of the routine kind of can throw off performance too. Like we were talking about with, if I don't do X, Y, and Z, I'm not going to perform. It's like releasing that, releasing those thoughts is something that I've been working on forever, but it's never been more clear to me than right now that like that

stuff doesn't matter. Feelings don't matter. Just go play the game. And with reading the book, it's like, don't give any weight to what you're doing. Like I go into the cage to do my routine. It's not like every day I have to hit 50 balls exactly like this. It's like, no, just go in there and find the flow and then you're good to go regardless of what the result was. Right. And then go play.

Same with dealing with failure in the game because it's going to happen. It's really hard. But fouling a pitch off that you should hit or striking out three or four times. Like it doesn't matter. What's funny, there's a line from Epictetus where he's saying that, we don't know exactly what game he's referring to, but he says that like a great philosopher is like a great ballplayer in that they don't label throws good or bad.

They just catch it or throw it, you know? And that sort of tendency to want to put things in categories or to have an opinion about it, to me that's the distinction between like being in or out of the zone or the moment. When you're in it, you're just like, oh, I'm running to get this ball and then I'm throwing it back.

And then what are they gonna do? That's the back and forth of it. But when you're like, oh, I'm sucking today, or oh, they're sucking today, or oh, they're sucking today, or oh, like in golf, the second you go like, I'm really playing well today, that's like death. You know? It's over. When I'm writing, all's good.

When I'm like, is this a productive day, unproductive day? This is gold. Am I gonna use this? None of that. First off, that just takes mental energy. And so every thought that you have towards that is just not more words that you're writing. But it also means you're not fully immersed in the thing. You have one foot in and one foot out.

Right, yeah. And I mean, that's what taken from the end of game of tennis so far, it was talking about like the tennis player kept missing their backhand and they're like telling themselves your backhand sucks today or whatever. And it's like that takes you out. Like you're out of the performance. But if you just play, you don't even think about it,

you're probably hitting shots and you're not like, oh, I'm gonna hit this down the line. It's like, you just do it. I have a super, like, cause I run and like when I can like feel something in my shoe, I'm like, I'm gonna get a blister. I feel like I'm willing it into existence by thinking about it,

but if I wasn't thinking about it, it's probably not true, it would probably happen either way, but there's some part of me where I think that by focusing on it, I know it's gonna be a problem. And if I could forget that that's happening, it would be fine. It's like, like last night I was like reading some article about like flu cases or whatever,

and I was like, the next thing I know I'm like, do I feel, you know, like, because I thought about the thing, now you have an awareness. It's like when you feel a bug crawling on you, then you feel them everywhere. Right. You wanna be just, how quick you can get at forgetting things is like a magical part of performance.

And that's what's so crazy about hitting in general. You'll have somebody watching you, right? Let's say they're struggling, you're performing well. They'll come up to you and go, hey, what are you doing with your front shoulder there? Next thing you know, that's all you can think about. And you have no idea what that thing's doing, but now you have this awareness

and it's taken you out of the game. And in the book too, it was like, if the other person's playing really well, walk by them and ask them, like, what's working on your backhand today? And then they'll tell you like, ooh, I'm hitting it out front. Next thing you know, they're like over-conscious

and they're like, oh gosh, now they can't hit it. But it's like drawing awareness to something that you necessarily don't think about. It doesn't matter, but now you have that awareness and you're like, oh no, here we go. What does it feel like to connect with a pitch? When everything goes perfect, you kind of don't even feel it, truly.

Like when it's perfect, perfect, right on the barrel, it just kind of goes. But that's kind of like the flow of it all. There's definitely days where you try to manhandle it and that's where you end up breaking your bat. You end up- When you try to hit it really hard. Yeah.

When you're trying to do way too much with it. Especially me for years, exit velocity is a big stat. So I've always chased hitting the ball harder. Is that something you can consciously influence? No. No. Not at all. And honestly, you can't really change it. It's kind of something like you either have it or you don't.

And yeah, I've chased it forever. And so you start trying to swing harder or you start trying to manipulate ball flight, meaning like, I'm going to pull this ball in the air to left field. You can control that to some extent, but for the most part, if the pitch isn't perfect, you're not gonna be able to do what you're trying to do. So for me, coming out of college, I did need to make some swing adjustments. So like having a little mental awareness was good,

but now I've created an over awareness to that. I've like overdone it to where I have to go back and get back to the fundamentals that got me here in the first place because I've been trying to do something so much and trying so hard to do. And yeah, now I just lost complete thought of the question. No, the image I have in my mind that I'm going for

when I'm writing or working on a thing is, for some reason, and I haven't played baseball since I was like going for when I'm writing or working on a thing is for some reason, and I haven't played baseball since I was like 10, is like a batter connecting with the ball and that like crack and that sound and that just sort of like, I don't know why it is, but that's the image I have in my mind and that's what I sort of think about and that's not what I'm aiming for because it's not really something you're aiming for, but that's kind of this what I sort of think about. And it's not what I'm aiming for,

because it's not really something you're aiming for, but that's kind of this, I don't think about like, how do I make something that really does well or like that really helps people or whatever. I just think like all I'm trying to do is connect with the ball. I like that sound. That's just kind of the mental image I have for like

what a successful day is, is that connection. So I've always wondered what it actually feels like. I mean, I've been a bad occasion and stuff. I know what it feels like, but at some level doing it in a major league ballpark against someone who's throwing a pitch at you that again, at a physics level, you shouldn't be able to hit.

Like someone is trying as hard as they can at a peak level of human performance to not make it possible for you to do what you are trying to do, and then you have done it. I think that's like the magic that I'm imagining. Yeah, I mean, especially when you hit a homer or something. Yeah. And everyone talks about how, like, they black out.

For me, when stuff like that happens, it's almost like there's a split second where I don't hear anything and everything really slows down. And I'm assuming that's the zone that everybody talks about. It's just like a, it's a split second thing. It's not like this thing that lasts for a very long time. But I know when that happens, I'm like, oh, that was perfect.

But I don't know how to do it all the time. I don't know if anyone really does. I mean, the best who ever did it could only do it like 40% of the time for one season. Right. Ted Williams, 407. But it's like, how do you find that? And is the mental clarity really diving into self to the doer, does that create it more often? And it's not necessarily gonna produce more results, right? Like I could still hit the best ball ever and they could catch it.

Yeah, right. And they could do whatever. But how- I think that's part of why I like the metaphor, which is like all you can do is get under the ball and hit it as far and as hard as you're able to do. And then you can run, which you're supposed to do, but no other part of the process is in your control. Like what they're doing and how they're gonna respond to it is no longer up to you.

And so there's something just about like, okay, so the purity is you gotta connect. And then sometimes it's going over the back wall. Sometimes it's going to shock you how short it ends up. Sometimes it veers right over and into foul. Sometimes they they pull it off the back wall or like they they steal one from you. Sometimes you get thrown out at second because you get greedy. Like there's all the different things that could happen,

but like the purity of the moment that you're trying to go for as a creator or maybe as an athlete is just the last part of it that's up to you. Have you ever wondered how a circus performer could become the most powerful woman in the Byzantine Empire? Even The Royals is a podcast from Wondery that pulls back the curtain on royal families — from ancient empires to modern monarchs — to show you the darker side of what it

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the preparation. I could prepare all day for this pitcher and how I believe he's going to attack me. But as soon as I step in that box, I have to throw it out the window because they're 99% of the time, they're not going to attack me that way. Like I could, you know, every once in a while you'll get a gut feeling, you're like, oh, he's going to throw this pitch. Yeah. But the odds of you being correct is, I wanna say zero.

Yeah. Like, and if you- Statistically, you're not gonna be able to guess. Right. Yeah. And be successful. Like you're gonna guess every once in a while and get it right, but to be consistently successful,

you have to throw it out the window. So it's like, that's a whole nother thing. It's like prepare, but like we talked about, throw it out. And I think maybe I'm attracted to the elusiveness of it, right? Like a great hitter, you know, like hitting 200 is pretty decent, right? So somewhere between 20 and 40%, that's like the band that like the best to do it are even hoping for and understanding that, okay, so most of what I make, most of what I write, most of what I record isn't going to connect

at all. Like I'm just going to whiff, you know? And then a couple of times you're going to connect, but it's going to be, you know, like you're going to get your singles, then your doubles. And then sometimes you connect exactly when all the other factors line up and that's where you get those like amazing results. But that, you know, that's elusive,

even with the elusive parts. Yeah, and now there's so many statistics. You literally feel like a walking statistic. There's so many dang statistics in baseball. But like we talked about earlier, it's like you can do everything right. Literally every single thing right and they catch it. And it's like, okay, how do I view that?

Do I get frustrated and do I say, oh, it's a negative moment? It's like you literally did everything right, but you got out. And then you can do legitimately everything wrong. I remember I had a pinch hit at bat, wasn't ready for it, wasn't prepared. I go up there. I don't even think I had my wrist tape on.

I was just completely out of it and I ended up getting hit. By being out of it where you were actually in it because you didn't get to do your stuff? Right. Yeah. But then I did, my swing was terrible. I was swinging at pitches that I had no business swinging at and the result ended up being good for the club and it was like, huh, what just happened? I literally did everything wrong and I hit a single

and the guy scored and then all the days I prepared to be ready, you struggle and it's like, golly, this game sucks sometimes but that's where I'm trying to learn and develop routines, especially early in the day to go to the coffee shop, to go read, to do something for myself because the amount of intentionality I'm gonna have isn't gonna change, but I can delay flipping that switch an hour longer, two hours longer,

and now I'm not wasting time sitting in my locker, sitting in the film room, twiddling my thumbs, scrolling social media or whatever. It's like I'm actually intentional with that little time and then switch. What's weird to me about baseball, unlike the other sports that I've sort of gotten to go behind the scenes on, it's one of the only ones where you practice where you perform.

Almost all the other sports, the facility is in like the boonies somewhere and then the arena's where you practice where you perform. Almost all the other sports, the facility is in like the boonies somewhere and then the arena is where you go to work. So it must be a little weird. I could actually see on some level getting there earlier cause you're like, this is my home also. Like here, this place, this is where I write every day. So like I'm very comfortable here and I can feel like when I'm stressed or if I feel like I'm behind or I feel like I got something, I'm like, I'm very comfortable here. And I can feel like when I'm stressed

or if I feel like I'm behind or I feel like I got something, I'm like, I'm gonna go just do my, I'm gonna go into the rhythm, which is different than, you know, like when I have to go perform. That's a different, that's an unfamiliar place, or that's like, that's the showtime place. But yeah, baseball, like they just have the one place. And it's not super nice usually.

Like it's like these, cause you're in the bowels of a stadium as opposed to a practice facility. So it's usually like this like sort of cinder block like bunker thing as opposed to a, like I remember when I spoke to the Seahawks, you're like, oh, like the guy who owned Microsoft built this. Not only does it have like the best tech,

but he was like, well, what do my, what does like a great office feel like? I'm gonna make, this is their office. I'm gonna make them their thing. I've never felt that in a baseball stadium. No, baseball and our stadium is unbelievable. It's almost like a cathedral. Yeah, it was open to 2020, but it's beautiful.

But yeah, the games at seven, we practice at three o'clock. And that's our practice. So we don't actually really practice. It's like a gear up for the game, early batting practice, ground balls, whatever. But you don't actually ever practice to where football you have all week to prepare. Basketball you have a day in between

to go shoot around at the stadium you're going to play at. For us, it's like, show up and play today. But that's where developing those routines is so vital because you don't need to go out and take BP every day. Maybe once, twice, a week maybe. If you feel off and you just need to get the backdrop of the stadium, go do it. But it's not something you need to divulge in every day.

But kind of what you were talking about, being comfortable, I was like, yeah, that's where I was comfortable. So I'd literally wake up and as soon as I woke up, I'm in the car going to the field. But at the same time, that did create some anxiety of leading up to the performance. Now I was injured too.

So I was doing a bunch, trying to get in to do my rehab before the other guys got in, trying to be time conscious. Especially when I started playing again, cause I had to do X, Y, Z of things to try to be ready to play. But yeah, it's like, get comfortable in these other routines for me, and then flip the switch on two hours later,

cause it's not that big of a deal. 11.30 to 1.30 is not a big deal to get there and be prepared. But I've done something for myself. I've kind of released the thoughts. And one thing I took away from the new year, new you challenge was before bed every night, writing down all this stuff that like frustrated me

or made me mad or just thoughts I can't get rid of and burning them. Like that physical release has been amazing for me. Yeah, how do you wipe this slate clean? Cause you think about what you're accumulating in the course of a day. And then you think about what you're accumulating in the course of a week, in the course of a year.

It starts to be a lot that you're carrying. It's like, shit, you're aware. It's like, you're younger than me, but like there used to be this thing you would do on a computer called a defrag. And it was like this thing you would run and it would just like, I don't know exactly how it worked. But the point is your computer would just start to be slow

after a while and you would run this program and it would combine things or get rid of things that it would partially delete it, it would overwrite stuff. And then suddenly your computer would be working better. And then what I took from that is like, oh, there's just shit running in the background or there's things that I've accumulated, I'm wearing. It'd be like if you never took today's clothes off,

you just put on new clothes every day. Suddenly, like very soon, you'd have like this much clothes on. Right. And so how do you kind of start fresh and get rid of stuff? And the faster you can do that, the better. And then probably even like in the course of a game, like what is it a good game?

You might get up there four times. Four to five times max. So, but by the fifth time you have four other ones in your head just from that day, let alone, you played five games in a row. That's a lot to be carrying. It's definitely a lot. And that's what they say in baseball,

is being able to turn the page quick. But for me, I was always surprised it suppressed all of it and just like, oh, I'll deal with it later. Later never comes. You're 500 at bats end of the season and you're like, oh gosh, I've never dealt with this. But that's where that was very eye-opening to me because I was like, oh gosh, I've never dealt with this. But that's where that was very eye opening to me because I was like, oh, release it.

And I pray about it too, and I go through it, and I release it, but it's like, oh, this is actually really good to actually deal with it and let it go, and now I'm going to bed with a clean conscious. I'm not going to bed and your mind starts racing and you're like, oh, I shouldn't have swung at that pitch or I wish I would have swung at that pitch.

It's like, no, it's done, it's over. You can't change it for one, two, tomorrow's a new day. Yeah, you're getting a fresher path. I mean, the pitch count turns over. So like, why are you acting as if you're not O&O? Right, and that's where if you don't clear it, or even at bat to at bat, if you don't try and forget it, and you get hung up on it, now you're thinking,

oh, what, last time he did X, Y, Z to me, he might do that again. Next thing you know, he doesn't do that, and you're all discombobulated. Or you're still like, oh, my hands need to do this, this time. And again, you start thinking internally, you lose. And obviously everybody can do different things. Like there could be somebody that can think

about internal whatever. And some people are just so naturally gifted and amazing that they don't have any of these problems. And most of us are not those people. I don't think Bo Jackson thought about a lot of these things. There's sometimes like freaks of nature who are just whatever. And yeah, chances are you're not that person.

No, I over, like I definitely- I mean, any of us are not that person. Yeah, I overthink, I overanalyze. It's a good thing, but it's also kryptonite. Especially in a game of failure. Cause then you're trying to figure out what's wrong every time you don't succeed. And when you're doing that, let's say you have a bad week

and that's 20 straight at bats where you suck. It's like, oh gosh, now I'm thinking 20 different thoughts in one at bat, or in one swing right now. And it's like, no, no, I gotta turn off all of that. I gotta surrender all of that because, for one, that ain't gonna help me. And two, you wake up every day, your body's different than the day

before. Let's say you've played 17 in a row, your legs are heavy. Like you have to figure out who you are that day. Not, oh, well, I did this in spring training when my body felt unbelievable after four months off. Right. And I'm trying to do that in August when I've been grinding for four months. Like it's just not the same. 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 would really help the show.

We appreciate it. I'll see you next episode. If you like The Daily Stoic and thanks for listening, you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music. And before you go, would you tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey on Wondery.com slash survey.