>> Michael Huber: Welcome to the Freshman Foundation Podcast, helping you make the jump from high school athletics to the collegiate level and beyond. With your host, Michael Huber.
>> Mike Huber: What's the secret to overcoming adversity like a pro? Welcome to the Freshman Foundation Podcast, where we help young athletes become confident problem solvers in sport and life. In this episode, I spoke with diamond hall, mental performance coach for the Baltimore Orioles. We explored mental performance philosophies, elite preparation, and the habits that separate champions from the rest. Our conversation uncovers practical tools and strategies to help young athletes develop elite thinking habits. Excited for this conversation? Let's build your foundation with diamondhull. Hey, everyone, it's Mike Huber. Thank you for listening to the Freshman Foundation Podcast. Before we start, I want to share more valuable content with you. Please subscribe to my newsletter by visiting michaelvhuber.com Newsletter Every week you'll receive two simple emails. On Sundays, I'll share a short story about my work with young athletes to illustrate the power of mental performance coaching. On Tuesdays, I share three valuable nuggets to help you be a better athlete, parent or coach. Thank you for subscribing. I hope you find it valuable. Now let's get on to the podcast. Hey, Diamond. How are you doing?
>> Michael Huber: Fantastic.
>> Mike Huber: Great. Thanks for joining me here. It's great to have you. We don't really know each other that well. We connected on Instagram and we talked about, hey, let's. Let's fire up a podcast. So let's do it. We're here in the studio here in New Jersey, so why don't you tell. Tell me a little bit about yourself.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah, I think, for me, my story. My story began in this space when I was 14 years old. And I remember. I remember like it was yesterday. I was staring at the sky and I couldn't move from my neck down. A few moments before, I had dove head first with a football player, Put all of my time, all of my effort, all of my energy into the game of football, was one of the top running backs in the country, and dove head first for a loose fumble and boom. from the neck down, was temporarily paralyzed. So at the time, I had no idea what was going on. All I can remember is staring at the sky and my teammates, my teammates looking at me and saying, hey, diamond, get up, get up. And one of my teammates, Ryan Bayer, was to the left of me. And, he looks at me, he goes, diamond, get up. And I remember looking over at him and I told him, I can't move. And I remember his eyes Starting to tear up. Because in that moment he realized what was happening. And when I saw him start to tear up, I started to tear up. And so I had, at the age of 14, I had to come to a conclusion that, hey, that was it, that was it. Like, I've put all my time, all my effort into this game, but now I've seen this happen before. Like I'm going to have to be staring at the sky.
>> Michael Huber: Staring at the ceiling for the rest of my life. Somebody's gonna have to feed me through a tube. And so I get to the, I get to the hospital, they rush me to the hospital, et cetera, et cetera. Can't feel anything. And I'm going like in my head I'm like, wow, what in the world? How is this happening? This can't be happening. This is like a dream. And ended up getting my feeling back 24 hours later. And I remember a doctor coming in and he said, diamond, I've got good news for you and I've got bad news for you. I was like, all right, Doc, well, let's start with, let's start with the, let's start with the good news. Struggling right now, you know, I'm just now getting my feeling back. Let's start with the good news. And he goes, well, the good news is you're moving. Your hands work, your body works, your feet work, you can actually move. It wasn't supposed to be this way, this was supposed to be permanent. And in that moment I became really grateful. Felt this rush of gratitude throughout my body. And then we moved on to the bad news. Bad news is I remember, I remember, I remember him standing there and he was like, bad news is we can't clear to play football anymore. And for me in that moment, I remember getting lightheaded, I had to sit down and I remember looking over at the doctor and going, look, look, I've spent all of my, all of my life, like I put all of my time, all of my effort, all of my energy into this game. Like I'm supposed to get to the NFL to take care of my family.
>> Michael Huber: Like, this is what I was built and this is who I am. This is what I'm built to do. This is what I was built to do. This is who I am. This is where I'm going. Like, you can't just take this away from me. I was like, why can't I be clear to play the game? And he goes, well, you have something called congenital stenosis. And I remember thinking to myself, well, what's congenital stenosis? And he goes, congenital stenosis is narrowing of fluid in your spine. Everybody has a certain amount of fluid around their spine and you have less than the average, what the average human being has. And I remember him pulling up the scans on the screen and I started getting lightheaded again. I had to sit down and it was like my whole world was just crumbling. Few months later, dad ends up, dad ended up, my dad ends up going to, he ends up going to jail. And so there goes like my whole world was just crashing on top of me. And the main thing that I remember was that two month timeframe I had to make a decision on what I was going to do.
>> Michael Huber: Like I can't play football anymore. I've got these gifts, I've got to use them in some way, shape, form or fashion. So picked up the game of basketball and I'd been playing basketball football for my whole life, been running track and so I was like, okay, the NBA, that's what it is. That's how I'm going to take care of my family. I'm going to put all my time on my, I'm going to get there earlier than everybody, just like I did with football. I'm going to be the last one to leave. I'm going to do everything. I'm going to study, study, study, apply, apply, apply. And a year later the same thing happened with basketball. And it just, the whole thing ran back over paralyzed from my neck down on the court. Yeah, but this time I knew what was going on. Knew what was going on.
>> Mike Huber: Right, right.
>> Michael Huber: And was like, okay, there goes basketball.
>> Mike Huber: So, so what happened? So, so what happened? Like what was the, so when it was the event like on the basketball court.
>> Michael Huber: So I was driving, I was driving to the lane and tripped up and then went headfirst into somebody's chest. And then immediately everything from here down just totally went away. Staring at the sky again, staring at the, at the, at the ceiling in the stadium. And it's like, man, there goes basketball. And I started thinking, this time I knew what was going on. So I started thinking, process. Okay, what's next? What do I like? What are the other options? So I went through the whole nine yards. They pulled up the, the thing on the screen Again, the MRIs and hey, look, we can't clear you to play. So it was baseball. So started picking up baseball and I had to play catch up. As you and I, you and I both know baseball is such a different sport than football and basketball. From a, from a skill standpoint, from a physical skill standpoint, and from a mental skill standpoint, definitely you can't take the same mentality that you have in football and basketball and apply that to baseball. Just, it just won't, it just won't be as effective.
>> Mike Huber: Right.
>> Michael Huber: And, and you know, five tool player. But the skill I had to, I had to play a lot of catch up. I remember. And this is what started the journey for me. one of my teammates, at alter after practice was over, he was like, hey, I want to give you something. I was like, what you got? And he gives me heads up. Baseball by ken Riviza and Dr. Tom Hansen. And he was like, if you study this, if you read this from COVID to cover and you apply everything that's in here, it's gonna totally change the game for you. It's like, okay. So I did. And as soon as I got to the first few pages, I was like, why isn't anybody talking about this stuff? This stuff is the key. I needed this when I played football and basketball. Like, everybody needs to hear it. Why is no one talking about these mental skills that exist that allow the best of the best to compete at the highest level possible? So I started studying that. And then he gave me a book a few weeks later called, 360 degree leader by John Maxwell. So now I've been introduced to the mental performance space, mental skills and then leadership John Maxwell. And from there my bookshelf just started to grow. I could not, I could not stop reading. I could not stop studying. I could not stop applying these things to my life.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: So Fast Forward ended up, ended up catching up to my peers and, got a scholarship to Lincoln Trail. And when I got there, built a great relationship with Kevin Bowers, our head coach at the time. And, he gave me a book, well, a series of books by Harvey Dorfman. The Mental Game of baseball, the mental ABCs of pitching. And then what was the last one? The Mental side of Hitting. And he was like, listen, study these. It's going to take your game to the next level. And so the theme m that I'm noticing throughout the course of my career is that the thing that takes people to the next level is the mental side of the game. Like when you study the Tom Brady's, when you study the Michael Jordans, when you study the LeBron James, when you study the Ray Lewis's, when you study the Jeff Bezos, when you study the, like the Best of the Best in any industry, whether it's business or sport. They've got a competitive advantage up top the real estate in between their ears. And so did that and then got a scholarship to, got a scholarship to Grambling State. Two years later, got to Grambling State, came across another great coach in James Cooper, who's now a manager within the Yankees organization. And he, poured into me so much. you know, I'm coming in as a junior, this is my draft year after being at a juco for two years. Supposed to get drafted this year. And he poured into me. He gave me relentless. And then he gave me body, mind mastery Relentless by Tim Grover, who was as, you know, yeah, we read.
>> Mike Huber: A lot of the same things.
>> Michael Huber: Kobe Bryant's guy, Michael Jordan's guy, breaks it down into three different types of competitors. And I'm like, he wrote this book about me. Like I'm a, like I'm a cleaner. I've got to reach out to him, I've got to pick his brain, etc. Etc. So shoot him. Like two or three emails don't get a response back. I stayed consistent. 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11th email, get in contact with him, we jump on the phone, he pours into me and just continue to learn that way. Like, I would read something and I would reach out to the author. Most people, like, oh, diamond, they're not going to get back to you. But in my mind I'm like, I'm one of the most resourceful people, resourceful people that I've ever come across. And I love talking about the idea of being resourceful because most people will say to themselves, oh, like, like I don't have the resources to be able to, to be able to do this, to be able to do that, to be able to do this thing over here. But when we all have access to the same resources, like we have the same 24 hours that Helen Keller had. We have the same 24 hours that all of these people who we look up like. And so what I learned was, okay, if I read something that resonates with me, I'm reach out to the author so I can pick their brain. and so that's what I did. I had a great conversation with Tim Grover and the other book, this one was a very fascinating book. Body, Mind Mastery by Dan Millman. M. So this guy is the guy that Phil Jackson, he would bring in to work with, the Bulls, Michael Jordan, that group, championship group. And so you hear like, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, giving credit to Phil Jackson, all the Zen master, all of those things. But that book talked about how you can build your self awareness to the point where, you're just really aware of the present moment and the idea of relaxation and what that can do for performance. And so when I put two and two together, like, oh, Michael Jordan, not only he had this relentless mentality, but then he combined that with this poise, this elite poise, to when the moment became the moment. He had already seen it in his mind. He recognized that this was the moment. And then he dominated every single time. Same M thing with Kobe Bryant. And you listen to their interviews and they allude to some of these things. So read those two books. And then I was hitting three. I remember, like it was yesterday. I was hitting 365 junior year. And, the day before what I'm about to share with you happened, I went four for four on tv, MLB Network. After I went four, four, I'm like, perfect. Like, we're doing great. We're in the moment. My process is nice. I'm gonna continue, like cranking up those inputs that are working when it comes to my pre pitch routine. All of those things, yes. And tore my ACL in the outfield the next day. So here we are again, facing another piece of adversity. Now I remember that night, Coach Cooper, he comes in the hotel and he looks at me and I'm doing like all of the. All of the. At this time, I don't know, it's torn. I'm doing all of the exercises that they gave me to do, like after the game, et cetera, et cetera. And he comes in and he looks at me and he starts tearing up. And in that moment I was like, he knows something that I don't. And I'm just like, I'm just being who I am, being relentless and like, all right, these are the exercises to get me back on the field. Perfect. I'm gonna do these. So find out that, month a little bit later, March 12, my birthday, that it was fully torn. Got a call from, the doctor. It's fully torn. You're gonna have to go through the process, et cetera, et cetera. This is my draft year. I'm like, ah. The cool part about this is when I reflect on my childhood, my mom, she was a psychologist, and she built my whole foundation of my brain on positive psychology. So whenever you experience some form of adversity, you find a way to flip it into a positive. You find A way to reframe it into something that you can learn from or something that's going to get you better in some way, shape, form or fashion. So that's how my brain was operating at the time. and so the career started coming to an end. Finished up at Georgia Southwestern State, was still super passionate about the leadership side. Was still studying, the bookshelf was still growing. Same thing on the, on the mental skill side. So when I got to Georgia Southwestern State, became a player coach. I started doing like workshops with, with our, with our coaches, with our players on the mental side of the game, on leadership, on team cohesion, all these things just out of pure like love for sure. Love for the stuff. Right. And so after that year was up, came back across Jeff Mercer, who I had come across during the recruiting process when I was at the junior college, who he was at the time. He was a, he was an assistant coach for Western Kentucky. And he remember, he remembered me like being in the dugout reading Heads Up Baseball beforehand and like highlighting the number one thing that I was going to put into practice that game and then watching me go and do it. And they were huge on the mental side of the game. Had worked with Ryan Kane and like, like, like very, very big on the mental side of the game.
>> Mike Huber: Sure.
>> Michael Huber: And came back across him and he was like, hey, I want to do something that's never been done before in college baseball. I was like, what's that? And he goes, I want you to be the first full time mental skills coach on staff in the history of Division 1 baseball. I was like, I'm interested. And what we did and what I learned there was how to build mental skill systems and leadership skills systems around three things that he wanted. Number one, he wanted our guys to get drafted. Number two, he wanted our guys to be the most mentally tough and together group in all of baseball. He was like, look, we don't have the same resources that Stanford has, we don't have the same resources that LSU has. But when we come across these guys, we want those two things to be the thing that separates. And so I did that. I built those, I built our systems around, our guys getting drafted around, making the most mentally tough guys we could possibly develop and then winning championships. That for me, learning how to take what I had learned and then reverse engineer from those three things.
>> Michael Huber: Totally changed the game for me as a mental performance coach.
>> Mike Huber: So from a systems perspective, right, because we know. And systems. Yeah. When I know, what I know the Little bit I know about you and what we both know just in terms of the work that we do.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: You know, mental performance coaching at some level has to be tailored to the individual. Right. So system sort of implies, like, hey, this is going to be kind of an umbrella over the top of everything. Right. But we also know that there are certain critical elements within systems that can apply to everybody that uses them. Right. So in those instances of we want to get you drafted, we want you to be the mentally toughest players, and we want to win championships, what are some of the key elements of those systems?
>> Michael Huber: So, number one, it was designing the curriculum. And to your point, there are golden. There are golden rules in leadership, teamwork and mental performance that will work across the board in business and in sport with the highest level athletes, and athletes that aren't at the highest level. But I want. But they want to get to the next level. So we built it around those golden. Those golden rules.
>> Mike Huber: Okay.
>> Michael Huber: And one of those golden rules, specifically within the mental skills. Within the mental skills piece. I mean, we had so many within our curriculum. But I think the number one. The number one golden rule that really made a big impact was, I would have to say it was learning how to relax to get results. Like, Mercer recruited. He recruited wrestling guys, football guys. Intense, intense, tough.
>> Mike Huber: The demands of those sports are different than a sport like baseball.
>> Michael Huber: Totally different. But when you take a guy like those guys that we recruited, like guys with Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, like, that kind of level of intensity and grit and toughness and desire to win, and then you combine it with this ability to relax, to be calm in the moment so you can get the outputs that you want and learn about the inputs that get those outputs. That was the one input that I saw had the biggest impact with those. Like, what do I mean by relaxing to get results? Like, oh, everybody talks about relaxing, et cetera, et cetera. Everybody talks about breathing to succeed. Right. But what does that actually. Well, when you actually execute those things in the right place at the right moment in the right time, specifically within a game of baseball, and we dominate the time in between pitches. When you dominate the time in between pitches, that's when you actually win pitches. Everybody says, compete one pitch at a time. I get it. I get it. But in order to compete one pitch at a time, you have to win the time in between pitches. And that was the number. That's the number. Because what does breathing actually do? When you breathe the right way? And Andrew Huberman talks about this like the double inhale long exhale. What that does is so many different things. Number one, it relaxes your body. Number two, it brings you to the present moment. Number three, it gets oxygen. It gets oxygen to the brain. So you can make better decisions. So you can make better decisions. Decision, making is huge.
>> Mike Huber: Yes. Yeah. You're speaking my language, right? And it applies to a lot of different sports, but baseball, like, I talk to the baseball players that I work with about, what are you doing with your time in the dugout? What are you doing with your time in the on deck circle? What are you doing with your time in between pitches? Right. How are you mentally preparing yourself for the next pitch? And I think a lot of times, especially for younger players who are a little less experienced, the default is physical or mechanical. It's not getting my mind into the right place to compete on the next pitch. They don't have the ability to do that. And I think it's really hard to get them to understand, how important it is to use that time in between. Because now you're getting this, you're developing a level of consistency that every single moment that you have is geared towards the goal. Which is what? To be completely present, to go execute in the moment. That doesn't just happen randomly. You have to practice that over and over and over again. Because as you know, like, you even referenced this in your story, right? Like, you didn't say it this way, but I'm thinking it. When you got injured that first time, you go back to the beginning of the story, your mind is already going to the future of, what does this mean? How, what's going to happen to me? How do I protect myself? The same happens on the baseball field. We're starting to go into the future. Like, what's going to happen if I strike out? Or what's going to happen if I make a mistake? No, I don't want, I can't stop it from going there, but once I notice it goes there, I got to get back to. Let's get back to the most important thing, which is right now, right now.
>> Michael Huber: Being able to dominate moment to moment. Do you know who's really good at this? And it makes, it makes sense that he signed a $700 million contract. Ohtani. There's a, when he was 16. I don't know if you've seen it. And if you're watching this right now, I want you to stop watching this. I want you to press pause and I want you to Google Ohtani goal setting sheet, especially for my Baseball guys, whether you're a big leaguer, whether you're in triple A, double A high, no M. Like, he's got a full set and he's got two sections that are very powerful. One of the sections is mental toughness where he, he literally mapped out and defined eight behaviors that he wanted to master in order to get him to the goal that he had in the middle. I mean, it's just a fantastic example.
>> Mike Huber: It sounds like, right?
>> Michael Huber: And then, and then you're like, oh, this is, this is the same guy who the 5050 Club. What? And then not like 700 million. This is a $700 million man, which means he has $700 million habits internally and externally. And when you go back and you look at what he has down when he was 16 years old, like, I can only imagine what it looks like now. But that's their culture. They study and they master everything above the neck, like from, from when they were this big.
>> Mike Huber: Right.
>> Michael Huber: But we struggle with that over here.
>> Mike Huber: We do. But I also think, like, you know, you probably know the difference between those players who were elite and a word that we throw around. I think way too much. The players who are elite are the ones who are the elite preparers, the ones who are willing to do everything it takes to succeed versus the people who want to succeed. But then they, they look at something like what you just described, like having this very detail oriented goal development process and they just go, I don't need to do that.
>> Michael Huber: Which means what? That they, they, they say they want.
>> Mike Huber: To succeed, but they don't really want to.
>> Michael Huber: The best of the best. I saw a video of Tom Brady in Bill Belichick's office. This is a video from when, he was with the Patriots and they were preparing together for the upcoming Sunday. Just those two. Like, these were the two best. Like one of the best coaches to ever do it. One of the best.
>> Mike Huber: The best quarterback, great minds.
>> Michael Huber: And they are preparing while everybody else is doing whatever they were doing at that time. Those two are in his office preparing for the upcoming Sunday.
>> Michael Huber: The best of the best. To your point. They prepare better than everyone, mentally and physically. And it shows the results that they get. It shows. LeBron James partnered with the Calm app, spends how much on his body every year? What?
>> Mike Huber: Millions.
>> Michael Huber: And he's 40 years old, running up and down the court in his underwear, dunking. Like, what are we, like what are we talking? Like, the evidence is there from the best of the best in every single industry. Yeah, it's a matter of getting the people, whether it's. Whether it's. Whether it's athletes, whether it's somebody in business, whether it's the everyday. The everyday person. If you want to be the best version of yourself, you've got to be willing to do what everybody else is willing to do, especially right now. And this is going to be the separator. It just is.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah. So, one of the other things, I saw this recently, too, and I'm going to check out that Ohtani thing, because I've never seen it, but something that happened in the World Series, there was a clip a friend of mine put on, sent to me, from like a post game where Freeman hit the home run to win the game. And he talks about his approach to that at bat. And he starts by saying, when I was in the on deck circle, I'm studying the at bat with Ohtani to, to think about, like, this is what they're doing with him, so what are they going to do with me? It's not going to be the same. Right. And so he starts to go through with that. Okay, I have a hypothesis about how they're going to pitch me. Well, how am I going to approach that? I'm going to cut the plate in half and I'm going to look for a fastball in. That's not my bag. but I know that's where they're coming. So rather than saying, I don't want to swing at that pitch, I know they're going to throw it, let's gear up and try to get it. And if it doesn't work, I know my process was good. Right. And he sold out to the fastball inner half and he crushed it. But, like, just the thought process of using that time in the on deck circle not to think about, you know, how's my body feel, or I'm stretching or. No, he's, he's formulating a plan in that situation to be ready to go and execute the process. Not the out, not worried about outcome.
>> Michael Huber: In the World Series and puts over outcomes. And this is the difference, this is the difference between hall of Famers. This is what separates hall of Famers from All Stars. It's what separates All Stars from guys who are in the big leagues. It's just what separates guys who are in the big leagues from guys who are in Triple A, Double A. Like, all, like, it's, it's the separator, this versus a guy who's in Double A, and he's not thinking about at all what the pitcher's tendencies are. And he's in his head about his last at bat in a victim mentality versus problem solving to see what he needs to do in order to dominate when he gets in the box. Like, that's what separates, and then you. And then we're talking about in the World Series, the highest pressurized environment.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: That exists throughout the course of the season. And like. But, but one of the things that I've heard, I, think it was Adam Grant talk about, he said, you don't fall to the level of, you don't rise to the level of the occasion. You don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level, level of your systems. You fall to the level of your habits. So, which means that we've got to be reverse engineering to win a World Series from day one.
>> Mike Huber: Right. Habits have to be consistent every single day, regardless of environment.
>> Michael Huber: The mental skills, the mental habits, the physical skills, the physical habits, everything should be reverse engineered from that environment. And so I learned this from Dave Turger, when I was at img. you talk about one of the best minds in baseball. I mean, he played chess while everybody else was playing checkers. And I learned his thought process around, and we collaborated very well. I loved working under him. and so to give you context, the first year that I was at ing, this was after, after I jumped off staff at Right City. you know, we, on paper, we should have won a national championship. and we did. But I'll never forget, after the year was up, Turd shoots me a text. And he was like, hey, stop by when you can. So stop by. He had his white. Excuse me. He had his yellow. He had his yellow notepad. He was sitting there, he had his glasses on, and he was like, what do you think we need to do to make sure we set ourselves up to win a championship next year? And we spent like 30, 30 minutes to an hour just mapping out what both of us thought needed to take place. From a leadership standpoint, from a mental skill standpoint, et cetera, et cetera. What do championship behaviors look like? What does championship teamwork look like? What does championship trust look like? What does championship communication look like? Yeah, what's a championship pre pitch routine look like? What's a championship, environment look like? What's a championship practice look like? Because at img, we didn't have the opportunity, we didn't have the opportunity to, compete for a state championship after the year was over. Like, we had to win out we had to go 25 0. Meaning that every game was a championship game. And if every game is a championship game, that means every practice has to be a championship practice. That means from the, from the first day that we start in, in the fall, like it's, we have to be focusing on what does a championship environment look like. Was that a championship practice today?
>> Mike Huber: Right.
>> Michael Huber: No. Then, then what do we need to do to make it a championship practice tomorrow? Diamond, this guy needs to work with championship discipline and championship consistency. Like fix it.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah. So that actually raises a question for me. And this hasn't come up, but I'm sure I have a sense of how you're going to answer it. But like to me, what you just described, such a critical component of being, achieving that level of success you're striving for is reflection. The ability to look at something objectively and say, was this a championship level practice? If the answer is no, it's not something that should make us feel bad. It should be, let's take the information to get better and let's leave the emotion behind because it's done. If you take that emotion into the next day, you're going to have another sub championship level practice. Because we feel bad. Don't feel bad. It was a bad practice today. Let's take out the learning, use it and take out the emotion and put it to the side and say, we don't need this because we got to show up tomorrow and practice at a championship level. So can you just talk about reflection as sort of a tool in the toolbox?
>> Michael Huber: I think reflection loops are the most powerful weapons that we have as human beings and as competitors. What I mean by reflection loop is, whether it's after every practice, every game, every, every day for the average Joe. For me, at the end of every single day, I walk myself through a reflection and acceleration process. What did, what went really well today?
>> Michael Huber: Count your wins, celebrate your wins. But what are the things that could have gone better? And I'm going to be as specific as I possibly can. I'm going to narrow it down to little tiny details and then what are the course corrections that need to be made for tomorrow? So you've got the daily reflection loops, you've got the weekly, you've got the monthly, you've got the quarterly, you've got the yearly, the best of the best. Even you look at businesses, they do this very well. And this weapon that we have, when we use it to our advantage, let's just give an example, you've got person A who does a reflection loop every single day. At the end of every single day spends five to 10 minutes reflecting on the day, objectively evaluating what he did well, what she did well, what could be better? What are the course corrections that need to be made? Smallest, smallest details. Spend five to ten minutes and then you've got 365 days a year and then you've got person B. Person B who does not do this. Actually, let's give person B one time. They do it at the very end of the year when the new Year's is coming up, and then they set their new goals right at the end of that year. This person has one. This person has 365 data points. This person, this person right here, this human being will be so far ahead of this human that it will be ridiculous. They will go through a time warp of becoming someone totally new from the last 365 days. And when we use this in sport and business and in everyday life, it changes the game.
>> Mike Huber: It does.
>> Michael Huber: It changes the game.
>> Mike Huber: Well, yeah, and it's also like, you know, there's revisionist history, right? If you're only reflecting once a year or once a month or once a quarter, you're going to look back and maybe look at it and go, oh, that went pretty well. But if you look at it when it, when it happens, you're probably not going to be as kind, right? You're going to be more, ruthless in terms of the way you evaluate it, right? So like, talk about using the time. Like one of the things I, a lot of times I suggest particularly to baseball players because they do have the ability to do it in the dugout is, hey, take a, keep a notebook, a journal. Reflect on your at bat right after the at bat. Reflect on the game right after the game while it's still fresh in your mind and collect those data points because you've got them, right? And it's like, well, you know, listen, I mean, you're at the professional level, so it may be different, but like at the high school or even college level, like, there's this like, oh, I don't look stupid. Yeah, right. Like, why are you doing that? And like, so I just want to blend in. Well, if you want to be great, like we've been talking about you, you've got to do things differently than the people who don't really want to be great. And that means looking stupid sometimes, you.
>> Michael Huber: Know, and knowing that to some people the things that look stupid to them are the things that are going to allow somebody else to be a Hall of Famer. Like this is. Yeah, it's funny, you've got videos of LeBron James visualizing before every single game, focusing on his breathing, doing a combination of meditation and then visualization. Like while his, while the rest of his teammates are doing, shoot around, whatever. Now to the, to your point, like somebody may be like, oh yeah, that might look, that looks kind of fucking, that looks stupid, right? Yeah, but, but, but, but like this is Also somebody who's 40 years old.
>> Mike Huber: He'S worth a billion dollars and he's you know, he's been playing for 25 years.
>> Michael Huber: He's dominating still.
>> Mike Huber: Dominating still. Right. So what does that tell you?
>> Michael Huber: That tells you that this is one of the most powerful tools, specifically visualization. We could talk about that in a little bit. But your mind, the skills of your mind are what, Especially when you, the higher you go when everybody, when everybody's physically fit and everybody's got incredible talent, you've got to be able to find that separator. Everybody's got a strength and conditioning coach, everybody's got a nutrition coach, but then you've got to find the separator. And the separator is the real estate in between your ears. It's what separates to what we talked about earlier. It's what separates guys who were, who were in the big leagues from guys who were in the All Star locker room.
>> Michael Huber: Guys who were in the All Star locker room to a few years later or after their career's over, being a Hall of Fame guy. Like it's the separator. You talk to all of the best of the best and they will continue. Say, I saw a video of Barry Bonds talking about it. Like, like, like, at what point, at what point do we just say, you know what, I want to ma, I want to get, I want to master, I don't want to just dabble in it. I want, I want to master this side of the game because I know it's going to separate me from my peers. Especially, especially the higher you are, the higher you go, like this is going to be what separates you. and what I've seen is the guys who do take that leap. Number one, the best of the best want to be coached. Turge used to say that too, and I agree with that. They want to be coached on all facets of the game. And from having the opportunity to work with a, lot of high level guys, it's true. Like diamond, what do you see what do you see here? And then I'll show them video. Hey, between this. Between each. Between each at bat. Let's look at this. Let's look at this. Let's look at this. What are you thinking here? What are you.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: And then actually breaking the video. Breaking the video down. What are you doing here in between pictures? What are you thinking? Interview. Like, it looks like. It looks like you weren't saying something that was productive to yourself. I'm just looking at your body language. Your body language is a direct reflection of what you say inside of your mind. It's a direct reflection of your internal language. So let's talk about what you're saying in your mind. Like, is that. Is that productive? Is that setting you up for success or is it not?
>> Mike Huber: Right. Well. And, it's something I talk to athletes about all the time. Right. Like, you can't see what I see, but they have to trust you enough to listen.
>> Michael Huber: Just like you trust your hitting coach, just like trust your pitching coach.
>> Mike Huber: Right? They trust you enough to listen to that feedback of, like, I saw you after that at bat, or I saw you after that play and your head dropped or your facial expression went in a certain direction or your effort level dropped, or you got quiet, Whatever it is. Right. To be able to help them build that awareness. To go, like, the next time it happens, oh, this is what the feedback was. I need to change it. That. Crank up that input of. I'm gonna put a smile on my face. I'm gonna lock in. I'm gonna put my shoulders back. I'm gonna take a deep breath, and now I'm gonna go attack the next play because I can't get back. that. Right. And like, the. The best are gonna take that feedback and run with it, and they're gonna crank up the input. Yes. versus taking it personally and saying, that guy doesn't know what he's talking about or screw him. I'm going to do it my way. Okay.
>> Michael Huber: The best of the best are coachable. The best of the best want to be coached, especially in this area. You look at Tom Brady's career and, and his guy that he came across at Michigan, that his mental performance. I'm like, like, this is when he was in college and he's still like, it's. It's. It's absolutely unbelievable. And to take us back to what we were just talking about, the ability to master your mind and master your thoughts. This brings me to the like, thoughts come in three. Three primary forms. And the Problem is that most people, most, people, most athletes don't know like how to control their thoughts. That's a big thing that I've seen. Like, like how do I, how do I control my thoughts? Like, I don't know. You just got to let them, let them, let them run through, do some mindfulness which, which works. But then there's, there's a point in time where you take control. You say, I'm going to be the master of my thoughts, I'm going to be the master of my mind. But first you have to understand the three primary first forms of thought. So the first form of thoughts are questions. The questions that you ask yourself will dictate the answers that you get. And people are like, well, what's the definition of, what's the definition of questions? Like what questions actually do. Questions are things are thoughts that seek clarity or information and they activate something in your brain called the reticular activating system. So whenever you get a new car, whenever you see some shoes that you want, whenever you see a new jacket. It's funny, my girlfriend, she, the the other day, when I was up here, we went to, we went to Nordstrom and we were looking at like jackets and everything. And now I'm seeing that jacket everywhere. It's a brown jacket. Yeah, you know, one of those like. And it's funny, the same thing happens whenever you're about to get a new car. When I was about to get my car, I started seeing my car like everywhere. But that's your reticular activating system, finding and seeking clarity and seeking the information that you've programmed it to want. Right, Right. So you've got questions and then you've got statements. What are statements? Statements are thoughts that declare or conclude. And then you've got images. Images are thoughts that create visual representations of ideas or scenarios. If you can learn, and this takes us into the visualization conversation, but if you can learn how to master the these three primary forms of thought, you will be deadly on whatever field in what, in whatever arena you are in on a day to day basis.
>> Mike Huber: It's interesting actually, so, so from. I'll just sort of share an observation from my own experience as an older person with more life experience and, and I'm much more biased towards or predisposed towards coaching the thoughts and the questions, the words like, that's the way I like to learn. But that's just for me. What I've learned about young people is the number one way to learn the way they Want to learn is visual. Right? They want to see, to learn. If you. If you. If you try to pump a lot of words into their. Into their operating system, it takes them. Sometimes it takes them a little longer to process. Right. Versus, if I can create a metaphor, an image that goes with the feeling or the thought that they want to experience. Now it's like they've connected the dots. Like, I want to look like this. I want to feel like that object. I want to see that thing. Now the thoughts and questions sort of follow with that. Right. And so, like, that's something that I. I would say, struggle with as a practitioner. Right. So, like, talk about how you use visualization with your athletes and. And how you apply it.
>> Michael Huber: Well, the research behind. Behind visualization, as you know, is so. It's so incredible. Like, your brain, when you visualize something taking place that you want, the neurons in your body are firing as though it's actually happening. Therefore, if we are competitors in whatever arena, why are we not using this to our competitive advantage? Every single day? For me, every single morning, as a coach, I visualize and I meditate within that first 30 minutes, whatever it may be, whether it's a project that I need to get done, whether it's task, how do I want to feel, how do I prime my brain to show up the way I want to show up every single morning. Some of the best baseball guys I've worked with at the highest level, they do the same thing. There's a video of. I'll give you an example. There's a video of Mookie Betts. He talked about, like, at the beginning of. Excuse me. Before every single game, he visualizes 40 to 50 at bats based on the guy they're gonna be facing the next day. What are we talking about? He's leveraging what we're talking about right now. He's leveraging the power of visualization, the, skill of visualization, so that his neurons are firing as though he's actually seeing those pitches. And then he's been there plenty of times, and he's hit hard line drives up the middle plenty of times off of multiple pitches.
>> Mike Huber: Well, what that's also gonna allow him to do is to relax.
>> Michael Huber: Bingo.
>> Mike Huber: Because I've already been there.
>> Michael Huber: He's been there.
>> Mike Huber: I'm not fearful or I'm not anxious about what's to come, and I'm not fearing the unknown. I've already been there and done that 50 times. So when I step into the box, I can relax and know that, hey, I know exactly what's going to happen or I'm comfortable that there's nothing that I'm going to see that surprises me. Think about that, right? Like I've already seen this movie. Like I know what's going to happen when your brain doesn't know the movie it's going to see. It's like looking for the answer. It wants to know the punchline. So now it's looking out into the future versus saying, hey, how do I stay present? How do I relax? How do I hit that relax button so that I can go out and do what I'm capable of doing? That's it's so powerful. Right. And so like. But who's really willing to commit to that level of do you want to.
>> Michael Huber: Be a Hall of Famer?
>> Mike Huber: You will? Well, that's right. Well, but, but I think, but I think it's important because, you know, you're at that level where you got players who want to, are professionals, who want to be professionals, and certainly they would say they aspire to be a Hall of Famer. Right?
>> Michael Huber: Right.
>> Mike Huber: I work with younger people and they say they want to be these things, but they're much further removed from it. And what I say to them is, listen, if you don't want to do these things on the mental side of your game, that's cool. But understand that there's a consequence to that. If you want to be great at this, if you want a Division 1 scholarship, if you want to get drafted, if you're not doing these things unless you are just so freakishly, supremely, talented, even then, even, even then you.
>> Michael Huber: Get to a certain level where everybody else is correct.
>> Mike Huber: So like, but I think that's one of the biggest challenges is, is, is I hate the word convincing, but like convincing young people that like trust, getting them to trust the idea that if they do this consistently now, the dividends are massive. Not just today on your, on the field or on the court or wherever, but like the long term benefit of it is just so extensive and that's a really hard, hard thing to do. Especially when you don't see an immediate return.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah, I think, for the, for the younger, for the younger generation.
>> Michael Huber: What I found at IMG that worked really well was a simple question. Who's your favorite player? Who do you look up to right now? Okay, let's, let's go and do some research because typically they'll give you whoever's the best of the best in that specific sport, no matter what Sport. and we go and we go and do a little bit of research, and more often than not, we will find something about their favorite player. Working on the mental side of the game at some high level opens their eyes and they're like, oh, like, that's what. That's what Trout. That's what Trout was talking about in that. In that interview. That's what Ohtani. That's what his goal setting sheet looks like. That's why he's making $700 million. Like, and then they're like, oh, it's just a shift to perspective. So I think that's the number one thing that I saw work at img. Like, you're a little resistant to it. Let's talk about your favorite players. Who do you like to study?
>> Mike Huber: But that kind of goes back to the visualization piece. It's visualization in a. In a different form, right?
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: If I can see my favorite player, who I emulate, who I idolize, doing these things that have made them successful, and I can actually see it now, it's like, okay, it crystallizes. Like, I need to be doing this too, versus it's abstract until you actually physically see it with your own eyes.
>> Michael Huber: Like, this is happening and it's possible.
>> Mike Huber: Right?
>> Michael Huber: You can spot it. Then you've got it. If you can spot these things in other people, that means you've got it somewhere inside of you. It's just a matter of awakening that thing inside of you and getting your. Like, there's a version of you that exists right now that's 100 times better than the version of you that you're currently experiencing. The only way to unlock that version of yourself is you have to be willing to do things that you haven't done before, because those are the things that are going to take you to the next level. And you've got to be willing to do it with confidence and conviction, and you've got to be ready to be coached. And I remember the first time, like, I came across the mental side of the game, like, I was sharing earlier. It just totally opened my eyes of, like, what this is what the best of the best are doing. And he gave such great examples in the book, Ken Revision and Talk. That book is gold of, like, the best of the best doing it. So, yeah, it's when we choose to become who we want to become, it will require you doing things you haven't done before. Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: So actually, one of the things that keeps popping up in my head here that we haven't talked about yet is motivation, right? Obviously, motivation. Some of it has to be internal, some of it is external. Right. And I think a lot of these things we're talking about, which I think sometimes are perceived as extras, right? Nice to haves, but not need to have, gotta have. how, as a leader, as a coach, do you sort of fit into that motivation piece, especially with professional players, how much do you have to motivate them? What are the conditions you have to create and how much is it just.
>> Michael Huber: On them, on the, on the professional side? These, these guys, you give them information, they're going to go and do it. When I was at img, you give them information and they may or may not go and do it. You got to follow up.
>> Mike Huber: That's my world.
>> Michael Huber: You got to challenge them, you got to support them. And, yeah, so, so the year we won the, the national championship, when I was under Dave Turgent, that, was, man, it was such an important piece because what Turge did well was he was an example from a leadership standpoint of what the things that he preached looked like. If, you know, one of the things that he used to say was, it's going to take all of, all of us in order to win a national championship. Meaning that it's going to take the nutrition coach, it's going to take the strength and conditioning coach, it's going to take our mental performance coach, it's going to take our leadership coach, it's going to take everybody in our dugout, it's going to take all of the nine guys who are on the, who are on the lineup card, and then everybody else who's on the. Like, it's going to take all of, all of us to pull this off every single day. But he was a living, breathing example and organism of what that looked like within the staff and I think from a coaching standpoint. So to answer your question, with professional guys, it's giving them the information they're motivated enough to go and do it. The, the high school, the high school and college level, you gotta, you gotta fire them up, motivate them whenever they need it. But you want to create an environment that's based around two things. You want to create a culture that's based around two things, challenge and support. You want to create a challenging, yet supportive environment. I'm going to challenge you, but at the same time, I'm going to support you, I'm going to believe in you. and that's what I've seen the best of the best. do Consistently. And if you think about it from a graph standpoint, let's say. Let's say we've got this graph, and right down here we'll say challenge. And up here we'll say support. The best cultures have a star up here, like. And the worst cultures are, like, down closer here, where the. Where the 1 and then the 1 and then up here, it's the 10 and then the 10. Do you see what I'm drawing here? Like, that is the kind of environment that you want to create. And that's not easy. No, it's not the best of the best. From a coaching standpoint, they are so detailed and, so rigorous around developing this kind of environment, because the environment is what will allow the seeds to grow. If you think about it from a farming standpoint, and it's funny, in baseball, you've got a farm system, but players are the seeds, and the environment that the seed is put in, grows in.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: will determine how well it grows, how fast it grows. And some seeds will grow differently than others. But if you continue to water that seed and give it sunlight, everything that it needs, the crops will eventually grow in the way that you want them to grow. But in order to do that, you've got to create a challenging and supportive environment. It's funny, I was at. When I was back, When I was back home in Ohio, my grandma, she was like, diamond, come outside. I want to show you something. She's always, like, giving these great stories.
>> Mike Huber: I know where you get it from.
>> Michael Huber: And she goes, look at my grass. And I look at her grass, and her grass is super green. And everybody now, she was like, look at everybody else's grass. Everybody else's grass is, like, yellow. This is around, like, this time. This is just a few weeks ago. So it's the fall, and her grass is, like, green. Like it's the summertime. She was like, do you know why my grass is greener than everybody else's? Because I water it and I spend time with it every single day.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: These people on the street, they've given up on their grass because it's fall, right? My grass is just green as it can be because every day I spend two to three hours watering it and creating the right environment for it. So from a coaching standpoint, it's the same thing. And she was. She was making a, connection with my relationship with my girlfriend. You got to water your relationship. You have to water your relationships. It's just how, if you want to make it work, you've got to water your relationships. And but it applies in all facets.
>> Mike Huber: Sure.
>> Michael Huber: Environment that you create, the culture that you create.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah. And. And if I think about it from an individual, because I'm, you know, the challenge and support 100%. Right. The third element, whether it's the third element or the third leg in that stool, whether they're equal or there's a kind of a precursor relationship, is trust. Right?
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Sometimes the support has to come before the challenge. Right. Because if you challenge without trust and you challenge without providing that support, now it's going to be perceived as a threat. Right. And so those relationships, to me, trust is just so critical and it's, it's a two way street. Right. And I think that's something that can be really, really hard. Especially when you're in an environment where like the other thing I wrote down while you were talking is like, you know when you're telling me about the championship culture at IMG and everybody has to be involved, this is role acceptance. What's my role? And I'm a part of this. I might not be a part of it the way I want to be a part of it.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: but I need to accept my role and do what I need to do as a matchup guy out of the bullpen or a pinch runner or don't.
>> Michael Huber: Don't only accept your role. Dominate. Dominate your role.
>> Mike Huber: Well, that's. I just.
>> Michael Huber: Sole ownership.
>> Mike Huber: I just saw something on that because that comes up a lot like it was in a basketball context. But, I was watching a reel that I watch this guy all the time. He's really good. He's a player development guy. And he said something to the effect of like. Right. Like if you're really good in your role, you're going to get a bigger role. Right. The coach is asking you to do this for a reason. Now there's a whole nother element to that idea or conversation in that what happens, I think a lot of times is coaches don't communicate to the athletes why that role exists, why they're expecting this of them. And now if I don't know why, and we talked a little bit this about this before we start recording. If I don't know as a young athlete why I'm being asked to be the sixth man, or if I'm being asked to be the bullpen guy or I'm asked to do this, and I think my role should be bigger if I don't understand why I'm not going to want to do it, you're right, I should want to dominate that role and expand it because if I. Right. But that takes a little bit of faith and trust that like my coach has my best interest at heart and it's in the best interest of the team. If that communication isn't there, that trust isn't there, there's going to be a breakdown.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah. And it's a two way street.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: Coaches have to, especially with this new generation, they have to adapt.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: What did Charles Darwin say? He said, it's not the, it's not the strongest who survive. It's not the smartest. It's not the, it's not the fittest. It's the, the most adaptable will survive. Coaches have to be willing to adapt to the new generation and answer the question, why is this decision being made? Even though it feels like they're being challenged. Which, you know, if you're an old school coach, you, you might not enjoy that, but at the same time you have to be willing to adapt to their communication style. And that's just a simple. I mean, you map out the framework of communication and you give them the what, you give them the why and you give it the how. How it's going to work. Typically we just want to give them the what and then the how. Toss the why in there. It's going to make them feel better. They're going to be willing to run through a brick wall for you, which is what you want at the end of the day.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: Like just toss it in there. And I found that players appreciate when they're given the honest truth 100%. Because if, if, if they're not. Even if it's, even if something is not addressed, but they know and everybody knows it needs to be addressed. Like it's, it just becomes this ruminating thing in the player's mind and they want to know and they're curious as to why is this decision being made.
>> Mike Huber: You just tell them why it creates an anxiety. It does that, that, that doesn't allow for that relaxation that allows for you to perform at the level that you want. Like, I just had this conversation with my daughter. She's 14 years old.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: She's a soccer player. She loves soccer. She wants to play college soccer.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: I love her. She's a hard worker, but she's got a little bit of that like anxiety in her. And I always talk to her about like trying to understand. Right. Like what your coaches want from you. Right. And she has told me like just what you just said. I Want to be coached. I don't care if you yell at me, but if you're telling me what I need to do to become a better player, I want to hear it. If you don't give me any feedback, I don't know what to do. At the same time she's questioning like, why aren't I getting these rewards or why aren't I getting this feedback. I said, well, you need to be able to go to your coach. So she had a conversation with her coach recently. I'm really proud of her. She's 14, talks to her coach who's a 30 year old man and said to her coach said, hey coach, what do I need to do to play at the next level up? And he's like, you need to get faster. Right? She's smart, high iq, physical, tough, a leader, super communicator. I need to get faster because athletically you got to be able to keep up. So what do I said to her? I said, well, if you want to get faster, we can try to give you some resources. And she's like, okay, I'll think about it.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: So like, yeah, yeah, there's like, this is like this process of like, you know, you also have to be patient with athletes, you know, and I know it's probably not that easy at that level that you're at where it's like, hey, yeah, we're watering those seeds and we're trying to develop, but let's get it go faster because we got to get to the World Series next year.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah, it goes back to the farmer. the farmer doesn't look at the, look at the plants go, oh, you need to grow faster. It doesn't do that. They don't do that. They know that the seasons will be the seasons. Yeah, this season I'm going to water them, I'm going to water them.
>> Mike Huber: Crank up those inputs.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah, I'm going to crank up the inputs and eventually exactly what you want will come. Will come. But it's the patience piece. The best coaches that you study, they're also the most patient. You think about Phil Jackson, what he had did, like I don't know if you, I don't know if you've seen, ah, what was that, what was that documentary on Netflix? It was Michael Jordan and in that Chicago Bulls team, the Last Dance. The Last Dance. And they talked about Dennis Rob. Do you know how much patience Phil Jackson had to have? But, but that's why he was one of the best of the best, because he understood his players.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: He was able to build trust to what you talked about earlier. And we're going to talk about the five dysfunctions of a team. If you're watching this right now, you've got to, you've got to read the five dysfunctions of a team. It'll give you a, a triangular framework around the best cultures and the five things that they do very well. We don't have time to go into it, but, who wrote that?
>> Mike Huber: Lencioni?
>> Michael Huber: I believe, I believe you might be right.
>> Mike Huber: He writes a lot of team stuff. I don't know the book, but you might be right. Yeah, but, but I think what you're saying, I'll let you keep going here, but I think it's really important. Right. Is that Rodman example is perfect.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: You get a guy who's the elite, elite competitor in Michael Jordan has, has nothing, will, nothing's, ever good enough.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: And then you get a guy like Rodman, who's personality wise, totally opposite. But Mike, Phil Jackson probably helps him bridge the gap. To say we need this guy, this piece to win, to win right now, that's not to say we're going to let him do whatever he wants. But if we understand him and we bridge that gap and that's going to allow us to get the most out of him.
>> Michael Huber: Understand, that's the key word.
>> Mike Huber: Understanding.
>> Michael Huber: That's something that, when you, when you watch that documentary, Dennis Romney said, man, Phil Jackson understood me, Michael Jordan understood me, Scotty understood me. And I appreciated that. That's why I was willing to do whatever, whatever I needed to do. Every time I was on the. And then Michael Jordan was like, yeah, he, like, he, we had to do, we, had to do the sprints the next day and he was the first one. Like, he, he, he just needed to do what he needed to do. But back to understanding from a coaching standpoint.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: You know, most people say you want to treat people, that you treat people the way you want to be treated. That's not a good rule. It's not a good rule at all. That's absolutely absurd. You want to treat people how they prefer to be treated. You want to communicate. You don't want to communicate to somebody how you prefer to be communicated to. You need to learn the other person and then communicate how they prefer to be communicated.
>> Mike Huber: To meet them where they're at,
>> Michael Huber: Meet them where they are. You have to learn how to meet them where they are. And that starts with taking a step back. All right. Before I give them all of these frameworks, all of the coaching, all of the things that I know, I've studied. I've studied this guy. I know exactly what he needs. I've got to understand how he communicates. I've got to understand how he processes information. I've got to understand what makes him feel comfortable, what makes him feel uncomfortable. And then I'm going to package it up in a way that gives it to him, and he's like, oh, man, if feels great. Like. And there are four different ways to do that. And we have to master as coaches, we have to master these four different ways to communicate. We've got to understand our players. We have to. If we want to create the culture that we want to create, if we want to create the trust that we want to create, if we want to get the results that we want to get, we have to be. And it's the same thing in relationships across the board.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: Same thing in everyday life.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah. And listen, I think, you know, the challenge, and it's not.
>> Michael Huber: It's a challenge. It's hard, it's not easy.
>> Mike Huber: To me, it's. Well, it's a challenge in a lot of ways. Right. In the sense that the biggest challenge I see.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Because for me, like, maybe I'm biased, and I have to, like, see things from other people's perspective. I don't think I. Something I think I do well is connect with people, understand them.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: But it still takes time. It takes time, takes patience.
>> Michael Huber: You're not preparation, too.
>> Mike Huber: I'm going back to my notes and something like. And I'm going to contrast what you just said. Right. Because, like, team building is hard because there's so many variables. Right. Every person is a variable.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Then you have environmental variables. Right.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: So being somebody who's skilled at, orchestrating all of that, like, that's a really hard thing to do. And I would say most times, at least in the world that I live in, I think most times, especially with high school athletes, they're in an environment where coaches don't know how to orchestrate that IMG is a very, very unique animal. Right. Most high schools, the coaches are there because they know X's and O's, or they're there because they've been there for a long time, or, they don't really know people. They know a game. Right. And so what I tell kids is they have to learn how to coach themselves. Right. And so one of the things that I took from the notes, as you said, you know, this is straight from something I read off your profile. Train your inner coach for unstoppable confidence.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah, yeah.
>> Mike Huber: 100% on board, right? Yeah. Let's get into it because to me, right, like we can only control so much.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: If I have a coach that's not good at understanding me. If I have a coach that is, is M is constructing my role in a way that I don't agree with. If I have a coach that's just not that good and we don't have a trusting relationship and I don't like them, I need to find a way to coach myself to solve those problems because I can't control the rest of that. I could try, I could try to manipulate the environment. I could try to talk to my coach. I could try to make things better. But, but ultimately I have to sit with all this stuff. So if I can't coach myself and solve my problems and know what to do with my thoughts and what questions to ask and what images to bring up when I need it so that I don't feel angry or frustrated or disappointed or whatever, that's going to take away from my ability to perform at my best. If I don't have that ability to coach myself, it's going to be really.
>> Michael Huber: Hard to succeed long term, very hard. And success leaves clues. When you study, when you study your best days, when you study your worst days. The, the best of the best. They study themselves.
>> Michael Huber: At the highest level in such detail that it's ridiculous. When you go back to the Tom Brady's and Michael Jordan Bryant's. I mean Kobe Bryant was, he was making a he was making like this video series called Details. And these guys, even coaches and the Jeff Bezos like oh my goodness. They study themselves at such a deep level to the point where they know their skills, they know their strengths, they know their weaknesses. Whether it comes to mindset, whether it comes to their actual physical skills, whether it comes to their technical skills or soft skills or hard to like. They know themselves like the back of their hand. Therefore they can coach themselves in the moments that they need to be coached. They, their inner coach is elite. And when, when, when we can master that awareness. one of the things that I've talked about in the past is awareness activates ability to adapt, adjust and ascend. The number one way to. Well you got two ways. The two ways to up level your awareness assessments. Self study. Self study also includes the reflection loops that we talked about earlier.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: These two things will allow you to truly tap into the best Version of yourself. Sure, most people. And this goes back to the preparation conversation. Most people aren't willing to put in the time, effort and energy to do so. If, this is what I've got to do to be great, I don't know if I'm really well. Okay? But the people who are at the highest level that you see and that you look up to, they, they understand themselves like, like at such a deep level. I remember watching a, watching, A. And hearing a story about, Bryce Harper and he, this, I think this was in. This was one of his first years in professional baseball. And he knew his swing so well, he knew his stuff so well, he knew himself so well that he like one of his teammates made a suggestion about something that he should do. Like, no, this won't work because of A, B and C. This is why I do this, this and this. And he just mapped it out. But knowing yourself to that point, that takes, that takes work.
>> Mike Huber: It does. And it's really important. Right? Because like, if I just think about my own life experience, forget about sports, and I have plenty of sports experience, it doesn't really matter. It's when you get to know yourself, you know which opinions to take in.
>> Michael Huber: You're a sponge, but you have a filter, right?
>> Mike Huber: You know which opinions to take. Because if you take everyone's opinion and you don't have. It's a conversation I have about values with athletes. What do you value? What's your identity as a person? What, what do you believe in? If you don't know what you value, you're going to take on everybody's values, right. You're not going to be able to filter out the stuff that, like, hey, I know what I need to take because I see the blind spot versus, oh, I'm not going to take that because I know I don't need it. I know myself well enough to know that this person has an opinion, but it's not an educated one. That takes a lot of not only self study and reflection, but it also takes a lot of really sustainable confidence to be like, I'm not going to let that person's opinion. Yep. which is invariably most times trying to help, not trying to put you down, but to know, like, I don't need that because I know exactly what I need.
>> Michael Huber: Yep.
>> Mike Huber: Because I've done the work.
>> Michael Huber: You've done the work. You studied your successes. Success leaves clues. Success leaves clues. Success, Success leaves clues. When you study your successes, you will always be able to find what worked for you in your best performances, on your best days, on your best weeks and your best months, your best projects, you have to be willing to take a step back. Get out your. Get out your notebook. Notebook. Get out your notebook and your pen and set a timer for 10 minutes and say, look, I'm going to study this. This performance where I went four for four, right. I'm going to study this performance where I diced up everybody who got in the box. and I'm gonna. I'm gonna study the. I'm gonna study this. This. Like when you study yourself and when you put those bullet points down, you'll find something like, oh, man, I didn't realize. Oh, I was. I was doing that. I was very calm, loose and relaxed when I stepped in the box. I was very calm, loose and relaxed, when I stepped on the mound. But my intensity was at maybe like an 8 or 9. I need to keep it there because this performance over here, my intensity level, my arousal level was at like a three or four. And that doesn't work for me. My fastball actually ticks up when my intensity is at 8 or 9. Therefore. But. But you can only find that out when you go to your notebook, you take out your pin and you study your best performance performance. The problem is, is that most people aren't willing to do the work and diamond. I want to be. I want to be in the 1%. If you want to be in the 1%, you've got to be willing to do all of the work that will allow you to become a part of the 1%.
>> Mike Huber: I agree with that. And I would take it one step further. I think, again, for younger athletes, I think they don't always know how to do it right. So, like, I'll give you an example. I was. I was. I've been recently working with this young woman who plays Division 1 college basketball.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: And she's in her sophomore year. And she. She had been struggling a bit. And I was really trying to just kind of get to know her, understand her. Like, I'm just building this relationship. And we start talking. She's telling me about this game that. Or actually, I went back and looked at box scores from her freshman year.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: And I found this game where she had a really, really great game. It's like our third game in.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: And I'm like, scored like 25 or 28 points or something. It was a third game in her college career.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Now fast forward exactly a year later, November of 2024. She's struggling.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: I Said, okay, let's look back to that game. What went well in that game? And she starts to rattle off, oh, I remember, I remember how I felt. I played against this girl that I played against in high school in aau, and I was as good as her, and she was on the other team and this is what I did. And, all of a sudden she's like, she's able to take out the information and crank up the inputs. Now all of a sudden she takes that she's learned something about herself and now she knows how to go apply it. If I do these things, it's going to put me in the best position to replicate that outcome because I know what worked. And I think a lot of times we just, we get so much tunnel vision about we want people to be in the present moment, but they also, they get too much in the present moment, meaning, like, they're so down or they're so emotional about the most recent results.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: That they can't draw on the, all the good stuff that got them into that position in, the first place. They get like tunnel vision of like, oh, I suck. This is really bad. What am I going to do versus, hey, I've done this before. Let's, let's start over and let's engineer, like, let's reverse engineer, to use your terminology, that success based upon what I've learned over time.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: They just, sometimes they don't know to do it right. And if you can teach them how to do that, now all of a sudden you're making them more resourceful, you're making them more dangerous, you know, as athletes, as performers. And they're going to give them the ammunition to get to where they, where they want to go.
>> Michael Huber: Yep. A few things come up.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah, for sure.
>> Michael Huber: Have we talked, have we talked about the inputs and outputs, what that actually means? I know you and I had a conversation before, but have we talked about that yet?
>> Mike Huber: Go ahead.
>> Michael Huber: For these.
>> Mike Huber: I don't think we have. I think we've talked about cranking on inputs.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: But we haven't really talked about what it means.
>> Michael Huber: We're going to break down that framework. And then the identity piece, to your point. and we see this a lot. Somebody, they make a mistake or they make a series of mistakes, and then they start to say, they start to use the I am the most powerful two words you can ever start a sentence with, and then they will say, I am this, I am that. Things that are unproductive. It goes back to the question statements and images that we Create. Those are statements that you're creating. What are, what are statements? Statements are thoughts that declare or conclude something. Therefore you're tapping into your belief system when you say things like that or you like, we have to stay away from making a mistake experiencing adversity and then tying the things that we say to our identity which we don't even realize we're doing. Oh man, I suck. Like the more you like, don't you realize you're feeding your subconscious in the moment? But it's not. So how do you replace it? You've got to be able to replace those thoughts with something that's productive. It can't be. One of the, One of the biggest problems that within this conversation that we're having that people face is they say disempowering statements to themselves instead of empowering statements. They ask disempowering questions instead of asking empowering questions. Meaning if person, let's go. Person A here. Person B here. Person B experiences adversity. The question that they will ask themselves is why is this happening to me? Person A experienced the same adversity and they're going to ask themselves, what can I learn from this experience? Person B will experience this adversity and they'll make a statement. They'll go, I suck. Person A will experience this adversity and they're going to make a statement that's a productive and empowering statement. I'm gonna learn from this experience and then I'll ask a question. What do I need to learn from this experience? How can I learn from this experience? These two Person A and B. Person A, B, Person A, you have a choice. In fact, I don't even wanna use the word choice. You have a decision to make.
>> Michael Huber: As far as who you're gonna be. When you look at the definition of a choice, choice says like making choices says you've got a lot of different options, which you do. But the decision, the definition of a decision is saying no to all of these other options. And I'm saying yes to this one option.
>> Mike Huber: Act on it.
>> Michael Huber: Say yes to say yes to creating empowering questions after something happens. Say yes to concluding empowering thoughts and empower. Like, like after something. If like the, the best of the best. That's what they do. They're. They're incredibly productive with their thoughts. Which goes to the inner coach piece. The inner coach is. This is something that I love to talk about when it comes to self talk. It's the, it's the direct, There's a Direct correlation with your inner coach and your confidence. People who are really, really confident their inner coach is elite. What is your inner coach? Your self Talk.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: What are you saying to yourself? Questions, statements, images.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: When you experience, whatever you experience, whether good or bad, ask yourself what takes place in your mind after that? Was that a productive thought? Was that a productive question, statement, image, or was it unproductive? The best of the best are productive with all of their thoughts. The Freddy Freeman example that you gave earlier.
>> Mike Huber: Yes. Yeah. So, so I, I, I think, you know, I think the thing that comes up when you were saying that is it's also a practice, meaning we have to be intentional about wanting to be person A. To be that person that frames every thing that happens, every adversity, every outcome as something we can learn from, we can grow from. We've got to get into that mindset. I don't think, I mean, I mean this is, it's a really hard right. Scientifically, you can't say anything definitively. Right. But I would say, by and large, right, we, we learn, right? We typically learn how to be negative, right? We've got to re, we gotta re. Because, and it's really, a lot of it has to do with the way our brain works, but we have to relearn that practice of every single day having that intention of how do I reflect on what I did. And this is what I talk about with athletes a lot is let's, let's rethink about how you define success. We have a goal which obviously we want to achieve it, right? I want to achieve certain outcome. I want to be a Hall of Famer. Let's use that example. Okay, well, how do I become a Hall of Famer? What do I have to do? Okay, I have to hit.300 every year for 10m years. How am I going to do that?
>> Michael Huber: Inputs, out, outputs, right?
>> Mike Huber: What am I going to do every single day? Right? So if I have six, or eight or ten things I'm going to do every single day, that's up to me. Their decisions and I do them and I'm 10 for 10 and I go out and I go for four, I can go back and say, okay, I was still successful on the input level. If I do those 10 things again tomorrow, I might go four for four. Let's focus on the wins that we get every day that are in our control and let that be a definition of success. Not just did I achieve the outcomes that I want, unless baseball's notorious for that. Yeah. and a question I ask baseball players all the time and maybe this is elementary at the major league level but for young people I think it's really instructive is would you rather go over 10 with 10, you know, lasers right at the shortstop or the center fielder or would you rather go 10 for 10 with a dribbler and a blooper? Right.
>> Michael Huber: Like I'm taking the first.
>> Mike Huber: Yes. Because if 10 more times come I'll probably, I'm probably going to go 10 for 20. Right. It's just the outcome has nothing to do with the, the process and the approach. When I have a kid who tells me he'd rather go 10 for 10 with 10 soft hits now, you kind of know where from an assessment perspective, you know where you're at mindset wise. Like all I care about is the result. I don't care how I get there and I just want to look good to the outside world. Now you're going to have a lot of yeah. Motivational issues of keeping them engaged or keeping their self talk where it needs to be to be confident. So it's really hard.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah. And by the way, the best of the best, they are obsessed with results and outputs but they understand that in order to get the outputs and the results that they want they have to master and study and identify the inputs that get them those results. There's Alex Harmozi. We were just talking about this before. Like he shared a, he shared a story. I think it was about when he was getting into Harvard or Stanford, I can't remember which one. But he said that he had to take some standardized tests.
>> Michael Huber: That was called like the GMAT or.
>> Mike Huber: Something like that business school.
>> Michael Huber: And he said he wasn't really good at under like understanding this stuff. And the first time he took it he got you know, subpar, subpar score. And then he came across this this study that said like people who study and do more of these problems before actually taking the test, like they get better results. Like it's a direct correlation like, like literally like the more, the more you do of those specific inputs of that specific input for him which was studying, doing more problems, the better results you're going to get. And so what he did was he set a timer for three hours for three months straight and just he got all like, he got like four or five stacks of books and then just every single day and then he ended up getting in the 99th percentile. Inputs, outputs. He figured out the input, the big domino input that he needed to do. And then he cranked the dial up on that and then he got the outputs that he wanted. The best of the best. Also understand that you can literally. And it's controlling the controllables. Right. But you can still want to hit 350. But you have to be willing to reverse engineer and say what are the inputs that it's going to take? You have to map out the pre game inputs, the in game inputs, post game inputs, and you have to look at, you have to look at which inputs work, which inputs don't work. And you want to find the big domino inputs. The big domino inputs are the big things. Like when I do this, like across all of the successes that I've studied, this continues to show up. Oh, when I do focus on visualization before every single game and I spend 10 minutes just visualizing myself, hit hardline drives or dot up this fastball where I want to dot it up or dot up my slider where I want to dot it up it like my. I know the research behind it, I know the data. I'm going to continue driving, I'm going to crank up the inputs. It's an input. It's a simple inputs, outputs equation for business.
>> Mike Huber: Exactly. And it also helps you to narrow your focus of like.
>> Michael Huber: And control the control.
>> Mike Huber: Exactly. This. I know this thing works and I'm going to, oh, I'm going to continue to invest in it. Right. And like, I think, you know, sometimes I think as mental performance coaches and you might have a different view on this. I mean I'm still relatively new at this. I've been doing it for five years. I think there's this sort of, this is my personal opinion. So there's a bias to like really, teaching the skills. Meaning like we've got to do all these skills and we've got to incorporate all these skills for everybody. And my thing is, is no, it's like let's find that one thing that works for that person and let's like let's throw gasoline on the fire and leverage it. Like, if this works for you and you're getting good results, let's master it. Consistency in that approach. If you do one thing really, really well in your mental game and it works for you, like do it, keep doing it, don't try to add more in, at least not right away. Let's get really good at this. Master.
>> Michael Huber: It's.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah, we were talking about this before and I was talking about my own, my own experiences as a coach is my business. Yeah, I know. I'm really good at one on one coaching. Yeah, I haven't mastered that yet. So if I start to focus on all these other things that I'm not as good at and that are going to divert my attention and my energy and my resources from becoming as good as I can be at that one on one game, then I'm going to, I'm going to water down everything. Yeah, right. But that requires patience. Right. Like, okay, like I'm going to just stay in that lane until I get it right. Well, it's been five years and I haven't gotten it right. So you have to fight that urge of like, oh, I want better outcomes, I want to make more money, I want to grow my practice, I want to people to know me. But then what happens? Right. Then I water it down. Right. So in the long term I'm not, it's not going to be as strong. So like that's like, it's, it's. I don't know. It's. Yeah, it's, yeah.
>> Michael Huber: inputs, outputs, output. Because what happens when we, what happens is when we find the inputs that work, we get shiny object syndrome. Oh, that looks cool over here. That looks cool over there. Especially, especially, especially in sports, even for us like. But it's a matter of sticking with the inputs, the big domino inputs that we know work. It's about discipline, it's about mastery. It's about cranking up the inputs that I know work that will get me the outcomes that I want.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: And then once, once you get to a certain point now it's like, okay, how can we systemize it? Et cetera, et cetera. So when I was at ah, when I was at Right State, Mercer, I'll never forget Mercer took us to this, this off site like workshop. Our staff, just our coaching staff and he was like diamond, you're gonna love this. And he knew I was a systems guy, systems thinker, et cetera, et cetera. And they introduced us to. So we go in this big place and like everything is really nice. They've got, we walk into a room and there are whiteboards everywhere and each one of us got assigned a whiteboard. And so for our specific area we had to develop the system for whatever we did. So for me I developed a mental skill system and leadership system. our scouting guy at the time, Nate Metzger, he developed our, that like that system, Our hitting coach, that system. Matt Talarico, the base, our base running guy at the time is now with the Yankees, he developed that System all. All on whiteboards. Now here was the interesting part. They introduced us to this book called the One Thing. Like, what's the one thing that if you focus on this, everything else will take care of itself? Big domino inputs. And that to me was the first place I was introduced to, number one, systems thinking and systems design. But then understanding how to reverse engineer from the outputs that you want at every single level. If I want this specific output. Excuse me, If I want this specific output, I need to. I need to create. I need to figure out all of the inputs that it's gonna take and then map out what that looks like in order to get to this output. And that's what we did. But that's what the best of the best do as well, in a micro way. Like Ohtani. When you guys look at Ohtani's goal setting sheet, he's got one. He's got one output in the middle. And then I believe he has around 70, 60, to 70 inputs around. It's a totally different way of goal setting, which I believe is. I believe is probably the best way to do it.
>> Mike Huber: Definitely fascinating.
>> Michael Huber: It is absolutely incredible.
>> Mike Huber: But it's inputs, output, but actually that visual, right? Like, so if I'm, when I'm teaching goal setting, I'm either teaching in a pyramid, right? Visual of like, hey, my, my goal is up the top of the pyramid or a ladder, right? And actually, if you think about it, right, the idea that your outcome that you want, the output that you want is in the middle is central. Everything that you do around it is centered around that output, right? So that visual actually makes a great deal of sense, right. We're not subordinating the inputs.
>> Michael Huber: We're actually putting them building, it around the output. Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Right. And now you have this image of like, this is central to everything, this output central to everything that I do, which is every single input around it.
>> Michael Huber: And then you look at the ratio and percentage of. I've got one, I've got one output, and then I've got how many inputs? 60 to 70 behaviors and things I need to do in order to consistently achieve that?
>> Mike Huber: Probably every single day.
>> Michael Huber: Every single day. Absolutely. That's why he's a $700 million.
>> Mike Huber: That's right. So, yeah, I wanted to. And, this is. This question is going to be out of left field, but it's in service of the conversation that we're having about understanding people. For those of you who are listening and not watching, diamond has a tattoo on his right bicep.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: It's in. Presumably in another language.
>> Michael Huber: In Greek. Y.
>> Mike Huber: In Greek. What does that. What does it mean?
>> Michael Huber: This means choose. This means choose Joy. and this is something that me and my family. Me and my. So my mom got this tattoo. I got this tattoo, and my little brother got this.
>> Mike Huber: That's amazing.
>> Michael Huber: So in 2020, I'll share with you the story. So my mom, she got diagnosed with stage four metastatic breast cancer. She's doing fine. She's doing great. She's showing up.
>> Mike Huber: I'm glad you jumped to the punchline.
>> Michael Huber: She's showing up again.
>> Mike Huber: I thought we were going down a somber road.
>> Michael Huber: No, no, no. But, I remember that year like, it was like it was yesterday. I mean, that was the year where Covid hit. Then Kobe died, and then my mom got cancer, like, right around my birthday. But, But. But one of the things that she's. She's such a great leader. One of the things that, that she embodied was choosing Joy, and that became her message to everybody that has cancer, et cetera, et cetera. Choose Joy. Like, no matter what you experience, you have a choice as to what you choose every day. Getting diagnosed with stage four metastatic cancer, I mean, that's tough. Yeah, right? Like, but. But then watching her say, look, we're going to choose Joy, even though we're all going through this experience, we're gonna choose Joy so much. So just get a tattoo of it. So that's, pretty. Choose Joy. Yeah. Yeah, but it's. But it's literally a decision that you make. I'm gonna say no to this over here. I'm gonna say no to this over here. And I will choose Joy every single day, because I know it's a choice.
>> Mike Huber: Well, it sounds like you. I mean, you referenced it earlier in the conversation. Sounds like you had a pretty powerful role model.
>> Michael Huber: Oh, yeah.
>> Mike Huber: In that respect. And I think that that's. That kind of goes back to, you know, what you.
>> Michael Huber: What we.
>> Mike Huber: You know, we talked about maybe before. What we talked about before, the four groups of people you surround yourself with now.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Obviously, families is a tricky. Family is a tricky animal. Right. Because we don't get to choose our family. Right. now we do have a decision as to whether we. How much we sort of invest in that.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: But we're given that. Right. So, like, to have a family member who. A lot of times family members don't. They serve the opposite. Right. goal to have that kind of person around you. But can you just, like, talk about that like, the Kinds of people that you, you want to surround yourself with or the kinds of people you want your clients, your athletes to surround themselves with.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah. So the research tells us that the quality of the relationships that we have throughout the course of our life will determine the quality of our life. Therefore, relationships are important. There are two things that are never going to go away. Results, in relationships, processes and people will exist until we die. Therefore, we might as well with the people in relationships. Conversation get really strategic around it. So the four, the four circles of people that I talk about that, ah, you want to keep yourself around is number one, your board of directors and mentors. So if you think about this as like, circle one, circle two, circle three, circle, circle four. Circle one is your board of directors and mentors. These are the people who, who you learn from, who are maybe at a, maybe at the place that you want to get to inside of your career, have been there and you just consistently pick their brain. You're curious, you're a lifelong learner, and you want to consistently learn from them. You have, two forms of, board of directors and mentors. You've got direct mentors, people who you can be across from and like actually be in person with. And then you've got, long distance mentors. These are the mentors who might, might, might not even be alive, but you can read their books. They've got, you know, you can watch their stuff online, et cetera, et cetera.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: And you know, that's so, so that's the first, that's the first group. That's the first circle of people you want to keep yourself around your board of directors. Now the second, the second, this is my favorite. The second circle of people that you want to have are sparring partners. These. And this is my favorite group of people. these are the people who are, they do something similar that you do and they're a little bit above you or a little bit below you, but enough to be able to bounce ideas off of each other, improve, etc. Etc. Like, when you, when you look at boxing, you know, everybody had like all of the best. They have sparring partners. Why do they have sparring part partner? So they can get better at developing the skill stack that they have. Like, in order to improve this skill, I'm gonna bounce these ideas off of this person. I'm gonna. It's funny, I think, it was, I forget who it was. I was watching an interview. I think it was, it was. This was a while ago. Kanye west was talking about, like, Drake and how, how, how Drake is like, like, oh, man, he just came out with this, with this new song, like, I'm gonna come out with a new song, like, somebody that motivates you. It's interesting when we ask ourselves the question. And so by the way, you, know Microsoft and Apple, like, excuse me, Microsoft and Google. And then, and then you've got, and then you've got, you've got Tesla, and then you've got other electric companies. You've got Jordan, and then you've got Larry Bird or Magic Johnson. You've to. You need it. We need it. No matter what people say, we need it. And one of the things that I always ask people is like, if you were running a race, if you were running a race, would you go faster if you were alone or if you were running next to someone? If you believe you'd run faster alone, go ahead, raise your hand. Nobody typically raises their hands everybody else, right? Like, I run faster when there are other people around me. What does that mean? That means that we need other people to get to where we are going. We cannot do it on our own. Most people have been sucked in this diy. Like, we can't. We need each other in order to get to where we want to get to. That's just the human race. So that's, that's circle number two. That's the second group of people, the third group of people. So we've got, right now we've got the board of directors, we've got the sparring partners. And then over here on this side, we have your inner circle. This is where your family and your closest friends are. This is more of your support group. These are the people who, who love you for who you are.
>> Mike Huber: Right.
>> Michael Huber: Your sparring partners are more so work focused. And your board of directors and mentors, they can be life focused or work focused, whatever, whatever you choose. But, your inner circle includes your family, include your closest friends. And to your point, we don't get to choose. We don't get to choose our family specifically. Therefore, we might as well build a great relationship with them if we can.
>> Mike Huber: Right?
>> Michael Huber: If we can, we might as well. and then you do get to choose. You do get to choose your close friends. you know, somebody, I think it was, it wasn't. Tim Ferriss said it. That's where I heard it. But I think it was Jim Rohn. You become the average of the five people you spend the most of your time with. Therefore, you want to choose those people wisely because their beliefs, their thoughts, their emotions, their behaviors eventually will rub off on you. Therefore, you've got to run inventory of who do you keep yourself around? Because eventually they will become an extension.
>> Mike Huber: Right.
>> Michael Huber: Of who you are.
>> Mike Huber: It creeps up on you.
>> Michael Huber: yeah. So, so for me, I only keep myself around people who are, who are doing productive things, who are positive, et cetera, et cetera. And I think that is a skill that we must, we have to tap into. Yes, we have to tap into. So the, so the fourth one is your tribe. These are the people who you serve. These are the people who you guide. These are the people who you coach. So we've got four circles of people. Your board of directors, your sparring partners, your tribe. And then we've got your inner circle. We have to literally, it's the same thing I said before. You take out a sheet of paper, you draw these four circles and you start thinking about who do I currently have in each one of these circles. Now you have to make a point. It's so funny. We're in such a results driven world. We're so work focused and we forget about the relationships that we have. it's, it's, it's so important to be proactive with keeping these circles.
>> Mike Huber: Well, yes, you got to curate in those relationships. You've got to identify the qualities. You've gotta, once you identify what you want to be, the people you want to be surrounded by, then you've got to make an effort. So, like, we've only got a few minutes left, but, I'll just share this because I think it's something that's really interesting is we, we share this feeling that this is really important is, you know, I was telling you before we got on, on the, you know, the air, we started recording that I developed a course and the course is specifically tailored to high school athletes going to college.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: And one of the modules in the course is about building, constructing your support network.
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: And one of the things that, one of the exercises that I put into the courses, I want you to write a list of, five interview questions. You're not going to interview those people, but I want you to write those questions down and say, what would I want to know from that person? To, evaluate whether or not I want to surround myself with them. And I just feel like from my own experience like that you can align yourself with the wrong people and unknowingly, not knowingly. It's, it's, it's, it's happenstance. It's random. Or you think they are what you know, there's something that they're not. But you're not really doing the work. You're not really digging in to understand who they are. You're just sort of taking it at face value. Now you get into that circle, and you're in six months, a year, two years. And now you look back on two years and go like, oh, that person's been a drain on me. but I didn't even realize it was dripping. Right. It was dripping slowly. It wasn't like they sucked the life out of me immediately. But now I've given up two years of my college career, I can't get back, and I've surrounded myself with the wrong people. So how am I. How can I be intentional about curating those circles?
>> Michael Huber: Yeah.
>> Mike Huber: Right. Questions.
>> Michael Huber: You have to choose faucets, not drains.
>> Mike Huber: That's a good.
>> Michael Huber: Got to choose faucets, not drains. We have to.
>> Mike Huber: Yeah.
>> Michael Huber: but being picky about that is so important. I think it's. And sometimes it's tough. You'll identify people. Who are you? know, one of the exercises I walk people through, is who are your firefighters? Who are your fire lighters? People who light your fire fire. And then people who. Who put water on your.
>> Mike Huber: With.
>> Michael Huber: and they may not even do it on purpose. It might be on accident. Like, be able. You have to identify.
>> Mike Huber: Yes.
>> Michael Huber: Who's who, and then choose who you spend your time with based on. Based on where people sit. Just based on that initial awareness and assessment and evaluation of everybody who you like. Look at your last five messages that you have in your phone. Like, who. Who are those people? where do they fall? Which. Which category do they fall in? Which circle of people? And then are they really good exercise. Are they firefighters or are they fire lighters? And then I'll give you some insight on what next steps and decisions to make.
>> Mike Huber: Awesome. All right, so we've got a few minutes left here. So this is a question that I like to ask it at the end of every interview that I do, every podcast. I think it's really important because it kind of choose to go back to the. The one thing.
>> Michael Huber: Right.
>> Mike Huber: I've. I've never read the book, but I'm familiar with it. But I am a big believer in prioritizing. Right. Like, hopefully that's come out a little bit. Picking that one thing, that input, and just going into it and blocking out all the other noise. So, like, if there's one piece of advice you leave behind today. Like, I know it's probably going to be hard because you got a lot of really good ideas.
>> Michael Huber: You know the Matrix where the green.
>> Mike Huber: What's the, like, what's. Maybe one thing that you'd say is like the most important thing or the thing that sort of jumps out at you that you'd want someone listening to.
>> Michael Huber: To leave with identity. Asking yourself, who are you? But then being able to commit to three identities that the highest performers in the world adopt. Number one, I am a lifelong learner. Number two, I am a lifelong achiever. Number three, this is the most important one. I am a lifelong giver. So being someone who is a, who's a go grower, who's a go getter, but most importantly, a go giver, the third identity is the most important. That's what this game of life is all about. Life is the most difficult and demanding sport ever created in the history of, of mankind. But if you can learn, but if you can learn how to center everything around service and contribution and adding value and that becomes everything, life and everything that you want to achieve on the way there will be so fulfilling.
>> Mike Huber: That's great. I'll leave it there. Diamond, it was a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you so much for joining me here today to record.
>> Michael Huber: Appreciate you having me.
>> Mike Huber: This is great. Yep, thanks so much. So what's your biggest takeaway from my conversation with Diamond Hall? My biggest takeaway was Diamond's belief that you relax to get results. Learning to breathe effectively and dominate the time in between moments leads to better decision making and performance. Allowing the body to relax lets the mind relax. When the mind relaxes, a performer's physical ability and training can take over. I want to thank diamond for joining me on the podcast. You can find diamond on Instagram and Twitter xiamondhall. Young athletes and parents can learn how to relax to get results by visiting my website, michaelvhuber.com thank you for listening. We'll see you back soon for episode 81.