Unlock Your Potential: George Mumford on Mindfulness, Authenticity, and Peak Performance | Ep. 074

Episode Transcript

Codie: 0:00

wanted to say, I, I read your book. I loved it. I was really inspired by the level of vulnerability that you really go into. it connected with me. my background, I wrote a book called From Foster Care to Millionaire. my parents were both alcoholics. They died before I turned 18. I pretty much had nothing, and the only thing I had was a business. And so I really worked my way up to become, successful. Ended up having a really big company, sold it for a lot of money, and now I'm doing the thing that I really love, which is having deeply meaningful conversations. Go ahead.

George: 0:34

Yeah, look at you. You bad. mo fo

Codie: 0:38

Thanks. I, I try. I try. Uh

George: 0:41

Yodas said Do or do not. There is no try

Codie: 1:00

Welcome to another episode of the mindhack podcast, where we dive deep into the minds of extraordinary individuals. to uncover their secrets to success, resilience and. Personal growth. I'm your host Cody McLain. And today we're honored to have George Mumford. A, legendary of mindfulness. Mindfulness coach who has worked with some of the greatest athletes of all time., including Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant. Under the leadership of Phil Jackson. George has helped these athletes. Unlock their full potential. Through the power of mindfulness. This conversation promises to be an enlightening journey . Into the world of peak performance, mental resilience. And the transformative power of mindfulness. In his early years, George struggled with severe addiction. A battle that took him to the depths of despair. It was through this crucible that he discovered mindfulness. A practice that. It would not only save his life, but also set him on a path. To helping others achieve their highest potential. After. Years of practicing and coaching mindfulness in various settings. George brought his unique perspective to the world of sports. Having worked with some of the top athletes in the NBA. NFL and NHL. George Mumford. Ability to connect with players. And teach mindfulness has been. Pivotal in their success stories. His first book. The mindful athlete secrets to pure performance. Offers. Deep insights into how mindfulness can enhance athletic performance. And everyday life. And today's episode. We'll dive deep and to George's latest work unlocked.. Where he shares more about his personal journey. The principles of. Mindfulness. And how these can be applied to overcome life's hurdles. We'll explore his time, working with inmates.. Profound transformations he's witnessed. And his insights. On how anyone can unlock their true potential. So without further ado, please welcome the remarkable George Mumford.

George: 3:10

so, um, the name of your company. you sold it and so you're just doing podcasts, or I mean, what else are you doing?

Codie: 3:19

Yeah, I mean, I sold it and really ever since then I've been trying to find what's the level of meaning that I can, I can get from life in some ways. I, found that I was deeply motivated to create a company and create a lot of success for myself, but initially it was out of the need for validation from others, and then it was out of a fear of being homeless. And so when your back is against the wall, then, you know, I've worked my ass off to, to become successful. But thing I never thought about what happens when I get the big house, what happens when I get the nice car, everything that I ever wanted and ever dreamed of, and it feels kind of empty. And so now I've been trying to figure out how can I derive that sense of meaning. I know you talked about that in your book, that sense of meaning that you give from teaching others the thing that you yourself learned. And, trying to use that as a source of motivation. So going from a place of, fear to, being pulled towards something positive.

George: 4:13

Yeah. So it's, the very deep question of, who are you or why are you here? Or what I say in, the book, what do you have to offer to the world? And the only thing you really have to offer is yourself, your unique, authentic self. and that's a challenge. And that's why you nailed it when you talked about, and then what, you do all this stuff and then you have success, but do you have fulfillment? do you have something that, you know, that makes you feel like, oh, I'm doing what I was put here to do. Because you can be really good at something, but yet it's not, it doesn't feed your heart. It's not something that you say, oh yeah, this is what I'm gonna do. For some of us, we don't know what we want to do. And that's the journey, isn't it? And even though you might achieve something, but Joseph Campbell it, it started out just reading about Native Americans and understanding that, and then he went from there into mythology and other things. And so that's a challenge. That's what I help people do. I like this. One of the things I do is I help people find themselves, you know, the authentic self, the unique self. And that's a journey, that's an internal journey. That's an inside job. But we all have the ability to do that. And sometimes we find it in many ways. Sometimes we find it by understanding what we don't want to do. but one of the things I've done over my career is I, I would ask questions like, if you only had six months to live, what would you be doing? That's a good one, huh?

Codie: 5:46

Yeah.

George: 5:47

So, and Joseph Campbell talked about following your bliss. That's what I did. Follow your bliss. what gives you bliss? What makes you happy? What are you curious about?

Codie: 5:56

I'm curious in the respect of, you know, you've, you've worked with a lot of, very well-known athletes, Olympic athletes even, and there's a quote that Jim Carrey had many years ago, which is that I wish everybody could be famous for a day so that they could see that it isn't. What it seems like it is, you know, you don't derive that sense of happiness from these things that we desire for much of our lives. But Jim Carrey himself came from a background of trauma. he had to overcome a lot of obstacles, and I see myself included, a lot of people who work extremely hard, are extremely dedicated to finding that level of success. But then I question. How do you move, how do you transition away from that? And I look at, say, all these Olympic athletes who get all these medals, Simone Biles, for example, I question what motivates her? What motivates so many others where when you've checked off everything you could possibly do when you've won all the Olympics, when you've beaten your own world records, why do you continue to do it? what's driving them? What's the difference between somebody who is motivated to, overcome obstacles and overcome trauma versus somebody who's able to find some other purpose, that pulls them to keep on doing this thing that they love?

George: 7:14

Yes. So there's this idea that drive comes from curiosity. Passion and purpose. And so that is very interesting for myself. I think about it, I've been doing this, this calibrated 40 years of sobriety and you know, I've worked with the elite of the elite. so why am I doing what I do now? I don't have do it, but I do it because I feel more fully alive being able to help people unlock, I, I developed a, a what was called a charter. And I was in this process, I was doing this workshop and it took me several months to develop the charter of, you know, what's my raison d'etre that's a release of divine spark in each and every human being. that for which, uh, the values that are at the heart of who I am are love, curiosity, truth, wisdom, integrity, selfless service, compassion, courage. Therefore, which I could be counted on for, is to be loving with a warrior spirit, with a serving and compassionate heart, pursuing excellence and wisdom with grace and ease. And so that purpose, that, mission, that charter is maybe lifetimes. It's more than a lifetime. And so it keeps me going. And so each time I challenge myself and see, you know, for the highest good, how many people can I unlock? You what's the value of having people unlock Is that when we are fully ourselves. And so I might say with all the success, the people that I've had, that I've worked with, have had, it's really, achievement is not as important as authenticity. But yet, if you're authentic, my experience is you achieve more success, and you achieve more things. But it's always, you begin with yourself, but you never end with yourself. It's about , the greatest good. The highest good. And so there's something about sport or doing something and going beyond what is considered the limit. If I think of, uh, sure. I wanna say, I don't know if it's Roger or Allen Bannister, I don't know what his name, it might be Roger Bannister. when he broke the four minute mile before that, it was considered, No one could run a, faster than four minutes. But when he broke the four minute mile, everybody else started doing it. And so that's kind of like, they call it a morphogenic field. When something is done, then the possibility of it repeating itself is enhanced. And so we have these self-limiting beliefs or these ideas about, like, the earth is flat, and it's not until somebody pushes beyond that boundary that we discover. There's more to it. And there's something fascinating about seeing somebody going beyond human, limitations or what we perceive as being limited. And I would say most of our limitations, uh, beliefs, self limiting beliefs. And so being able to explore or to ask the question, as Alan Watts said to ask the question, is to know the answer. And so we ask these questions, we pursue and we, expand. But when we've been traumatized, and we're doing things just to be accepted, appreciated, and approved, and then when we do that, it's not enough. That actual disenchantment is a opportunity to investigate and explore what is this? Why am I really here? And to really dig deeper and to get through that, that, Martin Buber in the book of the way, a man, he says, we live in a system of hideouts and we're hiding from myself. We have a divine spark that's encrusted in the shell, a isolating shell. And our job is to break out of it or to help some, have somebody help us break out of it and share that with everybody else, with the rest of the world to offer it to the world. So that's, that those are beliefs that I've been, those ideas, those ideas that are ideas that have been stimulating. My, my curiosity and my, interests how do we do their things? Why was I able to get clean when so many other people weren't? And what motivates people? Those are the things that, going back 40 years ago, that stimulated my interest and in pursuing that to pursuing excellence and wisdom with grace and ease. Why am I doing that? Because that's my bliss. that's what lights me up. And being able to see somebody light up, see somebody, unlock and then, but it's not a, you unlock once and that's it. No, you unlock. But then as things, things are always changing. You're always changing. The environment's always changing. There's always another level, another mountain to climb. But it's not climbing it for some purpose. The idea is what Emmi had talked about. You get to a point where you do the activity for the intrinsic value of the doing the activity for itself. It's the activity. It is the, it's a journey. That's the real thing, not the destination.

Codie: 11:57

All right.

George: 11:57

And so each moment you can, I, you can be successful, you're always getting a little bit better than you were before, but you can experience the joy, discovery, living that sense of wonder, the mystery. And we all have that capacity to do that. And then we're not limited. So Okay. They come along and say, oh, can you help us run a Stanley Cup? I've never worked with a NHL team before, but um, I have opportunity to transform people. To unlock people. Okay. Let's do it. Let's go for it.

Codie: 12:31

know, on the point of, of working with, as many athletes as you have and as many sports teams as you have, what do you do exactly when you are hired? When you were brought on with the Oilers and you're a coach, are you teaching them meditation? Do you have classes? What? Contribution do you make that helps them to have a mindset for success?

George: 12:53

Yes. So I like to talk about this idea of self-mastery. And in my mind, my definition of self-mastery is to get to a place where you get to self-mastery by having self-awareness and self-regulation. And so what do I mean by self-awareness? That means the awareness of myself, but awareness of myself and the world that I'm operating in so that I have mirror mine. So I'm just reflecting what's there. And through that self-awareness, I get to self-regulate. So what does that mean? Self-regulate, that means self-generated thoughts, feeling behaviors, even the ways, the way I interpret experience. And so that's it. So when I can get to a place where no matter what happens to me, I get victimized, traumatized, or, Whatever it is desensitized that I have the ability to step back and observe experience in ways where I can change my reaction or my response to things. So when I react to something, there's no space between stimulus and response, and it's a knee jerk. It's a habitual way of behaving. Versus if I can create space between stimulus and response, as Viktor Frankl talked about, and the space between stimulus and response, I have the freedom and power to choose. So I get to choose, so what are my values, uh, core values and worthy cause? And then by that, then that informs what choices I make. But it's always realizing that the ultimate freedom, as Viktor Frankl talked about, he, wrote a lot of books. Man's Search For Meaning. He talked about this idea of unavoidable freedom or when you're experience, well, ultimate freedom when you're experiencing unavoidable suffering. And you get to choose how you respond, your attitude and how you relate to it. And he also said, suffering ceases to be suffering when we find meaning in it. And so we are meaning making. Machines. I wouldn't even say machines, but, events. Uh, so people think we're, and I read this and I read over a book a week for the last 40 years. people think that we're fixed points. We are not fixed points. We are ever changing events. So we're always in the becoming. And so we can have multiplicity of, careers or take on different roles or whatever. And it's not so much what you're doing as who you are being while you're doing. So it's all about being, it's an existential thing. And they talk about being in potentiality and then be able to re reach our potential. So why is it so challenging for us to reach our potential? Because as so and talked about back in 1846, he talked about one side of the coin. I have a. American Quarter is potential or freedom. The other side of the coin is uncertainty, anxiety. They come together just like the duality of life and death. the duality of good and evil and, and we have to deal. It is always a conflict. How do I use my time? I have, you know, I have autonomy. I can choose what I focus on, but that's, if I'm aware of the fact that the environment is, is acting on me or I'm, I'm meeting what I mirror. And if I don't like what I see, I can change it. I can go inside and change it. Neville Goddard, it wrote a lot of books, uh, one of them is the Power of Awareness and many others, and in one of his books, on the side page, it says, leave the mirror alone and change your face. Think about that. If I'm frowning, then I can change that. And that's what life is. Life happens to us, but we have a choice and we have the freedom to choose. Even when we are programmed or addicted, we have the freedom to de- addict ourselves or to reprogram ourselves. And some people have these ideas that everything's determined. Yeah, there's a lawfulness in the universe, but it's not determined especially. But if you look at it from a Newtonian, view of physics, where you got these large bodies and, uh, force, equals counterforce, that's very different than the, quantum realm where the observed and the observer interacting. So as, your intention and your quality of your mind has everything to do with how you see and, what you create. And so now that makes it a lot more, but how can you. Coexist in two parts of the universe. Uh, you know, they have all of these theories that we don't, we don't really know. It's, it's strange than we can think. If you really think about it. And if you think about just the idea of galaxies and our galaxy, to get from one end of our galaxy to the other end, it takes a hundred thousand light years. Yet this galaxy bigger than ours, that it takes 6 million light years to go from one end to the other. And then there's probably galaxies bigger than that. And there's billions and billions and trillions of galaxies. It's beyond what we can think. And so when you think about it that way, whoa, there's a lot we don't know.

Codie: 17:43

true.

George: 17:44

but yet the only thing that we, we know for sure, and it is interesting. Because I spoke on a Tim Ferris podcast and, Lewis Howes School of Greatness, and they both asked me, what three things do I know as three things? I forget what the question, but I answered the same way. And when I reflected on those podcasts, I realized I said the same thing. And so the three things that I talked about was, number one, the only time you have is now Number two, the only one you could be is you. And number three, all you need is love. So that's a good one.. It's like, so that's it. And so now is always changing. So even if you think about the past of the future, you can only do that now. And we could try to be who we think others think we should be or be who we think we ought to be. But in reality, we just have to be who we are.. And that's an inside job. And you know when you are being authentically yourself'cause you will feel it. see it. But it's not something people have access to because we have a system of hideouts, we're always hiding out. For myself, I have this persona I want you to see instead of being, so you mentioned the V word, the vulnerability, being willing, being vulnerable to be who you really are and to feel what you're really feeling now in spite of what it might mean or how it might affect how you behave. Know the truth and the truth shall make you free. So th own self be true Shakespeare. And that's, that's what our challenge is, to be real, to be authentic. And we have a bullshit meter when people are not being authentic, we can feel it. But when they're being authentic, when they're being vulnerable, there's a power in the vulnerability. I was just talking today, you know, coming up, well, you don't know, but coming up on, you know, having celebrated 40 years and reflecting on what that meant and what was key for me to do that, uh, you start to realize that once I admit it, I was powerless or I don't know, then I kind of know, as you know, once again, a power of myth. So Campbell said, those who think they know, don't know, and those who don't know, know, and it's this, this conundrum and these paradoxes that we have to figure out. People love being in the flow or zone, but if you try to get in the flow or the zone, you won't get there. And it's like happiness cannot be pursued. It ensues Virkto Frankl again. So it's like trying to catch water in a paper bag, as Alan Watts talked about. You can't grab it. You can't grasp it. So you know that, and you don't have to make a problem out of it, but trying to make everything linear, one plus one equals two. There's the non-linear, there's the consciousness and there's the unconsciousness. There's what we call, declarative learning or explicit learning. And then there's non declarative or implicit learning where we learn things that we don't even know. We learn. We actually learn better unconsciously than we do consciously.'cause there's a pattern detector, there's a wisdom that goes, that comes outta that silence and stillness that we can't quantify. It's beyond human resources. Joseph Campbell will talk about it. So we live in a mystery. There's some things that we can know and some things we don't know, but we can extrapolate or we can see the effects of it. But we can't claim it. And I like to use the example of you learn how to ride a bike. How? How did you do that? How do you explain that? But yet, once you learn how to ride a bike, you always know how to ride a bike. What's up with that?

Codie: 21:10

Hmm.

George: 21:10

That's implicit, non-collaborative learning. You don't even know, you know it until you to, it expresses itself. So there's some things that are going on now that you, I might be aware of or learning that we don't even know. We learn until it expresses itself sometime in the future.

Codie: 21:26

you mentioned the, concept of, authenticity a lot. this is is something where you even mention it in your book, that we need to live authentically. And I'd really love to dig into that because when you say to live authentically, in some ways, I'm hearing that that should be your source of motivation. That we shouldn't be motivated by external desires, by having a, bunch of Olympic medals, by, having nice things that culture tells us that we should desire. So, we should work hard to get these things, and obviously you can get those things and not be happy. And what I really would love to know, what does it mean to live authentically as a source of waking up every day and feeling excited for the things and the life that you have.

George: 22:14

So when I got clean and I started seeing things differently, I was working as a financial analyst. Uh, working in, um, in the defense industry for 14 years and two years in the high tech industry. And so I, I was really good at what I did and after I left my job of nine years and went to a new place, I thought that things would be different. But when I went there, I was doing my job, but I wasn't really. Really into it. I would forget meetings or I just wasn't that interested. but my mind was telling me, oh yeah, I'm really good at this. I get paid money and I don't know what else I would do. And I remember, and I talk about this, in those days there weren't too many people doing the process, that we offer now. Mind, you know, uh, meditation. I, so I had a. My teacher, I used to go and meet with him once a week.'cause there weren't that many of us. I had a lot of access. And I go in to meet with him one day and as I walk into the interview room, he says, Hey, what's going on with you today? And I said, what do you mean? He says, you seem happy. And I said, oh, I took a mental health day off today. And he said, you should make a habit of that. So I wasn't being authentic with how I really felt about the job. And the way that Psyche works sometimes is we hide. We have a system of hideouts. We don't want to accept that factor, then we have to leave. So it could be a relationship, it could be a work situation, it could be a notion of who we think we are. Because when we talk about the fear of death. it is really a fear of non being. It's not just the physical death. It's a fear of, uh, of not being able, uh, this fear of a way of being, a fear of who we think we are versus who we really are. Because, and I'll say this, we are not what we think we are, but what we think we are. So what I'm really saying about authenticity is to really listen to how we are thinking.'cause that's how we're really being. That's who we really are versus what the ideas we have about who we are. Does that make sense? And so when you become authentic, you, have to go deep and realize that you're not happy where you are, even though. But there's a part of you that doesn't like to change, doesn't want to deal with the anxiety of not knowing or the uncertainty. That's involved in that. So it takes a certain amount of courage and I would call to get to the Hall of Fame, the HOF. You need hope, optimism, and faith to be able to say, yeah, I'm hiding myself and I'm doing this. I don't really know what I want to do, but this ain't it. And you kind of did that. Well, you didn't kind of do do that. You did it, you all this money, you got a company. Then you just sold it and say, okay, that's not what I want to do. So it comes with disenchantment. It comes from realizing that you're not happy and, and you, you might have some guilt because you, you have more than most, but that's not what happiness is. And so however you're feeling like some of us was politically correct, we say, okay, we're supposed to like this person. This is a family member or this is a member of my team. You don't pick your teammates and your family, but being authentic. Saying, I don't really like that person. If that person wasn't related to me, I wouldn't have anything to do with them. Nothing personal. It's just that we don't vibe. It's not, we're not in the same energy. And so acknowledging that doesn't mean you have to leave, but acknowledges that you are staying in a situation that no longer fulfills you. And so the authenticity is being real with that instead of being conflicted or saying, yeah, I don't like it, but I'm choosing to be here. And at some point, when you know it and you get to the point, you'll leave. And so it took my teacher, it took me getting into a place where it was harder to stay than to leave because they wanted me to be, to violate my principles, to stay there. And I got to a dark night of the soul, you might say, where I, I couldn't leave and I couldn't stay. The same with my recovery. I hit bottom and I couldn't keep doing it. I couldn't not do it. And then at some point, the crap hit the fan and I made a choice. And when I made that choice, there was a death of, you know, you, I went through grieving and that's part of the problem when you gotta let go to grow. But when you let go, when you accept, yes, I'm powerless or yeah, I'm vulnerable. go through the stages of grief, you go through denial, bargaining, anger, depression, acceptance. Do you get the acceptance? You get the acceptance. You have to say yes and embrace it and work through it. Just really get clear about it. And so we have all of these norms and the cultural, and everybody else is telling us who we need to be or who they think we ought to be. But our first choice as a leader is to choose to be ourselves regardless of the consequences. So you could be, Adam, you get kicked outta eden. You know, because, because you chose another path or you chose to see things differently. We want people to be around us to think like we do instead of realizing, no, embrace their diversity and it can make life rich, but it makes us look at what we are doing. And then there's this sense of, okay, maybe I'm living a un authentic life. and that happens to people. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross is the psychiatrist that came up with the death and dying and, and the stages of grief. And I remember her talking about talking to this doctor that was, no, he wasn't a doctor. Yeah, he was a doctor. He was 65 years old and he was in therapy with her. And he said, you know, all I wanted to do was to be a pianist. I didn't want to be a doctor, but my mom wanted me, be a doctor. And I wasn't strong enough to say, no, I'm not doing that. I'm doing what I, I'm following my bliss. I'm gonna do what I want to do. Well, how are you gonna survive? How are you gonna make a living? that's not so important. What's important as me being myself and figuring it out? So I could be a school teacher making not a lot of money, but if that's what my heart wants me to do, then that's success. But it takes a tremendous amount of courage to do that. Because we're not, encouraged to be authentic. We're encouraged to fit in. And even you have some people used to go to therapy. When I was studying to be a psychotherapist, you have some people to go to therapy and they think their job is to help people fit in and say, okay, you're in the job, you're in this relationship. you just gotta deal with your, whatever comes up or whatever you know, just, get, so you can be there. But what it costs you to be there is you gotta drink and drug because there's a part of you that's conflicted and doesn't want to be there. And you're, not being true to yourself. And when you're not being true to yourself, something is going to, the conflict is going to, manifest in the psychosomatically or whatever. Mind and body work, you know, your mind is so powerful. That our beliefs are so powerful we create with that. And so if you think about it, and this is what fascinated me when I first started doing this, one of the main things was this person has multiple personality disorder and in one personality they're diabetic and the other one they're not. How do you explain that? One or one personality They can see. And the other one that, they need glasses. The only thing that's changed is their self-image or how they're seeing themselves. It's the only thing that's changed. But physiologically it's the same. And so you do it with, you could see it with, you know, hypnosis where they'll hypnotize somebody and say, I got a iron poke and I'm gonna touch you here. Then the blister appears. What's up with that? But we don't understand how powerful our thoughts are. So one of the thoughts we may be thinking is actually causing illness or causing us not to be open to who we are.. And that's an internal investigation, us that can help us, like my teacher say, Hey man, you're happy now even though you don't wanna admit it, 'cause you admit it, you have to quit that job or that relationship, or quit, you know, quit, uh, being inauthentic and doing stuff that you don't want to do, but you think you should do. That's when the shoulds come in. You should do that instead of listening to your heart. So, Rollo May talks about, I think it was Rollo May, or I don't know if it was Erich Fromm or Rollo May, one of those guys talked about love and will. I think it might've been, uh, Rollo May, but, or it might've been, I don't know if it was Erich Fromm, but he talked about developing love your mind and your heart and not say, don't be emotional. Just be up here. But no, your emotion in your heart, they interact and they can support each other. Does that make sense? I think it's Erich Fromm, actually. He wrote the book, The Art of Loving, but they're all existential therapists they use psychoanalysis, but they, the existential philosophy about, about potential and authenticity and things like that, that helped me understand myself just realizing that, yeah, I'm a unique individual and it's my job to be me and not to do what people think or I should be, or who I ought to be, but me to make the decision to be myself.

Codie: 30:58

And that's so important today than ever when we're in a society now, especially where, young adults have access to Instagram, TikTok, and they see examples of other people who have this success and then they themselves derive it. But it's kind of like a fake, desire. It's not necessarily what they want, but they tend to embody this based on what they think others. say is acceptable for them to want, and then we end up having so many people living an inauthentic life. So how does, so in your book, you say first, however, it is important to learn, to be still and develop insight, to have the capacity and awareness to see things as they are. And so how do we have the, how do we find that capacity to sit still and sit with our, subconscious and pull out what is it that we actually want and how do we separate that from what others tell us that they want?

George: 31:58

Yes. So, these guys wrote a lot of books. One of Erich Fromm book is Escape from Freedom and I mentioned The Way of Man by Martin Buber and we have Hideouts. And one of the ways we do, we escape freedom by authoritarianism conformism, hiding in plain sight. And we do that. And we fit in, but there's a part of us that knows it's not right. and you can see a lot now with the dictators and everything. So the formula is make things chaotic so that you gotta go to daddy to save you. so you have an authoritarian. That tells you when to eat, when to sleep, and all the other stuff, and tells you what you can do with your body and whatnot. And so on some level you feel secure, but there's a false sense of security. And at the same time, you feel resentment and you might even feel guilt knowing that you're not being yourself and you're not being honest with how you really feel, but to be part of the group. And if you get to a point where it's a cult, you're not allowed to have your own feelings. Everybody has to have a group thing. You have to think for yourself. But, that's not who we are. And so we have to see what's my hideouts, what hideouts am I engaging in? how am I escaping from my freedom and it's authoritarianism? Or some one of 'em is even destructiveness. Just blow stuff up. Because if you don't have a self, you can't have fear of it. So you blow yourself up, you blow people up, you don't matter. It's suicide bombers and whatnot. So you can see it's all about escape of freedom. escape from the fact that you make choices. You have self-awareness, you make choices, you have self-mastery. You can choose to be yourself, but are you willing to take the blowback from being yourself? Because the challenge is we're in a network of relationships. And if you see the metaphor of being in a boat and one person moves a rowboat or a canoe and one person moves, everybody has to move or switch, or it's gonna tip over so people feel like this, this change is being forced on them.'cause you change, your relationships change.

Codie: 33:59

Hmm.

George: 34:00

They change, and people they change anyway. But we keep act relating to each other as we used to be, instead of relating to each other as we are now. You can see that. You can imagine how many people in the room if you. you know, who you think you are, who you want other people to see, and you know, at least three iterations, you know, I have this persona, I want you to see this, but then this is how I really think about myself. And then, then this is how I, I really am. So you have all these permutations. So if you say two people, this can be so many different variations on that relationship instead of being who you really are. And even that is, is challenging because it's, it's, it's like a flow. It's like flows. So it's a becoming. So you're always doing it. But that's why core values are really helpful in deciding the principles that we're gonna live by. That, Stephen Covey talks about, think win-win come from an abundance paradigm, you know, synergize. So you and I have, we agree that it is not your way, not my way, it's the third way. But that third way has to be a way that doesn't violate your core values or your core principles. And so we have to be able to do that, but it takes vulnerability to do that, to actually come up with a third way that works for both of us.

Codie: 35:21

George, I'm curious, have you ever had a conversation with an athlete in which you talked about the idea of, being authentic, knowing who we are as a person, and then they came to some realization and decided that, you know what, I'm not gonna be an athlete. and they quit and did something completely different.

George: 35:39

Yes, I had one situation in particular. I was working with this young lady. She was a freshman at a D one school and she was on the national team, so she was really good soccer player, and as a sophomore, a freshman, she talked about the fact. That she didn't really want to wanna play soccer. And she struggled with it. And I don't remember if it was the beginning of her, I know it was the beginning of her freshman year, and then as a sophomore she came back and she had the same thing. And I encouraged her to follow. She was lucky enough that her parents had enough money that she could give up a scholarship and still go to school. But I remember several years later when she, I was in a, uh, finagle bagel or one of those fast food, one of those places, and she came over to me and she gave me a big hug. She was graduating, but that was the best decision she ever made to stop being an athlete. And there'll be times when there'll be an athlete that they don't want to be on that team. For what? I had another young lady, she was very, um, religious and being a student athlete, she couldn't go to church as much as she wanted to. And this was in her freshman year actually. It was, it was a volleyball player and, and it was still preseason. So we were in preseason. We didn't get into the season yet, and she, it became clear to her that she didn't want to be there. And so she came to me and, and I helped her, uh, get out of her scholarship. And her mother didn't want her to leave. Her mother was really, was actually, I think she was in the military, but she was really pushing her to stay, but. I encouraged her to follow. You know, she didn't want to be there because that energy of not being there is not helpful to her or the team. And so those are just two instances where I just said, I'm not telling'em what to do, but I'm saying, you know, if your heart is saying it, and it took this one young lady two years to get to that realization.' cause it's really challenging to just to quit doing what you're doing when you're the best at it. But it's not fulfilling for you. It's not what you want to do, but you do it just like me. Well, I became a financial analyst. Why? Because my high school coach told me that accountants make good money and I didn't know who I could be. And if you don't know who you are, you're gonna end up being anybody. And if you don't know where you're going, you're gonna end up going anywhere. But I didn't have the wherewithal, the confidence to be self-directed to be self-led. And so you, you get what I'm saying? And so we do this, we do what's convenient or what everybody else is doing, but it takes real work to go inside and think about if you only had six months to live, what would you, how would you, what would you do? And you see some people, when I worked in the medical center, you see some people were facing death, whether it's through AIDS or cancer or whatever. They decided how they were gonna live their final days. Sometimes it takes death to get us to say, well, you know, I'm gonna choose how I go out. My uncle did that. He decided that when he was dying of cancer, he didn't wanna take any medication. Now I had him packed on him, I think because I was talking to him about being sober and not being able to, to engage like always did. And, and it inspired him. He wanted to, he said he wanted to see his maker with full consciousness. So, and this is a, a lifetime alcoholic. I. I was doing stuff like that. But I had real good relationships with my, even though I was dysfunctional, I had a lot of great relationships, especially with my uncles and this particular uncle. We were really close, even though he lived in another city, but we could be real and we could talk and he would just tell you things. He didn't sugar coat anything. He was funny. But we had that kind of relationship. And so you see that, and I can't tell you other people who stopped drinking'cause they seen how it affected me. They didn't have a problem, but they wanted to get what I was getting. So I just totally transformed just by being able to let go. And then I started encouraging myself to be myself. And it's challenging to be that because of the anxiety I talked about, people don't realize, oh, if you're doing what you're really doing, you're really good at it. What the hell are you being anxious about? Well, how about the fact that you can get hurt? or things can change or this uncertainty. The next moment is unknown. Tomorrow's unknown. There's no way you know, that you think, you know, but it's unknown really is. And so can you embrace the unknown, fully conscious and saying, okay, I don't know what is gonna come, but I know I have self mastery. I get to choose what my attitude I'm gonna bring. I get to choose how much energy and effort I bring into it. I get to choose what in. I get to interpret it in ways that resonate with me. The access gives me access to power. And once again, the resource says 90% of long term happiness, not 10%, but 90% is predicated on how the nervous system and the brain interprets experience. So is the proverbial glass half empty or half full? Both right? Half empty. Uh, you're in survival mode. So, and that reptilian brain, nine outta 10 thoughts are gonna be negative.. Codie: All right. So you're gonna be on your toe, on your heels. But if you see it as half full, now you're in the broaden and build and now you're seeing things and you're making connections and you have access to power, access to, yes, I can access to, oh, I make choices. If I make a mistake, I learn from it. Now you're in a growth mindset. So you're always looking for and realizing that you can change your brain, you can change yourself just by, by the self-awareness and the self-regulation. Then you get the self-mastery, and then when you have self-mastery, then, whatever organization you go to, then you could talk about, uh, and ripple that through. So everybody becomes self-led and not in a selfish way. Self-led in a authentic way.

Codie: 41:18

It seems so much that the default in human nature is to blame other people. To blame our environment, the way we were grown up as a means of, externalizing and blaming. The situation that we find ourselves in. but as you note so much that we have so much power over our perception that that stimulus between what happens and how we respond and that there's so much power in that, and yet we, don't really embody that. Is, that like a, a realization that you came from years of meditating, you

George: 41:52

Well, even, even early in recovery, when in my first, when I got clean, I, came to, um, what was in my face. I had chronic pain. Had migraines and back issues and all, all my life. And I had GI issues dealing with stress and whatever, And I was taking this, stress management course and I learned the three C's. See things be committed to my development, see things, as challenges instead of as curses, and I could control my reaction or my response to things. So we call that resilience, stress hardiness, uh, strong, self-efficacy, that I can control. the externals I can control the internal. So the locus of control we talk about has to be internal, not external, but we put all the thing out, everything out there, and we do what I call a, B, and D, the blame and denial. We blame other people, places, and things, never us, or we blame ourselves to the degree that it's. it's like self torture. or we deny that it's happening and that's where addiction, a big part of it is denial. Just acting like nothing's wrong. And so as long as I blame and deny, then I won't take personal responsibility and I'm giving all the power to the environment that becomes external locus of control. And when it's an external locus of control, if the situation is right, we react a certain way instead of realizing there's an internal locus of control where it doesn't matter what the environment is doing, it's how you're reacting or responding to it. And that's where the freedom and power to choose comes in. When you can start thinking and feeling and behaving in ways to create more space. Then you can slow things down, and now you're talking about your prefrontal cortex or the executive functions, having access instead of being emotionally hijacked. So the stimulus goes right to the amygdala, and then you're in the reptilian brain where you're gonna fight, flee, or freeze. Versus having space and really having access to what you already know, having access to using your wisdom, using your intelligence.

Codie: 43:58

and so a lot of what you talk about is on the power of self-belief. And I'm somebody who grew up thinking that I would never achieve anything that, nothing I would do would ever matter. And I ended up utilizing a mix of three different approaches, to help build up my self belief. I'd like to share what these three things that I came up with are and, and then ask you some questions after that. The first one the obvious, fake it till you make it. I think this is a very common one, but it often stems in my opinion, from a deep insecurity that we may not be the person that we are pretending to be. And unless we make progress quickly, then I think this, this form of self-belief can quickly shatter. The second one is a faith and a higher power or destiny. I think this can provide a boundless source of self-belief as long as we don't stray from the faith. But on the downside it's possible that it can, I think it can lead to feelings of grandiosity and extreme narcissism, especially if we have any underlying trauma. lastly number three is, we can build that internal self-belief through overcoming obstacles, like overcoming challenges. and that creates this sense that we can look back on of all these achievements that our ego can refer to during all the tough times that, that we need that or we need something to help keep us going. so really, my, question is how can we, what's the proper mix of, these sources of self-belief? Are there any. Any one or multiple that you saw Kobe, Michael Jordan, et cetera, what was the form of self-belief that gave some of the most successful athletes that you work with? that internal locus control, that power, that, that ability to live authentically.

George: 45:48

I would say that, let's just, talk about the three things you talked about.'cause I think even though you say certain things, I think there's some, there's a positive and a negative to it. and I would call it unshakeable belief. Not just belief in self, but belief in others. But I start off with original blessing or this idea that we have a masterpiece within. We have everything we need to succeed. We just have to access it. We have divinity. And it's interesting, I've studied, um, and hopefully I won't get too far off track, but I studied, um, Edgar Casey, the sleeping prophet. And I studied him for years. And one of the things he talks about is that when we align ourselves with divine principles like love or faith, hope and love, or any of those things, uh, I call the hall of fame hope, optimism, or faith, that consciousness can override. Our genes or our DNA because in order for our DNA and some of the conditioning we have, it has to be, , activated. And so by directing attention somewhere else or aligning with divinity, you can overcome that. Where they don't get triggered, they don't get activated, right. So I know that's a profound thing to say, but that's been my experience. So for me it's been love. I meditate on love, what he calls attunement and application. So the love flows through me and then that's the app to mate connect with the love energy. Then the application is to go out and be loving. So while I'm doing it to men, it might be one of my enemies or somebody that is very challenging, comes up and I don't hate on 'em. I just tolerate them or I send them blessings. Or pray for them or something like that, but changing my reaction to that. So, so there has to be this idea that, that we have, and of course in the, in the Buddhist context, they talk about Buddha nature or taking refuge in the fact that we have Buddha nature or Christ consciousness or the divine spark. So that's where everything I do starts off with the masterpiece within, but it's encrusted in the shell. How, just like the chrysalis, how do you break out to do it? So we are wire for success. We some bad mo fos just saying that's there now. Or some people would say like, uh, max, uh, malts that wrote, uh, psycho cybernetics. he talks about, that we have access. So in other words, want to put it this way? So let's get back to, you said fake it till you make it. Now if you fake it, you may not make it. Now you have imposter syndrome. But there is a act as if, which is the same thing, but it's very different.'cause it's, it's acting as if you're already a champion. So I say you gotta be a champion before you win a championship. So acting as if is important because when you act as if you actually end up doing what you, you want to do. So it's very subtle, but it's really powerful acting as if, and, and this idea of faith and a higher power, just knowing that there's a, there's a lawfulness. And so the second one, faith or higher power. And this Einstein says one of the most important decisions we make is deciding whether the universe is friendly or unfriendly. If it's unfriendly, that means we will use all our resources to deny and destroy any threat. But if we think it's a friendly universe, then we'll align ourselves more like, like Casey talked about, align ourself with the way things are, divinity. So you don't have to believe in gravity, but if you go up, you will come down. So you align yourself, with the way things are, use all your resources and your intelligence, to align yourself with how things are. And the third thing you talked about, you call it what you call overcoming obstacles. This is a aspect of strong self-efficacy, belief, which has to do with overcoming obstacles as, uh, I think what Nietzche said that was, does not kill me, makes me stronger. And so that's, that's one of the things that I, that I, I use all of these, the high power, uh, the acting as if and, overcoming obstacles and realizing, but at some point it took years for me to acknowledge that I did that. Overcoming a substance like heroin and, you know, dealing with chronic pain, that should make you more confident. But it didn't make me more confident'cause I didn't believe it... it was uncomfortable for me. To acknowledge that, uh, I have master peace within, or I, I'm on a hero's journey. Some of us, 'cause of our low self concept, we can't consent to it being true. And if we don't consent to it being true, you don't acknowledge it. but our job is to keep reminding, you know, reflecting on past successes, stuff like that. And so overcoming the obstacles if we're present and if we're real about it, we have to let in. That we achieved that. But for some of us it, because our self image is like a foreman, it says, yeah, I can believe that. I can't believe that. So you have to get overwhelmed and do it so many times for so many years that you start to let it in, start to let in that greatness. So there's something underneath that is saying yes to some things, no to other things. And this is what Maxwell Maltz talked about, the self image, this idea of thinking about it and getting rid of the negative emotions and the negativity, getting outta survival mode. So we're able to be in growth mode and able to see, oh, I don't have to believe this, but this happened and led to that. So if we keep at it and we have a community of people that are helping us, then we start to realize that we have Christ consciousness, Buddha, nature of the divine spark. And you can see it and have a direct experience of it by understanding it's not fake till you make it, it's acting as if, but that's, that requires faith. That faith is the substance of things. Hoped for the evidence of things unseen or not seen. And so when you have faith, 'cause belief is holding on, faith is letting go. So when you have faith, at least to Alan Watts, that's what he said. When you have faith, you act as if. So if you pray for something, you act as if you're going, the prayer's gonna be answered, or you make it, you act as if you're going to win something or you're going to achieve something, or you're gonna have a great experience. And by doing that, we call that outcome expectation. That's actually a self-fulfilling prophecy. You're actually telling your nervous system, not only your nervous system, but according to, I think it was the Alchemist when he talked about the universe will collude with you. And Joseph Campbell said, when you follow your bliss doors will open. Where there were no doors, there's an alignment. Of the energy when you really commit to Yeah, I'm about, have a masterpiece. I'm gonna act as if until I have the direct experience of it and then having a direct experience of it. then it grows. And then you start seeing, okay, now you have faith, but now you have conviction because you do it, you have a direct experience of it, and you see, indeed we are what we become what we think about. As Dr. Dre said, you get your mind on money, money in your mind. That's what you manifest and that's what makes us powerful because what we hold in mind, we manifest. So the challenge is we don't, we hold not good enough. You know, I can never do what I want. All of that stuff in mind. And that's what we become. So we have to see what are we thinking? What, what ideas are we entertaining? What emotions are we, feeding and that sort of thing. And you start to realize it's all about the mind. It's all about what you hold in mind. You become what you think about. That's the greatest secret that Earl Nightingale talked about in his book, the Strangest Secret. So we look at all these things. So my experience is fake it till you make it. Not fake it till you make it, but act as if, and then you have faith. and you act as if what you ask for is gonna happen. If you do that, then that becomes what it is. And then your belief, when you overcome obstacles, you actually get stronger and you actually see, oh, this does make sense. And then the more you do it, the more you get strong self efficacy, belief. And this research on this, when you have strong efficacy, belief, you set more challenging goals. You stay engaged in the process even though there's nothing telling you it's gonna work.

Codie: 53:50

Hmm.

George: 53:51

And so the rich get richer. And so you get to the point and not, and then you talk about, um, false. In my book, the Mindful athlete, this is why I talked about the superpowers. Mindfulness is helpful, but you need um, right effort. You need right concentration, and you need trust and insight. So if you have too much insight, you know a lot, but you don't have enough faith, you become cynical If you have. Too much faith and not enough verification, or insight on it, then you become pollyannaish. So it's a balancing act. You need both. It's not one or the other, but you have to verify it. You trust, but you verify and you see if you have a direct experience, and this is what the Buddhist said, said don't believe me. See if it's true. And that's one of the awakening powers the investigation to see if the teaching is actually, uh, can you have a direct experience of it? Intuition or direct experience, which is part of wisdom. You might think of wisdom as information and intellect or using your rational mind and a direct experience or intuition. Uh, knowing that goes beyond research. You just know stuff. So does that make sense? And so this is amazing and there's so much here that we could do. To allow ourselves to be who we are. But it is challenging and it's uncomfortable. So you have to get comfortable being uncomfortable and you have to be willing to do it, but you have to have a sense of urgency to do it. Like I call it the AOF method of motivation. What does that mean? Ass on fire. My ass was on fire. That's the only way I got to this before. Yeah. Intellectually I couldn't come there from the intellect. I had to come there from the pain. Pain is motivator. Does that make sense? And so this is what's available to all of us. There's nobody that is exempt from this process. But you have to be honest, you have to have the capacity to say yes to things. You have to have the capacity to look at how am I hiding out? How am I. Staying in survival mode so that I'm not in growth mode and I don't consent to the fact that I can learn anything I need to learn. That is being myself and being yourself means you gotta go inside and listen to yourself. No one can do it but you. No one's in there but you.

Codie: 56:01

Hmm.

George: 56:01

And that's what's challenging because you have to find your way. And Joseph Campbell talks about it in the power of myth. It can't be someone else's way. It has to be your way. So as a teacher, I can make suggestions to you, but you have to figure out how it's gonna work for you or what resonates with you. I can give you multiple things, and if I know you well enough, then I can talk about, based on what I know, if this might work, or I might just go with my intuition. That wisdom inside that when I'm quiet, it just knows stuff, right? And then I just say things. But my job is to help you unlock and embrace your greatness. Find the flow, discover success. That's how you unlock. But embracing your greatness is pretty damn challenging.

Codie: 56:40

Sure is.

George: 56:41

Does that make sense? So, so these are some amazing questions. I mean, you gave you, you gave me a lot of reach for the mill there, brother.

Codie: 56:51

I actually, I know that we're running short on time. I have. one last question if that's okay. Is that you talked so much about the importance of self-belief, about the ability for us to choose how we're going to react to a situation and to make sure that we're living authentically and the need and urgency that we need to create for ourselves, as well as the ability to sit still, to understand what is it that we actually want. And so often we can, wind ourselves up and we can, put ourselves out there, but in, in situations like, like most recently, as, I know that you were hired on to work with the Oilers, in their 2024 Stanley Cup run. you know, they were down zero to three against Florida and they managed the claw back and make it three to three, but they ultimately lost in that final game. And I can only imagine that the team, they were inspired, they were optimistic going into that final game, but only to have all their hopes crushed. And I'm really fascinated to know what did you tell the team? What do you tell anybody in a situation where they had this high chance of a comeback and they were super optimistic and, then They were just crushed afterwards and, you know, felt that incredible sense of defeat. how do you come back from, this huge sense of defeat, not only from the perspective of the Oilers, but from anybody who put themselves out there and the universe didn't deliver.

George: 58:12

Well, it's interesting how you interpreted that. That's not the way I see it. We weren't crushed. We were inspired.' cause there's no guarantee you can do everything you want and still lose, but you're not a loser. You just lost the game. You know? It came down to To one. One the first period. Really? The first period. And you know when they scored the second goal. But the thing is, we weren't crushed. But yet, was it painful? Yes. Is it devastating? Yes. But that's not who we are. That's just what happened. And the question is, what do you need to learn? That same team lost, I think last year. I think they might've lost in five games of, so they, they didn't even do as well as we did. But they came back this year and you used that as a stepping stone. What do you need to learn in practice so you can do it? So once again, 90% of long-term happiness is predicated on how you interpret things. If you interpret it being crushed and why do it is you're gonna get crushed. That's gonna keep you in survival mode and it is not worth it. But if you're in growth mode, you're looking at, okay, what's the lesson? What do we need to learn in practice so that when we come back, we'll be able to achieve it. But even that is no guarantee life. There's no guarantees in life. You do everything right and still lose, especially in ice hockey. That's one of the sports that the best team doesn't always win because if the goalie is, is on fire or you know, you, you hit the puck and it goes off the goalie's ass and goes into the, into the goal, that's the way it is. But this is life. There's no guarantee you can do everything right and get hit by car tomorrow. There's no guarantees. But to my mind, it is better to, to say yes to life and to go with it and to use it as a stepping stone, not as a roadblock and don't see it that way and see it. Yeah. It was painful to get that close and not get it, but this is where resilience is about. It's like, okay, your job is to do the next thing. And that's what we did. We got to a place where. We were down three 0, there were 10, days left in the game, I mean, in the, in the season. And we just have to make the next play, win the next game. It's being in the moment, being yourself, using love. That's how you get there. And so we ran outta steam or things didn't happen quite right but we were the first team to force the game. Seven since 1945. 45. We started off at, you know, two, nine and one. So, the resilience, you know, overcoming obstacles, that's it. So if you look at it like all that was devastating. We were crushed. That's not the way I, I, that's not what. What I'm interested in. And that's not what we did. We build on that and say, okay, the city, everybody, there's a whole country of Canada. They were inspired motivated, like, look what can happen when you just, be in the moment and be yourself and just do the best you can and doesn't guarantee you're going to get anything but being the best you can that's gonna elevate you. And we kept getting better and we'll continue to get better. But you don't, you're not your loss, you know, you're not even a hockey player. That's what you do. You're more than that. And it's about how you relate to things to determine who you are and what kind of experience you have. So how you relate the loss is with dignity and say, okay, best team won today. Good for them. And then what do we need to learn and what do we need to practice so that when we come back here, if we come back here, we're lucky enough to get back there. that we'll be able to do things. Now when I say luck, luck is when preparation and opportunity meet. So, uh, just, you can't control the outcome. That's the whole, lesson. But you can control your effort and and your attitude towards it. And so let's use it as a stepping stone, not as a roadblock. Does that make sense? And it's always the same. I don't get involved in the scores. I get involved in, let's get a little bit better today than we were yesterday. And my, definition of success is a progressive realization of a worthy ideal. We made it to the freaking finals. there's other 30 teams at home. There's only two teams left standing.

Codie: 1:02:04

Hmm.

George: 1:02:05

And so even though we don't get the cup, that doesn't take away from what we accomplish

Codie: 1:02:09

True.

George: 1:02:10

and how, how much inspiration we gave to a country and to a city and to other people. That was inspiring. That was an amazing experience to have. And don't let lose and take it away from you. That's what we do. We suck. all this stuff out. We look at what was wrong instead of looking at the whole thing. 99.5% 0.5 has been amazing, and now only 5%. Yeah, okay. That happened, but it could have gone either way. Unlucky, it didn't happen. But you don't quit. You don't stop. You use that as a stepping stone

Codie: 1:02:41

I love that. I, it doesn't matter what happens to you, it's your perception, how you interpret that is, you know, Viktor Frankl, if you can extract meaning and look at this situation that,

George: 1:02:52

to be suffering, but you have to embrace the devastation of what it feels like to get that close. You embrace it, but you don't identify with it.. You just say, okay, that felt awful, But that's what it is. And it's gonna happen again in some form or fashion, but it's how you relate to it and grow from it and feel it, and then let it go, and then move to the next thing. And that's how we were able to come back. It doesn't matter what happened, make the next play, make the next play, make the next play. One play at a time, one period at a time, one game at a time, one day at a time. And then you do that and see how far we, went. We played 10 more days. We had 10 more days of the season. And we played three more games. And there was a period there, game four or five and six, we dominated eight to one, five to three, five to one dominated. We didn't just beat'em, we dominated them. And so we know we can beat 'em. We just couldn't sustain it. and that's the next thing. How do we develop the tenacity to sustain it? But that wasn't just then. I mean, we won the first series, you know, four to one. Then we were in Vancouver, we were down three to two, and we won the next two games. And then when we played, Dallas was probably the best team outta all of them. we were down two to nothing and we won. I think we were also down three to two in that series, I believe, or was it three to two? Or maybe it was two. Two to nothing. But we ended up winning in six games. the last three games in a row, we won. I think we lost the first game, won this. I forget exactly what it was, but I, I do believe we were down two to 0 at one point, and we just came back and we just closed it out. Maybe we were, you know, two outta three in the last three games, but we just, we just got it done.

Codie: 1:04:33

Yeah,

George: 1:04:33

there's one game at a time. Anything's possible. And so that's the mindset we had. So we grew in each, series, we got better. And I think what happened to us in the last series, we had all that time in, and then we, we lost our, our rhythm and we lost our, I would say intensity wise, we were up here, but then we got down and it took us a while to get back up. Then once we were back up there, we just. We just coasted. And so I expect us to, they'd be better next year. Doesn't mean we'll win, but we have a lot of lessons and like I said, it is one of the things, you know, that can happen. We had injuries, we had, all of our guys were injured. Nobody knew that Leon was injured, Connor was injured. Kane didn't even play the last five games. And those, you know, any of that changes, it totally is a different experience. So that's it. So how you look at it and you could tell the mindset you're in when you look at it like, oh, you've got crushed. I don't see it that way, but if you see it that way, that telling you how you're seeing things and, your relationship to your consciousness. So to be a winner or to be somebody to act as if you focus on what works and how to make what work, work even better. It's not that we deny what happened, but you learn from your mistakes. And if we would've came, you know, knowing what I know now, we had to do over, we come out in the first period and punch 'em the mouth like we did the previous first games.'cause they don't like being behind. Once they get behind they can't do it. They can give 'em a two one lead, then all they do is clutch and grab and they didn't, call penalties 'cause we was scoring on penalties and somehow the officials, I'm not saying we still should win, but that was, you know, that we had one penalty and the whole game, the way they played really. You see what I'm saying? But you can't control that. You can only control you and not making excuses. But there were a lot of ways we could have won that game and we just didn't have enough to get it done. But doesn't mean we can't, we can't come back, there and do it differently. So that's it.'cause they, they lost last year and then they came back stronger. We can do the same thing.

Codie: 1:06:35

Yeah. Can't wait to see if, they can win another year. but George, it's been an absolute pleasure to have you, love this conversation and I know that there's so much more that we haven't been able to cover. but for those of you who are interested in this conversation, please check out his book. It's called, it's titled, unlocked, embrace Your Greatness, find Flow, discover Success,

George: 1:06:56

And they can also Go ahead. Go ahead. I'm

Codie: 1:06:58

no. Yeah. Is there any, any place that you would like to them to go to?

George: 1:07:02

my website georgemumford.com and I got a YouTube channel. and there's, I actually have an app on Apple and pretty soon on, Google, you know, the Apple and then the other one is the Android. I guess But the Apple and on the Apple store, they can get, what we call the Quick Hitters app that I have that's available for people and there's so much more out there. And then my book The Mindful Athlete: Secrets to Pure Performance that came out nine years ago. there's all that stuff, but there's so much stuff that you Google me, there's so many things that they can access. But yeah, I'm very excited about this opportunity to help people unlock and to help people, perform in a proper way to have, you know, access to pure performance.. And so that's it. and you ask some amazing questions and that's what makes the conversation rich. So thank you

Codie: 1:07:49

Thank you, George.

George: 1:07:51

and thank your audience. Appreciate it. Love and blessings are all.