97. Chris Wirth: Live a No Quit Life!

All right, welcome back. I am super excited for this episode. I have got with me Chris Worth. Chris is the founder of no Quit Living, a speaking, coaching and training company. He is also the host of the no Quit Living podcast. He is the author of the Positivity Tribe. And I am excited to have him because this guy is not only helping businesses kick ass today, at one time, he helped athletes kick ass on the basketball court. Chris, welcome aboard.

I appreciate the opportunity to be here.

So as I always love doing Chris, let's level set right out of the gate. For the listeners who may not know who Chris Worth is, just tell us a little bit about yourself. Where you're from, where you grew up, what makes you tick.

I enjoy long walks on the beach. No, I appreciate the opportunity. And I do this similar thing on my shows. I think it's super cliche when somebody reads like a seven paragraph introduction, but I grew up in the northeast, in Westchester County, New York, and I played basketball and tennis in college, Division 3. And, and I had the opportunity to coach AAU High School and college basketball for a couple years. And one of the things that I really enjoy doing prior to getting into no Quit Living was working with athletes during the summer and their off seasons. Because that's when you get a chance to really get into the improvements where, you know, during this season it's, as you know, it's very difficult to make adjustments. You're kind of just, you know, tinkering things a little bit. And I really enjoy working with athletes both on and off the court or field because that's where I think you can really help them have a positive impact in their season and also their career.

Oh, that's awesome. And so I'm curious, like right out of the gate, my sports brain goes here. I'm like, man, basketball and tennis, like, that's not the most common combination of sports. One would, you would hear one play, like in high school, right. You always thought football, basketball, baseball, what was it? Were there any skills, I'm curious, any skill sets that you had? You know, you applied on the basketball court, that applied on the tennis court?

Yeah, you know, just short backstory that I played basketball, football, baseball growing up, but I also played tennis at a pretty high level in the club kind of division where I grew up. And I played at the Yvonne Lentil Tennis Center. He's a. Yvonne Lendl's a former Grand Slam champion and I really enjoyed it. And I went to college to play basketball and I was playing basketball in college and my girlfriend at the Time wanted to play tennis, and I caught. I coached tennis when I was in high school and college in the summers. It was something easy to do, but I was just hitting with her, and then she hit me some balls, and I was just, you know, hitting back. And this kid came up to me and said, hey, would you want to play a set tomorrow morning? And I said, sure, no problem. I thought he. I thought he was just a kid. What I didn't know at the time was he was the assistant tennis coach. And I ended up beating him pretty easily the next morning. And he came up to me and said, you know, would you consider playing tennis? And I was like, oh, like. Like tomorrow, you know. He said, no, like for the team. And I was like, wait, what? And so I end up, in essence, walking on the team. But to answer your question, the similarities are. There's a lot of similarities with the movement. There's a lot of similarities, both individually playing singles, but also when you play doubles as a team. But for me, the movement of basketball and tennis are very similar in the sense of it's the quick pace back to back. You could go up and down the court in basketball for 2 minutes, 3 minutes. In tennis, you could have know, 30 or 40 shot, rally. And you also could have, you know, just that quick, quick foul in basketball. And the point could be over in tennis, but you get back to it, and you keep going. And I think for me, you know, I played baseball at a high level growing up, and I was a catcher, and I just. I hated how slow baseball was. And, you know, you're just getting into it. So I think that. That, for me, just the speed of it and that similarity is probably the most most important thing that I really hit me with. Why I like both of them.

Well, now, I got a dovetail question off of that in a second, but I. You've made my brain go back 30 years. You grew up in Connecticut, right?

West. Yep.

I believe are roughly the same age. And I remember playing AAU baseball growing up. There was a team out of New England that was so dang good. It was called the New England Mariners. Any and that name ring a bell?

I've heard of them. Yeah.

Okay. I just remember we had to play them one year at an AAU national tournament. Now, these. This team was drawing the best kids from Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island. I'm like, that is a stacked team. In fact, I think a couple of guys that we played against ended up going on and playing some pro ball. Now, here's my question, because I struggled with this. So myself too, Chris, growing up, I played football, basketball, baseball, your traditional sports. And then when I got out of high school, I got into some individual sports like triathlon. And it was actually a really, it was at first a hard shift for me mentally. Where do you see the differences? Like when you were playing basketball, very much a team sport, right. You have to flow in sync with your teammates on the court, you have to have spacing, you have to have know where guys are. In tennis, if you're not playing doubles, you're playing singles. It is a one on one sport. Did you notice playing that versus basketball a big shift mentally on how you had to prepare because it was more of an individual sport?

Yeah, you know, that's a really, really interesting question. And it was not so much just the preparation, but it was also, for me, the idea of when you're playing tennis, it's just you. And not that you want to make excuses or you want to make errors on the basketball court, but you know, for example, being a point guard, if I missed my assignment and my guy, my guy got behind me, I knew that one of the four other defenders on my team were likely going to step up. In tennis, if you come to the net and all of a sudden you get passed, you can't turn around and just be like, all right, someone else is going to get it. But it's a much different mental perspective. And for me, the difference more so than anything between the two sports is you have time in tennis to talk to and listen to yourself, where in basketball you don't. So for example, if the other team scores and all of a sudden somebody on your team inbounds the ball to someone else on your team or to yourself, you're just going. In tennis, a guy could hit a shot, a winner, or you can make an error. And then there's that 20, 30 seconds between the next point and. And you're just thinking, like, what did I do wrong? Like how did I let that, that ball get behind me? Or the other perspective is you start questioning yourself like, all right, like I'm not winning, I'm not doing well. And it's just a mental perspective where it's you versus you. Where basketball, obviously you have, you have teammates, but in tennis it's, it's just you.

And that's exactly it. That self talk can be good or bad, right? It makes me, it reminds me of watching, you know, those Wimbledon tournaments, those French Opens as a kid and they always put the camera on the guy waiting, awaiting the Serve right. And I'm always like, what's going through his head? As that 110, 120 mile an hour serve is about to come his way. And so you're right.

I can tell you a lot of times what's coming, what's going through the mind is, is please don't have it. Go buy me 120 miles an hour. Let me, let me at least get my racket on it. That's, that's kind of what most goes through the mind. But that's the other thing too with tennis is it's, you never know what's coming. Not that in basketball you do, but in tennis, you know, you could be totally thinking one thing and all of a sudden you're like, nope, that's not what happened.

Yep, that's, that's, and that's something we're going to talk about here as we go on into this conversation because you, when you got out of college, you actually continued tying your love to sports by coaching. You coached a little AAU ball, a little high school ball, and even coached at the University of Bridgeport as an assistant basketball coach.

In Connecticut where as we talked about offline, the home of the former college of.

7 foot 7 ball, Newt Bowl. So for the die hard basketball fans out there, Chris was the assistant coach at the same college a little after Manute Bowl, a little after his time. And I know you've had some interactions with him in the past which had to be a pretty cool experience.

Yeah, you know, he's, he's an un, but he was, excuse me, he passed a couple years ago. What an unbelievable guy. We had the opportunity being the basketball staff. He came back a couple times to visit, he spoke to our team, but we always did our athletic golf events every year. And just an unbelievable guy. Everybody wanted to take pictures with him and just, he was, he was, you know, the main attraction all the time, but just such a nice guy. And he always spoke to everybody and he did in such a respectful way that, you know, you could really tell that he was raised in a good way.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Well, let's talk about the coaching aspect. Moving from AAU high school and then to college. Did you notice a difference in the way you coached based on, let's call it the age of the kid because you know, on a, you could, you could be coaching a middle school, high school kid, high school, you're obviously coaching a 15 to 18 year old. And then in college you're starting to coach guys who are at that point young men Right. Did you notice a difference at all in the style of how you had to coach?

Yeah, you know, yeah, that's, that's a, that's a powerful question. And you definitely notice it as far as how you have to coach. But the other thing for me, and I actually coached ironically, AU first, then college second, and then I went back to high school. So for me, it was a very interesting dynamic of I took a team from rising seventh graders to rising seniors in high school, then I coached college basketball, then I went back and coached a high school basketball. But the perspective is not so much just how you coach them, but also how they need to be coached in the sense of how they listened and what resonated with them. And, and for me, that was always a challenge because you didn't know. And what I mean by that is kids don't wear signs on their head and say, look, you know, you got to be like Bobby Knight with me, or you need to be, you know, very philosophical with me. You had to figure that out more oftentimes, kind of trial by fire in the sense of, you know, like if I said to you, Andy, let's get going, and like, I'd see that you kind of deer and headlights didn't really work. You know, I'd figure out, okay, Andy's not the guy that I'm going to scream at or in front of the team, like, you got to do a better job. It's pulling, pulling you to the side, like, all right, Andy, like, you know, next, next play down, you know, make sure you set the screen and come off. And that for me is the fun perspective of, of coaching because it's, it's so different not only with each kid, but also with each age group. And a 16 year old kid is going to learn and think very differently than an 18, 19, 20 year old. And especially when they're playing at the collegiate level versus high school or aau.

And you were coaching what years again were you coaching?

Roughly 2000, 200099 to 2000. Up until 2014, 2015.

Okay, did you, this is where I wanted to go with this. You know, we've heard the old conversations in the corporate room in the, in the, in the boardroom these days about these millennials, these Gen Z kids. Did you see a change in the typ kid you coached from 1999 to 2014?

Yeah, that's, that's a, such an interesting question in many ways. But yeah, I think the way in which millennials get, I don't want to say termed by Companies and individuals. It's got its pros and cons. But for me, the thing that I saw was the work ethic was a little bit different, and it wasn't that they didn't work hard. And it does. And it's not one of these, you know, back when our parents, you know, their grandparents went to skill, went to school uphill both ways in the snow somehow, which I still don't understand how you can go to school uphill both ways. But just the way in which they learned and the way in which technology was moving changes your mindset in regard to other things. And the one thing that I know I'm gonna. I'm gonna date myself, but was really interesting, but also challenging was the technology, kids always having phones. And that, to me was. Was interesting because when I was coaching AAU and then college basketball, first it wasn't that way. And. And the last two years, when I was coaching in high school, that was something that I had to adjust to because it was almost like in some ways, you were, you know, vying for their time. Like, hey, Andy, could you put your phone down so we could talk about the team? Or. That's cool. Send your text message or your, you know, do your social media post. And. And I say that a joking way, but it's something that we all deal with. And I do a lot of speaking now with businesses that have a lot of millennials, because people need to understand that just because somebody thinks something about a generation, it's not always true. But secondly, you have to ask the questions to your employees, which, going back to my comment about working and finding out how people need to be coached, it's the same way whether you're in a business setting, in a basketball setting. And I think a lot of times in today's day and age, we don't ask enough questions how to really. And we also don't. And companies and businesses don't really take the time to get to know their employees or their players as well as I think they should.

Well, and something that came to my mind as you were saying, that was I had a few weeks ago a gentleman by the name of Andre Young on the podcast who's got a training coaching company called you Evolving now. And he uses the phrase, get great, catch people getting great. And I think, you know, this. This new generation, the younger generation, I feel like as a coach, you probably have to do a little more catching them getting great. You know, those positive reinforcement type statements. And maybe we had to do 20, 25 years ago. I Know, I think that's often why you see a lot of the coaches who coached back in the 80s and 90s, I don't know if they'd last today based on the way they coached, because it. That style just doesn't fly anymore. Would you agree with that statement?

I think that's a fantastic statement. I agree 100%. And one of the things that I talk about, too, which you just touched on briefly, is I think 10, 15, 20 years ago, coaches and both in business and in sports used to focus on the negatives. You know, Andy, you can't do this. Andy, you got to be there. And Chris, you got to do this. As opposed to catching them doing something the right way and focusing on that. And I think too many people focus on the negatives and what happens. It almost has a, you know, a double negative where now that person is only focusing and only thinking about messing up or mistakes and adjustments as opposed to going for their greatness and really trying to excel. And I think it. You can see that both in business and in sports.

Let's get to the mental side of this. As a coach, you know, when you look at a high school basketball game, some kids, let's face it, it could be easy to look at the court and say, okay, some kids at that age could just get by with raw talent. Right. Like, that is why they are so good and above and beyond head and shoulders, beyond anybody else. You know, I think of LeBron James when he was in high school. I still, I still remember to tuning into that game when they first aired his game on espn. And I remember Jay Billis saying, hands down, this is the greatest high school basketball player I have ever seen. But when you look at those kids that are head and heels above everybody else in talent, I got to believe there's something going on mentally as well.

Yeah. You know, the. The term mental midgets comes. Comes out a lot when people talk about the players that can only perform with their athleticism or their raw talent, and eventually it gets caught up to them. For, for me, when you can see a kid, male or female, that's just, you know, beyond everybody else. The question I always ask myself kind of is, you know, what's going to happen in a year or two when the other people catch up, whether it's height, whether it's muscle, whether it's skill. And for me, I look for those little intangibles as I'm watching people, you know, what else can they do? You know, obviously they're, you know, taller. They're stronger, they're faster, they can shoot better. But what about the other things? Are they talking on defense? Are they seeing things happen? And for me, it's what I talk about a lot is the things that don't show up in the box score that you can really tell a lot about a player's mental perspective of where they are. And do they really understand the game more so than just being a freak athlete?

Well, and that's such a good perspective because I think about playing college baseball, and there were guys that came in from high school that were three times as talented as I was, but maybe they got by with just pure raw talent back in high school, and now they're playing at. With guys at the same level as them. And if they don't have the mental toughness, those were the athletes, men and women, that showed up at college. And you're like, how did that individual fizzle out? They were so good when they came in, you know, and I think that's.

A really good point because now there's such an emphasis on what happens off the court or off the field or off the rink, where. Not that you need to spend, you know, all the time in the weight room and on the court and then four hours off the court doing all this mental training. But to your point, we all know so many people that we played with or against that sixth grade, seventh grade, eighth grade, were just here and we eventually caught up to them. And when we both got to the same level, the advantage a lot of times people had is, is the mental side of the mindset and the approach and at the college level. Let's be very. Let's be very clear. Everybody is skilled. You know, everybody has talent. You don't get to college, whether division one, two, or three, if you can't play your sport, but what, what's the extra, you know, and, and what happens when the game's on the line and mentally, you know, you're prepared for it, as opposed to someone else who up to that point, really only relied on his or her athletic skill.

Well, and I. I couldn't agree any. I couldn't agree more because the only reason I gave myself a chance, Chris, to play pro baseball was because of my mindset. It had nothing to do with my. I was 5 foot 9, 165 pounds. That is not what I would call the size you want for a pitcher. I did not throw 98 miles an hour. But it was that mental toughness of the stuff you do. I love what you just said, because this is where we're going, all the stuff you do off the field. And so now let's. Let's segue into your business. No Quit Living. I got so many questions I want to ask about that and how the whole mindset of athlete, you know, the athlete on the field and the athlete in the boardroom. Tell us just a little bit about no quit Living.

Yeah, it's a cool story about the name. I'm a huge quote guy and up, I think at my highest, I was probably subscribed to seven or eight different, you know, quotes of the day, and they just would fly in every day. But it was a famous quote by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, which I know you've seen is, it's always too early to quit. I went ahead and got the license plate. No quit. I've had a now, I think on four or five different cars. But for me, what I realized early on is the difference between good and average versus, you know, great and the best is that mental perspective of, I'm not going to give up. When I get knocked down, I'm going to get back up. If I get knocked down again, I'm going to get back up stronger or more educated or in a better position next time. And both on the court and in the business sense, and even in schools that we do some work with kids through the Positivity Tribe and some of those programs, you just see that people have something within them. And I think it can be taught, but I also think it can be increased. Where you get that idea of, I'm getting knocked down, but I'm going to get back up. And it's not going to be easy. It's not going to be overnight, but I want to learn to become the better version of me. And I realized that everybody has a no quit story within them. And that's one of the questions I ask my podcast. And people usually jokingly say, well, which story do you want to hear, Chris? The one from this week, last week, the biggest one, the best one. And it's kind of funny in some ways, but it really got me into the whole concept of my business and my coaching is that the most successful people in all walks of life, professional sports, business, entrepreneurs, you name the field, you name the demographics, they all have failed more than they've succeeded, but they get back and they come back and they learn and they improve. And I didn't understand that aspect early on when I was naming the company no Quid Living. Obviously, I knew some of that from sports and things, but just being able to interview and work with some amazing companies and teams. I've just seen that it's not about winning all the time. It's not about always being perfect. It's about all the little things we can control. And I talk often about controlling the controllables. One of the things I'm fascinated with is trying to get 1% better today than you were yesterday.

Let's talk about that because I think right now, as we have this conversation in February 2021, there's a lot of people who probably feel like they're losing a lot, right? And they hit that. Call it the no quit moment, the rock bottom moment. What advice would you give them? You talk about controlling the controllables. I think that's so important we focus on that right now because there's so much out here that is not in our control right now. So for that individual who's listening in and saying, yeah, I am there right now, what advice would you give them?

Yeah, I think that's a, that's a very on point question, especially what we're dealing with in 2021 and also obviously having 2020, being a toug, preparing for a pretty large event in New York City a couple years ago, I was speaking at and I was putting together my deck and I was always listening to a bunch of motivational stuff. And this video by Jocko Willing came, came on and I was kind of doing my preparation and he spoke about just, you know, don't give in today. Don't throw, don't throw in the white towel today. And it hit me because what he didn't say was, he didn't say, don't ever give up. Keep going today. And for the next 6,000 days straight, he said, just don't give up today, you know? You know, don't give up today. You know, don't throw in that white towel. And I realized that that's what people need to hear now is it doesn't mean you're never going to give up. It doesn't mean you don't ever stop anything, you know, going to bankruptcy, you know, all things like that. But it means that we all can get through today. You know, there's this saying which I know you've seen. We've all made it through 100% of our bad days or 100% of our worst days. But what people need to hear today is the importance of finishing today. You know, it doesn't mean that you're going to make tomorrow or the next day perfect, but don't give up. Today, you know, you might be having a tough time, business, professional, maybe with a spouse or significant other, but just keep going today and try to have a 1% win today. And I talk about that often, that 1% is. It's not about being perfect, and it's not about making a million dollars right this second. But you know What? You have 10 sales calls this afternoon. You know, try to give your perfect effort on all 10 calls doesn't mean you're going to go 10 for 10. But try to be perfect with your effort and with your attitude and your mindset. And I think for me, we always talk about the pma, that positive mental advantage, and I think that's something that we all can control. I can't control what you're going to say to me. I can't control what you're going to ask me, but I can control my positive mindset, my positive attitude. And what we ultimately teach our clients is a positive mental advantage where you can't control anything that you can't control. But between your two ears, you can control that. And it's something that I think in 2021, we need to really focus on more, but also understand more.

There's so many nuggets in what you just said. You know, celebrating small wins, I think is something everybody needs to do. Especially today. I look back, one of my vices as an athlete and early in my business career was not celebrating the wins, right? Once you won, you're on to the next win. I use this in a podcast. A couple months ago, guys like Michael Jordan were lauded because they'd win a title. And what were they doing the next morning? They already forgotten about the title, and they're lifting and getting ready for the next season. Nick Saban wins another national championship. Next morning, he's out recruiting, and I'm like, that's good. But at the same time, you got to celebrate the accomplishment. Now, those are massive accomplishments, right? The NBA title or the national championship in football, but even the small wins right now. And the other thing you said that hit home for me, Chris, was I'm going through this with my own coach right now. Is no matter what happens to you in a given day, you can always figure it out. And she always, she's so good at asking that question. Is there ever been a moment in your life where you have not figured it out? For most, the answer is no. I've always figured it out. Then what are you worried about?

I. I absolutely love that. And, and to touch on what you said, just, it hit Me, the, the Nick Saban example and Michael Jordan is. That's something that we see. And I think social media destroys it now. And technology, where it's to your point, it's Nick Saban wins a college NCAA championship and purposely, or not purposely, the next day there's an article or there's a post in social media of, hey, Nick's back on the road and you know, he's going to see four recruits today. So what does that do to the outside that then totally changes the narrative of it was great to win for that four hours and 12 minutes, but what's Nick Saban doing? And Michael Jordan won his NBA championship and now he's jumping on Dream Team and he's heading out to the Olympics. And again, nothing wrong with, with anything in regards to winning and wanting to win, but we don't celebrate those wins. And I think the other thing I would say to that too is not only do we not celebrate those small wins, and I have a saying that small wins lead to huge victories, but we also lament those losses too much. So, for example, we'll celebrate a win for, you know, a couple hours and then we're on to something else. But then we're going to focus on that loss for two days, three days, four days. So the dynamic totally changes. So think about it from a kid's perspective. Like, I'm watching Nick Saban, I'm a 12 year old kid and I'm like, oh, he won, that's great. And then I open up my phone the next day and I'm like, oh, Nick's, you know, Nick's out recruiting and then, you know, rewind a couple weeks, they lose a game and that's all everybody's talking about. Alabama should fire Nick Saban and it's over. So from a, from a perspective, you're like, wait a second, so he loses and the world's ending for two weeks on end, but then he wins and it's almost like, all right, that's great. What are you doing tomorrow? What are you doing right this minute? And I think you do have to celebrate those wins and you also need to acknowledge and address the losses so you can come back better.

That's awesome. I, yeah, that, that's exactly what it is. And especially as we've been talking about today more than ever, what are some of the secret ingredients? You see it now that you're coaching businesses and coaching teams in the boardroom. What, what are some of the secret ingredients that you get to witness and watch in winning business Teams that may, quite frankly, also be the same key that you saw on the basketball court. What. What, you know, what it took to be a winning team on the basketball court.

You know, the word, the word that I often talk about when I do speaking and coaching for not only businesses, but also sports, the word culture. And I know it sounds good from the outside, and I know a lot of people throw the, oh, well, they have a winning culture. Or in New York Yankees, you know, they have. You know, they have a winning culture, and they've won 26 or 28 or however many World Series. And I never really understood that until I took some time to digest it, but then do a little bit of research. And what I see with businesses, too, is it goes back to defining a goal. And I think one of the areas where we fall short in United States is when we're in first or second grade or even kindergarten, we always get asked the question, what do you want to be when you get older? So if I'm your teacher, Andy, what do you want to be? And it's always, I want to be a baseball player or a policeman or the president. But then we get into fifth, sixth grade, and it becomes more, this is what I have to do. I have my PSATs, and then we have our SATs, and then we have to get ready for high school, and then we have to get ready for college, and then we have to get ready for nursing. We lose the idea of dreaming big and setting goals. But the teams and the corporations that do really well are the ones that have specific goals, and they have a culture based on being specific with what their targets are. And Zig Ziglar had a famous quote is, you can't hit a target you cannot see. And it sounds very cliche, but it's so true. And I think one of the things I like to do with my clients is identify their culture. What is your culture? Or what do you want your culture to be within this company or team? And then secondly, what goals do you want to achieve individually as well as with the team or as well as a sales unit? But then most importantly is how are you going to track those measures? How are you going to track those metrics? But more importantly, going back to what you said is celebrate a win. It's important to acknowledge success along the way. It doesn't mean after you get a sale, you celebrate for a week and you don't come to work, but it means acknowledge it, address it, but then move forward. And I think so many times people look at you Know, I just want to be a champion or I just want to make the playoffs. And it's something that I say, well, we'll take it a step further. Is what does that mean to you? Does that mean your team, let's say NFL has to get to nine wins. Okay, if that's the case, then let's aim for five home wins and four on the road. How are we going to track them out of our 16 game schedule? Where do we think we're going to be able to get those wins from? And when you break them down into those bite sized pieces, yes, it's a big, it's a big goal at the end. The successful teams and companies that I get a chance to work with and witness are the ones that really are very specific.

And how they do that, that's the sport. Nut in me goes in so many directions. You know, we just, we were just talking about Michael Jordan, right. There's a huge difference between talent and culture. You know that 98 Bulls team, yeah, they still won the title, but if you watch the, the series must dance last dance, they were a shit show. That culture was terrible. Same. I would actually put the same apply to the end of the Golden State warriors dynasty here. You know, they had Durant, they had Curry, they had Tom, they had all those guys. But then inside you'd hear some of the locker room talk and you're like, things aren't as good as you think they are.

I have to interject for a second because I just, I mean I nodded about five times during. What you're saying is if you look at the Golden State warriors on paper, if you took their, not just their starting five but their entire team, including their coaching staff, the average fan who knows basketball well, and I'm talking about who knows the NBA game well, would, would say this team should never lose. They should go 82 0. To me that's a little bit over the top, but you hit it on the head. Just because you have the most talent does not mean that you are going to be unbeatable. And when you have issues in the locker room, in the huddle, off the court, in the weight room. But the other thing is you have those, those issues in the media. It doesn't matter how good your team is on paper, I truly feel you will lose. And they ultimately did. And ultimately look what happened to the team. Some guys stepped away and it wasn't because, you know, being in Golden State, it wasn't a good place. They have arguably one of if not the best arenas in the business, it's beautif beautiful weather out in California. But it was all the other stuff that didn't gel. And I think you just said it before, and I'm so glad you said it, because being the best, physically active, being the tallest, being the strongest, that's good in some ways. But what happens inside? Are you a mental midget or do you have the mental perspective to say, okay, we just got thrown a curveball when we were totally expecting a fastball. Is this going to completely change our season or are we going to be able to adapt? And I just think what you said was, was powerful and it's something that people need to think about, not only in business or sports, excuse me, but in business as well. You could have the best product or one of the better products, but everything internally is just complete, you know, chaos. You're not going to win. You might want to sell. You're definitely going to win a game here, there. But look at the Golden State Warriors. They did not win the NBA championship and ultimately they dismantled that team.

Well, and flip side, I think there's nothing more dangerous in sports than a team with a great culture and nothing to lose. You know, I think about. I had Joel Goldberg on the podcast a few weeks ago. He is the pre and post game announcer for the Kansas City Royals. The Royals were a disaster for a long, long time and then they ended up in the World Series in 14 and 15. Won it in 15. And he's told the story about the day he met Drayton Moore or Date Moore, excuse me, who is the general manager. And the day he took over the job with the Royals. He said, I'm going to build an amazing culture. And it makes me think about the Oakland A's of the past. Oakland. Nobody realizes again if you're a true baseball fan. The A's have had more consistent success as a small market team than most teams in baseball. Why their culture is phenomenal. I remember the article in Sports Illustrated when they had Barry Zito, Eric Burns, Mark Muller, those guys loved each other. And so I couldn't agree with you more about the, the importance of culture in business. I see it in the insurance world where I come from. People think it's about hiring talent. Go hire the guy from, from this big insurance agency that sold all this business. Well, if he's not a good fit for culture, it's not going to, it's not going to work.

It's, it's so important that you said that. And I think hopefully listeners or viewers take that Is. Is culture. Is. Is something that is so important. But the one thing I wanted to just touch on when you give your example of the Kansas City Royals was nobody said changing the culture today and tomorrow we're going to be the champions. And the one thing that I do have to say is, especially in sports and even in business, is they bring in a superstar general manager from this. In the business world, or to your point, in the insurance world, they bring in the most amazing insurance salesperson, and they automatically assume that, okay, because he's here, she's here, you know, we're going to, you know, snap our fingers and overnight we're going to be a success. And the same thing in sports is you bring in a stud athlete, female or male, to a team that's maybe okay or average, and then right away it's like, oh, well, he or she's gonna overnight change the culture and we're gonna be champions tomorrow. No, it doesn't. It doesn't look that way. I mean, that's. That's the beauty of. And also the beast when it comes to this social media. And everybody expects things overnight. And I'm not saying it's. It's going to be a five or ten year, but you look at so many sports coaches, both collegially and professionally, they get hired with the idea of. And what do they talk about in their first press conference? You know, we're going to build a championship culture, and we have the, you know, the right players in place and we get one or two more, and, you know, we're going to be really destined for success. And they don't win immediately, and they get fired. And you look at some of these programs, both professionally and collegiately, it's just been turnover after turnover, and they wonder why. Well, we're not winning. And I don't understand. You're like, well, you've had six coaches in the last nine years, and your boosters and your, you know, your fundraisers are up in arms because, you know, they have to pay these payout contracts and they bring somebody in and like, well, how come we didn't win overnight? Like, because success doesn't happen overnight.

Yeah. No. And what you said about Dayton Moore and the Royals, I think he took over in 07, maybe 08, and they didn't see that. That World series appearance until 14, 15, six, seven years later. So your point about is it takes time to build that culture is so true. So let's bring it on home here, the final third of the podcast, talking about two things that are near and dear to your heart. You've got the book Positivity Tribe. In fact, you've wrote a couple parts to it, right? You have parts two and three that just came out. What does that mean to you? Why did you write it?

Yeah, really interesting story. But in February and March of 2020, I was actually writing my first other book, which is the title of that one is Addition by Subtraction. And we dealt with this pandemic that just literally came in and hit everybody, both within the United States as well as throughout the world. And I have a men's mastermind group that we started. We meet on Zoom every Tuesday night. We have not missed a Tuesday night since the pandemic started, since holidays and everything. But we coined ourselves the Positivity Tribe. And in the middle to the end of 2019, I started spreading. I have them just to show these positivity notes. Literally just the top and the bottom are typed out, and then the middle part is blank. And we just use Sharpies and we write positive quotes or messages, and we started leaving them all throughout Westchester County, New York, and Fairford County, Connecticut, and doing it with zero expectations of what's going to happen. It wasn't for, okay, I want to be famous or I want to make money on it. And what happened is people started posting them or reposting them. And we've now spread over 14,000 positivity notes in, I think, 41 or 42 states, six countries. And I have to emphasize the we part because in no way, shape, or form am I flying to five other countries and driving to 42 states. But what I realized was positivity is contagious. And just as negativity is contagious. I've seen a dynamic shift in the last six to eight months where people are focusing on the importance of saying, you know, we need to do this and stronger together, or some type of positive reaffirming mission or message. And we use the hashtag all the time. We rise by lifting others up. And I think so many people don't realize that celebrating somebody else's success does not in any way shape or form limit or eliminate your success. And we need to get rid of that in this. In our world. And not only United States is celebrate other people, you know, cheer other people on. In no way does it limit your success. You know, if you. If you're successful, why can't I call you up or text you or send you a message? And if. If I can, I want to share one thing that me and my publisher are doing is we created this. This idea, Connect 5 support 10. I initially got it from Jesse Itzler. I believe he does something with three messages every day. But we've been doing it for the entire month of February, and I'm going to continue to do it longer, and I've been doing a little bit longer. But Connect 5 means you just connect with five people on a daily basis in a genuine, genuine way. So it's not a text message like, yo, Andy, it's something, whether it's a text message, a voice message, a phone call, an email, and just connect with those with five people. And the support 10 is genuinely supporting 10 people. So, for example, if I see you put out a post on social media about your podcast with whoever it is, Michael Jordan, I'm going to support you and say, hey, guys, check out my buddy Andy's, you know, latest interview. You did a fantastic job so doing those things. So 10 of those and connecting with five people. And I got to tell you, it's been unbelievable because as nice as it is to see somebody smile or respond in a positive way, I end up feeling. And my publisher, Dominic, has ended up feeling so much better about it, and it's been amazing.

Well, and you always get what you give, right? And I love what you said because I'll admit for a while that I struggled with gratitude. Like, how can I show my gratitude for others? And for me, it was always like, for some reason, I defaulted to. It must come from either time or money. Donate money. Donate time. But your point is, even when a peer puts something out on social media.