Trevor Moawad - Motivate The Motivated

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But I think a lot of times we sit down with people and this industry says, okay, Casey, these are the five things you need to do to get where you want. I don't look at it that way. What are the five things right now we could choose not to do that, get us closer to where we want.

What's going on, everyone? Casey Adams here. Welcome back to the Rise of the Young podcast and on today, today's episode, I am very thankful for the guests because we actually connected recently and today is our first time meeting and we're sitting here at his house and I'm really excited to introduce you to Trevor Moad. So thanks so much for coming on the show, Trevor.

You bet. My pleasure. Anytime you can be mobile and come to me. It's awesome, man. So excited, Casey, Excited to be here with your whole crew, Eshawn and Kieran, and excited to meet your audience.

Absolutely. So real quick, before we get into it, I want to sort of just set the. The set the tone for the episode because we got connected through my buddy Drama. I heard you were on his podcast and short story long, I listen to that show all the time and Drama and I, we've recently had some events together and I listened to the show and it was something that really struck my attention because those who don't know, Trevor, I know you're just getting onto the social media scene. He has worked with some of the top elite performers in terms of sports and NFL, Russell Wilson, all these different people, which we'll get into. And it was, I believe you said in 2017 you were ranked on Sports Illustrated. What was the exact title? It was the.

Yeah, I think it's, you know, Sports Illustrated yearly does the best of the best, you know, issue. And they'll have best quarterback, best running back, rest receiver. But they'll also go into different categories like human performance, best strength coach and other elements. That particular year they decide to profile sort of the sports psychology and mental conditioning industry. So in and around that, I was picked the sports world's best brain trainer. So it's a, you know, an interesting, interesting field, interesting category. But, you know, while I think the industry has stayed very small in sports, I still think to whenever you can get to the top of whatever your chosen industry is, and certainly this has been a long climb. It means a lot, particularly for a brand like Sports Illustrated to say that. So that was pretty cool.

Yeah, no, because I know, I read that and I wanted to set the tone for this interview because I believe the people listening on the Rise of the Young show, they tend to be 18, 25 years old. And I'd like for you to just give a quick recap of just how do you define what you do? Because I know from me listening to Drama's show, it was really intriguing to see that. And I read this article. You said you are pretty much the mindset to the elites, right? You keep people dialed in, you keep them aligned. And I'd like for you to just give a little brief recap of how you define what you do so that people are aware.

Yeah, I think that's a great question. I think if you look at the architecture of human development, essentially about 20 years ago a category came out focused on this idea of human performance. So obviously we have certain elements that we're born with. Talent, aptitude, intellectual quotient. Human performance is how do I maximize that? So if you were to get a kinesiology book, you would actually see sort of in the middle, you'd see this idea of the term performance. And then you'd have seven subcategories and 21 subcategories around that. And sports psychology, mental conditioning would be one of them. But essentially my responsibility, I think, is to work in an area where we believe that the mind is something that no matter where you're at in the journey of it, it can improve. And probably 20 years ago we started this new idea of for years, even the best athletes in the world would run in three laps and sit down and stretch in a static way. It never really made sense. If you're getting ready to compete at a super high level against the best in the world, then this idea of dynamic warm ups and stretch ups that you would actually warm and get warmed up and Your legs would kick and move. And so that really kind of took off and spawned this whole generation of training and much more beyond aerobics, but specialized at a functional training, that a skateboarder should train in a way that a skateboarder trains. A soccer player should train for the distances, the explosiveness that they cover. Football players, baseball players, basketball players, lacrosse, it doesn't matter. For years, people had only trained sort of like football players. Right. So the idea of psychologically developing the mind 20 years ago became this really cool future, which 20 years later is still looking for a present. It's never really arrived. So what do I do? I think I would be one of a series of types of experts who really specializes in helping really good people get better. And you know, the tagline would be motivate the motivated. But I think where I'm, you know, if somebody says I've got this left handed pitcher that throws to the 80th row, I think probably there's somebody that would be better to work with him or her than me.

Got it.

My job is, if you follow the Gallup statistics and you look at about 20 to 23% of Fortune 2000 companies have highly engaged employees. Right. My job would be them. How do you get your really good people to be their best? Because an organization or a team doesn't win without the best players performing well. And we think of sports psychology as what do we do when something goes wrong? That's never how I was trained.

Got it. That makes sense. So the CEO of Limitless Minds, which I know you said that's with Russell Wilson. Correct. Where did that come about and how did that partnership form? Because I know that's something. Before we started this podcast, we were talking about, what would you say Limitless Minds, like, where is the focus there with that? With a partnership with Russell Wilson? Like that is the elite of the elite.

Right.

So what is Limitless Minds as well, for the people that are listening? Because I think when I came across you and listened to the podcast with Drama and what we'll get into today, it's, you have this mental aptitude to just like you said, help the people who are already crushing it. Right. But back to the point, Limitless Minds. Just give us some more in depth on what that is.

Well, first of all, to go back to your second point, you have to look at, I mean, there's so many people, as I've now in the last six months, sort of took on the challenge of writing a book and you have to learn what's out there in the field. And it's not good, right? I mean, there's just, you know, most of the people that I've heard or listened to couldn't last 30 minutes with Georgia football. Yeah, right. And now they're smart enough, right. They'd never fuck around with sports or the highest level of sports. But the thing about sports is people are bullshit proof, right? There is no bullshit. Right. So the message has to be simple, it has to be clear. And more importantly, in the sports world, it's not about the presenter. Right. It's about the information. And is it real time? Can it help me get better right now? Because as soon as you step into an NFL locker room, they're already trying to get rid of you. Alright, so I think from.

What do you mean by that? From a player perspective or a mental psychology?

Well, I mean, there are no mental psychology people in sports.

Got it.

Okay, so let's, let's be clear about that. I mean, it doesn't mean that people, there's some organizations don't have access to some or some different types of people. But it's not an industry that I think is really grown in the sports world because you have an infinite supply of talent. And when you have an infinite supply of talent, you don't have to spend time developing it. If the talent can't meet the standard, you just get rid of them. Yeah, right. So to go back to where Russell and I would look at, I believe that, that the mind, if you look at the overall equation of a human, but certainly an athlete is about 5% of the overall performance equation and people will say it's 40, 50, 60%. I've just never bought that. If you're not big, fast, strong, explosive, kinetic, and even in business, if you don't have a great pipeline, a great strategy, a great product to sell as you and drama partner and you work on different things, what is the event? Who's going to participate? Where are we doing it? Where's the geography? How does it work for the consumer? How does it get broadcast to the world? I mean, as great as you guys having a great outlook and approach about it, those things are more important. Now where the mind can be a real asset is when you are really good and you have those things taken care of. If it's not strong, if it's not sharp, if you're not partnered with it efficiently, then no matter how good the event is, it can go wrong with the wrong mentality. So by picking great organizations then you can really help them go from a B to an A. I don't think it makes a lot of sense for me to somebody who's at a D plus in their life to try to get them to a C, you know. So in terms of how I spend my time now, Russell and I. Ultimately Russell would be one of 35 guys getting ready for the NFL draft. But he came, he went and found his own agent. He researched his agent and, and then he went to find the place that he wanted to train. So he found me out because he knew I'd worked with Drew Brees and Drew had been there 11 years early to train for the draft and Drew was also a six foot quarterback. Russell's not quite six feet. He loved it. He loved me to say he is.

Right now, how tall is he?

But, well, I mean he's, he's listed at 5 11. Okay, so we'll give him 5 11, we'll give him 5'11. But his physiology is exceptional, but it's not what separates him. Right. But when I would meet Russ, Russ would want to come and train with Chris Winke and the top quarterback people. But he was really interested in how he was going to present himself. What did Drew do? What are the characteristics of people who are making it, when their physiology might be challenged and if he gets behind those, because look, he wasn't going to make himself 6 5. But the reality was people are looking for six, five quarterbacks because historically those are the ones that have made it. And as excited as I am for your quarterback in Arizona right now, I would bet everything against him because yes, there are two six foot or under quarterbacks starting in the NFL. Drew Brees and Russell Wilson, but they're 11 years apart. Okay. Which means that in the 11 years between, nobody made it. And there's a lot of really, really good quarterbacks like Aaron Murray at Georgia and a lot of other top guys that were just, just couldn't sustain that standard. But they were world class. So anyway, the goal was how do we as we would develop and we would train Russell in an approach, Casey, where Russell never had problems. So it was how do we take his greatness and make it greater? And that was where we worked on understanding the basics of thinking and coming into an environment where you are going to be judged from the outside and how do you make your inside beliefs more dominant? And we wanted to take that really. His brother and his brother Harrison Wilson and his brother's partner DJ Eitzen, who'd been in pharmaceutical, said, how come the business world doesn't get what my brother gets. How come the business world is getting mindfulness? How come the business world is getting the power of positive thinking? Not that those don't have value, not that those are just things that are not readily. That we weren't focusing on that with Russell.

Got it. So I'm curious, so like we're talking about what you do now and for the people listening myself, where did this start and how, like, how did you get into this space? You said you've been in this for what, 20 years? You said. Yeah, about what was the starting point and how did you end up doing what you're doing today?

Yeah, that's a, It's a great question. Because I would go back and probably tell my 22 year old self, maybe do something different. But no, you know, I was blessed with a great family. My father had left high school coaching and teaching and in the mid-70s he would join this unique industry that was led by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, Maxwell Maltz, Thomas Tetko, Earl Nightingale, Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy. My dad would be one of the pioneers to join a company called the Pacific Institute. So really what I can remember at about four years old, they started me on designing my own ad campaign. I had six different affirmations from the age of four. I would say at night with my mom or dad, my dad traveled quite a bit and then they would play tapes of Zig Ziglar and Brian Tracy and Earl Nightingale and my dad at night From I think 4 to 11 years old, as well as cybernetic waves that had subliminal thinking messages in and around the. The power of positive thinking, I think at that time was what it was customized for. We didn't watch the news, I wasn't allowed to listen to country music. And then the word can't was kind of outlawed in my home. My mom says I was my dad's science experiment. But ultimately I obviously got exposure at a young age to this area back in the 70s and 80s that would be called peak performance education. This would be in the mid-80s when Tony Robbins would start to come and then you'd had sort of the infomercial age. My dad would not do that, which is disappointing. I really wish he would have been more open. And it's sort of funny that, you know, years later I would be equally closed off in many ways. But he just, you know, he felt like, hey, the people who were going to hear him or they were going to buy his system or hear his audio tapes or. And he was on Fox and ABC and a bunch of things that would be how it would work. So I had this exposure to this type of thinking. I was 18 years old. I. I faced a real serious health challenge going to college in Los Angeles. That would force me to really to lean on my thought process and then allow me to see the validity that this is real. Like, thinking is not optional. It's as powerful and required as eating, as stretching, as sleeping. And so you don't just opt into being a competitive thinker. You either do it or you don't. You either get your language right or you don't. You either minimize negativity or you don't. You either watch what you consume psychologically or you don't. And I learned that. And it's crazy that even in this great environment with all this ad campaign and all these things that I didn't get it till I got sick. And then I think from that point, you know, I went to school, went to graduate school, played a couple of years of pro soccer, was a high school teacher, found myself as the, an assistant mental conditioning coach at IMG Academy, which is like Hogwarts for athletes. It's in Bradenton, Florida. It was founded by Nick Bollettieri, a great tennis guru, coached 12 number one players in the world. And at that point, Casey, I was basically in a system where if I could be good at my job, sort of like if you at 19, right. Can be good at your job, you're right now you've been given the platform. If you can drive revenue, drive ad marketing, campaign and bring a good message out, you're going to make it. Same thing for me, right. I was 23, 24 years old. I was in a position even though mental conditioning or sports psychology wasn't big, if I was as good as I thought I had the aptitude to be in the way I was raised, I could make it. You know, by 26, we had the Jacksonville Jaguars, by 30, had the Miami Dolphins by 31 started at Alabama and then by 32, started at Florida State and then was really given the.

As in those are your clients that you're working with.

Those would be, those would be places I would be hired to consult in addition to this sports academy in Florida and U.S. soccer. And I'd get, you know, young athlete like Freddy Adu and Josie Altidore and. But I had a really sort of slow incremental development to stress and battle test what I believe to fail, right. And even going back to being a teacher in LA Unified School District, you know, I understood wow. I have 130 students, only 17 are going to college. And so it really taught me how to be a teacher because again, I think everything can be trained. I think if you're not a great communicator because you don't behave like a good communicator, I don't think it has to do with introversion or extroversion. I think just a few. I felt like I had great teaching aptitude, but if you didn't teach, if I didn't train it, I never would get good. So LA Unified was great for there. And I don't know, it's kind of crazy how I would get in this industry, but ultimately it's been a privilege, it's been awesome. And I think more than anything, what I'm probably most proud of, and I told this to Drama, is that I know how to live it. Right.

What do you mean by that?

Well, you know, I had one of those years last year where just for whatever reason and maybe reasons that I earned or situations that, that I put myself in, but I had a lot of things go the wrong way at the same time. And we teach this idea that while positive thinking at its very best, the data is anecdotal and it creates a lot of anxiety in people. We know that the information education efficacy around negative thinking is very clear. Right. And particularly as we externalize it. So negative thinking weaponizes you against you forget about what it does to other people in other countries. But most importantly, no one's going to influence Casey like Casey influences Casey. So in this moment where I had some good things happen, Russell and I did a TV show and we started Limitless Minds and we had some elements. So this idea of being neutral said, okay, well this is good. But I had probably five things that any one of them would have been a lot for anybody and to have five happening simultaneously. Stressed, financially stressed, emotionally stressed, relationship wise stress, personally stress in business, you know, I was able to navigate it and I didn't pretend I liked it, but I didn't make it worse than it could have been. So I think that's probably the thing that in teaching this I'm so proud of. And probably as I've studied this industry now and I'm learning, okay, well, who are the people writing books? What are they teaching, what are they doing? I don't understand why everybody's got to, got to say, you know, I've got hundreds of millions of dollars, look at my homes, look at my, look at this and that. And therefore, because of those Things, you know, because of who I am. Aspirationally, you should listen to me. I mean, I think great information stands on its own, and I think people already have it in them. Just like I think even through the tough things, you know, I had a good run in me, too. So I don't believe that I'm any different or any better or. And in fact, there's probably a lot of people at much higher levels than. I think. The information stands on its own. And I would testify to it, because I don't know that I could have made it through last year. I mean, I obviously would have. Some. Some version of me would have made it, but I came out better, you know, And I think that living the.

Principles you're teaching is what you were saying. You know, how to live it in that sense, correct?

I do. And I think that that's what probably I'm always asked, you know, because. Because my dad was, you know, he would be involved in the early origins of Chicken Soup for the Soul and the president for the national association for Self Esteem. And would he be proud of you? Not. You know, 911 happens. My dad and the governor addressed the state of Washington, Seattle, where I'm from. All my dad would care is that when life got hard, I could live what he'd raised me to do, and that when things are going well, I could also live it. And I wouldn't let my own success become my own adversity. And so many athletes and performers and people in business and relationships and their success becomes their adversity because, you know, they lose track of just that base fundamentals that were driving it to begin with.

That makes so much sense. And so I'm curious, going from you said IMG Academy to then starting to work independently with all of these different teams, was that the switch of, like, you at IMG Academy and then being more so independent, like, what was the separator between that or was that sort of the academy tuned then, therefore be independent? Because it sounded like when you were saying that that was the pivoting point. Is that correct?

So the Academy was awesome. It gave me a lot of flexibility. I never really, until the very end, made any money, but my dad taught me the idea of psychological pay, that if I'm developing, if I'm learning and if I'm getting better, Even if I'm 30 and the director of performance at IMG and making $60,000, look at who I'm getting access to. You know, Kevin Plank, Tom Coughlin, Nick Saban, Jimbo Fischer, Nick Bollettieri, Tommy Haas, Xavier Malice, Maria Sharapova, Freddy adu, Josie Altidore, U.S. soccer, U.S. women's Soccer. I mean, all these people that I really didn't necessarily have a right to get to know or be around. Right. But so I think what IMG Academy allowed me to do was it allowed. Gave me the ability to consult for the academy. So as teams reached out, because it was think of Southern California. I wouldn't meet Drama or you or a lot of different people if you're not in Southern California. Right. I was asked by Frank Lee from Facebook, hey, will you come speak at this dinner for 10 minutes? That opened the door to meeting Peter Kim and, you know, Hudson Jeans and Michael Mente and all these just different people I would never meet. Right. So Bradenton from the athletic perspective was the epicenter in many ways. Even though the town itself was, you know, 80% of the people were over 80 years old, but there was no place like it athletically. And so if you were good, you could develop there. And if you wanted to coast or if you wanted to be shitty, then you could. You could get away with that, too. I've never been comfortable with being average, and I don't believe that average is, you know, something that you're born with. I think average is really sort of catalyzed by the choices you make. And so when I got there, I knew that there were a lot of people. And I've never seen myself as particularly intelligent, but I believe my intelligence comes from my idea and understanding that if I behave intelligently, I'm intelligent, even if I don't have the aptitude that most intelligent people have. So when I got there, even as an intern, Casey, I'm not much older than you, and there were eight interns, and I'm sleeping on a floor of one of the tennis coaches. Because I had already been to graduate school, I didn't need the internship. And I saw, okay, there's eight categories each week we're going to teach to these 500 students. Well, I learned what the value proposition for the business was. And the business essentially was they had $350 packages a week that if you sold them, that would ultimately be the lifeblood for this business called Performax, which was a third party entity at this academy. Well, you'd have to get on the phone and make these phone calls, or you could do a really engaging presentation and offer athletes the opportunity to buy at the end. Well, I sold like 19 the first week, right. And I got $50 packages, right. And then I Got on the phone and looked at, this is my opportunity to make myself unequal with all these other people that were, you know. And there was nothing wrong with their approach, right? They were in graduate school. They were learning. They were executing Yerkes, Dodson's theory, activation theory, and motivation activation pressure. In my mind, I was like, what do these kids need to hear? And how do I give them a good message? But also let them know, hey, come meet with Chad Boling. He's the best in all of tennis. Talk to him. He'll make you better. Come meet with Jeff Tro. She'll make you better. I wasn't the one on one person at that point. Well, the second week, they offered me a job, right, Because I could drive revenue. And then Chad was like, hey, man, stop selling these. We don't have any more space. But then ultimately, he would say, we would get the opportunity now to teach these and consult with these people because the volume was so high. Now, ironically, I couldn't say yes to the job because I'd already promised to teach for my fourth year down in South Florida, which damn near killed me. But my father said, you know, you made a promise. It's July. You've got to honor your teaching contract, which, you know, was little inflection points like that. There aren't jobs in mental conditioning, right? There's some more jobs now through the army and through baseball, but there weren't then, and I had to say no to it. But anyways, I kind of worked hard on the internship throughout the summer. Then there was a meningitis outbreak in which I looked around and nobody seemed to be taking charge. So I jumped on a table, 23 years old, and helped organize. Everybody didn't panic. I knew the reality of meningitis. I didn't think I was going to catch it. And then the people that ran the academy said, look at this guy. This goes back to my philosophy. I told you guys when you walked in here and Karen as well, and basically that if you're good enough, you're old enough, right? If you're willing to do the right things right now, then it's there for you. So I ultimately sort of created this buzz. We got to hire this guy. I would come back a year later, I would take a pay cut from teaching to go work there. So I was teaching nine months, making X dollars. I took a pay cut to go work in the mental conditioning industry. But the one thing I'm most proud of, even 20 years later, is I'm, you know, I was able to get good at it.

Yeah.

What does that mean in the value to Sports Illustrated? It meant, you know, that I'm a good brain trainer to some organizations. It means, hey, he can be a force multiplier for our players. But I'll be honest with you, Casey, I've never signed more than a one year contract with teams and the sports world doesn't, doesn't spend a lot of money in this industry and there's not a lot of us that are actively doing it where they're relevant, where you're involved in player decisions, where you're helping the best get better, where you're making. That was, I think, the great thing that I was been afforded by people like Jimbo Fisher and Kirby Smart that said, hey, we're going to make you in, in the right areas. We're going to have you help us. And I'd been at this big academy and been the director and helping architect how we develop people off the field. So my skill set was a lot more than send Casey to Trevor's office and help him fix whatever his mindset issue was. I understood the bigger picture and could help a lot more than just that.

Yeah, and I wanted to say that too, like with, with players like these elite performers, when you're connecting with them and helping them and just getting their mindsets dialed in, like what would you say the average process looks like? Free. Because these people that are the elite, like I said, whether that's Russell Wilson or whoever you're working with, just what process do you take through them that we could give the viewers today in terms of how they, how they can do that with their own life? Like how do you look at someone where they are and then where they want to be and how do you help them get there?

Yes.

From your experience? Because I think there's something we can all take from this. Whether that's you're an athlete or you're someone that's in business. I know you talked about that, meaning on and off the field. But what would you say in the simple steps is something you take a player through to help them become their best performer?

That's a great question. In the late 90s, ESPN released this series called Sports Century. And Sports Century would basically profile the top 50 athletes in the world. And when it came out in the late 90s, we recorded every episode, myself and Chad and our other coworker Chris Pasarello, who also works for the Yankees now. And what we started to see when they would profile Lance Armstrong, Jackie Joyner, Kersey Hank Aaron, Michael Johnson, Larry Bird, that everybody was saying the same things across sports, across discipline. Red Auerbach from a coaching perspective, or Casey Jones. So then we started to see, well, what if success leaves clues across all disciplines, right? In the same reason why you and Drama want to put together these. These top people with Robert Greene and these different influencers so people can. Can understand these behaviors. So in the 1950s, Albert Ian Gray wrote this essay called the Common Denominator of Success. It was really an insurance expose, and it was actually maybe a little bit before then. And in it, his. His key conclusion was that successful performers simply do it. Unsuccessful performers don't like to do. All right, so when you start with any athlete or any person on their journey, the, you know, want is a powerful precursor. I mean, I would. When Bradenton, they're paying these families, paying $75,000 a year. People underestimate want, you know, like, well, my son just wants to play PlayStation. He's not motivated. Well, he's motivated but to play PlayStation. Right? So. But, you know, everyone's like, wow, wanting is not enough. You have to commit. I agree that commitment and want are different things, but it starts with wanting something. I want to change. I want to be more healthy in my life. I want to have a better relationship. I saw a statistic that said the average married couple is communicating 27 minutes a week. That's a problem. And that's not. You're not born with. As a great communicator, that's a decision. That's a behavior. So if I start, if I go down and sort of how I met Drama and I sit down with the three, three of the top quarterbacks getting ready for the draft, a what do they want? Why don't they have it? But I think a lot of times we sit down with people and this industry says, okay, Casey, these are the five things you need to do to get where you want. I don't look at it that way. What are the five things right now we could choose not to do that get us closer to where we want. Not to watch, not to eat, not to listen to, not to consume. You know, and I think that so much about this industry that starts with things we don't do, you know, and this idea early on where we would enter a program and a new program, a new athlete and a bag of Doritos in the left hand and an apple in the right hand and said, do you really need a world class nutritionist to tell you which is better for you? Right? Yeah, we don't need nutritionists to tell us that apple's better than Doritos. But to go to the fundamental level, whenever we start a program, it doesn't matter if it feels Fort Bragg or in the college setting or my, you know, good buddy of mine that just got the Colorado football head job. It's the same thing your success is going to be in the simple. Joe Madden from the Cubs do simple better, right? So why should I choose the apple? And that goes back to the fundamental thing, is what does Russell Wilson want? Russell Wilson wanted to confound expectations. He wanted to validate himself. He believed he was good enough, regardless of being 5 10, to make it in the National Football League. One step at a time. When we talked to Saquon Barkley last year, you know, everybody talks about being the face of the franchise. Hey, you're the third running back now. Your first goal should be to be the second, and then to be the first and then to be the best on your team and then one of the best in your division, then one of your best in the league. So many people are thinking too far down the road when be good where you're at, and I think that that's the first journey, is when you start with an athlete or team in an organization. If there is something that we want, which is important and we don't have it now, why and what could we not do that gets us closer? And then what are some things that we can do from behaviors? Too many people are focused on outcomes, you know, and again, if your focus is performance, you got a better chance because sometimes you can perform well and not win, but the more you perform well, the better you can. Sometimes you can get outcomes by bullshitting the process. So I think that that's fundamental. I think the second thing, and one of the most important thing I think for your listeners to understand is inside, like our internal thoughts at a subconscious level. Look, everybody has a dialogue, right? Carl Prebram, a neurosurgeon from Stanford, said, you know, we think in three dimensions. When I think about something creates a picture. And that picture affects my emotional state. My emotional state affects how I perform. That's all true. But this inside voice, which some people says is, you know, 100 to 200,000 thoughts a day. Other people say it's more. Everybody's fucked up there, you know, and so if you're, if you have doubt, if you're walking in to meet somebody, that's okay. But our outside language, when I say it out loud, when I say, you know, Casey, I don't know if I can get through this summer in Arizona. It's 118 degrees, right? Or I don't know if she'll like me. Or I don't know that at 19 years old, I could get into this industry where I'm competing against Evan Carmichael and drama and all these. Gary Vaynerchuk and all these different people. You know, when you say something out loud, it carries 10 times the power. And if it's negative, it could be a multiple of four to seven times more powerful than that. And we don't give ourself enough credit for the influence we have over ourself. And if we're not where we're not, it's because of what we've done.

And.

And if we are where we're at, it's because of what we've done. And that's where you go back to basic tenets of psychology, locus of control. Do I think I have control over my life or do I think you do? And what you'll find out about Russell Wilson is, yes, even though he was entering the draft process and only 255 guys were going to get picked and there were thousands of people competing and a number of really good quarterbacks, including he was training with every day and Ryan Tannehill and Kirk Cousins, and he still believed that based upon if he did the things that were within his control and maximize the gifts he had, he would be good enough. And think about how many people, Casey, measure themselves by who they think they're not, or who I think you think I'm not, rather than I'm 5, 10. These are the gifts I have. I'm going to use everyone I can, and I'm going to see where that gets me. And if more of our world was focused on utilizing that and also recognizing that, we wouldn't worry as much about what other people think thought of us. If they recognize they're not fucking thinking about us, they got their own things. So use the gifts you have. And I think for 18 to 25, that's who I live with. Right. You know, for colleges, our college population is essentially 120 athletes in a collegiate football environment. Even in the special operations community, a lot of times, I mean, a SEAL team is, you know, could be 18 to 30. Right. So just because you're young doesn't mean that you can't do the right things. Experience is a great teacher. And in my 40s, do I know more than I did in my 30s? Sure. Do I know more than I did in my 20s, I guess. Right. But if there were some things that I'm doing now that I would have done in my 30s, some success I could have had now would have been there. And I also think that ultimately, when you look at an athlete, an athlete is a sum total of their behaviors. And Tiger Wood's a great example. Tiger was the best collection of behaviors we'd ever seen. When he didn't behave in alignment with those behaviors combined with some physical challenges, he's just another golfer. Right. So don't attribute all sorts of other things. I don't have this because Casey's willing. Casey has this. I can tell you, I probably have, like a 9 IQ, all right? And in this particular area, yes, I was raised from a young age, probably with a unique level of insight, but. But I think being willing to listen, to learn, to study, but then to watch and to figure out and start to see. Mike, I just talked to Michael Johnson. He number one in the world for 11 years. He said three things that I also heard Patrick Rafter say. Well, how do you know Patrick Rafter? I picked him up at the airport, right? And then I. We interviewed him, and Patrick Rafter was number one in the world at that time and just won Wimbledon. And then you start to see. And you start to see, well, shoot, you know, he goes to bed at a good time. I could do that. He gets up at 6 in the morning. I could do that now if I don't want to do that, that's okay. And a lot of the people that are listening to your podcast right now, they are. They want to be average, and that's okay. The world needs average people. I don't fuck around with average people. But the world needs average people. But you're not born that way, okay? And for me, why do I focus on helping people who are already really good? Because they want to be helped, right? And athletes are a population that doesn't know they want to be helped when they meet you, right? When I walk in, no matter what the team is, if I start in Major League Baseball, the NBA, pro football, I know every one of those dudes are looking at me like, fuck that dude. I know that, right? But I also know that if I can establish the value proposition, and am I not coming with bullshit about breathing and meditating and all that stuff, which is hard, they can do that, and we can eventually get there. But if we control what we say out loud, we minimize negativity, we put a plan together, we identify why we don't have it, what it will take. If we do do these things and if we give up these other things and then we write them down the same way we would write them down if we went to a grocery store and we adhere to it and we do simple, better, then I think know I can help somebody. Going back to original question, get to that next level.

Yeah, that's. That's powerful, man. And I think something that I noticed there of the five things you don't want. Right. I think a lot, A lot of time, even myself, I think you sometimes we think about what do we want, Right. So you saying that to those players and those elite performers, how do you attribute that to your own life? Like, how do you apply those tactics? I know when we were talking before the podcast, we were talking about social media and how you're just getting involved with it, and you told me, like, you watch how you spend your time, and I know that's something where you probably don't want to get distracted, Right? So what would you say, like, those three to five things are that you don't want or that you don't give into to help you get you closer to your personal goals?

That's a really good question. One of the better ones I've heard in a long time. And you have to know yourself. So let's just say as I, the number one goal when Shannon Welch from HarperCollins and then Andy Staples from Sports Illustrated, now the athletic and myself, when we started talking about the book, was, all right, we want to put together a book that's true to what I believe, and we've done that now. Right? So then this next level was, well, how do people ultimately learn about who you are and what you teach and all those things? So that would eventually bring me into pr, strategic PR and social media as I demoed Facebook. Let's just use Facebook as an example, okay? Where I'm at in my life, it doesn't work for me. And the reason it doesn't work for me is not that it doesn't work, but because I had some relationship challenges and other things, and I don't have a traditional family in the way that other people do, which are decisions that I'm comfortable with and I've chosen right? But when I go on Facebook, even for an hour, I discipline myself to one hour. Every Friday, I would go on, and I would. At the end of that hour, the damage that would be done to me emotionally was significant because I'd see all these people that had lives that just seemed so much better. They're Home on the weekends, they're with their kids, their family, people that I grew up with. I'm on a plane, I'm on a field, I'm on, you might think, but. But. So it really forced me to judge myself. And I looked at it and said, at this point in my life, I'm not responsible enough to handle emotionally. Facebook. So what I liked about Twitter was I felt like, okay, I can control what I consume and I can, you know, put things, and then I won't judge myself as much. Instagram, I didn't know a lot about it. I've obviously personally been active on it. Now, I think for. Not that I'm counting, but 34 days and I am counting, but I think from a discipline perspective, it was like, all right, with Twitter and Instagram, at noon and at six o', clock, I'll give myself opportunities to engage for five minutes. Five minutes, yes.

Wow.

And then at that point, then I'll look and then I'll do the different types of things. But really more what. What I was told was like, all right, we need to make sure that we have some selective content out there and some things that kind of go through your message. And we had filmed a lot of this stuff, and Even the last three years, it was just given to me for Instagram, 60 seconds or less. But I never used it or I didn't understand it Right. And Russell and I had done this show on his app, Trace Me, called Dangerous Minds. So we had all this content, and then years I had that. So although I would say about Instagram, it doesn't affect me the way Facebook does. So as I look on it, it really doesn't bother me. And then I can kind of, okay, this is what needs to go. And then I can kind of check on some people, oh, it's, man, he's doing great, or she's doing great and whatever. And it doesn't bother me. So those are some things that I can and I can't do. And then I think also, you know, where I'm living.

Right.

Right where you guys are at right now. This is not like this is. This is about me.

Yeah.

This is about the connection I have to Manhattan beach, the way it makes me feel, the fact that I'm five hours from an airport. You know, I've got some things that I've got to take to another level in my own life. I'm not afraid to own that. I think everybody has the next level. I don't think we need to be sick to get better and I think we are number one person we're accountable is to ourselves before you can help other people. So this place just, you know, my buddy Chris, beautiful, by the way. Yeah, it's not, it's awesome. But my buddy Chris Brereton, who I met through Georgia football, who runs MGM Studios and I love surrounding myself around great people and he connected me to a realtor and I just feel good. Right. You know, when I was raised Catholic and my friends in college would kill me, like, what are you Catholic? And do you really believe in all this? I would look at them and I'd say, hey bro, when I go to church, all I know is when I walk out, I feel better. That's the only explanation I need if you want me to go. Like, so there's certain things about this environment I feel better. So I think that this place is a good place for me to be right now. And learning to enjoy and just basic things and then starting to think about, okay, you know, what is, what have I learned and how can I better apply some of these things to myself? I think physically I feel, you know, getting up, I, you know, going to yoga and biking. I'm here typically about three, three out of seven days a week, but I make those three days awesome. And so, so to go back to your original question, how do you apply it? What are some things I cannot do? I think I'm not a good eater, but I've learned how to not be a bad eater. So there's things I choose not to consume. I don't have the ability to watch the news right now in my life just because it's so chaotic. So I'll watch selected shows. I'll watch three one hour shows on Sunday just to get some basic information. Music wise, I'm pretty good. I can listen to kind of what I want now, but it's crazy when I micromanage my own behaviors. But now I don't think like in a. It sounds like I'm out of control, but it's like what's best for me. But I'm not telling you what's best for you. And anybody that's listening to this, just know yourself, right? Be consciously competent. Know and know that you know how to drive your own success. Don't be unconsciously incompetent where you don't even know that you don't know what's hurting you or helping you.

Yeah, I wanted to say on that too, like, what questions do you think if you had to ask the people listening, what questions should they ask Themselves to get more clear on what they do or don't want. If someone's listening, they're young, 18 to 25, and they may have either just started a business or they're crushing it, and anything in between, just what would you say to yourself that helped you get clear on what you do and don't want? What questions would you say people should ask themselves to get clear on that?

Well, first of all, wherever somebody's at right now, today, the end of July 2019, what you've done to this point has brought you here. You're accountable for that. That's real. Okay? The real problem the athletic world has, which is why Russell and I really wanted to take this idea of neutral thinking more publicly, is positive thinking. A lot of times tries to pretend that where we're at is not where we're at or what happened, good or bad, didn't happen when we know it did, right? And cognitive dissonance. So you own that, right? So if I'm 22 years old right now and I live in Akron, Ohio, and things are going really well for me in my personal relationships. I finished school, I'm excited. I'm starting a new job, and I like how it's going, then own that, understand why it happened, and continue to. And identify the behaviors, right? Identify exactly why. When Michael Johnson in 1996, would get ready to run his signature race, he had four things on a note card. Head down, pump my arms, explode, I'm a bullet. Those four things were behaviors that drove his success. Russell Wilson has three things written down. Great balance, great fundamentals. Be engaged, right? So own those things and don't write them down because some professor told you or because Simon Sinek told you or because a Harvard book told you. Write it down because you'd fucking do it at the grocery store to be successful, right? It's that simple, right? You go into a grocery store without shit written down, you suck. Go in with it written down, you got a chance, right? So start owning your success. If I'm listening to this, if you're not and you don't want to be in a better place, then that's fine, too. You may just need to tread water for a little while. There's a lot of people that might be listening, and maybe their first step is listening. But, man, I don't really want to change, right? Because comfort zones are kind of like a grave with the ends kicked out. Like, yeah, it's not that good. But, man, I don't really want to do that to get it Better. And that might be where you're at, you know, and maybe you listen to some more things and then you see, you check back in with yourself in a month or two months, and maybe you're willing to. To do a couple things differently or put the bag of Doritos down and maybe have the apple, but you might not be there yet. And then I think thirdly, if you're at a situation where you really want something different, you feel like this tension and you're listening to this, and I really want something different, then identify some people in your life or people that you work with who seem to have something that you don't have. See if there's something, not some magical gift that was given to them by whoever you believe the creator to be. But are they actually doing something that you could do, or are they not doing something that you could choose not to do? And I think that when. And then literally the idea. I love the idea of start today, right when I missed a penalty kick. I was in high school, and I really never should have been picking anybody who hears this that played on that team with me. Like, everybody kind of bagged kicking penalty kicks on the fifth one, so about 2,500 people. I missed it in the state championship. And what bothered me most was not that I missed it, and I didn't miss them anymore in college because I didn't take them in college, but when I went through that process, I wasn't prepared to take it. I hadn't practiced, hadn't worked at it. I hadn't earned the right to take it. I went up there and took it, and in my mind I knew I wasn't ready and I missed it. Now, I think what was what, what. My dad would leave a little note for me and on my mirror when I would wake up that morning, and it said, you know, I'm sorry, son, but remember this. A year from now, you might wish you started today. So start. And he knew. I. He knew, like, I was going to walk into school on that Monday and feel miserable and all the things, but if I want something different, go practice, go out and. And work for it, you know, things from that perspective. And I think that if I'm listening to this and I want a new outcome, you know, ask myself, am I. Am I willing to do those things and partner with those behaviors to start moving forward incrementally? You know, think about your evolution, right? Does the audience understand your evolution? I mean, did somebody just. Did you inherit. Was. Was your dad the owner of CBS and Just said, you know, I'm going to give you this podcast because a lot of people are listening to this, want to say that because it makes it easier for them to stay stagnant. Right.

Alright. So you talk a lot about neutral thinking and the difference between that and positive and negative thinking. And as we're wrapping up this show, I really want you to touch on that because I know you have a book coming out, I know you have content that you've held hostage for years and you've been doing the work. So when you say that neutral thinking, like what do you define as that for the people listening?

I think a great example would be if, if somebody went on to YouTube and just typed Tom Brady miked up. You know, Super Bowl. I think it's 50, 52. Right. And it would be the scores 28, 3 and Atlanta has everything sort of going for them. And you hear this unique moment on, on the other sideline, Atlanta's got the 25 point lead, about 13 minutes to go. And you hear conversation with Mohammed Sanu. Great player, great guy and a teammate. The teammate says, hey, I don't care what the score is, they still have Tom Brady. Right? And then sort of, sort of. You don't want to say that out loud, right. And you don't want to be thinking about that. But as you hear Tom Brady, Tom Brady's not in a moment where you're down 25 points with a quarter to go. Outcomes aren't going to sell. They're not good marketing platforms to your teammates. So if you're selling winning, right. Positive thinking requires, in my experience, an outcome. I'm going to make money, I'm going to find her in my life, I'm going to succeed, we are going to win. Negative implies, because of how things have gone to that point that you're doomed. Right. That the past predicts the future when the past is the sum total of the behaviors of the past, where the future could be different if the behaviors change. Neutral is simply a focus on your next behavior independent of what happened before. So let's say your 19th year of your life or for Karen, who's about to turn 20, he's going to be a big 20 year old. And if 19 was a great year for him, there's no real momentum outside of if he Learned what made 19 great. And there's no negative momentum if you learn what you did wrong. So Brady's how about we start showing some fight? How about we compete? And then he starts going to specific things that they could do Separate from an outcome and a neutral. I showed you, Jim. Level Apollo 13, same example, right? You have 205,000 miles away from Earth, your ship explodes. Hard to be positive at that moment, but negative thinking will smoke you. So I think a car goes from reversed to neutral to forward. Why would our minds be any different? I think it's hard to go from reverse. Like if somebody's going through a divorce and immediately say, think of all the women you get to meet. They didn't get married to meet new women. So to move them there as opposed to. That's a difficult thing. I'm sorry that you're going through this and then as you work through it, I do think your next relationship can be better when you're ready to take that step. Well, the negative way is constantly look at her social media, constantly talk about how you were screwed in the relationship and all the different types of things. Not talking about it, not looking at the social media, not doing those things, aren't pretending that they didn't happen. They're not giving the past power over now. All right, so I'm owning it. And then I'm starting to think about, well, what does a good relationship look like and how do I meet people and how do I start? By behaving a little bit differently. Maybe I wasn't very engaged in my relationship when I just meet Casey, who is my friend. I work to be more engaged with my friends first before I go out into the world and take my old behaviors and put them into a new relationship. And these old behaviors ruin the new relationship. Right. So neutral is, is, is non judgmental behavior based thinking that focuses on the next step. And so I think it's efficacy. And there's task orientation, process orientation. It's not, you know, it's not world peace. It's just another way of looking at it. And in my experience, which is in the sports world, being asked to where my relevance is built, you know, how do we educate everybody? I think it resonates, I think when you ask guys to be positive, it's challenging right now. I've been always asked in the sports psychology or mental conditioning world to have programs for everybody. Okay. Now the industry is not for everybody. And so like, okay, does that person have a problem? Some of the best organizations, when I think back to Alabama, Florida State, Georgia, I mean, you had multiple experts who had different skill sets. Some more clinical, some more psychiatric evaluation, some more motivational, some more educational. And I think, look at Those programs, they're five of 132 that are doing it. Nobody else in college sports is doing anything in terms of the same way. And I don't think those people are even asking the right questions. So I hope your population is asking questions. And questions come from studying success a lot more than studying failure. I think Matthew McConaughey said it. You know, while he wants to learn from his critics and take certain things, it's better and more important for him to understand what's driven his success. And I think, you know, you look at 26 years later, this guy is an Oscar winner, Academy Award winner. And who'd have thought that when he played Wooderson in 1993 in days and confused, I wouldn't have thought that. So how did he get there? Wasn't accidental?

Yeah, absolutely. No. And last thing to really wrap this up, I want to just say, number one, thank you for coming on this show. But for the people listening, something to give them something actionable to do. Like I said at the beginning, if someone's young, let's say 19 years old, my age, you looking back after working with a lot of these top level performers, whether that's athletes on and off the field or not, what would you say is something that if someone listening wants to. To not be complacent, but become a peak performer in any area of their life, what would be one of the skill sets or the mentality shifts that they can do today that would put them a step ahead than they were before they started listening?

Language, you know, to me, really become aware with a what you say out loud. I think that that's. I just think it's underestimated. I think so quickly we try to go to the inner thoughts and affirmations and things like that. So language is one, you know, like how. How am I talking about my life? And I'm not telling you to go out and lie to yourself. I'm just telling you to really manage what you say out loud. I think secondly, external consumption, right? There's a statistic recently that if I watch three minutes of news in the morning, it increases the likelihood that I'll say I had a shitty day by 27%. So you can always not watch the news. You can always not say certain things. So my challenge eventually, look, you have to do things. I'm not saying that you don't. But success, I think starts with the willingness not to do things. Discipline is less about making myself do things, which we can all say, I just ate three bag of Zarito, don't eat the fourth. Right. Positive to negative is like I've eaten six bags of Doritos and now I feel this compelled. I got to eat, you know, eight loaves of lettuce. Right. Just stop after the fourth bag of Doritos. Yeah. You know, so I think that, that Casey is really important. And don't buy into the fact that because I'm 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, I've been with Freddy Adu. When he went pro at 14, I watched Maria Sharapova go pro at 16. And, and when Wimbledon is 17, I saw Michelle, we launch a career. I saw Paula Kramer. I saw all these great athletes. But understand this. When you enter that world at 17 of the adult world, your clock starts. You don't all of a sudden, oh, I'm developing. It takes time. No, if I go pro, I'm a pro. So if I'm 14 and I'm Freddie to do, and I'm playing against Manchester United in a friendly, I might be 14. And the average age is 31. Once I'm on that field, it's all about what I do. Yeah, right. So, you know, am I battle tested with the behaviors, the knowledge, the understanding of what it takes to be successful? And I can do it at 18. Right. And are there advantages to being 28? Sure, if you learn something in those 10 years. Right. And then I think, you know, my last point is the external consumption in terms of the news and the music and the different things that we listen to. But, you know, really, we're in a time where, you know, partying is fast and loose and edibles and all these just different types of things. Like, in my experience, you've got to be really smart with what you put in your body. You know, now I'm in the pro sports world and your body makes your money. Right. So I know in entertainment and other things that you can be probably a little bit looser with it, but take care of yourself. You get one shot, you know, you get one shot at this. And it takes what it takes. Right. The title of the book, It Takes what it Takes to be a Good College Student. Right. Objectively. Maybe you don't like that teacher. So what are you going to do? What it does to do? Well, as a Intro to Poli Sci at Arizona State. And if you're not, then that's okay, but don't expect, you know, there's no easier way. There's just the way.

I love it. And I'm excited because when we started this, you're just getting started on social. You said 34 days now, and I want the people to end on this if they want to learn more about not only yourself but what you have up and coming, which is the book, what could they go to? Where can they follow you? And also I'd love for you to give them some context of what you're going to be releasing up and coming the next 60, 90, 180 days. Because I know you have the book coming out soon and I want them to pick it up. I know I will. So I'd love for you to just give them some context on where they can find you. What's coming up just before we wrap this up.

Yeah, well, I think, I think it's at Trevor Moad. T R A V O R M O A W A D and all.

The links will be down below. Yeah.

And what we're hoping is just to, just to put some more of things that we've been doing for years out, just, you know, conversations. I think we've got some stuff when we're on the road with Georgia and we're doing some of our team building stuff. And then, you know, Russell and I filmed a great show last year, five episodes on ESPN called Quarterback to Quarterback and, and his company west to east owned a lot of that footage. So we've been put, we've been putting that out and then strategically with some people like Casey and like Drama that we believe are in alignment. You know, I have a great PR group called Jay Conley out of New York and Chicago that's, that's helping us take the step. And, and you know, I told you Maria Shriver really challenged. She said, you know, like can't. Are you willing to take maybe a little bit of a different message, not a better message, but a different message out to the public? So we'll kind of roll that out, I think on our social media and then limitless minds think big-gofar.com I think we have a really great business that people can opt into corporations and companies. You don't need to be Microsoft to get the best people or to work with the top consultants. You know, we've tried to make it more consumable for everybody, you know. And then I think lastly I think if it's Trevor Moad, it takes what it takes at HarperCollins. The book is, you know, out there for pre order and over the course of the next six months we'll do more and then, you know, then I'll be coming to a sideline next to you, running around, you know, on a football field or baseball field or some of these other things where, you know, it's made sense to live the way I've lived for 18 years. But separate from the sports world, it's more about how does this impact Casey, you know, or how does this impact Kieran, or how does this impact a 23 year old sitting here listening right now? It's not, you know, the mentality shapes reality, but the mentality is the steering wheel for your behaviors. And that's, I think, the key thing. Your behaviors are going to precede your success. You know, nobody's even people that have trust funds. It's never enough, you know. So this is, I think that the closing point that I would make. We all have access to the same information. The real question is, are we going to give that information access to us?

I love that. Well, Trevor and everyone listening, make sure you go follow Trevor, learn more about him. And I just want to say thank you so much.

You bet. My pleasure.

So again, and everyone listening, thank you so much for tuning into the Rise of the Young podcast. Make sure you go pre order Trevor's book, give him a follow on Instagram. I know that's where he's putting a lot of his content out now. And thanks so much for listening. I'll talk to you soon.

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