Hey, it's your friend Mel and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. Wouldn't you just love to have a powerful mindset that makes you unstoppable and finally get that roadmap to success that you deserve?
Well, today, you're getting it because Coach Steve Magnus, who is one of the top performance and mindset coaches in the world.
I'm talking a guy who has coached elite athletes, Olympians, D1, professional athletes.
He is here in our Boston Studios for one reason, to coach you.
And to teach you the exact same mental techniques that he has been using in the most elite settings that are rooted in courage, purpose, and excellence.
And you're getting it all today for free.
You're going to learn how to train your mind just like the world's top performers do.
because when you change your mindset, you change the game.
So what does that look like?
Well, after the conversation today, you're going to know how to rise above any challenge, become mentally tougher and more resilient and able to easily handle any challenge that life throws your way or with the people that you love.
And this is absolutely a conversation that you are going to want to share with every buddy that you care about, every athlete, every student, every person in your life that has bigger goals and a bigger possibility, they need to hear this.
Because whether you're an entrepreneur, a parent, a shift worker, a nurse, teacher, work on a desk job, or you're a student, what you're about to learn today will transform every area of your life and unlock your next level of potential.
See, when Steve first started coaching elite runners, he noticed something fascinating.
It wasn't just her talent, it wasn't just her fitness level.
It was the way they trained their minds that set them apart.
His mental techniques have propelled some of the best athletes in the world to extraordinary success, even when they were filled with doubt, uncertainty and a string of losses.
Today, he's teaching you how to hack your mind and achieve anything you want.
So are you ready to be coached?
Because Coach Magnus is ready to coach you and he's here.
So let's do this. Your team has amazing potential, if only they had more hours in the day.
That's exactly what Breeze, HubSpot's built -in AI, delivers for your marketing, sales, and service teams. Breeze agents don't just assist you, they do the work for you.
Creating content, analyzing customer data, automating support, all that busy work, handled just like that, so you and your team can focus on what really matters.
Building relationships and growing your business.
Visit HubSpot .com slash AI to get started today.
If you've listened to the Mel Robbins Podcast for a while, you know how important acceptance is when it comes to personal growth.
And you know who else is big on acceptance?
Discover. You see Discover is accepted at 99 % of places that take credit cards nationwide.
That's a whole lot of places and a whole lot of acceptance, which is great for Discover, but even better for you, based on the February, 2024 Nielsen report.
Learn more at discover .com slash credit card. Hey, it's your friend, Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins podcast. I am so excited for the conversation today.
I am thrilled to be learning from coach Steve Magnus.
I'm gonna tell you about him in just a minute.
And look, it's always an honor to be able to spend time and be together with you.
And if you're a new listener, I want to take a moment and personally welcome you to the Mel Robbins podcast family.
I am so glad that you're here.
And because you hit play on this particular episode, here's what I already know about you.
You understand the power of your mindset and how your mind could help you unlock the next level of your potential.
And you're also here because you know that when you win the mental game, you win the game of life.
And one more thing.
If somebody sent this episode to you, here's what I want to tell you about that.
I think that's pretty cool because it means you have people in your life that care about you and they know you could be unstoppable.
You could reach higher possibilities if you take to heart everything that our expert today is about to share with you.
See, in our studios today, we have a really extraordinary thing that's about to happen.
You and I are about to be coached by one of the world's top experts in mindset, his name Coach Steve Magnus.
Steve has coached Olympians, professional athletes, D1 athletes, and some of the world's top performers.
He's an elite runner himself, a Division One college coach, and you're also going to hear the riveting story of how he turned whistleblower at one of the most elite Nike training camps, an experience that forever changed his life and his perspective on what mental toughness actually means.
Coach Steve has spent years helping the most elite runners in the world increase their athletic performance under pressure.
He's also the co -founder of The Growth Equation, where he and his team teach the science, art, and practice of sustainable peak performance through groundbreaking research and interactive courses.
Their work has been used by Ironman world champions, heart and lung transplant surgeons, world -class coaches across every single major sports league, award -winning creatives and leaders at some of the world's most respected brands.
He's written five bestselling books, including his latest, Win the Inside Game, How to Move from Surviving to Thriving.
And here's what I love most about Coach Steve.
Yes, he's coached Olympic athletes through the mental and emotional pressure of competing in the biggest arenas at the highest stakes, but you want to know what makes him truly different.
It's how real, relatable and accessible his tools, techniques and strategies will be to you, to your life and your goals.
He is here and he's got the cutting edge science, compelling research, and real -world experience on the track, in the classroom and in the game of life.
Because the fact is when you know how to win the mental game, you win the entire game of life.
So without further ado please help me welcome coach Steve Magnus to the Mel Robbins podcast. Coach I am so glad you're here and I also feel like I owe your wife, a huge thanks because I know you got two kids under the age of two, and she said it was cool for you to jump on a plane, fly across country, and be here with us.
A huge shout out to your wife, Hilary.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for being here.
Thanks so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
I'm thrilled that you're here.
So I want to read to you from your best -selling book, Do Hard Things, When the Inside Game, How to Move From Surviving to Thriving and Free Yourself Up to Perform.
And I'm reading this passage that really caught my attention on page 28.
We all get stuck. We don't reach our capabilities.
We get in our own way.
We feel trapped like we can't take the action that deep down we know we should.
This book is about freeing yourself up from whatever is preventing you from going on the journey to realizing your potential.
It's allowing yourself to be courageous.
For me, the journey started with realizing that everything I'd been taught about success was wrong.
Steve, could you speak to the person who has made the time to be with us right now, who is so excited to learn how to win the inside game from you?
Can you tell them what they might experience in their life that could be different, based on everything that you're about to share with us today?
the lesson that really astonished me in working with elite performers, first athletes and then across the board, is that all of us get in our own way and all of us are capable of more, but we let fear, anxiety, self -doubt, that voice in our head tell us, let's avoid this thing, let's stop doing this thing.
What I promise you today is, I might not be able to fix all of your problems, but I'm going to give you the tools to lighten the load, to be able to navigate that inner voice, to be able to switch stress from seeing it always as a threat, but as something that can challenge you and propel you forward and how to work with your brain and body instead of fighting against it endlessly.
Coach, I believe you.
I'm ready. I'm so glad that you're here.
You know, the book is called Win the Inside Game.
What does winning the inside game mean exactly?
And why is it so important to know how to do this?
I think let's start with the opposite, which is the external.
Okay. And I think the external is this, is when we tie our identity to our achievements.
In fact, there was a meta analysis, study of studies including 70 ,000 people.
That shows that when we prioritize and emphasize the external more than the internal, it is, and I quote, universally detrimental to our well -being.
So the inside game is opposite of that.
It's having clarity in who you are, why you're pursuing something.
it's understanding that you get to define what success means.
It means that instead of just fitting in, you find deep, genuine connection and belonging to those who you're going on this journey with.
When we find that, when we go towards that, what happens is instead of insecurity driving the ship, we feel secure enough to take risks, to take on challenges, to see again what we're capable of and do the things that we want to pursue?
I think I just got something out of that.
So, I think we make the mistake of looking at people that achieve things on the outside and believe that it's those achievements that are what make them good risk -takers and make them able to go after these things that we in our hearts wish we would do for ourselves.
But what you're actually saying is based on all of your experience coaching elite athletes, Olympians, studying this mindset toughness and being a coach for it in highly competitive settings.
You're saying based on that and all the research, it's actually the opposite.
It's those people that have learned how to win this inside game and who are secure in themselves who are actually able to take more risks.
Is that right? Absolutely.
I'll give you a story.
Okay, give me a story.
So Sarah Hall is one of America's top marathoners.
She's one of the best in the world.
She reached that level and later in her career than normally in her late 30s, early 40s is when she had her breakthrough.
I got to work with Sarah for a number of years and what I learned from her is the race she had her ultimate breakthrough where she set the American record in the half marathon. So fastest half marathon in American history for a woman.
Leading up into that race, she had this, I'm going to set this record. I'm paying attention to the outcome.
I'm going with the external thing." In about a month or two before the race, she said, you know what?
This is getting in the way.
I need to leave this behind, and to quote her, she said, it is stealing my peace.
Instead, what I'm going to focus on is, I'm going to focus on the feeling.
She defined the feeling is, I want to get in that race.
Be surrounded by a bunch of other women, not be threatened by them, But realize that we're all bringing out the best in each of us.
If I put myself in that spot and I enjoy that, great things are going to happen.
To me, that's what it is.
You're seeing one of the best in the world telling you that the way that you set the record isn't to obsess over the record, but to let go just enough and focus on that internal feeling and sensation, and that security knowing that you can take that risk, and if you fail, it's not gonna be the end of the world because you got to feel that experience.
You got to go through that journey.
You know, what I hear in that story that is so helpful, and I think we can all relate to that.
Whether we're like, okay, I gotta get into that nursing school, or I've gotta meet the person by the time I turn 30, or I gotta be making this kinda money, like that external thing.
When she made the switch, what I heard was actually the switch from pressure and performance to a sense of faith that if you put yourself in the right environment and you tap into the energy of what it's going to feel like to trust yourself there in that experience, that the rest of it takes care of itself, and a lot of that pressure that I would imagine can cause you to choke and get up into your head and kind of do things that you don't realize impact how you perform, but your ability to relax in and have faith in just being in the experience is what helps you win?
It is. I mean, that's the essence of what we call flow in sports psychology, which is that feeling of like everything clicks.
You cannot pressure your way into flow.
If you feel exceedingly amounts of pressure, you can't get in that state.
So ironically, sometimes we try too hard in trying, that wanting the thing is what is preventing us from actually getting that goal because we're trying to force it.
I had a really good track coach who was a mentor, who was the track coach of Carl Lewis.
He told me one day, he said, Steve, most people have the wrong concept of effort.
They think effort means digging down, trying harder and forcing yourself.
He said, no, no, effort is like Carl.
What he meant by that is if you watch Carl Lewis Sprint or Usain Bolt, they are going all out, but their cheeks are bouncing up and down.
Sometimes they're smiling a little bit, they're relaxed doing it because real effort is quiet.
It's how do we get the most out of ourselves, well being calm and relaxed doing it.
It's that paradox where we think we want to try and dig, but whenever we do that, it backfires.
It's probably the same if I sat down to write.
If I said, hey, I need to write this wonderful paragraph that's going to shock everyone and get them latched onto what I'm talking about, that paragraph isn't going to be good.
I've got to put myself in that position on the chair and say, hey, I've done the research. I'm a pretty good writer.
Trust myself to figure it out.
Completely, you know, it also, all of that pressure for a lot of people also results in procrastinating and getting so obsessed with how it's going to turn out that you don't actually even do the damn thing.
And I think that's a very interesting thing for us to talk about because, you know, ultimately you create mental toughness in the athletes that you are coaching.
and in the companies that you go into and work with, how do you define mental toughness and what do you think some of the common misconceptions around mental toughness is?
So you mentioned that I have two under two.
What's two under? Oh, two kids under two.
Two kids under two.
So my almost two -year -old has hit the stage where she's throwing tantrums, and my wife is also an elementary school teacher, so she's an expert on kids throwing tantrums. If we look at why do kids throw tantrums, here's what occurs.
Two -year -old maybe sees something that she wants.
Mom and dad say, no, no, no, she doesn't quite grasp the concept of no. She wants it.
She sees it. She gets frustrated or angry or mad.
Because those emotions and feelings are overwhelming and foreign for a two -year -old.
She goes into freakout mode, which eventually runs it coarse and then she shuts down.
Toughness is navigating that freakout.
We experience the same thing as adults except it has more layers.
We feel discomfort, or stress, or anxiety, or fatigue, or whatever it is, that emotion in that feeling, and then we bring in the layer of our voice tends to go with it.
Our voice starts to get negative and spiral and think about, oh, I can't do this.
If I don't win this race, or finish this, or get this job, I'm on be embarrassed, we just spiral out of control.
And what happens is your brain gets the message.
It says, hey, we've got overwhelming emotions, we've got a negative voice that is spiraling.
How do we escape this situation?
And our brain doesn't go, how do we get the best result out of this situation?
It says, how do we get out of this right now?
The quickest moment possible.
If I'm running a race, the quickest thing is just slow down or stop.
if I'm trying to finish my dissertation or nursing exam or whatever, and the quickest thing is procrastinate, like leave this, don't come back to it because that'll alleviate it in the moment.
And what real toughness to me is navigating.
How do we understand our inner world and those emotions so that they don't overwhelm us?
How do we stop that spiral or that rock rolling down the hill and gaining momentum?
How do we stop it early enough so that we can do something about it?
And I think the misconceptions around toughness is that our old school model tells us only one path, which is that grit it out, fight the thing, and often don't pay attention to your emotions or feelings, ignore them.
Well sometimes that works, generally on easy stuff, on hard things where it actually matters, It backfires because if I try and avoid the thing, if I try and resist the thing, we have a saying, what we resist persists.
How do we learn to listen to our body better?
How do we change our self -talk?
How do we change our focus to get us out of these spirals and navigate these situations?
I think I get it. But just so I make sure that the person who's here with us understands kind of how mental toughness is an important thing in their day -to -day life.
Like, how does having mental toughness help you navigate a job search or a breakup, or, you know, we use the example of, you know, your wife's a teacher and you've had a really, really tough week with the kids at school.
How does mental toughness help you in just your day -to -day life?
Yeah, we'll start with the teacher one because I see this all the time.
Okay. Teachers have one of the hardest jobs And it's sometimes a thankless job, but they do amazing job, so I love supporting my teachers out there.
Here's what happens, teaching is hard, you get home, you're overwhelmed.
And the tendency is to be like, okay, I'm so overwhelmed that I'm just shutting down and I can't do anything else.
Mental toughness is realizing that like, you're still gonna have to show up the next day and because you care about your job and the kids, show up and teach them to the best of your ability.
How do you get through that overwhelm and get yourself back in that position?
For a teacher, it could be something as simple as, what is my get home, shut down, and reset routine that allows me to deal with that stress, take it off, and say, okay, just for a couple hours, I'm going to get myself in a place where I rejuvenate, and then can get a good night's sleep, and then tackle the job again tomorrow.
With, I think you said job search, I think there is handling rejection.
It's because that feels personal.
Yeah. Right. You apply for the job, you do everything that you can to put yourself in the best position, and someone essentially says, you're not good enough or we don't want you.
In that moment, that can hit deep.
and toughness is realizing and figuring out how do I create the space between that almost failure in my identity and who I am.
To be able to say, I get it, that person didn't select me, but that doesn't mean that I'm not worthy as a human being and that I'm not capable of doing this job.
They just didn't see it.
How do I get back on the horse?
How do you do that with, like, let's say since you coach such elite athletes, you've got an athlete, and this is kind of part of your story too, which we're going to get into, that just misses the Olympic team or just misses the world record. Intellectually coach. I get it.
Like I gotta have a little bit of space for the rejection and the pain of coming just so close, But then there's that mental toughness skill that is your expertise.
What are some of the things that you would say to an athlete that you're coaching in those moments that feel similar to a job rejection, right?
Same psychological thing.
Same thing. So here, I take them through a process.
Is first, you can't deny that it hurts.
You have to accept and sit with it and live with it and realize that this thing you cared about, you fell short in and that sucks.
There's no getting around it.
There's no faking it.
It just sucks. So that's number one.
Number two is you've got to get your brain and body out of what I call stress and protect mode, where you're feeling all of these stress hormones, which pushes your brain to be like, protect myself, avoid the thing, shut down, which is our acute response to failure, and you've got to get it into, how do I almost get into a learning and growing mode?
And the best way to do this is simply socializing with friends.
When we're around other people, there's research that shows that when you're socializing with other people, you produce a hormone called oxytocin.
It's like a bonding hormone.
It's what's actually produced when women have babies to help them bond with the child.
Same thing occurs for us in adults.
And what research tells us is it counteracts the negative stress hormones that make us feel worthless or alone or whatever have you after stress.
So the best thing you can do with athletes, I always tell them that after the game, if you lose, guess what?
Go have pizza with your friends.
Go eat. And what that does is it shifts you out of that mindset.
And then the last part of this process is you've got to build yourself up.
You got to give yourself evidence that you are worthy.
And here I like to do it in two different ways.
There's one, I like to have people have what I call an evidence journal, which is write down things where you went through something tough and came out on the other side.
Coach, I'm picking up on the fact that your evidence journal is also part of the training.
It's sort of like the reps and a gym.
So can you just tick off a couple examples of some of the little things that people start to write down as evidence, right?
That they've survived other setbacks that the person listening might be able to relate to.
So some of the things I like to do is look at how consistent were you when you, you know, were preparing for this?
Did you get your five days a week of training and people can look back and say, I did it, I did the training plan, I showed up.
Did you prioritize yourself?
The day before the job interview, did you get the sleep in that you wanted to to prepare for the thing?
You're looking for how do I give myself the evidence that I gave myself the best shot that I could.
The other thing that I like to do is look through past experiences and moments where it's like, hey, I came through this thing.
The reason is pretty simple, is our brain often has a negativity bias, where we just latch onto and remember the times that it didn't go well.
Why? Because they sting.
Like we remember the things that sting more.
We forget all the times where it's like, hey, we showed up for practice when it was raining.
You know, we showed up for the job even when we were tired the night before and we still got it done.
Those things just go out the window.
So we've got to give our brain that information that reminds us like, hey, I've been here before.
I've gone through some tough things.
It's like, you are capable of this and more.
I think that's really important because I can say one of the things that I have to chronically work on is making sure that my relentless drive, right, to do better, to be more efficient, to have more fun in the way that we're working, to make a bigger impact doesn't negate all of the amazing things that are actually going well.
Can you give me an example of working with one of your athletes where their attitude or negativity was really starting to impact their performance?
This is very common, even at the elite level, because often you think like, oh, these people have bulletproof minds, right?
It's not true. What do you mean it's not true?
How do you get to the Olympics, Steve, and not have a bulletproof mind?
Here's what I learned, I used to think that.
I used to think, oh, there's something different about them.
But what you realize is the same problems that I'll literally talk about with a high school kid navigating the SAT and basketball team tryouts, are the same thing that I'll talk about with someone who's made the Olympic team and trying to show up to the Olympics.
You're kidding me? No, because it's a human problem.
What do you mean by it's a human problem?
The kid who's trying to make the basketball team and do well on the SATs, and the person who's just made the Olympic team achieved a dream and now is getting ready to compete in the Olympics, they're both facing the same psychological problem?
Our human stress response, which makes us see the negative, to think that we're not good enough, to think that we're going to be overwhelmed and freak out on the starting line and not be able to show up how we want to show up.
What you're basically talking about is self -doubt and choking.
Yeah. This is why choking happens to the best of the best. This is why Simone Biles got the twisties, because it's not anything to do with her being weak or anything.
She's the total opposite of that.
Amazing! But our biology is wired the same.
And although the arena might be different, our brain doesn't know the difference between what feels like a lot of pressure when we're at the high school gymnasium, versus the Olympic stadium, where we see hundreds of thousands of people, it's still pressure, and we still feel it the same way.
It's not like it's proportional to the amount of people who are viewing us.
This makes so much sense.
Coach, it's so cool what you do for a living, because it does make sense to me that if you're going in for an interview for a job that you're really interested in, of course you're going to feel pressure because you want to do well.
That's human nature.
If you're going in for an interview and for high school to talk to the coach, hoping that the coach is gonna want to recruit you for their team.
It's an interview that you care about.
It's the exact same psychological setup.
It's just that the place and the space is different, but you're feeling the same thing.
It's about the scale of it based on your experience.
And that I think is why mental toughness is everything.
What do you do in those moments when it matters or when your emotions rise up?
Because what you're also saying is it's not just a mental game, it's also a physical one.
And in fact, there's something that you write about in your book that I wanted to just read to you because we're on the topic of mental toughness.
So you write about this very interesting thing in your book, Win the Inside Game.
And this is on page 123.
In the 1960s, scientists noted an interesting phenomenon when animals were pitted against one another in the lab.
From rats to chicks to fish, when they were competing for resources, the contest results shifted the animal's subsequent behavior.
The winner became more aggressive attacking whatever opponent stepped into the cage next.
The losers hesitated.
They retreated and defended, hoping to avoid conflict.
The behaviors translated into consistent outcomes.
The winners kept winning at an alarming rate, and the losers kept a streak of their own.
See, what was interesting about reading this is that you basically are starting to make the case, Steve, that it's not just your thoughts but with the emotions and then the way that your thoughts start to spiral, there is a biology.
There's something physical and probably neurochemical happening in your body that winners learn that they have to fight to gain resources Winners and losers come up with a different strategy.
You might think that winners keep winning simply because they're better fighters, but research found that relative skill didn't explain the winning and losing streaks.
It's about what changes in the animals' biology when they either win or lose.
Can you talk more about this?
This is some of the most fascinating research I've come across.
And it's called the winner and loser effect.
And what happens is, we change our stress response based on the outcome of the event or even more so our expectation of the event.
What I mean by that is after you win, you tend to get a bump in testosterone.
And this has been found in both men and women.
You get a bump in testosterone.
And that increase in testosterone makes you think, okay, I'm gonna be more confident going into this next thing.
I can take on this challenge.
And what tends to happen is next time you step into the arena your brain goes, hey, remember last time we got that bump in testosterone, let's do that again.
So we're more likely to approach whatever it is we're taking with more challenge, more testosterone, and we have what psychologists call a challenge response.
If on the flip side, is if you lose And then, especially if you stew in that loss, you think it is overwhelming, this is the end of the world, my life is over, I'm never gonna be able to do this thing again, you have more cortisol.
And what your brain learns is it says, hey, this place really sucks.
So, next time we face something similar, before you even step into the arena, your brain defaults to producing more cortisol to try and convince you to avoid the situation you're getting in.
So, okay, hold on. Let me just unpack this.
Because I think this is so important in real life, not that athletics is not real life, if you've just been broken up with and then you're about to put yourself back out there.
This is an example where cortisol might spike and you might feel the, uh -oh, if you've been laid off and you're now starting to go for interviews.
It might be an uh -oh, right?
If you didn't get into your dream school and and now you're reapplying again.
Your body is wired, because of the sting of that, to actually feel that hesitation and protection.
Am I getting this right?
Absolutely, spot on.
And what do you wanna say to those of us, to the person listening, who is either feeling this way now or who has somebody in their life who now has this hesitation, or feels defeated, or is starting to really lose their edge, what do you want us to know, Coach, about these moments in our life and what to do about it?
Two things. One is we can influence this to a large degree based on our expectations.
What? So what research tells us is, if we set the expectations, which are based on, Essentially, our brain goes, what are the demands that we're facing and what are we capable of.
What are the demands that we're facing and what are we capable of?
So if you're sitting there and you're saying, I got broken up with, I'm putting myself back in the arena, I'm going on the date, the demands are I'm going to have to talk to someone who I don't know very well and open up and put myself out there.
Now, your capabilities, because last time it didn't go very well, Your brain goes like, I don't know if you're capable of this.
I don't know. So what do you have to do in that situation?
You have to, you have two options.
You can say, okay, I'm gonna set the expectations and sometimes lower them a little bit.
Say, hey, this is my first date.
I'm not trying to set the world on fire.
I'm just going to put myself out there and go talk to them.
Lower those expectations.
Okay, so that's step nine.
So one thing you can do is lower.
I don't have to get this job.
I don't have to. Okay, gotcha.
I can just go. And the fact that I'm getting out there, that's a win.
Okay, so lower expectations, step one.
And the second part is improving that your capabilities side.
Okay. Which is in athletics, what do we do?
We train. You practice.
You practice. In life, you can do the same thing, right?
If you are struggling and afraid of going on that first date, go call up a friend and say, hey, we're gonna practice some conversations together.
I'm gonna talk about myself.
We're gonna role -play this.
And it sounds a little silly, but what it does is your brain goes, okay, I've been here before.
If you're keep being afraid of that job interview, then you wanna go do some mock job interviews.
And the good thing is this, is when you control the environment, right, and you're doing it with friends or family or someone who doesn't entice that fear around you, then your brain doesn't automatically default and you can train that.
I love that. So I think I would even say, I bet there's something else, Coach, that you do with the people that you coach, is it's actually very helpful to know that it is a hard -wired response and a sign that your brain is working as it should, that if I'm about to try something that I'm nervous about or the stakes are high or that I really sucked at or got screwed over or hurt by that it's normal to have your cortisol spike and it's normal to feel that hesitation but I got options.
So the hesitation now doesn't scare me because I should expect to be nervous.
And then you just taught me, just lower your expectations.
I don't have to kill this thing.
I just have to, like, I'm just going to put myself out there.
And then the second thing is kind of obvious but we avoid it if we're stressed out, which is just practice.
This feels like the perfect moment to take a quick pause.
Let everything that you have poured into us just really set in.
I wanna also give you a chance to share this with people that you care about.
If you've got a high school athlete, you've got somebody that wants to do better at work, you've got somebody that needs to strengthen the mental game because what are we learning?
When you change your mindset, you change the game.
Share this episode with them.
We all need a little coach Steve in our life and don't go anywhere because after the short break, We've got a lot more to cover, more tools, more tips.
We're gonna continue to win the inside games.
So stay with me. Let's get real.
Growing a business can feel impossible, but HubSpot's customer platform can really help.
It's powered by Breeze, their built -in AI to handle all the tasks slowing you down.
Imagine walking in tomorrow and boom, your emails are drafted, your leads are prioritized, and customer questions are already answered.
It's happening right now for businesses just like yours.
They're growing faster because they're focusing on what really matters.
Taking action is the first step to growth.
Visit HubSpot .com slash AI today.
This is your life. If you want to reinvent yourself, it's time.
Southern New Hampshire University offers over 200 degree programs to help you take the next step.
Courses are available online 24 7 so you can balance work, family and everything in between.
And with low online tuition rates Southern New Hampshire University makes it easier to invest in you.
Don't wait for some day start today.
Visit snhu .edu slash Mel to learn more.
That's snhu .edu slash Mel.
The Mel Robbins podcast is proudly sponsored by Amica Insurance, our exclusive insurance partner.
As Amica says, empathy is our best policy.
That's why they'll go above and beyond to tailor your insurance coverage to best fit your needs.
Whether you're on the road, at home or traveling along life's journey, their friendly and knowledgeable representatives will work with you to ensure you have the right coverage in place.
Amica will provide you with peace of mind.
Go to Amica dot com and get a quote today.
Welcome back. It's your buddy, Mel Robbins.
I am so thrilled you are here.
Thank you for sharing this with people that you care about.
You and I are learning how to win the inside game and get mentally tough with coach Steve Magnus.
You have such a fascinating career and we're going to get into it.
But you've transitioned from, in my opinion, a world -class athlete, to an Olympic coach, to a best selling author of not one, not two, but literally five books, to now being a sought after and world renowned, elite performance and mindset coach, both with elite athletes with, you know, some of the world's leading brands.
How has your personal journey and the twists and turns of your career and the people that you have been in coaching, shaped your understanding of mental toughness and how to build it?
I think I've had a diversity of experiences that you outlined, which has made me realize that my early on view of toughness, which was only through sport, was kind of wrong.
Meaning, I grew up in the no pain, no gain, like just push and that's what I thought.
In the other thing that really I think was an aha moment, which is during I think my first book, is I got to interview a guy named Matt Billingsley who was a world -class drummer, who was now the drummer for Taylor Swift. It was one of my first big interviews where I'm like, this is awesome, let's go.
I'm like, just tell me about what it's like to be on stage with a hundred thousand screaming people and you doing your thing." And he starts walking me through how he's preparing.
As I'm listening to this, all I'm thinking in my mind is like, this is how I would mentally prepare for race.
What was he saying?
Well, the thing that struck me is he said, I don't really drum much before the concert, he said, I already know how to drum.
What I'm doing is, first I'm getting my body loose.
I'm going through all these like, you know, stretching and things to get my body feeling good.
And then I'm getting my mind right, which is like just rehearsing the beginning of a couple of different songs so that I can get in that groove in the state of performance that I need to get in.
And he walked me through all that, and I said, I said, this is the same kind of stuff that I do for a race.
And what it made me realize is that performance is performance.
So performance is performance means the thing that you have to do is the thing that you have to do.
Whether it's an interview or a date or a presentation or work or stepping onto a track and running in the state championship.
Yeah. That's the thing you have to do.
But the thing that comes before it, what is that, coach?
It's setting up your environment well.
Okay. So what that means is you prime yourself to perform.
This is why athletes put on their special race day shoes.
They put on their jersey.
Matt had the drumsticks that he used for concert times.
He's got everything lined up where this is what it's going to be.
I put myself in the environment that's going to invite the action that I want to take.
It's setting your mindset.
What am I trying to do?
Am I seeing this as an opportunity to take on or is this thing that is causing this overwhelming anxiety or feeling like a threat?
And I think what I realized, it's not just from Matt's story, but also others is it's the same stuff.
As I said, my wife's a teacher.
Early in her career, she was a world -class runner.
She represented the US at a half marathon world championships and - No big deal.
You too are going to have really fast kids, you know that?
Yeah, don't put the pressure on our two -year -old now.
Sorry. But what I realized is that, again, when she got into teaching, she takes the same mindset, she's like, I want to be great at this.
What you realize is, okay, what does that take?
Consistently showing up, putting in the training, being prepared for the next day and priming yourself.
Okay, how am I going to get into the mindset where I am like enthusiastic and energetic because kindergartners, guess what?
You got to keep their attention.
You can't do that by just walking in the door and being like, okay, I'm here.
Like, let's talk about art colors in ABCs or what have you.
You've got to think about the tactics that you're going to use.
You know what I love about what you're saying, coach, is that I think we get so obsessed about the performance or the thing that we have to do at work, or the thing that we have to do at school, or the way that it's going to turn out or the result, that we don't take the time to think about the environment, or the steps leading up to the thing that actually allow you to step on the field of life and do the thing.
Who do you want to be?
Who you want to show up as?
That's it. Is that what you ask the people you coach who you want to be?
Absolutely. Who do you because here's the thing is, and this is something else that people often don't get, is if you look at some of the elite performers is that who they are on game day when they step out on the field is a little bit different than who they are at home.
How so? So I'll give the example of Aaron Judge, the baseball player for the Yankees is he puts it like this is on the field.
I want to be 99, which is his number.
99, and I'm paraphrasing, is aggressive.
He plays hard. He wants to win.
When I take that jersey off, I'm no longer 99, I'm Aaron.
You know, Aaron gets along with his family.
He doesn't need to be hyper -competitive at everything.
He can let things go.
But you see that all the time with athletes, because what happens is like, we all have kind of different states we can get into.
Even just that invitation coach, who do you want to be?
It's a way that you can snap yourself into a moment of intentionality to basically, who do I want to be in the interview?
Who do I want to be today at work?
Who do I want to be when I show up at that parent teacher conference?
And by asking yourself that I would imagine that's part of the mental toughness because you're cueing your mind, right?
To start to think about these things.
You're spot on. Who do you want to be in this situation?
And I think too often and we don't put the thought and care to align ourselves with that action.
When you were in high school, you, as a elite runner, came extremely close to breaking the four -minute mile, which is a goal that you had had forever, and the fact that you missed it by a second haunted you, on one hand, but that failure also has fueled your life's work.
What did not reaching that goal teach you about life and how you coach other people when it comes to mindset and performance?
At that time I think in the history of the US only five high schoolers had broken the four minute barrier.
So it's something that basically never happened.
and I came to shy and I still can picture it to this day.
There's four laps around the track, every lap needs to be under a minute.
So you're literally watching the clock and you're seeing it and you're like, I'm still under, I'm still under, I'm still under and going into that last 100 meters, I can see that clock and realizing, oh no, I'm going to be right at it or just shy.
Then I remember crossing that line, there's like 30 seconds before the results come out, I'm staring at the results board, and then I see myself four minutes and one second.
It's just devastating because you see this thing that is your goal, it was literally written on the wall of my high school bedroom where this is the thing that I'm going to do that is going to define myself.
I didn't care about anything else in high school, nothing.
Parents couldn't get me to care about anything except running.
I fell short. For a while, I think that got to me.
I couldn't do it. I put everything into it and found out that I wasn't good enough.
Everything I learned about performance came as a result of being like, okay, let's analyze this.
Let's figure out how do we get on the other side of feeling this ultimate failure in making it into something worthwhile and good.
And that's where my search for understanding the mental side of sport came from.
If I didn't let go and pull the other way just enough, I wouldn't going to be able to fulfill my potential because every race was going to feel like life or death.
And it did. We all have our four minute miles.
We all have those things where we create that story in our head where it's like, oh, this is what I care about deeply.
This is what I'm obsessed with.
and we can't, because we care about it.
We think that if we just let go a little bit, that that means I'm weak, that means I'm not all -in, that means that I'm not actually striving for that.
But what it actually means is it allows that inner game to flourish because our brain goes like, okay, yeah, yeah, like the four -minute mile matters.
Like getting that job, selling this many books, whatever, it matters.
like let's be real, but it can't be the only thing.
We've got to have something else pulling in the other direction.
I absolutely love this, because you also say that the inner game is not about like checking boxes, that it's the process of chasing goals.
And why does tying the achievement, or landing that job, or getting into that medical school, or being married by this date, or having that car that you drive, why does those things on the outside actually end up screwing you over?
What happens is when we tie our identity to that external pursuit, it makes us fragile instead of resilient, because our brain goes, if I don't get this goal, then it literally is life or death.
I am not worth anything.
We don't perform best in that situation.
And we need to take a little bit of the pressure off.
We need to have that robustness where you realize that I am secure in who I am.
In win or lose, it might sting, but I'm still who I am.
I'm still surrounded by those who love and support me.
They're still gonna be here.
And that's where we perform best at because we get to take those risks instead of feeling like, oh, gosh, here it is.
I'm gonna fall short again, brain freaks out.
I just love listening to you and I want to take a quick pause so that we can hear a word from our amazing sponsors.
And I also want to give you a chance to share coach Magnus's incredible wisdom with the people that you care about.
Every one of us needs to know how to win the inside game and that's exactly what we're doing today.
And don't go anywhere because after this short break, coach and I, we're gonna be waiting for you.
I mean, we got a lot of ground to cover and we're gonna do that when we return.
Stay with us. I'm all about a balanced science -back approach to food.
Cause you need fuel that supports your brain, your body, and your life.
And that's why I love RX Bar.
RX Bar gets it. They've said no to BS like artificial junk, and yes to simple ingredients that serve a purpose.
Protein, fiber, the good stuff you can actually pronounce.
And when I'm running out the door or heading into back -to -back meetings, I always grab A chocolate sea salt R -X bar protein bar.
It tastes as good as it sounds.
It hits like a meal and keeps me full without the crash.
I keep one with me wherever I am.
I feel good eating it and I feel good after I eat it.
Whether you're into their 12 gram bars, the nut butter and oat bars, or their cute little minis.
They've got options that fit your life.
Use code Mel on rxbar .com for 25 % off.
R -X bar proud sponsor of no BS.
subject to full terms and conditions and to change.
Valid until September 30th, 2025 and may not be combined with other offers.
See RXBAR .com for full details and limitations.
You know, at the end of the day, when you're locking up and then you're turning off the lights, what do you wanna feel?
Safe. That's what SimpliSafe is built to give you.
See, most security systems only react after someone breaks in.
That's too late. SimpliSafe's new Active Guard outdoor protection will change everything.
It's proactive. AI -powered cameras detect suspicious activity around your home.
So if someone's lurking, real human agents speak to them through the camera.
They flip on spotlights and can call the police before anything happens.
That's not just surveillance.
That's prevention and that's peace of mind.
Whether you're at home or you're on vacation, SimpliSafe keeps you safe.
Plans start at about a dollar a day.
No contracts. No hidden fees.
60 day money back guarantee.
More than 4 million people already trust Simply Safe.
Now it's your turn.
Visit simplysafe .com slash MEL to claim 50 % off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free.
That's simplysafe .com slash MEL.
There's no safe like Simply Safe.
So ever since publishing the Let Them Theory, I have been signing and sending a ton of copies of these books.
And the other day I was trying to mail a bunch of them and here's what that looked like.
the printer that jammed every ten minutes, a giant pile of manilla envelopes, and me tearing my hair out.
Total disaster. I ran out of tape, missed a deadline, then it hit me.
Why am I still dragging all the stuff to the post office?
Why am I standing in line?
Why don't I bring it all to me?
Stamps .com to the rescue.
See, your time is your money, so don't waste it.
Stamps .com is the expert you call.
It's simple, it's faster, it's a lifesaver.
It's basically a post office at your home or work.
You get access to all the United States Postal Service and UPS services right from your computer.
They even send you a free scale.
How awesome is that?
Stamps .com saves me money and my team saves hours every week.
We love it! Let stamps .com do what they do best so you can focus your time and money on what you do better.
Go to Stamps .com and use code MEL to sign up for a special offer.
There's no contract required and you can cancel anytime.
That's stamps .com code MEL.
Welcome back. It's your buddy Mel Robbins.
I'm so glad you're here today because you and I are getting coaching from one of the most respected and renowned mindset coaches on the planet.
I'm talking about Coach Steve Magnus.
We're learning about how we win the inside game.
You know, there's super fascinating research in your book that I think is really important to read right now because I was really surprised by this, and it goes to this point because again I think it's super counterintuitive to think, okay, the world's top, top, top, top, top performers, whether it's in business who you're coaching or it is the world's like most elite athletes, they're maniacally focused, they're 1 ,000 percent disciplined, it's hustle, hustle, hustle, they're focused on the Super Bowl, they're focused on this thing.
The Research actually shows the opposite.
And I'm reading from Win the Inside Game page 90.
This is research that you write about for Michigan State University.
I was blown away with this, that they looked at over 100 years of Nobel Prize -winning scientists.
And it turned out that what these Nobel Prize -winning scientists did in their downtime away from the lab may have proved vital.
The distinguished scientists, check this out, were 22 times more likely to perform, sing or act, 12 times more likely to pursue creative writing and about seven times more likely to participate in crafts like sculpting, painting or glassblowing.
Whereas their less accomplished peers were more likely to be entirely focused on their scientific research. And so this research basically, as you write in your book, is like that going all in and attaching who you are to one achievement or to the fact that you're the chief resident or you're married to so -and -so, or you drive this, this singular focus actually hinders us.
It does, and it runs counter to just about everything we're told.
Completely. Just go all in, be obsessed, only care about this thing And the research, as you said, on Nobel -winning scientists shows it's different.
There's research on entrepreneurs, that the ones who are more likely to actually succeed don't quit their day job early on.
There's research on athletes that show that they generally, those who make it to the top of the top, are more diversified in both their sports early on and then their later interests, because what it does is it makes us resilient.
Because if we fail at the one thing and that's all that matters, comes back to our brain and the alarm.
We produce a ton of cortisol.
Your brain says, I'm losing.
My identity is at stake.
Like shutdown. If we have other things in our life that we care about, they give us something else to think about, give us other pursuit to do interesting things on.
then even though the law stings, you still have that resilience in your life.
It's sort of like being like a stool.
So instead of being on a unicycle, you have three wheels, a tricycle, various things that give you grounding and foundation in your life.
You know, in your experience coach, especially with Olympic athletes, elite performers, what habits do mentally tough people tend to have?
What you see is they prioritize consistency over intensity, meaning they don't just shoot for like the magic day, where everything aligns.
They're like, hey, I've got to figure out how to show up day after day, even on the bad days, right?
Even on the days when things aren't going well, where maybe we don't get the full workout in, but we get something in because they know that if they stack enough solid days after days, then that is what leads to greatness.
In fact, way back when I was a college coach, I tracked this, I tracked how many times did people show up to practice in workouts and how many times did they miss them?
And then I ran a correlation between improvement and who showed up.
And guess what? Strong correlation, the people who showed up and didn't miss days performed better.
In fact, the person who showed up the most during that period was this young lady who came in, and I kid you not, her freshman year, in a race of 100 plus people, I think she was 99th out of like 101.
By her senior year, she was qualified for the first round of the National Championships.
Wow. Huge jump. If you looked at the data, out of everybody on the team throughout that period, she missed the least amount of practice.
She missed the least amount of workouts.
I mean, it's incredible.
Yeah. And that is what mental toughness creates, is the ability to meet those moments and process what happened and learn from it, right, and step back on the track and grow.
And so much of it is the story that we tell ourselves in our head, because we get locked in these negative stories that again, define us as, I'm not good at this thing.
And if you talk to, again, elite performers, could be athletes, whoever it is, what you realize is they start to tell themselves stories that are about growth and agency, meaning taking control of the situation, what can I do about it, versus stories that kind of push us down and where we can't do things about it, where there is no path forward. So it's all about figuring out how to tell yourself that story.
It's such great advice.
And as a coach, you're already using their name and talking to them that way.
But we can do that to ourselves by using, hey Mel, you can handle this.
Hey, Mel, it's shake it off.
Like, what are some of the things that you would say just reflexively to one of your athletes if you're trying to boost a shift in their mindset?
So, number one is I tend to give them an action.
Okay. Actions work better.
Okay. So instead of telling someone, hey Mel, you need to relax, like in the history of the world, I don't think telling someone to relax has ever worked.
Yep. So instead, I say, hey Mel, shake out your arms. Get a little loose.
And what happens is your body goes like, okay, I'm gonna let go some of this tension, therefore, I'm gonna relax.
Action is number one.
Number two is, what do they need to be focused on?
Because generally what happens is stress, like, either we narrowly focus on the negative, see all the bad things, or our brain goes scatter shot and it's all over the freakin' place.
So what we have to do is say, okay, what matters, I'm gonna focus on that.
There's research on this.
If you're a field goal kicker and you're feeling pressure and your mind's all over the place, what you literally do is say, focus on that spot right there, stare at it, and kick it there.
And that will help you perform.
And we can do that in our other aspects of life, which is like give it a narrow goal or narrow thing to latch onto and tell yourself to focus on that.
In the third person.
In the third person.
Mel, just focus on the next right move.
Mel, just focus on the phone call you need to make.
We'll worry about that other thing later.
Bingo. Wow, so coach, how do you train yourself to handle like hard tasks, like, you know, you find yourself not that motivated, you've got something that you need to do.
Can you train yourself?
I mean, you're an elite runner, so I'm sure you can push through just about anything.
But for the rest of us mere mortals who are having trouble getting up the stairs without feeling winded.
Like, how do you hack this?
Like, let's say you're somebody who's, all right, a goal is I really want to get my finances under control.
I need to create a budget.
I need to cut some expenses.
I need to get serious about what I want to save. Like, it's time for me to stop jerking around about this.
Okay? So that's your goal.
But then you go, I don't want to face my horrible spending habits.
I don't want to look at the fact that I literally have no savings.
So how does it work in this scenario?
Start with the smallest step forward where you can make progress.
Okay. So in this example, it might be, take the thing that is staring you in the face, that you spend money on, that you know you shouldn't, and just focus first on that.
Maybe it's every morning you go get your special foam latte at Starbucks and you say, This is what I need.
This spinning habit is, I know I shouldn't do it every day, so I need to fix this.
That's it, narrow in on that one.
And you've minimum viable progress.
So maybe it's instead of every day I say, you know what?
Next week I'm going to go two days a week.
And that's what I'm going to allow myself to do.
What happens is you make progress and you get these small wins, and small wins give us a bump in this like feel good hormones that say, hey, look, Steve, you're making progress.
If we can stack enough small wins, then that allows us to take the next step in the next big thing, and that's all it is.
It sounds almost ridiculously simple, but what prevents us from taking on the hard things is we only see the hard things.
Again, I love running, so too many running examples, but if someone who had never run came up to me and said, Hey, I wanna go to marathon. I wouldn't say, great, we're gonna tackle a marathon, and be like, no, no, we're gonna go on walks.
And then when you get to your street, I want you to jog the street home.
Because all you're trying to do is say simple, small progress.
And if you can stack that day after day, that is what creates that mental muscle and gives your brain evidence of like, okay, I've made progress, and it stokes that motivational fire.
So coach makes perfect sense, and you and I both know, that the second you even do the small thing, that you're going to face discomfort.
And even if we just keep it in the lane of personal changes, whether somebody just heard you say walk and they're like, you know, I do need to start to take better care of myself, I do need to move my body more consistently.
And that's a goal of mine to really make that a priority.
And so, you can break it down and say, okay, I'm going to go for a walk, after a week of that, I'm going to jog back down my block to my house, but you're going to face tremendous discomfort because you've never done it before.
And you say that discomfort is an opportunity to train your mental muscle.
If we want to train discomfort or train toughness, we've got to do the very small things that make us realize that, hey, this discomfort is just a signal.
And sometimes that signal is like accurate, meaning we've got, you know, you sprain your ankle and you need to listen to that discomfort.
It's a pain signal that's like fix this, get off of your foot, like take care of it.
So here's a non -athletic example.
We all are kind of addicted to our phones.
Yes. Okay. And what happens is, I bet you the listener or have experienced this, is that you feel in your pocket, your phone vibrate, and you're like, up there's that buzz!
And you reach for your phone, you pick it up, and there's no notification.
It's called phantom vibration.
It occurs in about 90 % of us.
Huh, wait, literally the phone didn't vibrate?
Yep. You're kidding me!
Yeah. 90 % of people experience a phantom vibration?
Depending on the research, but yes, about 90 % of people feel it.
The reason is because your brain is saying, hey, here's this thing you give a lot of attention to.
You feel good when it buzzes and beeps and you get a notification.
So we're essentially almost mistakenly going to predict that because that's what we're locked onto.
Now, if I take that phone away, what happens is you probably feel a little bit of discomfort.
Yeah. You get fidgety.
You're like, where is the thing?
You're worried, you start thinking that something might be wrong with somebody and what if they can't reach me and what am I missing and I'm gonna get trouble at work and where did the thing go and oh my God.
Your brain catastrophizes.
Yeah. Your brain, your inner voice goes crazy.
I experienced it, we all experience it.
Okay. Okay? If we wanted to turn down that alarm, what would we do?
We'd take our phone for a small bit, and we say, okay, I'm gonna, for an hour, I'm gonna leave it in the other room.
And at first, what would happen?
Your brain would go crazy.
I'm spiraling out of control.
What if someone's getting at me?
But if you left it for that hour, at some point, your brain would let go and say, you know what, I'm going to see it at an hour.
The world isn't going to end.
And that right there is training toughness for discomfort.
You know what I love about this example I think that at this point in time, every single one of us has a very conflicted relationship with our phone.
Every single one of us wishes we spent less time on it.
We all know intellectually we should.
And we've also been told a million times that we should create boundaries.
But none of that actually changes behavior.
And what I really like about your invitation here, coach, is that you're framing this as an opportunity to train mental toughness in yourself and being tough enough mentally to not allow distraction, emotion, craving, anxiety, whatever it is, it's gonna rise up no matter what, to derail you from staying focused and present or just performing and doing what you need to do.
What kind of person do you wanna be?
And I don't want to be a person that's beholden to my phone.
I don't want the phone to have more power over me than I have over myself.
And it's a powerful thing to build inside yourself this ability to not be rattled by something outside of you.
And that's what you're actually talking about.
You're actually training your presence and your mental toughness in a way that helps you not only for dealing with your phone, but everything else in life.
You also talk about how listening to your body is a form of mental strength rather than a sign of weakness.
What is one mental drill or a tool that the person listening can implement this week to start building this mental toughness and real resilience?
I think the most powerful thing you can do to develop mental resilience is time spent alone in your head." When we make our inner world seem foreign, when we make our inner world seem like a threat, like it's distant from who we are, then our brain reacts accordingly.
And it says, oh, my gosh, I'm alone in my head.
Because being alone with your thoughts is kind of foreign and threatening.
If you're listening to this podcast, I'm gonna tell you, pick something.
It doesn't matter what it is.
Pick something where the phone's at the side.
It's just you alone with your thoughts for a short period of time, because that's how you navigate things.
In fact, the late, great Kobe Bryant put this brilliantly when he was talking about youth basketball practices.
He had his daughter's youth basketball practice.
Someone was yelling at their kid to what to think about and what to do from the sideline.
and Bryant said, I told that parent, this is the key moment.
Your kid is learning how to be alone with their head and negotiate in their head.
That's where we learn how to be tough.
You don't want them to focus on external things.
You the parent screaming at them, because chances are they're not gonna listen to you in the game.
They need to learn this skill.
So it doesn't matter if it's sport or life, figure out something where it's you alone in your head and give yourself just a little bit of time and space and that'll create toughness.
You know, we've talked a lot about not only how maniacally focusing on outer success and achievement and all the things that we chase can backfire on you and you have given us tool after tool after tool in all the research on how we can not only win the inside game but we can build this skill of mental toughness.
And there was a time in your life where all of the things that you were chasing on the outside just blew up in your face.
And I would love for you to take us back to what was probably one of the hardest moments of your entire life.
You were 26 years old, you had your dream job, and absolutely everything just flipped on its head.
can you just describe what the job was and what happened?
I got the job for what was then called the Nike Oregon Project, which was essentially Nike sponsored an elite track and field team where literally the goal was to win Olympic championships.
And you landed this at 26?
You're one of the coaches?
I was the assistant coach, 26, the youngest professional coach in the sport fresh out of graduate school, I thought I had hit the freaking lottery.
And I was told, I was like, you know what, this goes well.
You're going to be, this program is going to be yours.
You're going to lead these professional athletes.
And let me tell you, in running, this is really rare because there's only a handful of professional teams that do this at this level.
And it was with the premier, sporting goods company in the world.
I thought I had my dream job, and I told everyone I had my dream job.
My parents were like, thank God, we are set, like Steve is killing it.
Then months into it, I started to see things that raise some red flags where I started to see some documents that suggested from the sports scientists at Nike that suggested, like, there was some cheating going on, some nefarious things going on that didn't fit the rules of the sport.
And at first I remember calling my parents in the stairwell at Nike and saying, hey, I just saw this document that mentioned testosterone medication, which is a banned substance in sport.
And they're like, Oh, no." At first, you rationalize it because you're like, this is where I want to be, this is it.
But eventually, what happened is it just nod at me.
Going back to asking that question, who do you want to be?
I have a clear view of how I see myself in terms of ethics and morals and what I want out of sport, especially a sport like running where no one gets in it to become a millionaire.
You get in it for the love of the competition itself to try and make that Olympic dream that you have as a kid.
I came face -to -face where I had a decision, where do I keep going and keep my, quote -unquote, dream job, or do I stick to my ethics, and morals, and values, and quit, and essentially blow the whistle?
You know, what's interesting is you're right about this moment.
Because as you started to tell people, and you're right about this moment in the stairwell, that you risked your career and your livelihood and you ignored advice from friends and lawyers and even a prominent judge who told you at this time, it may be the right thing to blow the whistle on this, but whistleblowers seldom come out on top.
You're risking your career before it even gets started.
And you go on to write, after all, I was at my dream job.
I was the heir apparent to the best funded professional track team in the country, one with a future Olympic champion and medalist. It was everything I ever wanted professionally.
The advice family members kept repeating was can you just stick it out through the Olympics?
I was there for a year and a half before I'd had enough.
We like our story simple.
The hero who overcomes adversity.
The woman who values, are hard earned and firmly held, who prevails against all odds.
We think of ourselves in similar ways, crafting a personal narrative where we are the hero of the story.
We even have a psychological immune system, a protective mechanism to thwart negative self evaluations.
We want to think of ourselves as good, moral, decent people.
We shove away the messiness.
As you read this story, you probably believe you would have done the right thing immediately if thrust into that same position.
What happened? Like how long were you wrestling with what to do?
Months. I mean, it took me months at first to decide to quit.
it, and then once I left, it took me months to actually blow the whistle and tell somebody.
There was just this deep inner feeling, this gnawing away that just kept occurring where I was like, gosh, I can't live with this feeling.
This isn't who I am.
And then more so, I'd see other people who were like me, young, and probably were sitting there thinking I got the dream job and were headed out there and I couldn't help myself with thinking oh my gosh they have no idea what they're getting into they have no idea what decisions they're gonna face or what the environment is like and those feelings were eventually pushed me to say okay what can I live with like who do again who do I want to be do I want my values to be slogans, or do I want them to be things that I can look at and say, deep down, they mean something?
And eventually what happened, again, I didn't even tell anybody this.
I just said, you know what?
I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna blow the whistle.
I wrote a long email to US Anti -Doping, who was the regulatory body, and said, here's everything I know, let's talk, let's start that process.
And it was the most scared I had ever been in my life.
What was it like to hit send on that?
It was just this experience where you're like, I kind of know what I'm getting into, but I have no idea.
And my life is about to turn upside down.
And I'm going to lose a little bit of control over my life because this other thing is going to potentially dominate it.
Again, I'm some shy introvert who just wants to coach some people, help people perform well, and then go home and sit at home and read a good book.
I was like, that's not going to be possible.
It wasn't. I had reporters who came to my house and stocked it, to follow me at work.
I had the FBI show up as I was backing out of the garage of my house and knock on the car window and show me some badges like I'm in a movie.
It was just stuff that I couldn't even imagine, but there was no other possibility, except I had to figure out how to navigate it.
What happened? The head coach and the head doctor of the program had a ban from the sport.
Positive change came out of it, where people, A, understood, and then I think some increased safety and guards to make sure that didn't happen in the future occurred.
But it took 10 years to go from hitting send on that email essentially to when the final appeal happened because there were lawyers and all sorts of things, and evidence.
And I had to turn over my computer and phone and have everyone go through everything I'd ever written.
It was the most try more than any experience I had in sport or life.
Like it pushed me to the max of how do I keep my sanity and not lose who I am and not let that negativity spiral take over because there are absolutely points where I'm like, I don't have lost control of my life.
What did it teach you?
If you would have outlined everything that I would have had to go through before I hit Send on that email, I would have said, No way in hell, because it was tough.
But it taught me that we're always capable of more.
The other thing that I think it really brought home is that, two things, is that we get to write our own story.
Even though it felt like I've lost control in my life, I was in charge.
I got to say, you know what, whatever.
Who cares what the external world sees?
What matters to me?
How am I judging myself on this?
How am I defining my life based on this?
how do I want to integrate this experience into the story I'm telling about myself?
The last thing, and I think most important thing is, is that I realized that toughness is not the stoic individual pursuit that we often portray it as.
It is not the individual hero in the movie.
It takes a village and it takes support.
If you don't have loved ones and the support and the friends, who are gonna say, you know what Steve, I see you're struggling, I'm here for you.
Whatever that means.
I'd get those texts, I'd get those calls and sometimes I'd take them up on it and sometimes just seeing that text reminds you like, okay, I'm not alone, I've got people in my corner.
And I think that's what it is, is that when we talk about doing tough things is maybe the answer is we talked about a lot of tools and tips, but it's making sure that you have genuine people who love and support you, surrounding you.
Because if you do...
like, they're gonna be the people who allow you to handle the challenges and who are there when you can't use any of the tips and tricks.
You just need a shoulder, literally, to cry on or a hug to support you, to make you realize that, like, it's going to be okay.
Life will work out.
What are your parting words?
My parting words for you, the listener, is that you can do this, you've got this, you're capable of more.
And that capability doesn't mean doing something heroic.
It just means taking the next small step towards the challenge that you want to embrace.
That's what it is, is consistency over intensity.
And if you can take that small step, then you're gonna build the momentum to change who you are and what your pursuit is.
Coach, Steve, Magnus, you absolutely showed up and just dusted this thing.
I mean, in the rankings of podcast interviews, I would say you broke the four -minute mile.
Thank you. I try to do the best that I can and show up who I am and help people in how I can.
So, well, I appreciate how you got into that chair.
And it was very clear that you asked yourself the question, who do I want to be?
And you put on the coach and I'm going to speak power into the person that's listening and you delivered.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. And I also want to thank you.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to something that will absolutely improve your life.
Like this is a life changing conversation.
I'm so thrilled you're listening and watching all the way to the end.
Thank you for sharing this with everybody in your life that you care about, because we all need to know how to win the inside game, and I am so blown away by what we learned today.
I can't wait to see how it changes your life, because I know that it's going to.
And in case no one else tells you, I wanted to be sure to tell you that I love you.
I love you for listening and watching this.
I believe in you. I believe in your ability to create a better life, and you've got a roadmap and tools today.
So go use them. All righty, I'll see you in the next episode.
I'll be waiting for you the moment you hit play.
Let me find this. You're doing great.
You're so good. Thank you.
You're welcome. Killing it.
She represented the US at a half marathon World Championships.
No big deal. You two are going to have really fast kids.
You know that? Don't put the pressure on our two year old now.
I'm sorry. So will you just explain first, second, and third?
Because I always mix those up.
Yeah, I do too. And I'm a writer, so.
We're both writers, this is bad.
You were incredible.
Thank you. Thank you.
You better get ready for a lot more podcast interviews because.
That was fun. You guys make it so easy though.
Awesome, good job everybody.
All right, now I can watch videos.
Oh, and one more thing.
And no, this is not a blooper.
This is the legal language.
You know what the lawyers write and what I need to read to you.
This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes.
I'm just your friend.
I am not a licensed therapist and this podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional.
Got it? Good. I'll see you in the next episode.
