Building Resilience | Brian’s Story (Part 3 of 3)
Building Resilience | Brian’s Story (Part 3 of 3)
In light of Brian’s story shared through our podcast and Gina’s recent reflection video, I’ve been pondering two critical questions:
- How do we build resilience into our lives?
- How do we consistently move toward our highest potential as individuals and leaders?
These are challenging endeavors. Life presents us with all kinds of obstacles and setbacks, and we often feel unprepared to handle them effectively.
As a sports fan, I’ve found that professional athletes, coaches, and team sports offer valuable lessons. I’m particularly inspired by MLB players who have consistently performed at a high level and remained with their teams for their entire careers. Players like Cal Ripken, Tony Gwynn, Robin Yount, Derek Jeter, and George Brett had approximately 20-year careers. Considering that the average major league career lasts less than six years and only 1% of players reach 20 years in the league, this is pretty impressive. These guys mostly played in an era before the current hyper-focus on conditioning, diet, and sports psychology in professional sports, yet they still accomplished something incredible. This begs the question: how did they do it? What was the source of their resilience?
In many ways, it is a rhetorical question and there is no clear answer. While they took care of their bodies, possessed mental toughness, incredible talent, and a love for the game, many other players displayed similar traits but did not achieve the same level of success. Perhaps good fortune played a role, but they certainly shared a particular winner’s mindset.
I recently saw an interview with George Brett where he outlined his three goals for every game:
- Have more fun than anyone else on the field.
- Have the dirtiest uniform after nine innings.
- Play better than anyone else in the game.
While these goals don’t perfectly translate to us mere mortals that have day jobs and families to care for, there are solid principles we can adopt:
- Cultivate purpose. A sense of purpose produces passion and motivation, which can sustain us during dark times. Perhaps you remember the infamous “pine tar incident,” where Brett ran out of the dugout to defend himself. This is one of the best displays of passion you’ll ever see.
- Develop a growth mindset. Winners have a positive attitude and always believe they can improve. Late in Brett’s career, the media claimed he was washed up and his best days were behind him. In truth, he wasn’t playing that great. But he rose to the challenge and started coming to the park early to get his batting practice in. His efforts paid off and, in 1990, he won another batting title at the age of 37.
- Focus on what you can control. We can’t control what happens to us or how others behave. However, we can always control our response, our effort, and our attitude.
Resilience flows from who we are, the character we cultivate, and the choices we make. It’s about being, not just doing.
You can find Parts 1 and 2 of Brian’s story series linked below:
- Part 1 – Transformation Through Trials (Podcast with Brian Black and Jerry Murray)
- Part 2 – Cultivating Gratitude and Reflection (Video with Gina Breslin)
The lesson of resilience was the greatest lesson I learned playing college sports and coaching high school sports for 20+ years. Honestly, everything seems easy in comparison.