It took me years
and some hard lessons to learn what it means to truly have a mindset of
success. The world is filled with
people who claim they WANT greatness.
They talk a big game, but when it comes time to step up and display the
tenacity inherent in those of us who refuse to lose, they fall short. The difference is that many WANT to be
great, they WANT to achieve success, but few NEED it.
My story begins
sometime in the Stone Age. About
eight years ago now, I was a junior football player at Lenape High School in
Medford, New Jersey. I had
talent, and at six foot and 220 pounds played offensive guard. I earned a varsity spot after camp as a
junior, and through hard work and perseverance, became a two-way starter by the
middle of my junior year.
By senior year,
I was a captain, a two-way starter, and was the teams starting kicker. I’ve never considered myself naturally
athletic. I attribute my athletic
success at the time to nothing but hard work. By the end of my high school career I had earned 1st
Team All Conference, 1st Team All County, and 2nd Team
All Group 4 honors. When it came
time to train in the offseason, I did EVERYTHING the coaches asked of me. I ran sprints until I puked. I lifted as hard as I could. I pushed my teammates. I refused to lose…
However, I did
nothing on my own. I went home
after every training session, every camp, every practice, and just kicked back
and dreaded the next one. I HATED
training, but I did it because I knew I had to, to be successful. I look back on my high school career
now, years removed, and realize that I did what I had to do to get by.
At the end of my
high school career, I made the decision to go to Fairleigh Dickinson University
to continue my college career. At
the same time, I had a girlfriend, and was recovering from a shoulder
surgery. I became so lazy, so
embarrassingly complacent, that I ballooned up to 262 pounds, 30 pounds heavier
than I’d ever been, while gaining no strength and no muscle. I wanted to be the life of the party, I
wanted to be accepted by everyone, I wanted to live it up, as I saw. My priorities were completely fucked
up, and by the time I came I entered camp at FDU I was fat, slow, cocky, and
completely unprepared for what was to come.
Over the next
three years, I struggled through the hardest time in my life. My freshmen year against Delaware
Valley College, I let my guard down after a blocked extra point and ended up
getting clipped about 30 yards behind the play. My cleat caught in the turf and my body kept going, leaving
my knee the victim. This was my
first ACL tear, and my meniscus and MCL went with it.
To be honest,
looking back on it, I wasn’t even THAT disappointed. I was a freshmen, I got to play in one of the greatest wins
in FDU football history, as we defeated the number 14 ranked team in the
nation, and now I had a battle scar as an excuse for why I could no longer
participate. I didn’t realize it
at the time, but I was full of excuses.
I had shoulder surgery, I had to work, I had a girlfriend, and now I had
a busted up knee…my life had become one big excuse for why I had all the
potential in the world, and yet hadn’t achieved any real success.
Two years went
by, and unfortunately, I sustained two more ACL tears, which were followed by
two more wonderful ACL surgeries.
I took the opportunity to start drinking, a lot. I justified it as just a college kid
living it up and enjoying the golden years but looking back on it, I was just
drinking way too damn much. I get
it. Every kid wants to be cool. Every kid wants to go to parties and
fuck girls and get wasted and be the fucking man. Let me promise you something. There will ALWAYS be another party. There will ALWAYS be another
opportunity to get wasted and bang a girl you’ll regret in the morning. But if you choose to make that your
priority over your goals, you will never reach your potential.
While this
period lead to some of the lowest lows in my life, it also prepped me for the
maturation necessary to get me onto the path toward success. I have no idea when it happened, but I
began to develop a fire, a passion, and a hunger that pushed me towards
success. I say it all the time but
“obsessed” is a term the lazy use to describe the motivated. Let me say that again, “OBSESSED” IS A
TERM THE LAZY USE TO DESCRIBE THE MOTIVATED. Many people called me a meathead, many people called me
obsessed, and many people looked at me as a loser who would rather spend my
time training than drinking or partying like I should be.
I dove further
and further into strength and conditioning training. I became more and more interested in the way the body works,
and how I could improve myself through physical training. I wanted to challenge myself. I wanted to better myself. And most importantly I wanted to get
fucking huge! I hated the fatass
me that had developed through laziness at the end of my senior year in high
school. I never wanted to let
myself feel that way again. To
this day, I spend HOURS every single night reading about strength and conditioning
and weightlifting and watching weightlifting videos. I wake up everyday excited about training. I love the feel of a heavy bar in my
hands, I take pride in my lifts, and love passing on my passion to my
friends. I often have to be told
to take it easy or take time off to recover, because I just refuse to sit
still. I believe if I’m not
improving, I’m dying, all the while someone else is getting better than
me.
My “obsession”
paid off, and as a senior I completed my first full year of college football
without injury, starting 9 games at left tackle. As a fifth year senior, I was a captain at FDU, started 9
games, was a 2nd Team All Conference performer, and the Team MVP.
I tell this
story because I want people to understand how I came to this point. There was a time when people around me
would hear about my three knee surgeries and ask, “What are you doing? You’re still trying to play
football? Are you crazy?” Though I never took it seriously, there
were times I questioned whether I’d ever be a successful college football
player. There was a time where most
of my energy was devoted to the next time I’d be getting drunk. It was a waste of my time, a waste of
my energy, and I am damn lucky that it didn’t cost me more than it did. The only way I came out of this was to
change my mindset. I came to a
point where I downright refused to lose.
My priorities
changed. I was finally healthy,
and a full season of college football became a reality to me. I no longer cared about drinking or
partying. I devoted everything I
had to the game of football. There
was and is nothing more satisfying than the feeling of spilling everything you
having toward a cause. That’s how
I feel after every lifting session, that’s how I feel after every practice, and
that’s how I feel after every game.
I give everything I have because I don’t know any other way. The fact is, if you want to be
successful, it can’t be a part-time job.
You can’t show up whenever you feel like it and put in some work and
then say that’s enough I’m sure that’s good enough for today. You need to push. You need to push yourself past the
point of failure every day. You
need to love and relish competition.
It doesn’t matter whom it’s with.
One day your competing on the practice field with your teammates,
another day your competing against yourself in the weight room, and on another
day your competing against EVERYTHING from the weather to the crowd to your
opponent to your own personal exhaustion come game day. Do not accept defeat. Do not allow anything else to get in
your way. Attack each day like
it’s the last opportunity you will have to achieve success. Once you begin to see the world this
way, you will finally be on track to achieve your goals.
The truth is,
I’ve been around the Fairleigh Dickinson University football program for a long
time now, and there has been a culture of losing. Now some may say of course there is, look at the record you’ll
see there is a culture of losing.
But it’s so much more than the record and the on-field performance. It’s the athletes.
First let me
just say I have met some of my best friends and some great teammates in my
nearly six years in the program.
BUT, the reality is that there have been more kids that can talk a big
game and do nothing to back it up than anything else. I can’t even count the number of people that have come into
the program, run their mouth, and then exited, having made no positive impact
other then to burden us with lies about how great they were in the past. I’ll tell you the truth, I don’t give a
shit what you’ve done in the past.
What can you do now? Do you
refuse to lose? Do you wake up
everyday and kick ass? Do you
bring anger, a fire, and a passion to everything you do that will make not only
yourself but also your teammates better?
I’m sick of teammates that care about nothing but establishing their own
personal profile among their teammates.
I swear there have been more athletes on FDU’s teams that talk and talk
from the sidelines, perpetually injured or forever riding the bench then I ever
imagined I’d meet. It’s
unfortunate, but there are some great athletes in the program, who love the
game and love the team and give their all toward the common cause of victory,
but there just aren’t enough of them.
In order for a football team to be successful EVERYONE must be working
toward a single goal.
The point is,
take pride in what you do. If you
make a decision to walk down a path, like football, attack it with fire in your
eyes and intensity in your heart.
Don’t ever allow yourself to look back and ask, “What could have been?”
or “Could I have done more?” Those
that are successful understand that success isn’t given, and it isn’t earned
when things are going well.
Success is an ongoing process of trials and adversity through which one
is tested to see if they possess the fortitude to be successful. If you can get back up, regardless of
what obstacles you face or failures you encounter, and outright refuse to lose,
you can call yourself successful.
This is the mindset of success, and all champions possess it.
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