kyle maynard: no excuses
EPISODE 110
In Episode 110: We look at No Excuses (buy on Amazon), the inspiring story of Kyle Maynard's battle against the odds. Born without arms or legs below his elbows and knees. But that didn’t stop Kyle Maynard from becoming a champion, on the wrestling mat and in his life.
No Excuses is his inspirational autobiography that shows how a positive can-do attitude gives someone we might see as disadvantaged the advantage over life.
In this episode, Kyle talks about Martin Heidegger and Jean-Paul Sartre, and their idea of Facticity.
You can find out more by clicking on the embedded links or the list below. Kyle also believes in Alfred Korzybski's concept of 'the Map is Not the Territory' and how the word is not the thing. You can find out more in the links below.
Links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Heidegger
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Paul_Sartre
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facticity
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Korzybski
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map%E2%80%93territory_relation
https://www.solutionsiq.com/resource/blog-post/map-territory-agile-teams-know-difference/
SHOW OUTLINE
INTRO
Who is Kyle Maynard
Kyle Maynard Intro (1m09)
POTENTIAL
Anything is possible with the right mindset and the right support
Test your limits and know yourself (2m22)
Once we are aware of our limits, we can decide what we do; it’s your choice
Awaken your potential and know No limits (1m43)
Failure isn’t fun but it helps you learn how to stand back up
A Better Version of Ourselves (2m31)
FAILURE
The support of those around us does help us learn and focus on growth
Learn To Fail First (3m05)
Making excuses is what makes you incapable of success
Follow your own path (1m37)
OUTRO
Don’t be putting off by learning curves - just commit to the next 3 feet
Turning Up is Winning (2m03)
TRANSCRIPT
Hello and welcome to the Moonshots podcast it's episode or one, one zero. It is. Time for me, Mike Parsons and Mark Pearson Freeland to jump into a brand new series. Hello, good morning, Mark. Good morning, Mike. This is a fantastic episode. We've got ahead. What a way to, you know, continue kicking off the brand new year of 2021 a I have to.
I agree. And I think that there is, you know, here we are. We're in January it's 2021 and. Things, uh, kind of a little bit odd and a little bit weird. Um, but. It's sort of time to take control of things. Be true. Moonshot is and get the right [00:01:00] mindset and to go forward. And boy today, have we got someone that is going to turbocharger for the year?
Right today? We have a fantastic inspiration. Moonshot or Mike called Kyle Maynard. We're covering his true storybook, No Excuses (buy on Amazon). And we're going to be digging into exactly, as you say, the positive mindsets, the paths to success that he's gone on, as well as this concept of resilience that I believe coming off the back of last year in the first few weeks of January 20, 21 is the perfect North star piece of inspiration that.
Yeah, can guide us as we embark on this new year of new moonshots. I totally agree. And, um, I'm trying to think this next hour will be full of inspiration and positivity and energy. Can you think of a previous show where we've had, uh, uh, focused [00:02:00] on a innovator? Um, that has just this much energy. I mean, is there anyone that comes close?
I mean, David Goggins, he was pretty powerful. Um, who else comes to mind as being sort of more on the high energy in? Well, I mean, from a high energy perspective, we've got Gary V, Joe Rogan. He was pretty, uh, shall I say passionate? Um, you need an adult adult warning before listening to that show, but I mean, I, I think they're positive.
Can-do attitudes. Are very inline with, with Kyle Maynard, having said that their backgrounds, I mean, as we're going to find out in this show, the backgrounds could not be more different. You know, Kyle has such an incredible backstory. Oh, he does. He does. So, so let me pitch you how special Kyle is and why we should all like spend the next hour together learning, uh, this guy, he has fought [00:03:00] MMA.
He's climbed Kilimanjaro. I mean, this guy has done some amazing things. What else has he done? Well, I mean, the thing that we're leaving out Mike is the fact that he was so disadvantaged from the day that he was born. He doesn't act Kyle Maynard, even though he's excelled as this champion athlete, as well as an inspirational speaker, he was born without arms and legs from the elbow down.
I mean, it's just such a disadvantage. And let me tell you, we can take something from him. There's so much to learn from him because he never let this stop him. Or keep him down. And frankly, Mark, when we were listening to the clips and doing the research for this show, the only thought you have, when you hear what he has accomplished under the challenges and constraints by which he has done them, you can only say to yourself, What the [00:04:00] hell am I complaining about?
There is no reason to complain. So Mark, I am pumped up. I'm ready to go. I think we should fire up and introduce ourselves to call mine out. What do you think? Yeah, this first clip, let's get straight into it. We want to hear from Kyle May not himself about who he is. My name is Kyle Maynard.
my entire life. Some people have told me and my dreams were impossible. I know in my heart that they weren't,
when he was born in the world who realized wasn't really set up for Kyle.
Forgive me for being so blunt, but it seems to me that if a guy like you quit every time he can't do something, the first time around you're [00:05:00] going to be quitting.
Some of my dreams led me to break old records and weightlifting.
Climb into a cage and fight and mixed martial arts
and crawl to the 19,000 foot roof of Africa.
I still have a few more dreams you have to live. Wow. Wow. He's won the SB award from ESPN for best athlete. Twice, right. That's up there with like MJ and Kobe. His book was a New York times bestseller. He is a broken world records, not only in sports and MMA weightlifting, the guy has 36 wrestling victories and he has no arms and legs Mark.
I mean, this just resets it. Everything [00:06:00] that we might assume, uh, to be barriers, to be limits. And that is why we can really be good students. Um, Today, listening to the thoughts and discussing Kyle main idea. It truly is a pretty exciting proposition to kick off the year, right? Yeah. You're I like that word.
I just want to come back to that, this idea of resetting this end of the year, beginning of new year, let's reset our mindsets or challenges, problems. And. Rethink how we look at challenges, you know, his Kyle Menard's ability to never give up. We'll never quit and always strive for those dreams. As he was telling us in that clip, MMA climbing, Kilimanjaro, you know, he happens to break records, but not necessarily because he was targeting them.
I think he just wanted to go and do it. So he set himself that challenge that ambition, and [00:07:00] he never quit. And that. For me straight off the bat, you know, beginning of the episode. I'm already inspired by Kyle. Yeah. And he's very Goggins ask. I think if we were to look at other moonshiners and, um, if we kind of break apart, what's installed for us is there's two big buckets, very moonshots themes.
Uh, one is understanding and maybe challenging how we perceive our own potential. And you know, this is very much in theme or something we talk about, which is. Being the very best version of yourself. So we've got some great clips coming up with three there for, you know, realizing our potential. But when we're on that journey, Mark, the other thing we have to face is this idea of failure.
And boy, do we talk about reimagining the way we need to process failure? If we can walk away from the shame and look at us, look at the learning and the growth that comes through failure [00:08:00] and look. Comment that has got a lot to teach us, uh, on this idea of. Yeah, rethinking a failure and how we should better embrace failure.
So what are action packed? Uh, a bunch of learnings. Mark hit us up. Where are we going to start? Well, let's start straight away with this concept of potential, which I think from day zero Karmanos or always had in his mind. So I want to hear from Kyle right now telling us that anything is possible. As long as you have the right mindset.
Anything is possible. I love the spirit of that. I love the spirit of that. I don't believe it's true. Anything is possible. Cool. Go bench, press 10,000 pounds or a hundred thousand pounds is actually more effective is really to go and say, like to tell the truth or ourselves to like actually know our limits, like to truly know our limits and to truly know our limits.
We have to go and test those [00:09:00] limits without that. It's just an assumption. The first time actually on killing the jar or what I thought was I found myself on the fourth night and the trip and I was completely physically broken bear crawling for six to seven hours a day. My arms were swelling up my feet, the pain gotten to be really intense.
And I thought like I'm done with only four days. We projected that was going to take us 15 days to reach the summit. I thought that next morning, I'm going to get up and I'm going to helicopter out. Aconcagua is the same day on the fourth day. And this, this day in particular, you seen this photo, it was like close to a thousand.
Pull-ups through these ice fields called penitent days and got to the top of this thing. It was a scree field where I'm just sliding down, like. Faster than then I could go and climb. And all of a sudden they get to the top of the screen field is physically more exhausted than I'd ever been. And my guide yells rocket watermelon sized Boulder releases goes by a foot away from my head.
As I dove under a rock. [00:10:00] No I'm questioning that night too is in the tent. Just laying there crying, thinking like, why am I here?
born. My parents had no idea. I was going to be born with a disability. It was a very sudden thing. And the ultrasound technology was a lot different. They had normal checkups, normal ultrasounds, normal pregnancy, normal first birth up until I was born. And then in those first couple of days, The conversations were, were kind of grim, you know, it's, you're going to have to probably take care of Kyle with everything you're going to have to feed them and clothe them and dress them, never going to really be able to do much of anything on his own.
And it's kind of what their prognosis was. My grandparents, just within hours after I was born, they were in Fort Wayne, Indiana and hopped in the car, drove to DC. And my grandma told my mom, she said, you know, if you can just look at his face and look at his smile, see his eyes, know that everything was going to be okay.
Well, I mean, you hear that from the first [00:11:00] thought is my gee. It sounds like he was so blessed with the family that he had. It sounds like they wanted to set him up for success. I mean, that's the first one. It isn't it. Yeah. I mean, it does remind you, and we've covered this a little bit, um, comes to mind Patrick Lencioni, you know, when you've got the structures and the foundation of a good team.
And in obviously Carl May not the case, you know, family is obviously the team here. You can. Give yourself the confidence or the courage to push that little bit harder and to have that positive mindset. I think that's a good straight off the bat. It's a, it's a good reminder of that, I think. Yeah. And, and also the fact that he even attempted to climb the mountain to climb Kilimanjaro, but then.
To listen to the challenges he faced throughout that journey. And even still, he was faced with the question that we all have is like, Oh, I should just stop. [00:12:00] Right? Whether it's at work on a startup, on a project, to be quite honest, Mark, when I'm doing a tough run that thought does come into, I think, uh, it is really about the capacity.
To go through those, those barriers. Um, and my question for you is like, what are some of the things you do when you're on the mountain and the Boulder comes well? That's true. I actually think Kyle's referenced to this scree field with the Boulder coming down and him having to duck on a rock. It's a perfect visual metaphor for when you're going for a run or whether you've got something tough at work and you're just getting ground.
Yeah, sorry. Yeah, you're getting kind of a grind it down to the ground, so to speak for me. It's, it's tough. Isn't it having that resilience in your mind to just keep on plowing? How do you, how do you do it? Yeah, I think what I do, who is, [00:13:00] you know, take a breath, remember that I'm working with people and it's a shared burden.
You know, I'm not the only one going through this marathon or scree field. I'm not the only one having to duck out of the way when a rock is rolling down the Hill. That's right. So can I just say too, that it's like, when people, everyone I talk to when we discuss. The idea of, of 2020. I think everybody says the same things, no matter what part of my life, they're from everybody from direct friends, colleagues, uh, relations, new people that I meet family, you name it.
Everyone's like bull so tough. Uh, you know, I was talking with a friend the other day and he's just like, man, the stress at work is crazy. And do you know what that theme of uncertainty and challenge [00:14:00] is? I mean, it's like it's at peak, uh, coming out of 2020. And, um, so I think you're absolutely right. We are all going through challenge and I think what's in front of us right now with this show, with these thoughts from Kyle, is that it is your mindset.
That will get you through your mindset will get you to the top of Kilimanjaro and in a kind of way, when you hear people who've done amazing things and they revealed that they had negative thoughts and doubt in their mind. It's somehow. It makes it a little easier for us, doesn't it? Because you hear like, okay, well even Kyle is having doubts, right?
I think this is one of the, the fun things of, of learning out loud together. We are digging into these innovators and other moonshots is, and making it feel quite. Approachable, I think challenges [00:15:00] when they're on your back and you haven't shared it where you feel as though you're the only one carrying the world, that's when it gets really intense and stressful.
Right. But actually, as we go through the practice of digging into, um, mindsets of these, these innovators on the show, you think, okay, well, if, if they can do it well, maybe so can I, and it's, I think it's quite inspirational to feel as though you've got a relation. Or relate-ability to that, to that innovator.
Yeah, totally. And I think, um, the build that I'd give you here is that, um, we are often have this inbuilt thing, which is, uh, fight or flight when we face challenge. And this is a genetic thing where our survival instincts kick in. So this is the thing when you are. And I'll use my running analogy. You can guess what I did over the holiday break, a lot of writing.
Um, [00:16:00] and the thing is that when you're under hardship mentally, physically, emotionally, it is a natural response to either want to run away or to fight us in a negative sense. And if you understand. This reaction is just automatically triggered. You can do what Joe Rogan talked a lot about is getting comfortable with discomfort, right?
Getting used to it, embracing the discomfort, knowing that when you're running and it's so hard, they actually thinking about stopping because you're worried about your breath. This is just natural instincts kicking in. And once you know that, that's what it is. You can control it and go beyond it. Just like when you face uncertainty in, uh, bringing your visions to life, whether they are project, uh, whether it's at work, it doesn't matter.
And I think the starting point for all of that is that if you understand [00:17:00] your limits, this is a starting point. To actually improving and growing your capacity as a human. And I tell you what I want you to listen up because we are now going to listen to coal miner. Who's got a real treat for us, which is all about understanding your limits and breaking through them.
No, there are going to be people that are receptive to ideas, and we're going to go and spend it's sort of Plato's principle, right? We're going to go into the 80 20 rule. We're going to spend 80% of our time arguing with us by new group of people that. That you know, aren't gonna go and change their mind.
Anyway, they're going to stuck in the same patterns and routines. And I think sometimes we have to go and give that up. Like we also too, in the idea of like excuses and limitations, like we have to go and give up knowing what is, there's two of my favorite, like philosophers, he versus I can't, but like Martin Heidegger, John Paul started, they will talk about this idea of facticity.
And so that's, that's like the backdrop of like all of like the, the situation that we were thrown into when we were born, you know, our language, our skin color, our like [00:18:00] socioeconomic stuff, the location language, I'll be all like the arms legs, no arms and legs, all that. And really like what we go and do with that though.
Like all that stuff too, is like, that's completely outside of our control. But once we were awakened to the idea of our own potential and our own personal responsibilities, like we get to go and decide what we go and do with that. And that's a choice and that's something we can go and teach and the more people we can go and teach that, and more people we can go and wake up.
And I believe that the more people to Daniel's point, you know, we're going to go in and care about like, what is like the, you know, what, what actually matters in this world. And it's amazing to go and see like the progress that we've gotten to go in and make over the last decade. If you think about it, it's crazy, but really with like limits, you know, I think no limits of the, really the better idea to go and think about this is like, To to know, like, where are those limits right now, but never, ever stopped trying to break them.
It's every one of us in this room were to go and give up our biggest excuse. How different would the world look a year from [00:19:00] today, three months from today? What would be possible? What would be possible if you just accept things rather than making excuses? I mean, whew. Again, if there's anybody. In, in the moonshots repertoire and our library and archive or anybody who's out in the world, somebody like Kyle is the perfect figurehead, I suppose, in this space by saying, just accept what you have.
Don't make excuses of why you can't do something. If, if that's where you want to go and do. Try and make it work, deal with the situation and go and work on it to the best of your capability. That's how I interpret that. Mike, how are you, how you I'm hearing from Carla, this concept of potential and knowing your limits.
I, I guess, I mean, um, he mentioned a word there. He said it very quickly. It's a [00:20:00] facticity. Is that correct? Yes, that's correct. Yeah. Yeah. And what does it, tell me more about what that means, why it's got a variety meetings, but ultimately I think the way that Kyle was referring to it here is, um, you know, acceptance, contingency, uh, the fact that, you know, your human existence.
And you accept the situation that you have. It's kind of like a form of, uh, I'm, I'm obviously playing it down a little bit due to my lack of, um, sociology, I suppose, and philosophy. So I apologize listeners for, uh, for probably dumbing it down a little bit too much. But when you think about existentialism, um, it's kind of just accepting the reality for what it is and not allowing it to be a problem.
And so what I took from that is that he then says, Oh great. That is the starting point. And I'm going to set some stretch goals beyond that. Yeah. So he doesn't say, Oh no, your limits and accept [00:21:00] them as being the end, but rather the stars, correct. The start of being, uh, thrown into the world and having that brew fact and saying, okay, well, here we go.
And I think it's all in, uh, service, uh, trying to scratch that itch to be the best that we can be. And I think, um, it's so powerful because once you have that baseline Cole, Maynard is essentially arguing. Okay, well then C set your stretch goals and push beyond that. Um, except the constraints that you have, but don't accept.
That that limits your potential. And it's such a powerful thing because, you know, I was, um, I was watching the CrossFit games and, um, there's this, uh, guy, Matt Fraser. Who's won it for the guy's version for like the last three or four years. [00:22:00] And, uh, I was just, I just caught, uh, an interview with him and, uh, he said to himself, I think.
That most people do not realize how much potential they have. I mean, this is the guy for four years in a row. Who's, single-handedly been one of the fittest and strongest men in the world. Um, and he is, I mean, he's dominant in CrossFit and, um, what's fascinating is it seems like the people that do remarkable things have such a bigger view.
A bigger imagination. They dream bigger about their own potential. And it's almost like a lot of us except our lot in life and the constraint and the limit upon us. And one of the mindset differences that we see with people like Carl [00:23:00] Maynard or Matt Fraser, or many, many, many others. I mean, Michael Jordan comes to mind a lot here.
Is that they just have a bigger appreciation, a bigger sense of their own potential and what they often come down to is that what we don't realize is potential is only limited by ourselves. And so that's why so many people feel. Frustrated with their lot in life because they dream so small and those that succeed so much like Carl he's like, Oh, I see my limits.
I see my constraints as the starting points for my stretch goals, for my growth, for my potential. Cool. I mean, that's pretty impressive. Right. And just to build on. On that mic. It reminds me again of that first clip we had from Kyle, when he references that his [00:24:00] dreams broke records. Again, he wasn't necessarily accepting his, his lot, so to speak and saying, right, well, that's it.
Then that's my limit. He was saying, you know, I want to go and climb this mountain and I will give myself that stretch goal in order to go and achieve that dream of mine. You know, he, I, I do like this concept of, you know, seeing a potential only limited by your almost imagination and your strength of mind.
Yeah, absolutely. And this kind of sets us up for his next thought, which is, you know, really unlocking what is the very best version of ourselves. The very first time I got myself dressed. I was 16 years old. It was my summer going into, um, summer break going into my junior year of high school. And I was sitting at home in my sweat pants and my [00:25:00] best friend, Joey calls me up and he says that him and his mom wanted me to come and pick me up and take me out to a movie.
Then like an hour sitting at home, home alone. My mom was five minutes away at a local park watching my sisters play in a softball tournament. And I told her, I said, there is absolutely no way I'm asking my best friend or my best friend's mom to get me dressed. She said, let me call you back in a couple of minutes, five minutes later, she called back and she said, I'm sorry, I can't leave.
You're going to have to find a way to do this on your own. So I had to go through a grief cycle pretty quick, you know, 32 seconds to be sad and maybe another 29 seconds to be really ticked off at her and had to figure out how to do this. Now, the clock is ticking, so I've got an hour window to go in to make this happen.
So it wouldn't start it. With my left sock and battle with a sock, trying to get this on my foot and finally found, um, some kind of tool. I knew that there would be some kind of tool to use to get the sock on. [00:26:00] My dad is an engineer and always helped me think outside of the box. So I went and found some paperclips and undid the paperclips in my mouth does shape a hook.
So I stuffed the paperclip inside the sock and I just. Bought with this thing for like 30 minutes to get that first sock on the next sock aid was able to figure out then about 15 minutes and use my same paperclip system for that. And when I leaned back and stuck the, uh, the paperclip inside the zipper of my pants and use that to go and zip my pants up for the first time, that whole process altogether took like an hour.
Now, when I get dressed on my own, it takes maybe a minute. If I'm just throwing on my socks and throwing on my pants. Zip it up my pants. I don't use the same, um, adaptation. I figured out how to do it just with the ends of my arms. And maybe it takes a minute, but where we start anything, it's, it's really, really hard at first.
But I think in order for our next generation to be a better version of [00:27:00] ourselves, then we do have to learn how to fail. And sometimes failure is not fun, but I believe it is the only way. To go outside of our comfort zone and to learn is to be knocked down and to learn how to go and to stand back up.
Or actually just before I dig into a few comments, I just want to take a breath. Wow. What a story? I mean, I love where cause pointing out what he's calling out here. It's always hard at the start and. No matter what the end result is of that difficult moment, whether it's failure or a success you're going to improve upon it.
You're going to become that little bit more comfortable with the discomfort you're going to become that little bit more, maybe resilient or. Adapt new ingenuity towards a future problems, future [00:28:00] challenges, because you've gone through that process of learning. I think this is what, you know, the clip from Carl there is really all about, he didn't want to give up.
So he learned and adapted and created a new method or form. To combat that problem. Yeah. And it's, so it's such a vivid story because you can just see the choice it's like, do I try and get ready or do I just accept that it's not possible? And the fact that he put a paper clip in it, remember this guy has no hands and he puts a paper clip in his mouth and untangles and binds the paperclip.
So can use as a hook to get his socks on. Can you believe what he's telling me is so powerful in getting us to reset what we think is possible and what is not. And even if it's more basic [00:29:00] than that, it's a bit of a, for me, it's a nice cold shower. Wake up call. It's like don't complain. Don't give up.
There's always a way. And I just think that that is such a powerful, um, starting point for us as we embark on 2021, as we're resetting ourselves and refreshing ourselves for this new year. I think none of this, it's not possible talk. It's all about. Okay. Well, Let's think about it differently. Let's challenge ourselves.
And I think just embracing the challenge and it gets a bit awkward. It gets a little uncomfortable and that's okay. I think just to put a word on, on that closing thought you just had there, Mike, I think it's ownership. I think it's owning or, or almost embracing that challenge that you might have and thinking.
Okay. Right. [00:30:00] I've got to adapt it or I've got to figure it out. Um, I choose how I'm going to respond in this situation. Like Kyle was calling out, he went through a grief cycle in, in a, in a few minutes or so, uh, himself, he then with his own ingenuity, figured out this, this, this way himself. I think there's a great lesson here within that vivid, vivid story.
You own your reaction to these difficult moments, so true. So true. Well, there you go. I mean, look that is, um, a whole plethora of thoughts, ideas in it, inspiration around rethinking our very own potential and. It kind of opens things up a little bit. I mean, it just makes you a little lighter. It makes you see maybe further into the horizon.
And that's exactly, uh, the idea of what we're trying to do here, which is learning out loud [00:31:00] together, uh, so that we can indeed, as Kai would say, be the very best version of ourselves and Mark. Before we get into some more clips dealing with obstacles and challenges and how we win. I think what's been so fantastic is we've just finished the rising star series, where we had the likes of Michelle Obama, where we had all of, you know, some of our real classic moonshot is that really, that really were home runs in 2020 David Goggins VIM half.
James clear, but I think we should really, uh, set our, um, our listeners up for what is ahead. What is on the roadmap of moonshots? We've got a pretty action. I I'd like to say Mike, we've got a pretty action packed first. I do. I do agree. There's some real, real good ones. Yeah. Obviously kicking ourselves off [00:32:00] today with, with Kyle inspiring us to.
Not give up and, and turn away from challenges. We're going to then move into a brand new series and individual we haven't covered before. It's, uh, author, uh, an original thinker, an innovator Ryan holiday, and his series of books, all about stoic thinking, um, considering and rethinking obstacles in your path.
And. I think that's going to be a really great series then you think do very timely, very timely as well. So, um, I can't wait to get into, I mean, we've got some real classics, uh, around stoic thinking. Ego is the enemy stillness. The obstacle is the way, um, very, very good stuff. And, um, beyond that, we actually have a, a show that one of our listeners, uh, recommended to us.
[00:33:00] Correct episode one, one, five. So five episodes from now, we're going to be digging into Christine Lagarde recommended by some of our listeners, president of the European central bank. Going to be really interesting. One that I can't wait to dig into the, um, The structures process and thinking of Christine Lagon.
Oh, could you imagine trying to, um, could you just, just imagine trying to, uh, succeed and thrive in the world of banking and finance as a woman? I mean, that can, that can only be a huge challenge, right? Yeah. It's going to be. Pretty, uh, inspiration again, I'd say, you know, coming from. Uh, a sector that's, that's pretty traditional, I guess.
Um, and, and breaking those boundaries and breaking the mold. I mean, talk about a moonshot, right. [00:34:00] And, and we should call out Bettina and Munich, who suggested that we do Christine the gods. So a big thanks to patina for that suggestion. And by the way, talking about suggestions, Mark, we've got another one, uh, just this week.
Didn't we, we did from. Mr. Thomas holiday. Thank you so much for reaching out to us. We love, love, love, love. I can't say it enough. Hearing from our listeners. It's really valuable to, to Mike and I, when we do hear that you guys are enjoying. The show and more importantly, also giving us more inspiration on who we're going to be digging into.
So on our list, now we have Richard Fineman, a pretty powerful problem solver, a mathematician, and I'd say philosopher from the sixties. So I think he's going to be great fun to come on to later in 2021. Yeah. Now, if you're listening to this and thinking, how can you be part of the moonshots community? Go into your podcast app, [00:35:00] whatever, whether it's, uh, Spotify, Apple, Stitcher, um, Leave us a rating, leave us a review, share it with a friend because that's how we grow our community.
That's how we can learn out loud with more people from all over the world. And I can tell you that we, we do indeed have listeners from all four corners of the world. It is so, so damn inspiring. I mean, obviously we have a ton from the U S and Australia. The UK and Canada, but Mark what's so exciting is we've got some really, uh, really exciting pockets.
So moonshot is in places like Denmark, Singapore, Portugal, remaining, Malaysia, Pakistan, Czech Republic, Kenya, Nigeria, Hong Kong. It goes on and on and on, and we want to hear from you. And what we really love is when you tell us. Who you would like us to cover in the show, gives tips and feedback [00:36:00] about the show and Mark there's actually somewhere they can go to do that.
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So I think now that [00:37:00] we are enlightened with the world of our own personal potential and the best version of ourselves, In addition to that, we've invited you to help moonshots be the best version of itself. I think it's only time now to get into the hard work of when we start upon this journey. When we try to get those stretch goals.
When we try to go beyond the constraints, we get confronted with challenge and as always, Cole may not have some great advice for us. And the journey starts with learning to fail fast. When I was younger, my dad told me, he believes the purpose of parenting was to make me and my sisters a little bit better version of him.
And I think about the time when I was born, there was a lot of fear and doubt and frustration. I was born without my arms and legs, and I don't have any kids in my own. Uh, but I do have some pretty amazing parents that had an attitude that they weren't going to allow that to go in control and dictate and affect [00:38:00] my life.
Any major, negative way. Um, Doctors told them a lot of things. I might be dependent on their help living at home, the rest of my life, maybe dependent on, uh, prosthetics or other devices that it would be very expensive. It really didn't have an education. Uh, they didn't have a whole lot of money there. Rosa, I'm sure a lot of hard times early on, but they made that decision early on that they weren't going to, uh, just to allow me to live a different life that they're going to go and treat me as, as normal.
I have a baby niece. Now she's eight months old and uh, her name is Kelly. I see Kelly reaching out to go and try to grab the spoon when she's being fed. Well, I'm watching her do that. I thought about the first couple of times that I would go and reach out to try to go and grab the spoon and then how hard that must've been for them to see me fail a whole lot, learning how to pick up a spoon and holding it just between the ends of my elbows.
Like the way that I hold the spoon now. I'm sure it must've been hard. It was their natural instinct to want to come in and [00:39:00] try to help me out at first. But I had to go through those failures to learn how to do it. And some things came back. So some things didn't. Um, but now in, in my life, I really don't have that many adaptations for things because of what they taught me early on, learn how to eat with normal spoon and fork, just holding, um, the silverware between the ends of my arms and swinging it around to go and scoop the food up.
Learn how to, um, shave kind of the same way when the shaver, um, the ends of my arms writing with a normal pen pencil, holding it between the ends of my arms, uh, type about 50 words a minute on a normal keyboard. Um, Now live in a three-story townhouse on my own, my bedrooms on the top floor. I've got a stool to go and get up to the bathroom sink.
Uh, in my vehicle that I drive, we've got a Dodge Durango has lifted up pedals, extensions in the pedals. I use my left foot for the break, my right foot for the gas to normal steering wheel. Put the seat up a little bit closer to the wheel. And it's become my favorite hobby to thoroughly freak people out in the Starbucks drive through fast, my credit card real quick to go [00:40:00] and, uh, pay for the coffee and see people like kind of freak out, dark off.
You're all over the place. But to me, they, they did encourage me to not focus on the disability. And I think a lot of times we get caught up in looking at the wrong things and as. As adults for, for me, with my niece, for maybe for you and your kids or your grandkids, I mean, they, they will watch you to see what you're focusing on.
And I think if, uh, if they'd helped me with everything, I wouldn't have been able to, to learn how to do things on my own. I had to go through and learn how to fail a lot at first. I mean a lot of great, great tips again, told from such a personable and vivid storyteller, Mr. Carl Maynard, this, this positive mindset of Kyle comes through in all of these different clips.
Doesn't it mind? And I think it's just a great [00:41:00] reminder. No matter what year it is, no matter what challenge don't focus on the wrong things, don't always focus on the. Misery misery, I suppose, or, or the failures instead think. Okay. Right. Well, here you go. Here's the challenge. How do I react to it? How am I going to respond to it?
And the positive mindset of Kyle here, I believe is such a, uh, a stark reminder that you choose how you respond to these things. Right? Why do you, why do you think we, we have this. Um, in the best way I can describe, we often have such guilt about failure, right? Such, um, negative. Why is that? Why are we, why did we beat ourselves up so much?
You know what, that's a really interesting question. And I think that it might be the pressure that we put on ourselves. Uh, [00:42:00] my belief would be, uh, if I'm struggling. With, with, uh, with a job and it's, maybe it's not going, maybe the wheels are a little bit wonky and it's gone over budget or over time, or maybe somebody is not happy, whatever it might be instead of thinking, ah, it's, it's, it's my fault.
Or I wanted it to be perfect instead of beating yourself up on those. I think that's the natural human reaction, at least from my perspective to immediately go, huh? I should have done this. Better, maybe it's unnatural or unfair pressure that we put on ourselves. I don't know where it would spark from.
Maybe it's upbringing, maybe it's, um, education system or maybe it's just human nature. What do you think about, well, I, I think, I think it's an interesting thing that, uh, you know, it's, um, [00:43:00] You know, you, you have these high expectations and something does goes, right. So you take it incredibly negative when, I mean, th the one sidebar here, it's so curious that all of these great moonshot is have just got a default of, Oh, I failed.
Good. What did I learn? And what do I do next? Right. They just move moving on as, as fast as possible. I think that, um, I think it's a little bit our selfish nurse and our ego to expect that things will be easy, more our desire for it to be easy. Um, and so I think, uh, this fear of failure can be quite crippling for people because they dream.
They think about possibilities and then they say to themselves, Oh no, no, I wouldn't dare take that risk. Right. Um, and so I think that there's a lot of ego inside of [00:44:00] it. I think there's perhaps a little bit of, uh, laziness and, um, we are not engineered to go through and break our limits. We are engineered.
To survive and survival in itself is a thing. But when you do not explore the new push, your boundaries have stretch goals. That's when it starts to become negative because you. You know, you abandon your dreams. And I think, um, the capacity to jump lunge into those things and embrace the discomfort, embrace the failures.
And I think actually the path to success in being great is really learning from those failures. I mean, how many Moonshadows have we started? Who've talked about Epic failure in their life. It's such a reoccurring theme and concept. And I think you're [00:45:00] right. I think it's the ego gets in the way. So with our historic moonshots is that we've covered.
I think a lot of them, if you ask them, they would agree and say, I didn't let my pride or my, um, expectations of something being perfect, getting in the way of. Achieving that dream of mine and failure just happened to be a path or a, or an obstacle to get around. And so I, I got on with it, you know, similar to, to Kyle talking about, uh, the scree field with the rock, the Boulder coming towards him.
He could have turned around then and said, Oh, you know, it's pretty, pretty impossible, pretty hard. But he, he carried on going. I think that's a great. Um, metaphor for maybe the challenges that Elon Musk had with, um, with space X and his childhood heroes against [00:46:00] that kind of feels like a Boulder coming towards you.
And he sort of kept going metaphorically. Yeah. It ducked out the way he kept on going and he could have let his ego. So, no. So, so I think what we can say about Ilan is that he followed his own path. Uh, he made his own destiny and the great news is we've got another clip from Carmina that really illuminates the way forward.
So once again, let's have a listen to Kyle May not. And that really, if I need to go and like pick one thing that I'd want to go and do, and in part on the world is to combat that like excuse of impotent. It's really that all of us, like in our own way, whether it's in an individual conversation, like we know for a fact, like we have the capacity to be able to go and do something, but it's only when we go and make that excuse that we're even capable.
We don't care, which is usually a lie. Then, then we don't. And there's a concept that changed my life. Like, like, I mean, it's a big statement to make too, but it really did in a lot of ways [00:47:00] when I learned this and it was Alfred Korzybski said in 1931, he said, the map is not the territory. Meaning that like object, you know, language, you know, with our words spoken words, it's an abstraction, it's not reality itself, whatever that means.
Right? So the territory being reality, like that's, whatever is, but the deal is, is all of us go and walk around. It's a human, natural phenomenon. We all go and walk around relating to our own mental maps as if they are reality. Instead of realizing they're just a map and some maps are more useful than others, right?
If we make a map of Chicago, you know, and we've got 15 minutes to go and make it, then it's probably not going to be a very accurate map. If we use a map from 1960 of Chicago, it's probably not gonna be a very accurate map. We know the more accurate we can go and get to the real time there. Then the better off that we are.
But for me, and how that relates is, you know, it actually changed me in the sense that like, I felt like when I learned that I didn't really [00:48:00] have to go and prove anything to anybody. And it gave me a lot more freedom and ease to go and understand, you know, when relating to other people that that was just like somebody else's map.
Mm. I love this idea of redrawing, the map. I mean, this comes back to what we said a lot earlier, uh, in don't, uh, don't accept constraints and today's limits as being the end, but actually the star and, um, the way to, to get through. This journey, what was really quite powerful for me is like this excuse making of all the reasons why something didn't happen and how sometimes we can dwell in that for so long.
And then we might even start to judge. Ourselves or others or blame ourselves and others. And that means that you ain't going anywhere fast because you are [00:49:00] dwelling in backwards, negative thinking, and you're not asking yourself, what did I learn? You're not asking yourself, what can I do next? And what's important is people seem to make such.
Personal judgments of themselves strong, uh, judgments, uh, through their own failures rather, and making excuses and judgments and all of this. And all we need to do is just pivot a little bit and look at it from this point of view of okay. It's just one step along the way, just because I failed it doesn't make me a bad person.
I think that's some of the things we need to get, right? Yeah. It's, it's such a good lesson, such a good lesson, that things aren't just black and white, you know, I'm not a, I'm not a failure or a success. I'm not, um, a winner or a loser, you know, there is this concept [00:50:00] of, uh, we're going to get a little bit philosophical here, Mike, but there's this concept of interpreting your reality.
And I think, you know, again, very focused on this concept of, ah, it's too hard for me versus, okay, I'm going to go and give it a go anyway, that mindset that when you look at a challenge and you can see through that fog, And you know how to go and give it a go or I'd try and find a solution for it. I think that's very in line with not only a lot of the moonshots that we've covered in the past, you look for those solutions, but also Kyle and, and this, uh, reference he calls out here.
The map is not the territory in, in just re reanalyzing. I suppose how we look at things. And coming at it, maybe in a different way, maybe it's an original thinking, okay, we've got a business problem and we want to go and find the right product. We want to talk to the right customers. [00:51:00] Or it's just a personal challenge that we might have.
We might be feeling stressed or anxious. So instead of weekend, think about it in a different way and no, it's not finite. Hmm. That feels like, like a significant, um, Less than that we can learn from Carl as well as the other moonshots. That's where I'm going. That's where I'm feeling it. Yeah. Yeah. And so I think that, um, as we start to put together this body of work from Carmina, there definitely seems to be this, you know, knowing your limit, going beyond that.
Um, and this idea of striving really just to be the best you can be. Um, And then as you go on that journey, you know, fail, fail fast. Right. And that's okay. And don't make excuses along the way. [00:52:00] That's that sounds like a really important, um, sort of almost a roadmap to follow doesn't it. Yeah, it does. You're right.
It feels like an actionable plan that you can, that you can follow that shows you. Okay. You're going to go through these different cycles. You're going to have times that are really tough. You might fail more than once, but as long as you get yourself back up, Learn from it. See it as an opportunity and go out and give it a go, Hey, you're going to be in a pretty good place exactly.
To your point. You know, you reminded us earlier of the Joe Rogan show and how he was reappropriating discomfort and saying we should be embracing that. I really do agree. This is a great comparison and connection here, which is, um, you know, don't give up and instead think of those challenges as.
Opportunities to learn and grow from past. So true. So very true. That all sets us [00:53:00] up for, for this last clip that we'll bring it all home. Mark, what are these last thoughts from, uh, Mr. Kyle Maynard? Well, you can imagine just picking up this map of life and getting in your car and driving because you've got to learn.
You've got to go through different cycles and challenges. And as we've heard from Kyle many, many, um, you know, occasional moments where things feel to Tufts. So this final clip that we're going to hear from Mr. Inspiration himself, Mr. Carl Maynard is all about turning up. It's all about winning. Even as something as simple as like putting it on the sock.
The first 10 times I put on my socks, you know, there's a massive learning curve there, the next hundred or the next thousand, the next 10,000, obviously I'm getting a much diminished return, but I do know that just like the soft or whatever else, if we go and stick it out long enough, if we go in like actually commit ourselves to it, that it [00:54:00] just eventually we'll get to the other side.
It was our last day, wake up at 6:00 AM. We had to hit the summit by 4:00 PM. Or we had to go in like turn around, like nearly 23,000 feet. The summit was, it was in like insight. I wasn't moving fast enough. And I had a moment of just feeling sorry for myself and thinking like, we've been here for 17 days.
I'm not going to go and make this. Now I'm going to be literally a hundred meters from the summit.
It was a moment of it. This is like surrender my guide nine. And he was behind me. He was just like yelling at me, encouraging me. He was like up Kyle up up, keep climbing, keep climbing Kyle up. So then it was, you know, at that point it was like, I see my friends, like hitting the summit and I'm thinking like, I've been here for 17 days.
Like I'm going to go and waste this, not going to go and make it. And I was like, you know what? This is a stupid thought, like no amount of thinking about this or whatever, wanting to be on the [00:55:00] summit or imagining how far we come. It doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is right here. It was literally just, it was turned into, into a game.
It was what I could see in my ski goggles. My head town is what I could see mosquitoes. I was like, that's the only three feet that I have to deal with right now. And then I'm going to go ahead and there's another three feet to go and deal with and another three feet and all of a sudden my guide about an hour and 15 minutes later, he tells me to stop and look up.
And I'm 15 minutes away from the summit. And a couple of minutes later, I'm staying at the roof. Of South America with some of my best friends. And it was an amazing moment. Ooh, ha did we make the promise at the start of this show that this is ad turbocharge for 2021? The mountain has been scaled. Now let's just make sure we, uh, can reflect back on it.
You know what? I [00:56:00] love that just to, just to really drill it in, drill it home. What matters is right here in your ski ball? Yes. The next step, the next step. No fantastic stuff. Which of all of these thoughts has really captured your imagination map. I think the concepts of accepting your accepting your situation, but not letting it limit your dream.
So to coin the phrase that you said earlier, the stretch goals, you know, Kyle always had this ambition of MMA. Um, you know, he now lives, uh, you know, without any support he drives his car is also climbed Kilimanjaro. You know, these are things that, um, he stretched himself to go and achieve despite knowing where he was.
And that for me is, is a great stock. Um, inspiration. What about you? What, which, which was your favorite piece? I [00:57:00] really gravitated to, um, This thought that we got in the first half of the show, which is like, you know, find where your limits are and see them as the starting point to stretch goals, to going beyond your limits.
Um, rather than like, well, that's the best I can do. That's all I can do. I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's just the start ladies and gentlemen, I thought that was fantastic. Didn't you? Yeah, totally agree. He's he's got so much, he's achieved so much, but just the way he thinks that positivity, that kind of alludes from him, I could have heard I'm looking forward to seeing, and you know, what I'm looking forward to Mark is the Ryan holiday four-part series, which is next.
Whew. Yep. Starting with the daily stoic episode, 111, we're going to then go on to [00:58:00] ego. Is the enemy a topic that we were discussing even today? The call may not show. Episode one, one, three, the upskill is away. Episode one 14, stillness. Great. For part parts for the Ryan holiday series. I'm pumped me too. So Mark big.
Thanks. Thank you to you and thank you to you. Our listeners, it has been so good to kick off the new year with a whole lot of positivity from none other than Kyle Maynard and what we learned today. It's sort of a step-by-step process to going way beyond to realizing our potential. And it starts with knowing your limits, but we don't stop.
There we go beyond and we strive to go. Bob beyond anything we could have dreamed of to be the very best version of ourselves. And when we go on that journey, we're going to fail. But well, couple of Karmanos has invited us to do is to fail [00:59:00] fast, to learn and to see every failure as a chance. To learn and go beyond our wildest dreams.
And as we climb the mountain and the Boulder start rolling, do not make excuses along the way. Do not give up because as Kyle would say, if you turn up, you'll win. All right. That's the wrap off the moonshots.