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Unlock the discipline and mindset necessary for reaching your full potential as Dre Baldwin, CEO of Work On Your Game Inc., shares his invaluable wisdom on achieving peak performance.
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Connect with Dre Baldwin
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More About the Episode
Our conversation spans the gritty truths of maintaining high-level effort on the 'third day,' where willpower wanes, to the strategic parallels between the competitive worlds of sports and business.
Dre's journey from athlete to entrepreneur serves as a testament to the power of mental toughness, discipline, and unwavering consistency, which he convincingly argues are key to excelling in any field.
Throughout this episode, we reflect on the transformative shifts athletes undergo when entering the business arena, offering a unique perspective that combines sports' thrill with entrepreneurship's rigor.
Dre provides a playbook on leveraging the mental resilience honed in athletics for business success, emphasizing the significance of a growth mindset. By sharing his own transition story, he inspires listeners to envision new levels of success, whether they're sprinting down a court or spearheading a boardroom discussion.
Finally, we delve into the psychological intricacies of success, addressing fears and the pivotal role of discipline in fostering confidence. Dre candidly discusses the importance of investing in oneself across various dimensions—time, energy, focus—and how this philosophy is a cornerstone of his message to his sons and the wider community.
As we wrap up, we invite our audience to stay connected and take advantage of the resources offered through Work On Your Game University, ensuring that this episode is more than just a conversation—it's a stepping stone to your personal and professional development.
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Hosted by Ryan Hanley, a relentless leader and performance strategist—this is the way.
In a crude laboratory in the basement of his home. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the show. Today, we have a tremendous conversation for you. We are talking with Dre Baldwin. He is the CEO of Work On Your Game Inc, and I gotta be honest with you guys.
Ryan Hanley:When I was introduced to Dre, I I hadn't heard of Dre before, checked out his work. And, you know, what the my method for bringing guests on, especially guests who I've never met before or don't know. You know, some of the people that come on the show, I've had multiple conversations with. In this case, I hadn't met Dre before. And when you're I don't like to do too much research.
Ryan Hanley:I don't like to overinvestigate someone because I want the conversation to be real and organic and authentic, and I wanna dial in on the things that that particular guest is interested in in that day. But in this case, I kinda accidentally got sucked in because my philosophy, the philosophy that we talk about here on finding peak, becoming the best version of yourself, the pursuit of peak performance, discipline, consistency, perseverance, confidence, all these kinds of things. Dre's work dials in completely, and it's not even just the way he talks or what he talks about, but his story of of working through adversity and, you know, becoming a professional basketball player, how he built his platform as a speaker, as a coach, the work he does in helping young athletes, and how that expanded into the business community, entrepreneurial community. He's done multiple TED Talks. I actually, you know, I was making dinner the other night, for my kids, and I got I went all the way through, one of his keynotes, and then had that, then that went into, after we were done and I was cleaning up.
Ryan Hanley:I was listening to his Ted Talks, and I got really deep into Dre's work, and I I'm a huge fan, And I'm so glad that I'm able to share him and what he does with you guys. We're gonna have all kinds of, shout outs and links at the end of the show, as well as we'll be in the show notes for ways that you can connect with him. I highly recommend that you do that. Before we get there, I just wanna tell you guys I love you for listening to this show. If we wanna keep getting amazing guests like Dre on the show, I just need, one thing from you guys.
Ryan Hanley:If if you're not subscribed, subscribe. Whether you listen on Apple, Spotify, whether you're watching on YouTube, wherever you are, would love for you to, subscribe to this show and share the show. Right? Whether you're you're just kinda adding some comments onto, what we're already talking about, or if you disagree with something or you think that we didn't approach it the right way. Those types of dissenting or disagreeing opinions or how this conversation expands, and how we all get better at what we do.
Ryan Hanley:And lastly, if you can, if you're willing to, ratings and reviews of this show help us immensely. Going to Apple, going to Spotify, and leaving a rating review is so incredibly important to growing the show because guests like Dre who do don't know me, we didn't know each other before we connected on this. They go and they look at those ratings and reviews. That's what I do. Right?
Ryan Hanley:To get a feel. Is this sound like someone who's gonna who's gonna do right by me? Who's gonna challenge me? Who's gonna make this a great episode? That's where we get that information when we're guests on other podcasts.
Ryan Hanley:And if you can go and and talk about why you listen to this show, why someone might want to be a guest on this show, or listen to this show. That means so much to me personally. It's why I don't run ads. I might ask of you guys is not that you support a sponsor because I can make money other ways. My ask of you is that if you enjoy this work and you want this work to reach more people that, you either subscribe, share, or leave a review of the show.
Ryan Hanley:That that helps me. It helps the audience. It helps us get more guests. It helps us expand this message that through this work, we can be the best version of ourselves. I love you guys for listening.
Ryan Hanley:Let's get on to Dre Baldwin. Well, my man, I I I'm very excited to have you on the show. You know, when when your people reached out and and I started researching, I was taken immediately by this concept that you have of the 3rd day. I watched, you know, I I I started researching, and then I ended up watching, like, 2 or 3 of your keynotes. And, you know, I I love this concept.
Ryan Hanley:It fits right in with what we talk a lot about here on the show, what I do in my own work, in my own talks. And I'd love to start there. I'd love for you to break this concept down for the audience and, you know, we we can start with with what this idea of the 3rd day is.
Dre Baldwin:Perfect. So the 3rd day, Ryan, is all about how you show up and give your best effort when you least feel like it. So this is just this it came from actually my background in basketball because at this time, had a lot of ballplayers, follow me on YouTube. And they would see me in the gym. And I would always work out in this gym in Miami that still exists, not far from where I am now.
Dre Baldwin:And it would appear it was obvious that there was nobody else in the gym. And anybody who plays basketball knows it's hard to find an empty basketball gym to yourself.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. You know what?
Dre Baldwin:Because basketball is a very popular sport. So these players will say, well, Dre, do you own the gym? Is it attached to your house? Do you rent it out? How are you getting this gym to yourself all the time?
Dre Baldwin:And that's where I came up with this concept of the 3rd day. Because on the 1st day, everybody shows up. They're all excited to use this this thing, whatever it is, or to do this thing or to show themselves off or whatever the job is. 2nd day, still pretty excited, but a little bit less than they were on the 1st day. And by the 3rd day already and I mean, it's metaphorically, it doesn't have to be 3 days.
Dre Baldwin:But by that 3rd day, this is when people realize that this thing that they signed up for is real work. It's a real job. There's a real grind. It's not all fun and games. It's not one big party.
Dre Baldwin:And that's when we find out who is serious about doing the thing versus who is not. And I went on to explain to the basketball players that the reason why my gym was always empty is not because I don't own the gym. I don't rent it out. I don't block anybody else from coming in. It's simply because I'm willing to show up more often than everybody else's.
Dre Baldwin:So most of my videos, there's nobody else in the gym simply because I'm here more often than everybody else is. So that most of the time I'm recording, nobody else there. There's a few times there'd be a couple no random stragglers. Most of the time was me by myself. So that's where the concepts came from, the 3rd day.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. I love that. And I think that, you know, this idea, you know, it it it sounds, you know, persistence, resilience, these kind of things, consistency. I'm infatuated with with Kobe Bryant. I always have been his mentality.
Ryan Hanley:You know, I I feel like anyone who who can't relate to him can't see past maybe some of the some of the kind of Michael Jordan personality traits, which also made him so successful. And there's a story, I think Kevin Garnett tells it, that, speaks to what you're talking about. He's he was on a podcast, and I was listening to, and he says, you know, we're all coming back. It's it's, this is one of the, one of the Olympic one of the Olympic teams. And they're all coming in at 3 AM from the club or wherever they were.
Ryan Hanley:They're out partying, having a good time, whatever city they were in, and they're coming back to the hotel. And Kobe's already got ice on his knees, and he's he's sitting in the lobby and getting ready for his next workout. Already have done workout at at done one workout at 3:30 in the morning. And Right. You know, when you think about that and you pull it all the way back and this is I'm I'm so what I love about your story and what you've done is you can relate it, not just to to to the athletic world, but into the business world as well.
Ryan Hanley:Because, you know, this this concept, I think we it makes sense in sports. Right? You put in more work. You show up that extra day. You're consistent.
Ryan Hanley:It makes a lot of sense.
Dre Baldwin:I
Ryan Hanley:feel like and and this is where I really would love to get your translation. I think a lot of people who maybe haven't experienced that or maybe just played sports in high school and were never super serious, they struggle to translate that mentality into the business world. How does that start to show up in a in a business context?
Dre Baldwin:Taking you mean taking the the mindset that works in?
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. That 3rd day concept and continuing to show up. How does that translate from sports to say, to a to a business world?
Dre Baldwin:Okay. The story you were telling, I don't know if you said Kevin Garnett or did you say Kevin Durant?
Ryan Hanley:Garnett is who I meant. If I said Durant, I apologize. I meant Kevin Garnett. He was
Dre Baldwin:I think you meant Durant.
Ryan Hanley:Did I was it was it Durant?
Dre Baldwin:Yeah. Garnett and Kobe didn't play on the same Olympic team.
Ryan Hanley:Alright. Then it was Durant. It would whatever it was. Yes. Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:Garnett only played in he played in 2 1,000. Kobe didn't join the USA till 2008.
Ryan Hanley:Yes. So I watched way too many of these interviews, so I apologize
Dre Baldwin:for writing right now. 2 of
Ryan Hanley:them up. But the story is accurate in terms of these guys are showing up at 3 AM and Kobe had already got his workout in.
Dre Baldwin:Right. Yeah. I heard those stories about the about the o eight team and probably the 12 team as well. Yeah. But, anyway, to answer your question there, there are many similarities and many differences between the sports world and the business world.
Dre Baldwin:And it's a difficult transition for a lot of athletes because, I even tell people this to this day that being an athlete is the easiest job you're gonna have if you're gonna become an entrepreneur. I do a lot more work now. It's a lot harder job now than it was when I was playing sports. And a long day in sports is maybe 3 hours, maybe 4, if you have a a hard driving coach. But in the business world, a long day is the entire day.
Dre Baldwin:Right? You go to sleep, you still got stuff you didn't finish. So the the biggest thing that can translate over at the same time let me say it this way. At the same time, the reason why many people in the business world like to recruit athletes is because we have some traits baked into us from our sports experience that apply very well in business. Number 1, we're competitive.
Dre Baldwin:So anything that has to do with sales or anything where there's measurements and it's clear, hey, who's doing better than who? Athletes are great for that because we're naturally wired to compete. Discipline. Just showing up every single day and doing the job even when it's not easy, even when it's not fun, even when it's a grind. Athletes, we always we're used to doing that as athletes because we gotta go to practice every day.
Dre Baldwin:But at the same time, we won't mind going to practice because we appreciate the games. We appreciate the competitiveness that comes with it. And we know that there's an end goal far down the road, like, winning the championship that comes with doing the practices every single day. So we appreciate that. Number 3, athletes have to be coachable.
Dre Baldwin:You can't be an athlete if you are not willing to be coached. Whether you're doing a solo sport like boxing So we are highly coachable. Meaning, you can tell an athlete, hey, you're messing up. You made a mistake. You didn't do what you were supposed to do.
Dre Baldwin:An athlete is used to taking that. We're used to taking that kind of, accountability to our faces even in front of everybody, and it's not gonna cause us to fold up and and quit. Whereas a lot of people don't have that experience, they they can't handle it. And also the mental toughness that in the sports world, if you're a boxer, there's no way you can win a boxing match without getting hit in the face a couple times. You're gonna get hit.
Dre Baldwin:You you can still win the fight, but you're gonna get punched. Now if you're a basketball player, eventually, somebody's gonna block your shot or dump on you or cross you over or, you're gonna miss a couple shots in a row. It's gonna happen. You can still win the game, but you have to take that and you gotta keep going. So for in sales, for example, there's no salesperson in the world who closes every sale.
Dre Baldwin:We get phones hung up on us. We get doors slammed in our faces. We get people telling us, no. Don't call me again. And we have to show up to the next sales call as if the last one didn't happen.
Dre Baldwin:So many of these, pieces that and one last thing I'll give you is performance. I mean, the sports world you gotta perform. We do all that practice, and when we get our chance, we gotta go out there and do our things. And it's the same thing in the business world. We do all our preparation and research and, you know, learning about our prospect and the product and all of that.
Dre Baldwin:And then we get to the the sales call or the presentation or whatever it is, the expo hall, we gotta go out there and perform. So there are many similarities from the sports world that apply to the business world. And, I mean, I don't know if you set me up with this question. But the thing is the work when you're gaining philosophy is all about extracting those things from the sports world and then translating and articulating how they apply in business. So that's really basically what I do.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. Well, I'd like to believe that I'm good at interviewing people. So it was a setup for you because because I knew I knew what you had coming next, man. I I love your whole philosophy, so I I tried to put you up on there. My my job you know, I played sports too, so I like to put the ball right on a tee.
Ryan Hanley:I was a baseball player now. Yeah. But, no. Yeah. No.
Ryan Hanley:You can roll right into it, dude. I I, this is great stuff.
Dre Baldwin:Thank you. Well, I tried to play baseball for a while. I wasn't too good. So luckily, I I switched over to basketball.
Ryan Hanley:I, funny as it is, I, I loved always loved basketball, but I just wasn't great at it. So I was a football and a baseball player, and I played high school basketball. But I was like, I was the 12th guy that they'd run out there, just so the big guys could beat me up and run into me and stuff during practice. I didn't get my turn. But, I You're a
Dre Baldwin:practice dummy. That's what they called it.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. Exact that's what it was. They're like, bring a big football dummy in. Let the big guys beat them up for a while and do their skill moves on them, and, we won't care what happens. But I, I actually was a a a ref for 12 years and, did did some college, ultimately had kids and couldn't keep going, but, I love the game.
Ryan Hanley:And what I found really interesting, and this is completely aside from what we're here to talk about, I just I love basketball. When you see it, so I haven't played through high school. I never I didn't play in college. I played baseball in college, but, I haven't seen the game from the referee side, we're, you know, seeing the angles of that sport. Now I coach my kids.
Ryan Hanley:I mean, whatever. It's it it is what it is. But, like, you get this really interesting view that I almost wish, you know, I look at young ball players today, and I'm like, I wish they could see the ref's perspective, not for the mentality and that kind of stuff. That's not what I'm talking about. The angles that you have to take to see the game at to be a good referee, Mhmm.
Ryan Hanley:You then go back to playing those you see the you see the a completely new set of angles to the sport that that you didn't necessarily see as a player that weren't there. It's it's a really interesting perspective that I try to share with my players now, that that I coach because you you a lot of coaches and a lot of players have only seen the game from that player's perspective. They've never actually worked the angles that you have to to see the ref's perspective. And what it does is it opens up I found it opens up different opportunities. It's it's really it's just interesting.
Ryan Hanley:It's it's anecdotal, but it's interesting.
Dre Baldwin:That is interesting. Have you thought about or have you ever called a ref and say, come to practice and talk to the players about what they see?
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. So it's funny. My so my dad's been a ref for 30 6 years. He's the one that got me into it, and I have had him talk to the guys a little bit because, what you there are a lot of there are a lot of open passing angles that when you're playing, some guys intrinsically see them, but they tend to be elite. And what I've what I've said to some of my guys who maybe just don't have that natural intuition, who are still developing, that is there are these angles that you that are there that when you're playing, you might not see, but they're but they're absolutely positively there.
Ryan Hanley:And if you can fill those spaces, it's it it has a lot to do with you know, I try to get them to move a lot without the ball because it's those guys seeing those lanes through through this different perspective that that helps them. And sometimes I'll have them stand on the baseline and and watch how a ref will see the game and see that type of angle. And then when they go out and they practice, they they can kinda move into different spots that maybe the defense isn't expecting. It's it's it's interesting.
Dre Baldwin:That is interesting.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. I don't know. About this. Someone who know actually knows the game better than me should take that and turn it into something really good. But, Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:There's something there.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. There's something there. It it it gives you that idea of, like, you know, we all have, and I think about this from business too. Like, what are what are the unknown unknowns kind of idea? Like like, I think that's what that perspective is and where I picked up on that is, hey.
Ryan Hanley:We we know this business really well. What are are there parts of it that we just don't even know that we don't know exist? That maybe someone else is seeing or a vendor is seeing that we don't see, etcetera. It's it's it's a Right. It's an interesting way of looking at it.
Ryan Hanley:But but let's get into, let's get into your philosophy around around this particular topic.
Dre Baldwin:Sure. Around which part?
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. They'll they'll work on them. Sorry. Work on your game. You work on your game philosophy.
Ryan Hanley:That's that's where we're headed before I took us off
Dre Baldwin:track. Right. So what you just said though there, Ryan, actually, goes in line with something that I talk about, and I tell people my superpower in business because, you know, working as a coach, you know, there are a lot of coaches out there, a lot of authors, a lot of people talk about mindset or entrepreneurship or even former athletes doing things. I tell people my superpower is insight. And what you just described is insight.
Dre Baldwin:It's helping people understand what they weren't even aware that they didn't understand. But once they understand that they could use it, now they're like, oh, wow. That is a that's a paradigm shifting, perspective. Now that I see that, now I see things completely different. Now I realized that I was asking myself the wrong question.
Dre Baldwin:Now you helped me see a different question I should be asking myself, and that's where all the difference is. Because these days with all the access we have to information, a lot of times people are looking for answers. The problem is they get the answers to the wrong questions. So even if you get the right answers, you still have a problem. So for me, my biggest thing when I'm working with people is helping them get insight.
Dre Baldwin:Okay. I see what you're asking and what you're looking to do. Let me show you the questions that you weren't even aware that you need to be asking. Once we answer those, that'll knock out not only the questions that you had, but also the questions that would come that would come up after that that we needed to resolve anyway. So the work on your gaining philosophy, to answer your question here is based around 4 pieces.
Dre Baldwin:Mindset, strategy, systems, and accountability as far as what we do with business people. But the foundation of it started with I believe you're referring to the mindset piece was discipline, confidence, mental toughness, and personal initiative. And those things all came from, my background in sports. So where that started was, while I was on YouTube, this is before it was YouTube. This is before it's right around the time we started to say social media.
Ryan Hanley:Yep.
Dre Baldwin:I had an audience of ballplayers who were following me, and they found out about my background. I only played 1 year high school ball. I walked on and played d 3 college ball. And at this point, I was a pro player, but I was sometimes employed, sometimes unemployed pro basketball player. So I would be in this empty gym in Miami.
Dre Baldwin:And they're like, wait a minute. I thought you were a pro basketball player. Why are you an empty gym in Miami? Shouldn't you be playing for somebody? And I would tell them, I'll answer these questions.
Dre Baldwin:I would say, well, I'm a free agent right now, and I was waiting for the phone to ring. So they would just start asking, well, Dre, what what keeps you coming to the gym every day to work out? Because you don't even know when the phone's gonna ring again. And sometimes I didn't know if the phone would ring in. Not at all not when, but if it was gonna ring again.
Dre Baldwin:What kept you coming to the gym and working out even in your teen years when you weren't making the high school team? Or how do you get the confidence to perform? Because anybody who knows the sports world, Ryan, you know that you practice all year and tryouts for the high school team is, like, one day. Yeah. So 364 days of practice for one day.
Dre Baldwin:And if you don't do good that one day, you gotta wait a whole other year before you can try again. So how do you get the confidence to perform in that one chance that you get even at the pro level? Often, your your tryout is literally Monday. Or, you barely made the high school team, walked on to college. No.
Dre Baldwin:You're in and out of you're in and out of pros. Sometimes you're not signed. What's the the mindset behind somebody who keeps trying despite, you know, all the quote, unquote reality in front of you that says this probably isn't a good idea. And from there so from the first one, I started talking discipline. 2nd question, I started talking confidence.
Dre Baldwin:3rd one, mental toughness. And the 4th one was and people just ask how do you get started on things? Because there were a couple of things I had gotten started on. Number 1, playing basketball overseas because most of my career has played in Europe. A lot of ball players who are aspiring at that time, because that was my target audience, these aspiring 13, 18 year old ballplayers, mostly male.
Dre Baldwin:How do you get started playing overseas if I actually wanted to? Because overseas basketball world is not like being a lawyer or a doctor where you can read the you follow the fit these requirements, you make it. It doesn't work like that. It's a very shadowy industry. So I had figured it out, and I start to explain it back to people.
Dre Baldwin:How do you get started? Or they would ask, well, how do you get started getting known on the Internet? Because now at this point, we're starting to hit this inflection point where the Internet went from being a thing for geeks to a thing that people would consume to a thing that people wanted to participate. Now we're starting to be a participant. Now people are starting to create content, and I was already doing it.
Dre Baldwin:So people are like, well, how can I get known on Internet? Because now we're starting to look like, we can see it now, Ryan. But at the time, it was starting to look like maybe somebody could do this as a full time job, just be on the Internet and put stuff out. And I was already doing it. So they were just asked how to get started on this stuff.
Dre Baldwin:And I obviously was a person they could tell just from my experience and the things I would tell them that I'm a big initiative taking individual. So they would just ask about that. So I started talking about personal initiative. So that's where the 4 pieces came from. Discipline, confidence, mental toughness, personal initiative.
Dre Baldwin:As I started sharing those things, the athletes would say to me well, 2 things happen here. Athletes said to me, Dre, the way that you're explaining this, you sound like a philosopher. You sound like a college professor. You sound like a a professional speaker. And that kinda gave me a a a right ball moment.
Dre Baldwin:Like, hey. Maybe I could just go and talk about this stuff and maybe there's a is there an industry for this? I didn't know it was such thing as just stand on the stage and getting paid to give a speech at this time. This is about 2,010. And the other thing that happened was people who didn't play sports actually, 3 things happened.
Dre Baldwin:Let me tell you the second thing before I get to the third thing. Second thing was I started explaining these concepts in a video every week. I called it the weekly motivation. I did this video every Monday. Now at this point, I'm putting out videos on YouTube every single day.
Dre Baldwin:6 days a week is just basketball. How to dribble, how to shoot, how to jump higher so you can dunk. This is literally on the court basketball or off the court training, but it was all training. Mondays, I would do the weekly motivation. And this would just be a little 2 to 5 minute selfie video before selfie videos were a thing on my cheap little camera because we didn't even have video cameras on the phones at
Ryan Hanley:this point.
Dre Baldwin:Yeah. Right? And I did that video every Monday for 400 Mondays in a row. And that laid the foundation for what we have now. Because those pieces that I laid, those bricks that I laid there, I really just went back and revisited them as I started to put together these things for the non athletes.
Dre Baldwin:Because the 3rd piece, Ryan, was people who didn't play sports started seeing those weekly motivation videos. They weren't watching me show you how to do the Kobe move. They were watching me talk about mindset, about this point, about confidence. Because I wouldn't relate it just to sports. I was just talking about it, period.
Dre Baldwin:Even though my audience were athletes. And these people would say, Dre, I don't even play sports. No. I don't even Dre, I don't know who you were, but my son was watching your YouTube video and I heard it. I I overheard what you were saying.
Dre Baldwin:And these things that you're saying, they apply to people who are not athletes the same way they apply to people who are athletes. And that was the moment, Ryan, that I realized, okay, I can have an audience outside of the sports world. Because I always knew I wanted to do something outside of sports. I just didn't know how I was going to do it.
Ryan Hanley:And at
Dre Baldwin:this point, this is about 2010. I played from 22,005 to 2015. So I still play for 5 more years. The phone didn't ring you. And at that point, from 2010 to 2015, I started to lay the foundation for the business that we have today because I started to share messages that were applicable to people who were not playing sports.
Dre Baldwin:With the respect to the fact that a lot of the athletes who were following me at that time, many of them would not go on to even play in college. We're gonna go and play pro. They were all gonna transition out of sports anyway. Just like I would at some point. Athlete careers are very short.
Dre Baldwin:So eventually, we all move on to something else. So I would love to say I was so clairvoyant that I could I could have laid all this out in 2010. I didn't. Couldn't. But luckily, it worked out that way.
Dre Baldwin:I started to put these pieces together because because I was thinking outside of basketball. I knew I didn't wanna be a trainer. I didn't wanna be a referee. I didn't wanna be a coach. I didn't wanna be an analyst.
Dre Baldwin:Now I wasn't gonna be the old guy at LA Fitness. I was gonna get done playing, and I was done. I was gonna walk away cold turkey, which is exactly what I did in 2015. And I was gonna move into a different space, which is what I did. And luckily, I already had a runway.
Dre Baldwin:So my transition from being an athlete to being an entrepreneur was much smoother than it is for a lot of athletes. And the main reason for that is because my ride to get in was much rougher than most athletes. So it's kinda the first shall be best and the last shall be first.
Ryan Hanley:What was that like when you hung him up? Did you did you have I mean, you obviously had made the decision and committed to it, but there had to be some residual emotion. I think a lot of guys struggle with that. Even if they're confident in their next step, do you still think about it? Do you still think about the days of playing?
Ryan Hanley:How do you how do you handle that? And and and I'll give you the context of my question. There are 2 moments. There are 2 activities in my sports career. 1, sacking a quarterback as a middle linebacker, and 2, hitting a home run that I find it very, very difficult in a professional environment to recreate the emotion that you feel in those moments.
Ryan Hanley:Right? Maybe that's the similar to hitting a big 3 or dunking or whatever whatever it is equivalent to basketball. Obviously, I I like I said, I didn't play basketball at a high level. So I, you know, I'm hung my cleats up a long time ago, you know, outside of the occasional beer league softball game that I get pulled in as a mercenary for. I'm you know, I I, you know, for the most part, I just train to stay much stay fit today.
Ryan Hanley:Mhmm. But those two moments, it's funny. I still have dreams. I still I still will, you know, occasionally wake up and have moments where you're recreating your brain is recreating these these moments in your head that I find you just cannot get or I shouldn't say can't. The closest thing I found is is speaking on stage is the closest thing that I found on the speaker as well.
Ryan Hanley:Do 1, do you do you can you relate to that? Do you do you have that that similar thing? And 2, have you found aspects or been able to replace some of those electrifying sports moments in your professional career?
Dre Baldwin:And so several things. Number 1, I don't still have the visions of the athletic stuff as much as I did when I first stopped. So it was been almost 10 years since I stopped playing. So one of the things that I would even tell myself, and I did this consciously, is when I first stopped playing and I would get know that that just that visionary in your mind, I would always envision something that was athletic, something that you did with your body physically because that's the world that I came from. And that's the way that I could express whatever energy I had.
Dre Baldwin:I expressed that energy through the basketball court or through lifting weights or whatever it was. But then I constantly started telling myself, okay. Well, if that's gonna be over, then we have to shift this mindset, and we can't start defaulting to envisioning athletic performance. We gotta start envisioning whatever business performance is gonna be. I didn't even know what it was gonna be.
Dre Baldwin:I had to start shifting the way that I defaulted to thinking because I knew I was moving into a different space. And that took some time, but I got there. The second thing is I still work out every day. I go I drop basketball. I don't touch I have not again, when I said cold turkey, I really mean cold turkey.
Dre Baldwin:The last game was a a 3 on 3 tournament that finished my sponsor. We won, $10,000, and I haven't played a single official game basketball since. Not even pickup. So when I walked away, I just dropped basketball and picked up other things. So now I like to run.
Dre Baldwin:I'll run, like, 10 k's. I've done a couple marathons, stuff like that. I go to boxing gym. So that's the way I can still do get my, you know, physical rocks off, still do that kind of stuff. And as far as what can emulate that high of getting a nice dunk in the game or, you know, just getting a reaction from the audience when they realize, like, oh, this guy can do some stuff that maybe we didn't think he could do.
Dre Baldwin:We didn't know who he was. Now he just did that. Oh, he's actually he can play. That's I think the closest thing is being on the stage as a speaker. Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:I think that is the closest. That's as far as the things that I do because that's the only place where you have crowd. You know, in business, you're doing it online. You do it through email. You're talking to 1 client or you got one consulting consulting gig.
Dre Baldwin:But the only place you have a crowd in the business world is as a speaker. So, yeah, I would agree that that's the closest that you get to it. Unfortunately, there aren't 82 games a year, at least not for me. My business is not that not not yet not there yet. Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:Right. So, yeah, that's the closest is the speaking. And then it's really, the biggest thing that I tell athletes, and we don't always have a choice in this. Luckily, I had a choice, is hopefully, you get it all out of your system so that you're not looking back like, damn, maybe I coulda did this, maybe I coulda did that. And that's why I said, I was lucky enough to be able to walk away from the game because for a lot of athletes, they say, you know, sometimes you're the last one to find out your career's over.
Dre Baldwin:Yeah. Right? That it you are forced out of the game. You don't choose to walk away. You're forced out.
Dre Baldwin:So luckily, I was able to walk away and I didn't have any regrets of anything that I didn't do or of course, there's always it'd be great to play against this guy again so I could be him or these people. But other than that, no. I got everything I want to get out of it.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. No. That's I I appreciate that a lot. I think that's very useful for a lot of people, myself included. I my my moment of truth was, I I was playing semi pro ball in Washington, DC, which was, you know, the bigger expenses and some other nonsense, but I still had a straight job.
Ryan Hanley:And, after college and I walked into a meeting, and I and my boss looks down at me and goes, did you have a game last night? And I said, yeah. Yeah. We won, you know, whatever. And he goes, yeah.
Ryan Hanley:I can tell, there's blood coming through your khakis. And I looked down and, you know, where I had I had stole 2nd base at some point in the game. And, and I had to the bloodstain from where I slid was coming through my caggies, and it obviously opened up, you know, on my way to work. And, that was when I was kinda like, you know, I think it's time. You know what I mean?
Ryan Hanley:Like, you know, I'm not getting picked up by any pro teams at this point. You know, I I had a couple I had a couple shots and whatever and it was all good. And and look, I was very satisfied with my sports career so I have no regrets but it it was funny. It was just, you know, she kind of looked me up and down. It was like, yeah.
Ryan Hanley:You know, you might wanna start thinking about the fact that you can't show up to business meetings with blood stains with gas. You know? Yeah. You're probably you're probably right about that. You know?
Ryan Hanley:Space probably paying the bills at this point. But so so there was something that you said in, I think it was your TEDx talk that really struck me that when I'm talking particularly, I think, to, to to to younger professionals who have maybe gotten past that, like, I'm brand new to business phase and are in are starting to figure out what what they wanna do. But but they all we all kinda hit this moment or a lot of people hit this moment where we we kind of we wanna be more than we are, but we're not but we but we're hesitant to do the things to get there. And Right. You know, you you addressed a bunch of things in in the TEDx talk that I saw, but the one that really resonated with me that I would love for you to address this idea of a fear of success.
Ryan Hanley:Because I think a lot of people hear a fear of failure. They understand it. They've heard a 1,000,000 talks about it. It's kind of a concept that they have their thoughts on. But I don't think many people consider a fear of success.
Ryan Hanley:And, I I wanna I want I would love for you to expand on this, talk about it, and why it is actually something that we need to think through in order to move forward in our careers.
Dre Baldwin:Man, so that fear of success, I actually, recorded some content on that. It was about a 30 part series or 30 piece 30 points. Yeah.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:Three point 10 parts 30 points. I talked about the fear of success. I wish I could recite all 30 to you. I don't know off the top of my head. But, when it comes to that fear of success, I think is one of the main things that slows people down these days because, obviously, we can see other people's success.
Dre Baldwin:I think fear of failure used to be the biggest thing, let's say, before we had the Internet and we were all interconnected because we didn't know we didn't really know what success looked like if you didn't already have it and you weren't close to someone who had it. But now you can see a lot of people who are successful. You can see all the stuff that they're doing and that they have and that they say and etcetera, etcetera. And I think a lot of people now start to overthink it because we have access to so much information that people just get ahead of themselves mentally and start beating themselves before they even get to before they even get to a thing, they're beating themselves. It's kinda like driving with the emergency brake on.
Dre Baldwin:So that fear of success, I'll give you a a funny example. There's a girl I knew years ago. We were living in the same building and she said, hey. Can you come with me? Because you know I worked out and know I was an athlete.
Dre Baldwin:He said, can you when I'm next time I go to the gym, can you just show me how to do some workouts and stuff? Because she had never worked out in her life. And I said, sure. I'll show you how to use the machines and show you some exercises. And she told me what areas of her body she wanted to work on, etcetera.
Dre Baldwin:I said, alright. Cool. She said, oh, Jerry, one more thing. She gave me a disclaimer. She said, no.
Dre Baldwin:Before we even do that, I How about we just figure out you get into the gym 2 days in a row before you worry about you having too many muscles.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:And and this is what happens with a lot of people. They start fearing the things that might happen with success. I remember once I was talking to some kids. I was working with a volunteer group years ago. These kids were 7th 8th graders.
Dre Baldwin:And the question asked them was, would you wanna be rich, and make a lot of money in life? And a lot of it, these are all young men. They all many of them consistently said, no, I don't wanna make a lot of money because we have a lot of money, we have all these problems. People try to take your money from you and they wanna steal it from you and you get sued. And I'm like, where did y'all learn this?
Dre Baldwin:Where did you get where are you getting this from?
Ryan Hanley:Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:And again, it's just slowing themselves down for something that they haven't even achieved yet. So when it comes to the fear of success, I think one of the biggest things that gets in people's way is the expectations that come with it. Because when you're successful, the first thing that happens is the other people who are not as successful as you, they are not going to try to catch up to you. Because many people think that's what happens that you become successful to all your peers. They see you being successful.
Dre Baldwin:They're gonna say, oh, well, what is Ryan doing? Well, let me get on that same plane of what he's doing. Let me get on let me ride with him. That's not actually what happens. What happens is most people will just stop my end, they'll go sit on sign on and watch you.
Dre Baldwin:Because that's it's easier for them to watch and live vicariously through you as a success than it is for them to do what you did to become a success because not as easy as it looks on TV. And why is that why would somebody fear that? Why does that matter? So let's say you get you got a whole audience of people now watching you be successful. Why would you fear that?
Dre Baldwin:Why would you resist that? Reason that people end up resisting that because people are not dumb. They can think a couple steps ahead. Well, if everybody's on the sideline watching me be successful, what does that mean? That means I need to keep being successful.
Dre Baldwin:That means whatever I did to become successful, I must keep doing it. So it's one thing to make the game winning shot today, but now the next game, they expect you to do it again. And the game after that and the game after that, that's an expectation that becomes a weight on your shoulders. Once you show that you can be successful, now everyone is going to expect you to keep being that level of success all the time. And the thing is, Ryan, is not that people don't know how to do it because once you've done the thing that creates success, whatever that means, then you already know the formula.
Dre Baldwin:You can just deconstruct what you just did in order to be successful. The challenge is not tangible and physical. Can you do it? The challenge is mental and emotional. Are you willing to push yourself to do it?
Dre Baldwin:That's the challenge. And this is why and you mentioned Kobe Bryant earlier today and, for me it'll be Michael Jordan. And what made Michael Jordan who he was is not that he won the championships and the sneakers and the stats. It's the fact that once he became successful and all the expectation was on him to keep being that guy, he actually did it. He delivered on it and he never came off it.
Dre Baldwin:He stayed up there and he never fell down. That is the challenge. And that's a mental and emotional thing. You can't count that. You can't measure it.
Dre Baldwin:There's no film on that. So when people talk about Jordan and Kobe and LeBron, nobody mentions that. Most people don't mention that part. And they don't bring it up in arguments because it's hard to quantify. But that is the main thing that made him who he was.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. You know, one of the things that one of the reasons I started this podcast, you know, when I speak, when I when I coach clients, etcetera, it's it's almost never on tactics. And and in fact, I almost get frustrated when, someone over indexes on tactics. It's always fine to ask about tactics. Tactics are important, and sometimes they can be obstacles.
Ryan Hanley:So I'm not trying to knock them. But on on the realm of importance with all the, you know, successful people I've worked for early in my career that I've been peers with, friends who are very successful when we get together and talk, and you probably know this from your own circles and your own clients. Right? When you're sitting down and, you know, you know, some of my friends, you know, whether it's a glass of whiskey or you're just chilling or whatever you're having, whatever you're, you know, you're just sitting there. No one ever goes, you know, that tactic we put in place didn't work, right?
Ryan Hanley:That that's never the conversation. It's never it's never, you know, we did this and this sales process didn't work and that's what screwed us. It is always something that has to do with their mindset, how they approach the situation. Maybe there was an employee related issue and they came at it too aggressively, or they didn't, reframe their thoughts before they approach something, or they allow their emotions to help them make a decision. And it's it's why I love conversations like this and and and and talking to guys like yourself is that, you know, so much of your work is around the idea of mindset and and how we connect.
Ryan Hanley:And and I think one of the important things I was actually just talking to a buddy of mine who's a who's a a very successful speaker, and we speak on a lot of the same topics. Mhmm. And, you know, I said to him, you know, I was asking him about, you know, what do you do when you're on a speaking docket and you know that someone else earlier in the day, etcetera, possibly had talks on the same topics as you. Right?
Dre Baldwin:Right.
Ryan Hanley:And his response was, we could say the same words, and half the audience will relate to her and half her audience will relate to me. And I think that this is kind of speaking to what you're talking about is you just have to keep going. Right? Because the the the there are always going to be people who may be the way I I could say the same things you're saying, and people are like, I don't get it. And then you frame it with the 3rd day or or talking you're framing in context of your basketball, career.
Ryan Hanley:And all of a sudden, bam. It, like, clicks over for them. And if we just stop because we feel like x number of people or some arbitrary number of views on YouTube haven't been hit yet, we completely missed the purpose of doing the work. And, you know, you you've used multiple times this idea of discipline. I think it's it's cliche to say discipline is important.
Ryan Hanley:But so so, I don't necessarily want you to explain why it's important. I would love for you to explain how you cultivate discipline in your own life. What that how how do you bring that out in yourself? How do you and and maybe even expanding on that as you give your answer. When you feel yourself fall off the path of discipline, how do you correct and bring yourself back on?
Dre Baldwin:Excellent question. So, first thing is most of the time when people are looking for some type of mindsets, boost or advancement or, enhancement, They usually look for confidence. They and I ask people if you could change any internal trait about yourself, something that we can't see or touch, but you can feel it and it matters. What is answer is always confidence. I wanna be more confident, have more self esteem, believe in myself more, which makes more scent makes sense because, Ryan, if people people understand by deductive reasoning.
Dre Baldwin:If I believe in myself more, I'll try more things. I'll do more things. I have, maybe better energy when I do it, and that'll lead to better performance, more results. And it's true. Confidence will help you do all of those things.
Dre Baldwin:The challenge is people don't know where to get confidence from. How do you actually get confidence? And the truth is discipline creates confidence. So if you look at the most confident people you know or at least people who are most confident in a particular area, they are usually highly disciplined in that area as well. That's the reason why they're so confident.
Dre Baldwin:Because they've done the work, they've earned their right to be confident. Now, then the question becomes, let's take another step back. Where did this point come from? Discipline is a result of structure. When you have a proper structure in place, you will be disciplined because you don't have to force it.
Dre Baldwin:See the challenge with discipline, Ryan, is that a lot of people try to make themselves be disciplined. And I hear from the I hear from people all the time, they say this. I'll ask them. Somebody you know, DMs me or text me, and I say, well, what's the biggest challenge you're dealing with right now? And they'll say something like, I need to be more disciplined.
Dre Baldwin:I need to be more, just lack of discipline. There was some some form of that, rhymes with that. And I say, okay. Well, what are you doing to fix it? That's always my follow-up question.
Dre Baldwin:Whatever they say, what are you doing to fix it? And they'll say, well, I just gotta be more consistent. I gotta push myself more. I gotta get more motivated. I just gotta be more disappointed to think.
Dre Baldwin:In other words, I have a problem doing this. So what I need to do is get better at doing this. In other words, they don't they got a circular issue that they can't solve. That's usually the issue that people have when it comes to this. And the reason why I explained to people that structure creates discipline is because when you have the proper structure, if you simply follow the structure, discipline comes out of the bottom of the funnel metaphorically speaking.
Dre Baldwin:You don't have to make yourself be disciplined. All you have to do is follow a process, discipline comes out. So structure, process, systems, also on a personal level habits. These are all in this context, they all mean the same thing. It's a process that you follow, the same things, the same way every time.
Dre Baldwin:The outcome is discipline. So that's where you get that that result of being a more disciplined individual. And again, that discipline produces the confidence, the confidence to the performance, performance to the results results to the rewards. What was the rest of your question? I forgot it here while I'm talking.
Ryan Hanley:No. No. No. It's great. No.
Ryan Hanley:It's awesome. And I'm perfectly happy to reframe the second half. When you find yourself off the path. Right? So so I think, you know, that how do you correct yourself?
Ryan Hanley:How do you how do you see that? And what do you do to get back on? I and and I'll I'll give you the context of this question is I had, a good client of mine call me the other day and say, I've been doing the things and everything was great. And then kid gets sick, wife goes out of town, tough board meeting comes up 3 weeks later. All the structures and processes have been destroyed and he's back to square 1.
Ryan Hanley:And the his com his question was, like, he felt defeated. Right? And, so it's how do you catch yourself and and and get yourself back on that path when you find yourself falling off of it?
Dre Baldwin:Well, the first thing is you had to have a system of checks and balances so that you actually notice that you're off whatever you're supposed to be on. So at least he knew he was off.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:Yeah. At least that's the first step. He knew he was off. And he called you and told you he knew he was off. Now someone of a lesser quality, lesser caliber either would have been off and not known it or they would have been off, known it, and didn't call you and tell you.
Dre Baldwin:So if he's to call, he knew it, and he said something. And he knew he needed to get it fixed, so he calls you to help him get it fixed. So he had to do 3 things there. And most people don't do 1, 2, or 3. So that's the first thing is you have to have a system of checks and balances.
Dre Baldwin:That's why the 4th piece of our program is accountability. Because accountability is not just for the people, it's also for the process. Because if your process is not producing the desired result, we gotta fix the process.
Ryan Hanley:Mhmm.
Dre Baldwin:And if the person is and the person is not following the process and not getting the result, then we gotta fix the person. So the number one thing is you gotta catch yourself. So for me, I'll give you a personal example. I like to try to get out with my son for a walk by 5 PM EST. And for about 2 weeks, I was leaving at 5:17, 5:20, 5:30, 5:40.
Dre Baldwin:I was letting work leak into that time and it was pushing back my evening routine. I was going to bed late and then I wake up at the same time every day early and I wasn't getting enough sleep. So my energy was terrible for about 3 weeks straight this month as we're recording this. And I had to catch myself. I said, okay.
Dre Baldwin:I have to stop doing this. I have to be done work at a certain time. Doesn't mean work I'm gonna do be doing is less. It means I need to do a better job of getting more work done in the time that I do have rather than buying rather than stealing from my time, which is impossible because there's no such thing as managing time. It it goes same pace no matter what you do.
Dre Baldwin:I didn't manage myself and get my stuff done in the time that I have so that I'm not stealing from one activity in order to finish another activity. So I had to catch myself. That's all part of accountability. And this is why we had a systems of checks and balances. And this is why in anything, anybody has an accountant.
Dre Baldwin:You know, accountants do double entry. Why do you do double entry? To make sure that they made a mistake on part a, that part b catches it. Alright. That's the whole point.
Dre Baldwin:That's the reason why you have accountability and it's literally they're called accountants. The reason is they're holding on themselves to account. So you have to have a way of holding yourself to account or being held to account. This is why people in the military perform at a higher level while they're in the service than when they're out because they're always being held to account when they're in the service. Athletes, we're used to being coached.
Dre Baldwin:This is the reason why business people like to hire athletes because we are used to being held accountable. So when you hold them accountable at work, they can take it. Whereas someone who's not used to that, they may bristle and fall apart when they're being held accountable. So these are, these processes and that's a structure. That's the form of a structure.
Dre Baldwin:The military is probably the most structured environment known to man. I've never been in the military before from what I hear. And the next closest place is probably in the sports world, team sports. And the next is maybe certain businesses. Not all of them but certain businesses.
Dre Baldwin:And then hopefully, you get some people who can apply these things in their own lives. So, the answer to your question is you have to have a way of checking yourself. And the only way you can check yourself is there must be a structure in the 1st place because if there's no structure, then there's nothing to check. So your client who called you and said, everything's off structure. Well, how do you know everything's off structures because there's a certain thing is being on structure.
Dre Baldwin:Because before they hired you, maybe there was no structure.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:Right? So if they would have been in that same situation without hiring you, there would be no one to call and nothing to talk about because there's nothing to hold it against.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:So for me, if I say I wanna be done work at 5 PM, even if I just said that, I don't I don't have any other structures in my life. I wanna be done work at 5 PM, and I look at the clock and it's 5:30. At least I had that holding me accountable. So when people hear these words structures and they hear people talk about systems, a lot of business people talk about systems all the time and processes. People think it's some big complex thing and it can be, but it doesn't have to be.
Dre Baldwin:It can be very simple. Alright. The calendar app on your phone that you get for free is a structure. It is a system because it's 24 hours in a day. All you gotta do is put all your activities in there and you'll realize that you can't do everything because everything does isn't gonna fit.
Dre Baldwin:That is a form of a structure. So a structure can be extremely simple. It can be extremely complex, but there needs to be one in order for you to be disciplined. So if you wanna be a disciplined person, anyone listen to this, you must have a structure to follow. No structure, no discipline.
Ryan Hanley:I love that. I'm reading this, this really good book, The Effective Executive. It's by, Peter Drucker. And, you know, read the book. Don't read the book.
Ryan Hanley:The core idea is too often we focus on getting things done instead of getting the right things done. And that is I talked to, I talked to my clients a lot about this because, you know, there a lot of the people that come to me are are are not lazy people. They come to me because they're not lazy, but they feel like they're still not getting the results that they should get despite working really hard. And I think too often, we there's 2 things I see is 1, we just we just check boxes and consider that activity getting things done and reframing that prioritizing is very important. The second thing that I see and, I think some of this comes out of, you know, kind of my jail Christian values or whatever.
Ryan Hanley:Is you know, I have this I have this, quote that I say to myself all the time. It's very short. Grace upon grace. Right? We need to give ourselves grace when you fall off, when you're when you're getting out at 522 and 517 and 516, you know, some people will get really mad at themselves.
Ryan Hanley:Right? And be, I can't do this. What's wrong with me? You know, my son's important to me. This time is, you know, and they and they they allow all this negative emotion to flood themselves when they miss their marks.
Ryan Hanley:And I talk to my clients a lot about, like, you're gonna mess up 10,000 times all the time. Everyone does. Listen to any anyone. And, anyone who's been a success in any way when they when they get past the, like, early egotistical years and they get into the reflective years of their career, they will share with you all the mistakes that they made along the way. And we need to give ourselves, I think, grace and and which helps us I found helps some of these people get back on the path easier because, you know, like, with this guy, he was so mad at himself when he called me.
Ryan Hanley:And I said I said, look, like, you know, we do monthly check ins. And, you know, so I hadn't heard from him. You know? I said, how are you doing? Whatever.
Ryan Hanley:What's up? And I could tell he was upset. And he's like, you know, and we have very simple you know, I like to use physical copy for just the the the right things. Right? I like to use physical because I think there's some now physically checking a box.
Ryan Hanley:It I don't it's got some, it just helps people. It doesn't Doesn't work for everybody. Some people like more digital stuff. But, he said I haven't checked the box in 3 weeks. That's what he said to me.
Ryan Hanley:And I was and he was so upset. And I just said, take a deep breath, man. Like, it's all good. It's 3 weeks of your life. Like, here's the key.
Ryan Hanley:Mhmm. Getting back on the path, not allowing this to derail you for longer. Right? And, I think to your point, and this is why I love the way you broke this down, is that when once we've built that structure once, getting back on the path is so much easier because now we can say, okay. Alright.
Ryan Hanley:I'll be okay. 3 weeks is not the end of my life. I know the process. Let's get right back to it. Let's start doing it again.
Ryan Hanley:Whatever that thing is. Right? If it's if it's sports or if it's business or if it's being a good spouse or partner or a good parent or, you know, a good community leader, whatever that thing is, I I see so many people derail themselves further because they wanna, like, punish themselves for what is just being inhuman. And, you know, I don't know. I I I I'm interested in how much you've seen that and and it you know, how you know, have you have you applied grace or concepts like that?
Ryan Hanley:Or how do you talk to people when they're being in they get to that really negative place when they've missed a goal?
Dre Baldwin:Well, a couple things that you said there that I wanna make sure I say before I before I even answer that question. So when you said you have you get off the structure, you get back on it. It's much easier when you're getting coming to it the second, 3rd time, 4th time besides the first time. So, going back to that concept by the 3rd day, we call that first day. So the first day would be like, let's say someone was really on their thing when it comes to working out or whatever the process is your client was following, but he stopped following it.
Dre Baldwin:And then when you come you get off it for a while and then you come back to it, you're at what we call the first day, which is when you know what it feels like to be in the flow and being perform at your highest level, but you're not there because you've been all 4 minutes, so you're a little bit rusty. So you gotta get back, but you have to respect the process that you do have to start back at step 1. But you'll be able to get to step 10 much faster than you did the first time around. But you must respect the process. We can't just go from 0 to 100 because we gotta build you back up.
Dre Baldwin:It's kinda like when Michael Jordan retire, went to play baseball, came back, wasn't exactly Michael Jordan anymore. It was still pretty good. But then he had to spend that off season getting back to being Michael Jordan, and then he won 3 more championships. So he had to respect the 1st day. He had to go back and do the work all over again.
Dre Baldwin:So I want to mention that that you brought that up. Yeah. Then the other thing is, when you talk about, the effective executive and the titling is is perfect because a lot of people focus on being productive. I just wanna be productive. Productive is checking the boxes, like you said, and we all fall victim to that.
Dre Baldwin:Just yesterday, for example, is, I'm finishing up a course, a marketing course I'm trying to create and or I'm gonna create. And I could have recorded some content yesterday. Recording content is easy for me. It's my comfort zone. But I said, you know what?
Dre Baldwin:I need to finish I'll be finished making this funnel, which is a little bit more work, is a little bit more tedious. But creating the content would have been very easy for me, autopilot. Let me finish making the funnel. And, that funnel will be ready today. I'll probably be launching that course, this weekend.
Dre Baldwin:But the whole thing is I had to catch myself not trying to be productive, but instead being effective. Because that is gonna matter much more for the long run and be making another video or 2.
Ryan Hanley:Yeah.
Dre Baldwin:And it's the the hierarchy is productivity, efficiency, effectiveness. Because productivity is just checking boxes and doing anything. You'd be productive at doing a bunch of nonsense. Then you can be efficient, meaning you're getting a whole bunch of things done. But again, the things are getting done, do they matter?
Dre Baldwin:Like, what you just said. And then effective is getting things done that matter. That's the level that we all wanna be at. Even if you only get one thing done in a day, that one thing could be more important than the other 20 little itsy bitsy things that you were doing yesterday. Alright?
Dre Baldwin:So it's a matter of those things. And can you ask the question again? Because I forgot what the question was.
Ryan Hanley:To be honest with you, I don't even know because that answer was so good. I I can't. Yeah. I said I was a good interviewer, but I was lying. You know, I wanna be respectful of your time.
Ryan Hanley:I wanna respectful the audience's time, and and I have one final question for you, and and you can answer this any way that you want. So so take this wherever you want to go. I I titled this podcast Finding Peak. And, you know, it was a testament to my own pursuit of peak performance, understanding kind of journey, not a destination. And oftentimes and and and as I've grown the podcast, it's become even more important to me that this is a archive for my own my I have 2 boys for my boys to understand what what this journey means and what their father was thinking about at this time.
Ryan Hanley:They're they're younger. They're 8 and 10. And some of these concepts, although I try to talk to them about these concepts, some of them still go over their head. And I'm like, you'll understand when you get older, but let that stuff marinate. So, you know, taking into account everything you've already said and you can repeat answers.
Ryan Hanley:You've already made In in your own pursuit of of peak performance in your life, whether that's your basketball career, your your entrepreneurial career, your relationship with with loved ones, your son, etcetera. So take this whatever direction you want. In in the pursuit of p perfection or p performance, I'm sorry, if there was one thing, just just just one thing that you could you could instill upon your your child and say, here is if you grab this one thing, you got the best chance of of becoming the best version of yourself, the best version of however god made you. What what would that what would that one thing be?
Dre Baldwin:That's a great question. I've never been asked that one. The one thing that I would give him to be the best version of himself is it will be tapping into investing in yourself, is understanding the concept of investing in yourself. And that in life, we have 5 forms of investment, time, money, attention, energy, and focus. And anything in which we wanna be successful, you must invest off of.
Dre Baldwin:There are no shortcuts to that. And any challenge that he ever faces, he needs to look at, has he made the investments that will position him to resolve and handle that challenge that's in front of him. As long as he understands that, then he can look and say, okay. I'm having this problem with my body. I'm having this problem with my business.
Dre Baldwin:I'm having this problem with my relationships. Have you made the investments? And then he can just by deductive reasoning that is a structure in itself, look at and see where he may be deficient. Fix that deficiency. It usually will lead him in the direction if not completely solving the problem.
Ryan Hanley:I love that answer. Man, it's been my absolute pleasure to connect with you and chat with you. I love your work. I love what you're doing. For those listening, to this show or watching on YouTube, where is the best place for them to connect with you, learn more, learn more about the courses you have, your books, your work, or if they wanna hire you to speak, where are the best places to drive people?
Dre Baldwin:Well, people can get a that concept the 3rd day. I got a book on it. I give people a free copy. Can I share that?
Ryan Hanley:Yeah. Share whatever you want, man. This is this is full promo time. You you you you gave so much value to us. I want I want you to give as get as much back as you can.
Dre Baldwin:Perfect. Well, this is the book, The 3rd Day. The decision that separates the pros from the amateurs. So I as I talked about, made a YouTube video about this 10 years ago, and then I did a TED talk about it, like, when I first got out of sports, and then I wrote a book about it. So this book is all about how you show up and give your best effort when you always feel like it.
Dre Baldwin:I'll give you a free copy of this paperback version of the book. All you gotta do is go to 3rd day book.com. The book is free. We just ask that you cover the shipping in 3rd day book.com. As far as everything else that we're doing, once you get this book, you'll be on my email list, and I send out a lot of email.
Dre Baldwin:I sent out about a 1,000,000 and a half emails this month. So, you'll be in my email list. I'll know everything we got going, but, work on your game. University.com is the place where, we're most focused right now. That's usually that's where we do our coaching, consulting, etcetera.
Dre Baldwin:And you can if you wanna reach out to me about anything else that is not covered on one of those sites, you could just send us an email. I am very easy to reach. All our profiles are public. I'm on every social media platform. So just whip my name up.
Dre Baldwin:I'm hard not to find. So just send us a DM or email, and we're easy to reach.
Ryan Hanley:Dre, it's been such a pleasure having you on the show.
Dre Baldwin:Thank you for having me. Thank you for sharing your platform, Ryan.