Marcus Daniell: How Elite Athletes Master Pressure, Purpose & Life After Sport

But yeah, so like, noticing the pressure, accepting that it's normal. So those are two for me. Those are two like, necessary stages. And then from there, moving to, well, OK, but I've done this thousands of times before. I'm a great tennis player. I know I have the tools to do the job. So just fucking get the job done. Like, it's like this caring, sort of open. Yeah. Like warm space to begin. And then it's like, OK, you feeling all this stuff? That's fine. Welcome, Marcus. Great to have you here on the show and I've been really looking forward to this one.

You are one of the most articulate people that I know and we have a lot of history together and I'm just excited to explore where you've been since you stopped playing professional tennis. I do know a lot about it, but I'm sure you enlighten us even more. And you've had AI mean from really humble tennis beginnings, you had a stellar career. I mean, 5 tour titles, quarterfinals of Grand Slams and of course the big one, an Olympic medal. And if I remember correctly, the first tennis Olympic medal in New Zealand ever had, which is just a phenomenal achievement.

And you know, that kind of sets you apart from many players in New Zealand, especially from when I think of where you began this whole journey and everything like that, that can tell anybody that if they put in the work and get their focus right and everything like that, amazing things can happen over time. But the thing that really fascinates me, and it's going to be my first question to you after you've given a little synopsis of where you're at now and and a little bit about your journey, your exit from tennis.

And I want to really explore that. So if you can, you know, give people just a little synopsis of your movie trailer sort of of your life. I know our lives are very, very big, but if you can just and dance it, that would be great. Yeah, for sure. Well, always a pleasure to talk to you, Dave. One very technical correction. So we were, we were the first medalists for New Zealand at the Olympics and tennis. But Anthony Wilding, who's our greatest ever, who played in the early 1900s, he won a bronze medal in singles for Australasia.

So until 1920, I think New Zealand and Australia competed at the Olympics together. So Kiwi has won an Olympic tennis medal before but hasn't won it for New Zealand. So I don't know. We can, we can claim that, but it feels a little hollow. We'll put it this way for for over 100 years something. A little bit about me. So I grew up in rural New Zealand on a chicken beef farm. My family, both sides of my family actually come from generations of farmers. Yeah, middle of nowhere. The closest town of any note was a place called Mastodon, which had 20,000 people.

Luckily the farmhouse had this old asphalt tennis court and my parents would play recreationally. So, you know, New Zealand, we have long summer evenings and they'd get out there after the farm work had finished. I have an older sister and an older brother who wanted to join in and all youngest siblings want to do what the oldest siblings do. So basically from when I could walk I was running around after them dragging a tennis racket. Apparently I never wanted a kid sized tennis racket, so I was dragging tennis rackets that were bigger than me around.

The thing that probably made me fall in love with tennis was, and this was genius from my mom, 3 young kids, all pretty rambunctious. She put a tennis ball in a stocking and hung it from the roof of the garage. And apparently that was like my, my PlayStation, you know, like I'd just be in the garage by myself, just like batting this ball around for hours. And I meant mum could focus on the other two siblings. So you know, what was probably a selfish mood from my mum actually turned into an amazing little little entertainment for me and turned into a career.

You got your 10,000 hours without knowing it. Yeah, exactly. And then, so when I was about four, we moved a little closer to the, to Mastodon to town, about 10 minutes outside town so we could go to school there. And that was when I first, you know, played tennis at a club. I, I met there was a coach there called Silla Pollock, who I guess saw some natural talent and, and wanted to give me some lessons. But fast forwarding through the next sort of 10 years of life, I had a very normal childhood in New Zealand, especially in rural New Zealand, New Zealand, which is, you know, holidays.

I was working on the farm if I didn't have any other sport commitments and doing every single sport I could get my hands on, from snowboarding to surfing to basketball, soccer, tennis, any just anything. And tennis was very much a summer sport. You know, as I got older, I started from the age of about 10 or 11, I think once a week I'd drive to a small city nearby to get a tennis lesson. But it was just, it was fun and I was competitive. I was talented. I was playing tournaments. But but yeah, it wasn't really, you know, I wasn't sort of grinding from a young age.

And then at the age of 15, I was actually, you know, I guess this, this shows how small New Zealanders. But I'd made it into the New Zealand squad for both soccer and tennis and I had a decision forced on me between the two. The New Zealand Soccer Federation or whatever they were called at the time, said I needed to be year round with that team to stay on the team. Ended up choosing tennis, moved up to Auckland to boarding school so I could train more. Did that for two years and then did my felt like I maxed out New Zealand potential to to improve in tennis.

And I guess I was taking it more seriously from that stage because I'd given up something I'd loved. I'd moved away from home. I was like, OK shit, I'd better get get my act together here. And then did my last year of high school by correspondence from Slovakia. I was working with a Slovakian coach who who took me over there and that's when I really knuckled down, learned what it would take to be a pro because in New Zealand I was a big fashion, a small pond. Got over to Europe for the first time as a 17 year old and was like, oh crap, I'm so far behind the 8 ball here.

So yeah, like trained my ass off too hard really and got injured, but started my pro career there and I'll try and Fast forward very quickly through this next little bit. Made some progress, got injured, came back, met the team at Bath and met you Dave, when I was in my young 20s, I don't know, maybe 2122, and was trying to look for a more considered and professional way to approach training, particularly physical training so as not to get injured. I thought that the environment and Bath was great so started working with you and we might get into this later, but there was an inflection point in our time working together where it really.

From that point I really started boosting up the rankings and playing a lot better and getting better results. And then injuries kept hounding me. Started focusing on double S at the age of 24 or 25. And actually when I made that decision, it was very, very quick between making the decision and getting to the stage where I was playing tour events can week out and playing all the slams. And yeah, then I never feel like I really backed out my potential. But there were some really special moments, you know, the Olympic medal being by far the highlight for me, but also some tour wins after a long time of making third rounds of grand slams, breaking into the quarterfinals a few times, that felt really special.

And, and yeah, and I was a total of probably 17 years on tour with some time away with injury, but it was a long time living outside New Zealand and grinding, but some pretty incredible experiences along the way. Great. Yeah, very good summary. Thank you. And I think that will give a lot of tennis players and athletes in any sport some good perspective that you don't have to specialize from a very young age to make it in a sport. And there is a lot of research saying that if you play multi sports, ultimately most people who make it through have do better if they've played multi sports than if they specialize very, very young.

I think, you know, there are a number of players who who are very good at other sports and then eventually had to choose if, you know, wanting to go professional. So I think it's a bit of a myth that, you know, if you specialize really, really young that that's going to give you an unbelievable leg up because it actually doesn't and in some ways I think can burn people out. But what I'm very interested in is, and I don't know, because obviously I was with you and the the starting of high impact athletes and your exit from tennis, how much of it was planned?

Because it seems from the outside that you actually planned it pretty well or how much of it was kind of by accident, you know, moving in the direction that you have done it was you start, you started with it while you were playing, but was it with the end goal in mind or is it just something you start and thought, well, I'll see how this goes? There's absolutely no, there was no intention to have it be my job after tennis at all. I I didn't think it was going to be a thing when I started it. Well, yeah, that that sort of doesn't make sense.

Let me explain. The way high impact athletes came about was when when I started focusing on double S, which was basically basically the time where I started making a living from tennis. I wanted to balance the scales of giving back in sport in general. And I think in tennis in particular, it's a it's very selfish and you take a lot from the world, you take from the people around you. Everything is is taking to make you better. And that's necessary. And you know, everyone who succeeds in tennis has that ambition and, and, and has the, the grit and determination to do that and, and to take and to push themselves forward.

But just as a way to be in the world outside of tennis that never really set perfectly with me. And, and actually often through my career, I struggled with the person that I felt like I had to be on the tennis court to win matches and the person that I wanted to be moving through the world outside of tennis and the way to treat people and to think about people and kindness and all all this sort of stuff. So anyway, when when I started making a living from tennis, I felt this really strong urge to give back in some way and didn't trust the charities I've grown up around wanted to make an informed decision about giving back if it was going to be donations and and giving financially.

So anyway, I went down this rabbit hole, found this niche in the charity world that's all about effectiveness and cost effectiveness and impact. That really landed for me because it was like the high performance mindset applied to charity and I started giving, gave a discrete donation that year. I think the following year I started with a 1% pledge of my income and that felt good at the end of the year. So next year did 5%, keep building it up, building it up. And I did that for about 5 years, I think from about 2015 to 2020.

And I never told anyone about it, never really spoke about it publicly because it just felt like something that I wanted to do. And also in New Zealand, we had this thing called tall puppy syndrome, where, you know, if you boast, then people sort of absolutely drag you through the mud for it. But then in 2020, when COVID hit and the tour stopped and basically I lost my job, I started thinking, OK, well, like, you know, at that stage, I think I'd committed 8% of my income. And I was like, well, 8% of 0 is 0.

If I don't play tennis this year, then I'm not going to be able to give to these organizations financially. So what else can I do? And I had this realization that I just sort of had to get over myself around my discomfort about speaking about giving to charity. And that was the conception of high impact athletes was I need to speak about this to the people who follow me. And I have a relatively small following in the athletes space, but a bunch of athletes that I know have huge followings, you know, for better or worse, athletes I listen to about things wider than their sport.

So that was the conception. Honestly thought it was just going to be me pestering my friends on tour about these charities that I thought were were great. But very quickly, little of 2020, I started tinkering and trying to figure out how to build a website and all that sort of stuff. Made it sort of official in public and at the start of December 2020 and by the Aussie Open the next year mid Jan 2021, I was starting to think oh shit like I'm probably going to need to hire some help for this because there's so much interest from the athlete community, which was a real surprise.

It's it's almost like a lot of athletes had this desire to be more generous or to give back, but didn't have trust in the space or didn't have this easy sort of how to do. It really, I mean, I know it's, yeah, it sounds silly, but who do I give to? Why do I give to them? And, and I think, yeah. And it's amazing. The pent up desire that you had actually you found was in many athletes. Yeah, totally. And, and well, I'd love to speak to that, but first like, yeah, that, that how to do it is actually a really big problem because there are literally millions of charities in the world and follows a distribution curve like anything else.

The majority of them are really average. Some of them are literally harmful even though they're trying to help. Some of them are scandals and frauds. But then the other tail end is there are some that are just outrageously impactful for every dollar. So we work with the research organizations to to identify those ones and just connect athletes with them. So athletes have this problem solved of, OK, if I give to one of HA's charities, then I know that they're one of the best in the world and it's sort of problem solved.

They've done my giving back. I can focus on my tennis, on my sport, whatever it is. But the the thing that I've realized after speaking to hundreds and hundreds of athletes is especially amongst athletes who have sort of made it, whatever that means for them, there's this intense focus and journey to get to the point where you make it. And it's almost like nothing else has the space to come in during that process because it's all consuming. So then if you get there and if you stay there and you feel some sort of security about it, then it seems really common that for a lot of athletes at some point in their careers, they ask why, Like, what's the deeper purpose?

OK, I've done this thing. I've like achieved this, this level that I, that was my dream. Why, why am I doing this? Why should I keep smashing myself to to stay there? And it's that purpose piece that I think giving back and giving to charity and or, you know, some athletes find it and doing it for their families or supporting, you know, the wider families or whatever it is. A lot of athletes grasp for that deeper why the deeper purpose behind the sacrifices that you have to keep making. And so I think your high impact athletes sort of can step into that gap and and say, Hey, well, if you want to give back, here are some options that are proven to be some of the best in the world.

But yeah, going back to your your original question, it was never anywhere near my mind that this would be what I would do post tennis. And it's been, it's been pretty astounding to watch it grow over the five years since it started. You know, there's been, it probably took away from my tennis since I started it. Like there's I've put a lot of time and energy into making it what it is today, but I don't regret a thing. Like, it's I was talking to a friend a while back who said, like, you know, wouldn't it be funny if in New Zealand you're remembered not as an Olympic medalist, but as like someone who's built this, this organization that's done all this good in the world?

And that to me is the dream. Like, I would love for that to be the case. So I sort of think of it as a life's work. And I feel like we're just at the start. Yeah. I feel like we're we're building momentum and it's, it's pretty exciting. Yeah, and and speaking to that, I think that and I, and, and I do say this to to athletes that I work with is, you know, every player is going to be an ex player one day. And there's a lot of life after tennis. And so it's a phase of your life where you have to be incredibly focused.

And I use it kind of from another direction is, you know, why not do this now while you can and then you can do that. And yeah. And, and I would agree with you, I think it did detract a little bit from your tennis because you weren't like that. You were probably more a little bit like that. But that width, you know, the differences are so small at a high level. But at the same time, had you not done it? I think, I think one of the the key aspects here is had you not done it while you were still playing, I think it would have been a lot harder to get the traction that you got because you were able to be there in the locker rooms and talking to people and do it personally.

And once you've stopped, that becomes a little more difficult to to do. So I think you know, in terms of the long term, starting at while you were still playing is probably a big reason why it's grown so fast. I agree. I agree. And it's been interesting to watch since I've, you know, I was injured for almost 2 years and then played one more year, then then retired. And it's been interesting to see there has been a slight drop off and athlete giving. And it might be because I'm, I'm not there. I'm not, you know, people forget a little bit.

Yeah. And I tried to be really sensitive while I was on tour, basically to not be a pain in the ass, you know, like in the locker room. It wasn't like cornering people and being like, hey, sit down. Let me tell you about charity. It was like, you know, if you ever have the time and the desire to to have a chat, then I'm here and this is what we do. Well, I mean, I think it's a credit to you because I never heard in the locker room from anybody saying, oh, Mark is a pain in the ass. So, and, and I'm, I'm pretty sure I would have heard it if if people were feeling like they were being pressured.

So so your your low key sales pitch worked. I'm very glad to hear that, actually. My second question for you is obviously you've dealt with a lot of pressure in, in tennis. Has it kind of formulated a model in your head as to how to deal with pressure now off the court? Or how do you, you know, what is the process you go through when you've got a tough decision to make and need to make it, you know, and, and, and has the athlete background had an impact on that or, you know, has it helped you formulate some kind of model for dealing with pressure off the court?

100% it has helped dealing with pressure. There are two things that I think tennis in particular, I can't speak to other sports, but a tennis in particular I think teaches you extremely well. One is dealing with pressure and pressure moments and the other is dealing with failure. And in terms of dealing with pressure, the framework that I found most helpful, most consistently was there has to be an aspect of acceptance to it. Like a, you know, you and I have spoken about this a lot over the years.

We worked together. There were people that I played with and double S who would do anything not to acknowledge that pressure existed. And to me, to me that's really unhelpful because you know, if you're lying to yourself and trying to suppress this thing that keeps growing and growing and growing as a match gets tighter and as the stakes get higher, then it's, it's like, it's almost like this insidious. You have to keep it down and it'll keep crawling through the cracks and, and creeping up on you.

The thing that worked for me was, and I, I sort of hate how cliche this word word has become, but like being mindful of the fact that you're feeling pressure and you're feeling nervous. So the first thing is noticing it. The second thing is being like this is normal. It's everyone feels pressure, every player. Some people mask it better than others. I think why from what people have told me, if they're watching on, on TV or whatever, I think usually I masked it pretty well. Although if you're a tennis player, you, you see all these tiny, you know, the tiny little signs that that we'll show you.

Yeah, and, and, and often it manifests just from one shot that a player hits. You just feel that was tight. Yeah, or like the serve loses like 4 kilometers an hour. Yeah. Yeah. OK. Yeah. But yeah, so like, noticing the pressure, accepting that it's normal. So those are two for me. Those are two, like, necessary stages. And then from there moving to. Well, OK. But I've done this thousands of times before. I'm a great tennis player. I know I have the tools to do the job. So just fucking get the job done.

Like, it's like this caring, sort of open. Yeah, like warm space to begin. And then it's like, OK, you're feeling all the stuff. That's fine, but you've still got a job to do. You've still got to step up and hit the serve. And, you know, you've done it. How many serves have you hit in your life? Millions. And so, you know, you can hit it in the court, so just go and bloody do it. And I found that that sort of contrast of, you know, between a point when you're trying to breathe and you're, you know, trying to.

Figure out what to do next. Being like, oh shit, I'm feeling nervous. OK, Arms are a bit tight. OK, well, probably should because it's like, you know, break point down for all in the third or whatever it is. And then you're like, OK, I am feeling those things. That's fine. My partner might be feeling them too. If the other team was in the same situation, they'd be feeling it. So that's all fine. Let's just go up and and like go through the routine and do the thing that you've done millions of times before.

Yeah. I, I don't know if that's if that's like explained well enough, but that's sort of the process. I think it's very good and I think acceptance is such a huge part of the sport because the other thing is it doesn't matter how good you are. And even if you didn't get nervous, which is not possible, but even if you didn't say it was possible, you're still not going to come through every press situation because sport doesn't work like that. So you know, the acceptance comes both sides, like, you know, I'm going to do the best that I can with this moment.

And you know, if I come out the wrong side of it, I'll accept that because that's the sport. And if I come out on the right side of it, that's great because that's what I'm trying to do as much as possible. And the other thing is, you know, which, you know, I wasn't able to impart this knowledge to you at the time because I didn't, I didn't really think of it at that, you know, until, you know, the last couple of years. But the best way to, you know, deal with nerves and tension is to see every time that you're in that place as an opportunity to become a better player under pressure, a better player when you're nervous.

Because at the end of the day, when you're nervous, you got to play good, good nervous tennis. And the only way you're going to play good nervous tennis is to be nervous a lot and get good at playing nervous tennis. I love that reframing because it reframes it as as an opportunity. There's something something in the mental reframing of that that I think is really powerful. It's not like a challenge, it's like a it's not a difficulty, it's an opportunity. I really like that. Yeah. And as I said, I apologize.

I didn't know that I was working with you, but yeah. And I think, again, it's an acceptance that, you know, I have to get good at this. I can't try to hope that it goes away by itself or that it does. It's not going to happen always because it is going to happen a lot 1. Of one of my favorite and most memorable quotes that you have is same shit, different level and it's so true. And so anyone who thinks like you know, know that jogger actual whatever doesn't feel nerves. He's felt the same types of nerves since he was a kid.

The stakes just get higher and higher, but it's exactly the same feeling set in the body. Yeah, and, and, and really what experience and level as you get better means actually that you've just learning how to play those nervous moments better, You're managing them better. The trying to avoid it is the worst thing because how you're going to get good at something if you don't go through it all time and see that this is what I have to do. This is it's not an option. Those people who pretend that it doesn't exist, all right, are really hurting themselves because they they're not ever getting into that head spaces.

Look, I have to get good at doing this when I'm nervous, they're always attending. Like I wasn't nervous. It's you know, the sun got in my eyes or you know, you know, I don't know what you know, the the ball didn't bounce right. That's why my arm tightened up or, you know, there's, you know, and and that's another thing that that I've come to realize is when someone makes an excuse, which brings us to a pivotal moment in your career. But when someone makes an excuse, actually what they're saying is I should have, I should be doing something different.

So somebody makes an excuse, then if you challenge them and say, OK, you know, let's say, you know, it was so cold today. I just couldn't play well. If you didn't make that excuse, what would you have to do differently? What would you? Because an excuse says that I would have to do something different to sort the situation out. You didn't you just use the excuse saying, OK, it's too cold. I I can't win today. But if it if you did something different in order to drop that excuse, what would it be?

And that's a tough question to answer, but it's the right question. Yeah, I, I feel like because of you, my relationship with excuses changed pretty drastically. And when you, when you see excuses for what they are, you see how common they are and everything that firstly, that your own mind does, and secondly, in what everyone else communicates around you. And I think, I think it's, yeah, it's this reframing of excuses and the sort of package that goes with it, I think is one of the most powerful, one of the most powerful things that anyone can learn in any sphere of life because it doesn't matter where you want to apply it, it's still useful.

And I think you'd like, we had this conversation long before this guy in this book came out and spoke about it publicly. But it reminds me of this concept of radical ownership by Jocko Willing. Where? Yeah, like you, you, you take a radical ownership of your own failings and weaknesses and sort of turn them on themselves. Well, yeah, I mean, I'd say the day you turned your back on the Chapel of Bullshit was a pivotal moment, absolutely. And I think it's an unbelievable credit to you because it's one thing to understand it, it's quite another thing to actually do it.

Long process too. I mean, I remember we, Yeah, I so the short version of the story, I was playing a challenger in Nottingham on grass. I don't know what I was ranked at the time, 607 hundred, something like that, playing against the guy who was ranked 200 or something, also known as a good grass court player. I went out, played pretty well, lost in two tiebreak sets and felt like I'd fought hard. But from memory, at like 3 all in the first set tiebreaker, he'd got a net cord winner and I'd turn to Dave on the sideline and said, like, oh man, it's not my day.

And that, that little utter ring came back to haunt me many times. So anyway, I, we've, I finished this match, went and warmed down, had a shower and came out to, to do a debrief with Dave and, and Makka, who was the two ICFF at the time. You know, I was expecting it to be the normal thing of like, you know, where do you feel like you did well? Would you do poorly? What can we work on, strategy, that sort of thing. And I sat down, remember this setting vividly. It was on all those picnic tables outside of Nottingham.

The first thing out of Dave's mouth was you are a fucking tourist. I was like, wow, OK, that's that's not the start. I was, I was expecting but went on to explain what he meant by that. And after my shock and defensiveness, which to be fair took like a little while like I was, I think I was feeling pretty defensive for the first 10-15 minutes. And this was a this was like a a for the for the ages Dave rant. So lasted a good sort of 30-40 minutes. But Dave explained what he meant by that, explained the concept of the Chapel of Bullshit and why I was living in it.

And that thing that I said on court during that first set, tiebreaker was a perfect example of it because I was playing pretty well. Like I wasn't off my game. I was competing, you know, I was in with a very good chance of winning that set. It was basically neck and neck. One piece of luck happened. And that was enough for me to think and to say out loud, it's not my day. Basically meaning like, OK, I'm not going to win this match. And if you, you know, in the moment, it's just a stupid thing to say, but my mind was in that place.

And if you zoom out from that and think about it from an objective level, like how can you say that you're down 4 three in the first set tiebreaker? How can you say it's not your day? It just doesn't make any sense. So for me, like in time, looking back on it, that's the perfect example of an excuse that has no merit to it that was holding me back. That probably was a large factor in and me losing that match. And if you can remove that excuse, remove it from your mind, then you remove that huge reason to lose the match and you and you probably lose less of those matches.

So that that for me was like was just a huge moment of understanding as that chaplet bullshit talk went on. But getting back to the process piece, like I remember you and I made a deal and actually I'd love to, I'd love to get what you remember about this because I'm hazy on one of the details. I remember we made a deal that from that point forward in training, if I was less than 100% mentally there for, for individual shots, not for like stretches of drills or whatever, then training would stop.

So I had to be from the very first ball of training until I could not anymore. I had to be 100% mentally present. And I remember for the first week or so, I don't think I made it past about 40 or 45 minutes. And I was exhausted after those after less than an hour because it was a different type of presence and energy and focus than I'd ever consciously put in before. But what I don't remember was it wasn't one shot. And I know I could have one shot that wasn't 100% mentally present, but I can't remember if it was two shots in a row or three shots where it was like you called it or we called it three shots, 3, three shots.

Yeah, that's what I thought. And it was it was an honesty system, right? It was like I had to acknowledge it or you had to point it out and I had to accept. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that was, that was an incredible process because I'd never, I thought I'd worked. I had physically worked incredibly hard before that point, but I don't think I had understood what's deep 100% committed mental work associated alongside that physical work felt like and it's like 5 times more exhausting. I could have trained for five hours on the court and and 2-3 hours in the gym before that point a day, but when I started applying myself like that, I couldn't last more than 40 minutes on court in the first week.

It was amazing. Yeah. And I think at every level the focus gets sharper and sharper. And I think, you know, players and athletes don't always realize that you have to get mentally fit. And what happened in that process is you began started to become truly mentally fit where you were able to focus, truly focus for longer and longer periods. And, and that that is the difference. And you know, ability is not really, you know, and I'm not saying I'm saying given a given an equal ability, let's say a player is 1000 to a player is 50.

We'll just be focused and and not using excuses. You know, those 2GO hand in hand. But if you get that focused, you almost don't have space as much space for the excuses to come in as well. You know, because you're so intent on doing your job well, there's less time. You know, obviously tennis has all this time in between and that's where the stuff happens in the head. But while you're actually practicing and doing it, you don't have as much time for excuses to grab hold and. Completely agree. Hand in hand.

I think one one bit of nuance there is. I agree that the difference between 1050 is is focus for the most part. I think it's it's focus over time though right? Like yes a person who's 1000 can't apply themselves 100% mentally and then beat top 50 players consistently. It's like applying 100% focus over time as you improve. Because yeah, well, I think you improve as your focus improves. Yep, all the time. You're getting mentally fitter and your game is getting better as well. So, you know, you can't separate these things.

They're all part of a part of a package, you know, and at at the end of the day, you know, they they've been players with some pretty big holes in their game, but they've mentally got to a place where they know how to make this package very effective. And you know, you know, they've been players, you know, you know, Ed Berg had a, you know, slightly Dicky forehand. You know, Richard Krycheck, you know, he's one handed backhand was not a great shot. But rather than saying, oh, you know, my backhand is terrible, I'm you know, this is going to really hurt me, you know, you know, and I had the discussion with Richard and, and he said, well, I knew I had to do something to to hide my backhand in a way.

And so I started running around backhands more and cranking my forehand more, going to the net more and, and as a competitor saying, OK, this is what I've got, how do I win with this? Rather than, you know, and, and, and you know, there are players that I've worked with who have absolutely everything except 1 little area that lets them down. And it kills their career because they they get so caught up in the fact that when they can't make a forehand as an example that, you know, he has. There it goes again, you know, and I'm kind of done.

You've been gifted so much. Just manages one damn thing. Yeah, Most players have one damn thing. That's just not the best, you know, close to the best. So I think it's it's really important. I think it's also in life is, you know, you got your hand, play it well. You know, you can't change the cards. You got to play your hand and just try to play it well. And that that package is really, really important. Completely agree. My I've got 2 questions for you now. What person's journey has really influenced you and kind of amazed or taught you something incredibly interesting?

I mean, I know life is long and there's been a lot of people in your life or books you've read or whatever. But if, if it is, you know, it's kind of one person's journey as an example to you or whatever, who would that be or what would it be? That's a great question. The first person who comes to my mind, it's actually pretty left field. It's a guy called Peter Singer, who's a philosopher. I say him because he's actually shapes my life hugely. So Aussie guy still alive, He's, he's probably in his 70s now and his philosophy is around practical ethics.

So basically thinking about what it means to live a good life and how to live a good life. And I first came across, I did some university sort of distance learning university stuff and did quite a lot of philosophy papers first came across. I've still got a picture of you getting your diploma. Really. Remember I gave it to you. I don't know. I think, I don't know which tournament we were at, but you had passed and I, I, I can't remember the details. I can't remember either. I hope you can find us.

Yeah, I I'll send it to you. Yeah, definitely. Like congratulations, you passed and that was for. Now get back on the court. Yeah, but I'm trying to it was in a hotel lobby and I can't remember where we were, but anyway, I. Was in auspicious graduation ceremony ever. Yeah. So this anyway, this guy, he, he's written a lot about animal welfare and animal rights. And I remember coming across some of his arguments when I was in my young 20s around vegetarianism and finding them interesting and sort of forgetting about it.

And then in my mid 20s came across him again and started reading a few of his books. And he's, he's an incredible writer. He writes about things that should be uncomfortable or are are uncomfortable and might sound boring at face value and makes them really interesting. And it's just so clear in his thinking and his writing that Long story short, he's probably one of the main reasons that I decided to start giving to charity in the 1st place. He's an inspiration in terms of the pledge that he's made and one of the reasons that I made a pledge to give at least 10% of my income for the rest of my life.

He's also the main reason behind why I went vegetarian and 2017 or something. So he's his thinking and his writing have led to these really massive life decisions for me that have shaped, have shaped the way that I live my life in a pretty profound way. And some of it's quite annoying. Like I, I, it would have been a lot easier for me not to be vegetarian when I was on tour would still be a lot easier for me not to be vegetarian. You know, I grew up on a sheep and beef farm eating meat 38 * a week.

You know, I, I miss, I miss and, and, and remember the flavors. So it would, it would be more convenient to, to not have come across Peter Singer, his, his reasoning and his arguments. Just shut all of the doors and gone back to excuses. All of these excuses I had for myself one by one got taken away. And if you're not living in the Chapel of bullshit, then you can't give yourself, you know, these, these stupid excuses to live by. So he's the first guy that came to mind. And I feel like he's been vilified a little bit in the media from time to time because he has stances that people read the headlines of and think he's a horrible person.

But if you actually read what what his ideas were, then you'd understand that he's deeply compassionate and just a pretty incredible human. Great. Well, I just urge everybody to read. I've read some of his stuff as well. And yeah, it's, I think, you know, there's a, there's such a strong correlation there. You know, I said to you earlier, it's one thing knowing something and being aware of something. It's another thing actually doing it. And the fact that you, you know, committed to what he, you know, a lot of what he was saying and decided that this is the way you want to live your life.

I think it's the exact same reason why you made it in tennis, because it's easy to say and hard to do. I hadn't put that together. Yeah, you might be right. I'm sure of it. It's that same mindset that that's and it's going to be the same mindset that makes you incredibly successful with HIA because you know it doesn't matter what your truth is. But if you start to live by your truth then and take away the excuses for not living by your truth, then I think you're going to do very, very well anybody.

Because you're not having excuses for not doing things that are uncomfortable. Because it doesn't, you know, if it doesn't suit your truth, then you have to make an excuse. Otherwise you can't deviate from it. I think there's. Nobody's going to be perfect or anything like that, but in broad terms. Yeah, I there's, there's something, there's something really interesting in that. And so, you know, being vegetarian on tour is it's a bit different. And you know, I tried not to shout it from the rooftops, but you know, people found out about it.

And especially after the documentary The Game Changers came out, I actually had a lot of people asking me what my experiences were and how it was on tour to be to be vegetarian. And you know, being honest, I didn't feel better physically being vegetarian. The only benefit I found? Was after lunch, I didn't have such a heavy stomach to train or play a match on. So lighter stomach that was nice and helped sometimes, but it wasn't like I stopped eating meat and had this huge like burst of energy or like less inflammation.

Like I didn't personally experience any of that. I've met people who have, but not for me. The thing that I legitimately noticed was this is like a real intangible, more internal peace. And I think it's to what you were saying. I think it's like I had come to believe a set of things about ethics and about what it meant for me to be a good person and to live a good life. And I had decided to live by them. And in living by them, it just sort of mentally just like things just calmed down a little bit.

And I felt generally it's, it's hard to explain it without getting sort of woo woo, but just like a little bit more in tune with with the world. Yeah, yeah. That's a great word for it. And that I don't know if it translated to something that was better in my tennis, but in life I just felt better in general, which was a beautiful change. And the one thing about that game changes is how many people turned vegetarian and it lasted anything from 5 minutes to, you know, 50 days to maybe five months and then went back.

So yeah, again, I and, and it's not a criticism. It's just that I think doing something because it's a fad and not your truth, you're never going to stick to it. Yeah, I agree. I was. I was really disappointed actually. I had so many great conversations with so many people about my experiences and and the reasons and all that sort of stuff and had a lot of head nodding and like interest. But yeah, I don't, I don't think it really stuck. But a lot of people did actually go vegetarian, right? You know, that I was around.

And then, you know, as I said, it just didn't last very, very long. Yeah. And so their reasons for doing it were to kind of this is what's the in thing now or whatever and not and not because they I don't know or they truly felt it, but then it got too difficult for them to keep doing it. I don't know. And that's a real challenge. I, I hope the good tasty protein heavy vegetarian options become more normal because especially as an athlete, I got really, you know, I smuggled tofu into so many places just to try and get some protein and eating, eating plain tofu as you're like pretty gross.

So yeah, I hope it becomes more convenient. I think it seems to be a bit of a swing back the other way at the moment, but yeah, yeah, it's that is what it is. Last question is what are the fun things about your job now? I I find it really fun when I see athletes get excited about the impact that they've made. So if an athlete does something like takes a costly action, whether that's giving money to an organization at the end of the year or like fronting a campaign that where they give money and also their their followers get around them and and give to I, I get really excited by seeing the excitement and other athletes.

Yeah, that's a lot of what I do with high impact athletes is people oriented like talking to athletes and and talking through concerns or thoughts or, you know, essentially trying to advise on what their values and their what they care about trying to match that with organizations that we know do an incredible job in those spaces. And and so yeah, when I see when I see that the joy of giving back and someone else that that gets me gone because I need to find the the study that showed this, but it's I've seen this bandied around so often like giving back doing something for other people is one of the only things that's guaranteed to make us feel better.

Example from this morning and it's a bad example because it's exceedingly rare for me to do this, but I was pushing, pushing our little boy around on the stroller and throwing the ball for the dog before I jumped on this podcast. And my wife's just come back to work and she she works really hard and she looked a little stressed. So I picked some wildflowers on the side of the road and like brought them back and gave them to her just before I got on the podcast. And the act of doing that and seeing her pleasure from it like that felt so good for me.

And if you on the surface, it's not on the surface, it's supposed to feel good for her. But I kind of probably felt just as good, if not better for me to do that thing. And I'm not that good of a husband. Like, I think this might be like the third time I've ever done this. But just an example of like this tiny thing that I was already on my way and I just saw these wildfires. Like I'm to grab, grab a bunch then and bring them back. It's the same with with giving to charity and like, yeah, so, so seeing, seeing athletes understand that and feel that that real pleasure and joy of giving back, I love that.

It keeps me going. I love that too and I've experimented with us and and the change in energy that is unbelievable. But just try this on a given day. If you're out, waitress, waiter, doorkeeper, anything, just compliment three people like, wow, love your hair or you know, that's a pretty dress you're wearing or you know, hey, I like your shoes. You know, I said that to a guy the other day and in a coffee shop I said, hey, those are great shoes. And you know, it's amazing. They light up and you light up and your energy changes.

So and I wish I was better at remembering to do that every day. It kind of comes and goes. If you get, if I get busy, then I'm, you know, but when I do remember it, which is fairly often, it does change things big time, Especially when you when you when you're dealing with somebody who's pretty grumpy, you don't know what's going on in their life. But if you just give them something like, you know, that you've got a great twinkle in your eye there and they're like, you know, frowning and everything like that, you know, throws them off.

You know, I don't know what you're talking about because I'm pissed off, you know, but but often it can just break that cycle that they're in, you know, where where just gets them out of their own head somehow. So, you know, I encourage anybody to to try that because it's exactly what you're talking about. Can I ask you a question on this of you how much coaching is one way of looking at coaching? Is your your job, your life revolves around giving back, giving, giving to someone. Does it feel that way or is it is it like you feel like it's work?

And then there are moments where where it feels like that. For me, it's most of the time it's not work. I find that when I'm coaching and in the flow, you know, and it's just thinking about it now, I think, I think it really helps me keep in the present and that, and that's a good feeling. And you know, when, when an insight kind of surfaces and you know, you can see from the person you're working with, whether it's online or or on court or anywhere and you see something. Oh, wow, you know that I like that.

You know it. I think it's a similar thing. It kind of just that that lights you up. You know what I mean? Yeah, think I mean, and obviously you worked with me is I've always tried to make make it fun because what I found very early on is if I made it fun, it was more fun for me and time went a lot faster, especially when you're doing some grind stuff and and that just has to be done. So yes, I think I know I'm getting a little burned out when it starts to feel like work. Interesting. Definitely.

Yeah, that that's definitely the case. Just just remind me of your question, Have I gotten it all or? I don't think it was framed very well. You know, the the joy that you feel in giving back or paying someone to compliment. Yeah. I was just curious how much of that feeling is embedded in coaching, Because coaching is obviously it's like it is a grind. It is work. You, you have to put in the time. But at its essence, it's doing, doing something to improve someone else. So you you, you're giving to someone else.

I get a huge amount of pleasure. Out of progress, I mean. I'd say that's why I've never been somebody who's had to coach at any kind of level. You know, I'm very glad that I've coached at a very high level, but I can at any level where I coached. It's the progress that that drove me and the progress that that was made it fun for me. You know, working with a really, really good player when you don't feel like you're making progress is not fun. That is really hard work. So when you feel like you're making progress, then it doesn't, you know, it very rarely feels like work.

It only feels like work if you burned out and that's overtired or whatever travel too much. So, yeah. And and I think that's the progress is what feels like the giving back. I think, you know, it feels like, you know, the reward of your work is, is, is the progress to me that that the other person makes. Yeah. I mean, I think that's the best way of explaining it. Yeah. I can't think of anything else to say about that. No, Yeah, I think that makes sense to me. Yeah, that makes sense. Because when you, when you're talking to an athlete about, you know, hi and everything, you'll be so in the moment.

And that's, you know, people say stay in the present. Well, we all go all over the place. But when you really get into something, that's when you are really in the present. And I must say that, and it's funny, you know, I don't know why, but late afternoon sessions, like especially outdoors and and like on the grass on the clay or something like that. I don't know why. If I look back on my career, some of my best work and some of the greatest moments and everything like that was coaching almost always late afternoon on something and everything clicked.

It was a lot of fun and pro and and just this, I don't know, it's like you get on the totally the same wavelength as the athlete and it's just and that's just an unbelievable feeling. It really is. It's just like the time just float, floats and everything just you know, and you know, and and then afterwards maybe you certain chat about anything like that and it's just everything just goes so smoothly. And and those were wonderful moments in my coaching career and that you never knew exactly when they were going to come.

But you know, those are some of my, you know, best memories are not actually matches or somebody winning a match or whatever. It's it's those moments of just that unbelievable closeness that you develop and you know you're going in the right direction. I love that and I remember it too. Yeah, they, they, they great times. Usually it's far away from not far away, but it's, it's, yeah, maybe late afternoon because often there's not many other players around. There's not, it's not a lot of noise. It's just often you the only ones on the court or whatever, you know.

Yeah. And those, those were really in a way highlights for me, just brilliant that feeling is is. You know, one thing I miss about tennis is like what you're describing there. I think it's, I think it might be easier to reach that state, that sort of flow state when when your direction and purpose is so clear. And with tennis or with any sport, it's so simple and a lot of ways like you get almost instant feedback on whether you do something right or wrong. You have this objective goal that you can measure yourself against.

And so you wake up in the morning and you know pretty much exactly what you have to do to be better and to to like make progress towards your goal. And one thing that I've found difficult at times with behind backed athletes and, and, you know, trying to run an organization is you could make a decision now, but you won't get feedback on that decision until six months down the line. And it might be really hazy, fuzzy feedback. And so you don't actually know if it was a good decision or not. So yeah, that's sort of like that sharp clarity of being on a court and working on a thing that, you know, is going to help and tinkering and making progress.

Something like, OK, there's another brick in the wall that we're building here that looking back, I don't think I appreciated that enough because I didn't have the contrast. But that's a really beautiful thing about sport, I think. Yes, I agree with you with that. But one thing I would urge you to think about is because, you know, I'm building a business as well, and I've start to realize that that moment comes whenever you have a moment of real clarity. It's like I know what to do. It's not for one end goal in in a way, yes, you know, to, to, to obviously, you know, run a successful business, But it's more about the clarity of like I was being struggling with this and suddenly now I know what to do.

And for that day or that morning or for the next couple of hours when you actually know what to do, I, I, I get a similar buzz. It's not quite the same, but it, it's the only kind of equivalent that I can get is that moments of clarity feel good. Yeah. The tough thing is tennis is there's less, there's less noise because you, it's just about getting better, better, better. Whereas outside of sport, there's a lot of noise that comes in all the time and distractions and everything like that. So you know it it it's not as elongated and it's not as consistent, but you can still find it I think.

Yeah, my experience so far, just fewer and further between. Yes, yeah. Well, you know, that's why it's you have to really enjoy your sport while you're in it, you know, true. But then, you know, a lot of time it's, it's hard to, like you said, have that perspective while you're playing it. You know, it's very, very difficult. Anyway, thank you very much, Marcus. It's been an absolute pleasure, high impact athletes. We're going to put all the the links and, and, and how people can find you and catch up with all that you're doing.

And of course, Tweak is your chance to put me in the hot seat and ask me some questions. I'm looking forward to that. Great for watching locker room power with David Samuel. If you enjoyed the episode, hit subscribe and leave a comment on your favorite platform. See you in the next one.

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