#509: George Mumford, Mindfulness Coach to Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, on Awareness, Compassionate Action, The Dizziness of Freedom, and More

George Mumford, Mindfulness Coach to Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, on Awareness, Compassionate Action, The Dizziness of Freedom, and More | Brought to you by Tonal http://tonal.com/ smart home gym, LinkedIn Jobs http://linkedin.com/tim recruitment platform with 700M+ users, and Eight Sleep’s Pod Pro Cover http://eightsleep.com/Tim sleeping solution for dynamic cooling and heating More on all three below. George Mumford (@gtmumford https://twitter.com/gtmumford) is a globally recognized speaker, teacher, and coach. Since 1989, he’s been honing his gentle but groundbreaking mindfulness techniques with people from locker rooms to board rooms, Yale to jail. While at the University of Massachusetts, where he roomed with future Hall of Famer Julius Erving, injuries forced George out of basketball and eventually into an addiction to pain medication and drugs. With the help of meditation and mindfulness, he got clean and made it his mission to teach and work with others. Michael Jordan credits George with transforming his on-court leadership, helping the Bulls to six NBA championships. George has also worked with Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O’Neal, and countless other NBA players, as well as Olympians, executives, and artists. George believes everyone has a masterpiece within. His book The Mindful Athlete: Secrets to Pure Performance https://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Athlete-Secrets-Pure-Performance/dp/1941529259/?tag=offsitoftimfe-20— both memoir and instruction guide — can show you how to access it. George also has The Mindful Athlete Course, which can be found at GeorgeMumford.com http://georgemumford.com/. Please enjoy! * This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn Jobs https://linkedin.com/Tim. Whether you are looking to hire now for a critical role or thinking about needs that you may have in the future, LinkedIn Jobs https://linkedin.com/Tim can help. LinkedIn screens candidates for the hard and soft skills you’re looking for and puts your job in front of candidates looking for job opportunities that match what you have to offer. Using LinkedIn’s active community of more than 722 million professionals worldwide, LinkedIn Jobs https://linkedin.com/Tim can help you find and hire the right person faster. When your business is ready to make that next hire, find the right person with LinkedIn Jobs. And now, you can post a job for free. Just visit LinkedIn.com/Tim https://linkedin.com/Tim. * This episode is also brought to you by Eight Sleep http://eightsleep.com/Tim! Eight Sleep’s Pod Pro Cover http://eightsleep.com/Tim is the easiest and fastest way to sleep at the perfect temperature. It pairs dynamic cooling and heating with biometric tracking to offer the most advanced (and user-friendly) solution on the market. Simply add the Pod Pro Cover http://eightsleep.com/Tim to your current mattress and start sleeping as cool as 55°F or as hot as 110°F. It also splits your bed in half, so your partner can choose a totally different temperature. And now, my dear listeners—that’s you—can get $250 off the Pod Pro Cover http://eightsleep.com/Tim. Simply go to EightSleep.com/Tim http://eightsleep.com/Tim or use code TIM. * This episode is also brought to you by Tonal http://tonal.com/! Tonal is the world’s most intelligent home gym and personal trainer. It is precision engineered and designed to be the world’s most advanced strength studio. Tonal http://tonal.com/ uses breakthrough technology—like adaptive digital weights and A. I. learning—together with the best experts in resistance training so you get stronger, faster. Every program is personalized to your body using A. I., and smart features check your form in real time, just like a personal trainer. Try Tonal http://tonal.com/, the world’s smartest home gym, for 30 days in your home, and if you don’t love it, you can return it for a full refund. Visit Tonal.com http://tonal.com/ for $100 off their smart accessories when you use promo code TIM21 at checkout. * If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-tim-ferriss-show/id863897795?mt=2/iTunes? It takes less than 60 seconds, and it really makes a difference in helping to convince hard-to-get guests. I also love reading the reviews! For show notes and past guests, please visit tim.blog/podcast https://tim.blog/podcast/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=podcast-description. Sign up for Tim’s email newsletter (“5-Bullet Friday”) at tim.blog/friday https://go.tim.blog/5-bullet-friday-1/. For transcripts of episodes, go to tim.blog/transcripts http://tim.blog/transcripts. 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Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Tim Ferriss?

  This episode is brought to you by Eight Sleep. My God, am I in love with Eight Sleep. Good sleep is the ultimate game changer. More than 30% of Americans struggle with sleep, and I'm a member of that sad group. Temperature is one of the main causes of poor sleep, and heat has always been my nemesis. I've suffered for decades tossing and turning, throwing blankets off, putting them back on, and repeating ad nauseam. But now I am falling asleep in record time, faster than ever. Why? Because I'm using a simple device called the Pod Pro Cover by Eight Sleep. It's the easiest and fastest way to sleep at the perfect temperature. It pairs dynamic cooling and heating with biometric tracking to offer the most advanced, but most user-friendly solution on the market.

• 0:44Tim Ferriss?

  I polled all of you guys on social media about the best tools for sleep, enhancing sleep, and Eight Sleep was by far and away the crowd favorite. I mean, people were just raving fans of this. So I used it, and here we are. Add the Pod Pro Cover to your current mattress and start sleeping as cool as 55 degrees Fahrenheit or as hot as 110 degrees Fahrenheit. It also splits your bed in half so your partner can choose a totally different temperature. My girlfriend runs hot all the time. She doesn't need cooling. She loves the heat, and we can have our own bespoke temperatures on either side, which is exactly what we're doing. Now, for me, and for many people, the result: Eight Sleep users fall asleep up to 32% faster,

• 1:28Tim Ferriss?

  reduce sleep interruptions by up to 40%, and get more restful sleep overall. I can personally attest to this because I track it in all sorts of ways. It's the total solution for enhanced recovery so you can take on the next day feeling refreshed. And now, my dear listeners, that's you guys, you can get $250 off of the Pod Pro Cover. That's a lot. Simply go to eightsleep.com/tim or use code TIM. That's eight all spelled out, E-I-G-H-T, sleep.com/tim, or use coupon code TIM, T-I-M. Eightsleep.com/tim for $200 off your Pod Pro Cover.

• 2:11Tim Ferriss?

  This episode is brought to you by Tonal. That's T-O-N-A-L. Tonal is the world's most intelligent home gym and personal trainer. That's the tagline from their website, folks. So it gives you the one sentence summary. By eliminating traditional metal weights, Tonal can deliver 200 pounds of resistance in a device smaller than a flat screen TV. It mounts right on your wall with no floor space required. I've had one for a few months now after a number of close friends recommended Tonal to me. And it allows me to do things that I would normally need a huge gym for, like cable chop and lift or rotational exercises. And it allows me to do other things that are nearly impossible otherwise, like eccentric loading, which I'll talk about again later. Tonal is precision engineered and designed

• 2:54Tim Ferriss?

  to be the world's most advanced strength studio and personal trainer. It uses breakthrough technology like adaptive digital weights and AI learning, together with the best experts in resistance training, so you can get stronger faster. One of my friends, who used to be a competitive skier, very high level competitive skier, has doubled his strength in many exercises over a period of months. So what are these adaptive digital weights? Tonal's patented digital weight system makes thousands of calculations a second to deliver you a smooth weightlifting experience using their advanced electronic motor technology. And a lot of the buttons are built right into the handles themselves, into the grips, so you don't need to move around. And it is extremely easy to use. Tonal lets you adjust the weight in one pound increments, and you can do it on the fly,

• 3:39Tim Ferriss?

  something that was never possible with traditional dumbbells. It's easy to dial weights up and down with just the touch of a button. Tonal also has built in dynamic weight modes, like chains, eccentric, and their patent pending SmartFlex technology. So you can experiment with more ways to get stronger faster without the hassle of extra equipment like chains and bands. The eccentric, which I mentioned, means that you can set a mode that allows you to say, just as an example, bicep curl 15 pounds up, and then lower automatically 20, 25 pounds down. And it is incredible. How much you can get done in just a handful of minutes when you use this type of technology. So, check it out. Try Tonal, T-O-N-A-L, the world's smartest home gym for 30 days in your home.

• 4:24Tim Ferriss?

  And if you don't love it, you can return it for a full refund. Visit www.tonal.com, T-O-N-A-L dot com. And for a limited time, get $100 off of smart accessories when you use promo code TIM21. Like I'm ready for my first drink at checkout. That's www.tonal, T-O-N-A-L dot com, promo code TIM21, T-I-M-21. Tonal, be your strongest. At this altitude, I can run flat out for a half mile before my hands start shaking. Can I ask you a personal question?

• 5:00Speaker 01

  No, we're just sitting in a perfect time.

• 5:03Speaker 02

  What if I did the opposite? I'm a cybernetic organism, living tissue over metal endoskeleton.

• 5:08Tim Ferriss?

  Hello, boys and girls, ladies and germs. This is Tim Ferriss, and welcome to another episode of The Tim Ferriss Show, where it is my job to interview world-class performers from all different areas. And I feel very fortunate today to have not only a world-class performer in his own right, but a world-class performer who has a lot of experience working with world-class performers. George Mumford, he is a globally recognized speaker, teacher, and coach. Since 1989, he's been honing his gentle but groundbreaking mindfulness techniques with people from locker rooms to boardrooms, from Yale to jail.

• 5:53Tim Ferriss?

  While at the University of Massachusetts, where he roomed with future Hall of Famer Julius Irving, injuries forced Mumford out of basketball and eventually into an addiction to pain medication and drugs. With the help of meditation and mindfulness, he got clean and made it his mission to teach and work with others. Michael Jordan credits George with transforming his on-court leadership, helping the Bulls to six NBA championships. George has also worked with Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O'Neal, and countless other NBA players, as well as Olympians, executives, and artists. George believes- Everyone has a masterpiece within. His book, The Mindful Athlete: Secrets to Pure Performance, both memoir and instruction guide can show you how to access it. George also has The Mindful Athlete Course, which can be found at George Mumford.com as well as many other resources.

• 6:38Tim Ferriss?

  You can find him on Instagram @george.mumford, M-U-M-F-O-R-D, and on Twitter @GTMumford. George, welcome to the show.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  Thank you, Tim. It's a pleasure to be here. I'm excited about being here.

• 6:52Tim Ferriss?

  Me too. We were introduced by our mutual friend, Jack Cornfield, who has nothing but wonderful things to say. And you are a practitioner in more ways than one. So I love digging into the details and the stories. So we're going to start with a story and then we'll probably rewind. But I would love to hear about the first time you ever watched Michael Jordan practice. What was that experience like?

• 7:20Speaker 01

  The first time I watched Michael Jordan practice, it was amazing because he, there's no difference between how he plays and what he, how he practices. So if you see him performing on the court, that's how he practices. There's no difference. He's just playing at a high level, playing to win. But also, you can see how he gets better each time he gets on the court. He's just really locked in and really committed to excellence. I want to dovetail, because my first encounter with Michael was not in practice. It was when I first went to work with the Bulls, he had retired. And even though he was retired, he wasn't with the team. He actually was hanging around. He was in a locker room. And so I asked one of the players, or it might have

• 8:04Speaker 01

  been a coach, to introduce me to him. Even before I could get close to him, I could feel his aura, I could feel his, his ability, his level of concentration, his mind focus.

• 8:17Speaker 01

  His ability, he had this energy and I'm like an empath, so I can feel things. I'm a, I'm a feeler. It was so profound, even before I even got to meet him, just feeling the energy that exuded from him and his ability to really be the eye of the hurricane and the midst of things. So that was the first fascinating thing I saw about him was just his energy, just walking into the room and meeting him, even though he didn't have on a basketball uniform, he wasn't out on the court. He was just in a locker room, just hanging out.

• 8:46Tim Ferriss?

  What is it that you felt like in your body? What was that experience like?

• 8:51Speaker 01

  In meditation circles, we talk about getting into a state of intense state of concentration or samadhi or calm. So when you're really concentrated and you're really locked in, there's like an alert relaxness. So you're alert, but there's a poise there because you're in the moment, you're centered and you're just totally present. And that's what it felt like. It just felt like there was an energy, a calm energy, but also an intense energy. So that's what it felt like, a combination of intensity and calmness.

• 9:23Tim Ferriss?

  Now you can't trust everything you read, but I was of course doing some reading in preparation for this. So please feel free to fact check this. But I read that when you first saw him practicing, you thought to yourself, something along the lines of, there's no way he can sustain that. This must be someone with bipolar disorder or some type of disorder who's in a manic stage. Is there any truth to that?

• 9:49Speaker 01

  No, I never said that.

• 9:50Tim Ferriss?

  Okay.

• 9:51Speaker 01

  So I never know, because my thing is, see, I, I know the difference between high intensity and having an intensity based on, on a mindset that's positive and combined. The one thing I did notice about the first practice that you reminded me of was that when I first saw him practice, he looked like a person trying to make the team.

• 10:14Tim Ferriss?

  In what respect? He was just, he was putting forth the extra effort?

• 10:18Speaker 01

  Putting forth the extra effort, like I gotta make the team. And of course, now I understand why he was that way because what he did was, let's think about how he related to his experience. We call it strong self-efficacy. It's like when you master, your mastery of life experiences. So he got cut from his high school basketball team. In the 10th grade. And so I think at that time, he made a decision, he would never get cut from a team again. And I saw that in the practice, where he was acting like he was trying to make the team. Now, I don't mean like, like he has anxiety and he's trying to impress people. I'm saying he was proving that he's the best player on the court. You were getting

• 11:00Speaker 01

  his best. You were getting at a high level. He wasn't resting. He was acting like, I need to get better. I need to prove a point. Not so much prove a point, but to let people know that there's no way I'm not making this team. But there's no way I'm not going to be central to what we're doing. So I see it as a positive. I don't remember saying that because I don't know if I would say, I would say he has high energy. I know other people that have high energy. But his difference of him having high energy, it's with a purpose and there's a cat like quality to it. And what I mean by like a cat like quality, like you can see a cat, a house cat, they can go from being kind of chill to jump into action with a grace,

• 11:40Speaker 01

  with the ease, with the ferocity, and with the direction, like a direct assault, or whatever. They just, he was like, yeah, he could punch on you any minute.

• 11:52Tim Ferriss?

  And we're gonna certainly come back to Michael Jordan, who especially, I mean, at that time, was effectively treated like a god. I mean, this was, this was the man who could walk on water. And I'll add a footnote, just for anyone at Vice who's listening, if so, this is an article from Vice.com, which has a lot of great articles, well researched articles, but this one may need some factual corrections. That is the Zen Masters Zen Master, which is a great headline, though, you must admit. That is, is a very complimentary headline. Let's roll back the clock, because I want to provide a snapshot of you working with

• 12:31Tim Ferriss?

  not just athletes at the top of their game, but really at the time, this pantheon of athletes who were worshipped around the world. And there's a big difference. And there really is a difference.

• 12:43Speaker 01

  Right.

• 12:44Tim Ferriss?

  But it wasn't always that way, far from it. And so, let's fact check a separate quote, and you can tell me if this is more on the money. And I should say also that the manic Quote wasn't so much a quote, it was an indirect quote, so they didn't use quotation marks, but they said thought to himself and things like that. This is one that I believe is a direct quote, and it's from the Boston Globe. Quote, "I had a security clearance on my badge and track marks on my forearm. If that is even approximately accurate, could you provide a time and a place for when this was and explain, please?"

• 13:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was totally accurate because when I first job out of college, I was working in what was called, it was a financial management development program. And I was working for GTE Savannah, I don't even know what they're called now, but general telephone electronics and then Savannah Light bulbs. And that was a big company. At the time, when I got out of college, I was a functional addict, and so I had tracks on my arm. So I always wore long sleeve shirts, I couldn't wear short sleeve shirts.

• 13:54Tim Ferriss?

  And this was from heroin use?

• 13:56Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm, yeah, from shooting up, yes. So in those days, when I was getting my security clearance, they literally had FBI agents coming around and interviewing my friends and family, going back 10 years. You have to go through this tremendous process just to get a secret clearance, then it's top secret. But I had the secret clearance, so I had the clearance, but at the same time, I had this hidden life of, you know, tracks on my arm. So that's very accurate, it's totally accurate. And it wasn't until probably when I got clean in 84, years after that, that there's no more track marks. But for years, it was very tenuous because I was concerned about passing physicals because I had to get examined by the doctors and they say, "Oh, what's up with that?

• 14:40Speaker 01

  You know, what's that on your arm?" You know, they kind of know what it looks like. That was a process, and as a matter of fact, when I used to have to give blood sometimes, they would make a comment like, "Well, you got that all-used-up look on your arms." You know, so I would just laugh at it, but it was a fair statement. So yeah, I had to wear long sleeve shirts all year round.

• 15:01Tim Ferriss?

  At that time, and this might seem like a really silly question, because in the introduction and in the bio I read, it mentioned...

• 15:12Tim Ferriss?

  Injuries and addiction. But at that point, when you had this clearance and you're shooting up, why were you an addict? That's not to say that it wasn't natural and understandable. I'm just, I'm just wondering if it was a byproduct of the pain and then you became physically dependent? Or if there was more to it?

• 15:32Speaker 01

  It's complex. But one of the things I discovered in my days competing as an athlete, when I got injured, they didn't have pain medicine. So they would give me Dab Maroon or they'd give me some kind of pain. Cause I was always in pain. Part of it was emotional pain. I had a lot of stomach problems or GI issues because of stress. I noticed that when I was, was under the influence of these pain meds, that I actually felt good and I could talk to people. Other than that, I was quiet and shy and let my basketball talk to me. So it impacted me in a certain way, like any addiction. So you do it, you do it. And then you cross that line where you become addicted. You cannot not do it. Not only does it become something that your body craves, but it becomes part of a lifestyle,

• 16:17Speaker 01

  part of an identity. So I got my first vaccination shot two weeks ago tomorrow. And I remember, so she went right into my arm, gave me a vaccination spot. And I realized that it reminded me when I started using drugs, I didn't start off just going into the vein. I started off what we call skin popping, just like getting the vaccine. It is put it into your system, into the skin. So it always starts where you, you know, you just get high a little bit. Then it keeps growing. It's a progressive thing. It's a progressive disease and it kept progressing. And then you start doing other things and then you start doing things in combination. And then you're doing drugs that are not even your drugs of choice or drinking things you don't even drink. You're looking to get high. So it's the emotional pain, but it's also a way of dealing with reality.

• 17:02Speaker 01

  So that was my thing. I was under the influence in one way, form or fashion.

• 17:07Tim Ferriss?

  Many addicts don't make it out or they don't stop using until they either just continue as a functioning addict.

• 17:19Tim Ferriss?

  Until the end of their days or some catastrophe befalls them. What were the deciding moments or elements that helped you to become sober?

• 17:33Speaker 01

  I had an incident, I think it was in March, because I went to my first 12 step meeting, which was AA on April Fool's Day, April 1st. In March, I had a strep infection, but I didn't know that I was sick until I went to the doctors and I had a 140 degree temperature. So I had to go in the hospital. I went in the hospital and they had an abscess in my arm and they had to treat it. And they wouldn't give me any payments because they knew I was addicted to drugs and I was withdrawing or whatever. And at that point, as people would say, you know, if you keep this up, you're going to die. And for some reason, it hit me that I just couldn't do it anymore. And so I got to a spiritual bottom. So I call it, it's the elevator theory.

• 18:18Speaker 01

  You might start off at the penthouse and for some people, they have to go to the sub level, B2 or B3, whatever it is. But for me, I knew I was at, maybe not the penthouse, but if I was on, on the 25th floor, I'm now on the fourth floor, then I'm heading towards the third floor. So I decided to get out because, you know, I just couldn't do it anymore. It was just emotionally, it was like being in a place where I couldn't do it anymore, but I could not, not do it because it was a habit. That was in March, when I think started hitting the rock bottom. And then when my friend came by, took me to AA meeting on April 1st, that's when I saw that there was, it was a way forward, there was a way out.

• 18:59Speaker 01

  I looked at this person that was like me, but yet he was, yeah, sobriety. I went to the meeting and then I continued to use in, but I started thinking about ways. And then when I went into the detox, I was different. But I think all of that paid dividends. So even though I was around recovery, going to meetings, but I was still getting high and well, using drugs and alcohol, but mostly, yeah, I was doing both, but it was different. Something changed when I shifted, when I went to my first meeting. But then what happened when I went into the detox? There was a thought process or inner dialogue that said, "The same George that goes in here can't be the same George that comes out."

• 19:43Speaker 01

  Because the same George that goes in, if that George comes out, he's gonna get high. He's gonna keep doing what he's doing. So you have to be a different person. You have to be a different George. And I don't know where that came from. It was just, just the thought that told me that, yeah, I had to do it differently. I had to be different.

• 19:59Tim Ferriss?

  Where were you at the time geographically?

• 20:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was living in Dorchester. I mean, actually, I lived in Mattapan. So I was living in Boston. A lot was happening. I, I lost my car. You know, I was just barely surviving. I continued to work and everything, but I had some issues. And when I did that, and the detox is in walking distance from my house. And so after I got out of the detox and walked home, it was the first time I ever saw my house, my street.

• 20:27Tim Ferriss?

  First time you ever saw it, meaning you, first time you saw it in, in with clarity?

• 20:31Speaker 01

  On life terms, where I could really see it and not seeing it through a face or through, through a haze. Or, you know, because I, I lived in fantasy or I was, you know, hiding out in plain sight. So I didn't know that until I noticed that, oh, I'm really seeing, I really see things. But it was more about me really seeing life and seeing myself for the first time without having the influence of substances or hiding out in my own little inner fantasy world.

• 20:59Tim Ferriss?

  How did mindfulness in any capacity enter your life?

• 21:05Speaker 01

  What happened was, just to give you a little insight, my spiritual experience of my first mindfulness or meditative experience that I can think of that, that was powerful, was that day I got out of the detox and maybe it was the next day I went to work. When I went to work, I, I had like, it was three weeks out of work. I had all this money waiting for me and the obsession and Luke, the use, the compulsion, the obsession to use came upon me. This is the thing, I got triggered. And I knew that if I were to go into the restroom and the men's room and just recite the serenity prayer, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

• 21:49Speaker 01

  I did that like a mantra, just repeating it silently over and over, and the obsession was removed. And I had some stabilization. So that was my first experience. But what also happened when I got clean, I had chronic pain. My migraine headaches, which if anybody ever had a migraine headache, you know, when it gets to a point, doesn't matter what they give you, it's just not enough. And I had chronic back pains, which I had since college. I used to sleep on a bedboard and I've been going to a chiropractor since nineteen seventy five. So what's that forty six years?

• 22:22Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah.

• 22:23Speaker 01

  So I was going to chiropractic before, you know, when it was still wasn't viewed like it is today. So I had a lot of pain. I was dealing with my pain administering pain medicine, not just physical, but emotional and probably spiritual pain.

• 22:38Tim Ferriss?

  See, you use the Serenity Prayer as this sort of grounding mantra that helps you to stabilize. And then from where does the mindfulness or meditation come?

• 22:53Speaker 01

  So I had the chronic pain. And so at the same time, I was in a HMO back in those days and and they had this experimental program. So I was in, I had a therapist I was working with to help me, you know, sort out stuff so I can go into the detox and I was working with him. And when I got out, we were talking about strategies and they had this experimental program run out of Beth Israel run by Dr. Joan Boricinco, who at the time was one of the three psycho neuro immunologists in the world. It just means mind, body, medicine and the endocrine system and that sort of thing. So they had this stress management program. So I signed up and I had to pee and spit and they take pre and post testing.

• 23:35Speaker 01

  And what they did was they introduced us to this idea of taking responsibility for ourselves, learning about the mind body process, but being an active participant with the healthcare that we were getting, whether it was a doctor or whatever. And that's where I learned about meditation and mindfulness and yoga and and some of the mind body practices like Tai Chi and yoga, obviously. And they gave us a syllabus of a bunch of books to read. I don't know if they had twenty twenty five books on that list. I read every one of those books and then I read books that they recommended. So I'm thirty six years and six months clean and sober and I have averaged over a book a week during that time. So I just

• 24:19Speaker 01

  really got into understanding. I wanted to understand how did I get clean and others don't? What was the motivation? How do I enhance my ability to grow and develop? And so I got really stimulated intellectually stimulated around that. And that's how I got into this whole thing of mindfulness. And then I was doing that and that helped with my recovery. I was already in twelve steps. My recovery was pretty good because I was connected to the spirit or I had my concept of God which worked for me and allowed me to understand that there is a power grid in myself and that all I had to do is basically is a plug in the wall. All I had to do is plug into the power source and and I would be able to do things. And then as a natural outgrowth of that, she suggested that I go to do a retreat at this place in Barry, Mass called

• 25:04Speaker 01

  Insight Meditation Society. And so I did a weekend retreat there. And then I was introduced to the Cambridge Insight Meditation Center, which is in Cambridge, right in the city. And you could go there and do day longs and stuff like that. So that's how I got into it. And then while I was doing that, my teacher there, Larry Rosenberg, was good friend with John Capitzen. After three or four years of recovery, I connected with John and then I did the mindfulness based stress reduction. And then I ended up working in the Center for Mindfulness. At that time, it was called Stress Reduction and Relaxation Program. I ended up working there for five years. I had a prison project and then we developed an inner city project. But I lived

• 25:48Speaker 01

  at the meditation center in Cambridge for six years while I was working and two years where I wasn't working, where I was just meditating and reading and studying and teaching, going out from the center would get these requests from different outlets. It could be a youth center, it could be a business like AT&T or Nynex at the time. And I would go out and I would teach mindfulness. I would teach meditation. I have a business school. So I was doing my training to become a teacher at the same time I was continuing to grow and evolve. And then when I worked at the Center for Mindfulness, it was part of my job is to teach mindfulness-based stress reduction, but really it was more about teaching them the same process I had.

• 26:31Speaker 01

  It's the inner game and how to take control of your life in the sense of being responsible and understanding how the mind and body work and how we can relate to our experience in a way that leads to more peace, ease, freedom, compassion.

• 26:45Tim Ferriss?

  That's one hell of a U-turn and self-transformation. And I'm also still thinking about the stacks of books that would represent the number of books you've read over that period of time that you mentioned. Were there any books in the beginning that really ignited you? Or any books that you remember really grabbing your attention? Because you really applied yourself in a very wholehearted way. And I'm wondering what some of the catalysts might have been. Were any books particularly impactful or conversations?

• 27:24Speaker 01

  One that was on a New York bestseller list for like 10 years, Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck. But also Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind. There was a lot of books. Pain is Motivator. Love is Letting Go of Fear. And there were a lot of different books, but the Bible was always in there. It's interesting. I was doing like a presentation at Lululemon for about a thousand people a couple of years ago. And they asked me, well, what book would I recommend? And I was thinking about, because there's tons of books, depends on where you are and what books work for you. And I said, uh, the Bible. And I don't know where that came from. It just came out of my deep sense. And I said, well, that makes sense because there's one in every hotel room and there's a lot of stuff in there.

• 28:08Speaker 01

  And I said, the acronym that I remember is ASK.

• 28:14Speaker 01

  And that is asking that she'll be given to you, seeking ye shall find knocking that she'll be open to you. It's amazing. I went to some Sunday school till I was 13, then I stopped going to church. Yet, as I get older, all of those sayings, like, there's even mindfulness in the Bible. A double minded man is unstable in all his ways. And I started realizing that spiritual truth is spiritual truth, whether it comes out of the Bible or the Quran, or the Kabbalah, it doesn't matter, or from the Buddhist teachings, it's all that wisdom, literature, and philosophy. I've read a lot of Martin Buber's stuff, I and Thou, the Way of Man. I got really drawn to existentialism when I went back to graduate school, and I

• 28:59Speaker 01

  studied Viktor Frankl and Man's Search for Meaning, and what I call the religious existentialists like Viktor Frankl and Martin Buber, and then there's Camus, Sartre, Kierkegaard.

• 29:10Tim Ferriss?

  If we look at the entire spectrum of books you've read, I'll try to help narrow them down, and then we'll, we'll move into some different lines of questioning. But what books would you say, aside from your own, that you have gifted to other people or recommended the most to other people? Those people could be high level athletes. I'm just wondering if there are a handful of books that you tend to gift the most or recommend the most to other people?

• 29:39Speaker 01

  Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, used to be one that I would recommend years ago. So it depends on, on the time and who the person is. But I think more recently, when we're talking about performance, when I'm working with clients, it's, there's a book called The Three Laws of Performance. This is what that looks like. It's a really good one.

• 29:58Tim Ferriss?

  Steve Safran and Dave Loeb.

• 30:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then on Becoming a Leader, these are the books that I've been reading recently by Warren Bennis.

• 30:07Tim Ferriss?

  Warren Bennis, yeah, lots of good stuff.

• 30:08Speaker 01

  The thing I like about it, he says to become a leader, you have to become yourself. So I've been focusing on leadership a little bit more recently. But any of the books that, you know, some of the books about the teachings of the Buddha, or psychology books, I read a lot of Rollo May, The Meaning of Anxiety, Erich Fromm, it's a bunch of guys. Obviously, Viktor Frankl's book Man's Search for Meaning would be a good one. It's really challenging for me to answer that question, because it's fluid.

• 30:39Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, totally. Depends on the person as well.

• 30:44Tim Ferriss?

  Just a quick thanks to one of our sponsors and we'll be right back to the show. This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn Jobs. Small business owners have always shown an incredible ability to adapt and innovate. This past year has certainly highlighted many examples. Now, another way you can adapt and innovate in 2021 is by finding the right people to help you grow your business. LinkedIn Jobs makes it possible for you to do exactly that. Get started by posting your job for free to reach LinkedIn's network of more than 740 million professionals. Fill out targeted screening questions to get your role in front of the most qualified candidates with the experience, skills, and motivation you're looking for. Then, with simple filtering and management tools, you can easily review, rate, and home in on your top candidates.

• 31:28Tim Ferriss?

  LinkedIn Jobs can help you find the right person to help you grow your business. And your first job post is free, so just visit LinkedIn.com/Tim to learn more. Again, that's LinkedIn.com/Tim to post your first job for free. Terms and conditions do apply.

• 31:49Tim Ferriss?

  Well, it seems like you're traveling this path. You've gone from competitive athlete, then to working and using simultaneously. You become sober, you're still working, but then the nature of your self-work certainly changes and you're developing this ability, cultivating this greater awareness, this ability to observe your own thinking. How did Elite Sports enter the picture? How did you end up becoming connected to that world?

• 32:21Speaker 01

  When I was working at the Medical Center, and at that time, we had the prison project. We were in about five Department of Corrections, Massachusetts Department of Corrections prisons. But I also taught at their training facility. I used to work with staff, do two cycles a year, teaching the staff mindfulness-based stress reduction. At that time, John used to go to this place called Omega Institute.

• 32:44Tim Ferriss?

  John Cabot's in.

• 32:45Speaker 01

  John Cabot's in. And he was out there, him and his partner Saki Santorelli, and they met and Phil used to do a program called Beyond Basketball there. So they were there on campus at the same time and they were talking and

• 33:00Tim Ferriss?

  This is Phil Jackson.

• 33:01Speaker 01

  Phil Jackson, Phil Jackson.

• 33:02Tim Ferriss?

  Which that's okay, which a lot of people would have

• 33:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:05Tim Ferriss?

  Seen from The Last Dance.

• 33:07Speaker 01

  Yes. So at that summer interaction, Phil was and his wife at the time, June, they were interested in having somebody come in and work with the Bulls out because they had just won three NBA championships in a row. And so they were giving a presentation and then they saw me and they said, well, who's this guy? And she worked with, they said, yeah, this is George Mumford. He worked with Dr. J and, you know, he does this. And they said he would be perfect for our team. And so Phil and I talked and he invited me to training camp in 1993. And in the interim, we talked in July, in the interim, Michael Jordan's father got murdered and Michael retired. When I showed up in Chicago in October

• 33:49Speaker 01

  in 1993, there were a full blown crisis. And then I went in and I had pretty much done an intervention with the team and then talking to them about this process of, I talked about being a spiritual warrior. And just like martial arts, you have to train a certain way. And so I talked about martial arts. I studied Tai Chi for a lot of years. I brought Zen into martial arts. That's what I, I presented to them and then being in the zone, being in flow. That's how it all started. And then it just took off from there.

• 34:20Tim Ferriss?

  Let's approach this from a bunch of different angles. The first angle I'd love to cover is what Phil believed the team needed or why he felt it would be well served by having your skill set or you there. What, what was it that he hoped to accomplish?

• 34:43Speaker 01

  Phil, we have a similar philosophy. You may recall when LeBron James entered into the political sphere, they told him to just dribble and shut up. Phil looks at the whole person as a basketball player with a body, my heart and soul. And so to him, he's, his job is to care for them and beyond basketball. And they had just won three NBA championships. They were dealing with the stress of success. What happens when you become successful? Everybody comes at you. They want something. He wanted them to be prepared. And wanted to support them in their ability to sustain that success and to continue to grow and evolve as people, not just basketball players. And so bringing me in to help them

• 35:28Speaker 01

  deal with the stress of success, because I was working in a stress reduction clinic. It made a lot of sense. And yet I had similar backgrounds and I played basketball. I was an athlete and I was around celebrity. Dr. J was Michael Jordan before Michael Jordan. So even when I was in college, being his roommate, everywhere he went, it was like, not quite like the Beatles, but everybody would come in and he just couldn't go many places because he would draw a crowd. He had a certain level of charisma and stuff. So I had my experience, had the experience of, and I used to go visit him when he played in ABA. So I've been around the NBA and that sort of thing. So it made perfect sense for me to go in and to teach them how to deal with the stress of success. That was

• 36:12Speaker 01

  the initial thing. But of course, when I had gone down there, they had an identity crisis as well as an opportunity to grow. And that's what I proposed to the, to the team is a crisis has two meanings. One meaning is danger, which we get, but the other meaning is opportunity. This is an opportunity to look just like me. It's an opportunity. My southern's abuse wasn't a curse. It was a blessing. Wouldn't be who I was if I didn't experience that. How do we relate to life in a way where it empowers and inspires us? That's why when I was down there, that's why I worked so well with Phil, because if he didn't have my philosophy, if he had the philosophy of just shut up and dribble, I wouldn't be able to work with him.

• 36:56Tim Ferriss?

  Had Phil tried other approaches to impart, even if this word is appropriate as the objective mindfulness, had he tried other things before or was?

• 37:08Tim Ferriss?

  Were you just the perfect vehicle in his mind for introducing the players to some of these skills?

• 37:16Speaker 01

  To answer your question, yes, that's what happened. I came in and he realized that it could work and especially it's nothing like baptism, you know.

• 37:25Tim Ferriss?

  Baptism by fire.

• 37:26Speaker 01

  Yes, it was. Okay, how do you do? It's okay when everything's nice, but what's gonna happen when when everybody's busts on fire? How is he gonna, is he gonna be able to meet the challenge? I think that Phil used to do sessions with the guys, but it was obvious, and he says it in his books, that it made sense for somebody from the outside to come in. And because I could do it in a way where they could listen to me and I had a user-friendly language. You know, I could teach in any domain. That was all of those years going and making house calls, if you will, not working in the main centers or the traditional places, but going where people lived and being able to talk to them in a language they could understand, but yet give them the essence of

• 38:10Speaker 01

  the teachings. But he has, from time to time, he's he brought in yoga teachers, he brought in somebody to teach him Tai Chi. But the thing was, I think a lot of people can have the training in these disciplines, but you have to meet people where they are. And so they would come in and I remember having conversations with this one particular person. And I told her, I said, they just had two and a half hour practice. You can't take them through two hours of yoga. You can't do it. Or you have to make it real for them and you have to understand that less is more. It might be better for you to teach them how to stretch and relax a little bit and then depending on their situation and

• 38:50Speaker 01

  you can teach them, some people maybe need more standing yoga poses, whatever. So my whole idea was you got to start with the understanding of what you can do to help the situation and you got to meet people where they were. So a lot of people, I think, at least in some cases, they come in not understanding that the context is more important than the content.

• 39:12Tim Ferriss?

  That's a really, that's a really, really important concept in line to underscore, right? The context is more important than the content and this in so much as what that brings to mind for me is that the tendency, the very understandable impulse that a lot of people have to copy and paste whatever is working in one place to another place.

• 39:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:34Tim Ferriss?

  But that just doesn't necessarily work. Like you said, if someone's just come out of a two and a half hour practice and they're going 100%, they don't have the slack in the system to do two hours of yoga. And I read that, as you noted, one of the things you observed when you first started working with Chicago Bulls was that they're dealing with all types of distractions that you don't necessarily get exposed to until you're at a higher level and that the more successful a person or team becomes, the more distractions there are. So it actually gets in some respects, very difficult to continue doing the things that got you to where you are in the first place. So they're getting requests for tickets

• 40:15Tim Ferriss?

  from friends and other hangers-on right before some of the most important games, all manners of shiny objects and obstacles and distractions. What were some of the recommendations you made or tools you suggested, anything to these players so they could turn down the volume on some of these distractions?

• 40:37Speaker 01

  Yes. The thing is, understanding that whatever you're doing, you've got to be fully present to it and understand what are you doing and what are the consequences? What's it costing you? How much energy can you allow for this activity versus the next activity? I would say a lot of things to them. One thing I would say to them is, don't believe the hype. So what does that mean? That means that when you go get interviewed, they tell you, you're the greatest thing since sliced bread. You say, thank you, and you just smile. And if they tell you, you're the biggest choke artist of all time, you just thank them and smile. So it's more about how to relate to people and just not give energy to that. It's just really understand that what's really important. You have to

• 41:21Speaker 01

  understand that even though you have your family with you, even though there's certain things that are going on, you have to create a kind of a cocoon for yourself to be ready to play. And so your rituals, your rituals, the day of the game. And so I would talk to them about rituals, but it was really more about, there's no such thing as multitasking. That you just do one thing at a time. So if you have a process where you're going to write tickets for a certain amount of time, at certain time during the pregame thing, then you do that, then you set that aside, then you have to have your space and time for your readiness, for you to get ready to play. But I didn't really get into that. They'd have to ask me about it. Back in those days, it was really different.

• 42:05Speaker 01

  It was like they had a volunteer, whereas now, the analogy I would use is before it was like laissez faire, the ones that wanted to do it, fine. Once it didn't, that's fine. But I have the analogy of if you have somebody out in the rain, you can at least go out there with an umbrella and ask them if they want to come in. You know, so you just meet them where they are and then if you can kind of bring them in. But some people, they thrive. I mean, everybody's different. Some people like quiet. Some people want, you know, rousing music. It's different.

• 42:36Tim Ferriss?

  Like Dennis Rodman in the latter category.

• 42:39Speaker 01

  Dennis Rodman. But it's really more about them, it was really more about teaching them from moment to moment, how they're relating to their experience and understanding the quality of mind that they have, the mind state that they have, and how to just be in the moment and be clear about what you're doing and what you're getting and the willingness to adjust and adapt. Like you said, what gets you here is just what that is. It got you here, but to go beyond that, you have to let go to grow. And you have to be willing to develop other habit patterns, other ways of being to go, to continue to evolve and to grow. So it's really more about the inner game and them getting clarity about what they want and who they're being and how to

• 43:23Speaker 01

  develop the me, but the we has to be the context in which the me is operating.

• 43:29Tim Ferriss?

  So let's talk about meeting people where they are because that person in the rain, you know, you might have, not to stretch the metaphor too far, but you might have one person who's doing jumping jacks and smiling, one person who's huddling in a corner, another person who's, who knows, drinking out of a puddle. There are so many different personalities.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  Right.

• 43:49Tim Ferriss?

  And I was reading a piece in the Boston Globe. And man, I mean, you, the types of testimonials that you have, the belief that other people ascribe to you is just incredible. And I'll just read a little piece here. This is from the Boston Globe, a piece in 2015. This is Kobe Bryant. He's basically saying, I'm going to paraphrase here. So he's saying that many people tried to get him to meditate, Kobe Bryant once told an interviewer, quote, "But I couldn't sit still for 20 minutes." "Under the tutelage of Phil Jackson and Mumford, however, meditation became a key to game preparation for Bryant and for his teammate and feud counterpart Shaquille O'Neal. There weren't a lot of things that Shaq and Kobe agreed on," says Lazenby, another person in

• 44:31Tim Ferriss?

  this piece, "but they both agreed on the effectiveness of George Mumford." Okay. Could you speak to the differences or similarities in teaching, say, Michael Jordan versus Kobe versus Shaquille O'Neal, some of the tools in your toolkit? Like, how did you approach those seemingly very different personalities?

• 44:53Speaker 01

  When I say talk about meeting people where they are, I let the wisdom and the mindfulness dictate what I do. I have to get insight. I have to get a clarity of, okay, what's the context? How do I deal with this person? One size does not fit all. It has to be a specificity of really getting clear, but also getting clear in my mind, what's my intention? But at the same time, it's just going in and just figuring out how to relate to them in a way that makes sense. You think about, about the great spiritual teachers like Jesus Abuda, they talk in parables. Or if they're going to talk to carpenters, they're going to use carpentry examples. If you're going to talk to people who are bricklayers or stonemasons, you're going to use that language to express the essence of what you're talking

• 45:38Speaker 01

  about. So when you talk to people about, if you create a vision of possibility where you say, hey, you're challenged with this, or you want to achieve this, you might consider doing this, because this can enhance you. And by the way, you know, I did this with this person, or, you know, I know the Leeds, they do that. Yeah, I went with Jay, Dr. Jay, I'm talking about. And he, you know, I know for a fact, there's certain practices people have, there's certain ways of being that you can have. So some people are auditory, some people are visual, some people are kinesthetic. So I had to meet them in that modality where... They can take in information. So a lot of it is connecting with them. I don't know how

• 46:18Speaker 01

  I was to say it. And then, and then feeling your way through, just being present with it and relating to them as each individual and understanding how, what will work for them. When I first started doing this, I didn't like standing still. I used to do more walking meditation than sitting, or do more Tai Chi or more yoga. But I talk about, sometimes you got to move your way into stillness.

• 46:44Tim Ferriss?

  I like that. That's great.

• 46:45Speaker 01

  And then sometime, and you have stillness and movement. My teacher, my seaford used to talk about this movement and stillness and stillness and movement. So you have to understand, my modality is more like physical. So how do I move myself in the stillness?

• 47:00Tim Ferriss?

  Can you give any examples, any specific examples or stories related to working with, say, Kobe or Shaq? I'm curious to know what this looks like in practice, if any moments or stories or examples come to mind.

• 47:16Speaker 01

  It's interesting because I spend a lot of my time just, just sitting there observing. Most of it is observing and getting a sense for where people are. And then finding the moment when I can go in and give them a teaching, or talk to them about something they're dealing with. I had a conversation with Kobe early on, in my first year I worked with them, when I said to Kobe, the best way to score is not to try to score. Because I saw that he was trying really hard. And several years ago, when he invited me to go down to Newport Beach and hang out with him, I asked him about that. And he said that he remembered everything I told him. And he has like a photographic memory, but it's picking the time to really

• 47:58Speaker 01

  ask him how they're seeing things or talk to them about, okay, I know you want to achieve this. Think about this. A lot of people think that the practice of mindfulness, the practice of insight meditation is just sitting and being still. There's a big part of it is cultivating wisdom, and talking about integrity, talking about walking your talk, but also understanding how to cultivate a sense of compassion for yourself and others, and how to, I guess, love is the way I would talk about it. You, when you love something, you labor for it, you make it grow. And so talking about this heart to heart, just talking about, well, if this is what you're interested in, here's an application. There's a way of thinking or looking at it and you might consider these things.

• 48:44Tim Ferriss?

  Could you explain what the dizziness of freedom is? I've heard you use this phrase before.

• 48:51Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 48:52Tim Ferriss?

  And it really stuck with me. Could you please explain what this is and how you see it?

• 48:58Speaker 01

  Freedom is not free, if you will. So the dizziness of freedom is because you're on, you're in the road less traveled or you're on shaky ground, the ground you're on is moving to the degree that, and I'm going back to 1846, Soren Kierkegaard, and he said that one side of the coin is freedom or potential, the heads, the other side is anxiety or uncertainty. He called it the alarming possibility of being able.

• 49:29Speaker 01

  When you change a behavior or a habit, you have to experience anxiety, you have to experience uncertainty, you have to experience discomfort because we're comfortable with where we are. And so when we grow, the only way that happens is you gotta be able to be a little bit uncomfortable. You gotta be beyond your comfort zone. You gotta have a discomfort zone where you go into. And then because we adapt to things, then you will adapt. So it's possible you get comfortable with being uncomfortable. So the dizziness of freedom is like, okay, before when you didn't have freedom, you did the same thing, you don't have to think, you don't have to reflect, you don't have to take a risk, you don't have to be vulnerable. But now you're being freedom and you're going to a different door, you're trying something

• 50:13Speaker 01

  else, then the dizziness of it is you do this thing, but you could do that thing. How do you make a choice out of all of these options? And you want to have more options because if you only have two options on some level, it's restricting, but on another level is yes, either or. So when you start understanding that this is, there's no meaning in the universe other than what you give it, or even though you could do this thing, you can also do that thing. And when you do this thing, you no longer have those things. So if I have five choices, I make one, I lose four. So now I'm in here and now I'm worried, oh, did I make the right choice? So the uncertainty. It's a military term they use, VUCA.

• 50:57Speaker 01

  From moment to moment, things are volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. So you have to embrace uncertainty, ambiguity. That's part of the life. This is what life is about. It's about saying yes and. Yes, it's frustrating, it's unpleasant. And it's okay, this is it. When I grow, this is what comes with it. If I achieve my goals, you look at the positive, but there's a negative. The other side is you're in a rowboat with people. You change, they gotta change, they gotta move, they don't wanna move.

• 51:29Speaker 01

  Or they got you in a box and now you're out of the box. So now they gotta re-figure who you are. They're gonna keep you in a box and get mad at you. So for whatever reason, but it always comes down to discomfort, being uncomfortable. The nervous system is wired this way. If it's pleasant, we move approach. It's unpleasant, we avoid. And if it's neither with indifference, we space out. It's what the nervous system does. So when you impute meaning on it, something and say, it's gonna be great. Even though it's uncomfortable, I know on the other side, this is the only way out. It's true. Then, once I commit to that and I have the experience of going through it and then coming to another level of grace, of ease, of peace, then I continue to do that.

• 52:13Speaker 01

  That's what I talk about, the superpower of trust. You need trust, but when you can verify it through insight, through information, through experience, now it goes from confidence to conviction. And then now you, you get on a beneficial cycle where things keep getting, the grits get richer. Because you know that if you learn and you achieve, it's gonna generate enthusiasm and you're gonna wanna learn more, you're gonna wanna commit to it. Cause you know that, and this is what the elites do, they see those things as challenges. Oh, this is great. This is an opportunity for me to express myself. That mindset is the growth mindset, but it's also pursuing excellence.

• 52:53Tim Ferriss?

  Let's talk about growth and excellence. And I'd love to frame it through a contrast that I've read you make. And you've written about this and there, there are examples of this on georgemumford.com. The or a barrier breakthrough versus the improvement trap? Could you explain for people what these two things are?

• 53:17Speaker 01

  Incremental improvement means you're just improving. But when you have a paradigm shift, then it's totally different. Cause when you're improving something, okay, I'm going to improve this shot. I'm going to do it. So that can be a trap. It can be helpful, but it can be a trap because you're just looking to improve instead of looking to break out. As Stephen Curry says, every breakthrough is a break with. So you, you have to change the paradigm. So you have to change how you see yourself. So if you keep, so Michael Jordan's, what did he say when he hit the winning shot against Georgetown in the NCAA? He said, I went from Mike Jordan to Michael Jordan.

• 53:56Speaker 01

  See what I'm saying? So he had a paradigm shift, realize, okay, I'm great. Not I'm going to be great or I can be great. I'm a great player. I see myself as Michael Jordan capable of doing everything. When you have a breakthrough, that means you're changing how you see things. And when you change how you see things, then things change. So when you change how you see things, things you look at change. The constant improvement is great to have improvement, but a breakout has to do with, you could be improving and being a little pawn. And it's good for the little pawn, but to really break out, to really go beyond that is you have to just have creative initiative. It's nice. I can hit singles all day.

• 54:37Speaker 01

  I'm playing baseball, just get a single, but you want to be able to not only hit a single, but hit, hit whatever the heck you want. Hit home runs, hit, hit whatever. So I would say the vision of possibility is bigger in one versus the other, where it's keeping you playing small and it's comfortable versus being big and having a breakout.

• 54:56Tim Ferriss?

  Right. Having that complete kind of shift of perspective in, and it sounds like particularly as, as you mentioned in the Mike Jordan to Michael Jordan, it's a shift in how one views themselves. Are there any other examples that you can think of? Things you've seen in athletes or others that have?

• 55:21Tim Ferriss?

  Really stuck in your mind that stand out in your memory, other breakthroughs or breakouts like this, where not over a long period of time, but in an instant or in a single game, in a single practice, maybe over a week or a month, you see a real quantum leap in someone you've worked with?

• 55:40Speaker 01

  One of the athletes I worked with at Boston College, name is Troy Bell. He's a point guard. I think he holds a record in B C for the most points scored. Troy, as a sophomore, we were playing in the Big East. He got Big East Player of the Year. He was co-play of the year with Murphy from Notre Dame. His junior year, it was kind of okey doke. Then he came back in the senior year and he won Player of the Year outright. And as a matter of fact, you saw where his game was going. He was increasing and then it just took off. In January, in the senior year, he just went to a whole other level where this play, so much so that Sports Illustrated came and interviewed him.

• 56:25Speaker 01

  When they told him, he says, you know, working with George and, you know, just a mental game is all of that stuff that we were working on, all of a sudden, it just took off. In a linear perspective, you say one plus one equals two. But in a nonlinear, well, right brain, if you're left, right-handed, one plus one equals six. You get a jump. So that happened with Troy. The team he was playing on, Boston College Eagles, Al Skinner's team, who was my roommate from college, one year, he was six and 21, six wins, 21 losses. The next year, the team was 11 and 19.

• 57:05Speaker 01

  And out of those 19 losses, 12 losses came in a row when they lost in the last possession of the game. The next year, a same team, which you played 16 games in the league. So Biggies, you played 16 games that first year where they were 11 and 19, they won three games and lost 13. The next year, they won 13 games and lost three. So they was 27 and 5. It kept going and then it just took off. I could say the same thing, same thing about the Bulls, you know, when they won 72 games, you know, they struggled, they go through it, then you take off. You chip away at it, but because slow motion gets you there quicker, or it's like the tortoise and the hare, you just keep doing what's in front of you. You,

• 57:49Speaker 01

  you stay in locked in, you stay enthusiastic, you do what you have to do. Then something happens. It happens a lot of the time. You just break out. You have a breakout because you're not just improving, you're looking. And these guys had a vision. So that team that was 27 and 5, that year, we had what they call a European trip. So we're in the gym in August before they go and I'm hanging around, I'm listening and the guys are saying, you know, we've been getting beat by 40 by all these teams. Any team that comes in here this year, we're gonna beat them by 20. That's self image. That's a shift in consciousness.

• 58:27Tim Ferriss?

  Right. And it's very concrete, too. Very specific.

• 58:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. And you know what their record was that year? 17 and 0, and they won by 22 and a half points.

• 58:37Tim Ferriss?

  I'd be curious to know, since you've sort of tracked yourself and your sort of development over a long period of time, if you look back at the younger George, say, in the first year of working with high level athletes, is there any advice that you would give him now, just with the benefit of hindsight?

• 59:00Speaker 01

  I would tell him that focus on self-observation, teaching them how to observe their experience in a uncritical way, where they can start to see, okay, if I'm shooting free throws, let's just talk about shooting free throws. When I go up and I shoot a free throw, I want to be able to observe what happened. You know, I missed a free throw. A lot of times, people say, shoot, I missed a free throw. I want them to be able to say, okay, so I'm observing it.

• 59:27Speaker 01

  So when I shot the free throw, what did I notice that was off? Did I use my feet? Did I keep my elbow in? Did I stick it? And it's just a matter of like, okay, so what do I need to change? Okay, I need to stick it next time. If you go back to Michael Jordan, playing in 1998 against the Utah Jazz, in the fourth quarter, he was shooting shots and they were short.

• 59:48Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah.

• 59:49Speaker 01

  So what adjustment did he make? So when he shot the shot, he stuck it.

• 59:54Tim Ferriss?

  Can you explain sticking it to people visually?

• 59:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:56Tim Ferriss?

  That's more extension through the wrist.

• 59:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, but it's really more like sticking it like this, like, like follow through.

• 1:00:02Tim Ferriss?

  Follow through.

• 1:00:03Speaker 01

  Right? What he did was he made the adjustment. My shot is short, so to get it up, I have to get it up and stick it. So you see in real time, he'll make an adjustment, but how does that work? So I talk about the four A's. So the four A's have to do with awareness. The kind of awareness that you could just notice, you know, this uncritical, it's mindfulness. You just notice like mirror mind, you're aware of what happened. Okay, I'm shooting my jump shot and it's flat. Then the acceptance of it. That's the challenging part. Because sometimes you say, oh, man, you know, I just rushed it or whatever. You're not taking responsibility for it and saying, yeah, I don't like it. It sucks. It feels bad. But once I embrace it and say, this is what happened.

• 1:00:46Speaker 01

  This is know the truth and the truth shall make you free. You know that it was short. And then what's the compassionate action? Compassionate action is what? Okay, what do I need to do to fix it? I need to stick it. That's all I need to do is just follow through. Then the assessment afterwards is, so there's awareness, acceptance, which is the big challenging thing. Action, compassionate action. And assessment, what worked, what didn't work. And then, then go back to it. So if you're practicing meditation, you're sitting and you notice that. You're sitting, but your mind keeps thinking about, let's do what happens to a lot of people.

• 1:01:27Speaker 01

  I'm listening to a song on the radio, like they say, Stop Me Up by Mick Jagger, whatever. And you heard it on the radio and you're in your meditation and it stopped me up. And it keeps going and the more you try to avoid it, it keeps staying there. Then you go through the sitting and you say, well, the whole time I was struggling with this damn song. I couldn't get rid of it. The awareness is this song or this, it could be a thought pattern or whatever. It could be something we're worried about, like somebody's sick and we're worried about how the operation went or something like that. So the instructions are when you get distracted, just go back to your breath or be with the body. But you spend all the time doing that, but it's a struggle and it's hard to do it.

• 1:02:09Speaker 01

  The awareness of that, then the acceptance is, yeah, I couldn't do it. But then the compassion and action is, okay, so George, what do you do? Here's what I teach. So if this becomes so much of a distraction, instead of fighting it,

• 1:02:25Speaker 01

  just turn your attention towards it. And that becomes the object. What is this? And so by not resisting it, by looking at it, then you know, so what is it? What does it feel like? You know, this song, you know, what does it feel like in my body? What is it? Why is it this song is staying there? Maybe there's something about Stop Me Up or Jimi Hendrix, who knows? Or, you know, the power of love, it could be whatever it is. But then we look at it, but we just notice that it's just thinking.

• 1:02:54Speaker 01

  And we just, instead of resisting it, we, we turn attention to it and we open it up. Okay, what is this? And you just let it be there, acceptance. And then by doing that, you'll notice that you'll calm down. And then because all you're doing is taking this, instead of being attached to this object, you just take whatever comes up. Okay, this is here, let's just go with that. Notice the song, you just focus on that and you will still get concentrated because you focus on one thing. So that's where, you know, the awareness, the acceptance, but if I'm going through this every day for five days in a row, if it's not that, it's something else and I'm struggling. I just can't stay on the object. What I'm gonna do is say, I can't do this. This is not for me. I'm not able to do it. Instead of saying no, it's just

• 1:03:40Speaker 01

  noticing what's happening. You're distracted and it's instead of fighting it, just let it become your obvious awareness. This is part of the process. And then when you do that, then you're going to get to this place of calm. Then you can let go and then you can just come back to wherever you are, but you have to be aware of it. You have to accept that, yeah, it's happening. I suck as a meditator. That's all judgment. It's awareness without being critical or without judgment. And then for passionate action is just notice, okay, let's see what mind takes us. Cause maybe the mind is telling us something and you focus on that. Then you come back and then you notice that there's more ease. And so then your assessment of it is what worked, what didn't work, what did you change?

• 1:04:23Speaker 01

  So now you have that ability. So it could be a sound. It could be a ache in your body.

• 1:04:30Speaker 01

  Now you have the same thing. So you're aware of your breathing, but there's this twisting, burning, and maybe it's anxiety and you have this tightness in your chest. And you're like this. So instead of avoiding that, you open to it, you focus on that and say, what is this? And can I open and can I just breathe and just let it be there? What's the sensation? Okay. So it's tightness. But then at some point, it's going to change. It's going to dissipate because I'm not fighting it. Then I can move on. So that's what I mean by the four A's.

• 1:05:01Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, I like it. I like the four A's and you know, the examples that you gave of turning, let's just say what people might consider a problem into the object. It makes me think of this, specifically a fortune cookie that I was given at one point to carry my wallet or that I ended up carrying my wallet and it said, that which hinders your task is your task. And I think it's, it's a very helpful framework, this four A's, especially for beginning meditators, because it's so easy without that type of perspective to become very frustrated and to beat yourself up. It's a very valuable, very valuable approach. So thank you for that.

• 1:05:45Speaker 01

  Yeah. So can I give you an example, a story that illustrates?

• 1:05:48Tim Ferriss?

  Yes, please. Great.

• 1:05:49Speaker 01

  So I was working in this prison. Norfolk County House of Correction, actually, the little tidbit is there, that's what Malcolm X did his time in that prison. I actually saw his jacket, you know, his record, so I used to work in there. And so I go in there to teach this meditation class, or this meditation yoga class, but meditation class, and I have all these copious notes. This is when I was really and I was gonna give them a sermon, or a lecture, or a Dhamma talk, whatever you wanna call it, it's gonna be awesome. I got all these notes in there and everything. So, and this also goes into what Bruce Lee talks about, be like water. I go in there, and then when I get in the class, I realized that out of thirty-two students, twenty-eight of them are Spanish-speaking only.

• 1:06:36Speaker 01

  So, so, the awareness, the acceptance, okay, what's the capacity and action? Okay, I gotta interpret it, I gotta make this shit real simple. I gotta just, just give them the basic things, breathe in, breathe out, whatever, you know, it's something about being in the present and what that looks like. And that's when all them notes went out the window.

• 1:06:56Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:57Speaker 01

  And I just had to just be like, what, just, okay, what is, what is here? How can I work with it? Just, I won't say surrender, I say embrace it, and then generate the hope. What can I do? How can I still have to keep it simple, but I can just show up and do things? And so that applies. And then we can fast forward to, you like stories, I'll give you another story.

• 1:07:18Tim Ferriss?

  Well, one second, how did that talk turn out?

• 1:07:21Speaker 01

  How did it turn out? Turn out great.

• 1:07:23Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah.

• 1:07:23Speaker 01

  Because they got something and I got something. And I realized that what it told me was, especially working in prison, you had no idea what the hell was gonna happen. You could be doing a class, and then the alarm goes off and everybody gets locked out.

• 1:07:37Tim Ferriss?

  Right, right.

• 1:07:38Speaker 01

  So, how did it go? It went great because I gave them what they could hear, I met them where they were. But the main thing was, I wasn't rigid, I wasn't attached to my- Wanting to force something on them. I'd say, okay, they're not gonna be able to hear this. So what can I do? How can I be of service? And so I just went right into it, but I laughed because I said, all that preparation and it just kind of goes. And so that's the same thing. So whatever happens, can we say yes to it? Can we embrace it and then generate the hope or say, okay, what can we do? What's the next play? This is an opportunity for us to figure out what we need to do. And maybe if we don't know, well, just start with just sitting and just being present with what's going on.

• 1:08:22Speaker 01

  I had a friend of mine, his name is Bo Lozoff, he passed away, but he, he was doing a thing in prison. And he decided to bring the men and the women together. And when he did that, it was other playoffs. And he was there and you know what he did? He sat down and meditated right in the middle of them and they all got quiet.

• 1:08:42Speaker 01

  He had no idea what the hell to do. So he said, I'm just gonna sit and think about, you know, see what happens. And they all looked at him and said, well, how could he do that?

• 1:08:51Speaker 01

  So you see what I'm saying? So there's, and I'm guarantee you, if you think about your experience or even the listeners, if you think about a time when you were able to just say, okay, this is what it is. What can I do? How can I relate to it? That's what it is. So awareness, acceptance, once you accept it, then you can do something about it. So you're not in denial or you're not blaming somebody. You're saying, okay, this is what it is. How can I do about it? So those four A's can apply anytime, anywhere.

• 1:09:17Tim Ferriss?

  That's a great story. What are you most excited about these days personally?

• 1:09:22Speaker 01

  Personally, I'm excited about the fact that, that I get to do what I was put here to do and be of service and just show up. I mean, it's a journey of discovery where I have no idea what's going to happen with COVID and, and all the other things. My job is just, like I said, to show up and to be myself, which in my case is I want to be loving. I want to be compassionate, but I want to be helpful. To show up, be myself and have fun is like, okay, so I had to be like, why? So whatever is coming, can I embrace it? And create a container to hold it. And at the same time, generate, okay, how can I relate to this in a way that inspires, motivates, moves is helpful?

• 1:10:04Tim Ferriss?

  Yeah, it is. There's certainly a world of uncertainty right now. It's a ripe opportunity for practicing a lot of what you discuss. And it's really highlighted how much is outside of our control.

• 1:10:17Speaker 01

  Yes, but at the same time, Hans Selye, the scientist that came up with the stress of life and the stress reaction and all of that, is his belief and it's also my belief that when the crisis or when there's a challenge, that's when our latent abilities express themselves. It's like seeing everything. So we know this, that how you can predict how somebody does in a job, three things, what they call positive genius or optimism and hope. Second thing is social support. And the third thing is seeing a crisis as a challenge.

• 1:10:52Speaker 01

  And so when we can do that, now we generate, we stimulate these latent abilities. So, oh, this is great. This is an opportunity to show up and to really be helpful. So that's what I'm excited about is it really doesn't matter what happens on some level. What matters is can I create space between stimulus and response? And in that space, can I be loving? Can I be compassionate? Can I be wise? I make wise choices? And can I live according to what my core values are? Love, compassion, connection, that sort of thing. And that no matter what happens, I need to train myself so I can keep showing up. But the good news is because I share, I give away what I have, I get more of it. And if I want to learn something, I teach it.

• 1:11:39Tim Ferriss?

  George, I want to commend you for the work you do in the world and also the fact that you share what you've learned and your story and the tools, not just with the celebrities that are known worldwide, but that you've also dedicated a substantial part of your life to at-risk populations, people who are looking for new ways to change and new chapters and transitions into a better way of being. And I just think that's really a manifestation of

• 1:12:13Tim Ferriss?

  Love in you and it's beautiful to witness that and to know that there are people like you offering that. So I just want to thank you.

• 1:12:23Speaker 01

  Thank you. And it's people like you that they give me an opportunity to share my experience, strength and hope. And it's also wonderful because I know the impact you've been having on folks and continue to have. So I want to say ditto to you, but I'm, I'm just happy, man. I'm just happy that, that I can just be here and have this wonderful conversation about how do we live in a solution, not in a problem. And that how do we access the fact that we are already perfect, whole and complete in terms of being a masterpiece or divine spark? We just don't know it or we don't show it.

• 1:12:57Tim Ferriss?

  I think that is, that is an excellent piece to anchor on as we, as we come to a close. George, is there anything else that you would like to say? Any question you'd like to post to the audience or request you'd like to make of people listening before we wrap up?

• 1:13:12Speaker 01

  Yes. My wish for everyone is for everyone to really understand they have a masterpiece and how to know ourselves so we can be ourselves, so we can express ourselves, so we can share ourselves. So the sharing is really important and just understanding that we have a masterpiece. And I have my book, I have my online course, I have my YouTube channel, and you have all sorts of resources. My hope is that we all understand that we have to take personal responsibility as an inner game. And if we don't like what we are experiencing, we can change it. But we have to be willing and also not letting blame or denial prevent us from taking responsibility

• 1:13:55Speaker 01

  and being able to, to share the focus on the solution. So if we're going to criticize somebody, it's one thing to say, I don't like this. It's another thing to say it and then give them an option. It's helpful.

• 1:14:08Tim Ferriss?

  Very different worlds of difference. And that goes for criticizing other people or criticizing yourself. It applies in so many ways. George, people can find you at georgemumford.com, certainly on Instagram. We'll link to all these things in the show notes as well. At george.mumford, Twitter, at GT Mumford. And they can find the Mindful Athlete course certainly on your website. Your book is The Mindful Athlete subtitle Secrets to Pure Performance. And to everyone listening, we'll link to everything that we've discussed, including the YouTube channel and so on, in the show notes at tim.blog/podcast as per always. And George, thank you so much for taking the time.

• 1:14:51Speaker 01

  Thank you. I appreciate you.

• 1:14:53Tim Ferriss?

  And to everybody listening, until next time, thank you for tuning in. Hey, guys, this is Tim again. Just a few more things before you take off. Number one, this is Five Bullet Friday. Do you want to get a short email from me? Would you enjoy getting a short email from me every Friday that provides a little morsel of fun before the weekend? And Five Bullet Friday is a very short email where I share the coolest things I've found or that I've been pondering over the week. That could include favorite new albums that I've discovered. It could include gizmos and gadgets and all sorts of weird shit that I've somehow dug up in the world of the esoteric as I do. It could include favorite articles that I've read

• 1:15:36Tim Ferriss?

  and that I've shared with my close friends, for instance. And it's very short. It's just a little tiny bite of goodness before you head off for the weekend. So if you want to receive that, check it out. Just go to fourhourworkweek.com. That's fourhourworkweek.com all spelled out. And just drop in your email and you will get the very next one. And if you sign up, I hope you enjoy it. This episode is brought to you by Tonal. That's T-O-N-A-L. Tonal is the world's most intelligent home gym and personal trainer. That's the tagline from their website, folks. So it gives you the one-sentence summary. By eliminating traditional metal weights, Tonal can deliver 200 pounds of resistance in a device smaller than a flat-screen TV. It mounts right on your wall with no floor space required.

• 1:16:21Tim Ferriss?

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• 1:17:05Tim Ferriss?

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• 1:17:48Tim Ferriss?

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• 1:18:32Tim Ferriss?

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