← Earn the Right to Live Your Dreams
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Foreign welcome to the Earn the right to live your dreams podcast. This is Coit Cooper and I'm ready to rock it out. So this week was an interesting week for me. I had a good friend of mine who had coached me when I was growing up write me to let me know that his dad had passed away. His dad's name is Ron. And Ron was to this day the most influential, impactful coach, leader, human being that I'd ever been around. I mean, of all the people who I'd been coached and taught by, this was hands down the guy who had really just transformed my life. I mean, he had changed my life. I still. 20 years later, over 20 years later, right now, you use lessons. Every single day that I learn from Ron, when I'm in a tough situation, I think about those lessons and I use those things and he's just, he's a man that I absolutely love. And so when he wrote me to tell me that, it didn't necessarily catch me off guard because Ron has had Parkinson's for a lot of years and his life has slowly kind of, I guess, deteriorated in a way over time to where a lot of pain, hard time remembering things, just has had a. Had a hard battle. And so when you hear that news, there's a part of you that is relieved because you know that he, he's in a better place. Right. Heaven inherited an amazing coach. And I know that that is something that is good for him. But there's also the part that causes you to reflect, right? When you lose somebody who's really close to you, you think it causes you to automatically pause in your life. And we consider things that we don't normally consider. Death has a way of doing that. It makes us think about the way that we're living our lives. It makes us think about what's next. And in the middle of this, I was sitting and I was watching first and seeing as this news broke, the number of wrestlers, athletes, parents, people surrounding him that were writing and when people pass, they generally, people write nice things about them. Oh, they're a good person. Really enjoyed this, but these were different. These were messages that were like, this man literally changed my life. He loved me unconditionally. He made me believe in myself. The type of just life altering messages, the type that every person who's writing it is saying, he stepped into my life and he made me better forever. That's amazing, wouldn't you say? I mean, just, it's so amazing. And it made me think, like, what is it that made him so unique. Like, how is it? Like, so many of us, we're looking around and we want our lives to matter. We know that most of us have this feeling we're here for a bigger reason. You know, we're on this planet to learn something, to do something, to contribute. Right in here is somebody who contributed so much, and you can just feel it. It's tangible. After he's gone with the love and the messages that are being passed on, and when you look at that, you automatically reflect. You say, how do I do more of that? I feel like he was on to something. He knew something in the way that he poured into people and he just treated them and he just influenced them. I feel like there's something to that. So my immediate thought was this, like, what is it that made him so unique? And there's so many things that went through my mind. You know, you might be sitting here and you say, if you're intrigued, you're going, koi. Was it his personality? Did he have a unique personality? Because I think all of us have been around people with these unique personalities that we just remember. And I say he unequivocally had a unique personality. He was a guy who could literally, when you walked into a room, he could look at you with his eyes and smile, and he could lift you up just doing that. His energy and enthusiasm was contagious. I mean, you just felt it when you were around him. And every time you saw him, he had this incredible ability to make you feel like you were the most important person that he was talking to. I still remember being so excited to go into practices, and you'd walk down the stairs and you'd step in and he'd look at you, and he'd immediately smile, and he'd give you his full attention, and he'd walk over and he'd say, hey, what's up, buddy? Almost every time. And then he would ask you things that were really important. He'd ask you, how is your family doing? Have you thanked him for bringing you here? You know, he's teaching you about gratitude. He asked you, like, how's school going? You know, are you. Are you making sure you're doing those things to set yourself up? Then and only then would he ask you if you're ready for practice. But he just cared deeply. But the way he looked at you, the energy, the enthusiasm, the passion. He had an incredible personality. He was. He had a gravitating personality. So was that part of it? Yeah, no question. That is something that made him unique. It's a part of what helped him be successful as a coach. But was it the thing? And the answer is no, it wasn't the thing. It wasn't the thing that truly differentiated him from other coaches and other teachers and other leaders. It wasn't that. You might be saying coy. Was it his? Just, did he have amazing training? Was he really good at strategies and techniques? And I'll tell you, he really was unique in that area. You know, he had a way of bringing these just quirky, quirky training techniques that were brilliant. I mean, brilliant. And in wrestling, there's a style called Greco Roman wrestling. And your job is to keep your elbows in hold position. If you're not a wrestler, it's okay. You don't need to know that. But I remember one time we walked into practice and you're going to say this. I don't see this as innovative, but it was. It was different. And trust me, the outcomes were amazing. He brought you in and he had all these ropes lined out. And we're sitting here and going, oh, my goodness. Like, what is going? What's next? And he goes, and he starts tying our elbows to our sides, right? And. And he says, I want you to wrestle all day like this. And we're like, what do you mean? What? Like, no, like, why would we do that? And he said, just do it. And it was so difficult to learn how to do it that way. But it didn't take us long to realize that he was teaching us. We had to keep our elbows in. We couldn't give up that position. And if we were really great there, we were going to have a lot of success in Greco Roman wrestling. I went on and was able to win multiple national championships, make multiple world teams. And it's because of stuff like that. He used to do interval training, you know, the different, different types of sprints and stuff to get us into shape. He would. He would tailor our workouts for national tournaments. He was so good at this, like, 25 years ago, stuff that's become more common now. He was amazing at that. And so say, is that the reason. Is that the reason he was unique? I say it was. It definitely helped him as a coach, but it's not, it's not the reason. It's not the thing that you hear his athletes say. It's not. And so you might be saying, was he really good at the mental stuff? Man, when you went to big tournaments, was he able to just do things to get you mentally hyped? And I tell people he's One of the best I ever had at that. I remember the first time I went to a big national tournament, a world team trials tournament, and he convinced me that I should go. At the age 14, I got a doctor's note. I have a story associated with that. I'll leave that alone for now. But we went to the. We. We went to the tournament, and we go walking in, and he looks at me, and he smiles and he claps his hand. He's like, buddy, are you ready to have some fun? And I'm like, wait, what? Like, what do you mean, fun? You see, I transferred over to this club to wrestle with Ron. And I had gone to big regional tournaments before, where you're wrestling people from a lot of different states. But I was always taught, you got to be serious. Put your game face on. Get your game face on. You need to be ready. You need to be serious. And I did that. And I guess in some ways it was okay. But Ron came in and said, are you ready to have fun? And I'm like, what do you mean, fun? But I looked at him and he was serious. Let's have fun. And I learned that that needed to be a part of the process. You needed to enjoy what you're doing. You needed to be excited about was the key to bringing out your best, and it was the key to minimizing your fears and your anx is to change the way you saw you were doing the things you were doing. The crazy thing is now in sports, you see more of this coming out. You see coaches embracing. It's like this innovative thing. But I look back and I go, wait, no, we were doing this 25 years ago. Ron was. And it was amazing. And I had the best tournaments of my life. When you combine that just personality that made you want to go into practice and be around him with innovative techniques, he was so good at the basics. And then this mindset where he got you excited to compete, he got you to embrace a growth mindset and just go out and lay it on the line. And even when you fell short, he didn't lay it on you. He didn't yell at you, he didn't tell you was wrong. He'd put his arm around you and try to get you to see where the lesson is, how can you get better? He knew there was a long game to all of this. But even that final thing, his greatness at getting you to see things differently, that it still wasn't the thing. It wasn't the thing that all of his athletes talk about, of what made him special? You see, there was something underlining all of this that made him so remarkably special as a coach and human being. And I'm talking about this to honor him, no question about it. But I'm really also talking about it to carry on that legacy. Maybe you're a coach out there, you want to have your coaching matter, or maybe you're a teacher and you think, man, I just want to be able to pour into people. Maybe you're a parent who wants to make sure that your kids are getting these amazing, amazing lessons. Maybe you're just somebody that wants to be able to walk in a room and make everybody better around you in all of these circumstances. This has to be the secret sauce. It was the thing that will make Ron memorable for good. I mean, in the minds of his athletes, they will always remember him. He's not going to be forgotten. And I know that's not the point, but it's pretty cool, right? And it's one of those things that it's gonna get passed on because it was so unique, it made such a big impact on the athletes and the parents that it makes you, as one of them, want to go carrying it on. And you might be saying, well, what is it quite. Or maybe some of you know what I'm gonna say already. And here's what it was. As I read through all the posts of former teammates, people who competed before me, wrestled for him afterwards, the parents and all those generations, one of the things that they said is he just loved you. He just loved you unconditionally. Now think about that for a second. That doesn't seem like something that's a fit in a sport like wrestling or boxing or, or football, but yet that's what it was. You might say, oh, you probably weren't that good. It was probably this feel good club. No, it was one of the best clubs on the west coast, maybe even one of the best ones in the country at the time. We had, we had so many multiple time state champs. People were going on and winning national championships. People were going off to D1 colleges. It was such a good place to train. It was, we were so effective. So it wasn't that, but it was this love in between that made it all work. And when you think about it, it makes total sense, right? I don't know that I saw it in the moment. I just kind of got caught up in it and I was just influenced by it. But when you reflect, you look back and you go, it makes sense now. You see, I work with People who are wanting to go out and live to their highest potential. And what I see, even in high level people is fear, is self doubt, is a worry of whether or not you're enough. We walk around and we're not sure of our worth, we're not sure that matter. And you know what Ron did? Every time he saw you, he made you feel like you mattered. He gave you his full attention. He tried to find any way that he possibly could to help you elevate more in a world of people who are out trying to get attention and trying to get more for themselves. He was somebody. All he was trying to do was pour into you. He just wanted to make your life better. It was incredible. He saw you not only for the person that you were, but he dug in and he found all the things that were special about you and he saw you for the person that you could become. And this was incredible. He taught kids to believe in themselves. He taught me to believe in myself. When I was 14 years old and I wasn't sure I belonged at a national tournament and I had the number one kid in the country, he looked at me and he said, no, that kid has you. They have to deal with you. And he looked at me with those eyes and I knew that he believed it. He believed in me even when I wasn't sure if I believed in myself. He believed in me and he lifted me an entire level. I beat that kid, made the world team, unequivocally would have never done that without somebody who believed in me. And so what I'm really saying is to be able to go out and have your life matter. Try to be a little bit more like Ron. Make love your criteria. Make caring about people your criteria. Go in and look for the things that make them unique and point them out to them. Look at people and tell them that they're capable of more, that they can go out and they can live a really remarkable life and they can make an influence and believe in them because people need that. We're in a time right now where people are struggling, they're not sure what to do, they're frustrated, they're overwhelmed, there's negativity. And what we really need is more people like Ron who step in the middle and who have this just enthusiastic, positive demeanor about them and just infectious, just energy where they carry it. And they're looking for a way to go out and to be better and to be able to pour it into people as much as they possibly can. So really, all this podcast is usually I'M going, oh, here's three steps. Here's four steps. No, no, no. This is one step. Just strive to find ways to love on people. Look for ways in your day to say, hey, how can I serve people? How can I lift people? How can I look for the best in them? As the world wants to look for what's wrong and what's negative, look for what's good, look for the things that you can elevate and become a positive influence in this world. I know that what I'm going to do is go out and just try to be more of that, you know, to try to look at people in that way, to try to care about people in that way, to try to find the best in them. But if we just did that, we would do our part to make the world a better place. We could all be a little bit more like Ron. It would be amazing. I hope this podcast serves you. If so, be sure to share it with other people and get out and be a positive influencer. Take care. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast episode. I hope you truly enjoyed it. If so, be sure to pass it on to somebody who might enjoy it as well. If you're looking for additional resources to help you just up your game, head on over to Thrive 365 coaching. And check out my coaching club and my private coaching, which have just incredible resources to help you go out and create results and a life you truly love.