Why You Keep Stopping at 90% | Arturo Nuñez

Finding Peak with Ryan Hanley

In this episode, Ryan Hanley and Arturo Nuñez explore the intersection of elite athletic mindset and corporate leadership. They use Kobe Bry

Key takeaways

• Kobe Bryant's 'bottling better' project was designed to teach anyone how to achieve excellence through curiosity and obsession with detail.
• A fundamental distinction exists between being curious (noticing obstacles) and being committed (preparing to trudge through them).

Main topics

• Kobe Bryant's mindset
• Commitment vs. Curiosity

Notable quotes

Greatness is a choice. Not some far-flung one day I'm going to be great choice. A daily choice.

Conclusion

The episode serves as a motivational guide for professionals seeking t

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) I did not appreciate Kobe Bryant enough when he was alive. I Speaker 3 (0:04) got the privilege of spending four and a half years working with that guy directly and we became friends. So I got to know the man, not the legend, not the legendary basketball player. I got to know the man. His objective, his legacy project was he wanted to do what he called bottling better. Kobe used to say it like this, greatness is a choice. Not some far-flung one day I'm going to Speaker 1 (0:22) be great choice. A daily choice. What is one of the unwritten rules that you think most people who... either haven't lived a life or read your book run into the most often. The Speaker 3 (0:33) quality of your life is the quality of your relationships. Full stop. Point blank. Speaker 1 (0:45) I did not appreciate Kobe Bryant enough when he was alive. And I think some of that was because... I don't think he talked as much about this stuff while he was playing. He was just so focused on the work. But man, and it's, I mean, obviously it's just a tragedy upon tragedies, what happened to him and his family and et cetera. But the work that he did. from retirement until his unfortunate passing, I mean, there is just mountains of value and insight that like, it was like he had been storing up and I feel like we were almost robbed because it couldn't have been everything he had. You know what I mean? Like, but just being able to get out there, you know, once he stopped playing and do these interviews and create this stuff and share these stories, I just, I like it. I look at him like I did not appreciate who this man was and his mentality and mindset enough when he was here with us. Speaker 3 (1:49) Man, you know, I got the privilege of spending four and a half years working with that guy directly and we became friends in that process. So I got to know the man, not the legend, not the legendary basketball player, not the incredible athlete, not the, you know, perfection obsessed athlete. I got to know the man. And man, I learned so much. I learned so much. And a lot of the stuff is in my book. Well, some of the stuff is in my book, but I could tell you stories for days about this guy and what he meant to me and what he meant to young people. Just a visionary guy. And it all started with, you know, when I first met Cody Wright, the first thing that strikes you about him is just how damn curious he is. He's curious about everything. Everything. Hey, the gas prices went up. Get me the guy from Chevron on the phone. What do you mean the guy from Chevron? Give me the CEO. I want to talk to him about the gas prices. I don't understand what's going on. He was that guy. And the guy, the CEO of Chevron would get on the call because it's Kobe Bryant, right? Kobe Bryant's calling me. Let me get on the call. He would do that about anything he was curious about. Give me the world's foremost expert on that on the phone. I want to hear. I want to understand that. I don't understand that. What's going on there? What's happening in Brazil? Give me somebody. He would do that all the time. So incredible curiosity. Incredible curiosity. And I think that was a superpower for him. That allowed him to become great at what he was doing. But I'll say this. His objective, his legacy project was he wanted to do what he called bottling better. I want to bottle better. Come on, what do you mean bottle better? What does that mean? I want to show young people that you can achieve the standard of excellence that I achieved in basketball at anything that you should desire to do. If you just use the qualities of curiosity, obsession of detail, honing the craft of what you're doing, watching the masters do what you want to do. Anything that you want to do, you can achieve that level of greatness just by following the formula. And that's what he called bottling better. And that's what he wanted to leave behind for young people. It wasn't about playing basketball. You need to be a basketball player. You want to be a poet? Here's how you do it. Here's how you do poetry. You obsess the dictionary. You obsess Maya Angelou. That's how you get into it. And that's what he wanted to leave behind for folks, which I thought was really amazing. Speaker 1 (3:57) Do you think we culturally have lost our... respect or appreciation for excellence the way we used to. Like, and not just to take like a basketball example, but like, you look at Jordan, you look at Kobe, let's just take those two. Obviously incredibly successful from a championship perspective, a points, but when we think about them, like, I don't think Michael Jordan's six titles. I think someone who literally, like the example, my son, my son's a basketball player. He loves Jordan. He's like, dad. He was dead. I think the most incredible thing about Michael Jordan is that when the Detroit Pistons beat the crap out of him, he went out and went to the gym and put on 40 pounds of muscle and came back the next year. You know what I mean? He's like, you know what I mean? And he's like, when we think about these guys, we think about the fact that. They were unyieldingly committed to excellence. And it seems like today, not that there aren't people. Yeah, it's not like there aren't people who are excellent, but I feel like we don't put that on the pedestal that we used to. Do you think that's fair? I think that's Speaker 3 (5:08) a Speaker 1 (5:08) fair assessment. I want to say two things about that. Speaker 3 (5:09) One time I was with Kobe and he said, you know, Michael and I, Michael Jackson and I are good friends. Michael Jackson? What are you talking about? Speaker 3 (5:20) What do you and Michael Jackson have in common? Oh, we talk all the time. We're both obsessed with craft, obsessed with it, obsessed with the idea of getting better today than we were yesterday at our craft. And it's cost us everything. We've sacrificed everything to be able to do this. And we talk about that sacrifice and we talk about that obsession with craft. And then one thing that he said, which relates directly to the question that you asked me is, you know, one day he said, Arturo, are you curious or are you committed? So what do you mean, Kog? It's like, you know, the curious, right? When they see potholes, landmines, obstacles, challenges, roadblocks, they turn back. The committed not only expected the landmines, roadblocks, obstacles, and challenges, they were prepared to trudge through them. towards greatness and success. They were committed to greatness and success. A lot of people today are curious about a lot of stuff. We've got a lot of access to information. We get real curious about stuff and you can reach anything, which is amazing. Technology has allowed us to find out about things that we've got at our fingertips. We get curious a lot. What I fail to see a lot is commitment. You're curious, but are you committed? Are you prepared to go the distance? Are you prepared to trudge through the unpleasantry, the uncomfortable bits to get to greatness? You got to be prepared to go through the uncomfortable part. Greatness is not comfortable. It's the uncomfortable. And by the way, our Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok culture has us wanting to take the picture at the top of Mount Everest. I use this as an example all the time when I do public speaking. If I could magically transport you to the top of Mount Everest to take the picture, a lot of people would choose that over taking the journey. The greatness is in the journey. The greatness is in the trotting and the altitude and the altitude sneakness and pitching a tent. Your colleagues and the camaraderie and teamwork and can I make it? And the storm is coming and damn, it's cold. That's the greatness. That's where the greatness is. The greatness is not in the snapshot at the top. Colby said, I don't do this for championships. I don't do this for records. I don't do it for trophies. I do this because I get the privilege of playing basketball for a living, a game that I love. I get the privilege of every day getting up in the morning and decided how I work on my body, how I work on my game, what I did yesterday, getting better for tomorrow, what that guy did. He would say crazy things to me like, oh, I'm playing against such and such. I won't name names. Playing against such and such. Yeah, I studied his game. I got him. Oh, you studied his game? Yeah, when his left heel goes down, I'm blowing right by him. Wait, what? I've looked at the film. He drops his left heel. Once he does that, there's no way he can stop me going left. I'm blowing by him. Who's studying the game like that? He's studying the game. He's studying the angles to the game. And I think that there is a certain level. I know this is a long-winded answer, but I think we have a narrow definition of genius. I'm going someplace else for a second. When I was a kid growing up, Garry Kasparov was the chess champion. Garry Kasparov, Russian Garry, chess champion. And he could beat anybody. Nobody could beat the guy. Eventually, a machine could beat him. But first, he beat the machines too, and then... He started losing one out of a thousand with the machines and the machines probably beat him. But he was the guy. And I was like, man, that's genius. Nobody can beat this guy. That is absolute genius. He's literally on that chessboard. He knows all the dimensions of the board. He's moving fast. You know, you've got the little clock. You got to move with the clock. He's moving fast. That's genius. But I never thought about for a second that Allen Iverson at a five foot 11, maybe 10 on a good day level would drive through the paint, jump up and there'd be like Elijah Wan and. other seven foot people in front of him, giants that also jumped. And in midair, he has to make a decision to get under this arm and around this one and across the other one and then put the ball up against the glass at the perfect angle for it to go in. And nobody ever told me that was genius. How is that not genius? You know what? There's not a clock. It's not timed. There's not a clock. He does that instantaneously in midair. How is that not genius? To me, that's genius. And to your point, not enough people are trying to reach the maximum expression of genius by going through the pitfalls, the challenge, the obstacles, the roadblocks, right, to get there. We're curious today about a lot of things, jack of all trades even, but not committed. And I think that makes a huge difference. How do you go from curious to committed? Making a decision that you want to be a master at something. striving for success, striving, by the way, striving for perfection. And anyone who's ever strived for perfection knows that it is and will always be around the corner because there is no perfection. Not even Michael Jordan himself was perfect, right? There is no perfection. Are you willing to take that journey knowing you'll never reach it? Knowing it's always around the corner, knowing it's always another walk out away. Are you willing to take that journey? Many people are not willing to take that journey. Speaker 3 (10:18) commitment, sacrifice, consistency. Kobe Bryant said, what have you done today to be better than you were yesterday? And if you stack enough days in a row like that, you end up at greatness. Speaker 1 (10:32) One of my favorite Kobe stories is they had just lost. I can't remember if it was the Western Conference Championship or the finals, but they had just lost. Season's over. Speaker 1 (10:47) And he's on the bench and his legs are out and he's got the ice on his knees and he's got a towel over his face. Game ends. He gets up. He's walking off the court. And one of the courtside reporters comes up and says, Kobe, you seem really emotional. What's going through your head? Are you okay? And he kind of straightens up and looks at her and goes, what? That's not, I'm paraphrasing, but essentially his response is essentially. I'm not emotional. I was thinking about what I need to work on tomorrow when I get to the gym so that this doesn't happen again next year. She goes, you shouldn't. The look on her face is like, what are you talking about? And he's like, yeah, I had the towel over my face because I was thinking about what I wanted to do at the gym tomorrow to make sure that next year we're not in this position. And like. It's when it's like moments like that when you realize just how and to your word committed he like he was literally going to the gym the day after he lost and his season was over and he was thinking on the bench about what he wanted to do the next day. Like it's just another day in the journey. Not planning a vacation, not thinking about the beach. He told Speaker 3 (12:02) me getting to do this is a privilege. I love getting to do that. I get to do this for a living. I don't have to do anything else but this for a living. And I love this game. You know, I'll tell you Speaker 2 (12:12) another funny Kobe story, just so you know, the mentality of Kobe Bryant. Speaker 3 (12:17) Kobe said to me one day, he said, you know, Arturo, I like playing away games more than home games. Speaker 2 (12:24) Cole, you're one of the world famous Los Angeles Lakers. Speaker 3 (12:27) You play in Speaker 2 (12:27) the Speaker 3 (12:27) most beautiful building in LA. The celebrities come out, the celebrity row. You got the vibration, the artists, the actors, the musicians, the rappers, everyone's there. What do you mean you like playing away games more than home games? He said, Arturo, nothing makes me more excited. than watching a father with his child in a Minnesota Timberwolves jersey leaving the building with four minutes left because they have no chance to win. Nothing gets me more excited than that. I was like, wow, you are a savage, sir. Speaker 3 (13:02) You're an absolute sad. He's like, he described everything. The fun finger, they're walking out. They've got no chance. There's four minutes left. Speaker 1 (13:10) Nothing, nothing gets me that excited. You used to use the word that I think, unfortunately, in today's current environment is used in its negative capacity, but you just used it in its positive capacity. And that's the word privilege. One, maybe what is. for the audience, kind of the difference between the two and why how you use that term, I believe, is so incredibly powerful from a mindset perspective to be able to think of something as like, I get to talk to you today. I sat down and I was like, I'm watching your clips online and I'm going, I can't wait to talk to this guy today. Like, what a privilege to be able to speak. to a human being who has your insights, your knowledge, your personality, your energy, right? Like, but we don't often frame these things as privileges. And we use it in a way of like, oh, he's privileged or she's privileged or in this negative capacity. So maybe what is the difference in, what does it actually mean to think of the way Kobe did about the privilege of being able to do the job? Speaker 3 (14:18) Yo, imagine, you know, everybody. You were growing up probably like when I was growing up, you know, your parents wanted you