Kobe Bryant Told Me Why He Was the Best in the World It's Not Talent

Duration: 9:59 1980 transcript words EN summary

Video summary

The central theme of the discussion revolves around Kobe Bryant's philosophy that true greatness stems from a relentless dedication to mastering basic fundamentals rather than relying solely on natural talent. The speaker recounts meeting Kobe in 2007, where he was surprised by how deeply Kobe drilled into simple movements like pivoting and ball handling during early morning workouts. When asked about this focus, Kobe explained that his status as the best player came from never getting bored with these basics and continuously working toward mastery of them. This insight became a foundational belief for the speaker, who realized that excellence in any field requires identifying what winning looks like and then consistently improving upon the core building blocks necessary to achieve it. This principle is applied universally across various domains such as public speaking, writing, physical fitness, and parenting by first defining specific standards of success and then isolating a few key fundamentals to improve daily. The transcript illustrates this with the example of Queen's men's basketball program, which identified four critical statistics that determined game outcomes; by focusing exclusively on perfecting these areas in every practice and workout, they achieved an 98% winning rate. However, it is emphasized that while one can always make improvements through hard work on controllable inputs like effort, attitude, preparation, and decision-making, becoming world-class also depends on external factors such as genetic predisposition or raw talent. Therefore, the goal should be to simplify success by focusing entirely on the process rather than obsessing over outcomes, understanding that if one does not succeed despite maximum effort in areas within their control, it is simply a matter of circumstances beyond influence. Ultimately, adopting this mindset provides a sense of liberation and places an individual firmly in the driver's seat of their own destiny. By accepting that success is never guaranteed because life involves elements outside our control, such as how well opponents execute or whether certain cards are dealt by fate, one can find peace knowing they did everything possible within their power. This approach shifts the focus from worrying about results to perfecting inputs like nutrition, training intensity, sleep quality, and hydration in fitness contexts, which naturally skews the odds in favor of success over time. The speaker concludes that whether it is sports or personal life, if you try your hardest and do not let anything within your control be a reason for failure, you can navigate an amazing life without regret, knowing that any lack of success was never due to insufficient effort but rather factors beyond one's reach.

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He said, "The reason I'm the best player in the world is cuz I never get bored with the basics. I continue to work towards mastery of the basic building blocks." It all stems back to 2007 when I met Kobe Bryant for the first time and and he said something that fundamentally changed my life. It was my assertion that at that time he was the best player in the world and I watched one of his really early morning workouts and I noticed that he was just drilling down on a series of very basic fundamental movements. Pivoting drills, ball handling drills, finishing drills, but but basic stuff that I had done with middle school and high school age players. And and as a young coach that really surprised me. So when I asked him about it, he said this line that still to this day is the foundation of everything I believe. He said, "The reason I'm the best player in the world is cuz I never get bored with the basics. I continue to work towards mastery of the basic building blocks." And I've extrapolated that out and and applied that to every area of my life. So I pick a domain that I'm aiming for excellence in. It could be keynote speaking, it could be writing, it could be my own physical fitness, it could be being a father. But I figure out what's an area that I want to improve in and I want to aim for excellence. And the very first thing I do is I define, "Well, what does winning look like in this? What does being an excellent father look like? What does being in excellent shape as a 50-year-old man look like? What does being an excellent keynote speaker look like?" And I I decide what winning looks like and that is completely up to me. That's not up to anybody else. So I decide what winning looks like or what success looks like. And then the very next question I ask is, "What are the basic building blocks or the fundamentals that if I stick to these and work on these relentlessly and consistently and improve in, it will lead me to the path of excellence or winning in this area?" So in other words, what are the four or five basic fundamentals that I need to do to be the best father I'm capable of, to be the best keynote speaker I can be, to be as fit as I can be as a 50-year-old man? And I figure out what those building blocks are, those fundamentals, and then I go heads down and consistently work on those things every single day. During the unseen hours, during the seen hours, but I focus on those basic building blocks cuz I believe if I can make drastic improvement in those fundamental building blocks, then the only byproduct possible is going to be what I've considered winning or excellence or success in that area. And And you would asked about the the Queen's men's basketball program. That's basically what they did. They figured out that there were four key statistics that would determine whether or not they would win the game. And then they just made sure that everything they did came down to improving those four areas of the game. Make sure every workout, every practice, every film session always focused on those four things because as you said, if they did those four things at a high level and executed those four things with excellence, in their case they won 98% of their games, which is a pretty good winning percentage. But but but that means if they don't do those four things or don't execute, then the chance of winning goes down significantly. So for me, it's all about simplifying success, focusing on the basics and the fundamentals, and working towards mastery of those, and and you can be good at at anything. Now, whether or not you can be world class in it is not completely up to you because that also there's some determining factors and whether or not you have talent in that area, do you have some, you know, genetic predispositions. So if I enjoy singing and I I decide that I'm going to work on the four or five things that would lead to being a better singer, there is no doubt that I'll make improvement. Now, whether I'll be good enough to win American Idol or to get a record deal, a lot of that has to do with whether or not I have the the talent to do that. So I'm not implying that you can be world class in anything that you say you're going to commit to the basics, but you can absolutely make improvement. >> Hm. Alex Hormozi says, "Do you so much volume that it be that it's unreasonable that you will not succeed." And I love that term, the make it unreasonable that you won't succeed. And I wrote some lyrics from one of my favorite songs by by J. Cole. Um you know J. Cole? >> Of course, dude. He's my >> favorite. And he said um this the line that is on the sentiment that's one of my favorites. He said, "Like the second time I got caught from the junior varsity, fighting back tears, I promised to switch gears and said to myself, whatever you do, you won't do it partially. From this day forward, I knew I move with a new ferocity for IQ velocity, a fail-proof philosophy. Success is in the effort. So, if a brother tried his hardest, I'm at peace knowing God ain't deal it in this group of cards for me." And I love that line. If I try my hardest, I'm at peace because I know that God didn't deal it in this group of cards for me. And whether you're religious or not, >> Yeah. >> that can that idea that try so hard that you can't be mad at the world that there's no regret, there's no what if because that question of what if it eats at you. Try so hard, do the right thing so much that it becomes pretty much unreasonable that you won't succeed. And if you don't succeed, just wasn't it wasn't meant to be. >> Yes. Well first of all, I'm a big J. Cole fan, so that his lyrics are off the charts. He's also a really good basketball player, by the way. In celebrity circles, he's one of the best basketball players that's a non-professional player. So, I can see that he he put in the work. Um the way that I've always framed that for myself and I framed that for my kids is if there's ever going to be a reason that you don't reach a goal or there's a reason that you are not successful, do not let it be because of something within your control. So, effort is absolutely within our control. Our attitude is within our control. Our enthusiasm is within our control. Our preparedness, how well we prepare and preparation is within our control. The decisions we make or the responses we have, those things are in our control. So, don't ever let those be the reasons that you fall short of a goal or that that that you're not successful. If it's because of something else, if it's because of something that's outside of your control, you'll still be disappointed that you fell short or that you missed your goal or that you weren't successful. But, I know from first-hand experience, you'll eventually find peace in knowing that you did everything you were capable of and in control of to give yourself the chance to be successful and it just didn't work out. And that's because as we've said before, but it is worth repeating, success is never guaranteed. If it was guaranteed, it wouldn't be as joyous when you actually are successful in something. So, you know, you can do everything right and sometimes the chips just don't fall in your favor. And that's, you know, to a T, that's sports. Yeah. That's the game of basketball. You you can play hard, you can play smart, you can play together, you can execute, and some nights the ball just doesn't go in the basket. Some nights your opponent's a little bit better and and they executed a little bit better than you and you'll learn to be at peace with that. What you will not be at peace with is if the other team outworked you or if the other team was more unselfish than you were or if the other team had a better attitude and played hard. Those would be unacceptable reasons to lose, but yeah, to me and I find this type of approach and this mindset to be very liberating because it puts me in the driver's seat and it basically says, "I'm in control of my destiny." Now, I'm not in control of what outcomes I get and I'm not in control of whether or not I'm going to actually hit ring that bell of success, but I'm in control of my attitude, my effort, my enthusiasm, my preparation, my decisions, my responses. And I tell you what, that's that's plenty of things to be in control to navigate an unbelievably amazing life. >> Yeah, it reminds me a lot of Jim Murphy who wrote Inner Excellence. I had him on the podcast and he talked about how he will never use the words winning. The word winning is never brought up with him and his clients and he works with some of the greatest athletes in the world right now as you have and winning is never brought up because the outcome is not the focus, the focus is the input. >> Yes. >> And what you're focusing on you will do well. And so if you do the inputs well, you are skewing the odds in your favor to win. >> Absolutely. >> We're not focused on winning, we're focused on improving and winning should be a byproduct of that. >> Yes. And and anything that you'd want to substitute the word winning for, we could in this case it sounds very synonymous to say success. Same thing. You don't have to focus on whether or not you're reaching a level of success, you got to focus on the process, focus on the inputs, focus on the things you have control over and then success by any measure will just be the natural byproduct of that. And this is true in every area of our life. It's true financially, it's true for our fitness and our wellness, it's true for everything. Like the chips are going to fall where the chips are going to fall. We don't control that. But but say for our physical fitness, you have control over over what you eat and when you eat it. You have control over how often you move your body or if you choose to progressively strength train, whether you do some mobility and flexibility stuff. You have control to a degree over how much sleep you're getting and the quality of sleep. You have control over how hydrated you are. So you have control over all of that stuff. Now the exact finish product of of all of your your measurements and your metrics and your exact body composition and your exact physique, you don't necessarily have complete control over that. That's outcome based, but you have control over all of those inputs. And if you focus relentlessly on maximizing those inputs, then generally speaking [music] the outputs will tend to lean in your favor more times than not. >> Mhm.