Players, young coaches, or anyone that needs a little push… This one is for you.
Let’s rewind 10 years.
I’m 18 years old.
5 foot 7. 145 pounds.
20 career high school hockey points.
I’m sitting in a car with my Dad on Sunday morning at a beach when I should be 5 minutes down the road at the ice rink.
I was so anxious to go to the last day of tryouts for a junior team that it could go either way for me.
I was frozen… Wasn’t talking, couldn’t eat, could hardly breathe.
I had been cut from 5 teams over the summer and it was getting late in the year. This team was in an independent tier 3 league that existed for about 2 weeks.
It was in that car that I first learned this lesson:
Sometimes you have to do shit before you’re ready.
Great decision to head to the rink, you created a lifelong relationship with the coach.
The coach left and the situation quickly turned sour.
The lesson from the beach came up again when the coach who left made a phone call to a buddy and found you a new team to land on.
Wasn’t ready for 12 hours from home in Minnesota but I went anyway.
Wasn’t ready to be the worst player on one of the best tier 3 teams in the country.
Wasn’t ready to get scratched 35 games that season.
But I started before I was ready. It was eye-opening and I knew I was behind where I wanted to be. So I dug in and got to work.
Continued Adversity
After my first year of juniors, I kept this lesson in mind as:
My college coach who recruited me got fired.
The new coach cut most of the previous coach’s recruiting class.
I transferred to Iowa State.
Wasn’t ready to do that in the middle of my sophomore year.
I didn’t even visit, the place was completely unknown.
I just sent a bunch of emails to schools after tryouts ended in October and they were the only ones to say yes.
Start Leading Before You’re Ready
After college, I asked if I could be a volunteer assistant coach on my previous junior team’s staff.
6 months later I was a head coach at 26.
In the 2 years there, I experienced more failure, heartache, and was as depressed as I’ve ever been in my life.
And when I came out the other side, it was the greatest experience I’ve ever had.
It was the greatest application of the lesson. Start before you’re ready.
Share Your Thoughts Before You’re Ready
I started blogging at a time in my life where I was scared to share what I thought.
However…
It’s been the most incredible individual growth tool and has connected me to a new network of people.
There are like 100 people reading this. Crazy to me. (thanks for getting this far in the post)
Start before you’re ready.
In Summary…
Fail early, fail often… This is part of most success stories.
Start before you’re ready.
So many companies were on the brink of losing it all before it all happens for them.
Start before you’re ready.
Fire, Aim, Ready.