In 2020, I almost got what I wanted. Exactly what I wanted.
After 2 disastrous years as a tier 3 HC, I was itching to ‘get out’.
To move up to Tier 2 and do my Jon Cooper thing that was playing in my head.
2 years at each stop until I made it to the NHL.
I was on the phone with the NAHL HC, he said he was discussing with his owner today and tomorrow, I’d be official.
Tomorrow never happened.
A few days later, that team sat out the year due to the laws of their state in 2020.
As Guy Germaine would have said, “ I was this close.”
Looking back, not getting that job, not taking that next step up the ladder was the greatest thing that never happened to me.
Here’s me resonating with Napolean Hill as he talks about a similar experience:
Looking backward now, in the light of all that has happened, I can see that those minor experiences of adversity through which I had passed were among the most fortunate and profitable of all of my experiences. They were blessings in disguise because they forced me to continue a work which finally brought me an opportunity to make myself more useful to the world than I might have been had I succeeded in any previous plan or purpose.
If I would have stayed on the traditional path, I wouldn’t have started writing because I would have been too busy ‘grinding’ like the rest of the indoctrinated coaches in the industry. My online platform has a better chance to scale impact to a greater number of people. So beginning to build it during the 3-year coaching sabbatical I’m on is important.
I wouldn’t have taken this step had I stayed in it.
I was meant to coach. I was also meant for more than just being ‘a’ coach to 20 players a year. I know this now.
Russ says it a little differently:
“Blowing up at nineteen is the greatest thing that never happened to me. At that time I thought my journey was much shorter than it ended up being, much shorter. The journey is forever. Your car will never stop and when it does, you won’t even be around to see it parked. Just enjoy the ride.”
-IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD, pg 149
Russ makes mention of the infinite game as well as knowing he wasn’t ready to be who he is in 2023, in 2016.
He knows the journey is the reward and having it handed to him early wouldn’t have been best for him. He wouldn’t have appreciated it as much.
The Level 1 Coach can appreciate the view from the top of the mountain when he gets there because he climbed the whole fucking thing.