Episode 164: Get It Done: Resiliency Separates The Good From Great With Mark Gottfried
Discovering how to transform struggling programs into winners requires a "get it done" mentality. Join us for a fascinating conversation with Mark Gottfried, former Division One head basketball coach and player, and current host of The Mark Gottfried Show. Mark shares his insights on building resilience, fostering strong relationships, and what truly separates good from great in both sports and life. From winning a national championship as an assistant coach at UCLA to leading teams at Murray State, the University of Alabama, and North Carolina State, Mark discusses how embracing challenges and believing in yourself can lead to incredible success, even when facing setbacks.
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Get It Done: Resiliency Separates The Good From Great With Mark Gottfried
Welcome to this episode of Breaking Beliefs, where I interviewed Mark Gottfried. He is a former Division I head basketball coach and player, and is currently the host of The Coach Mark Gottfried Show. Mark has coached at the pinnacle of collegiate athletics, winning a national championship as an assistant coach at UCLA. He later served as the head basketball coach at Murray State University, the University of Alabama, and North Carolina State. His teams achieved notable upsets against the number one teams in the nation.
Mark has a history of taking underachieving, struggling programs and transforming them into winners by instilling the “Get It Done” mentality. You're going to love Mark's story and also his examples of resilience and of his whole theory of utilizing the mantra “Get It Done” to create that positive mindset and make sure that you're not wallowing in where you might have some defeats or things that are not working out for you. You're looking at what you can get done and where you can go, and making sure that you achieve the vision that you had. I hope that you enjoy this conversation. If it is helpful to you and you think it would be helpful to somebody else, please like, share, and subscribe to this show so that others can enjoy it as well.
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From Court To Coach & The Power Of Relationships
Welcome to this episode of Breaking Beliefs. I'm very excited to be interviewing Mark Gottfried. Mark, would you give the audience a little bit of an introduction of yourself before we begin?
My pleasure. First of all, thank you for having me. I was a college basketball coach for probably 34 years. I played college basketball and played a little bit in the NBA, but then I had a wonderful career where I was incredibly blessed. I was the head coach of my alma mater, the University of Alabama, for eleven years. I stayed in North Carolina for six years. I worked for the Dallas Mavericks. I was at a school called Murray State University as the head coach. I had a wonderful run for a good long time. I'm the host of The Coach Mark Gottfried Show, my podcast. I've done a lot of keynote speaking as well. It's all good.
I am excited to have you here. I get into your background of how you became you. I would love to start out with understanding where you grew up, what your parents did for a living, and just a little background there.
I was born in North Central Ohio. My parents were from a small town, north of Columbus, Ohio. It is about 45 minutes. It was a railroad community when my dad and mom were younger. Both my parents were educators. My mom was a schoolteacher for probably close to 40 years. My dad was a high school basketball coach and then a college coach. With my family in coaching, a lot of times, you move around a bit. We had a stop in Southern Illinois for a couple of years in Carbondale, and then my family moved to Mobile, Alabama, in 1981. I was a high school senior-to-be.
That's a hard time to move.
I ended up in the state of Alabama. I later went on to attend the University of Alabama. Later, I became the head coach at the University of Alabama in basketball. Alabama is home to my family, but they are originally Ohio folks. I bounced all around everywhere I've lived in all over the country, but Alabama would be considered home.
When did you start playing basketball?
I was young. My dad was a high school basketball coach. After school, when I was little, my first stop was to ride my bike down to the gym. I was that little guy who was running around the gym at 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 years old, around the game. I sat on the end of the bench down there when I was young, when he coached. I always grew up around it. I was always around sports and watching him from a distance as a young person.
What did you pick up by watching him coach?
We all want to win. I want to win. I'm probably too competitive at times. More than the winning and losing when you're coaching, what I watched over the years was this. My dad has a brother who was also a coach, a college football coach. I watched them have great relationships with their players. When I was young, the teams were always at our house. They were reaching into the fridge and making a ham sandwich. It was like they were part of our family. I watched the impact they had on other people. That's what got me more excited about coaching than anything else.
How did this run in your family? Did this go further in your family?
We've got coaches all over. My dad's name is Joe Gottfried. He later became an Athletic Director at the University of South Alabama for about 30 years. His brother, Mike Gottfried, was the head football coach at the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Cincinnati, and the University of Kansas. He was on ESPN for a number of years. I have cousins, Jim and John Harbaugh.
Jim is the head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers. John Harbaugh is the head coach of the Baltimore Ravens. Their father was a coach, Jack Harbaugh. Being around sports and coaching, Jim Harbaugh, John Harbaugh, and I are the next generation watching our dads coach. We all ended up getting into coaching as well. I was all around it growing up, and mostly basketball and football. It was part of our daily lives.
What did that mean for your mom? How was that part of her life?
It meant she gets sainthood. My mom was the one, too. She was a great role model. Times have changed, but I can remember growing up. We'd eat dinner at our house. We'd sit down back then when there was only a handful of channels on television. My mom would sit there. She'd pull out the papers. She taught third grade, fourth grade, and fifth grade. She'd be grading papers at night. We're watching shows. My mother was a great role model, too. She was always amazingly supportive and understood the highs and lows of coaching as the wife of a coach. That made quite an impression on me as well.
When you were young, did you want to be a coach because your dad was a coach and that's what you saw, or did you want to be an athlete? Was it like, “I like to go professional as an athlete.”?
I love to play. I had a ball in my hands when I was young. I set goals early on. I wanted to accomplish great things as a player. I played at the University of Alabama and was part of an SEC Championship. I was a starting guard there for almost 100 straight games. I got drafted by the Detroit Pistons. All those things were important to me. In the back of my mind, it always came naturally for me that I felt I wanted to coach. I wanted to be around the game. I felt like I had a chance to impact young people. I felt I could get good at it. I ended up coaching for almost 34 straight years. Being around it with my father and my uncle left a great impression on me that that's what I wanted to do.
Did you notice a difference in your father's and uncle's coaching?
I'm sure there were a lot of them. There were more similarities. They lost their father to a heart attack when my dad was sixteen years old, and my uncle was twelve. There was another brother who was eight. They had to go through a lot of life without their father. It became very apparent. They wanted to pour back into other young people. They almost wanted to be the father figures, not only to me and my sister, but to all of the players they coached. They were both similar in how they wanted to coach. Everybody wants to win. On top of the winning are those types of things that are more important than any wins and losses.
I have a friend who works a lot with coaching coaches, high schools, and so forth. One of the things he talks about is that you are this other father figure because you're there with the kids more, a lot of times, than their families, and the impact that you make.
A lot of times, you'll talk to people. If you ask the question, “If you go back in your life, who impacted you the most?” A lot of times, it's your parents. On top of that, it usually comes back to a teacher or a coach. They've poured into you a little bit and motivated or inspired you to become good. That's one of the beautiful things I've always felt, especially in college and high school coaching. When you get to the NBA, it's a little different. You're dealing with adults. In college and high school, you have a chance to make a great impact on people.
Get It Done: If you ask people who impacted them the most in their lives, it usually comes back to a teacher, a coach—someone who poured into them a little bit and motivated or inspired them to become really good.
Diverse Coaching Philosophies: Finding Your Leadership Style
Having your uncle and father as coaches is one thing, but you have to be under different coaches growing up. What did you notice were differences or things you liked or didn't like, based on how you had watched your father all those years?
One thing I learned is that there are a lot of ways to do it. I played for a good coach in college. His name was Wimp Sanderson at the University of Alabama. He had great success. He hardly ever had a day off. He was a tough guy, but he was good. I tell people all the time, “I went through four years of college. I practiced on Christmas Day every year. We never had a day off.”
I had an opportunity to be an assistant coach at UCLA. It was my first coaching job. I worked for a guy named Jim Harrick for seven years. Jim was a little bit of the opposite. He believed in players having fresh legs and fresh minds. I was quickly able to see a contrast in the guy I played for and then, eventually, in the first person I worked for in coaching. What it taught me was that at the core, there are some similar things, but you have to be open to different ideas because there are a lot of ways to do it. There are a lot of ways to be successful. I was able to learn that pretty early in coaching.
Get It Done: You have to be open to different ideas, because there are many ways to be successful.
It's very tangential to the corporate world. There are leaders who work too much. I am in the CPA profession. It's known that we're partners at a leadership level, or working too many hours. People in the organization see that and say, “Do I want to be a partner? Is that the way it has to be?” There are organizations that make a shift. The partners say, “We're going to shift this environment.” From looking at those two, and maybe what you took into your coaching, what is the right balance as far as getting the best out of people?
One thing I always want to do is to empower everybody around me to be the best they can be. In other words, whether it was my assistant coaches when I was a head coach, or my players, it is about giving them the confidence that they can do it, they can be great, and they can be amazing. Sometimes, we all forget that everybody has stuff going on in their own lives. You need somebody who believes in you a little bit. Whether it was my assistants or my players, I hoped that I could instill in them the confidence to believe and be better than they even think they can be, and give them the space to do that.
Get It Done: Sometimes, you just need somebody that believes in you a little bit.
When you're in a leadership role, you have to be who you are. You have to be authentic. At the same time, sometimes, people do drive people too hard. They have to be able to embrace their journey on their own and say, “Do you have the real will to become great? Do you have that desire? Do you understand what the word grit means?” When you begin to teach and build those things into people, then all of a sudden, people begin to rise. They can become the best versions of who they are. I've always said there's not one way to do it. I always wanted to convince those around me that they could be great and that they are great. They're going to play at a high level or coach at a high level, and then we go from there.
Grit And Greatness: The "Get It Done" Mindset
What makes someone great? What in your mind is that difference between someone good and someone great?
Early on in my coaching career, I can remember a timeout in the NCAA tournament. This was 2004. It was maybe the first time I found myself saying it. This is a ‘Get it done’ moment. It's time to get it done. We all have them in our lives every day, whether it's in sports, life, parenting, or work. You have to have some grit. You have to understand what grit is. There is an old saying, “When the going gets tough, the tough gets going.” A person's ability to be resilient, dig down at critical times, and say, “I am getting this done. I am going to get it done in a great way,” is more of a mindset.
It's more of an approach mentally. We all need the technical skills to be good at whatever we're doing. I talk a lot about grit, integrity, and desire. How bad do you want it? I can probably remember every player that I ever recruited. I'd ask the question, “Do you want to be a great player?” Every time, it's “Yes, coach. I want to be great.” Do you love what you're doing? When you love what you're doing, that pushes you through those difficult times. It allows you to have that resiliency.
When I was young, I never thought anything bad would happen. I thought it was all going to be wonderful. You realize, as you get older, you go through these times in life where you do get punched in the gut. You do have difficult times. At that point, are you strong enough to be resilient? Do you have that grit, that toughness, and that desire to become great? Those are the things that separate good from the great in my view.
Bouncing Back: Navigating Adversity And Defining Success
What are some times that you've had to demonstrate that in your life?
Unfortunately, there has been a lot. I became the head coach at my alma mater, the University of Alabama. It is a very public position in the entire state of Alabama. If anybody followed sports, they knew who I was. I'd been the head coach there for eleven years. We always joke around in coaching, “That's like dog years. That's seven years.” I got fired. They decided to make a change. That one for me was one of the first times where I went home, crawled up in that fetal position, and lay in bed. It was like, “I don't think the sun will come up tomorrow.”
I was embarrassed. I felt like a failure. I felt like I didn't get the job done in the way I wanted to get it done. That was probably for me one of those times where I had to figure out how to pick myself up off the mat. What do I do now? Our mind plays so many games with this when you go through difficult times. You create this thing, or I did in my mind, that everybody looked at me in a bad way. Everybody looked at me as a failure, which is not true, but your mind almost goes there, or mine did.
That was probably the first time that I felt like this was a punch in the gut for me that I wasn't expecting. It hurt badly. You realize most people go through difficult times. It could be death, some tragedy, or firing. I also went through a very public divorce, which was difficult. As you get older, you realize those moments don't define us. It's how we respond to those moments that define who we are and who our audience is. My audience was my five children. That was pretty much it.
Get It Done: As you get older, you realize moments don't define us; how we respond to them does.
I began to learn that I cared what people thought, but I didn't care. The audience was my children. That's it. I wanted to do the best I could for them. There have been times. If we're all honest, we all know when those moments are. They're moments of truth. At that point, you have to have a mindset that, “I'm still going to get it done. I'm going to find a way to turn the page. In my next chapter in life, I am going to get it done.” It's more of a mindset than anything else.
What did you do?
What you learn quickly is who is really in your corner. Especially in coaching and those public positions, everybody is your buddy. Everybody is your friend. Everybody wants to hang out. Everybody wants to take a picture with you. Everybody wants to say they know you. I can remember asking myself, “Who do I think was going to stand at my funeral one day? When all the dust settles, who is it that truly cares?” What I learned is that it's a small group of people. It is your family, your closest friends, 2, 3, or 4 buddies that I had that I knew if I called on them, they would be honest with me and be there for me.
It is the same with my parents. My dad has been one of those guys who, no matter what, no good, bad, or indifferent. I call, and he picks up the phone. He's nonjudgmental. He's got that teaching background. When we hit those places where we feel rock bottom, sometimes, the first thing is to define who counts in our lives. Those are the people that I wanted to lean on in my toughest times.
Did you call them up and say, “I need you?”
I called a couple of my buddies. They always had great wisdom. When people do care about you, they come from a place of being very authentic and transparent. It comes from a place of love as well. The sun will come up tomorrow. I remember somebody telling me that. “Mark, I know you think tomorrow, the sun is not coming up, but it is coming. Trust me, it's going to come up. You're going to be okay. Life will move on. It's going to keep moving. It's going to be your ability to be resilient.”
I can remember one of my friends saying, “A lot of times when we feel like we've hit rock bottom, and there are a lot of ways we can get to that place, it's turning your rock bottom into those rock bottoms becoming your foundation for the next step. It's sinking sand, but it's the opportunity at that point to build a foundation for your next chapter.” I can remember one of my friends telling me that. It made sense to me that even though this is tough, it's hard, I'm embarrassed, I would go places throughout the state of Alabama and felt like I was the guy walking around with the loser on my forehead, the reality is that period probably did more to help shape me for the next period of my life. Sometimes, when we're in those, we don't see it that way because we're so hurt at times.
A lot of times, we want to be best friends with that internal voice because we're the hardest on ourselves. No one is thinking a lot of the things we're probably thinking. What are the steps that you took to turn things around at that point?
Finding Your Foundation: Faith, Values, And Resilience
Another part of the equation has always been my faith. As I've gotten older, I've learned this a little bit more. When I've hit the toughest times, it's where my faith in God has helped me. I don't want to be too superficial in that regard. That was something I knew I could always hang my hat on. God does have a plan for me. It is bigger than I think at times. He understands. At times, or at least for me in my own life, when I've had those tough situations, I feel like I'm carrying the weight of everything on my shoulders. The weight of the world is on your back. That has probably been the most steadying thing for me.
I've also learned that if I can look back at the highs and lows of my professional and private life, when my values have been crystal clear, then most of my decisions I make are fairly easy. When my values are cloudy and shaky, and I convince myself to do something that I probably know I shouldn't, that's when decisions are difficult. Usually, that's when I put my foot in a bear trap. More than anything, in those toughest times, it's been my faith.
A lot of what you're talking about is we go against our gut, instead of allowing ourselves to get still and say, “What's important? What do I want to do?” What was your next shift after that happened?
Not to make it sound simple, but it was to get back on the saddle. There are times like, “I don't think anybody will want me. I don't think anybody in the whole world would want me to do anything.” Your mind begins to play these games to where you're wounded. I felt as though, at that point, I was so tarnished as a coach. I was at a Southeastern Conference school at the University of Alabama. Immediately, I got offered a job to go to ESPN.
I worked on television for two years. After my second year at ESPN, the phone rings. I'm getting offered a job at North Carolina State University in the ACC. We're 15 miles away from North Carolina and Duke. It was a massive challenge. All of a sudden, with the difficult times I went through, other people weren't viewing me the way I was viewing myself. Other people still looked at me as someone who could bring value to a program, a company, or whatever it might be. I was convincing myself that I was unwanted, tarnished, and broken.
Mentally, at times, we convince ourselves of one thing that may not be true. It goes back to that accountability group of people you have around you that can help. At the end of the day, that resiliency is what separates good from great. I can go back to almost every great player, great coach, or great leader. I've been asked this many times. “What makes somebody great?” I say, “Sometimes, it's being resilient.” It is maybe easier said than done, but you've got to find a way. We all do. We have to find a way to write a new chapter, whatever that might be. That's the resiliency part of the equation that becomes important.
Conquering Imposter Syndrome: Embracing New Beginnings
Many people have gone through what you're talking about. They don't talk about it because they're trying to move forward in a certain way. I've had those shifts in my life where you're feeling bad about yourself. Other people aren't perceiving you that way. You've got to walk forward, showing them what they're looking for in you. There's a piece of impostor syndrome happening at the same time. You're like, “If they knew,” “Maybe they're kidding themselves,” or whatever that is that so many people experience. When you had that shift and then went to ESPN, which is a very public type of job to have after you've been fired, how did you get past that impostor syndrome feeling and start embracing and embodying this new transition and role for yourself?
This will sound very trite, but it's take a deep breath. I can remember the first time I was on television. I was walking in to call a game for ESPN. It was at Virginia Tech. Even walking into the gym, I was thinking to myself, “Everybody in this entire stadium is looking at me like I'm some loser. Here I am on television.” The reality is, first of all, nobody cared. You got in your mind that everybody in here is viewing you one way, but the reality is that's not true at all.
It is concentrating on all the positives, too, that have happened in all of our lives. Whenever we get punched in the gut, and it happens to all of us, we tend to forget all of the amazing things that we've done and the amazing accomplishments we've made along the way. Concentrating on those, staying positive all the time, and having a positive mindset, it begins to eliminate some of that noise. It's made-up noise in our head. It's not real, but it begins to push that away. See yourself a little bit differently than your mind wants you to at times. It is that positive attitude, staying positive every day.
There's an old saying that I used to tell our players all the time. “Yard by yard, life is hard, but inch by inch, life is a cinch.” Sometimes, it's taking that baby step, and then one more baby step, inch by inch. We want to conquer something so big right away, to cleanse ourselves or make ourselves feel good again. Sometimes it's just the daily steps. Stack them on top of one another, having a good day, another good day, and another good day. All of a sudden, you feel like you're coming out the other side a little bit.
Beyond The Court: New Ventures In Impact And Inspiration
After a successful career in coaching, how did you make this last transition? What are you doing now?
I'm having a great time. It's an interesting story. A couple of years ago, I had a flat tire. I had to take my car to a tire shop. The guy said, “It'll be about an hour or an hour and a half before we change a tire.” Right across the street was a little building. It said podcast studio. I've listened to podcasts. I walked across the street and introduced myself to the guys. Long story short, I decided, “Let me see if I can maybe tackle this.” I'm about 75 episodes in The Coach Mark Gottfried Show. I love it.
That was an opportunity for me. It is a little bit like coaching. I felt like I could get amazing guests who have had success and learn about their story. “What are the obstacles you overcame? How did you handle this situation? How do you handle that situation?” It's been a lot of fun. As a coach, we're always speaking in front of others. We're always up on stage. We're in front of booster groups. We're on television. It was the idea that I could have an impact on people through the podcast.
Hopefully, I can have an impact as well as a keynote speaker, get the opportunity to speak to different groups, and put together a talk that will cause people to look inwardly and to become the very best possible version they can of themselves. A lot of people talk about that, but I try to draw on a lot of stories from coaching. There were a lot of different situations that I was in as a coach with our teams, players, and other people like that. The combination of being a podcast host and public speaking has been a lot of fun. My goal is that I truly can impact someone in a real, positive way that will have a lasting effect on how they live their own lives.
I'd like to end with some rapid-fire questions. You'll choose a category, which is family and friends, money, spiritual, or health.
Let's go with health. Let's try that.
What are the things or actions I don't have that I want to have with my health?
It is probably the level of discipline that I would like to have. I’m 61 years old. I play pickleball every day for two hours. I'm a pretty active guy. With discipline, even in snacking, food, or the right nutrition, everything ties together in our lives. There is a discipline in one area. There is a discipline in another area. Health-wise, if I could be improved in one area, it would be to have the level of discipline that I know I should have.
What are the things or actions that I have that I want to keep?
Keep moving, working out, and staying active. I met a doctor years ago. He was probably in his 70s and had vibrant skin. This guy was amazing. I asked him one time, “How do you stay in such great shape?” He said, “I see people get into their 50s. A lot of times, they quit. They quit taking care of themselves. They quit eating right. I exercise every day. I'm doing something every day.” That's one thing that I feel like I am doing right. I'm finding ways to exercise, get outside, and get in the sun. Hopefully, those things end up in the long run being a benefit.
I once watched this documentary on the way back from the UK. It was these four women who were all in their 70s, and the lives they were living. One had been a dancer. What she was talking about was how you keep it up with the movement. She's like, “It hurts every day. I get out of my bed. I get on that floor, and I stretch.” You can't stop because it hurts.
You've got to keep on going. That's a good thing. I've been able to do that pretty well.
What are things or actions that I don't have that I don't want to have?
The first thing that comes to mind is the bad habits. I don't have a lot of them. I don't ever want to judge anybody smoking, drinking, or whatever. I like a little bourbon here and there. Especially as we get older, we need to maintain great habits in how we live every day, with our health and fitness. That does so much for every aspect of our lives. It is staying away from the bad habits.
Get It Done: As we get older, maintaining great daily habits in our health and fitness is key.
I appreciate you sharing your story. Is there anything that you want to emphasize or that you didn't get to say before we close out?
Not really. I always talk about GID, Get It Done. You're getting it done with everything you're doing, but it's a mindset. Whoever happens to be reading, embrace the “Get It Done” approach. Get things done, period. End of day, end of story. Get it done.
Thank you so much for being on and sharing your story with the audience. I'm sure so many will take away some great lessons.
Thank you for having me. It's been my pleasure.
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For my Mindful Moments with this episode from Mark Gottfried, what a great episode. Learning from Mark's career and all that he's learned over time, being a coach and watching coaches, is very fascinating. It is fascinating how that applies to the business world as well. We started out talking about how his parents were teachers, but also his father and his uncle were in the coaching arena. His dad coached college basketball, and his uncle was a head football coach as well. He was watching them and saw how important it was to create relationships with the players on the team.
I talk about this difference in what leadership is today versus in the past. When I started in the business world, it was one of those things where you weren't supposed to get close to people who worked under you. That was what was taught as a leadership lesson. We've seen over time, and research has proven it over and over in these Gallup work studies, that leadership isn't separate from the team. That relationship that you create with each person is so important. It's what helps them to feel like they are a part of the greater value of the organization.
That's the same thing he was talking about with his dad. The players felt comfortable enough to even come over to their house, to hang out, and to have personal relationships besides having the relationship on the court. These types of lessons are something that we bring through. If we've been taught something else, it's important at certain points in our career to step back and think about what truly aligns with who we are or what we even think is the right way to go about having relationships with people who work for you. The other thing that we talked about was the other traits he saw in his dad that were important. He also saw that his dad loved the sport.
When we talk about our jobs, we need to have love or joy in the work that we do. Sometimes, we get distracted from that because we get so distracted by the work that we forget to enjoy the work that we're doing. Why do we even get up in the morning at the end of the day? What is the value that we're trying to create? What fills you up? These types of questions are important to ask yourself to make sure that you are still finding joy in that work and remembering why you even started doing what you do, so that you get the most out of yourself and your team as well.
The other thing that we don't realize is that we are an example for the people around us. They may look at us as being too tough of a leader, they may look at us as being too soft, or they're going to take different traits of ours and other leaders into their own, of what they think works and doesn't work. We talked about the difference between a coach who's hard driving and doesn't have a day off for the team, versus coaches who believe that people do need a day off. They need to reset. They need to have fresh bodies as well as minds so that they can make the best decisions possible and be the best that they can be.
Those types of examples are important for us to think about what aligns with us. It is making sure that we've determined the values that are important to us, that we want to be able to give to others. One of the things we talked about was making sure that people can feel that confidence in themselves. They can be great. They can be amazing. A lot of times, we focus on what's not going well and what needs to be fixed versus what is going well. It is about giving people kudos for that, so that they feel proud. Not everybody feels better from negative feedback. A lot of times, that can take us out. When we're giving positive feedback and making sure that negative feedback is balanced, it's important in building confidence in the people around you.
We also talked about what was important and the difference between someone good versus great as an athlete. One of the things that Mark focuses on in his podcast, as well as the talks that he does, is getting it done. It is about having the grit and the ability to be resilient when things are tough and asking yourself, “How bad do you want it? Do you love what you're doing?” You can be resilient during the hardest times and not lose the thing that you love the most. You can have that desire to be great and realize, “What is it that I find value in, that I find enjoyment in? What is going to make me proud? I'm not looking for that outside perception of me. I am looking internally to make myself proud as well.”
We talked about a time in his life when he didn't feel proud and how he had to take his advice and have grit and the mindset to come out of it. What we talked about is when you do hit rock bottom, that's when we learn about ourselves and what counts. That is when we know the people who are there for us and are going to lift us. We can be authentically who we are, transparent in how we're feeling, and not feel like we have to hide anything. In those times that we feel stuck or in those hardest times where we hit rock bottom, that is our opportunity to build the next chapter, get clear on what we want, and be open to exploring and playing with what is new and how that is shifting our lives.
I hope that you enjoyed this conversation. I did. There are so many great tips in here to help you when you are hitting those hard times, and also to think about what is important to you as a leader. You want to make sure that your teams are getting from you as well. We're not just going about our day, letting it happen. We're being intentional about the energy that we're creating and the energy that we're creating for the people around us. I want to thank you so much for reading this episode. Make sure to share it with the people that you think it would be helpful to. Subscribe to and review our show. It helps people to know that we're around. I appreciate your support over the years that we've been on, tuning in to this show and learning from its lessons as well.
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About Mark Gottfried
Coach Mark Gottfried is a former Division One head basketball coach & player and is currently the host of The Mark Gottfried Show. Mark has coached at the pinnacle of collegiate athletics, winning a national championship as an assistant coach at UCLA. He later served as the head basketball coach at Murray State University, the University of Alabama, and NC State, where his teams achieved notable upsets against the #1 teams in the nation. Mark has a history of taking underachieving, struggling programs and transforming them into winners by instilling the “GET IT DONE” mentality.