Latest / The Action Catalyst / REMASTERED: Know That You’re Extraordinary, with Matt Mayberry (Sports, Failure, Success, Business)

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REMASTERED: Know That You’re Extraordinary, with Matt Mayberry (Sports, Failure, Success, Business) · The Action Catalyst

• 0:00
  Host: He is a former NFL linebacker with the Chicago
• 0:16
  Bears. His name is Matt Mayberry. He also played at IU
• 0:51
  Indiana University. Was team captain from 2009 to 2010 he is
• 0:56
  one of the movers and shakers in the world of speaking. He works
• 0:59
  with some of the NFL teams, NBA teams. He shared the stage with
• 1:03
  Stedman Graham, and he's just an all around stud and good guy. So
• 1:06
  Matt Mayberry, welcome to the show, my friend.
• 1:09
  Matt Mayberry: Pleasure to be here.
• 1:10
  Host: Can you tell us your story? Because it's like you
• 1:12
  made it, and then you have this, this ankle thing, like, just
• 1:15
  kind of walk us through how you got started and how you how you
• 1:18
  made it to the NFL.
• 1:20
  Matt Mayberry: Well, you know, really, it started for me, you
• 1:22
  know, I really have three big failures in life that I always
• 1:24
  come back to. It all started for me when I was a high school. I
• 1:27
  was raised by two wonderful parents provided me and my
• 1:30
  brother with really everything that we needed. I had to be
• 1:33
  successful young men and really be difference majors in this
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  society. One of my first big failures came when I entered
• 1:39
  high school. I think when we enter high school, we're around,
• 1:43
  you know, more opportunity for peer pressure to make wrong
• 1:45
  decisions. And that's what happened in my life, you know, I
• 1:48
  always say associations, everything. I started hanging
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  out with, you know, guys doing drugs and doing, you know,
• 1:55
  things that they shouldn't be doing, breaking the law, you
• 1:57
  know. So basically, I was becoming a keen drug addict at
• 2:01
  16 years old. And to put that in perspective for you, I'm not
• 2:05
  just talking about a little marijuana here and there. I've
• 2:08
  done every single drug besides heroin. That's the life I
• 2:12
  started to enter. You know, robberies, getting arrested. You
• 2:15
  know, cocaine, almost every day, getting suspended every other
• 2:18
  week. My best sport growing up was baseball. You know, people
• 2:22
  that were close to me knew that baseball was my best sport and
• 2:25
  that I probably could get drafted out of high school.
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  Well, two months later, I ended up getting kicked off the
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  baseball team because I stole one of my teammates while and
• 2:34
  the other side of the story is it wasn't just a teammate, it
• 2:36
  was one of my good friends. So, you know, you see what a dark
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  place I was in and, you know, my fifth and he came one night
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  after I went to an outpatient rehab facility, I missed school
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  for about a month. This was my only way to stay in school. This
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  is my only way really to keep living. My guidance counselor
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  called me ID in prison or dead by my 18th birthday, before my
• 2:56
  18th birthday, that's what I was being told. So I knew that there
• 2:59
  was only one way out now to go to outpatient rehab and and try
• 3:03
  to get better. After two weeks in the program, I came home one
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  night, had a conversation with my father. And, you know, like
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  every other conversation when I was drugged out and being the
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  way that I was for the past three years, you know, anything
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  that he said went in one ear and out the other Well, for some
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  reason this time, I just started to hear him more in depth. And,
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  you know, really, it started to hit me and run through my mind,
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  body and spirit. And after that conversation, I went in the
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  bathroom, and for the first time in three years, I looked myself
• 3:32
  in the mirror, and I hated what I saw. I saw a monster. I saw
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  anger, I saw disgust. I just hated what I saw. I started to
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  realize, you know, all the terrible things that I've done
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  in this world, all the people that I've heard, all the drugs
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  that I've done. I got in a fight with my father before I broke
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  both of his ridge. You know, my mother has seen me do cocaine,
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  personally, all the stuff that I've hurt the people that love
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  me most through I started to see that those memories started to
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  play through my mind. And I go into my room, and I really just
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  cry out to God, and that's when I really get deep into my faith.
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  That was all I had left at that time. You know, as I talk about,
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  you know, a lot faith into the miracle. You know, you're not
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  going to get a miracle overnight, but what will happen
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  is you can, you'll get clarity and peace of mind and direction.
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  And that night, when I asked, What can I do to get out of this
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  better place? What can I do to pay back those people that I
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  hurt most, and athletic came to mind. That was the only thing I
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  knew. I knew I only had football. I got kicked off my
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  baseball team, so I have football right here, right now.
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  A scholarship was the first one that came to mind. That's how I
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  could pay back my mother and fire. That's how I could pay
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  back my grandparents that I nearly killed from all the
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  stress I put them through. I mean, I think when you're, you
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  know, grown parents have, you know, cried to you almost every
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  night for the past two years, and you know, you've seen your
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  grandparents who were like parents as well in your life,
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  almost completely die from everything that you've done, you
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  know, other other stress and how pain to put them through. I'm
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  so. It wasn't very powerful. It wasn't about what can I do? It's
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  about what can I pay back those people? And, you know, my father
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  always just hoped, and I'll put a Bible throughout the house. I
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  put a motivational book throughout the house. And it
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  just so happened at a, you know, the late great Zig Ziglar folks
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  here at the pop was laying on my back, and for whatever reason, I
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  saw, you know, the chapter was open. We're talking about the
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  power, of gold. And that's why I truly discovered that that goals
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  can change our lives, that goals could take it to the next level.
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  And I from, you know, we all hear about goals and how
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  important they are, but once we fully know how to set goals, the
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  proper and correct one, and once you know how to carry out and
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  you know, make definite plan to achieve those goals, our lives
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  will never be the same again. And I learned this at 17 years
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  old. I wrote a goal next year I will have the division one
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  scholarship. I didn't say, get a division one scholarship. I
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  said, I will have a division one scholarship next week day I go
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  into school. Everyone still thought I would drop. Everyone
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  still thought I was high because I was going in there saying,
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  Hey, I'm getting a visual on scholarship. I'm going to
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  Tennessee, to Alabama. I already started head schools and made up
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  in my mind. No one would believe me. Everyone doubted me. That's
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  when I devoted seven days a week. My parents helped me out.
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  They hired a speed coach. I needed to factor. They hired a
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  strength coach. I had to get younger for seven hours. I'm a
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  weekend to devoted every ounce of effort. I researched schools
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  that I had to, you know, get in contact with coaches, phone
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  numbers, emails, long story short, after so much blood,
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  sweat and tears, you know, night that I almost cried just because
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  I wired it so bad, I ended up with 19 Division One scholarship
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  offers. A year later, I ended up closing Indiana University
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  Manny, for one reason, I still get it today yet tonight,
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  football powerhouse, temperature. Some of the other
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  offers I had, which was Georgia, Georgia pack, Maryland, but I
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  connected real well with the late coach, Terry Heppner, big
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  mentor to Ben rock with burger, he told me, Matt, if you come to
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  Indiana, you won't just become an asset. You become a bright
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  young man that will make a tremendous difference in this
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  world. I promise you that you'll be more successful outside of
• 7:00
  football then you ever will be inside of football.
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  Host: So what was your big kind of second failure?
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  Matt Mayberry: Well, my big second failure came when I was,
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  you know, as you previously mentioned, you know, projecting
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  me to go in the third round of the NFL draft. You know, I was
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  feeling good. I performed well, how my workouts, all the teams
• 7:17
  that I met with, the workout with, for with the patriots,
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  Chicago Bears. So feeling good. You know, me and my family
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  really thought that I was gonna go in the third fourth month. So
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  as a player, you already have that made up in your mind. You
• 7:28
  know, get the big signing bonus. Okay, you got a little bit of
• 7:31
  security, if there's a such thing called security in that
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  league. So I'm feeling good, and we'll come Draft Day. I didn't
• 7:37
  get back Tennessee Titan called me. I'll take a listen to fourth
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  round. So give my family around TV. We're getting ready to fit
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  you. They didn't pick, pick someone else. They can happen
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  three other time throughout that night. And I think a lot of
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  people, you know, they don't understand the severity of how
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  that makes you feel when you really project you to go, you
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  know, in a certain round, you don't get drafted at all. A lot
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  of things have to question, you know, am I getting up to playing
• 8:01
  a big am I? Am I as good as I thought I was? You start to
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  question your Billy. And luckily, 20 minutes later, that
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  kind of, when I talk about my blessing in disguise, Chicago
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  Bears from calling me Jerry Angelo, the general manager
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  offer me a free agent contract I sign right there. Next thing you
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  know, I'm a Chicago bear. You know, hometown kid playing for
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  the hometown King. Kind of a Cinderella story. Everyone in my
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  community kind of broke the story, and now everyone's not
• 8:27
  rooting for me. And that enters my third biggest failure that
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  kind of really shocked my whole world, which, you know, as I
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  said, everyone in the community, everyone kind of built up this
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  Cinderella kid story, rooting for me. Have a great training
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  camp. I work my way from 14 to second king behind land bridge
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  playing the San Diego charges on beautiful Saturday evening out
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  in sunny San Diego, California, second quarter, big 320 pound
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  lineman comes crashing down on my ankle with all the adrenaline
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  and everything built up in a first NFL game, I said, Okay,
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  you know, I might have sprained my ankle. Well, the following
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  day, when I wake up and I'll continue to play throughout that
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  game, I had a great game, actually, even though I had a
• 9:07
  missed back opportunity, it was still a pretty good game for me,
• 9:10
  the rookie, my first outing. But the next day, when I get out of
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  bed, I completely collapse and I realized, oh no, that can't be
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  good, because I know that under fells first thing the big
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  business, big money business, and that decisions have to be
• 9:24
  made. Why go into this facility? Good treatment. That's when I
• 9:28
  realized that they're going to pick me. We'll get MRIs ray
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  comes back, that I can put the core bone off my ankle. I'll be
• 9:34
  out for nine months. And I knew that...
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  Host: This is your first game? It happened in your first game?
• 9:38
  Matt Mayberry: My first game as a rookie. And then, you know,
• 9:41
  obviously, as you know, as a rookie, you can't afford that. I
• 9:44
  knew, hey, I'm out for nine months. I still remember sitting
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  down with my head down. The doctor walked in and said, Matt,
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  you won't be stepping on a football field anytime soon. I
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  said, What do you mean, Doc? He says, Matt, you completely tore
• 9:55
  a pulling off your ankle. You know, you continuing to play in
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  that game hurt. You know your ankle. What it was, I said, Now,
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  what do you mean? This is my dream. I'm living my dream. What
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  do you mean? You're out for nine months. You know that this is a
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  part of the game. There's nothing I could do. There's
• 10:09
  nothing that you could do except heal and Rise and go to therapy
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  and do what you got to do to get it healthy. I said, but I'm a
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  rookie. They're going to cut me. What do you mean? You know why I
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  was saying that to the doctor. I knew we couldn't do anything,
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  but I knew that my parent, the dark place, the drug addict of
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  me, everything was just starting to circulate through my thought
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  process, you know, man, this is it. You know, we reached an
• 10:33
  injury settlement with the Chicago Bears. It means I take
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  my money and I go my way. You go your way. And, you know that
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  kind of when you know I was depressed, I was anger. I mean,
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  that was one of the worst times in my life, because I've really
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  felt that I was the biggest failure walking, even though, as
• 10:49
  an athlete, you can't control injuries, but I felt that that
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  was the biggest failure.
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  Host: So let me ask this now, Matt, so you go through this
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  whole thing, you have this, this up and down story, and such a
• 11:00
  great story of redemption. So I know now, as you look to the
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  professional world and and what you're doing, do you find a big
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  resemblance, you know, or connection to sort of the
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  mindset of being successful in companies compared to performing
• 11:15
  in professional or division one athletics?
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  Matt Mayberry: Absolutely, you know, that's why, wherever I go,
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  you know, I always talk, even if you know the executives in the
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  audience I'm speaking a corporation or a conference, you
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  know, I always say, I personally believe, in my personal stories,
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  that athletics degrees teacher of all. And you know, even if
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  they want an athlete, obviously they're not going to be an
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  athlete, you know, five or 10 years from now. And maybe even
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  that they might have a son or a daughter that you know might be
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  at age that they want to go into athletics, and my hope is that
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  one day they get to experience truly, one of the greatest
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  teachers of all of life. You know, what it teaches about
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  ourselves and our characteristics and the daily
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  disciplines in order to be successful? Um, athletics is
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  just unbelievable in that respect. But to answer your
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  question, absolutely, I see 100% resemblance between the top
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  athletes, between the top executives, and not only that,
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  and from an individual standpoint, from a collective
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  team standpoint, the top performing corporations compared
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  with the top performing teams in athletics.
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  Host: What are some of those characteristics like, what are
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  some of those things that they have in common?
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  Matt Mayberry: Number one is vision, first and foremost. And
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  I think we know as a football team, you walk in the beginning
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  of the season, Eric and you have one goal of doing the Super Bowl
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  every single team meeting that you have, you revisit that
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  subject. And not only that, you know exactly what you have to do
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  in order to get to that big show. You know what you have to
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  do day in and day out. Everything is scripted. You have
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  a set routine, set schedule. The same thing is transferred over
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  in the business arena. You you have one goal, your one mission,
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  one vision. You know you 510, even 510, years from now the
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  business world. But every single day, everybody has to be bought
• 12:59
  into that vision, every single employee.
• 13:01
  Host: So I guess the part that I didn't know so much about your
• 13:05
  story was the low points. If somebody's listening right now,
• 13:09
  Matt, and let's say that they're going through one of those low
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  points, what advice would you give to that person?
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  Matt Mayberry: Yeah, I think that the first advice is number
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  one. Just know that you're extraordinary. I think so many
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  kinds. When we've been hit repeatedly over in light, day in
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  and day out, we forget how powerful we are. We forget that,
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  you know, hey, we truly are extraordinary. We come from an
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  extraordinary guy, and I think once we can first realize that
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  aspect, we're destined for greatness, no matter how dark
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  kinds may be throughout life, if we just continually move
• 13:40
  forward, find ways to better ourselves, day in and day out,
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  work to become the best version of ourselves. We will get there.
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  It's a matter of time.
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  Host: Well, I admire your courage and stay the path. And
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  thank you for being here.
• 13:54
  Matt Mayberry: Absolutely. Thanks so much for having me.