Latest / We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits / 105. Uniting Athletes Around Purpose - Marcus Daniell

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105. Uniting Athletes Around Purpose - Marcus Daniell · We Are For Good Podcast - The Podcast for Nonprofits

• 0:01
  Jonathan McCoy: Hey, I'm john.
• 0:02
  Unknown: And I'm Becky.
• 0:03
  Jonathan McCoy: And this is the we are for good podcast.
• 0:05
  Becky Endicott: nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.
• 0:15
  Becky Endicott: We're here to learn with you
• 0:16
  Jonathan McCoy: from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an impact uprising.
• 0:23
  Becky Endicott: So welcome to the good community, where nonprofit professionals, philanthropist, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.
• 0:34
  Jonathan McCoy: So let's get started.
• 0:36
  Unknown: Welcome, welcome, Becky, how's
• 0:38
  Jonathan McCoy: it going?
• 0:38
  Becky Endicott: I just love our life. The fact that we can sit here across from each other, and bring in someone like our guests today just shows how incredible The world is. And so a lot of firsts happening with our guests
• 0:52
  Unknown: today.
• 0:52
  Becky Endicott: It is I am so excited, you can feel the buzzing light coming out of me right now. Because, you know, we bring in so many nonprofit experts, we bring in so many people who have worked, you know, their entire careers in our sector. And then every once in a while you stumble upon someone who is like the greatest human who does something completely out of their wheelhouse to help serve others.
• 1:16
  Becky Endicott: And that is actually a incredible athlete. And so we literally have a professional athlete on the podcast today, Marcus Daniel, who is the founder of high impact athletes.
• 1:29
  Becky Endicott: And it's just incredible to me that someone that could go play in, you know, the Australian Open or wherever you are in the world, you know, could sit down and take a step back from being just an incredible athlete and say, How can I use this platform to help others and that's what the exploration of this conversation is going to be. So I want to give a little bit of background into Marcus and then everyone at home who especially on state side is going to be loving this conversation as you listen to Marcus's New Zealand accent. But I want to give a little bit of background into his altruism movement. But he is an Olympian tennis player from New Zealand. He's got five incredible titles, quarterfinal appearances at Wimbledon, the Australian Open, I like the way I say it, like I'm just talking about, like anybody does this.
• 2:14
  Becky Endicott: And he's just been involved in what is the effective altruism movement since 2015. And it's really taking a step back and saying, What can I do with my platform with my position with my earnings, and serve people more. And so in 2021, Marcus took the giving what we can pledge to donate at least 10% of his annual winnings to organizations for life. And so if you've never heard of giving what we can pledge, which I had not before I met Marcus, I'm so excited to dive into it. We are going to talk about how we can be a light to others, even if we're not working specifically in the nonprofit space. So Marcus, welcome to the where for good podcast, we are so excited.
• 3:03
  Becky Endicott: You're here and excited to hear your story.
• 3:06
  Unknown: So lovely to be here.
• 3:06
  Unknown: Yeah, I'm really excited for this chat.
• 3:10
  Becky Endicott: So you grow up in New Zealand, you find out that you are one of these LeBron James types. The ability to be an incredible athlete, I want you to just kind of start like at the beginning and have us understand your career and how your heart got turned in this way.
• 3:29
  Unknown: Well, first, I wish I could say I was the LeBron James. Definitely not. But yeah, I mean, tennis has been a huge part of my life since I was very young. And, you know, I've been pursuing a professional career in tennis since I was around 15.
• 3:45
  Unknown: And it's a very self centered, self absorbed, focus, it's, um, you know, necessarily, so I think athletes to get to the top of the world need to have a huge amount of attention on themselves and what they're doing day to day. And that was my life for, you know, 10 years or so. And then, in 2015, I finally had my first year on tour where I actually saved some money, you know, it's the tennis store was incredibly expensive.
• 4:13
  Unknown: And it's incredibly poorly played, poorly paid at the lower levels. So, you know, it's all about grinding through those levels and trying to get to the top 2015. I did that for the first time, put a little bit of money away in the bank. And then with that financial security came this overwhelming need to give back in some way because I'd spent 10 years just sort of focusing on myself and really not feeling like I was balancing the scales there. And I basically just went online and started searching How can I best give back and I came across this website called 80,000 hours, and it absolutely blew my mind. Just the practical advice it gave for everyone. Whatever your career, the best one That you could use your career to give back. And that sort of the the concept of 80,000 hours is the amount of hours that the average person works in any given career. So the two things that I took with me from that were the idea of earning to give as an the more money I earned, the more I could give away, and advocacy where if I manage to create a bigger platform, then I could speak to more people more influentially and hopefully sway more people on to ideas that I thought were valuable. And those two things just dovetailed so well, with a tennis career, it actually really gave me more meaning in my day to day and more meaning in winning tennis matches, because then every every tennis match, I won was great for me personally, and it made me feel good. And it made me feel even better knowing that with each tennis match that I won, I was doing good for other people and other animals and the environment as a whole.
• 5:52
  Jonathan McCoy: Okay, Marcus, I don't think you realize how brilliant what you did is and how many parallels you know, we have conversations all the time with, like Becky said, nonprofit professionals. And I'll tell you one of the trends in the industry is how corporate giving is completely revolutionising.
• 6:05
  Jonathan McCoy: It's getting back on the tracks of how can we be a business to impact we're not just here just to earn money for our shareholders. And I feel like you had that personal awakening in yourself to to say, I mean, this, this comes into the deep ethos of why you do what you do.
• 6:18
  Jonathan McCoy: And it helps you find purpose in that. And so I love that you went on that exploration.
• 6:26
  Jonathan McCoy: Personally, and I think that's a it's a really interesting way to kind of channel your energy and channel your efforts and a really powerful way. So thank you for sharing that. Would you kind of tell us a little bit about the pledge piece of this?
• 6:38
  Jonathan McCoy: The getting what you can pledge?
• 6:38
  Jonathan McCoy: Yeah, I think it's a, I was surprised at how many had already taken this. But if you could give us I think it was over 5006, almost 6000 members last time we refreshed those numbers. Powerful amount of philanthropy 200 billion, 2 billion
• 6:56
  Becky Endicott: 2,000,000,002 point billion
• 6:58
  Jonathan McCoy: dollars, right.
• 6:58
  Jonathan McCoy: But I mean, just such a powerful pledge was you kind of talk to us about what is the genesis of that? And how did it come to be?
• 7:04
  Jonathan McCoy: Sure,
• 7:06
  Unknown: so so in 2015, I came across the effective altruism movement, and I made a donation.
• 7:10
  Unknown: And then that didn't feel like quite enough. So the next year, I made what's called the try Giving Pledge. And that's sort of a subset of giving what we can, it's the I want to try pledging without the burden of a 10% pledge. So the the true giving, what we can pledge is 10%. sentiment. So I started with 1% pledge. And then at the end of the year, that felt really comfortable. And then you know, I just started building up from there. But yeah, giving what we can is, it's essentially a community of people who want to do as much good as they can in the world and really want to make a meaningful commitment to doing that with their lives.
• 7:54
  Unknown: It's not legally binding, it's not, you know, something that at the end of the year, if you've just lost your job, or you know, you've been bankrupted or whatever, it's not an extra squeeze. It's just something that is, it's, it's just an internal commitment that I'm going to live my life for the good of the world and for the good of others. And the other aspect of it that I think is really powerful is if you make the pledge, then you go up onto the sort of member board, and it's a little public, and a lot of people choose to make their pledges more public than that.
• 8:28
  Unknown: And I think that public accountability is actually a really good tool to keeping with the pledge, and, you know, sticking with it, and hopefully eventually, furthering that pledge. I mean, there are some incredible philanthropists in the world who have gone one step further and said, you know, okay, I need X amount of dollars to live a comfortable, happy life II thing over and above that I'll donate to effective organizations. So I'm hoping at some point in my life to get to that stage at the moment, you know, I still feel like I'm trying to set myself up financially and, you know, sort of trying to find a place to live. It's a very transient and peripatetic job, this this tennis career. So once I've sort of settled my life. And then I'd really like to try and further it on. But yeah, as I say, giving what we can is, it's a platform, it's a community of people who want to do good in the world and want to give each other support and doing good.
• 9:24
  Becky Endicott: There's so much about this that I am just geeking out on because, one, the fact that you would have the sort of emotional intelligence built into you to understand that you feel within you that you would like to do more, and you don't know what that was. He didn't know what it was at the time. But you knew there was a void in the more and it's this, this idea that the more you pour into something that's bigger than yourself, it just starts to feel better and then you want to do more and more. There's like a compounding effect of that. But the other thing that I love about just the giving what we can pledge. I mean, it was founded on values, which I'm hearing, in your words here and i and i want to break them down real quick for everybody, because they're so simple.
• 10:08
  Becky Endicott: Caring is, is the first one, taking action, openness and optimism. That's it, when that's the underpinning of what you're actually trying to do. And when you're talking, Marcus, I just feel like that ethos is coming through in what you're saying.
• 10:26
  Becky Endicott: And so we've had a lot of conversations just about how values can set the tone for where you want to go, how you want to be a light in this world. And so I really liked that component. The other thing that I just think is so fascinating is just the grace that it gives, because we I think everybody's heard about the Giving Pledge, in terms of what Bill Gates and Warren Buffett have done, you know, to get billionaires to commit to giving away half their wealth, and I love that, but I've also felt my whole life like it wasn't enough. You know, why are we restricting that only to billionaires? What, why couldn't anyone subscribe to this belief that if we gave a portion of what we earned away, we can equalize the world a bit. And so I love that you discovered this so early in your career. And I just am really curious about, you know, why? Why did you pick the philanthropy that you did?
• 11:19
  Becky Endicott: And I'm really curious about where you're giving it back? I heard the environment, I heard the animal, I heard animal rights. So how did you start to unpack those things that were important to you based on your values? And where are you giving now?
• 11:33
  Unknown: Sure. And I just want to say I completely agree with what you're saying that it's it's easy to hear about the Giving Pledge, and Bill Gates and Warren Buffett and think, yeah, okay, fine, they can give, you know, they've got billions and billions in their bank accounts. But what about me, I don't have billions. But I really think that's the wrong way of thinking about it. I mean, there are around a billion people in the world who are living in a state of affluence.
• 11:57
  Unknown: And people people get surprised when they hear that I've committed to 10% of my annual income as donations. But the reality is, I'm not going to miss that money. You know, I there. I mean, it is significant, right? Like, at the end of the year, when I do donate that money, I do feel that I feel like it's a big deal. But you know, I'm not going to miss not being able to buy a slightly fancier car or slightly bigger house or you know, even an extra coffee a day, that sort of stuff. It doesn't contribute to my underlying happiness, contentedness fulfillment, but sending a chunk of money at the end of the year to these organizations where I know it's going to do a huge amount of good, that really gives me happiness, that the feeling where every day that I go and do some tennis training every day that I go and play a tennis match the knowledge that I'm contributing to the world in a positive way, that gives me happiness. And so I think, you know, anyone can find 1% of their income, that they're spending on luxury items, like, you could even consider something like a coffee from Starbucks, or luxury item, you can take this as extremely as you want. But But I think everyone living in a western country can say, there is room for me to do a little more good in my life. And I think all of us can, especially at the end of the year, or at the end of the tax year, if we're looking at making donations, we can say, Okay, how can I get a little uncomfortable with this, because I think that little bit of discomfort about giving is a good thing. And that's what I've personally done is just each year sort of got a little more uncomfortable and keep progressing. But Sorry, I've gone on an absolute tangent there, and we love it keep going Christian.
• 13:38
  Unknown: Well, I
• 13:41
  Becky Endicott: love that actually, I'm going to piggyback on you on your tangent. So I just think it's just such a healthy conversation, because you shouldn't give to your point until it hurts, you should really be giving until it feels good. And and I would even flip the script a little to all of our nonprofit listeners right now and say, if you have people who are willing to subscribe to this sort of ideology, then it is incumbent upon us to show that impact really, really well to the Marcus's of the world.
• 14:10
  Becky Endicott: Because the more we show impact, the more we show how we been able to utilize that philanthropy in a way that helps others, it's only going to, again, compound their need to want to do more and more and more. And so that's where I think some of the takeaway can be, but my original question was, how did you pick you know where you were going to be gifting to? And why did that align with your values? Yeah, so
• 15:11
  Unknown: so this is a really important question for everyone.
• 15:14
  Unknown: I think for everyone who's who's deciding that they want to donate and then where do you donate? For me, I started donating to the most effective extreme poverty causes I could find. And for me, the major standout there is an organization called the against malaria found And then actually, so a few years ago, three or four years ago, I went through a quite a big change in my life.
• 15:41
  Unknown: And I became vegetarian, initially for ethical reasons, and then, ultimately for ethical and environmental reasons. And along with that change, I did a lot more research into the industrial animal agriculture, industry, and its effects on the environment, its potential effects on public health, and that sort of stuff. And I did a lot of talking to people in this industry. And I eventually got persuaded that, for me donating to animal welfare, particularly farmed animal welfare, and by farmed animals, I mean, there's in factory farms. So now, all of my donations go towards organizations like the humane League, or good food Institute.
• 16:26
  Unknown: These are organizations that are really trying to eliminate factory farming from our our meat production practices. Good food Institute is trying to develop alternative proteins to sort of lessen the burden on industrial animal agriculture, and try and sway more people towards meat alternatives rather than meat. And then the other aspect of my giving is towards climate change organizations.
• 16:48
  Unknown: One thing that I felt very guilty about with my tennis career, since the beginning really has been my carbon footprint. It's just the reality of this job that you know, I'm flying around the world sort of 10 months a year, and flying is incredibly dirty. So yeah, I've been giving to Initially, it was a third party carbon offsetting organization. But more recently, based on the research from organiser missions, like founders pledge, I now donate to the Clean Air Task Force. And they're considered to be the most cost effective organization in terms of eliminating carbon dioxide equivalent in the atmosphere. So yeah, those three, my main focus is now the humane League, good food Institute and the Clean Air Task Force.
• 17:37
  Becky Endicott: Okay, Marcus feel his passion, right? He's like David Attenborough's?
• 17:39
  Becky Endicott: Obviously. You You are doing exactly what if for anyone that hasn't watched the David Attenborough documentary on Netflix, please put that in your queue this week, because this is what? Oh, my gosh,
• 17:55
  Unknown: what an amazing, we
• 17:56
  Becky Endicott: love him. So yes, I love your passion in this,
• 17:59
  Jonathan McCoy: okay. But I also love that we talk a lot about mindsets on the podcast, because we feel like that's where so much begins. And especially as an athlete, I just think of you as you were so focused on training in the most effective way to get to your end goal. And that is so categorically placed through your philanthropy, and it plays to your organization, we're going to transition and talk about that in a minute. But I just love that you're focused on trying to find the most effective way to actually impact the goal that you're setting out to do. And you're not afraid to course correct as you find more effective solutions. So I'm curious what, you know, where do you go to find that? And because I want to, I want our nonprofit partners to be thinking about this of like, how can we better talk about our impact? Talk about what $1 really translates to, in the mind of a donor? You know, you mean, you're now directing your personal philanthropy and you've shifted courses? What are you looking for in effective philanthropies these days?
• 18:58
  Unknown: That's that's a great question. And it's something that I think should be repeatedly asked. So for me that that's the the huge appeal of the effective altruism movement is that the whole drive is towards optimization. It's towards where during as much research as we can, to best answer the question, what is the most good we can do with the resources we have available to us? And I just feel like in every aspect of life, that's a that's a worthwhile question.
• 19:25
  Unknown: Right? I mean, there's billions and billions of dollars spent on that in investment and the finance world. In like you said earlier, and sport, this is what every single athlete is trying to do daily is demise their training so that they can get that extra point 1% out. And I really think this is this is an important question, and perhaps not one that's asked often enough, or with enough intensity in the charity world is, is this the absolute best thing we can be doing with our resources? And so, for me in terms of my personal given, I rely on the research done by effective altruism, charity evaluators, that's the likes of give Well, in the extreme poverty area, founders pledge in the area of climate change, and then animal charity evaluators in the area of animal welfare. And those evaluators I have a huge amount of trust and belief in they're continually updating their research. I believe that they're very impartial to the point where, you know, on give wells homepage, they have a tab saying our mistakes and you know, There's a whole list of these are the things that we could have done. These are the things we think we missed out on a little bit or got slightly wrong. And I just feel like that transparency and that constant, asking of oneself, can I do this better? I just feel like that that's a really positive thing.
• 20:51
  Unknown: And yeah, so those are the those are the research organizations that I go to, for running nations in terms of my own personal giving. That's also the place that I go to, and for recommendations for charities to represent on high impact athletes. So those two things are very closely aligned.
• 21:10
  Jonathan McCoy: Hey, friends, this episode is presented by virtuous and they just happen to be one of our favorite companies. Let me tell you why.
• 21:14
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• 21:30
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• 21:58
  Becky Endicott: I think this high impact athletes, organization is so groundbreaking and interesting.
• 22:05
  Becky Endicott: And I want you to talk a little bit about this because I'm ideal at idealizing it in my head where I'm thinking of Marcus, he's sitting in the locker room next to Roger Federer, and they're taking off their tennis shoes, and they're just talking about it. It's like how do you bring someone like Roger better, you know, nidal, or whoever it is along with you, because in say, this is really we have such a important platform here. And we have such a position of power, how can we create it as a groundswell of positive impact in the world? And so talk to me about how you do that and how high impact athletes came to be?
• 22:46
  Unknown: Oh, well, that's that's exactly what I'm trying to do.
• 22:48
  Unknown: I'm trying to create a movement in the in the sporting world of athletes giving back and giving back in a really meaningful way.
• 22:56
  Unknown: It was it was conceived last year during the first outbreak of COVID. So I was actually in Connecticut with my wife. The the tennis tour had been put on pause. And yeah, I basically had more time on my hands than I had ever had before in my career.
• 23:17
  Unknown: And I started thinking, how could I do more? How could I maximize my own personal impact?
• 23:23
  Unknown: At that stage, I didn't feel like I could increase my pledge, because I'd essentially just lost my job. So then, the second pillar of the two that I've been relying on with my philanthropy is advocacy. So I thought, Okay, how can I maximize my advocacy.
• 23:39
  Unknown: And eventually, what I landed on was, I should get up and as a brand, symbol, and movement, to try and get as many people on board with this idea of effective giving as possible.
• 23:52
  Unknown: And that was the conception of high impact athletes. And we launched early December last year. And actually, you know, that the pickup the response has been really incredible. It's been a pleasant surprise how onboard people have been so quickly. I mean, in February this year, we had eight athletes that are represented on a tray in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open, which is, it's just, you know, it's amazing, two months after launch, to have that sort of impact have already got a bunch of people who have pledged a percentage of income.
• 24:26
  Unknown: And yeah, I just want to really grow this as much as I possibly can to get as many athletes on board, pledging a percentage of their income and spreading this message of giving effectively not just to other athletes but ultimately to their audiences and followings because I think that's one of the real strengths of focusing on that athletic world is for better or worse athletes do have huge followings and huge audiences so if through them, they can sort of be the first domino to to have this big snowball effect of people giving and giving in the most effective places then that's my dream. And you know, we're very, very early in the journey but uh, thus far it's going amazingly well and I just hope we can keep growing exponentially.
• 25:12
  Unknown: Oh my gosh, human
• 25:13
  Becky Endicott: Marcus is the Warren Buffett of the athletic world. And in to me the 1.0 version of this would be just the advocacy piece that you talked about. Just getting someone a microphone to say this is why this cause is important.
• 25:28
  Becky Endicott: I think you should look at it if you feel called to give give if you feel called to volunteer volunteer, but the two Point out of that is athlete, I'm giving to it to join me. And so the power of the ripple of that could be so huge. And so I am just geeking out over the potential of this. And I just want to shout it from the rooftops. Because I really think that there is a way for athletes to come into the nonprofit space and have a significant impact in the way that we can move our missions forward.
• 25:59
  Unknown: You're exactly right, that I think the the message is so powerful if athletes that people look up who don't just say, Hey, you guys should do this. They say, Hey, I believe in this strongly enough that I give my own money towards it.
• 26:12
  Unknown: Why won't you join me? I think that's such a powerful message.
• 26:15
  Jonathan McCoy: Well, everybody needs to check out Marcus's website with this because high impact athletes.org the way you've laid it out the way you speak, and break it down and make it so easy to see why someone would want to get involved in this nonprofit should take note of that. I mean, your website is so clear and beautiful, and the way it's presented to what are your dreams for this space? I mean, what do you want hope to see happen from this organization?
• 26:40
  Unknown: Sure, well, I my shorter term dream is just to move as much funding as possible to these organizations that are doing incredible work with every dollar they get donated. So you know, that that I think is the most tangible, direct immediate impacts that I can have through ha, I've set myself a goal this year of moving a million dollars towards those organizations represented, that might be a stretch goal, but but you think it's it's, it's a good thing to have big goals. And then in a more long term fashion. And this, I think, is getting a little bit into into dream territory. But I really do want to create a movement, a almost an expectation, that when athletes at the big time when athletes start earning a lot of money, it's just part of the role of being an athlete, that you commit a percentage of your income to something that you really strongly believe in. And that does a huge amount of good in the world. And I think if we can get enough athletes across the board doing this, then it might be self perpetuating, it might be the sort of thing that you know, a young athlete coming up through the ranks, sees their role model and sees that they're donating 2% 5% 10% of their income, and says not only do I want to get to the top of the world of my sport, but I also want to give back the way that my idol is giving back. And yeah, so my sort of my dream and the legacy that I'd love to be able to leave with ha is that it's just part of what an athlete does is donate a percentage of their income to a really good cause.
• 28:20
  Becky Endicott: It's what happens when one person can and I love this idea that you have said, I am in a selfish sport.
• 28:29
  Becky Endicott: And that is, to me, the the funniest irony of this entire conversation that you self realize, I am in the sport that's all about me, me, me, me, me. And yet, you've flipped it completely and said, How can we just disrupt the space massively, and do for others and one person's great idea plants a seed. And the ability for it to be such a massive movement is something I feel like everybody can get on board with. And I love the point I have honestly didn't even think about just how a small child could look at their hero and say, Oh, this is just a part of their DNA. This is what I should be doing. And oh, it looks like it feels so good. And they're getting so much out of it. And that also has a ripple effect. So this is just I just really enjoyed this conversation, and I am rooting for you anything that we can do to help you in this community.
• 29:29
  Becky Endicott: We are all for it. You know, we like to ask all of our guests about a moment of philanthropy that that just moved you. And I'm wondering if there was a time that you have either given a gift or seen the impact of giving that you could share a story with us about it?
• 29:46
  Unknown: Sure, I think so from from a personal angle. I think that the very first time I pledged that 1% and 2016 that was a real life shifting moment for me. It was you know, it was it was a sort of a concrete acknowledgment of my desire to do good in the world and my commitment to doing good in the world. So so for me personally, that was probably the biggest moment I had and the most meaningful moment I had. And then I think looking out with a guy that I idolize and just have a huge amount of respect for as a philosopher called Peter Singer. And he is one of the founding fathers of the effective altruism movement. Not only that he's actually I think probably considered the founding father of The animal animal rights movement, as well. And he's one of those people who pretty early on just said, Okay, I only need, I can't remember what the figure figure was, but I think it was something around sort of 40,000 US dollars, 30,000 US dollars. That's how much I need to live my life happily, gives me everything I need, and anything over and above that he donates to charity. And that, to me is just such a selfless, caring, philanthropic, human being. And so I remember when I first read that, I just thought, well, this is something to aspire to. This as someone who's living life, right. And it movie hugely. So yeah. For for me personally, it was the first time I pledged and then someone else's gesture it was reading about Peter singers commitment to a life that's truly based on philanthropy.
• 31:30
  Becky Endicott: Okay, Peter Singer.
• 31:32
  Jonathan McCoy: Absolutely. And you know, we talk a lot about everyone matters is really our philosophy with philanthropy to in a nonprofit. And we believe that just from a core, everyone matters level, but from a nonprofit level to, if you have somebody making a small gift, this is their test gift. I mean, look at Marcus giving 1% across multiple charities trying to figure out what you really connected with where you saw your money, making a difference.
• 31:58
  Jonathan McCoy: And now that is at least tenfold and is probably going to be a lot more beyond that. I think this is the power of doing really incredible stewardship, and accountability with money, and showing your donors how that connects to it, because that's where the money is at, folks. So I love that that's such a part of your story. Because it needs we need to hear more of that because there's so much of an emphasis on major gifts, and we forget about people that are just coming in the door for the first time. But so I love that you're living living that out in front of us. And
• 32:30
  Becky Endicott: I love that his hero is not Andre Agassi or Boris Becker, or who I mean that honestly, I like as a small child, I don't know who you used to watch on the tennis playing field. But it's like the people that speak to you or the people who are literally helping humanity. And it's like, we just got to find all the Marcus's in the world and aggregate them, you know, the athletes because I'm looking at your athlete list. And it's not just tennis players. I mean, there's rugby, and I mean, pentathol on and I mean just these, it's such a global movement, which is I think the beauty of it, because we want to help people all around the world, not just in our own community. So anyway, I just I just think it's really fantastic. And love that you picked Peter.
• 33:17
  Unknown: Yeah, and you know, the amazing thing. When I was in Australia recently for the Australian Open, I actually got to meet him, which was completely surreal. I mean, this is a guy, I've read so many of his books, you know, I've made big changes in my life, basically, because of his work.
• 33:33
  Unknown: So to be able to sit down and have a coffee with them was just amazing. And he's actually now an advisor to HIV. So it's a Yeah, this this whole, since I started this thing, it's just been, it's just been surreal.
• 33:45
  Unknown: How many doors start opening, when you start putting this energy and this intention into the world, the amount of people who want to connect the amount of people who sort of give you positive energy, because you're really trying to generate positive energy in the world.
• 34:02
  Unknown: So, you know, like you were saying, these small gestures, you know, even if it's just 10 bucks a month, or something like whatever it is, if you putting those positive energy out into the world, I really do believe it comes from spades. And that's it's been borne out with my experience so far with ha,
• 34:21
  Becky Endicott: can't you just see Marcus, like plowing through a group of people knocking Roger Federer on the ground trying to get to Peter Singer.
• 34:30
  Jonathan McCoy: So okay, I love that I get to ask you this question. We ask all of our guests, what's your one good thing? And I just, I mean, teach us your ways. What is something that you as a professional athlete that started this movement, I look at the list of what you've accomplished in the first couple months getting people involved is nothing short of remarkable. what's what's one good thing that people can implement today, and maybe a habit piece of success? advice?
• 34:52
  Jonathan McCoy: What
• 34:52
  Unknown: is it? You know, I think we touched on it earlier.
• 34:55
  Unknown: And I think it's really just just constantly repeatedly asking yourself the question, is this the most good that I can do? Is this the best that I can do? And I think that's a that's a useful question to ask yourself, not just in philanthropy, but you know, and whatever work you're doing something I asked myself probably too much on a tennis court, you know, there's you get into the realm of trying to be perfect, which is definitely a negative rather than a positive.
• 35:22
  Unknown: But in general, I just think saying, you know, have I optimized here is, is, is a really good question. And it's, I mean, for me, it's, it's led to some success in sport, and it's lead to high impact athletes, which, you know, just gives me a huge amount of gratification a huge amount of joy and fulfillment in life. And I really do think it's going to be my life's work. So yeah. I'm aware of the dangers of trying to optimize too much and and, you know, not enjoying the moment because of that. So I feel like there should be some sort of small caveat there. But in general just saying is this the best that I can do i think is a is my top but recommendation
• 36:08
  Becky Endicott: and and i think that just your vulnerability there and your rawness is so well taken, because I mean, to be at a to be a professional athlete to be at that level, you've got to have some level of extreme drive and competition.
• 36:24
  Becky Endicott: And I love that you can literally take this competition and use it for good. And because we know that it's within all of these athletes, it's like how do we give them the right tools?
• 36:34
  Becky Endicott: How do we position that in a way because we know that you're not going to be a professional athlete your whole life, but you are going to have that drive your whole life and the fact that you would pour it into making the world a better place is just about the most wholesome thing ever. So that's wonderful.
• 36:49
  Unknown: Yeah, we're gonna try and try and figure out a way to make giving competitive and gamify the the giving and maybe we can get athletes.
• 36:59
  Becky Endicott: My mind is spinning. We're gonna pit Marcus against Serena Williams against Tiger Woods against LeBron. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh, I love it.
• 37:06
  Becky Endicott: So Marcus, how can people connect with you? How can they connect with high impact athletes? Where are you on socials? Give us all the details.
• 37:19
  Unknown: Yeah, so this is one thing that I wish I had sort of been more on top of. For the last years I've always had a see uneasy relationship with social media and you know, really did my best to keep my distance. But now when I have something that I actually really want to push out and spread the message about really lagging in terms of followers and audience and that sort of stuff. But you can find me on all of the socials if you just look for Marcus Daniel. I'm on there and high Mel's packed ethics. Yeah, high impact athletes is on all the socials.
• 37:49
  Unknown: If you search for high impact athletes, I think our website is a really good resource for getting to know what we do getting to know the types of charities we represent why we represent those charities, the selection method we use for for choosing those charities and, you know, being able to see all of the incredible athletes that we already have on board. And that website is high impact athletes.org. And yeah, please do reach out. I mean, we're a very, very small team. And we're hoping to stay small and lean and you know, spend as little as possible on on keeping the lights on and channel as much money as we can towards the organizations that are doing crazy amounts of good with each dollar. But yeah, please do reach out happy to have a chat to anyone who wants to be involved. And yeah, let's, let's do as much good as we can. Okay,
• 38:38
  Becky Endicott: good human award.
• 38:40
  Jonathan McCoy: I'm sorry, I'm the least athletic person in the room. But I'm here for your mission, man.
• 38:46
  Unknown: This is actually this is I think, something that I really need to say because I, the organization is called high impact athletes. And I am sort of focusing on trying to get as many athletes on board. But really, you don't have to be an athlete to give through ha or directly to whatever charity you believe in. The goal. The bottom line is really let's just get as much funding as possible as we can to the organizations that do the most good with it doesn't matter if that dollar comes from LeBron or from Joe public, it means the same edits in destination. So please just jump on board. You don't have to be athletic at all,
• 39:25
  Becky Endicott: I would like to extend a little invitation to you because I would love for you to come back in a couple years and have us revisit this conversation and see the way that your footprint has expanded not your carbon footprint but your philanthropic footprint.
• 39:38
  Becky Endicott: And I would really like to see how it's grown. And it would be fun to see the impact of what this dream has created and all the good that it's putting into the world so just know we're here we're rooting for you. And we wish you the best.
• 39:54
  Unknown: Absolutely love to come back your your enthusiasm and passion for the space just absolutely shines through. It's It's It's great to chat. It's great to be part of this uplifting movement. And I'd be very happy to chat again. And hopefully a couple years down the track. We have some crazy success stories to talk about.
• 40:11
  Becky Endicott: You're a good human, we appreciate you being here.
• 40:14
  Unknown: Thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed it.
• 40:17
  Jonathan McCoy: Thanks so much for listening to today's conversation. We hope Marcus inspired you to start thinking about how you can make an impact in your corner of the world. I hope you hear it in our voices but we love connecting you with the most innovative people to help you achieve more for your mission than ever before. That's what we'd love for you to join our good community. It's our own special network like an after party for every episode, a place to meet new friends find inspiration or just get help when you feel stuck. Sign up today we're for good calm slash Hello. One more thing if you love what you heard today, would you mind leaving us a podcast rating and review? It means the world to us and Your support helps more listeners find this community. Thanks so much friends. Our production hero who happens to be the daughter of a Dallas tennis legend herself is Julie Confer Hello and our theme song is sunray by Remy boys BAM go rock this week do gooders