Speaker 1: Welcome to Good Game with Sarah Spain, where we're running
Speaker 1: on liquid IV and Vitamin C powder. With all this traveling,
Speaker 1: I'm going to need all the help I can get
Speaker 1: to avoid a reappearance of the plague. It's Wednesday, February
Speaker 1: twenty sixth, and then on today's show, we're skipping the
Speaker 1: news to get you right to my conversation with Emmy
Speaker 1: Award winning ESPN broadcaster, speaker, and author Anne Marie Anderson.
Speaker 1: I caught up with her earlier this month to discuss
Speaker 1: lessons from her book Cultivating Audacity, Dismantle Doubt and Let
Speaker 1: Yourself Win. Plus we talk about her current role calling
Speaker 1: the inaugural season of League One Volleyball and how the
Speaker 1: Vibes landscape could change over the next five to ten years.
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed this interview and I left feeling both
Speaker 1: educated and inspired by her wisdom.
Speaker 2: So I hope you all do too. That conversation's coming
Speaker 2: out right after this joining us now.
Speaker 1: She's a three time Emmy Award winning ESPN broadcaster, a speaker,
Speaker 1: and author of the new book Cultivating Audacity, Dismantled Doubt
Speaker 1: and Let Yourself Win. She's covered six Olympic NBA and
Speaker 1: MLB playoffs, the Super Bowl, and more, and has served
Speaker 1: as a play by play announcer on major networks including ESPN, ABC, NBC, Fox,
Speaker 1: and TBS. A former volleyball player for Hofstra, former play
Speaker 1: by play announcer for the Las Vegas Aces, and currently
Speaker 1: broadcasting for NCAA and Love Volleyball, amongst other things.
Speaker 2: It's Anne Marie Anderson. Thanks for joining us. Thanks Sarah,
Speaker 2: good to talk to you.
Speaker 1: You've been on a whirlwind for the book and I
Speaker 1: can't wait to get into that. But I want to
Speaker 1: start with Love Volleyball because you're part of the broadcast
Speaker 1: team for this inaugural season. How has this met or
Speaker 1: maybe differed from your expectations coming in?
Speaker 3: It's incredible. These are the best athletes volleyball athletes in
Speaker 3: the world. You've got ten of thirteen US Olympians. Well,
Speaker 3: you also have Olympians from like Germany, Korea, Japan. It's
Speaker 3: been unbelievable, the best volleyball this country has ever seen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it was five years in the making, this league,
Speaker 1: and I remember hearing rumors about it a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago. Obviously, Love is a part of this much
Speaker 1: larger camp and youth organization systems. So it's really building
Speaker 1: on something that they've already had across the country with
Speaker 1: this growing youth volleyball scene, But for them to actually
Speaker 1: put it up, have it be visible, have it be
Speaker 1: something that really changes the landscape for pro volleyball has
Speaker 1: been cool to watch and also even to see their
Speaker 1: ability to take feedback almost instantly that first night of
Speaker 1: television everyone's watching. There were some kooky camera angles. They
Speaker 1: probably seemed like they'd be interesting and said they were
Speaker 1: a bit jarring, made it tough to watch, and they
Speaker 1: adjusted when you're behind the scenes, Were you hearing a
Speaker 1: lot of that as someone on the mic where you
Speaker 1: were receiving a lot of the feedback that they had
Speaker 1: for the league.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because of course I don't see those shots, right,
Speaker 3: I'm going the game from the floor. But that's the
Speaker 3: thing that's so great about Love is that they're trying
Speaker 3: to do things different. Look, we're all athletes. What are
Speaker 3: you going to do if you're not coachable through it?
Speaker 3: So I love that. And the other thing Sarah you
Speaker 3: hinted at it is that they call it an ecosystem
Speaker 3: from club volleyball all the way up through profession and Olympians,
Speaker 3: so it really ties those youth athletes to what's potentially
Speaker 3: their dreams.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which we didn't have a lot growing up, which
Speaker 1: is crazy. What have the crowds been like at the
Speaker 1: Love Games?
Speaker 2: They're great.
Speaker 3: It's been somewhat small arenas that they just sell out.
Speaker 2: At this point.
Speaker 3: I think they need to go to bigger arenas because
Speaker 3: the demand has been so huge.
Speaker 1: That's really cool that that's already happening. Yeah, we had
Speaker 1: some folks from Love on before the league's first launched
Speaker 1: this year, and that's what they said. We wanted to
Speaker 1: do manageable sizes to really make the environment great for
Speaker 1: the games. But if they're already selling out and needing
Speaker 1: to expand, that's fantastic. What do you make of the
Speaker 1: sort of crowded field for women's volleyball. We've got Love
Speaker 1: and Athletes Unlimited, which play at different times of the year,
Speaker 1: But then we've got PVF, the Professional Volleyball Federation in
Speaker 1: its second season, which plays at the same time as LOVE.
Speaker 1: And then a few weeks ago, one of the teams
Speaker 1: in the PVF, the Omaha Supernovas, announced they're leaving the
Speaker 1: PVF to be part of a new league called Major
Speaker 1: League Volleyball launching next season. Can you explain why the
Speaker 1: field's so crowded right now?
Speaker 3: No, Oh, Sarah, I cannot explain why the field is
Speaker 3: so crowded. I mean, just like any lever of sports,
Speaker 3: you kind of wish it was all consolidated into one,
Speaker 3: but it is what it is, and at this point
Speaker 3: we will see kind of hoopervails and my money's on love.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Have you spoken to any of the athletes about it,
Speaker 1: because on the one hand, it's so great that at
Speaker 1: one point you had to go abroad to even continue
Speaker 1: your career, and now there's all these opportunities in the States.
Speaker 1: At the same time, that's resources, money, opportunities, quality of play,
Speaker 1: that's being sort of split amongst many instead of focused.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Jordan Larson, who's the goat of volleyball, four time Olympic medalist,
Speaker 3: she plays in League one Volleyball and they had their
Speaker 3: home opener in Omaha recently and she said, I cried
Speaker 3: on my way to the arena because I've never slept
Speaker 3: in my bed before a game before. And then she'll
Speaker 3: go back and sleep again. It's in terms of talent
Speaker 3: being spread around I mean, again, there's so much talent.
Speaker 3: League one volleyball tends to go for the Olympians PVF
Speaker 3: somewhere that people that aren't quite that same level maybe
Speaker 3: can play. Not that there's not a great level and
Speaker 3: PVF there definitely is, but the Olympians are with Love.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it feels like on the one hand, it's like
Speaker 1: great that everybody's interested, but also, let's find out if
Speaker 1: the people who are launching all of these are wanting
Speaker 1: to be at the top of the pyramid instead of
Speaker 1: making sure that the pyramid is a solid foundation and
Speaker 1: one that will sustain, which usually means collaborating and working
Speaker 1: together instead of setting up all these different leagues. How
Speaker 1: have you personally handled the power that's given to broadcasters
Speaker 1: at Love or League one to pause play for a
Speaker 1: story or an explanation that we loved hearing from the
Speaker 1: Love folks before the season started about how they really
Speaker 1: wanted to let the broadcasters teach.
Speaker 2: The game while you were watching it.
Speaker 1: But that's a lot of power to have to wait,
Speaker 1: you know, they have to actually wait for y'all sometimes.
Speaker 1: How have you personally looked at that and how you
Speaker 1: want to approach it?
Speaker 3: Well, we've gone away from it a little bit because,
Speaker 3: as you said, taking feedback, what we do a lot
Speaker 3: now is mike the players, mike the announcers, and then
Speaker 3: are able to explain that afterwards. You get some great
Speaker 3: stuff of course in the huddles, and then some players
Speaker 3: on the floor as well. It's just a different way
Speaker 3: of looking at it, and it's tricky, Sarah, to balance. Okay,
Speaker 3: these are the volleyball folks who know the game and
Speaker 3: want to learn more, and these are the people that
Speaker 3: are just learning the game, and I don't want to
Speaker 3: lose them by talking over their heads. It's a bit
Speaker 3: of a dance.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So there was more of that at the beginning,
Speaker 1: and lately you haven't done it as much.
Speaker 3: You're saying no, not pausing play right.
Speaker 1: I think what would be fascinating to your point, and
Speaker 1: we work on this on our show as well, is
Speaker 1: how do you balance the people who already know a
Speaker 1: lot and want to get a little bit deeper and
Speaker 1: then the folks who show up and listen. And we
Speaker 1: don't want to scare them away because they don't know
Speaker 1: all the nicknames and all the acronyms and all the whatever.
Speaker 2: So we try to do a little bit of both.
Speaker 1: In your case, I wonder if it might be useful
Speaker 1: for love to take one of the great games that's
Speaker 1: already happened and have a couple analysts rewatch it being
Speaker 1: able to and walk people through so that if you
Speaker 1: do want to get into the league and understand better
Speaker 1: and be a better fan of it, you have this
Speaker 1: opportunity via something that you can just go to on
Speaker 1: their website and rewatch with them explaining and walking you
Speaker 1: through it.
Speaker 2: I love it. Have you brought that up to them now,
Speaker 2: but you should.
Speaker 1: I will take the idea run with it, because I
Speaker 1: would watch that. I love watching volleyball, but it's not
Speaker 1: my wheelhouse, and so to have someone actually tell me
Speaker 1: what I'm looking for and how I can see positioning
Speaker 1: or strategy or things like that would be would be
Speaker 1: really cool where you could pause the game and not
Speaker 1: feel like you're missing anything.
Speaker 3: For that so my wheelhouse. Sarah too that I'm kind
Speaker 3: of loving it. My son plays college volleyball and I
Speaker 3: just came back from his matches and it's always like
Speaker 3: the other mothers sitting next to me, going, what's happening, Yeah.
Speaker 2: What's happening? So I do it anyway, I'll bring it
Speaker 2: up to them. Why not.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you think the landscape's going to look
Speaker 1: like for pro women's volleyball?
Speaker 2: And say five or ten years.
Speaker 3: I think it's going to settle into one.
Speaker 2: I really hope.
Speaker 3: So. I do a lot of traveling overseas during the
Speaker 3: summer calling Volleyball Nations League, which is the professional teams
Speaker 3: from each country competing against each other, and the crowds
Speaker 3: overseas are insane. Brazil, Thailand, the Netherlands, the Philippines have
Speaker 3: been all over the place, Turkey, and I think that
Speaker 3: once the US gets one super strong pro league, and
Speaker 3: like you, that's my hope that things will consolidate into one.
Speaker 3: I think we're going to start seeing big crowds getting
Speaker 3: attached to these players. It's all about the stories, isn't it,
Speaker 3: And so knowing the athlete beyond oh how hard they
Speaker 3: can they hit the ball, but knowing their life and
Speaker 3: getting connected to them. It's been such a gift. All
Speaker 3: the US players are so incredibly grateful, and they're having
Speaker 3: a great time kind of welcoming all the international players
Speaker 3: in and teaching them American customs. It's been really fun.
Speaker 2: That's really cool. You also cover NCAA volleyball.
Speaker 1: How do you explain the massive spike in popularity for
Speaker 1: what we're calling college vibs.
Speaker 3: I think we've got a couple of female leaders both
Speaker 3: at ESPN and Erica Galbreath and at Big ten in
Speaker 3: Sue Maritt, who understand the game. And I think when
Speaker 3: the high level folks understand the game, they understand what
Speaker 3: it is that viewers want to see. And I think
Speaker 3: between the two of them, creating more and more of
Speaker 3: graphics and helping people attach kind of like you were
Speaker 3: just talking about, gives people something to root for. Plus, Sarah,
Speaker 3: I've been doing this for thirty five years. The athletes
Speaker 3: now are huge, and that's a compliment. It's so strong
Speaker 3: that it is electric volleyball. And the thing about women's
Speaker 3: volleyball versus men's and I love men's again, my son
Speaker 3: plays men's is that the rallies are longer. Yeah, And
Speaker 3: I think in women's volleyball the fans just live and
Speaker 3: die with each rally.
Speaker 1: It's a lot of fun, yeah, because they hit hard,
Speaker 1: but not so hard that you can't possibly return it,
Speaker 1: so that allows for them.
Speaker 2: I can't go on more. Well, we couldn't. But yeah, but.
Speaker 1: Those great players, can you know the state? I think
Speaker 1: to your point, we often blame the product when we
Speaker 1: don't supply it with the context necessary for people to
Speaker 1: get attached to it.
Speaker 2: We're so good at doing that.
Speaker 1: In men's sports, we give all the shoulder programming and
Speaker 1: the pre and post games and the stories and the features,
Speaker 1: and then you watch the game and you have all
Speaker 1: that information that you bring to it. And then women's
Speaker 1: sports a lot of times, especially more so even a
Speaker 1: decade ago, it's just like, here's the game. We're not
Speaker 1: gonna tell you anything before or after. We're not gonna
Speaker 1: introduce you anyone. You're not gonna way the contacts, you're
Speaker 1: not gonna go to the storylines, and then we're gonna
Speaker 1: blame the game when there aren't as many viewers even
Speaker 1: though we haven't given it an opportunity. So I love
Speaker 1: that you're saying there's people in charge who know better
Speaker 1: and are are doing better, and.
Speaker 2: It's paying off. One last quick thing about NCA Volleyball.
Speaker 1: Some incredible retirements that we're getting all in a row
Speaker 1: here from some of the biggest coaches in the game,
Speaker 1: John Cook, Mary Wise.
Speaker 2: There's another one. I'm forgetting right now. But what is this?
Speaker 1: This seems like of course, I mean they've been coaching
Speaker 1: twenty five years. Mary Why's thirty four years at Florida,
Speaker 1: John Cook twenty five at Nebraska. Obviously, they've been in
Speaker 1: a long time and they've earned it if they want
Speaker 1: to retire. But of all times, when it's peaking like this,
Speaker 1: are you surprised to see them step away?
Speaker 3: You know? The honest truth is no. The transfer portal
Speaker 3: is brutal, And how would you like to be somebody
Speaker 3: who's an absolute legend coaching in the game begging your
Speaker 3: eighteen year old to stay because.
Speaker 2: They didn't play.
Speaker 3: I mean, the transfer portal for me, in my opinion,
Speaker 3: is out of control, and it's taken away the ability
Speaker 3: of these legendary coaches to develop players. At this point,
Speaker 3: it's a constant emergency trying to keep your players happy,
Speaker 3: and you can't really develop because everybody's so impatient. So
Speaker 3: I think we're going to see some more longtime ogs retiring.
Speaker 1: I don't blame the coaches, especially after thirty twenty five years,
Speaker 1: reacting to this drastic change and being ready to kind
Speaker 1: of move on. But I think I still prioritize the
Speaker 1: player experience, particularly when you might only have those four years, right,
Speaker 1: and when there was no transfer portal, there was no
Speaker 1: recourse for someone that was unhappy or even if they
Speaker 1: weren't playing, and that was right, they didn't deserve it
Speaker 1: at that school. Maybe they just want to play somewhere
Speaker 1: else if that's their only chance. Right, Is your solution
Speaker 1: just more policy or rules around how and when you
Speaker 1: can transfer, because I assume you believe that the transfer
Speaker 1: portal existing is good, but maybe just the extent to
Speaker 1: which it's used is the problem.
Speaker 3: Yes, exactly. I mean again, I think you played college
Speaker 3: sports as well when we played. At least the role
Speaker 3: when I played was you had to sit out a year.
Speaker 3: That's tough, right, And you're talking about the player experience,
Speaker 3: But I think we got rid of some protections that
Speaker 3: maybe will help people not or would help people not
Speaker 3: jump so fast. Transferring within a conference could be one
Speaker 3: of them. Maybe a waiting period of some type, because
Speaker 3: like you, I want I want athletes to be able
Speaker 3: to play and be able to be a part of it.
Speaker 3: But at the same time, a lot of people are
Speaker 3: jumping now where there's money involved and other things.
Speaker 2: And it just clouds the field.
Speaker 3: I will say this though, Sarah, there's great parody across
Speaker 3: the country. Yeah. No longer is it just a couple
Speaker 3: of teams that are going to win. This past season
Speaker 3: was as wide open as we have ever seen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm still in favor of the athlete, but I
Speaker 1: do think sometimes they.
Speaker 2: Might even move too quickly for their own good.
Speaker 1: So you're still centering and prioritizing the athlete, but in
Speaker 1: a sense of protecting their ability to see their movement
Speaker 1: for what it might be, as opposed to just bouncing
Speaker 1: when things aren't going their way.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's.
Speaker 1: Complicated for sure, especially complicated for the coaches trying to
Speaker 1: develop players and grow programs.
Speaker 2: We got to take a quick break.
Speaker 1: When we come back more with Anne Marie Anderson, stay tuned.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about this book, Cultivating Audacity, Dismantle Doubt and
Speaker 1: let Yourself Win.
Speaker 2: Why did you want to write it and why now?
Speaker 3: I wanted to write it because I have seen so
Speaker 3: many people. It kills me when somebody says, ugh, I
Speaker 3: don't like my job, It just makes me so sad, like,
Speaker 3: what are you doing? Because of course your life isn't
Speaker 3: about your job, but a lot of us are afraid
Speaker 3: or we have another barrier that we let drive the bus.
Speaker 3: And I think, Sarah, we've been told like, conquer your fears,
Speaker 3: push it down away, and that just doesn't work. So
Speaker 3: audacity is about embracing making friends with fear, maybe recalibrating
Speaker 3: your relationship with rejection, and making some bold decisions where
Speaker 3: you're okay with the outcome no matter what it is
Speaker 3: because you understand it's data.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I say this all the time, and
Speaker 1: I know it's not easy for everybody, and there are
Speaker 1: definitely stretches of life where you will have a job
Speaker 1: you don't like out of necessity. But I always say
Speaker 1: to people, if you are at a job for long
Speaker 1: enough that the complaining never stops, but you're also not
Speaker 1: actively trying to find a way to make it better
Speaker 1: or do something else.
Speaker 2: Put up or shut up.
Speaker 1: Either find the joy and every day do a gratitude
Speaker 1: practice of coming back from this job you don't like
Speaker 1: and reiterating the things you love about it so that
Speaker 1: you train your brain to find the good or leave,
Speaker 1: because if it's a constant stream toward the negative, you're
Speaker 1: just telling your brain to keep looking for the worst.
Speaker 2: And it's going to get even worse.
Speaker 1: And so yeah, I mean, I think we spent so
Speaker 1: much of our lives working to hate.
Speaker 2: It is such a sad existence. So you've got to
Speaker 2: find a way out of that.
Speaker 1: And I think that there are some lessons in this
Speaker 1: that would apply to everyone. And I want to start
Speaker 1: with the fear you just mentioned. You have a way
Speaker 1: of three ways actually of making friends with your fear,
Speaker 1: figuring out how it might be telling you something, and
Speaker 1: how to bring it with you instead of fighting it.
Speaker 2: Can you tell us about that?
Speaker 3: Sure? I was terrified my first time on air, absolutely terrified,
Speaker 3: and what I ended up doing was kind of catastrophizing.
Speaker 3: People love to say what's the worst that can happen?
Speaker 3: And I was like, you want the worst that can happen?
Speaker 3: And I went all the way to dying, destitute and alone,
Speaker 3: you know kind of thing. But I feel like sometimes
Speaker 3: when we catastrophize, our fears take it all the way
Speaker 3: to the extreme end. We can see that's probably not
Speaker 3: going to happen, and you're probably not going to win
Speaker 3: an Emmy your first time out, and so there is
Speaker 3: some joy in realizing the action is what counted. I
Speaker 3: always say The win in audacity is in the action,
Speaker 3: not in the outcome, and I think that's something a
Speaker 3: lot of us do. So for fears. My first time
Speaker 3: on air, for example, I was afraid that I was
Speaker 3: going to be bad, that I was going to be embarrassed,
Speaker 3: that I was going to be judged, that I was
Speaker 3: going to be exposed. All that happens, Sarah, it.
Speaker 2: Was tragic, awful. What game were you calling?
Speaker 3: It was a college football game. My first time ever
Speaker 3: live was in seventy million homes on ESPN two. I
Speaker 3: know I was supposed to be on regional televisions and
Speaker 3: stuff happened. I'd already been a producer, and so I
Speaker 3: was literally crying outside the stadium.
Speaker 2: I cry when I'm frustrated.
Speaker 3: I was crying outside the stadium. Well, I went on air.
Speaker 3: I was indeed bad, exposed, you know, judge, embarrassed. But
Speaker 3: you know what, I survived. Yeah, And I think that's
Speaker 3: a big part of audacity and taking those actions is
Speaker 3: that once you fail by whatever definition you want to
Speaker 3: use for fail, and you survive it, you can go
Speaker 3: back and try again and maybe get better. I always
Speaker 3: say my second time on air the next week, the
Speaker 3: only thing that was better was that it wasn't the
Speaker 3: first time.
Speaker 1: Well, but also to your point, like we're so afraid
Speaker 1: of failure that we don't recognize that if you fail
Speaker 1: and it's not the end of the world, then the
Speaker 1: next time you don't have as much fear of it
Speaker 1: because you're like I survived that. It wasn't that big
Speaker 1: of a deal. I did one college football sideline reporting.
Speaker 2: It wasn't for me. I did for Big ten Network.
Speaker 2: It wasn't for me. But I was trying to talk
Speaker 2: about a statue that the.
Speaker 1: Illinois players run by and rub on their way onto
Speaker 1: the field for good luck.
Speaker 2: And I'm not great with numbers, which.
Speaker 1: Is why statistics storry's very clearly written out for me
Speaker 1: when I'm going to use them, I don't like try
Speaker 1: to mess about with them if I don't have a plan.
Speaker 2: I like words, not numbers.
Speaker 1: But I tried to say how much the statue weighed,
Speaker 1: and it was like way off. I was like eleven
Speaker 1: hundred tons or something like just completely wrong.
Speaker 2: And I afterwards was like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: One person on Twitter was like eleven hundred tons, like
Speaker 1: pretty sure that's and I Google like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: abs cletely wrong. I'm so embarrassed I made a huge
Speaker 1: mistake on television. Ever, literally no one else mentioned it.
Speaker 1: The boss has never mentioned it. Probably no one else
Speaker 1: even heard it or paid attention or knows whether it
Speaker 1: was eleven hundred tons. And I realized after that, like,
Speaker 1: even if I make an actual mistake that is inarguably wrong,
Speaker 1: it's not the end of the world. And then the
Speaker 1: next time you go out there, you're like, if I
Speaker 1: make a mistake, I've already done that and I lived
Speaker 1: through it and I still have a job, and it's okay.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make you any less intentional about perfection, but
Speaker 1: it does make it a little less scary.
Speaker 2: So I love that kind of like.
Speaker 3: Derek, can I tell you one thing about that. The
Speaker 3: most generous thing when I was going on air was
Speaker 3: that a very well known Side nine reporter called me
Speaker 3: right before I went on air just to check on me,
Speaker 3: you know how. I was waing, like check on each other,
Speaker 3: and she said, how you doing?
Speaker 2: And I was like, not good.
Speaker 3: I'm pretty sure I'm going to vomit on national television.
Speaker 3: And she was so generous because she said, to me,
Speaker 3: no matter what happens, it's not going to be as
Speaker 3: bad as my first time on air, and I thought,
Speaker 3: oh my god, what does that mean?
Speaker 2: What did you do?
Speaker 3: Basically for her? When they tossed down to her, she
Speaker 3: was told, as we all are, you're the eyes and
Speaker 3: the ears of the year. What would they not know
Speaker 3: if you're on the fee? So she said, guys, I
Speaker 3: know you're talking about Omar Jacobs as a possible Heisman contender,
Speaker 3: but the fans down here disagree. They are chanting Heisman
Speaker 3: my ass, you suck you suck Bob back to you.
Speaker 2: That's not exactly what they were looking for.
Speaker 3: I was dying because that took me right out of
Speaker 3: my own head because I thought, you know what, you're right,
Speaker 3: I'm not going to curse on live television. And if
Speaker 3: she was still, yeah, he's really successful. So I thought
Speaker 3: that was so generous of her to share that with me.
Speaker 1: I had that issue of like, I wish I had
Speaker 1: had someone giving me advice because I forgot that like
Speaker 1: what I was seeing and hearing down there, of course,
Speaker 1: wasn't what the fans at home were seeing and hearing.
Speaker 1: They had announcers throughout calling everything. So the starting quarterback
Speaker 1: got hurt, the backup went in. I knew his name.
Speaker 1: But when the coach came out to go to the
Speaker 1: half and I'm supposed to do the quick two questions,
Speaker 1: I said, you know, blah blah blah, and how about
Speaker 1: that backup stepping in? And afterwards they were like, you
Speaker 1: didn't know his name? I was like, no, I just
Speaker 1: wasn't sure if the audience would know him as well
Speaker 1: as a backup, and I forgot that. Of course, they've
Speaker 1: been saying his name ever since he came in. I
Speaker 1: hadn't heard any of it. And I think that's the
Speaker 1: other thing, is I wish I'd had them in my ears.
Speaker 1: You should wait, didn't I didn't have anything in my ears,
Speaker 1: so I didn't. I wasn't able to hear the call
Speaker 1: of the game that the fans at home were hearing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's horrible, Sarah.
Speaker 3: That's horrible, because how can you add otherwise if you're
Speaker 3: not like hey, like.
Speaker 1: I said, it wasn't for me. Also, that job doesn't
Speaker 1: allow enough opinion giving, and I'm full of opinions, so
Speaker 1: I knew it wasn't for me from the beginning.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 1: Mean, I do think I have such a producer me
Speaker 1: shoes on with us.
Speaker 2: We've talked about this.
Speaker 1: Our fear of failure gets in the way of us
Speaker 1: trying some things, and we need to learn how to
Speaker 1: microdose failure, like intentionally put ourselves out there and do
Speaker 1: things that we're going to suck at so that we
Speaker 1: stop making it so precious, which is something that I do.
Speaker 1: I struggle with being bad at things, so I just
Speaker 1: stop trying things that I might suck at, which is bad.
Speaker 2: Okay, so let's get tood.
Speaker 3: I want you to fail as many times as possible
Speaker 3: to desensitize yourself. I went out and sought out failure,
Speaker 3: like applied for jobs that I didn't think I would
Speaker 3: get because I wanted to desensitize myself.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, fail failed.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about another thing that you that you
Speaker 1: are sharing your wisdom about in this book, urgent versus important.
Speaker 2: Urgent but important is how you get to your dreams.
Speaker 3: Explain that, yeah, this is this is big because our
Speaker 3: whole lives are urgent. Right answer the text, respond to
Speaker 3: the email. You know, whatever it is everything we've been
Speaker 3: sold this bill of goods that like, if it's urgent,
Speaker 3: it must be important, but it's really not. Things that
Speaker 3: are urgent are reactionary. Right, we're responding to a request
Speaker 3: from someone else. They need something else. Things that are
Speaker 3: important may not have that deadline, but they have consequences
Speaker 3: because things that are important to us move us closer
Speaker 3: to our values and vision and who we want to be.
Speaker 3: So we have a tendency to say, I'll get to that.
Speaker 3: Let me just take care all this stuff I do,
Speaker 3: then I'll get to it. And of course the right
Speaker 3: time never arrives, So I'd say you have to find time,
Speaker 3: schedule throughout your day time to put everything else away
Speaker 3: and work on what's important to you.
Speaker 1: It's so true because if you don't take out the
Speaker 1: garbage or some other little thing that feels like it
Speaker 1: has a deadline because it's overflowing, right, you'll survive, yep.
Speaker 1: But if you constantly put all those tasks ahead of
Speaker 1: starting to write the book you've always wanted to and
Speaker 1: then you keep putting it off forever, then you never
Speaker 1: end up writing a book. But good job on that garbage,
Speaker 1: over and over, right, Like, it's so easy also to
Speaker 1: put off things that are overwhelming because they're important, and
Speaker 1: instead focus on the things that are urgent because they're
Speaker 1: not as scary it's like, I know I could take
Speaker 1: care of this quickly, and it gives you an excuse
Speaker 1: to not get to the stuff that really matters, that's
Speaker 1: so important.
Speaker 3: Checking off the list.
Speaker 1: Yeah, daily micro habits. So outside of your nine to five,
Speaker 1: the things that you're doing to help you lead a
Speaker 1: more fulfilling life.
Speaker 2: How did you come to decide what.
Speaker 1: Those things should be and what your limited time should
Speaker 1: be devoted to when you're not at work.
Speaker 3: Well, time and money are twins in my opinion, you
Speaker 3: have to know how much you have of each before
Speaker 3: you can distribute it. So for me, that's a lot
Speaker 3: about writing down exactly what I'm doing, then deciding the
Speaker 3: things that I don't enjoy doing expense reports and deciding
Speaker 3: I could trade money for energy, I could buy back
Speaker 3: time by putting some of that money in and then
Speaker 3: spend more time prospecting or getting better at play by
Speaker 3: play or writing the book. And so for me, it
Speaker 3: was about finding out what am I good at, what
Speaker 3: do I enjoy and what's really dragging me down and
Speaker 3: taking part of my day and it's not bringing me
Speaker 3: any joy at all. And so the little micro habits
Speaker 3: of figuring out where you can make those trades in
Speaker 3: your life. Those are the little things that are going
Speaker 3: to take somebody who doesn't enjoy their job into a
Speaker 3: new arena finding what really lights them fire.
Speaker 1: I have a friend who got a life coach after
Speaker 1: she left her job of eighteen years. She was ready
Speaker 1: to move on but didn't know what she wanted to
Speaker 1: do yet, and they were doing the opportunity to take
Speaker 1: a payment to leave, and she was ready to go.
Speaker 2: So she met with a life coach to figure out
Speaker 2: what she wanted to do next.
Speaker 1: And the woman said, over the next week or two,
Speaker 1: throughout your day, write down what mood you're in at
Speaker 1: various times, set a little alone, and when it goes off,
Speaker 1: say what mood am I in? And what am I doing?
Speaker 1: And then start to see if there's patterns. What are
Speaker 1: you around people whenever you say you're in a good
Speaker 1: mood or are you alone? Are you working by yourself?
Speaker 1: Are you collaborating? Are you in the car? Are you
Speaker 1: at home? And find out all these patterns because a
Speaker 1: lot of people don't even really recognize when they say
Speaker 1: they hate a job and then you ask them for more.
Speaker 1: So what I'm saying, oh, well, I do like working
Speaker 1: with this person or doing this part, and then you say, Okay,
Speaker 1: how do you pull those things out and then move
Speaker 1: them forward into a new job, or at least find
Speaker 1: a way to ask for more of what you like
Speaker 1: and doing less of what you don't. We're much more
Speaker 1: in control of those things than we really believe. Most
Speaker 1: of the time, we've sort of chalked it up to
Speaker 1: we're stuck, and there's a lot of mobility even if
Speaker 1: you stay in the space that you're in. Okay, women
Speaker 1: are often called audacious in a negative light, But how
Speaker 1: do you take the who does she think she is?
Speaker 1: And make it something that actually moves you forward when
Speaker 1: people are judging us that way?
Speaker 3: Well, first of all, the definition of audacity is a
Speaker 3: willingness to take bold risks, So the fact that it
Speaker 3: can be used as an insult is ridiculous. My sister
Speaker 3: in laws from Argentina and it's not at all has
Speaker 3: no negative connotation there. But somehow we've got the old
Speaker 3: audacity to ask that question here. Part of it's reframing
Speaker 3: it for ourselves. You know, Sarah, my father was the best.
Speaker 3: When I was eleven. One time, one time he said
Speaker 3: to me, Amory, I think you're getting a little bit cocky,
Speaker 3: and it was like, oh, just a stab. It was
Speaker 3: while I was writing this book decades and decades later
Speaker 3: that I decided to look up the definition of cocky.
Speaker 3: The definition of cocky is so sure of one's abilities
Speaker 3: that it annoys other people. That is the actual definition.
Speaker 3: And I thought, so sure of one's abilities, Hell, yeah,
Speaker 3: I am that it annoys other people. Well, gee, that
Speaker 3: sounds like other people's problems.
Speaker 2: Yeah, deal with it, right, You.
Speaker 1: Should get confident in your own abilities, Yes, exactly.
Speaker 3: But once I realized that that set me free because
Speaker 3: I'm not worrying about them. And City is a compliment,
Speaker 3: and I take it as a compliment, and I give
Speaker 3: it as a compliment. It's about reframing our ideas of what.
Speaker 2: It means to be audacious.
Speaker 1: I ask really powerful women this all the time, because
Speaker 1: I think there's a choice to live in the world
Speaker 1: you wish you were in, and then there's an acceptance
Speaker 1: that the moves you make and the decisions you make
Speaker 1: and the person that you are is still operating within
Speaker 1: a system. You're not in a bubble of what you
Speaker 1: wish existed. You're in the reality of life. So what
Speaker 1: are some ways to be cocky and audacious and sure
Speaker 1: of yourself and confidence in all of those positive qualities
Speaker 1: while still operating in, for instance, in our world, the
Speaker 1: male dominated industry, or maybe a space that isn't ready
Speaker 1: to receive that so that you can thrive. Because it's
Speaker 1: great to say all those things and be all those things,
Speaker 1: but if ultimately it holds you back or prevents you
Speaker 1: from success, it doesn't really serve you the same way
Speaker 1: you wish it did.
Speaker 3: I don't believe in being audacious just to swing for
Speaker 3: the fences. Right. There's worth it risks, and there's reckless risks.
Speaker 3: They changed throughout your life, so you have to really
Speaker 3: look at it. When I was twenty six years old
Speaker 3: and working at ESPN and Connecticut, I loved my job,
Speaker 3: I hated the snow, and so I ended up asking
Speaker 3: to be La Bureau producer.
Speaker 2: They said no.
Speaker 3: I quit write the dream job at ESPN, moved to La.
Speaker 3: My intention was to have my days and nights be better.
Speaker 3: I didn't move for more money.
Speaker 2: I didn't.
Speaker 3: My decision to do that audacious move was intrinsic. It
Speaker 3: wasn't for anyone else. I ended up getting hired back
Speaker 3: as La burea producer. But even if I hadn't, I
Speaker 3: would have still survived. And that's the thing I always
Speaker 3: ask people, examine your motivation for wanting to make an
Speaker 3: audacious move, because if it is to have the revenge body,
Speaker 3: to make somebody else notice you, to prove someone else wrong,
Speaker 3: it's never going to work. I've never made a decision
Speaker 3: for money for any kind of other accolades. If it
Speaker 3: is for you to improve your life and those around you,
Speaker 3: then is it worth it or is it reckless?
Speaker 1: Yeah, my audacity has more often come in the form
Speaker 1: of rejection than it has in the form of acceptance.
Speaker 1: In the sense of Ever since I was maybe twenty
Speaker 1: seven making not a lot of money, but had my
Speaker 1: first job in the sports world doing updates for a
Speaker 1: local radio show, every opportunity that I was offered I
Speaker 1: filtered it through will this make me happy every day?
Speaker 1: Or will this make me more money and more fame?
Speaker 1: And that resulted in turning down some big shows, hosting
Speaker 1: a show with Regis Philbin on Fox, hosting Get Up
Speaker 1: on ESPN. I didn't want to move to New York.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to wake up it four in the morning.
Speaker 1: I didn't want to do a certain kind of job
Speaker 1: or a certain type of show. There's just a lot
Speaker 1: of stuff I've rejected because I knew that in the
Speaker 1: industry it would be good for me for money and fame,
Speaker 1: but in my every day I would not be happy,
Speaker 1: and that wasn't something I was willing to sacrifice. Now,
Speaker 1: maybe if I'd said yes and done it for a
Speaker 1: year would have opened up another door that would have
Speaker 1: made me extremely happy. But I don't really do the
Speaker 1: sliding doors thing. I don't really do the what ifs
Speaker 1: because it serves me not at all. There is absolutely
Speaker 1: nothing to be gained from going down a path of
Speaker 1: what would have happened if I'd chosen this. I made
Speaker 1: this choice, and now it's looking ahead to what can
Speaker 1: I make out of what I've done and what I'm
Speaker 1: doing now. And it feels like those so many lessons
Speaker 1: and messages in your book are that kind of how
Speaker 1: do you reframe something and look at it or think
Speaker 1: about it differently than either what you've been told or
Speaker 1: what you've always done. And I've been doing a lot
Speaker 1: of research for the book that I just wrote that's.
Speaker 2: Coming out in June. Everyone can pre order it.
Speaker 1: Runs in the Family Sarah Spain, June third, But about
Speaker 1: emotional DNA, which is the language that our family uses
Speaker 1: that becomes ingrained in us as a reality instead of
Speaker 1: a statement of opinion, and if it's repeated enough times,
Speaker 1: we just buy it.
Speaker 2: Right. So, like, let's say your dad had always said.
Speaker 1: To you you're too cocky, you're too confident, and had
Speaker 1: said it repeatedly, and you internalize that, and then you
Speaker 1: moved through life with an opinion about how you should behave.
Speaker 1: That's so common, especially for so many women, and so
Speaker 1: being able to reframe the things we've always heard and
Speaker 1: internalized and decide whether they serve us anymore is the magic.
Speaker 1: It's the magic of life. And I feel like this
Speaker 1: book is probably doing a whole lot of that.
Speaker 3: You know, Sarah, It's what I call your front row, right,
Speaker 3: I mean, who are you listening to in your history?
Speaker 3: You have to dive into it, but your front row
Speaker 3: should be really small. And they're people that you've invited
Speaker 3: who are going to push you forward, you know, lift
Speaker 3: you up. It's probably not your mom, and it's probably
Speaker 3: not your best friend because they want you to be safe.
Speaker 3: And so I say, get a front row who's doing
Speaker 3: their own badassory somewhere, and who are going to give
Speaker 3: you the honest truth? Not somebody who wants to keep
Speaker 3: you safe, because for me, that's where the juice is
Speaker 3: is in is in the move and how did the
Speaker 3: move turn out? And you know, no, is not a
Speaker 3: period at the end of the sentence. For me, it
Speaker 3: is not yet or next. You know, it's just redirection
Speaker 3: in that in that's case.
Speaker 1: So the front row isn't the people you put in
Speaker 1: front of you and our closest to It's if you're
Speaker 1: on a stage and they're sitting up front and they're
Speaker 1: going to give you an accurate read on what you're
Speaker 1: doing and how you're doing it.
Speaker 2: That's how you're picturing the front row.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really not necessarily your best ease at all.
Speaker 3: It's people you trust to tell you the truth. They
Speaker 3: don't have to be in your same area of focus or.
Speaker 2: Anything like that.
Speaker 3: They just have to be somebody that you trust to say. Look, Sarah,
Speaker 3: you're feeding into your own fears. Nobody actually said that
Speaker 3: to you. It's something that you're telling yourself. Let's dig
Speaker 3: in to why you're believing your inner critic in this moment.
Speaker 1: Though, or even the opposite, which is, hey, you're fantastic
Speaker 1: at this, but this needs another rewrite. Yes, you know,
Speaker 1: the opposite two of like, hey, I'm going to be
Speaker 1: honest with you because you know I love you and
Speaker 1: respect you.
Speaker 2: This isn't quite it.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: The research actually tells us that if we want to
Speaker 1: embark in a significant behavior change or set a major
Speaker 1: goal for ourselves, the number.
Speaker 2: One thing to do is to seek someone that.
Speaker 1: You respect and that you consider to be slightly above
Speaker 1: you and tell them about it, because you're more likely
Speaker 1: to actually want to follow up on the goal to
Speaker 1: actually pursue the thing that you said you want to do.
Speaker 1: If you feel like somebody that has a little bit
Speaker 1: higher status than you might check back in and see.
Speaker 1: If it's a friend, if it's a mom, you know
Speaker 1: that they'll take it easy on you. All. You never
Speaker 1: actually ran that marathon, but that was cute that you
Speaker 1: thought you might. Meanwhile, you have this inner feeling of
Speaker 1: wanting to prove something to or show off to this
Speaker 1: person with higher status, and you're more likely to actually
Speaker 1: finish it if you tell them about it and check
Speaker 1: in with them, Which is to your point that front
Speaker 1: Row has got to have a little bit of a
Speaker 1: little bit of spice to it, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And it might be a little audacious for you
Speaker 3: to reach out to somebody you don't know who's ahead
Speaker 3: of you, but the fact is we've all been there,
Speaker 3: so most of the time that person will help because
Speaker 3: somebody helped them along the way.
Speaker 2: Absolutely that's the case.
Speaker 1: Well, it feels like this book's going to help a
Speaker 1: lot of people, and you might be getting some calls,
Speaker 1: and Marie, from folks maybe me too, who are reading
Speaker 1: this book and saying, Okay, wait, I need more on this,
Speaker 1: Tell me more about this, help me with this cultivating audacity,
Speaker 1: dismantled doubt and let yourself when you were just on
Speaker 1: GMA talking to your pal Robin Roberts about it. I
Speaker 1: hope the rest of the publicity goes great. Thanks so
Speaker 1: much for hopping on chatting with us. Thank you, Sarah,
Speaker 1: I had a great time talking. Thanks again to Anne
Speaker 1: Marie for joining us. We have to take another break
Speaker 1: when we come back. A salad that changes my brain
Speaker 1: chemistry every time I eat it.
Speaker 2: Welcome back Slices.
Speaker 1: We love that you're listening, but we want you to
Speaker 1: get in the game every day too. So here's our
Speaker 1: good game play of the day. Grab Anne Marie's book
Speaker 1: Cultivating Audacity, Dismantle Doubt and Let Yourself Win. I don't
Speaker 1: know about you, but everything we talked about, from making
Speaker 1: friends with fear to urgency versus importance really hit home
Speaker 1: with me, So I think we could all gain a
Speaker 1: lot from the book. Also shameless plug number two of
Speaker 1: this episode and probably.
Speaker 2: Four overall so far. Pre order my book Runs of
Speaker 2: the Family. It drops June third, which all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: feels really soon, So if y'all could go ahead and
Speaker 2: do that, that'd be great.
Speaker 1: We'd love to hear Hit us up on email good
Speaker 1: game at wondermedianetwork dot com or leave us a voicemail
Speaker 1: at eight seven two two o four fifty seventy.
Speaker 2: We always love to hear your voices, So.
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Speaker 2: Tell us you love us. It's easy.
Speaker 1: Watch chop Shop in Arizona, rating eleventy out of eleventy stars.
Speaker 2: Review.
Speaker 1: I am once again asking, nay begging for somebody to
Speaker 1: bring a chop Shop franchise to Chicago. Every single time
Speaker 1: I come out West for cbspring training. I eat as
Speaker 1: many meals as possible. There, salads, bowls, smoothies, juices. Everything
Speaker 1: is amazing, delicious, nutritious. They are not paying me for this,
Speaker 1: but they really should holler at me.
Speaker 2: Chop Shop.
Speaker 1: I love you so much. Now it's your turn, rate
Speaker 1: and review. Thanks for listening, slices, See you tomorrow. Good game, Anne, Marie,
Speaker 1: Good game to all my fellow audacious women out there.
Speaker 2: Cute to anyone who's got a problem with us.
Speaker 1: Good Game with Sarah Spain is an iHeart women's sports
Speaker 1: production in partnership with Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. You
Speaker 1: can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts. Production by Wonder Media Network,
Speaker 1: our producers are Alex Azzie and Misha Jones. Our executive
Speaker 1: producers are Christina Everett, Jesse Katz, Jenny Kaplan, and Emily Rudder.
Speaker 1: Our editors are Emily Rutterer, Britney Martinez, and Grace Lynch.
Speaker 1: Our associate producer is Lucy Jones and I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Sarah Spain