This week’s conversation is with Reid Priddy, a 4 time Olympian for the USA Men’s indoor volleyball team, winning Gold in 2008 and Bronze in 2016.

Over the past 16 years, Reid has competed at the highest level in indoor volleyball – both on the US National Team as well as on foreign Pro teams in domestic leagues all across the globe.

In 2014, Reid suffered a torn ACL during competition, which required double knee surgery.

In his late thirties, he defied the odds and worked his way all the way back to the top and helped the US Olympic Team win a Bronze Medal in Rio

Reid is looking to defy the odds once more by switching surfaces to the sand – he’s working towards representing the US in the Tokyo Olympic Games in 2020.

As someone who has had the fortune of being involved with multiple Olympic Games, most recently with the 2016 women’s indoor and beach volleyball teams I’ve seen just how challenging the Olympic quad process is… the rigorous hours and dedication required over a 4 year period to even have a shot at making the Olympics once.

Now imagine doing that successfully 4 times (16 years, not including the 10-20 years of prior training just to get the world-stage) and still having the hunger to come back and do it one final time.

In this conversation we learn how Reid has done it – we discuss everything from how he struggled with confidence in his early playing days, what it means to be clutch, and why he loves putting himself in situations that test his capabilities.

There aren’t many people who are able to call themselves a 4x Olympian so I can’t wait for you to learn from Reid.

“Clutch is the ability to hyper-focus under any circumstance and be here now.”

In This Episode:

• Struggling with confidence and why he cares about teaching kids confidence
• Why he believes his ability to adapt allowed him to have a longer career than those more talented
• How he defines clutch
• How he trained his mind to be more present
• The difficulties in transitioning from the volleyball world to business world
• Why he has an optimistic outlook on the world
• Support vs. challenge and what matters more in team culture
• The mindset coming back from 0-2 in Rio Olympics
• How to test your capabilities
• The relationship between awareness of thoughts, feedback loops, and positive self talk at the biggest moments
• Why he uses journaling to help combat self-doubt
• How he gets himself in “the zone”
• Why he started journaling: to separating emotions from what is real and get to objectivity