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Chris Natzke is an eighth degree black belt and master instructor and a former United States national TaeKwonDo champion. He ranks in the top 1% of all martial artists in the world. Not only is he a champion himself, but he has been training others to find their own inner champion for over four decades. He is a life leadership coach, keynote speaker and author, and his passion is sharing his unique brand of black belt leadership so others may discover the most empowered version of themselves.
Contact Chris Natzke
https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisnatzke/
Mentioned
Mastery by Robert Greene - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13589182-mastery
Black Belt Leadership - https://www.amazon.com/Black-Belt-Leadership-Creating-Discovering/dp/1489552979
Breaking Through: 3 Winning Strategies to Create Breakthrough Results in Your Life, Business, and Relationship - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08TBDF99Q/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i1
Bobbi’s Takeaways
I hope that you enjoyed that conversation. I had a lot of takeaways in here, some of my favorites,
I loved his story about his mentor who told him, “I'll make you a champion,” and how that shifted things for Chris and how it feeds into his desire to help others along that path.
When you find something that you truly love, it may be hard work, but you love the work. And this reminds me of something way back in episode 10, when Dennis Stanton was on. Dennis was an All-American in college. He led the nation in scoring, and then he went on to play professional basketball. And Dennis talked about this as well. When he talked about how he fell in love with the practice that went into mastering basketball. And that makes me think about how working on your craft is such an important part of the game.
Overcoming the hardships is where their lessons are learned. And it is usually what we are most proud of. I found it fascinating that only two students over the more than 12,000, who Chris has coached to get their black belts started out with it being relatively easy. And again, I'm using the term relatively easy, but I found Chris's comment that for the vast majority who had to work harder, maybe they were more engaged because of the challenge. And I found that to be an idea worth pondering. It made me think about how growth often comes on the other side of challenge. And maybe that is what keeps people going when trying to master something that they love or something or something new.
A black belt is a white belt who never quit, which goes to what Chris also said when he said that greatness awaits. If we work with intention and we persist.
He also said that the taste of success can keep us going. And this is something that I really agree with. And it reminds me of something that Dan Pink wrote in Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us. He said that there are three keys to intrinsic motivation, one of which is progress towards mastery, which I think is what Chris was talking about when he talked about that taste of success.
Something that I thought was a great metaphor for life is that the challenge isn't to be resisted. It's just there instead of resisting it, work through it, and maybe even embrace that it will help us take our game to a higher level and it will help us grow.
I loved when we talked about just getting outside and moving. The body was meant to move. We feel better when we move. And it's so funny, because people will make comments to me about how much I exercise. And when they say that it sort of takes me aback because I don't exercise. I play. I play by doing the things that I love: cross country skiing, road cycling, disc golfing, paddle-boarding, hiking, whatever else catches my attention. But those are all things that I love to do. Therefore it isn't exercise. It's play like when we were kids and we had fun with it.
Consistent right actions lead to mastery
Stumbling is a part of the learning.
Again, those were just a few of my takeaways and I'm sure that you had your own list.
New Year Note
On another note, I know that sometimes we don't make the progress towards our goals that we'd like. Sometimes there is just something holding us back. It's as though we have one foot on the gas and one foot on the brake. Because I've seen it so often in coaching over the years, I'm putting the finishing touches on a guide to help identify if we are falling prey to one of the biggest derailleurs of our goals. And I call it the Just-Wait Voice. This is an insidious little voice that shows up and encourages us to wait just as we are about to act. I hate that voice. I hate it. And I want to help combat it with what I've learned over the years. If you're interested, you can sign up, you can go to http://www.unyielded.net/goalkiller for the free guide.
Again, this has been the UnYielded podcast, where we are committed to bring in stories of growth and triumph. If you found it helpful, please consider leaving us a review on Apple, as well as sharing it with someone who could benefit from the message of hope and positivity so that they can thrive no matter what.
