Write Your Own Story & Quarterback Your Life | Yogi Roth

Yogi Roth (0:00)

Very clear of like, you go, especially as a young traveler, we go to see something. I want to go to Egypt. I want to see the seven wonders of the world. That was like my bucket list initially as a traveler.

Cool. What do you end up seeing? You see yourself in a totally different light.

Michael Gervais (0:24)

Okay, welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery Podcast. I am your host, Dr. Michael Gervais, by trade and training a high-performance psychologist. And I'm excited to have a dear friend on the podcast today, Yogi Roth. Yogi lives a full life. He is an adventurer of life. By trade, he is a college football analyst. He's been part of 30 documentaries. He's written four books. He's traveled to 34 countries because he loves relationships, he loves people. He is epic at relationships. I am excited to formally introduce Yogi Roth to Finding Mastery.

Yogi, you don't know this.

You're the first guest in the Finding Mastery studio.

Yogi Roth (1:10)

Love that.

Michael Gervais (1:11)

I know, isn't that fun?

Yogi Roth (1:13)

That is fun. I've done that before. Yeah. Jim Rome, I was the first in-studio guest ever in the history of his show.

Michael Gervais (1:19)

You were.

Yogi Roth (1:19)

I've had good convos with him. I'm sure this is going to be a great one as well, man.

Michael Gervais (1:24)

Which is really cool because you, in so many ways, you and I first met, it was in 2008 or 2009 It was somewhere in that range.

And a mutual friend introduced us, Joan Lynch, who was, I don't remember her title at ESPN. Do you remember what it was?

Yogi Roth (1:44)

She was in charge of all original programming.

Michael Gervais (1:46)

And so she said, we were working on a project, and she said, you've got to meet Yogi Roth. I said, okay, cool. And she's like, no, she assumed we knew each other. And I was like, no, I don't know Yogi. And she said, you've got to meet. So she put us together, and you were like early days adamant about Mike.

Get a microphone, get a camera, do something to capture the things that you're talking about.

And I thought, really? Do you remember this? And I was like, really? And you're like, yeah, it's time that you do that. So the whole reason that this podcast happened was from that little seed that you dropped in, in 2008, 2009, like do something. And then you and I were going to start a podcast together. And that didn't happen. Yeah, that didn't happen. I don't know if you know how much I care for you and how much I appreciate you. You also were responsible for introducing me to somebody that I'd say probably changed my life, you know? And that was the professional ranks as well. So, breakfasts forever are on me.

That was our deal for a long time.

Yogi Roth (3:00)

Well, I appreciate that. And you're right, I probably don't know exactly how you feel, but I've always felt your gratitude towards everything.

You know, flip it.

And my word of the year tradition that I had began about a decade ago is because of you and I in the ocean talking through that. And you, you know, the title of our podcast that never existed was The Space Between. And I've always loved the space between commitment and hesitation and surfing is such a great illustration that you taught me 10, 12 years ago that now to the point of like, I think the first year we both chose the word of the year, it was like, yes, we're both going to say yes to everything. I'll meet you in a year. How hard did you go? Any energy left? And then from that point on to have that purposeful thought every year, now I do it with my wife. I do it with our oldest son. I do it with a bunch of friends. People, of course, do it all over the world now. I get the bracelet, my intent on it or whatever it may be, but it's become a thing.

Mine have all strung together. So even this year is the year of flow and my whole mindset is move with intent, but go with the flow. So if I don't have that dialogue 12 years ago in the Pacific, who knows if I'm here with the focus and intention I have on life.

Michael Gervais (4:14)

Yeah, it's a simple little practice, isn't it? The year of, you know, but to do the deep work to really think about how am I going to be, and this word gets thrown around in a kind of a hippie, you know, I don't even know the right kind of psycho babble word like intention, but the intention is like, how am I going to show up in my life?