ode to the man bigger than Zeus

Wasted talent … a theme which drives many of these entries.

So many stories of people who could and should, but don’t or didn’t.

My freshman year at the University of California at Berkeley, I fell 47 feet from a cliff (about 5 stories) … I broke my arm, my hand, my leg, my tail bone and had multi-skull fractures. I was in a coma for a couple of weeks and nearly died.

One Friday afternoon, a friend and I had gone to a place called “the rock” in the Berkeley hills to drink beer, enjoy the view and dream….
The rock is a mountain cliff with beautiful views of the S.F. bay and surrounding areas.

Stupidly, I got too drunk and fell off the mountain.

After taking a year off school to rehabilitate – I went back to University, but I could no longer swim at the same level as before and “retired.”

I focused on studying and completely quit drinking alcohol.

One day, the head football coach heard about my accident and contacted me to speak to the football team.
He wanted me to share my story with the team and discuss the consequences of drinking, etc.

My American readers understand … speaking to your university’s football team is a very big deal …. so I prepared a lot for this speech.

My speech was at a hotel, after an alumni dinner … there was the team, their parents and many alumni, including some of ex-NFL player stars.

After the dinner, the coach called me on stage to give my speech.

I explained to the team that I had been just an “ok” swimmer…. although I had dreams/goals of becoming great, I never achieved my potential …. one of the several reasons why I never achieved my full potential was because I let partying and picking up girls (superficial pleasures) get in the way of my focus..

I got really into the speech….that night, it all clicked for me because I was speaking from the heart.

I said to them something like:

“some of you guys have the potential to become NFL players and make a career with football and potentially millions of dollars playing the game you love … so do not let something as stupid as drinking/partying get in the way of your focus.”

At the end of my speech, I got a long standing ovation and invited to have desert and coffee with the Captains of the team.

I remember one of the captains … a white guy that looked just like “Brad Pitt” and was built like Zeus…6’6″ (2 meters) and 240 lbs of pure muscle (120 kilos) a stud … that guy could pick up just about any girl he wanted.
But he asked me, “how do you “not” drink….? don’t you feel uncomfortable?”

Crazy …. here is the ultimate male specimen basically, telling me that he drinks alcohol because he needs to be “buzzed” to have the confidence to speak to women.
Unbelievable.

At the same table listening with his mom to our conversation was the star player …. another guy built like Zeus, but even bigger.
He explained as well that drinking a couple beers made him more “loose” ….. and he made several jokes about drinking and we all laughed.

I left that evening proud, and over the season I got invited to several VIP parties with the team.

About 9 months later, the guy who was bigger than Zeus; the star of the team who was projected to be the 4th overall pick in the NFL draft which was less than two weeks away ….

without question this man was soon to be a multi-millionaire and would be able to completely, change he and his mother’s life …. broke his neck in a drunk driving accident and is paralyzed from the neck down for the rest of his life.

Up until that football players accident … I spoke to several of the the teams including the basketball team where Jason Kidd was the star.
I also spoke to several high schools throughout America, but after that guy’s accident, I lost the drive and I never agreed to speak again.

The world is full of exceptional people … who have the talent to be great at what they do — but they fail to achieve their full potential because something gets in the way of their focus.

Don’t let anything get in the way of where you want to go.