the next three decades, I discovered new aspects of myself and worked through several careers. I bought a franchise, was named best new franchisee, and then sold the business when one of my children needed more attention. I stepped back from professional life, focused on my family, and volunteered in my community. Each new job, each volunteer position, each new venture, I gave it my all, always optimistic that by working as hard as I had in my previous life I would achieve the results I desired—and I did. But the longing for something more never left me, and I kept searching for that missing piece.
Throughout those years, I started over many times and negotiated a few messy middle stages. In retrospect, each adventure, every experience—positive or negative, joyful or gut-wrenching—added a valuable piece to my puzzle. Finally, twenty-seven years after I left sport, I figured out my own personal next, where my passions and purpose were fully engaged. I discovered that my true joy comes from coaching people, particularly those who have ambitious goals or those who feel they’ve suffered a setback and want to establish new goals, even if, in the current moment, they feel as if they are treading water or, worse, sinking.
This brings me to an event that eventually led to me writing this book: the death by suicide of my neighbour, canoeist John Wood, who ended his life on January 23, 2013, a death that rattled all who knew him.
John participated in three Olympics (1968, 1972, 1976) and won silver in the C1 500-metre canoe event at the 1976 Montreal Games. He was a business colleague of my husband, the father of four children roughly the same ages as ours, a fellow golfer, and an all-around good guy who volunteered and tried his best to leave a positive footprint on the world. Despite all this, John suffered, mostly silently, from the disease of depression.
For me, the taking of one’s life is a result of an illness that is no different from cancer or heart disease. But like many other friends and relatives of people who have died by suicide, I kept turning over the question of why John, a seemingly intense but kind person, had done what he did. Tragically, he took his reasons with him. After his death, I spent time with his widow, Debbie, who has since become a good friend. She said that John was always looking for an intense, athlete-like experience. He was trying to rediscover the deep passion he had experienced while competing at an elite level.
Over the years, I had often contemplated what athletes experience physically, emotionally, and mentally, both on and off the athletic stage. John’s death prompted me to dig deeper into the experiences of athletes as they move into a post-sport life. My conversations with Debbie helped lead me from questions of why and toward wondering how. How could I, as a professional coach, help others who are going through athletic transitions? How could I add value to this complex and relevant topic?
I am a big believer in the importance of pivot points—those times in life when we undergo fundamental changes—and 2013 was a tremendous pivot point for me: I had just lost my father to cancer, I was thrown by John’s death, and I was also acutely aware that my life was experiencing major adjustment (Jim and I became empty nesters). The upheaval motivated me to research how athletes who had achieved great success at a young age discovered new forms of fulfillment and joy after their athletic careers ended.
Questions upon questions spilled out into a list. What happens when athletes stop competing? What happens to them when they get injured and can no longer perform at the high level others expect of them, and that they expect of themselves? What happens when their natural desire starts to wane, or when they can no longer keep up with younger athletes hungrier or more talented than they are? Who are they then?
Some athletes transition out when they are still teenagers, especially those in sports such as gymnastics, where youthful talents are admired above all else. The careers of athletes who compete at a college level or in professional leagues may end when the players are in their twenties or early thirties. A very few athletes, such as Tom Brady, Derek Jeter, Steve Nash, and Serena Williams, will transition out of sports later than that. The experiences that come with seeking out a different form of work, relationships outside sports, and a new sense of meaning can range from being uncomfortable to being profoundly disruptive and discouraging. In some situations, the transition can lead to extreme and even self-destructive acts.
In October 2013, about nine months after John died, I decided to interview one hundred people who identified as having made the successful transition from a level of high achievement to their next stage of life. Little did I realize where that determination to interview so many would lead me: back to my athletic mindset. When you discover a personal next, you find the determination to make it a reality. My project was to figure out how to make a difference. I began with athletes located across the United States and Canada. I ended up interviewing Olympic and World Championship medal winners, and professional athletes from the CFL, LPGA, MLB, MLS, NBA, NFL, NHL, NWSL (National Women’s Soccer League), PGA, and UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale), as well as amateur and college athletes from basketball, canoeing, cross-country skiing, cycling, downhill skiing, dragon boating, equestrian sports, field hockey, football, hockey, kayaking, rowing, rugby, soccer, swimming, synchronized swimming, track and field, trampoline, volleyball, water polo, and wrestling. As I embarked on these interviews it became evident that I could learn how others survived life-altering events such as retirement, major illness, or a change in family circumstances, so I searched out approximately twenty non-athletes who identified as having positively transitioned to another life phase.
All told, I completed 103 interviews, and after they were transcribed, I had around two thousand pages—about one million words—of incredibly personal and heartfelt stories. As I pored over the material, I saw a larger story, too: a series of interlocking experiences that form the shape of an arc, one I call the “arc of transition.” This arc depicts the ascent to a personal best, the valley of a messy middle, and the eventual incline to discovering a personal next—new goals, new meaning. Not only that, but out of the wisdom of these million words emerged key practices that high performers use to achieve their goals.
So what can elite athletes teach us about navigating major life and career changes or going from a personal best to the next peak performance? What can we learn from a top executive who’s been packaged out, or from someone who walked into a doctor’s office expecting routine test results and left with a diagnosis of a life-threatening illness? How do people continue when a child, spouse, parent, or sibling dies? Anyone who strives for a personal best will face a personal next. In this book, I share the major lessons distilled from these interviews. My goal is to help you in your own transition from one peak performance to another.
I wrote this book to trace how people get to their achievements, to discuss frankly the often chaotic experience of transition, and to help with the challenging and sometimes painful journey of finding a personal next. I know how difficult it can be for someone who has achieved great heights to let go of past glories and find a new path to meaning. This book will help recalibrate how you see performance, and specifically peak performance—not as a capstone event but as one of many important but distinguishable peaks you will have in your life. Between each of those peak performances there is usually some kind of major or minor transition. This book offers tools to assist you in that transition period. Personal Next is also for all those who influence, encourage, and celebrate achievers: parents, friends, coaches, trainers, fans, employers, business partners, and life partners. I want to shine a light on all stages of the high achiever’s often heroic journey.
The first two sections of this book describe the arc of transition and the nine practices that high achievers develop as they work toward a personal best. Chapters 1 through 9 are divided into three stages that mirror the arc of transition: its initial ascent, its dip into the messy middle, and its climb toward a personal next. These chapters dive deeply into the points on the arc of transition and, through the stories of interviewees, illuminate some of the main issues at each. Whether you are an athlete or someone else who
