Speaker 1: 0:00

To say that you can tell me how great you want to be, but when we have a conversation with your action, we find out how bad you really want it, because there's no way to achieve it unless you have obstacles, unless you have struggle.

Speaker 2: 0:14

Struggle is a biological necessity to greatness.

Speaker 1: 0:33

Welcome back to another episode of the Burn. I am Ben Newman and you know how we do this every single week we're going to bring you a story of an athlete, an entertainer, a celebrity, somebody from the business world who's recognized that why and purpose is not enough. There's this underlying burn that ignites your why and purpose and causes you to show up on the days you don't feel like it, and especially after you win. I've told you in the past we have had special guests that highlight special mindsets and I don't know if we've had one that really highlights the power of vision, the way that Bo Eason is going to have the ability to highlight the power of vision for you, not just through his words and the things he says, and he does a lot of speaking, he does a lot of consulting. He's even written a play and gone on broadway.

Speaker 1: 1:28

His story is extraordinary all of this from having a vision as a nine-year-old boy, a 20-year vision as a nine-year-old boy, to one day play in the nfl, which ended up happening when he got drafted in the second round to the Houston Oilers. So when we talk about vision, this is not talk. This is not about it'd be great or I'm just going to motivate you. I think you will be fueled to ignite your burn on a deeper level by understanding. When you have a deep vision and when you take action, it's incredible what you can accomplish. Bo Eason, welcome to the Burn.

Speaker 2: 2:11

Ben, thank you so much for having me. What an introduction. That's so nice.

Speaker 1: 2:16

Well, it is deep-rooted, because I loved your book, so I'm going to get it out of the way first. I know a lot of times we'll mention books, but everybody, you need to stop what you're doing. When you're done listening or watching this interview, and you need to go straight to Amazoncom and you need to buy. There is no plan B for your A game Period. End of story. You need to buy the book. It's an extraordinary book. I'm even going to tease.

Speaker 1: 2:45

It was fun to be able to catch up with you and Dawn before we hit record and I had to tease Dawn. She's like thanks for reading the book. I'm like Dawn I didn't read the book. I love the book. So there is no plan B for your A game and we are going to talk about the book, but I just want to make sure and we're going to make it easy for everybody to hit the link of the call notes, but you better go and buy the book. Before we get to the book, though, bo, this is really an honor for me, having read and loved the book so much and just so many amazing stories in the book, and I think the thing that probably captures most people. Where I'd love to start is how does a nine-year-old boy cast a 20-year vision?

Speaker 2: 3:23

Yeah, that's actually a crazy story because of the people involved. So in 1969, my dad was watching a game, a football game, and my dad's a cowboy right, he's a rancher. He doesn't talk very much, he's dirty all the time and he's glued to the TV and I've never seen him like this before. And he's yelling at the TV and he says to me and my brother, who are kids my brother's 10, I'm 9. And he says this guy, look at this kid run, this kid is beautiful. Guy, look at this kid run, this kid is beautiful". Now, when you hear your dad speak, you know at that age it means something, right, especially a cowboy that doesn't talk very much. So when he says to watch somebody, and that this kid is beautiful and watch him run, you pay attention. So I'm like, well, I've never heard my dad say anybody was beautiful, let alone a guy running on tv in a football game. So we get, we get in front of the tv and we're watching and guess who that was? That was OJ Simpson. That was OJ Simpson man, that that when I tell that to people nowadays they go whoa, really. Oh, you know, but this was when he was like. I think he was like a rookie. He may have even been at USC at the time. But my dad was right he had never seen a guy run quite like that before and me and my brother certainly had never seen anybody do that like that before, and me and my brother certainly had never seen anybody do that. So I knew that it was important to my dad. That movement is emotional when somebody does it really effortlessly and smoothly and really with a tremendous speed. And that's what oj simpson represented. And when he said it, I go. Okay, I knew, and here's the. The second thing that entered my mind ben was um, that's important to my dad, I can do that, but I don't want to be that kid. I don't want to be oj simpson, I want to stop him. That isn't that weird. I'm nine years old and I didn't think like, oh, I want to be him. I thought I want to stop runners like that, I want to bring them down and psychologically you can go a lot of places with that right. A therapist can make a living on that one moment. But that's how I took it and so I drew up a plan with crayon. I still have the plan In 1969, I drew up the plan of me.

Speaker 2: 6:13

It's a picture of me, like a kid's drawing of me tackling, stopping OJ Simpson. Oh, a beautiful runner, right. So as as this plan grew and went on over the years, I realized that that position that could stop OJ Simpson was the position of safety. So that's when I said, okay, safety, I'm going to be the best safety in the whole world and I'll stop anybody who runs beautifully. I'll stop them all. In fact, I'll run beautifully and I'll have to be to catch them and I'll stop them.

Speaker 2: 6:54

Well, as this dream and this plan started to take shape over the years, I was getting really kind of no evidence, Ben, like no proof that I was even on the right path. I just stayed on the path, but it didn't. I wasn't big, I wasn't fast. No one really thought I was special as an athlete. It just didn't turn out that way, although I held the dream in place of being the best safety. So, even though I wasn't getting the feedback that I was taking the right steps, that I was actually becoming this best safety, I just stayed true to my the plan.

Speaker 2: 7:34

I stayed loyal to that little piece of paper rather than staying loyal to the feedback of the public, and a lot of that public was family, friends, coaches, colleges, for sure, like no, no one. Not one college recruited me, not one college recruited my brother, um. And then we had I had a, my best friend, kenny o'brien. We all thought we were pretty good football players but no one wanted us, no one recruited us, not even junior colleges. Nobody, no letters, nothing. But we thought we were pretty good and we won and call in high school and then we went to small colleges. My brother went to a junior college. I went to UC Davis, which was division two, no scholarships. Kenny O'Brien was my roommate. He went there with us and then cut to four years later.

Speaker 2: 8:27

Those two, kenny O'Brien and my brother, were first-round picks in the NFL, unrecruited first-round picks with six quarterbacks, went in the 1983 draft, went in the first round John Elway, dan Marino, todd Blackledge, my brother, my roommate, kenny O'Brien. Did I skip anybody? I can't remember, maybe dan marino elway? Yeah, I got them all. Six of them were the first round. Then I'm a year younger than those guys and I went in the second round the the next year, but I was the top safety you know taken. So even though all these years had passed and all this training had passed. Most of the evidence I was getting, right up until the end, ben of that dream coming true was yeah, it wasn't good enough. Isn't that weird? I think most people, when they may have a dream or they have a plan, they put it together. If they're not getting enough evidence that you play, that you're on the right, you're taking the right course, you quit because you're just not getting the feet, you're not getting the feedback off.

Speaker 1: 9:37

Oftentimes, you know, people lack what I call the aggressive patience. Right, it takes long obedience in the same direction with aggressive patience, and most people don't have a willingness to stay in the fight, to silence the naysayers, to continue to do the work, and that's one of the reasons why I loved your story is, you know, being an undersized guy going to UC Davis, a school that didn't even offer scholarships, yet you continued to believe. No matter what anybody said, you continued to believe. You continue to put action behind your vision. Tell us about the picture that you ended up putting in your locker, cause you had the crayon drawing. But then there was a picture that you actually put in your locker which tells an absolutely extraordinary story.

Speaker 2: 10:23

Yeah, is that? Are you talking about the Walter Payton? Yes, yes, so I, you know, everybody loved Walter Payton. This was, you know. Now we're in the seventies. Sweetness, that was my favorite Really.

Speaker 1: 10:34

Oh, the 1985 Bears. Sweetness. I mean, you know the the St Louis Cardinals were already gone, so you're not. You know we didn't have a football team in St Louis. I used to root for the Chicago Bears, so I love this story.

Speaker 2: 10:47

Oh yeah, 85 Bears greatest defense ever assembled had the fridge and had Walter Payton carrying the ball, and they were so good that on that day it wasn't my family's best day because my brother had to play against them in the Super Bowl. My brother was the quarterback for the Patriots against the Bears, which they got beat, and so it wasn't a great day for us. But man, what a team. Anyway, you guys, I put Walter Payton I always put pictures up in Sports Illustrated.

Speaker 2: 11:18

I would cut them out, I would put pictures up on my wall and I put this one up in my locker and you know you open your locker. You know, in high school, like I don't, I don't know eight, ten times a day, because in between classes and getting dressed for practice, and it's this specific picture of Walter Payton and he's running right at the camera, so it looks like the the lens must have been right there and he's running like right toward the camera with the ball and there's grass coming up behind him that's kicking up from his cleats. It's like one of those pictures that you just love and I just loved Walter Payton. So I would look at this picture 10 times a day as I opened my locker for four years straight in high school, so four years straight. Then, 1985 was the year, the year they won the Super Bowl. We were playing the Chicago Bears. Now, the guy I've been looking at for all these years in my locker, you know, and loving him like, loving him like an idol, you know, now I'm playing against him and now I'm playing safety. They give him the ball and I'm like, oh man, this is it they just gave Walter Payton. They tossed it to him. He was deep in the eye, they tossed it to him. He's running and he's running right toward my left, his right, and I'm going, I am going to tackle walter payton.

Speaker 2: 12:50

And when these moments happen in your life, you guys, it's not fast, it's slow, like it's it. Everything turned to slow motion. And now I'm like running in slow motion in real life in the astrodome, playing the chicago bears, and walter payton is running at me, slow motion, Everything's just like a dream, like a slow motion dream, and he's running right at me and I swear to you, the visual that I have locked in my brain is the one that was in my locker, the same picture that I saw him running at the camera. Like this. He is like that and I'm running to tackle him and I'm like this is crazy, I'm about to tackle walter. I'm this is what I'm thinking inside I'm about to tackle walter payton. I hope my mom and dad are watching and dad are watching. That's what I'm thinking and, sure enough, I get to him, tackle him.

Speaker 2: 13:50

Right now I'm on top of my hero. I'm laying on top of walter payton right, and I didn't know what to do. I was a rookie right, and when you, when you tackle your idol, right, you don't want to get off right, you just want to lay there for a minute, right. But when you're a veteran, when you're the greatest running back, one of the greatest running backs to ever live, you don't want some rookie laying on top of you while you're, you know, back is on turf right.

Speaker 2: 14:23

So, just like you would expect, you know, know, because Walter Payton, I just you know he had that soft voice, he was a nice guy, man of the year. I started to get off of him because he dropped a couple F-bombs on me and said get the F off of me, rookie. And I started to get up and I wasn't getting up quick enough. So he gave me a little heel, like a heel up into my body, like boom with his foot, and I was like, oh man, I guess the idolization is over. This is the real thing.

Speaker 2: 14:57

But often you guys, it's so funny I don't know if you guys had this experience in your life, but uh, every time I have a visual that I kind of look at day after day, day after day or year after year. Those visuals I then later see in my life and it feels like a deja vu moment, like man, and it's always slow motion, it's never fast, it's always like, wow, I've been here before and that's when I knew that the things that have all come into existence in my life, I had seen them for years ahead of that.

Speaker 1: 15:38

And then they come true and I'm like wow, it's so weird because not only did they come true, but it feels like I've already been here, like this already happened. See, this is so powerful for me, bo, because obviously reading it I loved hearing it. I was a big Walter Payton fan. I can enjoy the reading of the story, but to me this is almost like the ultimate story of the burn for many individuals who say, well, I really don't know what my underlying burn is. Right. Then you lose your mom and you watch your mom's fight and you want to live and be the best you can be because you have days your mom never got. That's deep. I didn't have that happen to me, or I didn't have to sacrifice, or I'm not saying people have, they struggle To me. I love it's this ultimate burn of vision, to where you almost said I have to keep going, no matter the naysayers, no matter the unpredictable world that we live in, no matter if somebody tells me this, no matter if I have a scholarship or not. And not only did you go on to play in the NFL, I mean, you went on to be an NFL All-Pro and so you did it at the highest possible level. And I just I think the story of vision and burn, and looking at that picture which generates this fuel, caused you to make that your reality, which people are like. Well, how is that possible? It's possible when you believe it and you put the action, and which is why I love the book so much, which I really want you to talk about when you truly believe, you don't just say it's there's only a plan A, there is no plan B. So back to me selling the book again. Right, there is no plan B for your A game, so the plan B was non-existent for you. You said will play in the NFL period. End of story. That's it. And I think so many people and I believe it's probably the same for you as much consulting and planning and things that you're doing with organizations in the business world.

Speaker 1: 17:39

Now, oh, it drives me crazy when somebody says, okay, we have a big, hairy, audacious goal, we have a stretch goal. Like what a bunch of bullshit that is. I said what do you mean? You have a stretch goal. I said how about you just go after the really big goal and if you don't hit it, we'll deal with it then? And that's why I loved your book so much, because it's almost like people say well, that's really exciting. I'll get excited to talk about this big goal, but I really only believe in the smaller one, and so that's why I loved your book. So where did it come from for you where you're like don't even talk to me about a B game, it doesn't exist. Go for the A game, yeah.

Speaker 2: 18:14

Yeah, I, you know, as I became a dad and got you know, as I was getting married and having kids and then, you know, getting more mature. I keep hearing people say, well, you have to make, you know, you have to make goals that are achievable. And I'm like that's not even a goal. Right, just do it. You know what are you talking about. That's not a goal, and I've and I think that the world Ben has a lot of.

Speaker 2: 18:47

I think we as human beings have a lot of false loyalties, like we're loyal to the wrong things. I was always taught to stay loyal to my dreams, and only my dreams. Isn't that weird? Like you know, cause you have these loyalties that you're supposed to be loyal to, but they might be false. What if you're just loyal to this dream, which is actually a vision, and then you don't wait for the vision to happen before you become that vision. You become that vision on day one.

Speaker 2: 19:23

So when I'm nine years old and I'm drawing up the plan, I'm not waiting until 1984 to get drafted to be the best safety in the world. I'm not waiting for 1984 to get drafted to be the best safety in the world. I'm not waiting for ESPN to say that there wasn't even an ESPN. I was that on day one, so I drew it up. I said that's me, that's OJ Simpson, I'm the best. And I started behaving as if I was that best safety. And I was scrawny and crappy and untalented, but I was talented at one thing at being loyal to what I wanted. And so for all those years leading up to 1984, between 69 and 1984, the one thing I had because you guys, at every turn people are saying no, I had. Between those times, you guys, I had three, four knee surgeries, I mean ACL surgeries, where I'm a kid and doctors are going dude, you can't play. This is 1984. This is 1977, when I had my first surgery You're done, we got to put screws in there, we can't. In those days they just opened you up, they put you in a cast for eight weeks. They said you're done, it's not like today. And I was so unloyal to what the doctors said to me.

Speaker 2: 20:51

When someone's in a white lab coat telling you that your dream is over, usually you succumb to that white lab coat and their education. And I just I said I hear you, I've got this plan, see, and it doesn't matter. The surgeries really don't matter, and it doesn't matter that there's no schools interested and it doesn't matter. The surgeries really don't matter, and it doesn't matter that there's no schools interested and it doesn't matter. None of these things matter. What matters is the dream, and if I stay loyal to this, eventually it will come true, and it did.

Speaker 2: 21:25

And then I just repeated the same thing over and over in my life and I've done it like four or five times where I just said I want to be the best in the world at this thing called playwriting. And I'm like everyone's going you don't even know how to write. You're crazy. You've never written anything. You can't even spell. How are you going to be the best playwright in the world? And I go well, who is the best playwright in the world? And I go well, who is the best playwright in the world? And they go uh, Shakespeare. And I'm like well, where's he? I'll talk to him. They go he's dead 500 years, 500 years ago. He's, he died. So you can't talk to him. And I go what did he do? Show me what he did. Show me what he did, show me where he did it.

Speaker 2: 22:08

I'll do it and that's, and then on. So on day one I get to become or behave like the best playwright in the world behaves. I didn't know what that was, ben, I had to learn what. How to how does the playwright behave? So the the.

Speaker 1: 22:29

So you write the play, because I want to make sure we capture this. You write the play the little runt. It goes to broadway. The new york times ends up saying it's one of the greatest plays over the last decade. So I want to take you to a place.

Speaker 1: 22:43

Regarding obstacles, I think this is really important because I know we're going to meet some of our listeners right now where they're going to go. Okay, this is like one of those rarest of the rare stories, ben. Like you know, the guy believes that nine years old, he's going to play in the NFL. He does. Then the guy's going to go become a play right After becoming the best. Safety in the New York times says he's the best.

Speaker 1: 23:03

Like Ben, I get it, but you don't understand the obstacles I face. Yes, hey, ben, bo, like I get it, but this is different. You're different, bo. How do you coach, how do you consult when you're in the business world, when the person goes yeah, bo, great story. But you know which we both know being communicators and paying attention to the details but negates what you said before and it's almost like, but your story doesn't apply to me, bo. How do you bring people back? What's the tool that you use? How do you work with them to say don't give power to your obstacles, because what you said was is you're basically I'm not giving any loyalty to what these doctors say. My loyalty will be to my plan. And so what do you say to those people who say no, no, no, no, you don't understand my obstacles yeah, yeah, I, I, I get it.

Speaker 2: 23:58

You guys, I, I do, I get. I face those every day too. You know, I I have, I have obstacles. You know I've struggled right. But listen, there's a great quote and I can't remember who said it, but it always struck me the world was not created by great men. The world was not created by great men or great women. The world was created by a demanding situation, and then that great man or that great woman rose to the occasion. Wow, that's it. The minute you write I want to be the best safety in the world. I want to be the best playwright in the world. I want to be the best husband in the world. I want to be the best father. I want to be the best motivational speaker in the world. The minute you say that, what have you just invited in? You created that declaration. You're the one who wrote it up. So you're the one who just created all the obstacles that are now going to come at you, because there's no way to achieve it unless you have obstacles, unless you have struggle. Struggle is a biological necessity to greatness. You can't have one without the other. You just can't. So you're the one who came up with your dream, your vision. It came from you. Therefore, you created the obstacles that are now on their way to you.

Speaker 2: 25:29

I could have just sat there at nine and gone. I'm just not as good as OJ Simpson. I'll never be as good as him. My dad loves him. That hurts my feelings. I'll never be anything. And then you guys, I certainly wouldn't be on this podcast. I certainly wouldn't have played in the NFL or wrote a play for Broadway or screenplays or whatever. I wouldn't have done anything if I didn't first say I want to be the best at this thing and invite all this struggle into Bo's life. I could have had no struggle in my life and I would have been worthless to the world.

Speaker 2: 26:07

You want to make yourself valuable to the world. You want to step to the top of the gold medal box? Here it is Put your ass in a demanding situation by way of making a declaration, making a promise to people that you're going to achieve this thing, because automatically, that puts you in a demanding situation. Well, that's the only way you have any value, the minute you put yourself in that situation. Now we get to see what you're made of, and there's a lot of struggle that comes with that. There's knee surgeries that come with that. You get dumped All your dreams like you're faced with. But if you keep going, you learn that, wow, I can actually overcome all these obstacles because they're made up. I'm the one who made them up, because I'm the one who made up the dream. I mean, I made up the vision, so they're all self-made. Therefore, you can overcome them, I.

Speaker 2: 27:09

I just I'd like to say this one thing, and it's it's this word attractive, you know, and that's like. That's like natural law. So there's laws of attraction. So for you to be valuable to the world, there's gotta be attraction coming at you. Now I'm not saying, oh, I'm handsome, you're not, oh, she's pretty. I'm not talking about that kind of attraction. I'm talking about somebody who has courage. That since time.

Speaker 2: 27:44

We are always, and this is really the only thing that's ever been rewarded over time uh, the history of our world is courage that's always rewarded. So if you have the courage to declare where what your vision is and then go despite what, all the obstacles then you have put yourself. You have made yourself one of the most attractive people on the planet, meaning people must pay attention to attraction. There's a reason they look at you. There's a because you're going somewhere. I always think in the quarterback position. If you guys look at that position in the world, it is. It is so unique because you, the, the coaches, the city, the university, the community is all attracted to where this quarterback is taking them.

Speaker 1: 28:41

So powerful.

Speaker 2: 28:42

And that's what they want to win. The city wants to win, the university wants to win, the team wants to win, the university wants to win, the team wants to win. And there's usually one person who doesn't really want this job they call that. The quarterback doesn't necessarily want all that responsibility, but takes it on and says you know what, guys, girls, we're gonna win some. Come hell or high water, we're getting this ball in the end zone.

Speaker 2: 29:09

I don't care who does it, I don't care who calls it, doesn't matter to me, we're going to do it and that's attractive. So if you, if I'm looking at my kids, if I'm looking at your kids, ben, if I'm looking at my clients, your clients, I I say what makes you most valuable to the world? What makes you most valuable to the world? What makes you most valuable to the world in our current culture? And that is it, this law of attraction, meaning I want you headed somewhere, with struggle up against you, so that we get to see a hero on this journey. Well, we're going to follow that hero, because it's attractive for someone to be courageous in this day and age where everybody just wants to opt out and quit.

Speaker 1: 29:56

So true, bo, I can't thank you enough for taking us to where you just took us to, which is really what the book does, which I'm going to encourage everybody again and then make it as easy as possible to stay connected with Bo through his website, to stay connected with Bo through his social media, to stay connected by reading.

Speaker 1: 30:15

There's no plan B for your A game, but what I want to thank you for most is providing the action through your example, as a result of the story and vision that you once believed.

Speaker 1: 30:29

You know, I think we live in a world where there's too many people who are telling themselves a story, and I always love to say that you can tell me how great you want to be, but when we have a conversation with your action, we find out how bad you really want it, and I think that's the beauty of your ability to be such an incredible storyteller.

Speaker 1: 30:47

But the storytellers are backed with action to prove that, when you believe in that power of attraction, when you put the action behind, when it's fueled by that burn, that vision, that belief, really anything does become possible, and it's not some trite statement, it's something that can happen as long as you stay in the fight. So I want to encourage you to do exactly what Bo said, which is to write that story, write that vision, but then put yourself in the demanding situation that it's going to take to cause you to take the action to allow that story, that vision, to come true. Bo Eason, I hope I captured that correctly because you absolutely nailed it. This was incredible to finally have you live on the burn and I appreciate you, my friend and it was incredible to have you, Ben.

Speaker 2: 31:39

Thank you so much. I'm so looking forward to being with you and I've been following you for so long and just watching you speak and communicate and how you're able to sum things up in a very much simpler way than me. I tend to go like this and you just go, boom, walk it in. Really good Anyway. So thanks so much for having me. I really appreciate it. Can't wait to work further together as we go along our careers.

Speaker 1: 32:07

I look forward to it as well, bo, and I do want to give a quick shout out to our dear friend Cody Foster at Advisors Excel AE. What an extraordinary man who originally put us together and so grateful to him for the connection and grateful to each and every single one of you who choose to go on this journey. Now in year seven of the burn, seven years of Burn episodes, and we're still able to find the extraordinary stories like Bo Eason to help fuel you, to believe more in you and to put the action behind it. So thank you for joining us for the Burn. Please share this episode, please like this episode. And for the fourth time I'm going to be mad at you. Go buy the book. There is no plan B for your A game Until next week. This has been the Burn.