George Mumford is a mindfulness and performance coach who has worked with elite athletes like Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant. He espouses an approach that is almost spiritual in nature—encouraging all of us to find the force within to unlock our potential, which ultimately should work toward a purpose that serves others. And an important observation he made about great athletes: they tend to view challenges differently. “They don’t see it as a curse. And their idea is, ‘I’m gonna fail up.’”
The following interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.Mr. George Mumford: Everything begins with energy. E equals MC square, energy equals mass times the speed of light squared, so we’re vibrating, we’re energy. And so everything begins with the spirit. That’s the life-giving principle that flows through us.
There’s trillions of galaxies, let alone stars and whatnot. So it’s so much more than then we might ever imagine. So there’s got to be some intelligence, some form of information or knowledge that is way beyond what we can actually comprehend. And so realizing there’s something greater than ourselves is really important. There’s a part of us that we know we can quantify, we can research it, and then there’s another part of our life or universe that is beyond description. So we need a metaphysical way of relating to things like that.
AE: How do you teach athletes to have a mindset of winning, but you’re not pursuing a result out of it?
Mr. Mumford: I said to Kobe, the exact quote, the best way to score is to not try to score. Those days, Kobe was trying really hard and one shot was the meaning of 35 points or whatever, it was just a lot of intensity. And this is what happens to us a lot. We try too hard. And we get in the way. And the thing we’re trying to do, we’re actually not able to do because we’re focused on the result, not on the moment, not on the steps or a process that gets us there. You have to have a certain amount of confidence, to be able to be vulnerable and just allow things to happen. And you just trust that by seeing clearly, by being in the moment—because no one’s perfect, we all make mistakes—but instead of making mistakes and getting lost in them, you just do error correction. And then you get back on track.
It’s the idea of just embracing whatever is there, and just noticing and learning from it, and then keep it moving. This is a metaphor for the masterpiece within. We just got to get rid of the noise and clutter or the things that are in the way. Like frustration, or maybe something happened to a relative or we almost came into a close encounter with an accident. Just step back, breathe in, breathe out, then focus, reset, reboot, renew. Make the next play.
In the Chinese literature that I’ve read, [they say] the journey of 1,000 miles begins with the first step. Taking this first step is how you get to that mountain, you have the intention of getting there, but then you have to just focus on the journey, not so much on the destination.
AE: You’ve worked with people who are in life imprisonment. How do you get them to see the potential in themselves?
Mr. Mumford: What I learned from “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl, he talks about being in the concentration camps. And realizing that between stimulus and response, there was a space, and in that space, you have the freedom and power to choose. So even though he was in a concentration camp, he said, “I have liberty, I have the freedom of choosing how I’m going to react and respond to my situation. And so if I want to be loving, or if I want to maintain my dignity, no matter what people are doing to me, they cannot control my mind. I have control over that.”
When we find meaning in unavoidable suffering, it ceases to be suffering. An example of that, I was addicted to pain medicine, illegal drugs, and alcohol. Most people would say, “Oh, I’m ashamed of that. I don’t want to talk about that.” My experience is, when I embrace it and say, “Okay, so what’s the lesson here? What is this teaching me?” It becomes a way of bringing more love, more joy, more compassion, more understanding, into the place I inhabit. I’m creating that by realizing, oh, that’s not a roadblock, that’s a stepping stone. That’s an opportunity, not a curse.
We get to change our thoughts, our feelings, our behaviors. We even get to change how we interpret what’s happening to us. That’s the freedom. Something happens, and we get to choose how we relate to it.
AE: Do we all have this ability, or are some people just born with it?
Mr. Mumford: We all have that tremendous potential, to be self-aware and to self-regulate. But if we don’t take responsibility, and if we don’t embrace that we have this ability, it doesn’t exist. The quality of our lives, our ability to unlock, our ability to live life fully and creatively, is going to be predicated on us being able to develop and access that greatness within. So when we do that, we will find the flow. And we will discover success.
My definition of success is a progressive realization of a worthy ideal. So it’s a moment-to-moment success, not waiting for something to happen. So enjoy the journey, and focus on the journey. I just want people to realize we have this potential. I want people to unlock it, because we need everybody to be their unique self and to offer that to the world.
This article was originally published in American Essence magazine.
