From Google X to Beer Keg Cricket: Adventures in Personal Growth and Resilience | Episode 29

In this episode, Simon and Rusty explore how leaders can leverage environment, mindfulness, and resilience to fuel both personal and organisational growth.

 Drawing from stories over the past month, they demonstrate how thoughtfully designed spaces—whether in the workplace or on the sports field—ignite connection, sharpen focus, and inspire meaningful progress. They also discuss why being fully present and intentionally planning time for recovery are not just wellness habits but essential leadership skills. Through practical mindfulness strategies and real-world examples from sport and business, they highlight the power of honest feedback, gratitude, and simple rituals in cultivating a culture where people and teams can adapt and thrive.

If you’re ready to build stronger resilience for yourself and your organisation, this episode delivers actionable insights you won’t want to miss.

Key Moments:

00:01:04 — Rusty shares the emotional reflections parents and coaches share when asked about teachers and mentors who shaped their growth.

00:06:58 — Insights from a former Google X executive explore how AI and wealth redistribution may redefine the future of work.

00:10:39 — Strategies for sustaining resilience when addressing the realities of career changes and job market uncertainty.

00:11:53 — The importance of momentum as a core element of resilience—emphasising continual forward movement.

00:18:02 — Exploring mindfulness as a driver for enhanced organisational performance and profitability.

00:22:19 — The role of simple rituals and engaging camp environments in fostering deeper connection and presence in children.

00:26:11 — Navigating the emotional complexities of stepping back from leadership while empowering others to lead.

00:40:31 — Embracing personal challenges through exposure to inspiring environments and honest, constructive feedback to stimulate growth.

Please like, subscribe or follow, so you're notified of any new episodes coming up, and if you're keen to reach Rusty or Simon with any suggestions, feedback or comments, you can contact them via the show's LinkedIn page here: 

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-bouncebackability-podcast/

Transcript

Rusty Earnshaw [00:00:00]:
Simon and Rusty here with the Bounce Back Ability podcast. The podcast that explores how to deal with obstacles, setbacks and challenges.

Simon Ursell [00:00:07]:
Hope you enjoy the pod.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:00:09]:
Looking forward to it. Listen on. Hi, everyone. Welcome to the pod. Me and Rusty, it's the evening. Rusty's had a long car journey. I've had a busy day of back to backs, so we're both fired up, feeling on top of our game, doing all the things we're supposed to do to be resilient. How you feeling, buddy?

Simon Ursell [00:00:29]:
Yeah, I think the two Greg sausage rolls and the coffee might have, you know, ignited me for a short period.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:00:36]:
Of time, looking after that, you know, you're doing a diet of champions there. Awesome.

Simon Ursell [00:00:40]:
Yeah. Well, I've been up in Seba this week and last week, so I've been doing 25 to 30, 000 steps a day, so kind of I'm convinced myself I've earned sausage rolls, pizzas, all that kind of stuff.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:00:54]:
Did you want a sausage roll? You have a sausage roll? It's all good.

Simon Ursell [00:00:58]:
Thank you.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:00:59]:
It's all good. I don't know if you need my permission, but I think you should have one.

Simon Ursell [00:01:04]:
And also, as luck would have it today I was in front of last week, Fletcher and we do, at the end of the week, we do some with the Barons who are coming in to pick up the children and we do a bit of stuff around like, I guess being a sporting parent and lots of them are coaches as well, help them with their coaching. And I, I, and I don't know whether you've done it or not, I. The last podcast and you confirmed this to me because you are the king of chat gtp. Yeah, we spoke about the ripple effect inside about a hundred people in a room today and shared with them some stuff around me meeting the guy from the NFL and the ripple effect stuff. So they all promised me that they would send a message to a person that's impacted their life, either a coach or a teacher. And actually how we started the session, which I guess is interesting and makes maybe lean into a bit of a conversation today, I, I was, I always go, oh, go and go and sit with someone you don't know. And all the grown ups look at me like I'm a bit weird and I'm like, well, when your kids arrived on Monday, that is what they had to do. Had to go and meet some people they didn't know and they had to go and share some stories with them and try and find connection.

Simon Ursell [00:02:12]:
And as we get older, maybe those skills. How did that go that sounds fine. It was great. And, and then I said, you know like yeah, with that person. Just have a conversation who's the teacher or coach that's had the impact on your life and some got some people to share some pretty beautiful stories if I'm honest. So a few, a few tears in the room to be fair.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:02:34]:
Oh that's nice. That's really nice. I'm wondering how the introverts in the world were finding your suggestions would have been freaking out.

Simon Ursell [00:02:43]:
Yeah, yeah. I'm not sure I appeal to the introverts at those moments.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:02:48]:
I bet you don't.

Simon Ursell [00:02:49]:
But there was kids in the room as well so the kids, so some of the kids chat to the grown ups as well and yeah, it was pretty. So I've done it. Are you. How did you go?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:03:00]:
Yeah, I mean I, I haven't actually, I haven't actually done it but I did. I was at a funeral yesterday for my godfather. Really really lovely man. Been in my life, my whole life. So it was quite sad but really nice to celebrate the life of someone who's done a lot with him, a lot with his life. So that was pretty cool. But yeah, I hung out and said thank you to a lot of people there that I knew. So I kind of, I kind of did it myself.

Simon Ursell [00:03:27]:
Yeah. That's great.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:03:28]:
So that's not bad is it? But yeah, I'm Nate to self. I've got a few things coming up where I'm hanging out with people who I could maybe suggest that would be a fun thing to do. So I think we'll keep it going. Eh? We'll just try and do a bit of gratitude. Maybe we should do this as a thing, try and get our guests and ourselves to do a little bit of gratitude spreading. I don't think it's ever going to be a bad idea, is it, to do that. Why not?

Simon Ursell [00:03:50]:
I don't think you can do too much gratitude. I actually bought Oliver Sacks book Gratitude which is a really short read and it has been put on my shelf with all the other short reads that I've yet to read. I fly to Canada on Saturday and I've convinced myself that I'm either going to sleep for nine, 10 hours or I'm going to read some books. So it might get ready.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:04:13]:
Yeah. Did you read stats book?

Simon Ursell [00:04:15]:
Yep.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:04:16]:
You did? And that was, and that was when you were away? Yeah. You were going to do that?

Simon Ursell [00:04:21]:
I've been recommending it and then I've, I've kind of referenced some bits with some people and I've been sending that.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:04:26]:
Film to a lot of people. Yeah, that's good. Yeah, it's great. I think we said last time I'd watched it five times, so. Yeah. And I'm using it quite a bit. I think it's really helpful. I just like it.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:04:40]:
I mean, I'm always conscious with these things of telling people that it's not the truth, though, Isn't it? Yeah, there might be some truth in there, but it's not the truth. It's not the answer. People can get a little bit carried away sometimes with these things and think that they've got. It's a. It's a textbook for their lives. But it's good stuff in there. It's good stuff.

Simon Ursell [00:04:58]:
Yeah. Nice. Well, anyway, look, the other thing is, like, I looked at when we last did the pod and I looked at what I've done since then, and it's a lot. And I think yours is probably a lot as well. So I'm just gonna. I'm gonna read you a list and then I don't know if any of it might, you know, know, be of interest to you. So all of it, probably. And this is like, I think about all July and August as the two months when I get to kind of Google X myself a little bit.

Simon Ursell [00:05:25]:
And interestingly, one of the things on my list is I went for a walk with my friend who was, like, really high up in Google X, so high up that he's obviously got loads of shares and he's now retired. So we had an hour and a half talking about things like the future of work and. And all of that. So then also I wrote a bit of work. Graham Higginbottom and Stride, which is a charity helping kids out in. In Manchester. I did the category football conference. I went to my old school and did the speech day and was in the assembly room that I fainted in for three years every day and didn't faint.

Simon Ursell [00:06:05]:
So that was progress. Iceland, Boston, Spain. Se pow. Drum Castle for my friends, 50th. Been putting a real focus in se on things like rituals, Google X, as I said. And then the other day, I did A for the Premier League. Good coach, I know well, Aaron Danks is head coach of Bayern Munich. I'm not sure he believes it either.

Simon Ursell [00:06:32]:
He was coaching in the community, in schools in Birmingham a couple of decades ago, and so we did a Q and A with Danksy and he shared some stuff with a group of coaches listening. So it's been a pretty hectic month.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:06:46]:
Well, I'M not going to beat that. Frankly, that's a lot of stuff. You're giving me a headache just thinking about everything you've done there. I think maybe the thing that really stands out is Google X. Come on, tell me more. The future of work.

Simon Ursell [00:06:58]:
So I'll tell you what was interesting. So Tom Tweddle was at university with me. He was. He's born in the Lake District, went to a state school and just has this incredible mind. And I probably haven't seen him for 20, 25 years. And he's over. He's been living in the US, living in San Fran. And he came over and, and interestingly he's interested.

Simon Ursell [00:07:24]:
He messaged me, said, oh, we should meet up and, and I said, cool, awesome, let's do it. And then independently, we both said to the same friend, oh, I haven't seen Rusty or tweds in 20, 25 years. Hope this is not going to be really awkward because I said to. So I said to my mate, you know, he went, he rang me and said exactly the same thing. This was after. So this was after the event. But anyway, so we had about nine minutes together and yeah, it's just really, I guess, interesting to get his view. I asked him a bit around like, you know, what are your principles? And he was like, look, first principle for me is now it's all about the people and.

Simon Ursell [00:08:04]:
Which is interesting. He works in tech sector. We then chat about, chat gtp and I guess his view is that it's going to be mean less work for humans. One of the things that he seemed to think is that, I guess if you're super skillful and have high expertise, then it's less likely to take your work. However, if you are, you know, if your work is less expert and can be replaced by computers, then. So then we got in and then I get into politics and we start talking about the redistribution of income and whether that happened or not. And then, and then scarily, the party I was at, Padam Kaspo Quasi Quatting, was that he was really close to the fire and I was a little bit tempted, but I didn't. So I know I shouldn't say that.

Simon Ursell [00:08:51]:
I know I shouldn't.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:08:52]:
You should know you're going to get, you're going to get people coming around looking you up if you're not careful.

Simon Ursell [00:08:57]:
But yeah, yeah, so. So I guess it's interesting, isn't it, that and, and his view again is that, yeah, just that the select few are going to capture more and more of the of the wealth?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:09:10]:
Yeah, sure. Those that control AI are the ones that will control wealth, I guess. But yeah, I mean, I think I have a slightly less bleak view on it.

Simon Ursell [00:09:21]:
Thank God. Tell me what it is.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:09:23]:
Well, they had the same thing happen in the Industrial revolution, didn't they? And had loads of guys smashing printing press and factories and all that kind of stuff. I think work just changes, you know, there's always stuff to be done. I think we just retrain, use different skills, hopefully use different bits of our brain, you know, I think, I think there is a. There's obviously a change in how people are working and what they're going to be doing, but I think, you know, human beings have been around a while and we're very adaptable and I think we're pretty good at coming up with new things. I think those that, I mean, hopefully things like AI are gonna, are gonna reduce the chances of poverty and of bad things happening rather than making them worse. And I think that if we can all feel quite positive about the future, I think it's more likely positive things will happen. I think there's a lot of negativity around and sadness and I think if we all try and be a bit more cheerful and think about good that might happen, then maybe good will happen. So, yeah, I don't know.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:10:33]:
I guess I'm just a, an optimist. It's the old hippie in me.

Simon Ursell [00:10:39]:
I like it. And then again, it just made me think about, okay, what can I be doing to just kind of increase my resilience to, you know, the, the work of the future. And again, I've got lots of friends that are going through, you know, being made redundant or lost my job or not quite sure this is what I want to do with my life. And so, yeah, I guess just interesting chatting through all that stuff.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:11:03]:
Yeah, well, you sent me a lot of people to come and talk to me about coaching and stuff, don't you? I mean, I. I don't know, it's.

Simon Ursell [00:11:10]:
You are the man. You're my go to.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:11:12]:
Well, I don't know why.

Simon Ursell [00:11:13]:
I don't know what to do.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:11:14]:
I don't know if I make them feel hopeless. I don't know what to do. Speak to Simon. Is that like the last resort? It's like there's nothing else left. Let's go right to the dregs and have a chat with Simon.

Simon Ursell [00:11:26]:
I don't know, it's the first resort. Just because I think you've been really creative with Tyler Grange and then creative with yourself. What could you know what's possible? What can I do? Where can I add value? How can I, you know, upskill myself to be able to do that?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:11:44]:
I love your tea. It's. It's a. It's a. Yeah. It's just momentum, isn't it? You just gotta keep moving.

Simon Ursell [00:11:53]:
I think you love momentum. You love it.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:11:55]:
I do love it. I think it's incredibly cool. I think it's one of the secret recipes for. For life. You got. You gotta keep moving. I mean, you know, don't. I mean.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:12:06]:
Yeah. I mean, you do need to sit and chill for a while sometimes, but I think, yeah, you definitely don't want to be sitting there feeling sorry for yourself. You gotta crack on. And that's. That is one of the keys to life. Do you know what would you want to know what I've been up to this month? I got my diary open through my pictures. It's nothing like you. I went to a festival that was fun.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:12:28]:
Amy Winehouse Experience, Fisherman's Friends were singing, which was. Yeah, that was new.

Simon Ursell [00:12:34]:
Were they singing, like the old kind of shanty?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:12:37]:
Yeah. And stuff. It was. That was fun. And Cooler Shaker, which I haven't heard for a long time, but they were great. So that was fun. Did that. It's really nice.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:12:45]:
I mention it because it was great. I reconnected with a few people. It was nice. You know, hanging with friends is pretty cool. Son's graduation. My son Dan. Shout out to dan. Got a T1 in economics from Warwick.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:12:58]:
Awesome. I mean that, you know, graduates now are struggling, so anyone out there's got a. Got any jobs going for an economics graduate, phone me up. He's an awesome kid. He's helping out with Tyler Grange at the moment, but, yeah, looking for a job, so. So, yeah, his graduation was great. I really enjoyed going to the graduation. It's great, isn't it? I mean, everyone's clapping for like three hours.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:13:23]:
Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap. And your hands are hurting it, but you kind of can't stop clapping, can you? Because you're just thinking, well, that one person going up at that one moment, that's their moment, isn't it? Of their. Of their degree. And I thought, yeah, I'm gonna keep clapping. So. And most. Which I thought was really cool. I mean.

Simon Ursell [00:13:41]:
And they got the world of their future, haven't they? It's such an exciting age and options and. Yeah, just doing great stuff.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:13:50]:
Yeah, that. That was really nice. Yeah. And then I guess, probably the other big thing I've done this I Mean, I've been doing my. I'm doing Reformer Pilates at the moment, so I've been in quite a bit of that. Do you know what that is?

Simon Ursell [00:14:04]:
Well, is it, is it reforming your body? Because I need it as well.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:14:07]:
Yeah, do it mate. It's really cool. So you're on like a. It's a torture machine, like the rack. It's a slidy sort of table in and they. You're pulling ropes and pulleys. It's like Pilates but it's very targeted. It's very good for 50 year old blokes that can't touch their toes.

Simon Ursell [00:14:23]:
And what's been the impact?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:14:26]:
It's made me a lot more flexible. I just really enjoy it. It's. It's stretching muscles that I haven't stretched for a long time. It's nice. Yeah, yeah. That's a cool thing to do. And then.

Simon Ursell [00:14:38]:
And you, and have you bought a rack or are you like going somewhere that has a rack?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:14:44]:
No, no, it's that. It's a massive thing. So I don't bought one. I don't know how much they cost. I wouldn't be able to fit in the house either. They're quite big. Google it. When, when we get off the pod.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:14:53]:
Reformer. Reformer Pilates. There'll be classes around you. It's very trendy with. Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:15:00]:
Middle aged balding man. Perfect.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:15:03]:
Well, I went to a class and I was the only bloke there. I think I'm one of the only blokes that goes. It's, it's mainly women again and they probably don't need it. I mean they're all like way more flexible. I mean I can barely move any. I mean the guy who was, who was doing the lesson, I, I think I shocked him at how bad I am. I think he's used to a slightly more flexible person than me.

Simon Ursell [00:15:27]:
Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:15:27]:
Should I say so?

Simon Ursell [00:15:28]:
Yeah. Was he like, we're gonna need a bigger board. Yes.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:15:33]:
We're gonna need heavier weights.

Simon Ursell [00:15:34]:
We've got to stretch this one out.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:15:36]:
And I'm there going, ow. As I can barely touch my knees, let alone my toes. It's good though. It's. I recommend it. It's nice. It's good. It definitely bit more flexible and it's helping my golf and that always motivates me.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:15:47]:
So if something's going to help my golf, I'm gonna do it. Yeah. So that's kind of cool.

Simon Ursell [00:15:53]:
Well, well, well. Obviously we've chatted about the Bertie boys and what we do on a morning 6:30 hit session. Charlie Courtney, the Earl of Devon, who is at uni with me and is definitely the only now his birthday present. His favorite birthday present was a set of 10 kilogram weights.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:16:14]:
Nice.

Simon Ursell [00:16:14]:
So Luke got him some 10 kilo weights, which is pretty cool and actually makes me think. I've been with. In the last couple of days I've been with three of our guests because I've been with James Rutter.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:16:25]:
Nice.

Simon Ursell [00:16:26]:
Dave Coleman, who surprised you. These people.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:16:29]:
Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:16:30]:
And John Fletcher, coach extraordinaire.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:16:32]:
Yeah. Oh, well that's really cool. Well, that's amazing because the last thing I did a few days back because I went up to Loughborough to a sports thing, sport of mindfulness. And in fact that was with Luke Doherty, who's been on the pod. So yeah, we've, we've been hanging around our guests. We probably need to expand our horizons, Rusty, and stop hanging around the same people all the time.

Simon Ursell [00:16:56]:
That's a good point. I actually did a Q and A type thing with Luke and Kareem the other day as well.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:17:02]:
Yes, I know because Luke shared the video with the guys on the course. So we had, we had, we had people from rugby pro rugby there, like James Bailey was there. Shout out to James because I know he listens to the pod. And we had GB skateboarding were there. We had Sunderland Football Club were there. West Ham football club had been there. We had flag football say, oh, Phoebe Shetler. She wasn't there but one of the guys who's working with her was there.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:17:33]:
So there's another little connection to the pod. So that was, yeah, that was just one step removed for the pod. So, yeah, yeah, there's a whole bunch of people. There was. I mean, you know, I was not worthy. I'm like, there is. Yeah, Simon's. Yeah, he, he's been a fat dad and shouted at kids on the touchline once.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:17:52]:
That's pretty much my sport coaching experience, but I love that.

Simon Ursell [00:17:57]:
And, and do you think it was impactful for all the people there?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:18:02]:
Yeah, I mean, I want to say life changing, but I think that's possibly exaggerating so I better not. But definitely huge impact on people that are realization. A lot of people talked about big expanses and huge open areas, this sort of stuff. And that's something that I've noticed with mindfulness. Certainly my experience as well is once you start doing it, you start realizing just what you haven't been paying attention to is enormous. I mean, I don't know. I mean, it's mindfulness, not something you're sort of that into rusty, is that fair to say?

Simon Ursell [00:18:42]:
If it depends what you mean by mindfulness, yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:18:44]:
We don't like the word.

Simon Ursell [00:18:45]:
Do we train space and. Yeah, doing, you know, doing good thinking or trying to get into flow, then I'm into mindfulness. You just reminded me. And I'll mention it when I remember someone doing something where they were like, you know, they were talking about like, just like closing your eyes and listening to the noises and try and try and listen to the noise that's the furthest away, which I loved. She made me like, really, like stretch your senses, which I think is what you're kind of referencing, isn't it?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:19:16]:
Yeah, definitely. And, you know, somebody like Luke, he. He really knows his craft. You know, speaking of, of jobs that chat GTP is going to take, they're not taking league's job that is 100 guaranteed, because there's no way any computer is going to be able to do that because he's so skillful at it. But yeah, it's just, just realizing just what, what a deep well of emotion you have knocking around. And if you pay attention to it, your performance is going to improve significantly. I think everybody went away because this was, this was the second session. I missed the first one because I was up in Scotland on, on.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:19:53]:
On the retreat. And then they've got a final one coming up and then they're going to be running some more of these, by the way, so if anyone's interested in getting on the next one, let me know. I think it's gonna be very popular, so if you do want to go, get in soon. But I can connect you to Luke and see if we can get you. Get you a place. But it is. Yeah, I think, I think in terms of the coaches there and what they were working with, I mean, the skateboarding guys, yeah, they're all over it because they're so chilled out. They're there in their cool skater gear.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:20:24]:
You know, everybody's in their tracksuits and their shorts and their hoodies and they're just rocking up in their, you know, the big baggy trousers and the, and the, and the shirts and everything. Just. Yeah, I'm embarrassing myself now. I'm going to stop talking about sartorial options because that's not my thing. But, yeah, I think the coaches are generally going away from it, thinking it's something that could be really, really impactful in their sporting environments in terms of resilience and people's ability to perform. I mean, I mean, I just take the business world, you know, the work we've done at Tardigrange and, And quite a lot of the other places now I'm working at have been using Luke and others to help them with this. It has a direct impact on profit. I can't say it any other way.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:21:14]:
That's not why I would do it necessarily. But if your thing is earning money, this is going to help you earn money. So I think the same thing with the sports coaches in terms of performance. I think they were going away thinking, yeah, this is something that's gonna, it's gonna help with that. Very cool. Very cool. And he's training coaches to use mindfulness in their coaching. So to bring mindful practice into their coaching.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:21:40]:
So they can help meditation with their, with their charges in their, in their environments. Say, yeah, it's cool, it's nice.

Simon Ursell [00:21:52]:
You made me think we should get Tom Mitchell on the pod because I was with Tom last week. That would be cool. Yeah, he's. He's. He'd be one of my spiritual people. I know. And we were, we were chatting a bit about this and last week I real focus on how do we create rituals that are going to help the kids. Like, so things like how we started the day and some of the celebrations and that we did then like some of.

Simon Ursell [00:22:19]:
We created a house handshake that took 36 hours to create, which I thought it would be quicker but we wanted it to be. We didn't want it to be too long, we didn't want it to be too short. So it sounds like very long. Yeah, I know. So. And then other stuff like them just. I tell you what's fascinating, like, so it was generally like 9:30 in bed. Hand your phone in at night.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:22:42]:
Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:22:43]:
And the kids were like just trying to have their phone in as early as possible really, because they're just like, oh. So some of the. Again, I caught some kids playing cricket with beer keg wickets.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:22:57]:
Awesome.

Simon Ursell [00:22:57]:
And a football for a ball. That was a game of skins versus shirts football.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:23:04]:
Awesome. That's old school. That's brilliant.

Simon Ursell [00:23:07]:
Yeah. But again, just kids in flow kids like being mindful kids being present. And then the best one is. And I haven't seen this yet, but. So there's a guy shout out to Austin who came to the camp a few years ago and. And left like arrived probably not that confident and left super confident and way more skillful as a brilliant kid. And he came back this year and instantly his mum was in the thing. We didn't.

Simon Ursell [00:23:34]:
She said actually we had to stop a couple of times on the way because he was super nervous. But anyway, he's found his feet again. He's connected with some kids. So we've got, like. We've had 15 coaches from Italy and 40 or 50 kids from Italy over at separate courses. So there's. It's been great because we're doing coach development and we've got a translator. We're all way more mindful about our language.

Simon Ursell [00:23:56]:
But on Wednesday night, we have this barbecue and, you know, soft play stuff and. And England play Italy. Like the Italian lads. Rugby. Sometimes it looked like it was full contact, sometimes it wasn't. Depend upon the relative size of the kids, okay? And they played this game. They had one kid who was the referee, and it was just a joy. And at the end, they got in the huddle together and completely.

Simon Ursell [00:24:24]:
And actually, you know, I've coached these kids for three, four days, and I think most of their favorite bit was a bit where I wasn't coaching them. They're playing in this game, and they were just in flow. But anyway, Austin's mum's messaged me, and I spoke to the evening, and his brother was calling Austin. He said, I've got to go. This was the Tuesday night. I've been selected as England captain against Italy tomorrow night, and we've got to have a team meeting. And she sent me some videos they've done of the kids doing press conferences. When you talk about, like, that mindfulness being in flow, like, kids were almost like, can you please take my phone off me?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:25:06]:
Yeah, yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:25:07]:
Which is like. I thought, oh, my God, we're gonna be like having a kettle of phones in. It's gonna be an. People couldn't wait to have their phones.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:25:15]:
That's nice. You see, that's credit to you, dude. I think. And the. And the people running the course because. And, you know, you say the favorite bit is the kids when you weren't doing the coaching. I mean, that's the. But that's kind of the point, isn't it? What you've done there is you've created an environment in which the coaching themselves.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:25:35]:
And that's got to be more powerful than you standing there speaking and all that nonsense, talking some old rubbish that you might come out with, don't you think?

Simon Ursell [00:25:43]:
Oh, yeah, it was so good. Like, I just. Just the. Yeah. Just so much impromptu stuff. Anyway, I think the rituals helped as well. Just give the kids, especially when they're, like, out of their comfort zone in a new place, meeting new kids, you know, it's you know, they're tired. Like, it's.

Simon Ursell [00:26:00]:
It's tough. There's a lot going on and. And their ability to just. Yeah. Just like, find those moments was like. It was so good to watch.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:26:11]:
Yeah. It's just made me think of that. That cliche, isn't it, if you love them. Letting go. Because it got me thinking about Tyler Grange and stepping back there. So I've not. I've been very hands free with Tyler Grange over the last sort of. Well, probably the last year, actually.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:26:27]:
Doing less and less and less deliberately doing less, just being available if they need me type thing. And I'm getting less and less contact.

Simon Ursell [00:26:38]:
I'm still alive, everyone. Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:26:40]:
But it's. It's devastatingly sad for me at the same time. It's just so freaking wonderful to see them doing so damn well. And I. You know, I don't want to sound. It's got nothing to do with me, really, but just you saying that. Then I was just thinking, God, yeah. Because I feel like I've helped create.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:27:01]:
I mean, with others. Other great people too, have, you know, probably done more than me. But I've had a. I've had an impact on the environment that we've created. Now is just. It's its own thing. It. I mean, if I'm in there knocking around, it's possibly not helping as much as just letting them get on like you with your kids.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:27:21]:
You know, they. They did their. Their own game, did the press conferences, bowling balls at beer kegs, and just generally having an absolute blast because you. You created the space in such a way that it's allowed them to do that and have an experience which they'll probably remember, if not for the rest of their lives, for a very long time.

Simon Ursell [00:27:42]:
That's gotta be. Yeah. I do think the physical environment helps, like the nature of the rivers and all that stuff and campfire, of course. And you just reminded me of when you were initially thinking about taking, you know, taking steps backwards from Tyler Granger, like how hard that was for other people to fill that space and possibly for you to stop having as much of that space as well. I'm appreciating. I appreciate your wry smile at that moment. Oh, so bad.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:28:17]:
I just. Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:28:18]:
Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:28:19]:
Actually, my mindfulness coach, Mia, has Dinesha, as she's now called. I hope that got that right. Mia, please. So she's. She's been ordained as a Buddhist cleric of some sort. I don't know what. What you call her, but anyway, she's come back from that looking Incredibly cool. And she reminded me of, I mean one of the things and mindfulness that I'm working on is not wanting to fill the space all the time.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:28:47]:
And that's just reminded me, I mean I think in terms of bounce back ability and resilience and something I think you and I've definitely, I don't know about you, but I've definitely learned from all of these pods we've done and I absolutely love doing this pod. It's one of the highlights of my month. It really is. I love it and but we, we've learned that the environment and how you build that environment is fundamental to people's ability to perform. And if you're not paying attention to that, you are not going to see good performance. End of story.

Simon Ursell [00:29:23]:
I'm going to give you a quick book recommendation. Simplifying Coaching by Claire Pedrick. Shout out to Rolly Reid who recommended to me a little bit about what you said. Almost like you doing less so they do more. And then the other thing you've made me think about and I've just talked about Danksey previously, so obviously was coaching on the mean streets of Birmingham in the schools and is now head coach of Bayern, won the Bundesliga last year. And he just told a great story that when you're speaking about environment, I think this is one of the key things. So he said at 15 he started doing his qualifications and he wanted to coach an England age grade team. And, and so the first meeting with all the coaches in the room and he was the youngest there, they said like speak to the person next to you about what you want to get in football.

Simon Ursell [00:30:10]:
And he said I wanted to, you know, tell this guy I want to coach England eighth grade. And then the guy said, has anyone heard anything from someone else? And guy said, oh, Aaron wants to coach England. And he said everyone in the room laughed. Oh. And he said I know, imagine that at 15. Like that's an oh moment, isn't it? He says it did fuel him a little bit. But he says 17 years later he was coaching in age grade and obviously now he's progressed on. But I just, I then asked him, I said like, so if I told you, you had to accelerate that and it couldn't be 17 years, had to be two years.

Simon Ursell [00:30:47]:
So at 17 you were, you know, the youngest England Asia coach ever. What would, what would be your one piece of advice? And he said an environment where it's just really normal to us for feedback. So he, when he worked in the age grade stuff in England and I have a similar experience with rugby in the 8th grade stuff with Fletch. And that is. It is like being at university and people are chasing feedback and people want to get better. And so go back to that environment of, you know, we know lots of places that are doing amazing stuff where it's just really normal to have the conversation that in some other places people don't have it.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:31:26]:
Yeah, I mean, for sure. There's so much in that. Really Rusty. That's true.

Simon Ursell [00:31:33]:
Because what I would say is so at seba, there's lots of stuff, but like, I'm lucky to work with guys like Duffs and Hickey and Sigh who have really like tough conversations with people as well. Because it's not just all. I just, you know, it's. It's. It's not like Lord of the Flies. It's got some organization around it as well.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:31:57]:
Yeah, yeah. High expectation, high support.

Simon Ursell [00:32:01]:
Yeah, that's exactly what it is. Mustafa.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:32:04]:
Get a bit boring again about Mustafa, but it's pretty cool. I'm just looking for one of my books, so. Have you read Messy, by Tim Harford, which is about chaos being great. It's all about messy environments.

Simon Ursell [00:32:17]:
I appreciate you recommending.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:32:18]:
One of the things that sticks out from that book was the old MIT building, which was a complete mess and people were banging holes in walls and chucking cables through things. It was just the most. And everyone loved it and they built a new building and everyone hated it. It was perfect. Everything was beautifully designed to achieve the best thing for them. But turns out everyone hates. They all love smashing holes in walls. And you put your head through a broken wall and talk to somebody next door and they would be doing something very different.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:32:49]:
And then you'd learn what they were doing and you'd bring that into your work. And in fact, I remember speaking to Kirk Vallis at Google about this and he was telling me that they. They designed some of their buildings to create more accidental meetings. So they. They'd put the toilets in places where you have to go past other people. And they basically thought really odd about how they could create the. The accidental, chaotic, chance meetings that spark creativity. So, yeah, I think paying attention to environment, I think that's.

Simon Ursell [00:33:29]:
Well, to be fair, we've been to Google and I always think, by the way. Yeah, like, they think about, like how long you queue in the coffee queue as well, don't they? So you end up speaking to someone. They think about the architecture, tables. But when we go up to that room at Google and there's those bits on the way that are like these wooden boxes, I always think, are they ever going to finish the office here or not? You know, you think it's going to be like super clean and it's not that clean. And by the way, Tim Harford is the undercover economist. My brain was working correctly.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:34:02]:
Well done. That's not bad after the long day. You've had good skills, buddy. That's nice.

Simon Ursell [00:34:07]:
Thank you. I appreciate you.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:34:09]:
Yeah, I appreciate you too. So, yeah, I'm excited that you spent some time with Luke and Kareem and talked about mindfulness. Tell me more about that.

Simon Ursell [00:34:19]:
Well, it was a blur because I was on holiday, but it was a bit before my wife arrived, so I was allowed to do zooms without being told off.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:34:28]:
Well, frankly, you deserve to be told.

Simon Ursell [00:34:33]:
Yeah, I think my, my overriding memory is like, I'm just way better. And whether, you know, you call it mindfulness or whatever, I'm way better at setting myself up to have more flow experiences. Way better at like planning the night before, creating space to think, getting in nature, lots. Factoring recovery after something that's been super hard, like that's probably the best thought about the most. And I guess the people I'm working with, well, they, they are performers, but they're not like the athletes, are they? And, and as coaches, we are performers. We have to be out.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:15]:
Like some of them are athletes as well, but yeah, that they are.

Simon Ursell [00:35:19]:
Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:19]:
Their job's coaching.

Simon Ursell [00:35:20]:
Yeah. Yes. And leadership and you know, and you've got to be able to like show up and adapt and improvise and, you know, practice new skills. And I think we should have the skills I have now back then as a player, that would have been really helpful.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:38]:
You're not the first 50 something year old Blake to say that, Rusty.

Simon Ursell [00:35:42]:
No, I know that, I know that.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:45]:
I think we all think we could have told stuff to our younger selves.

Simon Ursell [00:35:49]:
Yeah, I think my son's getting bored of me saying it as well. So I appreciate you pulling me up on that. Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:56]:
You might want to stop saying that to your son. I'm with your son.

Simon Ursell [00:36:00]:
Which is also, I mean, he's interested because Fred had his shoulder up again and he's in recovery mode at the moment. And, and just seeing that and then it's really interesting listening. So one of the coaches of the camp is Dean Macy. Like Dean Macy, like the legend. That is Dean Macy's legend.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:36:16]:
Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:36:16]:
And he's, he's amazing guy. And me, Fred and Dean had a conversation late last night, mainly because Love island has finished. And I had nothing to do after 9 o' clock to just about the impact of injuries on identity and all that stuff. So again, that was fascinating for Fred to hear that stuff. Definitely. He's heard it way too often from me. But to have someone who's a legend who spent, you know, he. He would say, like, I got.

Simon Ursell [00:36:46]:
I got medals because I was willing to get injured. And so he was, you know, he was injured. He described as injured for most of my career.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:36:54]:
I do remember Dean Macy being injured a lot. I mean, the guy's a legend. But he definitely pushed himself to the brink, didn't he, that guy? I mean.

Simon Ursell [00:37:01]:
Yeah, he has. Still pushing himself to the bridge, is he?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:37:05]:
It doesn't surprise me. You don't lose that kind of determination, do you?

Simon Ursell [00:37:09]:
Oh, my days.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:37:10]:
What a cool guy. So Sedbra's been amazing as usual then. You've had a wonderful time from the sounds of it.

Simon Ursell [00:37:17]:
Yeah, I mean, we do coach development every day. We get in nature up to three river swims a day. Hang out with the kids. They kind of keep you cool and young and thinking and that's pretty helpful. We go and see other sports. So there's that kind of, you know, sharing of learning. It was great to have the Italians with us. Some.

Simon Ursell [00:37:39]:
Some people stayed out last night and the Italians cook them pasta at 1am and yeah, it's just. It's just real good people like who. Who want to share, want to get better, want to help the kids. Like, yeah, it's. It's. It's a pretty amazing place, I guess. And the flip of that is that I think that pastorally, because it's. Kids stay over.

Simon Ursell [00:38:04]:
Like I've been doing it for. Since 2017 now. And it's definitely more challenging now, pastorally, than it ever has been from kids that have, you know, spent a lot of time with their families. Covid not been away that often. Like, lots going on. Way more kind of neurodiversity and diagnose season. So it's like. It's also like a great place just to go and practice your craft.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:38:32]:
Jealous practice.

Simon Ursell [00:38:34]:
You know, I know we were at the British school and I loved Stuart when he said, you know, we think all kids are awesome and the teenage brain is. And had that ringing in my head as kids were, you know, finding it.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:38:46]:
Tough, taking a bit, just trying to go with you. That's.

Simon Ursell [00:38:49]:
That is pretty brisk.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:38:51]:
Amazing.

Simon Ursell [00:38:52]:
Yeah. I feel like we had some real good kind of learning conversations with young people and that's what it's About. And I guess that's why I started with the parents of who's impacted you. And ultimately, that's what we want to do as a group of grownups is have impact on their lives. And what I would also say is we have young coaches like Fred and Ollie and the other Freddie there, and their ability to connect with the kids is remarkable. And it definitely makes me, you know, 50 or 50 now is like, how do you stay relevant? How are you interested in what they're interested in? How are you not that old guy over there who doesn't know what he's talking about?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:39:35]:
My life, buddy. Oh, Blake talking nonsense in the corner. Yeah, well, sorry. Someone might listen one day. Hopefully someone's listening to this podcast. We've.

Simon Ursell [00:39:48]:
We're hopefully not my one.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:39:50]:
Yeah. Preferably not. Likewise.

Simon Ursell [00:39:53]:
Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:39:55]:
So you might get grassed up.

Simon Ursell [00:39:57]:
Oh, my God.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:39:58]:
Yeah. Yeah. Be aware.

Simon Ursell [00:40:01]:
What are you thinking about? We've been pretty good at taking challenges. Like, what would be a good challenge for the next month?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:40:07]:
Well, definitely the Shadows to do some gratitude, so I'm going to keep doing that, but that's not a new one, so we would have to come up with something else. What could we do over this month? Well, I've picked on environment, so I think I might go off and see if I can. Actually, we're not reporting back next month because we've got a guest, so we can still talk about it, but.

Simon Ursell [00:40:29]:
Gives you two months. Gives you two months.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:40:31]:
Two months. Try and I think try and find an environment that's pretty cool that I can talk about. I'm bound to be in a few, so I try and pay. Pay a. Pay real attention to that and see if I can come back and share what I found.

Simon Ursell [00:40:47]:
What about you think I'm going to set myself a challenge this week with the coaches of having six, like, let's call them, like, important conversations to help coaches get better, but you know, like in the moment, kind, helpful, timely. So I know I spoke about the feedback stuff, but same again. I'm going to get to hang out with loads of coaches over the next few weeks. So just making sure I keep that up, really. From, you know, all the stuff, I think back to the Kevin Barings and the, you know, the John Fletcher's this world that. That in a very kind way, we punch you in the face. Those are pretty helpful moments. I'm gonna.

Simon Ursell [00:41:27]:
I'm gonna be more Aaron Danks. I'm gonna be a bit more Bundesliga than Premier League.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:41:32]:
Excellent. That's awesome.

Simon Ursell [00:41:34]:
Thank you.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:41:34]:
And we've got a. We've got an amazing guest on next month. I haven't told you much about him, so I'm not going to either all the listeners you'll have to listen, but I am gonna go out on a limb and say you're gonna love the guest. I think it's gonna be a good one.

Simon Ursell [00:41:49]:
I like the element of surprise. I love being surprised.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:41:52]:
Yeah, well, consider yourself surprised. Well, thanks for listening in again. Another month, everyone. And yeah, we'll see you with a guest next month. Excited about that over now.

Simon Ursell [00:42:07]:
Thanks so much for joining us on the Band Specability podcast with Sam and Russell. We've really enjoyed your company if you want to reach out to us. Simon, where can they reach you?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:42:16]:
LinkedIn's best place. Simon Ursel, you are S4 Sugar E doubleL Send me a message. Rusty, where can we find you?

Simon Ursell [00:42:23]:
TikTok? No, not really. LinkedIn, Russ Landshaw and then the same on Twitter. But please ignore all my political thoughts.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:42:30]:
Yeah, second that.

Simon Ursell [00:42:32]:
Over and out.