<![CDATA[blue collar grit

<![CDATA[blue collar grit - Blog]]>Thu, 11 Jun 2026 12:34:52 -0400Weebly<![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 11 Jun 2026 16:21:53 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog9772959

Joy > Happiness

Jim Collins immortalized James Stockdale in his book, Good to Great, with what he called the Stockdale Paradox. Collins described it as the ability to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, while never losing faith you will prevail in the end. It went beyond optimism. Faith and hope are foundational in the Stockdale Paradox. There must be a certainty that something better is coming, even if you can’t see it yet.
Stockdale was a Navy fighter pilot who was shot down over Vietnam in 1965. He was held as a prisoner of war for seven and a half years. In that time he was tortured dozens of times, lived in complete uncertainty with no idea when or if he would ever be released, and no idea if he would even get out alive.
What kept him going wasn't optimism or circumstances eventually breaking his way. Good days were hard to find. But something deeper and more durable were at play for Stockdale. Believe it or not, it was true joy. I know, I know, it's crazy to attach joy to time spent as a POW. But joy, as Stockdale understood it, was not the absence of suffering. It was the presence of the unshakeable belief that this is not the end of the story. And, he had it in spades.
Stockdale separated what he couldn’t control, like the cell, the torture, and the uncertainty, from what he could control like his identity, his values, and his hope. He held both truths at the same time and that tension, brutal honesty paired with unbreakable hope, is what allowed him to survive.
Why Should We Care?
Most of us are chasing happiness. And happiness obviously isn't a bad thing, it's just fragile. It's a byproduct. It shows up when things go your way and disappears when they don't. It's tied to the scoreboard, the outcome, the circumstance. Happy when we win. Happy when we're recognized. Happy when the plan works. The moment things go sideways, happiness goes with it. That's not a character flaw. That's just what happiness is. It was never designed to carry the weight we put on it.
Joy is different. Joy isn't circumstantial. It's foundational. It doesn't need a good day to survive. It lives underneath the good days and the bad ones. And the thing that feeds joy, the thing that brings it to life even in the worst circumstances, is hope. Not wishful thinking or naive optimism. Hope is the deep, settled conviction that there is meaning in the struggle and something worth pressing toward on the other side of it.
For leaders, your people are in the cell with you. They feel the certainty, or uncertainty. They feel the pressure. They watch what you do when the plan falls apart and the scoreboard doesn't cooperate. If all you can offer them is happy thoughts, it will last until the next hard thing shows up. And there will always be a next hard thing. But if you can deal them hope, you've given them something that survives the circumstances. And hope is always an option, you just have to choose it.

REAL TALK - Action Steps
The gap between a happiness-chasing leader and a hope-dealing leader is significant and your people feel it. Here's where to start closing the gap.

Name Your Hope
- When things are tough, what do you reach for? If your peace is entirely dependent on outcomes breaking your way, you are running on happiness. That tank empties fast. Joy requires an anchor below the circumstance line. It’s a conviction about who you are, why this matters, and what you believe is possible. Name yours. Get specific. Write it down. We can't offer what we don't have.

Name the Reality
- The Stockdale Paradox is a discipline. Your people don't need you to pretend. They need you to be honest about what's hard and unwilling to quit on what's possible. Practice holding both. The next time something goes sideways, resist the urge to immediately spin it positive. Name the reality first. Then name what you still believe. Honesty plus hope is what trust is built on.

Share It
- Hope isn't just a feeling you carry privately. It’s best when spoken. Your team needs to hear it from you. Not a pep talk. Something meaningful. Say it. Mean it. Say it again.

Happiness will come and go. It always does. Joy is available in every circumstance through the choices we make - and the difference is simply hope. Hope is something every leader can choose to carry and to give away. Afterall, that is our job so deal it!
Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 04 Jun 2026 17:06:11 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog8845017

The Cost of No

Pat Tillman understood it as well as anyone who has ever lived that I know of.
In May 2002, Tillman turned down a three-year, $3.6 million NFL contract offer to enlist in the U.S. Army with his younger brother Kevin. Tillman was 25 years old and the starting safety for the Arizona Cardinals. He had just set the Cardinals record for total tackles and, by every external measure, was a huge success and on his way to stardom.
For Tillman, this wasn't the first time he said no to more money. In 2001, the Rams had offered him a five-year, $9 million contract. He turned it down to stay with Arizona. The Cardinals were the team that drafted him and we wanted to stay out of loyalty, he would later say. Think about that. He said no to $9 million before he said no to $3.6 million.
He drove a beat-up truck to a facility full of guys who'd just signed multi-million dollar contracts. He read books in a locker room where most guys were watching their own highlights. He had never fit the mold. He was good being different.
Those who knew him best said Tillman had values that could not be compromised. He refused to let the world negotiate with them, no matter the price tag attached to doing so. Although he never offered reasons for his decision to enlist, his actions were enough explanation. He knew what success looked like to him. He lived by it. Society didn't set the definition. He did.
Why Should We Care?
The night before my daughter's wedding, I received a text from Sherri Coale. Coach Coale, while she is a legendary hall of fame coach, has become a trusted mentor on all things coaching and life. Her perspective shaped in equal parts by humility and wisdom: What a day. Your gift for putting family first. Enjoy every single second. Congratulations.
I've been turning that over ever since. It made me think about all my no's.
The career advancements I dabbled with, was on the verge of taking, but ultimately didn't chase. The opportunities I personally wanted to tackIe, go all in on, but for some reason chose not to pursue. The trips I didn’t make, hobbies I didn’t take up, and social gatherings I skipped out on have all made a lap through my mind in the last few days following my daughter’s wedding. At the time, every one of those decisions came with a cost, as they all do.
The world is loud about what success is supposed to look like. The title. The income. The popularity. It has a way of making you feel the gap between where you are and where it thinks you should be. The pressure is real and will slowly, subtly start writing your definition of success for you if you let it.
The most dangerous version of this is the slow drift away from who you know you want to be. The gradual recalibration of your values toward whatever the room is rewarding. You don't wake up one day and decide to stop living your priorities, like family. You just keep saying yes to a few more things that cost you a little more time. Until one day you look up and the life you're living doesn't match the one you said you wanted.
Defining success on your own terms isn't a one-time decision. It's a daily one. It requires knowing what you actually value, not what you're supposed to value, and then being willing to pay the price of the no when those two things conflict. The no is never free. But neither is the yes.
I’ve often asked myself, if I would’ve changed just one of those choices would my whole life be different? Would the life of my kids have gone differently? And, now I think I finally know the answer: Absolutely. Different doesn’t necessarily mean better or worse, but it surely would be different.
The world is a lousy mentor. I’m convinced the fastest way to make a mess of things is to make decisions based on what you think the world wants and deems successful. No matter how loudly it shouts, the world doesn’t know. You do. It’s just a matter of whether we have the clarity and conviction to live by it.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
Stop negotiating your definition of success with the world. Building that kind of clarity takes intentional work. Here's where to start.

How do you define success?
- Write. It. Down. When the applause stops and the title doesn't matter, what does success look like? Be specific. Most people have never put it in writing, which means it is little more than a feeling. And, feelings are easy to walk away from.

Does my ‘yes’ reflect my values?
- Every yes costs a no somewhere. If my yes doesn’t reflect my values, then the problem isn't a lack of discipline. It's a lack of clarity about what’s most important to you. Get clear on your destination before you start making turns.

Do I honor my ‘no’?
- They are not failures. They are proof that you know what matters. And over time, they add up to a life you actually meant to live.

Where are you with your definition of success? Are you living it or are you saying ‘yes’ to things that do not align with it? Are you slowly allowing the world to rewrite it for you?

Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 28 May 2026 13:54:58 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog9194646

She Can Laugh

Every morning at 8:00am, for a while now, I’ve sent the same two text messages. At first, they were offered as sagely advice for a situation one of our kids were trying to navigate - a kind of ninja parenting tactic if you will. One I’ve always known they saw cleanly through, but I would mask anyway. Now, I suppose, the purpose of the messages is simply to remind. To remind them of who they said they wanted to be and to remind myself of the hope each day brings to start fresh on just that.

To Gabe: Selfless. Devoted. Neoteny. Attack life! Have no fear! Love you!
To Dink: Thankful. Selfless. Resilient. God-fearing. Keep Smiling! Love you!

Dink is Ally and she’s getting married this week. Sure, that means I’m old but it’s still awesome. Naturally the monotony of the daily text messages tends to dull true meaning over time, but as I’ve hit send on the message the last few days the meaning has shoved its way back to the forefront. As I look closer, what was once my hope is a reality - and has been for a while.

Al is thankful. She doesn’t miss opportunities to say it. She doesn’t miss opportunities to show it. She knows exactly where she came from and is unapologetically proud of hanging out with janitors during basketball practice or shoveling cow poop at two in the morning. Al is selfless. There is no better gift giver in the world. She’s always listening, always paying attention to what makes those in her circle smile. She’s never more happy than when she can bless their world with a beam. Al is resilient. She’s a supreme optimist, tough as nails, and more disciplined when convicted than the most accomplished athlete. No one can kill a 30-day shred like her. And, Al is God-fearing. Strong in her convictions, respectful and proud of the person she is. As Proverbs 31:25 says, “She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.” Laughing is her specialty.

I’m so thankful Ally feels at home in her own skin. There may be no greater gift a child can give a parent. It allows her to enter her marriage as herself, not a cheapened version of whoever someone else wants her to be. Isn’t that how all of the best relationships operate? We accept ourselves, which frees us to accept others. When we are unable, or unwilling, to accept ourselves, then any relationship we have with another person falls victim to the same judgment we aim at ourselves.

My hope now is that her soon-to-be husband simply accepts her for who she is and she accepts him for who he is. Not the version of each other they might wish existed, or the version that shows up on the best days. The real one. The one that's tired and imperfect and still perfect. The best thing anyone can bring to a marriage is a full sense of self. A person who knows who they are doesn't need their spouse to complete them. They get to complement them instead.

Parenting is leadership, just with higher stakes. It took me a while, but I eventually realized that we don't get to choose the outcome for our kids, or those we lead. We get to choose what we say and do day after day after day. We get to choose whether we show up the same on the hard days as we do on the easy ones. And, we get to show someone who they are before they fully believe it themselves. What an honor to parent, and lead.

What will it feel like to hit send on the text message Saturday?
I’m not sure. But, I’m going to send it.

Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 21 May 2026 14:17:51 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog7746791

Nowhere to Be

Everyone knows the name John Wooden. He coached UCLA basketball for 27 seasons. In that time, he won 10 national championships, seven in a row, plus an 88-game winning streak that still stands as the longest in college basketball history. He was a legend that coached legends.
A noteworthy aspect of Wooden’s accomplishments was his coaching style. On most game nights he sat calmly with his rolled-up program in his hand, simply watching his players perform. He knew the majority of his work had been done in practice and by this point, he had surrendered the outcome. He wasn’t consumed by the scoreboard. He wasn’t obsessed with berating officials. Unlike his coaching peers, Wooden found a way to separate himself from the one thing everyone else was fixated on - the outcome.
It was intentionality, not indifference. And it was grown from deep within him, through years of losing and mediocrity that most disregard. Wooden spent 14 years quietly building his definition of success that had nothing to do with trophies before winning his first championship. Wooden’s definition goes like this: "Success is the peace of mind which is a direct result of the self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable."
He eliminated the external validation, making it completely absent from his definition of success. Wooden arrived somewhere most people spend their whole lives chasing and never find. Nowhere. He had nowhere to go. Nothing to get. No one to be.
Why Should We Care?
Most of us are living one step ahead, or behind, ourselves. We're not here, where our feet are. We're on to the next win, reaching for the next promotion, and already working on the next version of ourselves that may (fingers crossed) finally feel like enough. We believe that if we can just get there - wherever there is - we'll be good. We'll finally lead well, live well and feel like we've made it.
Unfortunately, or fortunately for those who have accepted it, there is no there. And deep down, you already know it. Because no matter how much you chase it, no matter what mountain you climb, there’s always another one.
Some lazily attribute this mindset to a lack of ambition, but ambition isn’t the problem. Ambition isn’t inherently good or bad. The problem is making your peace of mind contingent on outcomes you can't fully control. When that's the deal you've made with yourself, fear runs your decisions, not conviction. You protect the destination and those you lead can feel it. They feel the difference between a leader who is fully present with them and one who is desperately trying to be somewhere else.
Leading from desperation and leading from fullness are two very different things. When we start from a place of fullness, those we lead don’t have to wonder what we need from them because the answer is obvious. We need nothing. We’ve already decided what success is.
That kind of leadership feels like freedom, not pressure. And the people worth following give that to the people around them because they've stopped needing, not because they've stopped caring.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
Living from a place of nowhere to go and nothing to get requires intentional work. Here are three places to start:

Define the Score That Matters
- Wooden's definition of success had no scoreboard in it. How about yours? Write it down. What does success look like that has nothing to do with outcomes you can't control? What does it look like to fully give your best today regardless of what the result is? Be specific. Make it something you can actually measure.

Become Aware
- The next time you feel yourself managing someone's perception of you, ask one honest question: What am I protecting right now? The answer will tell you what you're still placing your identity in. What we cling to controls us. Naming it is the first step toward letting it go.

Free Your Team
- The most freeing thing a leader can offer their team is a version of themselves that doesn't need anything from them. Just full, present, committed leadership for its own sake. Start one conversation today with no agenda other than genuine investment in that person. No return required. No destination in mind. Just there.

Nowhere to go, nothing to get, no one to be … sounds easy enough. It's a mindset available to every one of us who is willing to stop running toward something long enough to ask whether what we already have is actually enough.

Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Fri, 15 May 2026 02:07:47 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog2401814

Laughing at Fear

I love the movie Hoosiers and love all the Rocky movies of course, but Secretariat may be my favorite film of all time. And, as far as scenes go, nothing beats Big Red making the final turn in Belmont Park. A narrator breaks the silence: “He laughs at fear, afraid of nothing. He will not shy away from the sword. He will not stand still when the trumpet sounds.” Her voice fades to the sound of Secretariat’s hooves thundering the dirt, on his way to a 31 length victory.

I cry every time.
Let me set the scene for you.
June 9, 1973. Belmont Park. Nearly 70,000 people in attendance to witness history. Secretariat had already won the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness. One race stood between him and the first Triple Crown in 25 years, but nobody knew what was really coming.
When the gates opened, Big Red, typically a come from behind type horse, ran side by side with his rival Sham through the first half mile. The pace was much faster than experts of the time expected. When most guessed Secretariat would fade at the longer distance, the exact opposite happened. He exploded and began to run not only faster, but freer. Ron Turcotte, his jockey, later said he never asked him for more. He simply let him run.
By the final turn, the question was no longer whether Secretariat would win. The question was by how much. He crossed the finish line 31 lengths ahead of the second-place horse, Sham. That’s a 253 feet win in a record time of 2:24 that still stands today.
Secretariat ran like he had nothing to protect and nothing to lose. There is no better place to perform, or lead, from.
Why Should We Care?
Fear is the most common performance killer in leadership, and it almost never looks like what we think it should. It usually shows up as hesitation disguised as wisdom. It shows up as over managing, over explaining, and over hedging. We wait a little longer than necessary, pull back a little sooner than needed, and stay safely inside a lane that's a little narrower than it has to be.
Fear-based leadership is exhausting. Not just for the leader, but for everyone around them. People can feel when their leader lacks the confidence to go for it, even when the leader can't. It changes the temperature of the room and lowers the ceiling of what a team believes is possible.
Laughing at fear isn't the absence of awareness. It's the presence of something stronger.
The leaders worth following are the ones who have developed something inside them that is more powerful than the fear. It’s certainty. Conviction. When it's truly present, fear doesn't disappear, it just stops driving.
Your team is running at the pace you set. If you're holding back, so are they. If you're hesitating, so are they. If you're managing your risk instead of running your race, so are they. Your posture is contagious in both directions.
Fear is coming. The question is do you have an anchor strong enough that you can laugh at it?
REAL TALK - Action Steps
Confronting fear with a smile takes deep work and intentional practice. Here are a few steps along that path:

Name It to Tame It
- What internal fear is limiting your leadership right now? Fear of failure? Fear of what people think? Fear of making the wrong call? You don't have to share the answer with anyone. You do have to know it and name it. What you refuse to name, you can't address. What you can't address, you can't overcome. Get specific and be honest.

Advantage to the Bold
- Fear doesn't always announce itself, it just quietly slows you down. Are you waiting because the timing isn't right, or are you waiting because you’re afraid? If it's the latter, make the move. Leadership that waits for certainty rarely gets there. The advantage always favors the bold.

Reach Up, Not Just Out
- The leaders who consistently operate without fear-based hesitation are not fearless. They’re deeply rooted in the purpose, people, and standard they've committed to. What belief is inside you right now that is larger than your fear? It's what allows each of us to run free.

“He laughs at fear” because he has already decided who he is and how he's going to run. The most impactful people, and powerful leaders, in any room have made the same decision. Not once, but daily.
Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 07 May 2026 15:24:19 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog1870600

Fighting Anticipation

There's an old western story that I've always liked. Three cowboys set out early in the morning and rode hard through the whole day with nothing in their stomachs. By midday two of them feel the need to express their frustrations and begin to complain - about the heat, about their saddle, but particularly about how long it had been since breakfast. They went on and on describing how hungry they were, as if the words themselves would fill them up.
The third cowboy, who had been in the saddle just as long and eaten just as little, said nothing.
Finally, one of the others turned to him and asked if he was hungry.
The third cowboy simply shrugged and shook his head ‘no’. Of course, that reply only prompted the first two cowboys to double down on their pain and struggle with more complaints.
That evening when they finally arrived at their destination, they settled in for their first meal of the day. The first to fill his plate and begin scarfing down his food … the third cowboy, the one who claimed to not be hungry. His two partners, surprised and watching closely, finally asked, "I thought you said you weren't hungry?"
The third cowboy set his fork down on his empty plate and looked at them for a second before replying, "Not wise to be hungry then. No food."
Why Should We Care?
Complaining is one of the most socially acceptable habits we have, which is exactly what makes it so dangerous. We treat it as a release valve. A way to connect. A reasonable response to difficulty. As true as any of those are, they rarely improve the situation. Most of the time, complaining about a problem that has no immediate solution is just an energy leak which costs more than we realize.
The cowboy in the story above wasn't pretending. He simply made a choice. Rather than suppressing his discomfort through gritted teeth while secretly suffering he made a decision to disregard his feeling of hunger completely knowing that the awareness of his hunger, with zero ability to fix it in that moment, served no useful purpose. So he redirected his energy toward things that did. He stayed present. He did the work in front of him. And when food arrived and he could actually do something about being hungry, he did.
There's a version of this that shows up everywhere in leadership and life. Complaining doesn't make the food come faster, the meeting more organized, or the practice more productive. It just makes the ride feel longer.
The best leaders are constantly assessing if the challenge immediately in front of them is something they can fix right now. If the answer is yes, then they stop talking and fix it. If the answer is no, they minimize the energy on it until they can. They aren't wired for denial, they're wired for efficiency. They understand that suffering out loud benefits no one.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
Here are a few ideas to shift your thinking in this direction.

What Can I Do?
- Before you voice a complaint, ask yourself honestly if there is something you can actually do about it right now? If the answer is yes, do that instead of complaining. If the answer is no, notice that you were about to spend energy on something that costs you and changes nothing. That awareness should start to shift the habit.

So What, Now What
- For one week, pay attention to how much time and attention you give to problems you can't currently solve. Most people are genuinely surprised by how often they're mentally engaged with complaining about a problem they can do nothing about. Seeing the pattern is the first step toward breaking it.

Saving AND Applying
- Whatever you are conserving yourself for, make sure you arrive there ready. The discipline of staying quiet when nothing productive can happen is what allows you to bring everything when something can. Save it. It's worth more when you need it.

The real battle most of us lose isn't with the problem itself, but with the anticipation of the problem. We love to rehearse the difficulty before it arrives. That's the trap. Not the hard thing itself, but the mental miles we log dreading it. The discipline of staying present and of refusing to suffer before suffering is even required is one of the most underrated forms of toughness there is.

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 30 Apr 2026 14:13:38 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog6551061

Fine Tuning

If you’ve ever seen the movie Miracle, about the 1980 US Olympic hockey team, then you have a pretty clear picture of what coach Herb Brooks valued. He was never enamored with having the most talented players. His focus was on picking the right ones - and right only pertained to his opinion, not the media. When his selection process was over, the roster confused almost everyone who watched it come together. Future NHL stars were left off while college kids nobody had heard of made it. The logic wasn't obvious, but Brooks knew exactly what he was building.
Brooks never wanted a collection of the best individuals. He wanted people who could each, individually, commit to a standard of play, preparation, and sacrifice that he had defined long before the team was selected. Once chosen, Brooks would crush them physically, running them until they couldn't stand. He would press their true commitment by challenging their identities before he challenged their skills.
A subtlety in Brooks’ approach is that he never asked them to follow each other. Instead, he asked each of them to follow something bigger. And because every single player on that roster eventually bowed to the same standard, twenty guys who didn't particularly like each other became one of the most unified teams in sports history.
They didn't find alignment by looking sideways at each other. They found it by looking up at something fixed, demanding, and non-negotiable. That's the thing about standards. When they're real, they do the heavy lifting. You don't have to manage people with each other. You just have to make sure everyone is committed to the same standard.
Why Should We Care?
Most people think culture is built through relationships. And relationships matter, but they alone don't hold a culture together when things get tough. The relationships need a shared standard that each person has individually accepted as their own too.
The clarity this provides is critical. It never drifts. If your standard is tied too closely to other people, then your ceiling is whatever the room produces. When the room is tired or tempted to cut corners, then the standard moves with it. And so does your identity.
Standards, as we all now, are the standards. They don’t move. They don't have good days and bad days. They don't soften when things get hard or tighten up when people are watching. They are fixed. And the only way a team actually holds a standard is when each individual on that team has made a personal decision to be accountable to it because they've decided that's who they want to be.
This is where individual excellence and team culture stop being separate conversations. Your personal standard is the building block of everything around you. How you prepare when no one's watching you. How you respond when you're corrected. Whether your effort changes based on the score. These aren't small things. These are the things that tell everyone around you what the real standard is. People believe what they see far more than what they hear.
Brooks didn't stand in front of that team and talk about unity. He stood in front of each individual player and demanded something specific. The unity was a byproduct of what each man chose to give despite what it cost him.
Your standard is your identity and your identity is your culture.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
The Tozer quote is convincing because it removes excuses. You don't get to point at the environment and explain away your standard. Here's a good place to start down that road.

Name It
- Every person who operates with real consistency has a fixed reference point. There is something specific they are accountable to regardless of circumstances. For some it's faith. For some it's their values. Whatever it is, it needs to be named. Get specific. Write it down. Make it real.

Check It
- Is your standard the same on a Tuesday in February as it is on a Friday in October? Is it the same when things are going great and when everything is a challenge? Most people’s aren't and most people don't even notice. Choose an area of life and ask yourself whether your standard in that area is fixed or flexible. Flexible standards aren't standards. They're preferences.

Live It
- The most powerful thing a leader can do is be the most visibly committed person in the room to the standard they're asking others to hold. You must be relentless in it. When the person leading sets their own standard at an unmistakable level, it gives everyone else something tangible to strive for. Culture trickles down from what people actually watch you do.

The 1980 team beat the Soviets because twenty individuals each made a personal decision to be accountable to something fixed and demanding. When it came time to perform, that alignment was unshakeable. The standard didn’t raise the bar. It held it.
Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 23 Apr 2026 20:32:44 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog7701451

Be Curious, Not Judgmental

There's a scene in Ted Lasso that stops me cold every time I see it.
Ted, the relentlessly optimistic football coach who jumped into the world of English soccer, is at a pub with his boss. In walks Rupert, his boss’ smug, condescending ex-husband. Eventually, he challenges Ted to a game of darts, in another effort to humiliate him. Rupert’s arrogance is palpable. He's confident he already knows who Ted is - a joke of a coach, an embarrassment of a man, and completely out of his league in all facets of his life.
Ted, who is as comfortable in his own skin as anyone, is an agreeable accomplice. His awkwardness and humility are easily mistaken for weakness. As the game is playing out, and Rupert is gaining confidence, Ted shifts the entire story line. Just before his final throws, Ted opens up.
He tells Rupert that guys have been underestimating him his whole life. For years it really bothered him. Until one day, driving his son to school, he saw a line painted on a wall: "Be curious, not judgmental." He liked that, Ted recalls. And then, it hit him. Every single person who had ever written him off had one thing in common. Not one of them had ever been curious. They thought they had it all figured out, so they judged everything and everyone.
To close his sidebar Ted looks at the board with a half-smile and shrug. "Because if they were curious," he says, "they would've asked questions. Questions like - have you played a lot of darts, Ted?" … as he throws a triple twenty. "To which I would've answered - yes sir. Every Sunday afternoon at a sports bar with my father, from age ten until I was sixteen, when he passed away." A deep breath is followed only by his final toss: “Barbecue Sauce.” Bullseye.
Why Should We Care?
The speed by which judgment can take place is part of the problem. It’s fast - real fast. Draw the conclusion and move on. Curiosity is slow, also part of the problem. Our brains are built to categorize quickly. We want to size people up, file them away, and move on. It's efficient. Unfortunately, it's also almost always incomplete. We see the surface and assume we understand the depths. We see someone's decision and have no idea what options they were actually working with.
Leaders who lead from judgment create cultures of fear. People stop being honest. They hide struggles, mistakes, and uncertainty because they know, or assume they know (after all isn’t that what’s being modeled for them?) exactly how it will be received. But leaders who lead from curiosity create safety. The simple act of asking a question or two or three before forming an opinion signals to people that they are worth understanding. That signal changes everything.
The understanding most leaders never grasp is that curiosity isn't just about how you see others. It's about how you see yourself. The most self-aware leaders in any room are the ones who stay curious about their own blind spots, their own assumptions, their own defaults. Judgment closes the loop. Curiosity keeps it open. And the best growth in people, teams, and organizations almost always happens in that open loop.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
The shift from judgment to curiosity isn't a personality trait. It's a daily practice. Here's a few ideas on where to start.

Ask One More
- The next time you catch yourself reacting to someone's behavior or decision, pause and ask one more question before you land on a verdict. Most of the time, the answer will change your stance entirely. You don't have to agree with someone to understand them. But you do have to ask.

No Silent Verdicts
- The silent verdict we render without ever saying a word is one of the habits we hold that does the most damage. Someone shows up late. Someone doesn't perform. Before your internal jury returns a verdict, ask yourself honestly: Why? Do I actually know what they were working with? Usually the answer is no. That space between what you see and what you know is exactly where curiosity belongs.

Wonder Why
- Judgment lives in certainty. Curiosity lives in wonder. It's a small language shift, but it rewires the posture entirely. Practice replacing "I think you should..." with "What have you tried?" That shift builds a different kind of leader.

People are more than what they look like at first glance. Judgment stops at the surface. Curiosity goes deeper. And the leaders who stay genuinely interested in people, in context, in the full story are the ones people trust, follow, and give their best to. Be curious, not judgmental.

Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg Blog]]>Thu, 16 Apr 2026 14:38:38 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog7684866

The Last Lie

Arthur Ashe had every reason to believe he did it himself.
Overcoming harsh odds often does that for us. Like growing up in segregated Richmond, Virginia or being the son of a simple, humble park worker. Ashe wasn't supposed to be playing tennis. He wasn’t supposed to be on the main courts. And he certainly wasn't supposed to be winning. But by 1975, Ashe had become the first Black man ever to win Wimbledon, defeating Jimmy Connors in what many still consider the biggest upset in tournament history.
Ask Ashe how he accomplished such a monumental feat and he would rank his contribution near the bottom. He would be relentless in naming the people who made him - Ron Charity, the man who first put a racket in his hand or Dr. Robert Johnson, who funded all of his travel, housed him, and coached him for a decade. He didn't mention those men as footnotes. He insisted they were the story. He carried a deep belief that his gifts were not his own to claim. They were given. And with that understanding came a deep, unshakable obligation to use them well, share them generously, and never confuse what he'd accomplished with who he was.
Late in his life, after a blood transfusion had given him HIV, after his body was failing and the world was watching, Ashe was asked if he ever questioned God for the hand he'd been dealt. His response says everything about his perspective on life. He explained, “If I’d asked ‘Why me?’ about AIDS, I'd have had to ask ‘Why me?’ about Wimbledon too. Both were gifts I didn't earn. Both belonged to something bigger than me.”
Why Should We Care?
C.S. Lewis wrote that the last principle of hell is the belief that "I am my own man." It sounds like strength. It's dressed up as power, self-reliance, the rugged pursuit of excellence … And in small doses, it's useful. But taken to its logical conclusion, this mindset becomes a prison. When we fully convince ourselves that we are the sole authors of our own success, we cut ourselves off from the very things that make sustained excellence possible. Things like honest relationships, genuine gratitude, and the humility to keep working to grow.
The tension every serious leader has to navigate is real. You have to develop yourself. You have to do the hard work, build the discipline, and own your growth. No one can do that for you. But the moment that pursuit tips into "I am my own man," you've crossed a dangerous line. You start protecting your ego instead of building your character. You stop believing in anything bigger than the accomplishments on your resume. And quietly, without even noticing it, your growth stalls and complacency sets in.
The best leaders carry a tension that lesser leaders can't hold. They are fiercely committed to their own development and deeply aware that they didn't get here alone. They push hard and stay grateful. They believe in something bigger than themselves without using it as an excuse to stop working. That's not a contradiction. That's excellence.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
This isn't complicated, but it is convicting. Here are three things you can focus on today to be a little more aware of who is lifting you up.

The Believer
- Everyone has one. Someone who saw something in you before you saw it in yourself. Someone who gave you a resource, an opportunity, or a belief that changed the trajectory of your life. Write that person's name down. Get specific about what they gave you. If they're still alive, reach out and thank them. The act of naming them keeps you honest about who you really are and how you really got here. Self-made is a myth.

The Anchor
- Fear is loud, and it only gets louder when the only thing you're working for is yourself. When you're anchored to something bigger like a team, a mission, or a faith, fear loses its grip. It still shows up. But it doesn't get to drive. Identify what you're actually building, and make sure it outlasts you.

The Loner
- This doesn't always show up as arrogance. Sometimes it shows up as crushing self-sufficiency. The refusal to ask for help, the inability to receive from others, the belief that needing people is weakness are all forms of it. If your self-development has quietly become self-isolation, it's time to check yourself. Dependence on the right people isn't a deficit. It's a sign that you understand how growth actually works.

Lewis was right. Fear doesn't last. Only love does. And the fastest way to get trapped in fear is to convince yourself that you're the whole story. Arthur Ashe won Wimbledon. He also knew exactly who helped him get there. That combination of fierce competitiveness and genuine humility is rare. But it's the only version of excellence that actually lasts.

Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

]]><![CDATA[bcg blog]]>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 13:41:01 GMThttps://www.bluecollargrit.com/blog/bcg-blog3818156

Return On Investment

Fred Rogers didn't pass the eye test for a leader. He had no corner office, no title worth bragging about, and no noteworthy prodigies he was responsible for. What he had was a television show, a nice cardigan, and a true conviction about how to treat people.
What most people don't know is that Rogers was deeply intentional about every relationship he built and not in the manipulative way many leaders attempt to gain trust. He kept a mental list of people who had impacted him. He wrote personal, handwritten letters to them often out of nowhere, years after their last interaction. He didn't tally what people owed him. As a matter of fact, he never seemed to be keeping score at all. In a world that measures everything, Fred Rogers was stubbornly, consistently unmeasurable.
People who knew him well said the same thing - you always felt like the most important person in the room. That wasn't a technique. It was the natural output of someone who had genuinely stopped calculating and started caring. He was the epitome of a ‘there you are’ person rather than a ‘here I am’ person.
The 100/0 Principle is a simple guide to all relationships. You view the relationship as 100% your responsibility and expect 0% in return. When we remove the expectation of receiving, we are more free to give. As long as there is a thought of a return on investment, the percentage will always fall below 100% and our relationships will be left wanting more.
Why Should We Care?
Return on investment is a brilliant concept for capital. You put money in, you measure what comes back, and you make decisions based on the math. Clean. Logical. Efficient. It fits nicely in a spreadsheet.
The problem is that we've snuck it into our relationships, and it's slowly poisoning them. If we’re not careful we will start keeping unconscious ledgers on people. Who showed up for us, who didn't, who gave more than they got, who owes us something - all become unconscious scoreboards. We invest our time and attention with one eye always on the return. The moment a relationship stops paying off, we begin to withdraw.
Unfortunately, we fail to realize the people around us always feel it. They may not be able to name it, but they know immediately when they're a transaction. They know when your generosity has strings. They know when your loyalty is conditional on performance. The moment they sense the ledger, the trust is already gone.
Deep relationships that last through real adversity, produce real loyalty, and create the kind of team or family culture that actually works. And, something that cannot be built on a return on investment framework. They are built on something fundamentally different. Generosity without guarantee, presence without performance metrics, and commitment that doesn't recalculate when the numbers shift … those are the real lifeblood of relationships and a championship culture.
Fred Rogers didn't write those letters because he expected something in return. He did it because he understood that people are not investments. They are ends in themselves. And leaders who genuinely believe that build something that no spreadsheet can quantify and no competitor can replicate.
REAL TALK - Action Steps
Here are a few ideas to keep the idea of return on investment out of mind while you’re building relationships and your team:

Forget Strings
- Most of us don't realize we're keeping score until we catch ourselves feeling resentful that someone didn't reciprocate. Make it a habit to give with no strings, or no expectation underneath it. You cannot build trust while simultaneously tracking returns. The moment you catch yourself calculating, it's time to reset.

Forget Efficient
- Do things that are inefficient by design. Efficiency is the wrong standard for people. Identify one relationship and do something for them that costs you more than it's convenient to give. The act of giving without calculation is what trains your heart away from the transactional and toward the relational.

Forget Proof
- One of the most common ways the return on investment mindset shows up in leadership is in conditional commitment - I'll fully invest in this person once they prove they're worth it. But trust doesn't work that way. It's built through consistent, unconditional presence over time, not through a series of auditions. Give before the proof is there.

Decide on your commitment to the people in your charge and then honor it. Not because they've earned it yet, but because you've decided who you are as a leader regardless of the return.

Checkout Surrender the Outcome on Amazon and order The Score That Matters with Ryan Hawk & Brook Cupps. The latest blog from Blue Collar Grit can be found here!

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