Let's Think About It Podcast
Welcome to the Let's Think About It Podcast with Morice (Coach Mo) Mabry! Are you ready to break free from fear, doubt, and uncertainty to unlock your true potential? Join Coach Mo on a transformative journey as we tackle the barriers hindering your personal growth. In each episode, we engage in insightful conversations with certified coaches, career professionals, and thriving entrepreneurs. Together, we uncover practical strategies to overcome self-imposed limitations and cultivate resilience. Gain clarity, boost confidence, and thrive in the face of uncertainty. Coach Mo, an Associate Certified Coach (ACC) accredited by the International Coaching Federation (ICF) and a published author, serves as your guide on this empowering quest for self-discovery and growth. Through mindfulness and mindset mastery, we empower you to navigate the inner critic and life's challenges to seize opportunities for success. Tune in to the Let's Think About It Podcast to equip yourself with the tools and inspiration needed to embrace uncertainty, conquer fear, tame the inner critic, and chart a course towards personal fulfillment. Start your journey to greatness today!
Let's Think About It Podcast
The Unspoken Struggle Behind Athletic Dreams and Education with JD
👥 Catching up with my close friend Jason Dillard (JD) from Sacramento, a 🌟 in education and sports, we stroll down memory lane. 💬 This heartfelt convo delves into JD's dedication to creating culturally proficient spaces and fostering student leadership. We explore the shift in mental health perceptions, from 'tough it out' to embracing openness. With JD, we discuss coaching evolution, social media's impact, and the quest for authentic connection in our tech-heavy world.
🏋️♂️ We dive deeper, addressing the hurdles faced by student-athletes, especially from under-resourced backgrounds, aiming for pro sports. Reflecting on our journey from Davis to the brink of pro-football with the Oakland Raiders, we uncover discrepancies in mentorship and support that shape an athlete's future. JD emphasizes the importance of nurturing sports environments in uplifting every athlete's journey, on and off the field. 📣 Parents with kids in sports, this episode is a must-listen! Join us for emotion, personal stories, and insights into athletics, education, and overcoming life's challenges.
Welcome to the let's Think About it podcast, where we embark on a journey of thoughtfulness and personal growth. I'm your host, coach Mo, and I'm here to guide you through thought-promoting discussions that will inspire you to unlock your full potential. In each episode, we'll explore a wide range of topics, from self-discovery and mindfulness to goal-setting and achieving success. Together, we'll challenge conventional thinking and dive deep into the realms of possibility. Whether you're looking to find clarity in your personal or professional life, or seeking strategies to overcome obstacles, this podcast is your go-to source for insightful conversations and practical advice. So find a comfortable spot, chill and let's embark on this journey of self-improvement together. Remember, the power of transformation lies within you, and together we'll uncover the tools and insights you need to make it happen. So let's dive in. Welcome to another episode of the let's Think About it podcast. I'm your host, coach Mo, and I'm here with another another exciting guest my man, long-time friend, my brother, my longtime dealer, aj JD, in the house.
Speaker 2:What's up, bro? What's going on? Coach Mo, how you doing man, man, I'm great man, I'm doing even better that you're here.
Speaker 1:You're on the show You're going to represent, but first I got a tradition that I share with all my audience you got to tell us where you're popping in from.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm here in Sacramento, California. I'm actually in my classroom in Del Paso Heights and man we represent, so it's all good.
Speaker 1:It's all good, man, it's all good good. Most people don't know me and jay go back over 30 years. We play football together. We from the same hotel, it's all good. We're from oakland, the whole nine right. There's much love right now. There's much excitement, there's much joy that I'm feeling right now having you on the show representing. That being said, tell my audience on this show representing. That being said, tell my audience about who you are, what you do and the type of value you bring?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, man. I'm very blessed. I am a father of three daughters, been married 24 years, I do cultural proficiency work, I'm an educational consultant and I also work with sports programs as well, helping coaches just bring out the best version of themselves for the student athletes that they work with. And so in schools I work with students, whether it's at the high school level or the middle school level, helping them focus on looking at things through a culturally proficient lens, helping them develop leadership skills, allyship and advocacy skills right Learning them, teaching them how to advocate for themselves and others in education.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's great man, that's great. So, Jay, what was the journey? What made you say Great man? That's?
Speaker 2:great. So, jay, what was the journey? What made you say yeah, I've done so many different things. I'm like the master of footwork in the paint. I'll pivot with the best of them. You know what I mean, like the Hakeem dream shake. So I've gone from selling real estate. At one point I've been a sports agent, representing NFL players, but I truly believe I've been a minister in the past at a Baptist church, right.
Speaker 2:So a lot of people know me as a lot of different things, but at the core of it was always service, right, and so wanting to help people accomplish their dreams.
Speaker 2:God has led me down this road, through some of the adversity that I faced as a parent, as an adult, really just giving me the compassion and empathy to pour into those who may not have it in their own homes.
Speaker 2:Man, I tell people all the time we post on social media and we always post the good stuff, but a lot of life is happening in between those pictures and it's the stuff that's happened in between the pictures and my own personal life that's led me down this path to really make sure that our schools and our locker rooms are safe spaces for everybody to feel included and that they belong. That's, and it's an incredible journey being a guy like yourself from North Oakland, the way that we grew up. When we grew up in the 80s and the 90s, mental health was never a thing, right. We say you rub some dirt on it, oh, you shake it off. I can hear 1990s Mo Mabry saying get over it. But these kids aren't built the way that we were built. And I say that and still understand that there's another level of compassion to help them get from point A to point B, and it's upon us as adults and leaders to help them figure it out.
Speaker 1:That's a good point, man, because when we were on a come up on the rise, even as teenagers and or even in our early 20s, we were taught you don't share your feelings, you don't talk about your feelings, what you say, you just suck it up and keep it moving. Your feelings, you don't talk about your feelings, what you say, you just suck it up and keep it moving. But in today's time we're in just a different world. It's a different animal. And especially when you start to include social media and how everybody is glued to the phone, right, we would just be outside playing. That was our camaraderie. But now the camaraderie is I'm going to text you or I got to do a post before I even connect with someone. Right, talk to me about that dynamic being in the sports mindset, working with coaches and their kids and their athletes. Was that integrated into your type of consulting and teaching?
Speaker 2:Definitely In the sports world. Being a former youth coach myself, being a college football player at UC Davis, being a former NFL sports agent, having experience working with the Oakland Raiders in their personnel department, I bring a wide variety of perspectives when I raised my daughters, who all were able to achieve success academically and athletically right. I have a daughter, naila, who got a full basketball scholarship. Her twin sister, naomi, got a full academic scholarship, and then the youngest one received a full athletic scholarship and then accepted a full academic scholarship. And as I really looked back at it, I said everybody doesn't have the same level of advocacy and support that my daughters had. That's something that I wanna empower other parents and give those student athletes a level of care that's directed primarily towards them individually.
Speaker 2:And so you and I played college football for coaches. We didn't always know they had our best interest in mind, like we were cool with our coaches, but do I trust my coach? So it came from a real place of introspection that I had to do to really understand what's motivating me to work with these coaches. To work with these coaches because I wanted these coaches that I interact with to really be the best version of themselves and understand not only their why, but then understand and develop the how and the where, and so there's levels to it. So the best coaches are prepared.
Speaker 2:The best coaches are prepared. They're confident. They're very clear communicators. The worst coaches are unprepared, they aren't confident, they don't communicate well. They might backdoor you like what do you mean? I'm not starting or that kind of stuff. The worst coaches you feel like they won't even make eye contact with you. You know they squirrely and understanding that the majority of athletes finish playing sports and they have a negative outlook on their experience. I really want to dive into coaches and help coaches develop coaching philosophies and mantras and branding and really be the best version of themselves and be confident and have the impact that we need our coaches to have on our students.
Speaker 1:That's an interesting viewpoint because I'm going back to myself, right, I played high school football, balled out college football balled out, but not really attached to the alumni of the programs that I came from. And I think when I reflect on that, just listening to you, it does tie back to your experience of going through the process of being an athlete in that situation, right of those schools and looking at Davis because that's where I balled out at right and, just like you said, the coach really got my back. Then you look at the national power five conferences of athletes that come out of those programs and the alumni of athletes that just go back to serve and be a part of the program and that connection has been lost for me.
Speaker 2:That's a real pain point and for your audience, let's be clear. Mo Mabry was an All-American college football player. Mo Mabry was an incredible college safety right who we all believe should have played in the NFL. When I finished at Davis, I got into minicamp with the Oakland Raiders. My coach didn't know anything about that opportunity because my coach at the time had no real vested interest in seeing me succeed outside of his program. As amazing as that sounds, with Daryl Russell and Napoleon Kaufman and all of these guys who I looked up to is, this is what it looks and feels like when you have everything lined up in your direction right, not to mention how incredibly talented those guys were. The point is you never know where you can end up with a little support.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're right, man, because I remember vividly and I don't think I've told many people this story, but I remember going to the head coach at Davis and I said I want to play in the league, I want to take that next step. What do I need to do? How do I get ready? And this was like my junior year. You know what he said oh, don't worry about that, we'll deal with that when that time comes. So guess what? I balled out my senior year. That time came. I was like what's up? Oh, just focus on education, you serve the program and just make sure you get your degree Right. Guess what?
Speaker 1:From that point on, I didn't know what. I didn't know. I didn't know what it took to get an agent. I didn't know that, how to invest in me. Nobody even knows that I was selected to an all-star game.
Speaker 1:In the all-star game, no coaches or anybody supported me. I couldn't even afford. I had to pay my own ticket to go to the game. I couldn't afford it. So I didn't go to the game. I didn't play because I didn't have a dough to go. And other key athletes at the time on the team right, it was three of us, I ain't gonna say no names, but those two athletes were able to come up with the funding, my background but those two athletes were able to come up with the funding, my background. I didn't have that funding, mo. It's powerful for what you're doing, jason, just real talk. Because, as an athlete, a young African-American male, no true role models figuring it out as you go, role models figuring it out as you go, and then you think the program has your back and you get to that pivotal point in your life where you're ready to make that transition and it's no, we can't help you, but everything happens for a reason. I believe that it's shaped, my journey, that Absolutely it's shaped my journey.
Speaker 2:But on your front, what you're doing, I think it's powerful man, it's a powerful conversation. It's a much needed dialogue because we coming from communities where we've come from and we don't have the same resources, right, and it's the whole equality versus equity conversation. It's like Mo and his two white teammates all have equal access to this all-star game that they've been selected for. Now what the program should have done is say Mo can't afford to get there, so we're going to pay, we're going to give Mo more support because he needs it. It's the right thing to do. Unfortunately, that's what has happened time and time again to us on the field and off the field. Right, everybody has access to the SAT. Everybody has access to the sat. Everybody has access to the psat. Right, but does everybody have access to the training materials that it takes to be really good at taking that test? And I'm passionate because I have lived with that pain.
Speaker 2:You were coming up and you were a role model for me. You were wearing the gold boots, the gold cleats. There were two guys who I looked up to. It was you and Larry Allen at Sonoma State. They were guys to me and when I played my freshman year and then I looked at my school schedule and I realized I was on track to graduate in five years. But the way they had me scheduled, I was going to be done playing in four years. Right, they weren't going to redshirt me ever.
Speaker 2:Imagine myself walking around UC Davis having completed all my eligibility and still having another year to go to school. So I red shirted on my own, and when I did that, I ruined my relationship with the coach. You know what I'm saying? Because I didn't have the mentor, I didn't have the guidance, I didn't have people saying so. I had to look at it on my own. As a 19 year old, am I going to survive through this program? And so the work that I'm doing now working with the kids on one end, but on the other end, working with the coaches to help them understand how to best serve the students like you and I, so how do you create that awareness for those coaches that they are better prepared to work with the dynamics of student athletes like yourself and I?
Speaker 2:So it's all about building the culture that all students and student athletes can thrive in, and so culture is about more than race. It's about norms and traditions and practices, and culture is something that you can control, and so the goal is to help these coaches develop a culture where winning is a byproduct of the culture that they create. Some people are going to win because they just got talented players Right. Other coaches are going to win because it's a product of the work they put in the offseason Right. You build in relationships with coaches Like I remember in high school there was a coach named Tom Keating who played for the Oakland Raiders, and his son, ryan, was my teammate at St Mary's College and High School in Berkeley Right.
Speaker 2:So my freshman year I'm playing middle linebacker and I had never played football before, played football before. And one day. One day we're doing this drill and you're reading the guard and then hitting the running back Right. And so I'm meeting the running back in the hole and I'm just hitting him Right. It clicked for me. So I hit this running back one time and big time Keating said Dillard, you would run through a wall if I asked you to. And just that empowerment man put a battery in my back and that stuck with me to this day. What happens when a coach gives you positive affirmations? When a coach tells an athlete that he believes in them? And we have the power to do that in all of our roles as parents, as coaches, as mentors. Man, I believe in you. Once a person know that you believe in them, it ain't no telling what they can do.
Speaker 1:Man. I'm going to flip to the other side of it though. Right, the student side, and how important and what you're saying in regards to creating culture in these programs. What you're saying in regards to creating culture in these programs, the amount of fear that kids carry, that I carry as a student athlete. I think the culture really can help set the stage for people as they move on past the program. Yes, in that avenue, dealing with adversity and the fears that we all deal with Right. Yes, with adversity and the fears that we all deal with right.
Speaker 1:I'm going to touch back on this because I was an athlete and going through the program that I went through at Davis, that structure didn't exist. Right, and, being a young African-American male with no older role models, I was and everybody's looking to me from the athletic standpoint. I didn't really have that person that I looked up to from a standpoint, because those guys had already graduated and just moved on right. Certain fears, adversity, show up, but you don't really have a structured way of approaching it and it starts to affect you in your mid-20s, early 30s, because it's never been addressed Absolutely. You just carry it. That's the foundation around what this podcast is too Like. How are you overcoming your fears and how do you tame that punk ass? Inner critic.
Speaker 2:The more you know, the better. Right, and tragically, a lot of these kids are just like you and I were at their age. You have this anxiety, right, in our community, people struggle to identify themselves. Who are you, where are you headed, what's happening? Right? So I'm a freshman, I'm a sophomore, I'm a junior, and now the noise is getting louder and louder. I'm a senior, and then now what? And without, like you said in your case, without having somebody to answer those questions and without having somebody that you trusted to ask those questions to one of the greatest players I've ever been around just got a job and started working. That's what you did, because people were going to say, okay, mo, you graduated, now what? Now what? Now what? And so our high school students have those same anxiety Freshman year, sophomore year, junior year, senior year.
Speaker 2:In the gang intervention and prevention work that I do, I do that work with a nonprofit organization called Academics for Athletes, centered here in Del Paso Heights. We were one of four organizations to receive a grant from the city of Sacramento to do gang intervention and prevention work. We do an annual gang summit at Grant High School with Mayor Steinberg. This will be year three coming up with Mayor Steinberg, I'm actually doing that next week, may 22nd, but I said all that to say. In our schools, our kids are identified as what grade you're in So-and-so as a junior, so-and-so as a senior.
Speaker 2:Okay, now, what are you doing? I'm rapping. I'm rapping, I'm making beats. I'm doing YouTube. I created a YouTube channel. I'm a content creator. Everybody is struggling to try to identify with something Right, and that noise has led us down a path of, like, pretty much destruction because, like you said, going back to the social media conversation, they expect everything to be immediate, and so I'm trying to get our youth to understand these are questions that you can start asking early. I want to expose them to different realities as early as possible alternative programming so that they can begin to envision themselves moving in more profitable directions. Right, and it's a real pain point, because I know what it looks and feels like to not have that clear direction, and it's something that I need our coaches to assist student athletes. What you described is what I tell these coaches all the time. You can either develop or you can use. A lot of us just felt like we were used. We were used.
Speaker 1:I was used. I was used. I have absolutely no connection to my alumni creation and the program.
Speaker 2:It's a shame that, seeing it like with my class, I, like nobody else in my class, touched the NFL film field. They never put on a NFL helmet, been in the NFL locker room, but you know how many of those guys ended up in coaching and got nods from our head coach. Nobody ever talked to me about being a GA. Hey, you can be a GA and work on your master's degree. Nobody told me that either. Never I didn't have that level of support, and so I'm asking coaches who are you coaching? Or I should be coaching future yous, right, just like when you spend time with your daughter, you're instilling in her all the ethics and morals and perspective that you learned from your mom. Right? You passing that down? Absolutely, we were never included in that family tree in that program, and so that's something that I'm working with these coaches I'm passionate about, because I don't want our student athletes to be tolerated. I want them to be valued, and so we talk about what it looks like and feels like to be valued in a program.
Speaker 1:And I appreciate that. I really do appreciate the work that you're doing. But tell me, how do you get your foot in the door? How do you connect with these coaches so that they know more about Dillard Consulting?
Speaker 2:Right now I'm blessed to have a contract with Twin Rivers Unified School District. We've been modeling what it looks like. I'm in partnership with the district athletic director, because at a school you will have some programs that's just up and rolling and that's the flagship, whether it's football or basketball. Then you'll have other sports programs. That's really struggling. People ain't really even trying out for the team. The coaches can't be consistent in terms of their assistant coaches, stuff like that. So it's okay. How do you build these cultures in the programs that struggle and to get them to rise up to where the flagship program is? So it's giving them tools that they can use.
Speaker 2:Helping the coaches develop a coaching philosophy is having conversations with athletic directors. Our coaches receive very little professional development and teachers receive a lot of professional development. But the reality is coaches have so much more of a profound impact on a student athlete's life because sports is still the carry. A teacher can only make you rewrite that paper so many times before you say forget it. The coach can say get on that line and do it again and you're going to do it again and you're going to go way farther past what you felt like doing, because the coach has that leverage. It's helping coaches realize how critical their role is. And, yeah, it's getting with other school administrators school superintendents, district athletic directors, maybe school athletic directors and helping them realize that our student athletes are better.
Speaker 2:If we invest in our coaches and build them up so that athletes don't feel like they have to do it on their own, there's a synergy, sadly, between our athletic programs and what's happening in the streets. A lot of people who fall victim to the streets are former athletes. They are competitors. They may have been the backup point guard, but they want to. We got to help them understand. You may not be the starting point guard, but there's still an opportunity for you, because this is bigger than just ball. This is life that we talking about and I'm going to help you have a profitable life. It's not just a matter of I only need one point guard. So if you don't make it, good luck in life.
Speaker 1:It's the foundation, really, because you're talking what 15 to 18, where you're really creating that, that foundation of what's next, absolutely that. What, if effect? What can I do next after? Whatever the sport is that I'm playing which is so, so impactful man? And what about? Because I have a lot of my listeners right, they got kids. Yeah, they got some kids. That are some kids, that are some athletes as well. Do you work with parents independently, or parents or families independently?
Speaker 2:or they're going to go to school or how does that dynamic? So I just started a nonprofit called the North Sacramento Sports Commission where we're going to be doing seminars for parents. I'm working with players individually and there are so many different aspects to this journey. Mo, like we really could talk for the next five hours. Like I had a daughter play Division One high major college basketball Right, and I know a lot of Division One college basketball players and parents and before you get there you think that's the pinnacle, that's the holy grail Right To get a college basketball scholarship. When you get there you realize it ain't all that you thought it was cracked up to be. Then it's okay.
Speaker 2:Now I'm just trying to make it through the same way that you and the same pain that you and I felt at Davis, man Cal, stanford, ucla, wherever you play. So, yes, I want to share that information with families because things happen along the way that's out of your control, right? Yeah, if Naila is out there, naila, freshman year at Texas Tech. She hit two, threes against Baylor. Baylor had just won the national championship the year before. This is my dream. My daughter is balling on the biggest stage right Against the best all-American players, the defending national champions in their building and she knocking down jumpers using the form that I taught her right. We all envision that, but it's.
Speaker 2:How do you handle when you get hurt yes, when that ACL gets torn and then you got to rehab and how do you communicate with the trainer and do you have to use their team doctor and the coaches kick you to the side because you're not playing this year. So there's so many different things to it and I'm definitely open to working with parents and helping them navigate the journey, because I've been there. But it's very important that your listeners know they're only facing what other men have met. Yeah, so it's advocate for your child. Your child has parents. Don't ever let nobody tell you you need to move out the way, because that is absolutely crazy. Nobody told Archie Manning to move out the way. Nobody told Andrew Luck's dad to move out the way. Nobody told Andrew Luck's dad to move out the way. So let's cut out all this vilifying parents. There has to be some trust, but trust takes time, and so I'm all for parents get to know some of these coaches and really stare down the situation, because some of these coaches need a whole lot of help.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, Jay. How do parents, school administrators get a hold of you?
Speaker 2:Okay, so I have a website. It's called DillardConsultingGrouporg DillardConsultingGrouporg. You can reach me there. All my contact information is on the website. I'm also on LinkedIn Jason Dillard on LinkedIn. You can see my profile there. I'm also on Instagram, jdill underscore Will and that's just a play on words because I just believe in myself, so it's just JDL underscore will, but the website is the best way to reach me and, yeah, I'm either in a gym or on a court or walking across a campus near you, man, just trying to give other people the best experience as possible. Because of what you and I experienced, I believe that God has given us what he gave us for a reason and so, just like you now, when you talk about attacking that fear, right, it's understanding where I came from and refusing to go back Absolutely and saying I'm going to make things better for my kids, and I was able to do that, and now I'm passionate about doing that for other people's kids.
Speaker 1:Man, I appreciate you. I just want to say I'm proud of you. You're a man that walk with extreme high integrity. Family, first manhood, all of those great things, man, Appreciate you. Any last words you would like to leave for the audience before we sign off.
Speaker 2:Absolutely tough, because you realize that there's not a lot of people who actually care about other people. And it's all about service, man, if you. I realize like I have a lot of momentum right now in business and just in life in general, and I found that pouring into other people is profitable. I'm not just talking about monetize. I'm saying that I'm a man of faith and I believe that God honors the service and the work that I do for his people, and so that's the motivation to keep me moving forward. And everybody just know somebody else has been there before and has the answers to the questions you have. So there it is.
Speaker 1:There it is. There it is, man. I appreciate you, man. Thanks for coming on. Anything that you need and support from me on work that you're doing, just let me know I got you.
Speaker 2:Definitely, man. I think I know that you got my back, so we're just going to continue moving forward together. That's a commitment that we have. We go way back and it only makes sense. So. So, yeah, it's all good, all right, thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you. Thank you for joining me in this episode of let's Think About it. Your time and attention are greatly appreciated. If you found value in today's discussion, I encourage you to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. Remember, the journey of self-improvement is ongoing and I'm here to support you every step of the way. Connect with me on social media for updates and insights. You can find me on Instagram and Facebook, at Coach Mo Coaching or LinkedIn, at Maurice Mabry, or visit my website at mauricemabrycom for exclusive content. Until next time, keep reflecting, keep growing and, most importantly, keep believing in yourself. Remember, the most effective way to do it is to do it Together. We're making incredible strides toward a better and more empowered you, so thank you, and I'll see you in our next episode.