Kind: captions
Language: en
i've been at a loss of words
but not at a loss of
thoughts and memories when i
learned that my grandmother
passed away several days ago i thought i
would
try to use this microphone
use this podcast
to try to find the words to uh honor the
woman
who's responsible for much of who i am
who taught me silly might be to say
but taught me how to be a man
taught me about strength about
wisdom about compassion
love and
that i could do anything that i set my
mind to in this world
that anything was possible and that i
of all people can do it
and not to let the world tell me
otherwise
she passed away in moscow russia
she was 91 years old
soon to be 92.
if you're listening to this maybe
the first words i can say is
at any moment life can end so
tell your friends tell your family your
loved ones
that you love them
so i tried to write the words i couldn't
have some desperate notes
but i decided to just speak about some
lessons that she taught me
and i hope that it's useful
to some of you to anyone
who might be listening the first lesson
is to be mentally strong
never to complain in her life
was one heck of a life to test that
lesson
she was born and raised near harkov
which is a ukrainian city close to
russia
in her childhood she lived through and
survived caldemore which is a famine
in the early 30s 1932 1933
that stalin had inflicted on his own
people or millions of people have died
one of the great atrocities of the 20th
century
just to give you some context the famine
that we're talking about
led to cannibalism
one historian has written that the good
people died first
the people who gave food to others
the people who refused to participate in
cannibalism
the people who gave everything they have
to their children for the survival of
their children
and therefore died before their children
did
i'll leave it at that my grandma
survived it
and as a teenager she lived through and
survived world war
ii imagine a young teenage girl
a beautiful young woman in fascist
occupied city
she rarely spoke of those times but
there were stories of
no food desperation and tragedy
and once again i'll just leave it at
that my grandmother survived
and in her eyes always remained this
glimmer of hope amidst the suffering
it's a glimmer that i've seen in the
eyes of others that i've met in my life
and it's just always inspiring to see
that triumph
that triumph over tragedy
and there's something that kind of
experience does to the human heart
it hardens it it protects it
from the outside world but also softens
it
to allow a deep connection with other
human beings
and maybe you've seen that i've done a
few things with david goggins
and i'm drawn to that kind of mindset in
him i see my grandmother
the toughest human being i've ever known
the second lesson she taught me was
physical strength there's
all kinds of images throughout my
childhood
of my grandmother doing incredible feats
of manual labor
carrying logs just carrying
heavy things without complaining just
getting the job done
i was a huge fan in russia there's
something called bugattiri
i guess similar to america that would be
america doesn't have centuries of
history to where you can go to
um the period of knights
or vikings so in america i guess for a
little kid that would be like a gi joe
but in russia that was bookethi were
kind of like the knights
or maybe the vikings the warriors of
ancient history
and i've always loved the the stoicism
the power the fearlessness of the
stories told about bugatti
i mean as a little kid that's all i
wanted to be is one of those guys
and i remember at a certain point in my
childhood i can't quite place
exactly the time but i remember
realizing
looking at my grandmother that women
could be those warriors as well
you know my little boy's brain and
whatever toys we had
i'd play with and i always imagined that
you know
bugatti were boys men going out to war
and when they return as victors home
they'd be celebrated by
the women the children of their family
but my grandmother made me
realize that women could be booga 3d too
but more than that she was this figure
in my life that
planted that eastern european seed
of admiring strength and physical power
and just toughness in that very basic
sense that's required to carry heavy
things
and to fight i think if i were to really
psychoanalyze myself
at that early age is when i fell in love
with martial arts
with the whole concept of martial combat
before i ever ever practiced anything
like it
the kind of sports i played as a kid
with soccer and tennis and swimming all
that kind of stuff
were very far away from martial combat
but she planted the seed
that when i first stepped on the
wrestling mat it felt like home
and even for the first couple years when
i really had my ass handed to me
on the map the fire that got me to train
harder to work harder that was my
grandmother
the third lesson is to think deeply
to be quiet and think
until you know the situation
you know the right thing to say and the
right thing to say
is the one that internalizes considers
and thinks through the big
picture of the situation
so the emotion you feel especially when
you're young about a particular
situation
the desire to be sort of a cry baby
about things about me me me
about being upset about this situation
or that situation
there was something about the way she
was
quiet and the way she looked over the
world
and the moments when she spoke
or words of wisdom of calm
and patience that was so inspiring
to a mind that was impatient she helped
me understand that the immediate
emotional response to particular
situations
the ups and downs of how you feel
influence the perception the cognition
of how everything is interpreted and
taking your time
thinking being quiet
and speaking when you have something to
say is the kind of man
i should be fourth lesson she taught me
was to believe in myself she made me
believe that i'm the most special person
in the world
and that i can achieve anything and then
she would tell me that
since i was a little baby until i was a
big baby
and her excitement about the little
successes in my life
really made me fall in love with the
successes of others
she inspired me to enjoy the success of
others
to believe in the people around me to
encourage
them to dream big to work hard to
accomplish anything
because she did that for me and you know
it's heartbreaking to think that
very few people in my life believed in
me
i was always a dreamer i reached for the
stars
and most people even people who loved me
gave me what they thought was wise
advice
to stick to the safe path to to be
reasonable
to find stability comfort
all those kinds of things that seem wise
in the grand scheme of life
to be normal and she didn't
she told me to go big to dream big and
that i could accomplish
anything i want to do everyone is
different
and i'm not a parent and i think
that kind of over the top encouragement
can perhaps spoil
some people or give them a false sense
of ego
but for somebody like me who was
genetically
full of self-doubt and
forgive me for saying even disliking
myself
she was a breath of fresh air
and so whatever dream i have now that
still
stays with me is the
fire she kindled is the
fire she kept going and a fire that
will never die because of her
over the past several years there's been
many days that
i'm grinding to a halt with self-doubt
i feel that in all kinds of ways i'm a
fraud
for daring to dream to go outside of
what i'm supposed to do what other
people much smarter than me are telling
me i'm supposed to do
in those moments when i say
i listen to my heart i listen to my gut
i really listen
to the thing that my grandmother left me
it's it's that fire the belief in myself
that i can do anything that
the dreams i have are not just silly
dreams
they're visions of a future that i can
create
if i work hard i can create
and finally the fifth
lesson she taught me through words
through her actions
is about love is to put love
out into the world
her husband
grandpa gregory
died when he was 58 in 1986
she loved him her whole life she loved
him
after he passed away and that love
while quiet in terms of her not
talking to me about it was always there
in the background was always in her eyes
the unshakable love
so that's the love between her and her
husband
my grandfather there's something about
loyalty about deep
unshakable human connection in that that
stayed with me
i seek that kind of love with with
friends with really close friends
i seek that kind of love with the world
around me
and i definitely seek that kind of love
with a life partner
with a person that i could uh
as the saying goes uh ride or die with
i can bury the bodies with them
you know it's kind of a bond that's
stronger than any
any other thing in this world a bond
that's stronger than any
fundamental force of physics she
uh i could see it in her and something
in that
stage with me but bigger just
love love of life love of the ups and
downs of life
love and gratitude of everything around
me
she had that this glowing joy
that's not a simple joy but a deep joy
that acknowledges the
that life is suffering that life is hard
and that love is hard but to
appreciate it anyway the whole of it not
just the ups
the whole of it
she taught me to love people love
life love the world no matter what the
world does to you
and to love unconditionally simply
and to not be afraid to be cliche
to be simple
naive because that's what love is
it's quite simple
love is the answer as
uh some guy on some broadcast once said
so i wanted to honor
this woman that was a great human being
in my life and the life of many others
with these words and the few folks who
listen i hope can
draw some inspiration from the lessons
she's given me
to be strong mentally and physically
to dream big to work hard
and to put a little bit of love out
into the world and
on that point let me uh if it's okay
read a poem in russian that my
grandmother enjoyed
called libov
loosely translated to learn to treasure
love
it's a simple poem that a couple of
russians listening out there right now
perhaps could appreciate but the gist of
it is uh
that love is not easy life
is not easy and uh the best
we ought to do is to learn how to
treasure love
to treasure the few years of life we
have on this earth
my grandmother's name is anne
and my brother and i in russian would
call
i promise i will work hard and hope that
your strength your brilliance
your love lives on my thoughts and in my
actions
this drop of vodka
is for you
you know i have shot glasses
but i think she's looking down and
knows i'm drinking her memory so she
would want me to
drink it out of a real glass
so
bye-bye i miss you
i love you i hope to make you proud one
day
you