109 Vision Beyond Limits Matt Formston_S Journey From 3_ Sight To Cycling World Record

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I'm Mike Boris and this is Straight Talk.

Now I've got about 1% vision left in my left eye and 3% in my right eye.

The big wave surfing I do now, like it's, people can't work out how it's physically possible.

Most people go, there's no fucking way I'm going in the water, that's the wall zone.

I love it.

Having a disability.

I wanted to be a pro surfer too and I thought that was never a possibility for me.

But I've made that choice as a kid that I'm going to get on with things

rather than sitting in the corner feeling sorry for myself.

Biggest waves in the world are there.

Someone died six weeks after I was there.

It's a serious place.

How big was it?

It was about 55 feet.

What the fuck?

Four cameras on land, two cameras on jet skis in the water, three safety skis, two drones above me.

No one could find me.

Oh my god.

When you were fully sighted?

Yeah.

Do you remember that period?

No.

My only memory is pre-five years old here.

It was on Christmas Eve and the dads all went outside and said,

I wonder if we can see Santa in the sky.

And we looked up and as we looked up there was a shooting star,

or maybe it was Santa, I'm not sure, but it went through the sky.

Super.

That's the power of empathy that you've built.

Something that I'm passionate about is understanding people and being empathetic.

And I think it comes back to me not being understood as a kid.

So I realise how important it is to truly understand people and what their differences are.

My mate, Mick, who I rode on a tandem with,

is Matt's whole life is just a two-iron piss.

Are you serious?

Yeah.

Matt Formson, welcome to Straight Talk, mate.

Mark, thanks for having me.

How are you going?

All right?

Good, mate.

Really good.

When I took my shoes off a few minutes ago, could you smell my feet?

I'm going to be polite and say no.

You're fucking lying to me.

I can smell them.

No, I couldn't smell them, mate.

It's fine.

Well, because I actually, as soon as you walked in,

I got very conscious of the fact that you probably had to grow up all your life

with heightened senses, relatively speaking, relative to, say,

someone who's not...

Who has full sight, for example.

Yeah.

Is that a thing?

Like, is that a real thing?

It's not a thing.

What it is, you learn to use the information better.

So, you sense that everyone's got the same senses.

It's just that the way you interpret the information becomes more tuned in.

That's interesting.

So, tell me what it is that you were afflicted with.

I mean, I got on here, it's called macular dystrophy.

What is that?

So, the macula is a part of the eye.

So, most people will have heard of the retina, which is the part that's the back of your eye.

The macula is a small part of the retina.

And basically, it's in charge of focusing and mainly central vision.

But it's essentially part of how your eye works.

And mine, if you look at a photo...

So, they've taken photos of the back of my eye.

And it looks like death.

It looks like something out of a zombie apocalypse movie.

It's just all dead tissue.

Whereas a normal eye, your eye would look nice.

It's like nice pink soft tissue.

Mine's just all dead scarring and lines.

And just, yeah, it's all dead.

I hope my fucking eye looks like that.

I mean, honestly...

I'm not sure.

I've been punched in there enough times for it might be...

No, maybe it doesn't.

But like...

So, you were at five years of age diagnosed with this?

Correct.

Is it a disease?

I mean, do you look at it like a disease?

What do you think of it?

Yeah, it's a disease.

It's a disorder.

Yeah, it's a disease.

It's ill health.

You know what I mean?

So, anything that's not optimal health or optimal for your body, I think, is a disease

or some sort of disability.

And yeah, it's very common in elderly people.

You will have heard of macular degeneration.

Yep.

Which affects actually one in seven adults over the age of 55.

And I presume that means the macula has degenerated with age and doesn't do its job anymore.

Correct.

Well, it's starting to degenerate and it will start getting that scarring.

It won't be that nice soft pink tissue.

It'll start degenerating and it will start getting some form of damage.

It can be managed though.

So, there's two forms.

There's wet and dry and that can be managed a lot better than when I...

Basically, my...

My vision deteriorated over one year.

So, from the age of four, I was looking straight in the...

Like, there's photos of me from when I was four.

I'm looking straight down the barrel of the camera, catching the ball, no problems, all

that stuff.

And then by the time I was five, I had to change the way I caught a ball because I was

sort of catching it at the last minute and I wasn't looking anywhere near the camera.

I was looking everywhere else.

Like, if you're going to try and catch something, for example, a ball, you can't really focus

on the ball.

No, not at all.

So, I'm basically waiting for it to just hit me on the chest and then I'll react to catch

it.

Or sometimes I can see it last minute because I can see...

I've got...

Well, I've now got about 1% of my vision left in my left eye and 3% in my right eye.

But when I was five, I was down to about 5%.

You can see light.

I mean, like...

I can see light, yeah.

So, you know, like if you go outside out of the studio on a bright Sunday day, you can

see light?

I can see light, shadows.

I can see colour.

But a lot of the times...

I mean, these days, coming to Sydney is a nightmare for me because there's so much sound.

I use sound to get around.

I rode from...

Yeah, I set some world records in cycling.

And I do that through echolocation.

I can hear the things around me.

Whereas when there's a saturation of sound, I can't hear anything.

Or I can hear everything, but it doesn't give me a map because it's just overwhelming the

amount of information.

I mean, you've done some fucking crazy shit here, like cycled, surfing.

I want to get into all that sort of stuff.

Because I'm absolutely intrigued how you navigate, as you said right at the very beginning, to

tap into the various senses we've all got.

But we probably don't...

Not necessarily take it for granted, but they all just work sort of...

You don't need...

You don't need to develop those skills.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, but you've made a conscious effort to do something, which is bloody incredible.

Not really, no.

Didn't make it...

No, it wasn't a conscious effort.

It was just evolved.

It was just an evolution because I had to.

So my mates are doing something, and I would just do it with them, and I'd learn how to

do it my way, and they'd learn how to do it their way.

When you were fully sighted?

Yeah.

Do you remember that period?

No.

No.

No, my only memory...

And we're talking pre-five years old here.

My only memory is...

And it could be made up, but it's a very clear memory in my head.

But it was...

Having a barbecue at a dad's mate's place down the road in our street, and it was sort

of dark, and it was on Christmas Eve, and the dads all went outside and said, I wonder

if we can see Santa in the sky.

And we looked up, and as we looked up, there was a...

I just remember seeing so many millions, like really fine, just how much detail there was

in the stars and everything.

And then a shooting star, or maybe it was Santa, I'm not sure, but it went through the

sky.

And I remember that vision really clearly, but everything else, I don't really have any

clarity of any visions.

I can't see my kids' faces really that well, and I can sort of map them out, and I feel

them, and I've got a bit of...

I can use a bit of sight and a lot of feel to work out what I think they look like.

But yeah, lots of things in my life I've just never been able to see.

So what does that mean in terms of memory then?

Like, so...

My memory is very visual.

Yeah.

Okay, can you explain it to me?

Like...

So everything's a map to me.

So I can walk into a bar that I went to in Italy six years ago, that I went to once,

and I could give you a map.

Once we walk in, I can say the bar...

The toilet is at the back, and if I've kept the seating arrangement the same, I'll remember

exactly how the seating arrangement is.

So it's a visual map in my head of how everything is.

But it's more a graphic design, so to speak.

You wouldn't remember there was a curve on the chair or something like that?

No, no, no.

It's just that I know...

It's like a step-by-step.

You go...

Like, it's going to be...

It's eight steps down that, straight ahead, and then two steps to the right, 90-degree

turn, or it might be a 45-degree, because there's something else there.

So I remember the angles, and it's like a...

It's a mind map of...

It's a mind map of how to get around the whole world, basically.

But are you continually doing that, drawing maps in your mind?

Yes, but it's not conscious.

I'm not consciously going, I need to remember where this toilet is in Italy.

I just do it, and my brain maps it for me, because it needs to.

Because I've made that choice as a kid, that I'm going to get on with things, rather than

sitting in the corner feeling sorry for myself, or going, I need everyone to help me.

I'm very fiercely independent, to my own detriment, a lot of times.

So I've made myself learn these things, and then now...

My body has a way of capturing that information, and storing it for me.

It's funny, I don't want to trivialize what we're talking about, but last night, I got

a minute, and I take a piss, because I'm at that age, when you get up a few times.

It's nighttime, so it was dark.

And I thought, I'm not going to turn the light on, because it might wake me up.

Because light apparently doesn't.

I know where you're going with this, and I've got a really funny story with this.

And I thought, well, I just...

And I was walking down the hallway.

Yeah.

I thought, I'll count the steps, how many steps it is to the toilet.

Yeah.

And just, I'm playing a bit of fun with myself, and I just put my arms out to feel where the

wall was, and actually kept my eyes closed on purpose.

Yeah.

But it was a conscious effort by me.

Yeah.

Whereas you're saying what you've done in the past, give me that example, the Italian

bar, restaurant, that's an unconscious one, or maybe subconscious, or whatever the word is.

Yeah, so I'm not counting the steps.

It's just, I know my body just knows that, okay, you've got to turn the light on.

Yeah.

And right now, there's no counting, there's no conscious counting going on.

As you were saying that about the toilet, I know I can walk, at any part of my house,

I can walk and put my hand up, and I know that I'm going to touch that part of the wall.

Wow.

But it's funny, because my mate, Mick, who I rode on a tandem with, and we won gold medals

all over the world together, spent way too much time in hotel rooms, more time with each

other than our wives at the time.

And he's, I'm making, we've just made a movie about my life and Big Wave Surfing, which

comes out in February.

And I've seen the first cut of it.

And Mick's in it, he's probably the, and his part in it, he says, and he, because he

obviously has been around me a lot, and he goes, Matt, like, we all go to the toilet,

you go to the toilet at 2am, and you get to the toilet, and you don't, you know, you don't

fall over, and you do a piss, and you don't, you do a piss here, and you get back to the

toilet, you get back to the bed, whatever, because Matt's, Matt's whole life's just a

2am piss.

Are you serious?

Yeah, that's what he says in the movie.

So, let's just, let's just, okay, let's just talk about Matt growing up.

Yeah.

So, he, yeah.

You know, you're a five-year-old kid.

Yeah.

And you get this, this deal happens, and you're diagnosed.

I mean, did you get it?

Did you understand what happened?

So, it was, it's really funny, so I obviously do keynote, I do keynote speaking, and a lot

of the times, after I finish speaking, the hero is my parents, not me, which is, which

is absolutely right.

So, they didn't tell me, hey, you're blind, your whole life's changing, everything's different.

These are all the problems that your life's going to be.

They're like, hey, well, there's a bit of a problem here with your eyes.

We're just going to work it out.

Don't, don't stress.

It's okay.

So, that, there was never a problem.

It didn't happen overnight, though, did it?

Is it a degenerative thing?

One year.

Right.

So, it happened pretty quick.

But I was already, I was already catching a ball, I was playing footy, and then I started

playing footy, and that all happened, and that was like, that was my, so an example

of that was my parents sheltered me from all this discrimination that happens in the world.

So, the, my dad was having a beer with a few mates, and they said, does Matt have any mates

that want to play?

There's under fives, or under sixes, and dad said, well, Matt'll play, because they didn't

have enough players on the team, and they said, oh.

What were we talking about now?

Rugby league.

Rugby league.

And the, basically, his mates that he was having a beer with said, oh, but Don, your

son, Matt's blind.

He can't play, you can't let him play, and made him out to be a bad parent because he

was putting his child with a disability in harm's way, in a contact sport.

Whereas.

I mean, the other way that you probably should look at it is, my God, this guy's giving his

child with a disability an opportunity.

But that wasn't the way the world looked at it, and they, so they, but they never, he

never came around and said, hey, God, these guys don't want you to play.

He came around and said, you're in, let's go, we're going to play footy, we'll work

it out.

And then, worked out that me being dummy half was a great place for me to be, because I'm

always in the center of the play.

I can pick the ball off the ground, and feed the boys, and learn to read the play.

And then, my disability ended up becoming an advantage, I ended up becoming captain

of the team.

Because.

Boys are all, when the first grade's playing, all the other boys are running around wrestling

and whatever.

I'm sitting there with the other, or they're watching a bit, but they can't really work

out what's going on.

I'm watching with my dad, and all these older people that have played the game forever,

talking through, like, they just did this, they moved, the defense moved up too quick,

they didn't stay together, telling me about what's happening in the game.

Yeah, so I'm getting commentary of different graded games since then I learned the game.

So, my strategy, my way to understand and read the game was way beyond my years, because

of the amount of hours I had listening to people that knew the game.

Can you just take me through what happens, like, your dummy half, how do you know the

ball's going to be played?

Well, I can see enough to see where the ball, so there's movement.

So, I can see the ball, everyone's running over that way, so they're not going over there

to get an ice cream most of the time, that's where the ball's going.

Yeah.

So, I follow them over that way, and then, like, if the ball's white, the grass is green.

So, you can see the difference of color?

You can see the contrast.

Yep.

So, how do you know the bloke who your dummy half to, in other words, is playing the ball?

Yeah, I can see enough to see that.

So, I can see that there's been a tackle, there's been multiple people in an area together.

Right.

So, there's a little blur, so I can see that, so I get in, and then, I can see the ball

getting passed, so I'm following just total focus on where the ball is.

So, I can see the ball get passed, I chase in defense, you know what I mean?

I see where the ball, I just follow and follow and follow the ball, and then, if the players

step back in, like, I'd get penalized every now and then for tackling someone that didn't

have a ball.

And can you hear the ball, by the way?

Can you hear the ball hit the ground?

Yeah, I hear the ball, 100%.

I hear the ball leaving someone's hand, I can hear it, someone else catching the ball,

it makes a lot of sound.

I can hear people, everyone, you know, there's...

There's a lot of sound as everyone's boots hitting the ground.

So, there's all this information that I'm learning to interpret, that I'm using.

And then, I ended up, the ball, the game got too fast for me, so the league became too

fast, and I went and played rugby union, because that flowed better, and I ended up playing

blindside breakaway, which, you know, has become, played my only good joke when I do

keynote speaking.

But in that position, I only had to be on the side of the ruck, and then, deal with

the halfback and the winger, or maybe an outside center in defense, and that was just really

good in defense.

And I stayed out of anything.

I set plays with the ball.

So, yeah, just learn where I work, where I fit into the team, and then, where I'm not,

where, like, where are my strengths, and where are my weaknesses, don't get involved in those

particular parts of the game.

So, what would you say your strengths and your weaknesses are?

Because, I mean, I don't think that's a fair question, because, and I reckon you're going

to be pretty honest with me, so, like, let's say...

Well, I'm definitely not going to be good at catching the cutout ball, I can tell you

that much.

And, or a bomb, you know, I'm not catching as if they're definitely my weaknesses.

So, you didn't play fullback?

No.

So, I'm always going to be a fullback.

I'm pretty much as tough as it gets.

Like, I don't get, I don't really get hurt.

If I get hurt, it's going to have to be enough that my body doesn't function anymore for

me to stop.

And, you know, there was, in rugby union, people would say, how's this kid?

Where does he keep coming out with the ball?

I'd feel the energy in the rack, and I'd get myself in there, and just the technique, and

my power, my strength, my power, like, pounds per square inch, like, for the size of me,

the amount of power I could output, I could get a ball off pretty much anyone.

And in terms of fitness?

I'd train every day.

So, I knew that I was, I had a disability.

So, every morning I'd do, basically, before school, when I was, you know, as a teenager,

I'd run 15 kilometers.

I'd come home, jump on my bike, ride my bike for a bit.

I'd go swimming.

I knew I had to be the fittest bloke on the field to be able to keep it, because I was

going to make mistakes because of my eyesight, and I didn't want to be, you know, a liability

for the boys on the field.

And so, my fitness and my strength had to be stronger than everyone's so that I could

make up for my disability.

What about your strength of character?

I mean, how does that work?

You know, I guess, did you get that from your parents?

I mean, how do you...

Build up in that environment, like your mental strength?

Well, so the, and I've worked this out now, you know, looking back at it, I didn't know

why at the time, but I was trying to prove to the world I didn't have a disability.

Because at school, I was, you know, I was bullied.

People would throw comments out, make different voices, so they didn't know who was saying

it.

I'd stand just out of reach and say, how many fingers am I holding up?

And...

Nah.

Oh, mate, it was horrendous.

So, at school, I've got this, I'm treated like this kid that's a pariah.

But then on the footy field, I'm one of the best kids on the field.

So, I get, you know, I'm included and I'm one of the boys.

So...

That sport was always the thing for me where I felt included.

And there was never, there was never, oh, you're a disabled kid, you don't miss the

tackle.

If I missed the tackle, the boys were into me.

Like, why'd you miss that tackle?

You know, it wasn't, you know, maybe I didn't see the pass, but that's not, that's not an

excuse because you're letting the team down.

So, I felt like I was included in part, as part of the team.

So, that was my drive, is just to prove to the world I didn't have a disability.

And that, that went through for me until I was probably 20 years old.

We hear a lot about disability these days.

Yeah.

So, we never used to hear much about it.

No, no.

In previously.

Honestly, my observation is that a lot of people talk about Black Lives Matter or Black

Lives, not black, they're white.

And it's sort of like white privileged people sort of, sort of, I don't know, it feels like

making, going to the confession and, and trying to make up for all the shit that the broader

society does.

Yeah.

And to some extent, I feel is a little bit the same when it comes to disability.

A lot of people are sort of apologists, whereas the people who are disabled or black people

or, they're not, they're not looking for apologists.

They're not feeling, they're not looking for sympathy.

They just want you to treat them like everybody else.

My, the thing that I see, like I obviously have a disability myself.

I work a lot in this space.

50% of my role now is in the, in the diversity and disability space.

And I'm on a few different disability boards as well.

So, it's very, I'm very prominent in this field.

A lot of the issues that I see come from fear.

People want to help, but they're scared of helping and they're making, of making,

making a mistake, saying the wrong thing, doing the wrong thing.

And I think that's putting, that's really setting us back at the moment.

I think if people have an intent, if the intent is there to help, and you, you'd

having a crack, people don't care if you make a mistake.

I think that's, that's one thing.

And then the other thing is this whole disability, all abilities thing, and

everyone's got their own take on it.

But I think it's a big mistake because it's, you've got a disability.

It's a dis, it's something that's not functioning the same as everybody else in

your body.

So, it's a disability.

Just because you have a disability doesn't mean you can't go and do it.

Yeah.

And do everything else that everyone else can do, but you do it, you're just

having to, uh, adapt and do things differently because you have a disability.

So that was a big thing for me that would changed my whole life is when I went from

being, I'm not disabled, I can prove to you all I'm not disabled to going, you

know what, I'm fucking disabled.

And I've got this dis, I've got this thing in me that doesn't work.

I'm going to tell you all that it doesn't work.

Can you help me out a bit?

And I might make my life a bit, make it easier for me.

It'll make it easier for you.

Cause when we're all walking on edge shows around the fact that I can't see, and it

changed.

My whole life.

So now I'm like, this is what I lead with.

And in business, right?

We all, we all want to differentiate.

We all want to go, okay, look, as you know, trying to sell a television or a car,

they're all the same, but you want to differentiate some way, but then as

people, we all go in on it with our CV and go, I do this, this, and this, and

this, but I'm going to hide my differentiation behind me because in case

they think I'm different, I lead.

And I teach my people leave with your disability with the differentiation.

I have a disability.

That's the top of my resume.

I've got a disability, but despite my disability, I've done all these other

things and that's built me resilience.

And it makes sure that I'm a problem solver.

Cause I can use, you know, other ways of resolving things

because I've got this disability.

Therefore, how do you feel about people presenting themselves

as apologists all the time?

Cause you know what I mean?

I mean, I guess

it's putting everything backwards.

Yeah.

Cause it's not about that.

As he said, it's about just creating opportunity.

It just, it's just creating an equal playing field for everyone.

Whether that's, you have different cold skin or if you have a disability or if

you've got different language, it's just, everyone should be treated the same way

and given the same opportunities.

Unfortunately with the disability piece, there's a lot

of.

Challenges around, um, just accessibility.

Like I can't, couldn't read a, I was, you know, running huge accounts as a sales

director and I had back in the like 2010s, all my colleagues had Blackberries and

they had email and calendars, everything on their phone.

I've got a, I've got a Nokia cause I can't see the, the Blackberry.

I've got a Nokia with, I'd have to like feel the five.

There's a little dot on the five.

So I'd have about six people's numbers I'd memorize so I could ring them.

I'd have to memorize all my meetings for the day that my turn by turn location.

I'd use the sun to navigate.

Cause I know the sun's going to be in the north in the middle of the day.

So then I know which way I'm going north, south, east, west to get to my meetings.

And then I get to the meeting and they are sorry.

So that was canceled two hours ago.

But my, my colleagues had the cancellation on their Blackberry.

So in 2009, I think it was Apple brought out the, um, three GS phone and it had voiceover on it.

So from one day, one day I had nothing on my phone.

I couldn't even use it the next day.

I've got 10 by 10 navigation, uh, email calendar.

I can read websites better than I could ever read anything before.

I'm on a device that's this big.

I couldn't even do that on a big computer.

So the, all this accessibility stuff that's happening is helping and, and, you know, ramps for ramps for people in wheelchairs, you build the ramp for the person in a wheelchair, but it also helps the old guy that's got a bad knee and it helps, you know, the very pregnant lady to get into that building.

So as you develop all this, this accessibility stuff, it's not just helping the people that have this user need in dis in disability space.

It's helping everybody.

And did you have to go and learn to read braille?

No, I didn't because I wanted to prove the world.

I didn't have a disability.

I refused to learn, to learn braille.

So how did you learn at school?

I listened.

You listened.

Yeah.

Ask questions.

Yeah.

So obviously it had to be accommodated to some extent.

I mean, I, I guess the teacher would probably wear it, but you went, you just went to the school.

Where'd you grow up?

Which area?

Uh, Narrabeen.

Narrabeen.

So you went to a Narrabeen high, whatever it is.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's no point writing it down, but does, what helps, what helps your memory?

Well, writing helps my memory.

Yeah.

If I write it, I'm more likely to remember it.

Yep.

Uh, I'd put things into like the patterns, the same as the phone in the bathroom in Italy.

I've sort of, I put things into patterns.

So if it's a scientific, if I'm doing science and I'm learning about a formula or something,

I just find a way to associate that word with something else in my, in my brain.

And to say it, you know, say it a few times and I'll come back and do it.

And then I, or I'll also go back at the end of a, and it's like note taking, but I'm doing

it mentally.

Um, I was that kid in the class in the...

Anyone that's hearing this that went to school with me probably knows I was annoying as far

as asking that many questions.

But when I was asking the questions, that was me reiterating the points.

And that was the way I took notes is by verbalizing stuff and, and making sure that it was accurate.

The other part was I couldn't go home and do, um, read my notes or do homework really.

Like my mom would help me as much as she could and she'd read stuff to me and I'd tell her,

but I, you know, I couldn't really do homework.

So I had to learn everything in class and take and, and, and focus on that.

And,

but that, that whole lot, you know, by choosing to do that and not learn braille, what that

did was it gave me, you know, my whole tertiary education, my whole schooling from kindergarten

through to university was all, it was basically a sales and, and, and, and leadership training

because I'm listening the whole time, focused on what I'm doing, a hundred percent focused,

listening, learning, being able to ask really concise questions, um, and get the information

I needed to move on.

So it's a different way of doing things, but it's, it's set me up for the, for the person

I'm in business with.

That's mad though, because, uh, your memory from what you hear and, or what you ask, would

you verbalize?

What I experience.

Must be fucking incredible.

Like, uh, I mean, like some people can tell me the same thing 10 times over and because

I'm not actually focusing on it.

Yeah.

Um, I probably don't retain it.

Yeah.

I mean, are you getting to, as we get older though, and I know this to be a fact, as we

get older, we get less room and we tend to, um, just concentrate on what's important.

Yep.

Are you starting to experience that a little bit now?

Definitely.

And I think as well, because of the amount of hats I wear these days as an athlete, as

a businessman, and I'm on a couple of different boards and I've got multiple things going

on, um, there's definitely not as much capacity to get into the details, but I think as well

that it's giving me like the roles that I'm in now in those positions, it's very much

the high level, getting into the detail when I need to, but the most of the time just understanding

the high level, what's going on and getting and helping my team own the detail.

So, um, at the moment.

I'm okay, but I can definitely foresee in the next 10, 20 years that there's going to

be some capacity issues and I'm hoping that the technology will evolve to help me bridge

that gap.

Don't fucking worry, mate.

Like I said, everyone's got selective memory.

It's not fucking bullshit.

Yeah.

I've got so much stuff I've had to sort of try and retain over the period.

My brain's just gone.

I'm tapping out.

I'm saying, fuck it.

I don't want any more information, you know?

And I think what's happening is I'm actually dropping shit out so I can fit something else

in that might be more important.

And my old man, I was talking to my dad's 90.

And I was, and he was telling me that he said, did you wait to get to 90?

He said, like, it gets worse.

He said, I started that.

That's it.

And he said, I started thinking to myself, as my dad speaking that, um, I was getting

Alzheimer's or something like that because I was forgetting stuff.

He said, but I also realized that I'm in new shits coming in every day.

He said, I just don't have any room for any more information.

Yeah.

He said, I just remember now the important stuff.

And I'm, and what's, you know, we don't learn just from what we hear.

Yeah.

Or we ask, we learn from what we see as well.

And, uh, I can only imagine it would, I would be dead set, exhausted at the end of the day

if I was doing what you do.

100%.

So not many people pick up on that, but I am, I'm always tired.

Um, especially when I'm traveling and getting through airports, doing all that stuff.

Um, it's, yeah, it's exhausting.

Um, cause I'm every footstep, every time I put every single time I put my foot down,

I'm having to feel the ground to see if I'm going to stub my toe or smash my shin into

something.

Or slip over.

Or run into a child or an old lady.

Or, you know, hurt someone else, which is, I'd rather, much rather hurt myself than hurt

someone else.

So it's, um, and then I'm trying to be on a call and, um, it's, yeah, it's, it's exhausting,

but it is what it is.

Do you don't have a cane or anything along those lines?

I do have a cane.

You do have a cane?

Yeah, but I used a cane, um, I went to the Paralympics in Rio and.

And what, what were you competing in?

Cycling.

Yep.

And, um, so it's, the Olympics is, you know, I think people always say there's all the

different body shapes.

So you go to the Olympics, you can see it.

You can visually, visually see someone that walks into the food hall and go, that's a,

that's a basketball player.

That's a volleyball player.

That's a, that's a rower.

That's a cyclist.

You know what I mean?

Um, you go to the Paralympics and there's all, there's that plus, so you've got all

the different body shapes because of the sport they've trained for, plus all the disabilities

and amputations and wheelchairs and everything else.

So there's just, it's crazy.

So we were coming out of the food, uh, food hall and the Israeli, um, wheelchair rugby

team were coming flying down the ramp into the, um, into the food.

So one of our physios there saw me that I wasn't moving.

So they're just like, we're coming down.

If you don't get out of the way, they're just going to snap your ankle.

They've got roll bars in the front of their, their wheelchairs.

Bumper bars.

Bumper bars.

And they're just going to straight, straight through.

So one of the guys pulled me out of the way.

Anyway, the reason I tell that story, so my physio said, you're where you're using your

cane for the rest of the time you're here because we can't have you get injured because

people don't, can't see that you're, so they can, they can stop and not take you out hopefully

because they can see that you're blind.

Yeah.

So I was wearing or using it for other people rather than for me.

So I used that for two weeks.

Solid.

And by the afternoon I took, when I put it down after those two weeks and went to walk

around the Olympic village, I was so lost.

I couldn't, I'd lost all my proprioception skills, my echolocation.

I use echolocation, which is like bats.

They can hear the noise bouncing off objects.

So I couldn't, I was just, I was almost scared to walk around because I'd lost all my skills

after two weeks.

So I use my cane sparingly when I need it for different areas and for showing other

people.

Like when I travel internationally, if I'm traveling by myself internationally, I use

a cane so that people can see I'm blind.

It's more of a sign.

They'll help me out.

Yeah.

It's more of a sign.

But as I use it, it's like a comfort blanket.

It's what you said about I'm exhausted.

I'm not exhausted because I'm using my cane and I can just, it's so relaxing.

It's like your comfy blanket, comfy pillow at night.

I'm just like, cool.

I'm cool.

I can just walk around.

I know I'm not going to run into somebody hopefully.

And someone's not going to run into you.

Oh mate, you'd be surprised.

Serious?

All the time.

You said you sound like bats do.

What does that mean?

No, no, no.

It's just one of these things as well.

I didn't know about it.

You can actually try and it's called echolocation.

So you're using the sound that's bouncing off objects to capture information.

So as I walk down a hallway, I can strike my heels and it taps and it sends a sound

out and then I can hear where the walls are and I can hear if there's a soft object because

if you're standing there, the noise isn't bouncing back at me.

So there's hard objects, soft objects.

So I can sort of get a map of what's around me by hearing, by using sound.

I'm only able to articulate that because of these types of conversations because I just

did it.

You know?

When people say, how do you walk?

How do you explain something how you walk?

Totally.

It's like, how do you get around?

I don't know.

I just get around.

But it's called echolocation and there's guys now in the States that can train people.

So if you're blind and you want to learn this skill, there's guys now that have worked out

how to train it.

But it was just something that I picked up riding skateboards, riding around the street

with my mates.

I just got better and better and better.

My body just obviously evolved because it needed that skill and it just built it.

It's funny because it's only a couple of days.

A couple of nights ago I was watching something on BBC on TV and they had this woman who's

blind and she was on a safari, her first safari, and she was talking to the guide and she was

saying how important it was to her to go on a safari, it was in Africa, how she could

hear the sounds, the richness of the sounds and the smells, probably more around the sounds,

and she could sort of...

pretty much imagine, I think, that's probably the best word to use, what was around her as

a safari.

And I thought about that and now here's someone like you telling me exactly that's what happens.

You can draw, you can write your own story, Nilly, about what that sounds like.

You might be able to tell the sound of a rhinoceros if that's what's going around the place.

And you're building maps in your brain and the brain's a fucking incredible thing.

Yeah.

It's become very appreciative of how good the brain is.

Oh, yeah.

But I use different, like when people say to me, oh, they can see, like yesterday my

wife was saying, get the sun cream or something, or get the one that was the kid's hat or something

in the house.

And she's, our pool's out the way out the back of our house.

She's seeing from inside the pool area to under my hand, I can't see under my hand.

She's like, just to your right.

So she's seeing something from 40 meters away in through glass from out in our, you know.

And I'm like, how do you do that?

So I'm amazed at what you guys do.

What do you do with your senses?

Whereas I just use them differently.

So I'm looking at you and you're talking about being able to hear really well.

And I started looking at your ears and I thought, hang on, are his ears a little bit more turned

towards me than normal?

I think I shoved my head in a few too many scrummers, mate.

Well, no, that could be it.

It looked like you could have been wrestling with Alex Volkanovski or something like that.

But I'm just, I'm wondering, I think, these are super fucking human ears because they

look like, I'm not joking.

Yeah.

They look like they're watching me.

Your ears look like they're fucking watching me.

I know it sounds, no, I'm not trying to be a smart ass.

I really believe that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well that's, that's-

Watch with ears.

Yeah.

But my, my nose is actually what I get most, I get the most sensitive information out of.

So you're saying about the safari.

So if I go into a food court, I can find the food I want by the scent, by the smell.

And then I use the sound so you can hear different sounds.

So like an Asian place, there'll be sounds of the walk out the back.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's information I can use.

I can find a chemist with my nose.

I can find a news agent, you know, they all smell differently.

So I just walk around it.

I can walk around a shopping center and find whatever I want using my scent, using smell.

Everybody has become, has become really tuned and it has become a big deal about mindfulness.

Yes.

And one of the things they say to us all in the morning, you just don't throw your coffee

down your gob, smell it, taste it and just be mindful of the moment.

Yeah.

It would appear to me that you're constantly mindful.

Mindful.

Yeah.

I drink my coffee quicker than anyone in the world.

But you're constantly mindful because you know, like I wouldn't be aware of the smell

or something.

Yeah.

No, I'm, I'm very mindful.

And like, as, and especially in the sports that I've played, I've become, that's, I think

that's what was one of the things why I've been so successful is that I'm very, I've

become very good at just being very focused on what I'm doing right now.

And my team would say that they know that, um, despite whatever I've got going, all those

hats that I mentioned when I'm with them, I'm with them a hundred percent.

So whatever I do, I'm doing it a hundred percent.

I'm completely mindful in that moment of what I'm doing.

Um, and that's, that's what I do.

And that's like the big wave surfing I do now, like it's people can't work out how it's

physically possible, but I'm so present in what's happening in my body and everything

else.

I just, every, everything else disappears.

And I'm just doing that one thing and my, through the thousands of hours of training

I've done, my body just knows what to do.

I'm going to talk about that because I mean, I was, I was a surfer till I was 20.

I stopped, I stopped surfing for a whole lot of reasons.

Yeah.

But one big wave surfer, I don't know if many people understand, like that is the most fucking

scary thing in the world.

Do you get taken out on a ski?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Like I used to surf Nazare last year.

Yeah.

So you get dragged out.

50 foot waves, you can't paddle into those waves.

No.

So you get, yeah.

Okay.

So like, that's a big deal.

Yeah.

Um, how do you know the difference between a left hand and right hand?

I mean, what's the deal?

How do you work that out?

Uh, well, we, we make it just big for, for, like for Nazare, for example, where we decide

we're only going to go right on this day.

So if we're going to change and go left, they'll tell me, they'll call out that, you know,

but most of the time with big waves, cause there's so much going on, we'll just go one

direction.

So that takes out the equation.

In the surf, when I'm competing, so I compete, um, the guys that spot for me, they call a

spotter.

They'll go, Matty, I think there's a right coming.

And then they'll talk me, say, paddle, paddle north, south to get me in the right position

and I'm into the wave.

And then they might say like, you know, sometimes the wave's coming and then it just last minute

hits the bank differently and it changes and becomes a left.

So they'll just go left, left and they'll, they'll send me left.

So.

So you have a spotter.

Have a spotter in the water.

Yeah.

But then big wave surfing, we've got a, we used an orientator.

So the, for anyone, Nazare is the spot in Portugal with the big lighthouse.

For anyone that, you know, I think anyone that's even, and not a surfer knows what that

is.

And it's the biggest waves in the world there.

So we, we surfed there and it's, it's like someone died six weeks after I was there.

It's a serious place.

Um, we use the, I'd use like saying yes, yes, yes.

So if we say go, go, go, what does that sound like?

Go, go, go.

Yeah.

Well, not what it sounds like.

No, no, no.

So it does that bit.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So you don't want to be, you don't want to be about to take, jump down the ledge with

a 50 foot wave and someone's going, you know, go, go, go.

And you don't know if it's the yes, yes, yes, or what it is.

So we just say yes, yes, everything's yes and no.

But then at that point we were like, well, it could like, there's jet skis going around.

There's so much noise and whatever.

So we've got an orientation whistle and basically they don't blow the whistle until they're

a hundred percent sure it's the right way.

And then as soon as they blow the whistle, I've got to have a hundred percent trust in

the boys that they're, you know, when you pull up to the headland there, you look at

the headland, most people go, there's no fucking way I'm going in the water.

That's that's a, that's a war zone.

I'm not going out there.

It's not, not, that's not, there's nothing part of me that wants to do that.

So I think I can do it.

And then you get to the water and you go, actually not, not today.

It's too big for me.

I can't do any of that.

So the boys have already made the decision that we're going out, that I'm capable of

it.

So, and then they send me on the wave.

So they buy the whistle.

I've got to have a hundred percent trust that they're sending me on a good wave.

I pull the rope and just drop down the face of the wave and it's all trust.

So, and then I'm going, and that's the, I love, I've always loved contact sport, team

sports.

So like it's that's once again, it's that inclusion.

Like I'm being included with the best big wave surfers in the world, taking me out surfing

and then I go down the wave.

And then.

They worked out that I wasn't turning early enough.

Cause you go on, you know, 60 plus kilometers an hour on waves that big.

I wasn't feeling the bottom of the wave enough and I was turning too late.

So then they blow the Lucas Chumbo was my spotter over there and Dylan Longbottom.

And they basically ride the edge of the wave.

So as I'm going on, they can see they're riding on the jet ski.

They can see me down the face, down the corner of the wave.

And then as I'm getting to the bottom, they buy the whistle again.

And I turn.

The bottom man turned at the bottom.

So at the right time.

At the right time.

So you're not obviously right at the bottom, but they know when I need to play the whistle

and then I'll react straight away.

I'm not, there's no delay.

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I like, I think, you know, as soon as I hear the whistle, I turn.

And then I start my bottom turn, it's like a long drawn out bottom turn, I want the waves

over there.

And then, and then the third, then they blow the whistle a third time for me to kick out.

So this is a really team effort though.

100%.

Fully team effort.

100%.

But it is for everyone over there, but my team just has to operate differently.

Yeah.

Totally.

Yeah.

Have you experienced any really shitty wipeouts?

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

The biggest wave.

That would be scary.

It was.

But mate, I trained- For me, I'm talking about.

Yeah.

But yeah.

And it's all, it's all, it's all relative and it's all capacity.

You know, you build capacity in these different areas.

So I went there knowing that I'd not, you can't over train for a place like that, but I was,

I trained really hard.

So- What does that include?

A lot of breath training.

So I'd done the surfing.

Surfing's not a big part of the training because I can surf.

I've been surfing, I'm a professional surfer, four time world champion.

The surfing will happen.

It's the what happens when the surfing doesn't happen.

Yeah.

So that's what you need to train for.

So if you fall off your board over there, that's when things go really, really bad and

you need to be able to calm down.

So it was breath, a lot of breath training, a lot of carbon dioxide tolerance.

What does that mean?

So swimming under the water, doing passive breath holds in my bed at night, walking,

doing lots of walking.

Underwater?

No, no.

Just in my street.

So just from my house.

Oh really?

Yep.

So I was doing a minute and 20 second breath hold.

So I just walked actively.

So it's stimulating increasing capacity.

Carbon dioxide like you would be if you're holding onto the rope.

And then I reduced my ... So you might get up and hold one, do one breath and it's another

breath that's going to hit you.

So I would do a minute 20 walk and then do ... My first recovery was a minute and a half

and then I'd come down a minute 15, a minute 45, 30, and the last one's 15 seconds.

So you've already built up massive amounts of carbon dioxide in your blood.

So all the time you do that last effort, it's real like ... There's these physiological

things that happen in your body you don't even know about, but as you start getting

to that point in your ... You're going to be able to do it.

Your gallbladder releases blood because it's basically saying you're running out of oxygen.

So it pushes blood into your system and you do a little wee in your pants.

So it's all these little weird things that happen in your body, but you're just learning.

So you're just simulating what's going to happen under those big waves.

So you've done most of it apart from the actual beating.

So your body's experienced it.

And then just long breath holds.

So I could hold my breath for six minutes just before I went, like a single breath for

six minutes underwater.

Okay.

Let's just ... You train like that?

Yeah.

Can you just tell me what was the sense you got the very first time you got tested?

A big wave?

Yeah, yeah.

I'm chill.

I just land underwater and I'll keep my arms ... I'll pull my arms in so I don't dislocate

my shoulder and I keep my abs locked in so I don't break my back.

And that's it.

And then I just ... I've never panicked underwater.

Yeah, I was going to talk to you about the panic bit.

No.

That's when you die.

Right?

You panic, you die.

They're linear.

So you just stay.

I don't know.

I don't know.

I love it.

I think if you're going out in waves like that, you have to want it, but I love it.

The boys freaked out massively, and we documented this part of the film, but you'll see it in

the movie, but they were all losing their minds and then the last wave, the biggest

wave I got over there, which we're putting in for Guinness World Records at the moment.

How big was it?

It was about 55 feet.

What the fuck?

And it got me.

So I got down at the end of that wave.

I was like, washed in and they couldn't get to me.

So they said, whatever happens, we're going to get to you.

They couldn't get to me.

And the second wave hit me and it just drove me back that hard.

So the waves are traveling at 50 Ks an hour or something.

It hit me.

I'm sitting in the water stationary and then it hit me and just drove me like 50 Ks, like

the acceleration.

And then it's just dragging me and bouncing me through the water.

So there was four cameras.

So we're filming a movie, right?

There's four cameras on land.

There's two cameras on jet skis in the water.

I've got three safety skis.

And I've got two drones above me.

No one could find me.

Oh my God.

And I'm in a bright orange wetsuit.

That's how far I got dragged underwater.

But I came up, I was sweet.

I got belted, but I was having the time of my life.

And then I was like, one more to Lucas and he was like pulling the toro up and like,

no, we're done.

No, because he's done.

He was done.

They were done.

They were like, fuck this.

We don't want any more of this stress.

So can you just talk about the movie?

What's the movie about?

Is it a doco?

Yeah.

It's about my life.

It's basically a 90 minute doco.

It's called The Blind Sea, S-E-A.

It's a bit of a play on words, but it's basically the first 45 minutes is about my backstory

of growing up with a disability, interviewing my friends and family and who's met for them.

And the last 45 minutes is literally 10 days in Nazare of how we prepped for it, how we

did it, and then the footage of the waves.

Even somebody like...

A person who's...

A person who's not blind.

Yeah.

Would shit themselves going for a surf there.

Oh yeah.

Most professional surfers wouldn't want to have any part of it.

They're professional surfers and they're people who've surfed all their whole life.

Yeah, yeah.

Who actually know how to surf.

People that get paid to...

The actual professional surfers that get paid to surf probably wouldn't want to have any

part of it.

So would you see yourself as a natural adventurer?

Yes.

Is that irrespective of the fact that you're blind?

100%.

Irrespective of that.

Well, I don't know.

Maybe my blindness made me that adventurer because...

Oh, you think so?

Maybe.

Yeah.

I've always had to do things different.

I've always had to be different to everyone else and it just made me be comfortable being

different and doing my...

And forging my own path.

Yeah.

But like taking risks?

Yeah.

I think I would've been a risk taker.

Was your old man like that?

Or your mom like that?

Is that a family thing?

No.

Dad's really conservative.

Mom's out there.

She's quite...

She's a...

I'd say like a conservative hippie.

She's out there.

She's into all sort of different things.

But no.

I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know.

It's just me.

Is it like more of a social formation, like growing up you became that person?

Yeah.

I grew up in Narrabeen.

Damien Hardener was in my street.

He was a world champion surfer.

I caught the bus to school with Nathan Hedge and all these pro surfers and everyone was...

They're all surfers.

And I wanted to be a pro surfer too and I thought that was never a possibility for me

having a disability.

And then they got to go and compete and I would never compete.

And they always used to say to me...

They'd put me in the water.

And I can actually say this for the first time properly on this podcast.

They'd say, imagine if they'd let you blind fuckers compete against each other.

They said that?

Yeah.

All my mates.

Imagine that.

You'd beat everyone.

And I'd be like, no, they're never going to...

It's too dangerous.

Imagine that.

We'll run into each other.

We'll kill each other.

It's never going to happen.

And then before I was...

When I was training, I was in Italy training for the base camp for Rio Paralympics.

And my mate texts me and he's like, you wouldn't believe it.

They're going to let you blind fuckers compete against each other with a press release that

they were going to do the first world championships for Paralympics.

So that was my upbringing.

I was just in there with the boys, but I couldn't really compete with them.

And then at the age of in my thirties, when I just retired from cycling, became a pro

surfer.

And now this year I actually won the heavy water award for surfing Australia, which was

an able-bodied award.

So I was the first para surfer to win a prestigious able-bodied award in big wave surfing.

How old are you now?

I'm 45.

45.

Yeah.

45 years of age.

Yeah.

Married?

Married.

Three kids.

Three.

And everyone's like, no one's...

It's not a genetic thing that they...

No.

They say it could go through.

My daughter might have...

My daughters might have boys that might have it.

Yeah.

Might skip a generation.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yep.

Okay.

But the kids are good?

Kids are good.

No dramas.

Oh mate.

Every day is a challenge, but no.

Yeah.

Because they're kids, but that's normal.

No visual issues.

They're all great.

Healthy.

Very active.

And they're crazy athletes as well.

My oldest son's played rep footy already and anything he touches, he's pretty good at.

How old is he?

He's nine.

So you go along to his match.

Yeah.

Can you get a sense of what's going on?

Well, I coached his team last year.

Wow.

He's a league team.

I coached the team for the year and...

Well, I coached them for three seasons and last year they were undefeated.

And I think once again, it's just the way I approach things.

I...

Because a lot of coaches go, you got to do this, you got to do this, boys, you got to

do this.

And I taught them, because you're on the field obviously with them until they're under

sevens or under eights.

While I was on the field with them, I got them to run the field because they know I

can't see.

And they also...

I gave them this sense of ownership that they could get away with stuff if they wanted to

because I can't see.

But is that really the right thing to do?

And they'd come down on pretty hard and they'd all come down on the rest of them if they

were trying to get over me because of my blindness.

And I think...

I think that through them having to own and manage the field themselves, they obviously

set their own little leadership structure up and they manage each other as a team.

So you hear them now on the field talking to each other under tens as a team, the way

they structure and own a field, they just dominate because of, I suppose, the tools

that I've given them.

But there's some good little athletes in there as well, obviously.

But they do really well.

So like at halftime, let's say they're behind, they're 10 points behind or whatever.

Yeah.

See, they're under 10.

So you get off and say, okay, boys, what's going on out there?

So I've got a coach.

I've got a coach who sits with me.

So my assistant coach, he tells me what's going on.

So I'm listening.

I'm going, who's doing this?

Who's missed that tackle?

Why'd they score that try?

So he's giving me all that verbal feedback.

And it's obviously his interpretation of it too, right?

So he might...

Clearly.

So there's got to take that into consideration.

And then I also get that map in my head.

Where are we going wrong?

Where do we need to increase?

But it's not about beating them up.

For me, even if I'm working with top athletes in the field, it's not about beating them

up.

We need to increase.

But it's not about beating them up.

For me, even if I'm working with top athletes in the NRL, wherever it is, you know the process.

You've done it.

You do your training every week.

Forget about all the whatever the rub.

If bad stuff's happened, that's fine.

Go back to basics.

It's simple footy.

You know what to do.

Go back to that and you'll win.

As long as you've got your discipline right and you've got your structure right, that's

where it...

And then once you've got the foundation and you're feeling like you're doing well, start

taking some more risks.

Throw the ball around.

Move it around.

And it's just the same all the time.

Whether they're winning or losing, it's always just get it back to basics.

Simple football.

Don't make errors.

And if you're feeling like you're confident and you're not making the errors, throw the

ball around and take some more risks.

So it's sort of like you give them the map.

Yeah, correct.

The map that you've got in your head.

You give them the map.

Correct.

And it's funny you should say that because I remember that once Gus Fugle told me that

one of the ways that State of Origins won, him being the most successful New South Wales

coach ever, is by telling every player what their job is and just go and stick to your

fucking job.

Yeah.

And just do your job.

100%.

And stay in one formation.

Up, back, up.

If you're defending, up, back, up, back.

And if you're attacking, these are the plays.

Yeah.

Three up the guts and three out the back, whatever the case may be, fifth tackle kick.

And I think life is like that.

It is.

Our whole life is like that.

Yeah.

It's just about just doing, just running a map and doing your thing.

And often we get a little bit panicky about when we feel like a little ... We panic when

we feel like we've lost control.

Yeah.

And I can imagine when you're in the big surf, you're there surfing for your movie or for

your doco.

Yeah.

And I immediately thought to myself, I would be panicking because I just analyze it in

my own mind.

It's because I feel like I lost control.

Yeah, yeah.

And that happens in business too.

Yeah, yeah.

You fucking feel like you lose control.

You panic.

Yeah.

And your life becomes shitty.

But it's you.

There's nothing wrong.

Correct.

Yeah.

I've got to trust in my training.

We're all going to be able to trust in what we know, what we've experienced.

Yeah.

And maybe we might not go as far as you do, so you're actually enjoying it coming out

the other end.

Yeah.

But that's a really big lesson for everybody.

Do you actually talk about that in keynotes and stuff like that?

I do.

Yeah.

So for me now, people go, how do you manage the stress in a heat?

Like you could be ... Now I compete in surfing and they're normally 20 or 40 minute heats.

And you could be down with ... It's 15 minutes gone.

But it's go back to basics.

Go back to basics.

And I'm never going to be as stressed as I was as a cyclist.

So you've made it through your whole career, you've won world cups, you've won world titles,

you get to the ... Whatever you're at, you're at world championships, there's a stadium

full of people, they're all screaming.

You've got to do four kilometers, my event was four kilometers, the one that I was the

best at.

So you've got to keep your heart rate down, because if you let your heart rate elevate,

while all these people are screaming and you're panicking about, I want to get this right,

I've done a lot of things.

All my family sacrificed all this time, I've been away training, I've been away traveling.

My work colleagues at the moment, you start thinking about all this stuff in your head,

about all the noise, your heart rate starts creeping up.

If your heart rate keeps up before you even come out of the start gate, you're done.

So you've got to keep your heart rate down.

Then the clock starts going.

So you're locked into the gate, you're in your pedals, your bike's locked into the gate.

The clock starts goes beep at 20 seconds.

That's another thing where your heart rate just goes bang.

Nervous.

Nervous.

Nervous.

Nervous.

Adrenaline.

Yeah.

Adrenaline.

No.

Stay calm.

Then the clock goes again at 10 seconds.

Beep.

And then another one.

Stay calm.

It's all good.

Go back to you.

Go back to what you're doing.

And then it goes beep.

And then it goes for the last five seconds, it'll do the beep.

So five.

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

And you come out.

If you get your timing wrong when you come out of that gate.

So if you're lent forwards before the gate releases you, you've washed all your momentum

off and you're done.

So you've just done all that.

All that time that you talked about your family, all the sacrifices, your sponsor spent

all this money, all this stuff.

Right?

It's all done.

It's game over.

You've got to come out of that.

You've got to come out of the gate with split second timing so that as you push back on

the second last beep and then as the last beep releases the gate, you come forward and

throw the bike out of the gate.

And then you've got to keep your heart rate down while you're doing the four kilometers.

You know, we were doing 60, averaging 60 Ks an hour plus for four Ks.

How do you keep your heart rate down?

Is it breathing?

Staying calm, breathing.

Mentally.

It's both mental and breathing.

The breathing helps you with the mental part of it, but it's the mental, it's the mental

anxiety that will increase your heart rate and the panic.

So I used to, before I found sport and you know, probably my wife's what gave me my consistency

and my real grounding for me to be able to just go out and focus and do healthy things

rather than unhealthy things.

But before that, because of the discrimination in school and then the sport, I found partying

and fighting.

And yeah.

I mean, when I get in an altercation with someone in a pub or whatever, I just, I just

remember everything just going so clear and calm and it's just slow right down and the

focus to the point where like I can't see, but I know if your hand, as soon as a hand

hits me or gets near me, as soon as I can get that hand, I can just start moving body

parts around and it's all until, and then until it's all over, then it's calm again.

And I've just always had that in my mind.

So that's really extreme example of it.

But surfing is the same.

Like when it's all on, it's on, it's on.

And I'm focused.

I'm focused.

I'm focused.

And then when it's over, I can just chill.

But while I'm in there, my brain just seems to, everything slows down and I can't, but

I noticed that when I go into a boardroom example, you know, going for a big pitch,

you start getting nervous before you go in.

But then, and for me, that's harder than the physical, the sporting stuff, because it's,

you're trying to also have a chat with someone else and you can't just be focused as an athlete.

You can just be completely, you can always be rude to people because you're just like,

no, I'm doing something right now.

You need to go away.

As an, as a business person, you can't do that.

So I've learned the skills of just going, go back to basics.

You've done the work.

You're an expert in this field.

The people you've got with you are the best people around you.

Everything's done right.

Just chill.

It's the work, all the work's done now.

All you've got to do is go into the room and, and, and deliver and just execute.

And that's the, that's the easiest part.

So like as a, as an Olympic, as a really good business person or as an Olympic athlete,

when you get to the start gate, which is walking in the room or it's whatever it is, if you're

the winner, you've already done all the work.

All you're doing in that last four minutes of effort is just, it's just a victory lap

as long as you stay calm.

Yeah.

And I guess that's quite a good thing to deliver to audiences, your experience as an athlete,

but as a blind athlete, but as an athlete as well about how they approach the business,

their business endeavors.

Because like every other day there's a challenge in business and it's about doing the work.

It's about backing yourself.

It doesn't always mean you're going to, you're not going to ride every wave.

You're going to get, you're going to, you're going to, you're going to bail out and you're

going to get dragged along and don't worry about getting dragged long.

Just that's what you're doing.

You're doing that.

You're going to get dragged long and you're going to pop your head up some stage.

You're going to be able to start breathing again properly.

You might get back on the board.

You might take a break.

You might get back on the board, paddle back out, listen to your team.

Teamwork's really important thing.

A great thing that you could talk to us all about.

Teamwork's a big deal.

I mean, you must be like nearly an expert on teamwork.

I'd say that's my biggest strength.

I know how to build a team.

Yeah.

So in my cycling, I built a team.

I got the best coaches.

I ended up developing the first carbon tandem bikes that were ever used in international

races.

So I did that with three different companies, but they were my, they were part of my team.

They were part of my extended team.

They came in with Garmin on pedals and worked with all these different people.

And that's what I've become really good at is building a team, staying high level, but

knowing that everyone owns their piece.

And then if something's starting to break, that's where I put my energy and let the other

pieces bubble away.

And then put my energy into the pieces that might be a bit, you know, getting a little

bit off track.

But the team is so important to me and as a blind person, you know, I need, I need to

trust that.

But that was one thing that I learned, you know, probably in the last five years was

cause I'm very much about, well, if someone else isn't going to, if it's not getting done

right, I'll just do it.

Cause I know I'm going to do it right.

Whereas I was burning myself out with that type of behavior.

So now I'm like actually either, either give that person the tools and let them get it

done or find someone else to do it.

But that means it assumes you've got a good team in the first place.

Yeah.

Correct.

That they're competent.

You build that team.

You build that team.

But if, if, if you can't, if that person can't do it, then it's, it's sometimes a really

hard decision to say, I'm going to give it to someone else, but it's long-term that's

going to be a better decision.

And then if that person can then build themselves back up and come up and help that person,

you know, put someone else on point that that person maybe still help, but put someone else

on point, you know, can own it and deliver on it.

And that person can learn along the journey and then you can bring them back on point

later on.

But if it's something that's really critical piece of the operation, don't just leave them

on point.

And let other people help them because it's, it's, it's probably not going to change.

And that's something that I've learned that I, that I'm working through with a few of

my people at the moment is, um, they're really hard decisions and they're sometimes hard

communication to, to have, but it actually helps everyone because the person that comes

on point work, it delivers the person that wasn't getting it done, learn if you communicate

with them well, and you don't do it, you know, you can do it in a right way.

You don't, you don't have to be rude about it or, or put them down or, or even make it

visible to everyone else.

There's ways that you can do things that it's going to help everyone.

And they all, they all achieve together.

So whole team achieves, you know, you win a gold medal, you sign a deal or you creating

your product, um, and then you can go back to, okay, well, who's the best people as we

go to the next evolution of building a product, selling it, whatever it is, where does, where's

everyone's strengths and weaknesses now as a team, as like a footy team, right?

You said you, you stay in, you stay in your, in your lane, you do your job.

This is your, this is your job for the, for the game.

Um, maybe your job changes slightly and you go on point for a different thing.

I went for a different thing because your strengths and weaknesses are more designed

to that.

So someone like you, I would, I'd like your, your opinion on it, or at least your verbalization

of it.

Someone like you has to develop unbelievably good communication skills, um, because teamwork

requires communication, particularly you.

I mean like your teams have to communicate to you, but equally you have to communicate

back to them.

Correct.

So what would you say?

Is the.

It's a good definition.

If you could apply it to business, um, of a good communicator relative to a team.

So what does a good communicator have to have in terms of being effective relative to his

or her team or her team?

Empathy.

Which means.

It means you understand your audience, understand your people.

You can live in their, you can, you try and live in their shoes, understand that.

So when you're communicating to them, you understand why, how they want to receive information,

how it's going to affect them personally.

Yeah.

Um, how, um, what, what, what day it is, is, you know, is, uh, is their wife having a child

that day?

Is it a good day to send them that message?

You know, because it's, uh, the, the style of communication and the timing of the, of

the communication are equally as important.

So.

So tone is important.

Tone's important.

Language.

Delivery.

Timing.

Is it, do you want to do it?

Is it, is it the message that should be delivered in the morning or in the afternoon?

Um, don't just go, I'm going to go and do this now because it's what I want to do.

Empathy.

It's understanding what other people want.

Uh, I think, and as a leader, if you can have that true empathy, understanding your people

and your customers, um, and really live in their lens and see the world through their

lens, then you will naturally communicate well because you're, you're trying to, you're,

you're trying to articulate to them in a way that they will understand and will help them

be the best person that they can be.

Yeah.

That's interesting when you say empathy, especially, um, a lot of people use the word and they

throw it around a lot, but empathy means actually understanding how another person is going

to receive something.

Correct.

And, uh, and that means you've got to understand all.

Yeah.

All of the circumstances.

So that means you're going to be, you know, it is a bit exhausting, like you said earlier,

but you've got to actually be continually making inquiry.

Correct.

And be open to receiving data, information about them.

I mean, that's a big deal, especially if you're running lots of different teams, how do you

get through that?

I, I, I am genuinely keen.

I like it.

Something that I'm passionate about is understanding people and, and, and being empathetic.

And I think it comes back to me not being understood as a kid.

So I.

Yeah.

I think it's important to realize how important it is to purely understand people and what

their differences are.

Um, so I, I want to do it.

Like whenever I jump on a call, I will be, I'll spend the first two or three minutes saying,

how are you?

What are you doing?

And especially if it's one-on-one, like if you jump on a call and there's other people

not there, like you get rather than just going, Oh, how's the weather?

How, like, how are your dogs?

How are your kids?

What are you doing?

And that's your little, it's a two minute opportunity you get, but you can come back

to that three months later and go, how did that, how did that thing go?

What are your challenges?

You know what I mean?

And then my team rings me and says, look, someone in my team is having this challenge

at the moment.

I pick the phone up and call them.

Like I make it an important, that's an important call for me to make that day and call them

one-on-one and say, like, I hear you.

I want to like, and then it might be, it might turn into a 15 minute call because they really,

they need to, to talk.

But by doing that, I think I'm known as a, as a leader that's empathetic and cares about

my people.

Um, and so they want to share information with me.

So it's a two-way dialogue, right?

So once you, once you start that feed, um, that's.

Yeah.

That's a cycle of, of showing that you truly are interested.

People will actually volunteer the information because if you, if they don't feel like you

want the information, they're not going to, they're not going to give it.

So then it actually becomes exhausting because you're trying to get it somehow, but it's

not actually, and it's probably not even the deep stuff that's going to help.

It's just that, that, that high level surface layer stuff.

Um, so I think because I truly have desire to understand people and to lead them from

a place of empathy that I get that information volunteered to me.

Maybe your real superpower is not.

Maybe your real superpower is that you map out people's lives, the people you're talking

to.

You map out what's important.

Yeah.

And the only way you can do this is by being empathetic.

Correct.

By asking stuff or listening to stuff and, and then, and you sort of, you position it,

you put it in places.

Yeah.

Maybe, I don't know.

Yeah.

Maybe people who can see perfectly, maybe we take shit for granted and for, and we never

have to tap into these superpowers.

I think as well, the whole visual thing is a bit of a distractor.

So I've, I, I speak.

I speak in my, in my, in my keynotes about how I manage a boardroom.

So I don't, if you're in a room, right, and there's six people in a room and they smile

and most smiling and nodding.

Smile fucking.

Yep.

Um, if they're not talking, I'm like, why is there silence or there's, so I can feel

energy in a room.

So I will feel if there's, if you're, if there's a void of energy coming from you or negative

energy coming from you, I want to talk to you because there's a problem.

I want to solve that problem in the room now.

I don't want to leave.

So a lot of people in a, in a, in a, in a, in a sales room or a boardroom situation,

we'll talk to the people that are talking to them because that's comfortable.

But those people already bought into the solution.

I use energy and sound and different information to go, why is that person not engaged?

Why are they distracted?

And let's fix the problem for them now.

So I don't leave the room and then they're going to go over to Tim and say, I don't like

that guy.

Let's get him on board.

Um, so there's energy that I use, but it's also saying you can hear the tone of someone's

voice when they're speaking, whether they're interested or they don't believe you or they're

disinterested or whatever it is.

You can pick that information up.

Whereas I think a lot of times the small fucking.

Whatever it is, is to really distracting people with vision.

So I'm, I'm almost sitting there with my eyes closed, just real.

And if you, next time you're in a, if you get an opportunity and you're in a room and

you can just close your eyes and listen to the tone and try and feel the energy.

And I, for me, it's, people ask me how, what does that mean?

How do you feel energy?

But it's almost like colors.

I can almost feel colors coming off people in the room and knowing what, you know, if

it's good energy or bad energy.

If you close your eyes and tap into that a bit, I bet you, you can, you can probably

learn a bit about the people you're working with that you, that you're not using.

At the moment, because you're seeing the, the, the small fucking.

Do you think that, you use the word energy, I love that word.

To me, like vibrations, voice is just vibrations and it's a form of energy.

Resonance.

Yeah.

But do you think that people try to hide their energy out of laziness or, or try to bluff

their way through, like if we're talking about board meetings or presentations, try to buff

their way through situations because they're either not engaged in the conversation and

they're just doing it.

They're doing it because it's like a rehearsal or they're doing it because they have to be

there.

Yeah.

Can you, do you think that's, do you, do you feel that?

Yeah, for sure.

And how do you deal with that?

So I, I think that's, a lot of it comes from insecurity.

There's a lot of very insecure people and people that come from a place of fear and

work from a place of fear.

I like to try and break down that fear, just go like, there's no, this is a safe place,

right?

You know, if you deliver the job, if you deliver the best, if you deliver to whatever you're

about to deliver to me, if you deliver to the best of your abilities, I don't care if you're

going to get a few words wrong or if it's not a hundred percent.

And if you, if you need to leave the room and go and get, if we don't, if you don't have

all the information right now and you go to leave the room and come back with it, that's

great.

But if you've, if you've come in here, you haven't prepared well, you're wasting my time.

I'm not going to deal with it.

And that's the, that's the other side to it.

Like I'm very empathetic and we just talked about the empathy and I want to understand

people, but if you're mucking around and you're wasting my time, I'm not going to be a friendly,

I'm not going to be a nice person to you.

I'm not going to, the empathy goes, I understand that you're not doing your job, so I'm going

to treat you.

With this, the disrespect that you're treating me with, you know what I mean?

I'm not going to treat you with disrespect.

I'm just going to call a spade a spade and say, it's not good enough to do better next

time.

I'm not going to engage.

Yeah.

Well, I'm going to engage and I'm going to tell you it's not good enough.

Come back, come back when you've done your job.

So you can be, you can be, have empathy, but you don't have to be gentle and soft.

I think there's kindness and there's softness and that's, that's, that's like that's needed

all the time.

But just, I think a lot of people would go, empathy, oh, it's just about being gentle

and soft.

And it's not, it's not all about that.

It's about understanding people.

But then if, if it's also, then if, if people need to have a little knock on the, you know,

a little tap on the back to say, you're not doing good enough, you need to step your game

up.

Then that's, that's required as well.

It's interesting.

When I was listening to that answer, I closed my eyes and I just, I didn't want to look

at you.

I just wanted to hear what you had to say.

I just try to do what maybe you have to do.

And I felt like I received everything much better.

And, and I, it's, but I also.

I felt like I had to be sort of a bit more generous towards you.

And maybe generosity is an important thing for disabled people.

Well, my wife says I'm too, I'm overly generous.

But no, but that's a superpower.

Yeah.

I think.

Yeah.

Maybe it's, it's, I mean, because I think what people like you have had to do, you've

had to develop these superpowers, which you, we probably all have it.

Yeah.

Maybe we, we, we take for granted.

Yeah.

We've got, and we don't need to.

Well, I, I truly believe that like Malcolm Gladwell outlines, like we're all humans.

We all go, oh, these people are amazing.

They're super, super human.

But then when you look at the, the life, the life experience they've had has, has brought

them to that point.

You know what I mean?

So I think that's a great book because it shows that we're all pretty similar.

It's just that our life experience gives us different capacities in different areas.

So I've had to develop because of my disability.

I've been given opportunities to learn, like, you know, listening and asking questions cause

I couldn't read or read braille.

I had to listen and ask questions.

So I've become superhuman at asking questions and listening and capturing information.

So it's just my life experience.

But I think if we all try a bit harder too, that's the other thing as well.

I think I've tried really hard and I had, I've worked my ass off in a lot of areas and

it's, you know, I haven't been given the awards that I've had in life because I've just learned

a few different little, little tricks.

You know what I mean?

There's the tricks, but there's the hard work that comes with it as well.

It's amazing.

You know, you just reminded me of a friend of mine who has been a friend of mine for

a long, long time, like 40, 50 years.

And when I first met him, he's about three years old and he's about, and he's, what was

it, like 20 years of age or something like that.

I went to a restaurant with him and he, we ordered, you know, we, he, he's not blind.

He can, you know, I, I met him through boxing, so, you know, he was, he was sparring, stuff

like that.

Yeah.

And he's not had too many beers.

No, no, no.

Well, he did like a drink.

He still does.

And, um, and, uh, and, uh, but he was, he, the waiter gave him the menu and he looked

at the menu and he said to the waiter, you know, what's everyone, you know, like what's

the specialty or whatever the words were.

And then I went to him over years, five years, I didn't realize he couldn't read and write.

Okay.

But I never knew.

Yeah.

Because he learned these little techniques.

Yeah.

He would listen to what everyone else was ordering.

Yeah.

Or he would ask the waiter, well, like, what's your special?

Yeah.

So what, what is, what's, what's the house special?

Yeah.

And he would ask him, what are you known for?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that little technique.

Yeah.

And, uh, anybody who would be sitting with him would not have known that he could not

read or write.

He never learned to read or write.

Yeah.

And he still can't really read or write.

Yeah.

To this very day.

And he, today he's 70 something.

Yeah.

71.

Yeah.

And, um, but he still gets away with it.

Yeah.

Because he learned techniques.

So a lot of people that meet me don't know that I'm blind.

Cause I can walk into a room, don't use a cane.

I can walk to, I've, especially I've been there before, I know where the seats are,

I know where everything is.

Um, and then I can do the same, I, you know, I've developed all those tricks and skills

of not letting people know that I, I've got some deficiencies in some part of my life.

Therefore, I mean, I, I know it's called disability, but sometimes we never really say these people

have got more ability.

No, no.

Different abilities.

Yeah.

Well, okay.

Different abilities.

Yeah.

It's a pretty weird thing to say different, different abilities.

Maybe we need a different word.

No, no.

It's, I'm really passionate about saying disability.

Yep.

Um, we all have abilities and we've all got pretty equal opportunities in life.

Okay.

So you and someone else, your friend that can't read probably have similar, he, but

he potentially has a mental disability.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He has a learning disability.

Learning disability.

Yeah.

So just something.

So, um, so you have a disability.

That disability actually gives him less opportunities in life than you.

That's true.

So let's just call it.

In our current structure.

In our current structure.

Societal structure.

Correct.

So let's just call a spade a spade.

Disability is disability.

But despite our disabilities, we all have different ability.

We all have different strengths, superpowers, as you said.

Um, so, and I think a lot of the times people with disabilities have to work a lot harder.

They have to go through a lot more.

They have to go through, they build more resilience because their life's a lot harder.

Um, and so I think when you look at, uh, employment statistics, there's like less than 50% of

Australians with, uh, have Australians with disability have a job, but then for the, for

the people that do, they've got like, they've got, I think it's six years longer tenure

than their able-bodied counterparts.

They take less sick days.

So the people with disabilities, they take less sick days on average than people that

are able-bodied.

Right.

So that, you know, but they're, they're really good employers, employees because they have

built their problem solvers because they've had to work way around things.

They're resilient.

You know, there's all these good things, but they still, to this day, they have less opportunities

to get a job.

Even though you can line all those things out and you're, you're going, wow, and it

probably makes sense to you, but they still don't have the same opportunities to get jobs

that they put their able-bodied counterparts to.

It's funny, I was talking to Dylan, I was, I saw Dylan Alcott do an ad on television

yesterday, uh, last night.

Yeah.

I think it was, uh, and I actually texted him talking about, uh, the representation

of, um, people with disabilities in relation to TV advertising.

Yeah.

They have such a small percentage of TV advertising.

Yeah.

Um, and, uh, that they should have more.

Yeah.

And I texted him and said, mate, that makes sense.

Yeah.

Makes a lot of sense.

Yeah.

To me.

Um, and, and then they have some examples of disabled people.

Yeah.

And, uh, I, I, again, I'm just, from my point of view, and I don't know whether I should

feel this way or not, but like when I sit here talking to someone like you, just like

doing a Dylan, I actually feel, um, quite humbled, um, to be able to sit down and talk

to someone who, who has a disability, but does things even with my ability, I wouldn't

be, I wouldn't be able to do it.

I wouldn't do it.

I wouldn't try it surfing like you did.

Uh.

I mean, I would, if someone said, put a blindfold on and ride in a bike race, I'd say, you're

kidding.

Um, or, or someone put a blindfold on and said to me, go on, go on box, fight that bloke.

Yeah.

Uh, you, you're joking, uh, or, or get a, get on, go and ride a hundred foot wave or

something like that.

Yeah.

Get off your head.

Yeah.

Um, uh, so I.

But you have a choice, right?

Not to do it.

Not to do it.

And so it comes down to choice, doesn't it?

Yeah.

It comes down to you not having choices and you, but you didn't have to choose to go and

ride those big waves.

And that's what my dad says.

You can maybe do something in the middle.

You don't have to go.

A hundred percent.

You don't have to go full, you know, do this level, but that's just who I am, I suppose.

That's, that's what I do.

Well, I feel quite privileged to be able to sit in, um, in, in someone like yours company,

but I'm probably, you know, the fact that you've achieved these things, but probably

the most important thing I get out of this conversation from you, Matt, is the super

power of empathy that you've built and acknowledging that.

And um, it makes me think about what I can do better and to a large extent.

I mean, I got a son nearly your age, um, he's only a year younger than you, um, so people

like you continually, you know, people, you, your age, young person, relatively speaking,

I'm talking about relatively speaking, but with a disability still, I still get inspired

and motivated by people like you and it's pretty fucking cool.

Like, uh, yeah, it's, that's one of the great things about my, my job doing a podcast is

being able to meet people like you and I walk out of this, I walk out of this feeling much

taller, much bigger.

Much better.

And, uh, and I also walk out of feeling a lot more gratitude for what I've got too.

I often, um, overlook how good it's been in 68 years.

So, um, thanks very much.

Appreciate it, mate.

Thank you.

Appreciate you having me.

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Okay.

Have a good one.

And I'll see you in the next episode.

Take care.

Bye bye.

Transcripted by Rev.com.

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