Thirty Minute Mentors Podcast Transcript: Olympic Gold Medalist Jessie Diggins

I recently interviewed Olympic gold medalist Jessie Diggins on my podcast, Thirty Minute Mentors. Here is a transcript of our interview:

Adam: Our guest today is the most decorated cross-country skier in American history. Jessie Diggins has won two World Cup overall titles, six World Championship medals, and three Olympic medals, including an Olympic gold medal. Jessie, thank you for joining us.

Jessie: Thank you for having me.

Adam: You grew up in Afton, Minnesota. You still spend a lot of time there. You started skiing at the age of four. By the time you were 11, you were competing against kids older than you. Can you take listeners back to those days, those early days? What early experiences and lessons shaped your worldview and shaped the trajectory of your success?

Jessie: Yeah, well, I was really lucky to grow up in such a beautiful area where you could be outside in all four seasons. And I think the luckiest thing for me was that my parents, they raised me to really appreciate being outdoors. So in the summer, we were camping and hiking and fishing and canoeing. In the winter, we were cross-country skiing or snowshoeing. In the fall, we were picking apples and raking leaves into piles. And in the spring, I was helping my mom in the garden. So I really got to be outside all the time and trying to just appreciate the different phases of nature and the different ways that you can move your body outside. And so I always grew up as a really active kid. I was outside all the time. And cross-country skiing is something that my parents both love because they just love the feeling of just gliding through the woods on these trails that are just swooping and turning. And they thought it was so fun and such a beautiful sport and such a cool way to challenge yourself. So, when I was a baby, they would just put me in their backpack and take me with them. So I grew up kind of on the trail thinking, this is so cool, this is so fun. we joined the Minnesota Youth Ski League. So I learned how to ski by just playing tag and playing soccer on skis and going on scavenger hunts in the woods. And we would have the big expedition to ski all of whatever it was, four kilometers to the frozen waterfall. But when you're six years old, that's a really big deal. So I grew up just totally loving the sport and seeing it just for fun. And I think A really important part of my upbringing was that, for me, fun was centered first. And for my parents, the big win is if our daughter loves being outside and is a good teammate and likes challenging herself. It's not she physically, literally wins the race. The win is that She's having fun and she's a good person and she's moving her body and that's all we want. And so I was really lucky because they have never pushed me in my life to race. It always had to be my decision to put the bib on and they would always support me. They were like, hey, we'll help you wax your skis. We'll get you to the race. We'll help you sign up. We'll do all the things, but you have to be the one. who wants to take it each step of the way. So when I started getting more and more into racing, it was very self-driven. And I think that was a really incredible foundation for me.

Adam: I love that. Great lesson from your parents. Not about winning the race. The win is having fun. And the reason why I love that is because if you do have that competitive fire, which most of us have, You don't need someone else to tell you that you need to win this race. You don't need someone else to tell you that you have to come in first. You know that yourself, but it's always important to be reminded, whether it's by people around you, people who you trust, your parents, your mentors, your friends, the people who you care about, who care about you. There are many different forms of winning, and winning isn't always necessarily about coming in first place.

Jessie: Absolutely. And like you said, when you're really a competitive driven person, you're already hard enough on yourself, probably. You're already trying as hard as you can, so you don't need additional external pressure, which is why I'm so glad. Even to this day, when I call my parents and catch up, they'll be like, hey, how was whatever race you did in Italy? Tell me about it. And it's open-ended. You tell me how it went. We're not going to assume how it went based on the results. We want to hear from you. What was your experience? What was cool? What was fun? What was challenging? And it's taught me so much about how I want to approach conversations with my teammates. After a good day, after a hard day, it's always leading with proud of your effort. How'd it go? You be the one to let me know what you thought about it.

Adam: The other thing I love about that lesson and what I love about that advice is that if you're not enjoying what you're doing, if you're not enjoying whether it's the sport you're playing or the business you're in or whatever it is you're pursuing, you're not going to have that same level of competitive fire, you're not going to be as eager, as hungry, as driven, as motivated intrinsically to go out and get it. So when you do love what you do, when you are having fun, when you genuinely enjoy what you're pursuing, that fire is going to be burning and it's going to be burning a lot more sustainably.

Jessie: Yeah, and I think it also helps you get through the days when it isn't easy, because if you're just in something to win it or to please someone else or to match external expectations, then when it's going well and when you're winning the race, then it's all good. It's all easy. You can still get out the door and train. But what happens when you have an injury or a setback or you're just not racing that well for who knows what reason? Life has ups and downs. And when you're internally motivated doing it because you love what you're doing, and ideally you like the people that you do it with, then it helps you get through those lower points that we're all going to have. That's just life. That's just part of the nature of things. It's not going to be super motivating every single day to get out the door and do your job. But if you do love what you're doing, then that helps you see the bigger picture and get out there to still accomplish the tasks that you want.

Adam: What happens on those days? Because those days exist, as you've shared with listeners, even for someone who's at the absolute top of her field. How do you motivate yourself on the days that you don't feel motivated?

Jessie: Yeah, well, it's a nuanced answer because for me, it's also very tied into reading my body and respecting what my body needs because our sport and cross-country skiing It's such a endurance power sport, where you need to make sure your body's functioning really well, and you're not pushing towards an injury. So sometimes if I wake up and I'm like, Oh, really tired, I'm really sore, I'm not feeling it. Sometimes that's a cue of like, huh. I'm very internally motivated to the point where I always want to go out there and train. Even if I'm not psyched about the weather, I'm like, okay, but I can put in a good podcast and I can go out there and, you know, I got this. But if I'm really like, I don't want to do this, then I'm like, whoa, wait a minute. My body and my brain is trying to tell me something. Maybe I'm headed toward an injury. Maybe I'm on the edge of getting sick. Maybe this is that moment where I need to actually pull back. and really consider carefully what's going on here and evaluate how my body feels. And sometimes maybe I am just tired and it's okay to modify the workout. Sometimes I need to scrap the workout and say, hey, I can do more later if I pull back in the here and now. And so it is kind of this balance of it's not always right to just push through something. But on the days when I don't want to go outside simply because it's 30 degrees and raining, that's when I lean on my team. And that's when I'm like, okay, like, that's why I'm part of a club. That's why I'm part of something bigger than just me. Because when I show up to practice, like I said, I was going to, I'm going to be able to make my teammates better, and they're going to make me better. And we only get better because we're pushing each other and encouraging each other and learning from each other and following each other. And so I'm committed to this entire group getting better, and it only gets better if I show up. And so that's one of the tricks to help get me through the days when it's right for my body to train, but my brain's like, oh, yuck, this is gross outside.

Adam: A lot of great advice there. The importance of listening to yourself, trusting your instincts, trusting your gut. Ultimately, your instincts, your gut is driven by all of your experiences and To get to where you are, you've had to do something right. So listen to what your body is telling you. Listen to what your instincts are telling you. That's shaped by everything you've done before. When you feel like it's time to push yourself, it's probably because you're, like we talked about before, a competitive person and you understand that the moment's right to push yourself. But sometimes the right decision is to take a step back and take it a little bit easy on yourself. How did you go from someone who loved skiing to being the very best at it?

Jessie: Well, that's kind of a meandering path to get there because I actually almost didn't join my high school cross country team because I heard that they practice six days a week. And I was like, I don't have time for that. I'm so busy with my homework and all my other sports. And I literally almost didn't even join the team. And I'm so glad I did. And the reason I joined was because the people and the culture and all my friends were doing it. And when I went to my first practice, I remember thinking, oh, these are my people. It was so welcoming, so inclusive. Nobody took themselves too seriously, although we were definitely working hard and striving for excellence, but there weren't egos. It was like, all right, this is a very humbling sport in and of itself. So we're just trying to beat the course here. We're not necessarily trying to beat each other. We're just trying to take on the challenge of trying to be the best that we can be. And I really dived that. And so my high school ski experience was when I really learned how to be just a good teammate and how to love racing for the sake of trying to score points for the team. And then eventually I learned that, oh, I also love racing for me. And that's okay too. I don't always have to race only for the team. I can also race because I want to try to go fast and see what's down there. And I think ultimately what led to me getting to where I am now is just the fact that Each step of the way, I've been very focused on the process, not the outcome. A lot of kids watch the Olympics and they're like, oh, that'd be super cool to go to the Olympics and win an Olympic medal. Of course, that is the dream for most sports that are Olympic sports. But you don't get an Olympic medal simply by focusing on the medal and being like, I want it, I want it. You get it by focusing on the process. How do I become better just a little bit every day? How am I a good teammate? How am I getting the most out of my training? How am I improving my technique? How can I improve my strategic decisions mid-race? Having race reports that you fill out and analyze how the race went afterwards can help you learn from mistakes in the past. this super slow methodical step-by-step, and I like to imagine it, and I hear this analogy a lot in endurance sports, where you're laying bricks. Like if you're trying to build this giant brick house, it doesn't happen right away. You're just stacking one brick on top of the other, and each brick is its own piece. So every time you go out there for a workout, you go out there and you complete your training session, and you're like, all right, that was the best that I can do. you're stacking another brick. And some days you stack a couple bricks, because it was super productive, and some days you're like, that's all I got is a one, and that's okay. And over time, you build this incredibly solid foundation and this giant thing, but it happens very slowly. You just have to be so focused on the task at hand and being in the moment.

Adam: I love that advice. Focus on the process, not on the outcome. How do I become better every single day? Even if it's just a little bit better. But that continual focus on self-improvement. I love how you broke down and continue to break down. every little element of what goes into making you successful and asking yourself, what can I do to improve in at least one aspect of what will allow me to become the very best at my craft every day and acknowledging that some days you're going to wake up and you're going to have it. You're going to have your fastball and you're going to be able to improve a lot. You're going to be able to, in your words, lay a number of bricks. And other days, you're just not going to have it. We all have days where we get out of bed and we just don't have it. But on those days, can I lay one brick? Can I take one small step? As long as you can improve even just a little bit every single day, that's how you get there.

Jessie: Yeah, and sometimes just showing up is laying that brick. On the days when it's really, really hard, hey, you showed up. And sometimes that's the biggest hurdle to get over, is just getting out the door and getting it done. And it doesn't have to be pretty, it doesn't have to be glamorous, it doesn't have to be the best ever every single day. Also, that's not realistic. You're not going to win every race. You're not going to smash every single workout, but sometimes just the act of showing up and putting forth whatever it is that you have that day. That can be pretty magical in the long run.

Adam: Are there any moments that stand out to you? failures, setbacks, challenges, losing big races, significant injuries that have defined you, that you've been able to navigate, come back from, and that you are able to reflect on and say, this has enabled me to become all that much better and here's how.

Jessie: Well, I think it's also important to acknowledge that when you list the highlights of someone's career, you're seeing just that, highlights. But I've also been fourth, fifth, sixth at the Olympics many, many times. I've been the first person out of a medal by mere seconds. I know what it feels like to come close and not get the thing that you've been working towards. And that's why I think it is so important to define winning not just as literally winning the race, but is winning, giving everything you have and being a good teammate and thanking the wax techs and the coaches and showing up for yourself and for your team the best that you're able to. And in that case, are you being the person that you want to be? But ultimately, when I think back, there isn't one race or one injury, although I've had many of those, that really defines me. But I think the thing that really has defined my journey and made me ultimately a much better person with actually my eating disorder. And that sounds really counterintuitive because it's not a fun experience going through an eating disorder and I had to learn so much. But the fact that I had to learn how to ask for help and to be vulnerable and to do the work with a therapist to really look inside my brain and figure out Who am I? What do I need? What does my soul need to be okay? How do I listen to myself? How do I respect what my body needs? How do I learn how to take a step back in order to ultimately take those steps forward? I think that going through treatment at the Emily program and learning how to take care of myself is the thing that has ultimately made me a great athlete now that I'm in a place of recovery. And I think without that, I probably would have made many more mistakes of just burying my head in the sand and being like, no, I'm going to train no matter what. And then I'd get super injured. I don't think I would have learned how to be as kind to myself and how to bounce back after tough races or disappointing setbacks as I am now because of how I've had to learn how to be kind to myself through my eating disorder.

Adam: It's an amazing and inspiring story. And I want to know if you can share with listeners, what are the best lessons that you've learned from your experience fighting your eating disorder? And more broadly, what lessons do you have for listeners around how to get to a place where they are at their very best when it comes to their mental health?

Jessie: So if your listeners are not familiar with my story, when I was 18, 19, I was diagnosed with bulimia, and that was the first time that my eating disorder really surfaced. And I, at the time, didn't really know anything about eating disorders beyond your couple days of eighth grade health class when you just learn very briefly about a wide range of things. And so I didn't know that, A, this was not actually my fault. I thought I was a bad kid all of a sudden with some sort of behavior control issue, but I didn't realize that nobody asks for an eating disorder. This is actually just the way my brain was hardwired and this is my unique challenge to overcome, but I didn't do anything to deserve it. And it wasn't just behavioral choices. This is actually something real in my brain that I was having to work through and overcome. I also had believed this myth that eating disorders only affect skinny, white, affluent teenage girls, which is sort of the thing that people generally think. But then when I went into treatment, I was like, oh my gosh, This affects anyone. Eating disorders don't discriminate. This can affect anyone in any gender, any ethnicity, any stage of life. It can affect someone who's eight years old, someone who is in their 80s. And I really had to open my eyes to the idea that eating disorders, unfortunately, are so much more common because when you're struggling, it can feel like you're the only person in the world who is struggling right now. Like everyone else has their shit together, Why don't I? And it can be this incredibly isolating experience. And unfortunately, that's what, you know, my eating disorder, at least, would thrive on that. It wanted me to think, oh, you can't tell anyone. Because the other thing I learned is that eating disorders can thrive in shame and secrecy. And when it's a taboo subject to talk about in society, when you feel like you can't talk about it with anyone, it becomes that much harder to ask for the help that you need. And so I was very much scared of asking for help. I was very scared to talk about it. I was very ashamed because, again, I thought this whole thing was just my fault and that if I could only just figure it out, I would just get better on my own. I learned that similarly to if I broke my arm today, I wouldn't be like, you know what? I'm a smart, competent woman. I can heal this on my own. No, I would go to a doctor. I would go to the medical professional and be like, all right, let's get an x-ray, let's get a Cath, let's figure out how to heal this. And I would lean on the advice of someone who has trained for years in their profession in order to help people. And that's the same thing with mental health and eating disorders. I don't have to be able to fix my own brain. It's okay to lean on the advice of medical professionals who have trained for years in this field. And they are fully equipped to be able to help me recover and get to a better place. And so that was something else that I learned. Like I had to get over this idea that I quote, should be able to fix myself or that I couldn't ask anyone for help. and be okay with letting people in and letting people be part of my recovery team. And I found that the more people that I told and the more people I let in and the more vulnerable I was, the more my eating disorder shrank into the shadows because it couldn't survive in all this openness and couldn't survive me talking openly about what I really needed and what I was really thinking and feeling.

Adam: If you want to become great at anything, you're not going to get there alone. You didn't become the greatest in your sport by yourself. And in order to get to that place, whether your objective is to be the best athlete you can be, to be the most successful you can be in business or in anything else, you need to have Great people around you to help you get there and How do you do that? Use the word you have to be vulnerable you have to be open you have to be willing and eager To want other people to help you. It's not a weakness. It's a strength

Jessie: It's very scary because it's counterintuitive. It's like, Hey, my younger teammates look up to me. I'm supposed to be their role model. You know, I'm 33 and the youngest on the team is 18. I need to be a good role model for these kids. How could I possibly show them that? Oh my gosh, I don't have everything figured out. I'm struggling. I get nervous before races, but every single time that I have said, Oh yeah, I'm super nervous for this race. I'm not totally sure about the tactics for this sprint or like, Hey, I had a relapse with my eating disorder and I reached back out to my therapist and my doctor and we're working on it. Every time that I have shown what could be seen as a big weakness, my teammates have said, oh yeah, you're human. We love you and we got your back. How can we be supportive? We care about you and that's fine that you don't have it figured out. And it feels truly like every time I've shown vulnerability, they respect me even more. And they also are able to actually connect with me because when someone seems to be perfect or have everything figured out, that's actually just not relatable because that's not real life. Nobody has everything figured out. And so I shouldn't have to pretend that I do. And so being able to show I'm struggling with X, Y, and Z, Not only am I then able to get the help that I need or have different ideas or new perspective, maybe someone says something like, gosh, I never thought of it that way. Thank you. But I'm also able to show them the most important thing that I think you could ever role model, which is that it's okay to ask for help when you need it. It is brave. It is a huge strength to be able to ask for the things that you need.

Adam: And you just shared a core leadership lesson, which is that if you want to be successful as a leader, you have to be authentic. You have to be vulnerable. You have to be the person who you are at all times. And when you're around the people who you're leading, they're going to look at you. And if they see someone who they can relate to, who they can connect with, They're going to respond to you. If they see someone who they can't relate to, they're going to have a lot harder time responding to you. And it's on you to show up as your authentic self every day. How do you do that? By being vulnerable.

Jessie: Yeah. And sometimes that's hard. And that's something that I had to learn that my eating disorder in particular, it wasn't about food or body image, which I think is really shocking for a lot of people to learn. Like, oh, wait, it's not just about looking a certain way or it's not being a certain weight for your sport. But for me, it was a lot about control and perfectionism. And that was the big trigger for me was feeling like my eating disorder was this crutch that gave me this illusion of having control over something. So if it was like, alright, you're stressed about races, you're stressed about travel, training, all these things, you feel like you don't have control over that. And then your eating disorder comes in and is like, oh, well, you can control your food, you can control your body, this one little thing you can control and it seems So tempting, even though very quickly you find out that it's the eating disorder that is controlling you and not the other way around. But I think it's also important to show that being vulnerable and being willing to not always be in control and not always have everything figured out. That was one of the big light bulb moments for me in learning how to get rid of my eating disorder and find a place of recovery was like, wow, I'm being so hard on myself. I don't have to be perfect. And I was leaning on my eating disorder because I was trying so hard to be perfect. But what if I just don't have to be perfect? What if just being who I am is good enough? Then I don't need my eating disorder anymore. It's obviously not quite that simple, but when you boil it down, those are kind of the big ideas that I took away from it. Wow, I am being way too hard on myself right now and I don't need to be in order to be good as an athlete, as a leader, as a teammate, as a big sister. I can be good enough by just doing the best I can every day. It doesn't have to be perfect.

Adam: And the lessons that you shared go well beyond trying to overcome an eating disorder. If you're trying to get to a place where you're going to be at your very best, you're not going to get there if you're spending your time punching yourself in the face. That's not going to help you elevate yourself. How do you get there? By taking steps, by focusing on constructive avenues that can help you get there, not by beating yourself up.

Jessie: You know, it's funny, because you know how I was saying earlier with the analogy of just laying even just one brick every single day while you're trying to build this house? That actually is quite similar to how it felt being in recovery from an eating disorder. Some days, all you can do is show up and maybe you lay no bricks, but you're just showing up. And then some days, wow, you're having a breakthrough, like you get to lay a couple of bricks. It feels so daunting, like how am I going to build this house? How am I ever going to get it done? But it's just day by day, I'm just going to focus on the process. And I learned that from my time at the Emily program working on recovery. But then I took that into sport. and into tackling these massive goals like trying to win the Olympics. You don't focus on the whole thing. You just focus on the day by day. You just do the best you can every day. So I think, yeah, like you were saying, there's so many lessons in life and in taking on these big challenges that we can learn from prior experiences. Even if it seems like it's not relatable, it actually is the same process.

Adam: Over the course of this conversation, you've made reference to a lot of people who have helped you get to where you are today. What makes a great coach? What makes a great leader? And what can anyone do to become a better leader?

Jessie: Well, I'm really lucky because I've had so many incredible mentors in my life and I'm still finding new ones. But my high school coach, Chris Hansen, she was incredible. And one of the big things that she taught actually was my first introduction to sports psychology. And she would always say, OK, after your race, before you look at the results, think about three things that you did really well. compliment yourself. What did you nail in that race? What went well? And then what are the three things that you want to improve on? So I would learn to decide for myself before I looked at the results. All right, here's how I think this went. I did this well. I didn't quite nail this downhill sharp corner. I'm going to take that with a little more bravery next time. And I would come up with all these things. And then I would look at the results. So I had this clear picture before I let a number next to my name to find my self-worth. That was super, super important. And then when I was 18 and I graduated high school and went into being a professional athlete, I started working with Jason Cork, who's still my coach today. And he and I have this awesome, super open relationship where I totally trust him and he totally trusts me. And with training, I learned that you have to take responsibility as an athlete. Even though he knows me well enough to be able to be like, okay, I can tell she's tired. Like, let's back it down. I need to trust him in order to say, hey, here's how I'm feeling today. Can we adjust this workout? Or I really think these certain training sessions really do a lot for me. And there's so much trust and open communication back and forth. And I think one thing he does super well as a leader and as a coach is it's not just his ideas, even though he's the smartest person I've ever met. He's like, I want you to tell me what you think. And strategically, he's never going to tell me, here's exactly when you make the move in the race. He's like, I'm going to watch her process this and work it out, and I'm going to let her come to these conclusions. And so he lets me work through these things and bounce ideas off of him. And the same with our other head coaches of the USG team, Chris Grover and Matt Whitcomb. It's a super collaborative effort where they're encouraging the athletes, we want you to be able to think for yourself so that in a race, you're not dependent on anyone. You know how to do it and what you want to do. And I think that's really, really cool. It's not just this top-down approach, it's we're your partners in this. We're not your boss, we're your partners. And I think that's really impressive because sometimes in leadership roles, people just want to be in charge because they care so much. I really think my idea is a really good one, and I really think we should all do this. And it's really impressive to me, and I've learned a lot from watching them be able to take a step back and be like, well, what do you think? I want to hear all your ideas. And I'm very, very impressed by that.

Adam: Jesse, what can anyone listening to this conversation do to become more successful personally and professionally?

Jessie: That's the money question. I think if I was going to boil it down to one or two things, I would say ask for the help that you need because no one's ever succeeding alone. Even if they say they succeed alone, it's not true. No one succeeds in a vacuum. And I would say surround yourself with caring, creative, smart people who can help challenge the way you think. Whether that's in training as an athlete, whether that's in business, whatever it is, whether that's in recovery from an eating disorder, you need people who are going to help you think outside the box and think a little bit differently and see things in a different light. And I think that's how we grow.

Adam: Jesse, thank you for all the great advice and thank you for being a part of Thirty Minute Mentors.

Jessie: Thanks for having me.


Adam Mendler is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker, educator, and nationally recognized authority on leadership. Adam is the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one on one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal-winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations. Adam has written extensively on leadership and related topics, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders. A Los Angeles native, Adam is a lifelong Angels fan and an avid backgammon player.

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