MINDSET - The Most Inspirational Kobe Bryant Speech

If I could work hard every day with the being blessed with the physical tools that I have what would my career be and I made a promise to myself from that day that I was going to work hard every single day so that when I do retire I have no regrets and that was the most important thing for me is to leave no stone unturned get better every single day and if I live that way then over time you know I'd have something that was beautiful but that was my philosophy it seems like a pretty simple one but you know if you live your life to just get better every single day and do that for 20 years I mean what do you have that's the trick isn't it it's finding what you love to do and we talk about hard work all the time it's like you know man if you got to get up every single morning and remind yourself how hard you need to work you probably need to choose a different profession you know because that shouldn't be there because I wake up in the morning excited to get to it you know if I'm not training I'm missing it I'm not watching a game of basketball I miss it you know there's no place I'd rather be and if you have that feeling then you're truly doing what God has put you on this earth to do I think the best way to prove your your value is to work is to learn is to absorb to be a sponge you always want to outwork your potential you know as hard as you believe you can work you can work harder than that and that's what I tried to do when I first came in the league but you know basketball is such a direct competition sport and me coming in at 17 I hated when like my teammates would say you know I get hit with an elbow right Shaq would hit me with an elbow in practice and like so like I always had that extra chip on my shoulder so like every day in practice for me was really trying to annihilate everybody that was that I was playing against because I wanted to prove you don't need to babysit me like I'm fine you know and uh and so it's always that competitive nature the work ethic and curiosity because I asked a lot of questions playing with Byron Scott I asked him a lot of questions Eddie Jones who was great at chasing guards off the screens and I didn't understand how to do that I would sit with him before practice after practice Magic James Worthy Kurt Rambis Kareem Abdul all the Laker greats I would always sit down and just ask him questions about certain games that I studied growing up what actually happened there what did you feel there why Phil introduced meditation to us when he came to our team in 99 2000 and um it was something that I instantly gravitated to because I could see the effects I used to watch you know studying the games the Bulls teams you know watching their demeanor watching their composure playing in a tough place like Utah doing the finals and being down 17 you couldn't tell if they were down 17 or up 20 or a tie game and it never changed and that's when I started doing more research and when Phil came I immediately gravitated to him and found myself accepted the challenge of finding what that space is and for the 81 point game man to be honest I was I wasn't even thinking about the game my knee was hurting so much um I didn't know then but you know I had a flap of joint uh cartilage stuck in my joint line and so my mind was really trying to go to a place where I don't feel that pain the game started and because of that I was just in a different space I wasn't worried about what was to come I wasn't worried about what just happened I was just here and when you're just there in the moment playing plays right in front of you your focus is heightened because nothing else matters um and that's the space I've tried to get to from the field this would be 18 for 20 from the line and an 81 point game 55 in the second