Gibraltar – A Dream Come True!

This is one of those weeks which will live long in my memory and something I never saw coming. I am in Gibraltar for 4 days where I have delivered Masterclass 2 from my Mind Resilience Programme to the amazing staff of Damex owned by former professional basketball player Sam Buxton.
 
I met Sam recently online when I was introduced to him by Randy Haefner, a former professional basketball player from America who played with me when I too was a professional basketball player playing for Sunderland way back in 1981.
 
 
Randy Haefner
 
Randy or Haef as I call him was our star American who then became our coach, and he was coaching when we won the Playoffs in 1981 the biggest prize in British basketball. They were fantastic times, and we spent a great deal of time together during those years and became good friends.
 
We have kept in touch over the years, and he came over with his lovely wife Ana Maria to our wedding in 2015. We have also met them in Gibraltar where he resides.
 
Around 2 months ago Haef called me out of the blue and said that I should contact Sam Buxton who runs this extremely successful Digital Asset Management company based in Gibraltar which is growing fast.
 
 
A great connection
 
We connected really well, and I am now working with him and his staff to develop their mental resilience and improve their ability to handle stress more effectively. Last month I delivered Masterclass 1 online which was very well received and yesterday I delivered Masterclass 2 which was even better face to face.
 
This is great but even better is the fact that Sam owns a basketball club in Spain, and we are going to watch the team play tonight. The three of us are going to have an amazing time watching the sport we all love with a passion.
 
This is stuff dreams are made of and I thank everyone who has helped me along this journey (you know who you are). I am so excited that I am giddy. I feel like a 20-year-old just starting my basketball career. All these emotions and feelings are washing over me and what really blows me away is that this is my job.
 
 
Am I really that small?
 
In the picture Haef is on the left and Sam on the right. I am 6ft 3” and you can see them tower over me. I think it’s the angle the photo was taken but I look so small!
 
I met all the team at Damex and you could feel the positivity and energy from them. One person who really stood out was Grahame Watson the head of HR. He took excellent care of me and organised every detail, so it was a very enjoyable experience. 
 
His background is amazing which he shared with me over lunch, and I am looking forward to getting to know him and the rest of the team better during the year.
 
 
Shot 9 times by a hit man
 
Born in 1975, in Queens, New York, Curtis Jackson, professionally known as 50-Cent, had a tumultuous past and a precarious upbringing. Growing up in poverty isn’t easy on anyone, especially in the Projects in New York’s roughest neighbourhoods.
 
Not only were drugs and crime all around him, but his own birth mother, Sabrina, was a drug dealer.
 
At the ripe young age of just 8-years old, his mother, however, died in what’s been coined a “mysterious” fire. His father left, leaving only his grandmother to help raise young Jackson, who started dealing drugs at the age of 12-years old during what’s been labelled the “crack epidemic,” in the 1980’s.
 
In 1994, at the age of 19-years old, after a string of run-ins with the cops and a subsequent arrest for possession of drugs and a firearm, he was sentenced to serve 3 to 9 years in prison but was instead sent to a bootcamp where he spent just 6 months, earning his GED in the meantime.
 
It was after his release that he adopted the name 50-Cent as a moniker for change, naming himself after a local bank robber by the same name. He states that he chose that name “because it says everything I want it to say. I’m the same kind of person 50-Cent was. I provide for myself by any means.”
 
In 2000, he was infamously shot 9 times at close range by an assailant outside his grandmother’s home and left for dead.
 
While in the hospital, he signed a deal with Columbia records, but was subsequently dropped from that label and even blacklisted within the recording industry due to a song entitled, “Ghetto Quran,” forcing him to go to Canada to record over 30 songs and release a mixtape.
 
In 2002, Eminem heard his song, “Guess Who’s Back?” and ultimately signed him to his label, Shady Records. He was coached by both Eminem and Dr. Dre, and released his first studio album, Get Rich or Die Tryin’, which later went 6-times platinum in the United States and Jackson has since become one of the world’s most famous and best-selling rappers.
 
 
Thoughts for the week 

1. The message for this week is don’t give up.
2. This was a clear driver for 50 Cents’ ultimate success. He kept coming back from one disaster to the next, never giving up on his dream.
3. This was my driver for this business bouncing back from losing everything just 3 years ago.
4. This week think about your world, are you frustrated with progress with something? Get back up and go again you will be amazed what happens when you don’t give up. 

 
Well, that’s it for this week, have a wonderful weekend and keep believing.
 
Warm regards

John 

https://jdmindcoach.com/product/off-the-wall-how-to-develop-world-class-mental-resilience/
 
https://jdmindcoach.com/product/100-days-to-mental-resilience/