E198 - Tom Grennan: How I flipped adversity into energy

0:00Before we get going with today's episode of High Performance, just a quick reminder that you can still get tickets for the final few dates on the High Performance live tour. We're going to be in Leeds, Salford, Guildford, and on the 25th of July, we're going to be in Cardiff. If you want to get your hands on some of the remaining tickets for those tour nights, it's an amazing evening. Just click the link in the description to this podcast or go to thehighperformancepodcast.com and click tour. Hi there. You're listening to High Performance, the award-winning podcast that unlocks the minds of some of the most fascinating people on the planet.

0:33I'm Jake Humphrey, and alongside Professor Damien Hughes, we learn from the stories, successes and struggles of our guests, allowing us all to explore, to be challenged and to grow. After hundreds of conversations, we've discovered every guest has managed to unlock their potential within. This podcast seeks to find out how. Here's what's coming up. I'm eating it, I'm sleeping it and I'm like, I didn't have to play guitar for example. I've got to have eight hours a day on a guitar and even if I'm on that one note for one day, just learning how to move about that one note, then I'll do that. I feel like if people can see the determination and the hunger you have, it also makes the other person hungry.

1:19I got jumped and that wasn't, like you say, just this little scuffle. It was something that humbled me massively but also affected me massively. you've just completely changed me thank you very much mate you've just created something unbelievable and i want to be the best i'm competitive i love knowing that i'm gonna win and if i don't win it it fucking annoys me so today we welcome the musician tom grennan to the high performance podcast i'm sure you know listening to this right now immediately you start to think of some of the awesome songs that tom's released over the last few years but trust me there's so much about his story and his mindset and his resilience that you just don't know and why would you because you're about to hear a conversation with Tom that he's not had before he's going to share with you the hours of therapy that he's had which means that when he's challenged in life he's able to flip his thoughts he changes things that we traditionally see as a negative like imposter syndrome or doubt or envy and he turns them into positives.

2:28And probably the biggest example of this, it's a very moving story, is when he talks to us about when he was the victim of a random attack. And he says that there was two ways he could go. He could be really badly derailed by it, and he was for a while. But in the end, through a lot of work, he was able to change his mindset. And he says to us that that person that attacked him doesn't even realise the person that they helped create, turning negatives into positives. is such an integral part of this conversation. You know, what is high performance? High performance is finding success, finding happiness, finding the thing we love, despite what life throws at us.

3:07And Tom's had some really tough moments, but he's come through them. And he is an incredible guest for this podcast. I can't tell you what a pleasure it was to sit down with someone as humble, but also someone as determined, as talented, and as deep thinking as Tom Garennan. So let's do it then. time to get you closer to your own version of high performance as we welcome tom garennan to the high performance podcast

3:39welcome to the podcast thank you very much for having me how are you really well how are you yeah i'm good i'm good happy to be here big fan of the podcast so yeah buzzing i'm on well we always start with this question what's your definition of high performance my brain would go to being an athlete mentally physically and when I say mentally it's being able to put yourself in a position where you're going I'm gonna set the goal of being the best person I need to be today tomorrow and so on and physically like I'm a musician and I've just got off tour and it was the best tour I've ever done because I'm so fit physically and mentally and high performance is being able to do your job or do life at 100 % every day I'm fascinated to find out how you've got to this point yeah if we wind the clock back to a 10 year old tom kicking a football in the back garden with dreams of being a professional footballer yeah what happened between then and here that means you're now doing a totally different career living a totally different life yeah but that elite mindset remains i think i always had a little voice in my head that said i could do whatever i wanted to do if i put everything into it football was obviously the dream but I realised when I was about 15, 16 that I wasn't good enough to get to the next level but I was the person who was stopping me from getting to that next level because I don't think I was confident enough with my ability of playing football.

5:28In the changing room I wasn't confident enough and then when I'd see people who were coming from other academies or I'm playing against other people in different football teams and I was like, he's better than me. it would I'd lose my head I was like right what am I gonna do now that I'm not playing football and I loved being able to get people's attention I've always been somebody who I don't know whether I've probably craved attention I have so I was like how do I do that and and I loved acting and I and I loved like creating a character if I was in class or whatever I'd always like love to just be a bit of an idiot so I was like I'm gonna try acting and I did and I was pretty good at it so I like auditioned for like different things in London and I got into like National Youth Theatre and I did that and I was like okay cool I can I can do the acting thing and it wasn't until I went to like a party where oh there was a karaoke like machine and everybody was like jumping up on the mic and I'd never sung in front of anybody and also I'd never sung in front of myself.

6:44I didn't even know I could sing. You didn't know you could sing at this age? No, no, no. But surely you sung like and thought, oh, that sounds all right. Nah, not really. Like, maybe like hum a tune and I knew that I could hold a note maybe. But I never like thought I'm going to be a singer and I never thought I'm going to try singing. And then anyway, I got on this karaoke thing and I did and everybody went like that kind of thing. And I saw that reaction, which I loved. And I saw I could please people. And I saw I could get everybody's attention. And I was like, okay, cool. I like this singing thing.

7:21Got the bug for it. And then there was boys in the music scene in school that had a band. And they were like, do you want to join this band? I was like, yeah, go on. And I'll give it a go. And we did our first gig kind of thing in school in A-levels. and again there was like an audience and I was like I saw people's faces like right that's that's what I'm gonna do but all them boys we started this band and all them boys went to uni to like do maths and science and I was like what we've got this amazing band but we weren't amazing we were pretty shit and they went to uni I was like right well I need to get out of Bedford I need to get out of Bedford and something happened to me where I was attacked and my jaw had broken and I it just mentally like flipped me upside down and I was like I need to get out of Bedford because being in Bedford gives me anxiety I can't like leave the house without feeling like somebody's gonna do something or whatnot I know that I want to be a singer but I can't study music because if I study something I'll lose interest in it I need to do this on my own but I'll go and do acting so I applied for like different drama schools and whatnot and ended up going to St Mary's in Twickenham to study physical theatre and loved it and it gave me the I don't know the confidence in being a showman but also gave me the time to really knuckle down and teach myself how to play guitar so I bought a guitar at uni hibernated for a year didn't really do the freshest thing didn't go out much and then started writing and I didn't really realize I was writing songs beforehand but because going back to when I got jumped and stuff the only way I could really communicate with my mum and dad of how I was feeling or to anybody else was to write about it so then I went back to this little like notepad and I realized that these things I'd been writing and were actually like song lyrics.

9:27So I had about six or seven songs and I just gigged them and gigged them and gigged them around London. And then luckily enough, there was like a guy from Sony who was having a beer and it was the rest is history from there really. Bloody hell. What a tale. Yeah. That's the end of the episode. Thanks so much. What a story though. So much to go out there for us. I mean, yeah, there's so much I want to unpick. What really intrigues me, Dave, is that experience of being 15 and you describe all like your inner voice being castigating to you about you're not good enough yeah better than you in that football dressing room yeah and yet then when somebody says do you fancy like joining our band what had happened to quiet and that inner voice that was so harsh to you in a football environment that turned itself off to give you the confidence to go and have a go at leading a band.

10:22I think I was so annoyed at myself for listening to this little other voice who was saying I wasn't good enough that I thought to myself I'm going to be spontaneous and I'm also going to just throw myself in to something that I never thought I'd ever do and see if I could swim and I ended up being able to swim in it and I thought this is wicked and I've also of flipped flip the thought i do a lot of therapy now i still and and i have this thing of flipping a thought which really really helps me in my day-to-day life anyway go on explain what you mean by that so if i have something that's given me anxiety say if i'm like i can't do this or i feel like i am sinking inside or something like i'll be like now i'm not i'm actually floating and then that makes it a positive thing straight away and it changes the way you your thought and it also it changes what that little voice inside your head is saying so you're kind of like shouting at that other voice saying nah mate that's not what i want to do i want to do that and then you're actually doing it so can we rewind a bit to the football thing because i think there is real there's a real thread here you obviously had to walk away from that yeah so what would you tell our listeners about having the bravery to walk away from something that for so long you've wanted i don't know whether it was brave but i would say if you are walking away from something that you really really want life is a thing that is unpredictable and things will be around the corner that you'll be like wow i never thought i would be in this position now so if one thing doesn't work then have more dreams than just that one dream but i was thinking about you tom when we knew we were going to meet today and i was reminded of um a brilliant book called forever young by oliver k that wrote about a young lad at manchester united called adrian doherty right that was seen as like a pair of Ryan gigs, seen as an equal talent.

12:38But he had like a real creative bed and he was a musician that used to go off and busk in Manchester City Centre after playing for the youth team and was seen as a real rising star. And it was only like a bad knee injury that ended his career. But what was interesting was that he was a guy that was seen as very different within that academy system. And he was bullied. He was made to feel ridiculous and silly. and I'm interested in how you dealt with conformity in that kind of environment of you, obviously somebody that was creative and might be in the centre of attention. What lessons have you got for listeners on how to stand out while still fitting in?

13:20I think being able to just be comfortable with who you are and not worrying about what others think about you. like I remember I was in I've always been again this kid in school who would love to push a bit few boundaries and push a few buttons I remember coming in to school once with like a pair of Ugg boots on yeah and it's not a big deal but back then coming into school with an Ugg boot on was like you were wearing some crazy, crazy thing. And I remember getting so much stick for it, but going, don't worry about it. You'll be wearing this in the next couple of years. And then they did. I feel like for me, that's always been the thing of like, I'll back myself and the listeners, whoever's listening to this, if you're feeling like you are different or you can do something different, then don't be worried about what your mates are going to say or what other people are going to say because your world is your world and let other people enter it.

14:30Break that down into detail for us in terms of because that advice of be yourself, follow your heart is great advice but I think people need to know how do I do that? So what sort of tips would you get of still being true to yourself and how do you handle it when people are taking the piss out of you or laughing at it? I laugh at it. I don't let it eat and manifest in me. I don't let that. I put like a, again, I put a shield up. Like, you can fire whatever you want at me, but it'll bounce off. And, and, again, my world is my world. and how I live is my choice. and I don't feel like I need to please I don't feel like I need to be anybody else for anybody like if you love me then you'll love me for who I am and and and that's it and I really had to like understand that and I really had to understand about other people as well like my mum said something to me that people aren't meant to be in your life forever like I thought and some people are like I thought I had a best friend I thought we'd be like brothers for life and there's a moment that happened and we had to go our different ways and that's because he was bad for me and I was probably not great for him and there's nothing bad about that but understanding that like people aren't meant to be in your life forever and and also being able to just say you didn't love me for who i am and that's unfortunate for you you speak about you know stopping football starting in a band coming to london gigging in pubs and then i met someone from sony right that is like oh it was all so easy i played a bit of music and now i'm a music artist let's tell the truth about the hard work the mindset the you know when i talk about that fire that's like deep inside you take us back to that young tom first coming to london starting to do the music thing and not just wanting to play music but wanting to be like a successful musician going back to the band thing yeah i remember doing the band and then i had a lot of mates in school who would take the piss out of it be like what are you doing like who do you think you are uh some of the band members were like why are you thinking that you can do this do that and i'm like all right then cool and i fell out of a lot of people and i just didn't speak to them because i saw the jealousy just soaking out of them i was like nah i can do what i want to do and I'll do it.

17:26Watch me, I'm going to do it. And I've always had this thing of, I will remember the people who said I couldn't do it, yeah? And I always love seeing them now and even if they don't speak to me, I know that they know what I'm doing. So that young guy there who was in that band and still in school said to himself, right, this is going to be a tough challenge. This is going to be, this is like winning the lottery and a lot of people try and do this for all their lives and don't get anywhere with it but if i put everything into it not only just hard work i'm talking manifest this thing talk to the walls about it talk to like every inch of the room about it then i'll do that explain that to us like no one talks about the depths of the hard work and the effort that goes into a career like yours?

18:21I'm eating it, I'm sleeping it, and I'm like, I didn't have to play guitar, for example. I've got to have eight hours a day on a guitar. And even if I'm on that one note for one day, just learning how to move about that one note, then I'll do that, and I'll really knuckle down and do that. So I'd go to bed thinking about how I'm going to go get my next gig. And that next gig was knocking on people's doors and saying, can I play here no you can't all right cool can I play here tomorrow all right cool you can play here but for no money sweet I don't want money all right cool how long can you do I can do however long you want me to do always being polite always being like a nice guy because that's who I am anyway but like I feel like if people can see the determination and the the hunger you have it also makes the other person hungry it's like it catches fire so if someone sees you you going i'm gonna put this gig on in in your pub and it's gonna be unbelievable i'm gonna get 100 people down here they're like 100 people no you won't i'm telling you and then there's 150 people do you know i mean how by just going to people at uni going oh yeah i've got this gig yeah it's gonna be three quid to get in and it'll be so good and just hyping it up that much to people at uni word of mouth and then people are coming and then you're creating this like fire and people then are going talking about it and i again i didn't really know about like youtube or anything like that and and i was like i don't want to be that youtube guy but i need videos out there and we i made this little video with my with my friend and and he was like let's put it out and we did and then people at uni who didn't come to the gig would then see the see this video because i posted it on like the uni page and then they've then shared that out and it was just caused it was just being able to create moments that people wanted i think i don't really know it's crazy when you're going knocking on doors and asking for a gig are you going up to strangers in a bar and trying to persuade him to come.

20:41I'm interested in how much was it a desire to create moments that matter and to fulfil this dream of being the centre of attention and how much of it was proving those naysayers from back home? All of it. I think I still have that fire of proving them people wrong now. So which is more powerful for you, Tom? The proving the wrong, I think. Is it? Yeah. I love the thought of people going, I didn't want it to happen for him, but it has happened for him, fair play. I don't know, I want to be the best. I'm competitive. I love knowing that I'm going to win. And if I don't win it, it fucking annoys me.

21:24But then that reminds me, I did a book many years ago about a great boxer called Marvin Hagler. Yeah. Who reveled in being the underdog. He loved the idea of being the one that... But I am the underdog. I still feel like the underdog. But what he would do was he would keep moving his status. So even when he became the champion, he would then make himself the underdog against other guys that were in his world. So it wasn't always about fighting the ones that he'd grown up with. He became a noun to prove these guys wrong and it was somebody else. Definitely. So how do you keep moving the target so that you keep being the underdog even when you're getting more and more successful?

22:05Everybody says, have you made it yet? I'm like, no, mate. I've not made anything. Am I happy? I'm so happy. And success is also about being happy and being able to move with happiness. But I've not made anything and I've not got to where I want to be. Are you fulfilled? No, that's the word I was looking for. Fulfilled. I'm not fulfilled at all in my career-wise. like things are going great and i'm so happy that people are listening to the music and and and i'd be lying if i go yeah but the music is in people's lives and they're enjoying it i want it to be in everybody's lives because i don't know i feel i've got a story to tell and i feel like i can i can help people out things are going great at the moment but there's people out there who are doing better what about though if i told you that this was it not in a negative way yeah so johnny wilkinson came on this podcast right he spent 20 years trying to be the best rugby player in the world he won the rugby world cup with that famous kick yeah he felt elated for 30 seconds everybody tells me to enjoy the moment i'm like cool i i get it and when i look back in 20 years time I probably will say I wish I enjoyed that a little bit more but I can't I can't like just did the biggest tour of my life and I got off stage and I was what are we doing next I want to do this every night it's hard to enjoy the moment when you know that there's a lot more coming if you really put your mind to it so I'm interested in exploring two incidents from your background that maybe help us understand this relentlessness.

23:56One was the one you've referred of being jumped at 18, which sounds pretty horrific. You know, it's not just a scuffle, that's some serious injuries. And secondly was around the same time, the death of your mate in the car accident. My cousin, yeah. Yeah. I got jumped and that wasn't, like you say, just this little scuffle it was something that humbled me massively but also affected me massively where like I couldn't leave my house I was like I said I've always been that guy who's I've got energy I'm always and I think this is the first time I ever understood what mental health was what like anger really really was what revenge really felt like all these different like emotions where like i couldn't cope with what was going on in my head and what precipitated the attack it was random wow so that's what i think that's what why has happened to me why why have they done this to me that was like i say the first time where i was like i can't i don't know how to be me anymore you've just completely changed me and not only that you changed my family's life too so i think that also gave me the fire when i could navigate my my thoughts and and what i wanted to do of like i'm gonna really become something bigger and better and being able to say like thank you very much mate you've just absolutely created something that you never thought and you never see me because you don't know me but you just create something unbelievable so thank you so you flipped it again yeah so did the person ever get found uh yeah yeah yeah do they know it's you uh yeah I've had I've had many I've had like messages from the other people saying like that guy knows and how often do you think about that moment uh is it there is it present yeah definitely like that was like the beginning of this thing that just so valuable to hear that like you're about to walk out on stage in front of i don't know 30 000 people or whatever some arena some big gig yeah and that moment where that person thought they were going to do something to really damage you yeah that's the moment where you're you that's in your head and that's built you and i think nobody wants to go through what you went through no abhorrent horrendous very difficult for a lot of people but look what flipping that is able to give you what because that's happened right that person doesn't deserve any more of you no than you gave them in that period directly after the attack when you were really struggling now look how much you're taking yeah exactly and i think that's powerful yeah man well that's exactly what i wanted to do you mentioned my cousin who died too in a car crash that was a big moment in my life too where I understood life was so short and life could be taken like that.

27:07I made a promise to him and to me that I'm going to have everybody knowing who he was and what our name is and put a footprint in the world because he deserves it and I deserve it too. I put so much hard work into it and I just want that to be felt but I think seeing him lose his life was it was crazy just because he was so young and just it was like that gone

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28:59If you want to take advantage of that offer, just go to drinkag1.com forward slash high performance. That's drinkag1.com forward slash high performance. It's been a game changer for me it just might be for you check it out so when you look back through those notebooks that you said became the source of the your early lyrics yeah when you read them a few years later and they became so valuable for you what were you reading that really resonated i was reading this boy's thoughts i was reading this guy's like heart and soul putting onto paper and his cries for help that's what i was reading but i was also reading this person who was like nah i'm gonna be able to come out of the fire like a phoenix mate that is it it sounds like cliche but that's what it was and and i also knew that these songs here i'm not going to be the only person who's feeling like this i'm not going to be the only person who's gone through this and sometimes like you get so indulged with your own self you're like i can't believe like i'm the only person who's going to be feeling like nah mate there's seven billion people on this what somebody's got to be going through what i'm going through so these lyrics and these words on this paper they're going to help this other person out and like all this stuff that's going on in my life like i was like i need to be able to communicate that with somebody and like also not only that when i was gigging on and and also showing people these songs that it was a way of me going you have my you have what i don't want and you can take my energy because i'm doing that i'm like sprinkling it off to other people and these songs you can do what you want with them and you can also like make them out with how you want to make them out so and if they help they help what what lyric or line or verse did you write that was the most helpful for you there's something in the war calling your name i think that's the first song i ever wrote and that was really me like looking at myself and going there's something in this world or this life that you're going to live and it's shouting at you and all you need to do is be able to to run with it and if you run with it then anything's possible I think if you were doing this job 30 years ago right you know you've come here with a load of really lovely people from your management or your record label really nice and they want the best for you but i'm pretty sure 30 years ago they'd be telling you not to talk about any of this right because the world is different yeah how important is it now in 2023 that you are able and that you do talk in this way for other people to hear so important i don't know we live in this weird world and to be honest with you i'd have loved to have done this 30 years ago i think it would have been way more funner and if you can't talk and if you can't speak about it, then do what I did.

32:13Write about it, draw about it, be creative with it. And if you can't, then just run it off or run into it and you'll find it. You know what I love about this conversation is the underlying theme of optimism that comes through. Like, you're a young guy at school and people are laughing at your clothes, yet you're the one going, you wait, you'll be wearing this in a little while. And then you're a guy who's playing football and your heart's no longer in it. So instead of fearing that, you're optimistic that there's something else out there for you and then you're banging down doors of pubs and you're believing that something great's going to happen.

32:48You know, you're going through the death of a cousin and a brutal attack and you're turning it into a positive. How important is an optimistic mindset for you? Do you believe great things are going to come? I believe great things will come if you put everything into that, yeah. I've just got to be the guy who drives the car and I've got to be the guy who gets to them great things. Is that ever exhausting? Yeah, of course. I've gone grey over it. Do you know what I mean? But I think I'll always be like that. I don't think I'll ever not be like that. That's exciting to me. Like, it'd be so boring if you were just comfortable.

33:35being comfortable is just that is not for me that makes me go oh nah nah nah really yeah man i like being like a bit like unsure and just if if there's something behind that door i'll be like i need to see what's behind that door man because it could be amazing another question i wanted to explore with you tom was like we get people talking to us here about neurodiversity and you and I know that you have dyslexia. I'm interested in exploring why that becomes a super strength for you rather than something that previously, like Jake's saying, 30 years ago might have either not been understood or seen as a weakness.

34:19What do you think your dyslexia has afforded you? I think it held me back in school. But I think it held me back because, again, in school, I was told I couldn't, I wasn't going to get like B's and C's, I was going to get D's and F's or whatever. And I got my B's and C's because I knew I could do it. But my dyslexia has helped me out so much because I've been able to like put words together or like put songs together. Some people read and be like, what is this? but they make sense to me and they also make sense to a lot of other people I've not ever read a book in my life really apart from Horrid Henry and Elton John's book but like a lot of people say like articulation comes from like reading and being able to like know big words and nah man I just understand my words and that's how I talk and how I write and a lot of people understand it too so what is your process is it a quiet room a blank piece of paper or a holiday what's the no the process is i need time to take in like i would i hate working in the morning like people are going to me like do you want to come in the studio like midday i'm like we have not experienced anything in the day how are you gonna like taking stories that you might have heard today.

35:54I like working at night where I've eaten different things from different places and I like writing with a nice amount of people in a room. I like noise, I like energy in a room. I do set times on it though. Like I do say, right, Like, I've got four or five months where I need to write an album, yeah? That is the five months. And I ain't going home until it's written. I think giving myself that pressure really helps me. I can't, I'm not that guy who can just write, like, some people are just on tour writing, just every day writing, writing, writing. Nah, that doesn't work for me. I need to have a blocked out schedule where I go, right this is where this album's going to be written and my writing brain needs to be flicked on but with the dyslexia thing going back to that like i have this like washing line that i've always put out if i'm writing a song and i write draw that line and then and i hang up these words and i and i say to myself right this word can fit with that word and that word doesn't really fit with that word but i can make that word fit with that word if you put it in a good wash do you know what i mean i love that but it makes it like i'll tell you a really random story i heard you on a radio show recently where they gave you a travel report to read yeah and that was so hard yeah and i heard you and you were making like lots of errors but what really stood out to me as i heard you reading it was just how open you were to failure if that makes sense so when so they'd correct you and say no you don't say it like that or you'd say so and you weren't precious about it you just interpret it and then say it right next time and then you do it again and you'd stumble you'd fall you'd be corrected yeah so when you describe this washing line theory of creating yeah tell us a little bit about your relationship with with failure and being corrected so you go into that loop of every improvement i like a bit of failure i like i like not being good at things i like being able to really improve i'm playing a lot of golf at the moment yeah and that is a game where i've gone i'm shit here but i'm gonna be amazing at it and i think that's just like with life i feel like if somebody says now that's not how you do it and i'll be like all right cool you show me how to do it then and then let's see if it works and then if it works then I'm like yeah cool I find it funny as well I just find it funny when scales I've never been or whatever they're called do you know I mean going to like notes where I thought my voice couldn't go and I'm like I've just unlocked another another thing but how does that fit because like when you described about you first decided to pursue a career in music and you went I'm not going to study it formally because that'll turn me off yeah so what you're describing is like real life experimentation and learning on the job yeah definitely i feel like that's the way i've i've always been able to learn like the voice thing i've just said like i learned that during a show so i was like whoa what is that just happened but if you think that you've completed something you're fucked and is your relationship with failure changed as you've become successful because I think people, when there's nothing to lose, failure's fine, risk is fine, pushing yourself is fine because there is nothing to lose.

39:32You've now got to a point where there is something to lose because you've got a great career. You know, I was watching the Lewis Capaldi documentary a few days ago and he was saying, the more success I get, the more self-doubt I have to deal with. That's a very confusing paradox for a lot of people, I think. So do you not find that like, as you get more successful, the fear is greater. Yeah, there's massive pressure. You've got to be able to put out something that's bigger than your last, or you've got to be able to pay back your... Massive advance. Yeah, that kind of stuff. And you're seeing other success as well, because I guess you're now comparing yourself with...

40:16Who do you look at and go, I'm not telling you. But you do? Of course. but of course but i also say i'm on my own journey and i need to always remember that this is my own journey and i don't think it is jealousy like some people like why are you jealous of him or why are you jealous of her now i'm not jealous i'm actually like i'm i love seeing it i love seeing that because it drives me more and why would you not say who they are that those because we all have them, people that make you go, oh. I don't know why. I don't know why. I think for me, that's just, that's for me. I'll let you know if I ever beat them.

41:02But then take us back. I love that. So that response there, I'm intrigued as to the difference between that response there and the response of 15-year-old you in the dressing room when some kids from a new academy are coming in. Yeah. What's the difference now between, so back then you said to us, you were thinking, I'm not good enough. They're miles better than me. What's the difference now between you looking at whoever it is that is in your game now? Because they're not better than me. These people are not better than me. That's what you've learned to say. Yeah. And again, that really sounds like, if you're listening, you sound a bit like a dickhead now, Tom.

41:44I'm not being a dickhead. I really believe that these people aren't better than me. they probably might be, but in myself, I'm saying that these people aren't better than me because as soon as I say that these people are better than me, I'm failing. You've given up. I've given up. 100%. I'm not saying that these people are better than me because I want them to fail. I'm saying it because I don't want myself to go, now these are better than me. I can't get to that next level. Yeah. I think it's really powerful because it makes it available to you. If you are saying that I'm as good as them or better than them, and they've got that that I want, well, then I can go and have it because I'm at that level of ability.

42:28I think as soon as, you know, life is already going to kick you in the balls and slap you across the face. And you've seen a million times over, you know, all kinds of things. None of them are your fault, but all of them are your responsibility in truth to deal with it. And it's the same as this. It's not your fault that there's X or Y selling millions of albums. but it's your responsibility to go and beat those sales if that's the thing that drives you on yeah exactly it is exciting though isn't it that is like a good feeling that gives me like I can't wait to go to the studio today I'm going to show I'm going to really make something cool do you like conversations like this?

43:05yeah I love it I feel like these conversations here I always do feel a bit like I find it hard to give advice because because I'm just a normal kid from Bedford. Like, why are people listening to my advice? Do you know what I mean? But I think it's cool that people are wanting to listen to my advice, but I find it hard to give advice because I know what I'm doing inside me, and I know my... And also, like, sometimes these conversations can be... Some people be like, mate you sound like you are i know but that's the world we live in but again like i don't care yeah i like i'm actually i sit here feeling really excited for you because i don't think we've had anyone on here with a mental strength that feels as bulletproof or as like solid and as real as yours the flipping of things the belief the optimism the desire I just think it's so like I think it's so inspiring I mean I remember as a kid and this sounds weird being in a nightclub right and I had just started on telly before kids telly before Formula One before anything and no one knew who I was because I was on like local TV and I remember going into the toilets in the nightclub right and I was really disciplined at that age and didn't drink or anything I remember banging all these numbers on my phone like random numbers because I was so wound up that I didn't have a good TV career at that time and then I used to redial that number every week whenever I felt like the the sort of desire in me was starting to melt away a bit and remind myself how it felt in that moment you know that real deep desire and I think it I think you have it I think you have it probably more now than you ever have I can sort of see that definitely I feel like for me I just need to carry on with what I'm doing and not be distracted by other things as well like people have you had to make decisions in life to avoid that definitely i've had to like what have you done i've had to distance myself from a lot of a lot of people i've had to understand that my relationship with alcohol like i need to stay away from that stuff i'm amazed though that someone with your mental strength even went there in the first place yeah um i think i wanted to please a lot of people i think i got i was easily led i thought it was the cool thing to do i also thought like it made me think even more the way i'm thinking but completely differently it became i became like the biggest egotistical twat ever and I didn't realise that and was there an incident that gave you that moment of recognition because you're self aware enough to recognise in football I can't get to that next level was there a similar moment when you thought I've got a problem here yeah probably when my mum came and was like you need to come home I was just in London around the wrong people I was hiding the fact like I'd be coming I'd be going to like different things and I was hiding I was very good at like just acting like everything's fine I think understanding that I am not my my mind and my soul is better when I'm when I'm sober or when I'm when I feel good alcohol i've not had a problem with alcohol like i'm my relationship with alcohol is i can have an i can have an easy drink now um when i say easy drink i mean like a responsible drink with like if i'm in a nice environment with people that i trust and then that's fine and exercise like i said earlier like crossfit and different exercises have completely changed the way i think I don't do it for physical like appearance I don't do it for appearance I've seen your Instagram there's some good topless shots on there it looks sweet I do it for my mental because the CrossFit thing like you are in this workout and you are fighting for your life in this CrossFit and you know that if you get to the end positive things are going to happen and the positive things that are going to happen at the end of the workout is that you're going to feel great.

47:42So I take that into my work and it changes my work completely. Like people in my team, like with label, with management, with my back, if I haven't done my routine and daily workout and all that kind of stuff, they know, they're like, are you all right? I'm like, yeah, I'm all right, but I've got energy in me that needs to come out. But then tell us about the inner circle now then. So you've obviously learned, you've flown close to the sun, you've been burnt a little bit, you've had that moment where your mum's called you home. Yeah. What are the questions or the criteria that you set now for anybody to get into your inner circle that you know is going to add value as opposed to take from you?

48:30I don't really know. Is it hard to trust people? No, because I trust easily. But I've got people around me that will go, see ya again i should probably do it myself but my missus says to me you're too nice you're too like too willing you're too like i'm a people pleaser yeah i'm a people pleaser and it goes back to the attention thing like i love that when somebody's happy and i can make some i'm like oh wicked we've almost reached the end of our interview where we do our quick fire questions yeah before we get there cool um i just would love to know from you what you think the future looks like considering this is a conversation where you're a guy with real optimism and you don't have to be humble at this point like cool if you close your eyes and think five years time five years what would the dream be uh in five years time i'm gonna give you a year because let's do it five years let's go for a year a year number one album a number one single and loads more gigs and success in life not just gigging just being able to say like i'm happy my family are happy and i'm just still on a path of being able to get to the next point right here we go then your three non-negotiable behaviors that people around you really should be buying into politeness kindness and drive and aspiration and stuff like that a bit of ambition ambition that's the one yeah what's your biggest strength and your greatest weakness my biggest strength would probably be my people pleaser i think that's i think that's a strength but also it's my biggest weakness definitely what advice would you give to a teenage tom just starting out the advice I'd give to myself would just be like keep doing what you're doing and enjoy the moments because they're going to be some great moments and the final question your sort of final message really for people that have listened to this really fascinating conversation after all the things you've been through the things you've learned what would you say is your one golden rule for living a high performance life the golden rule is to enjoy it but also don't be afraid to not be able to swim being uncomfortable is is is a good thing so living a high performance life if you're uncomfortable in them in them in them situations and you know doing something good definitely brilliant mate seeking discomfort you've just summed up high performance perfectly for us i think you know thank you for like being so honest thank you about the things you've been through the things you've learned but i think the you know the really big takeaway for people listening to this who might be struggling themselves is this ability to flip the negative into the positive because i think the greatest thing about that is whatever your future holds whatever happens even tomorrow if you can flip then you can keep hold of your optimism and what are we if we're not optimistic, eh?

51:47Yep. Definitely. Flip that thought. I think so. Really good.

51:55Damien. Jake. Well, another conversation with someone where we start thinking that we know them and we end it really knowing them. It was amazing. I think what we were talking about, the title of this whole podcast today with Tom should be about flipping the script. And I think that's exactly what he's just done in an hour of conversation is flip the script in terms of what you might think of Tom Granham versus what the reality is. And I think it also flips people's minds regarding what high performance means. You know, high performance is not the big house, the big car, the big paycheck. It is doing the things that Tom has learned to do, which is taking the inevitable setbacks in life.

52:38You know, nobody goes through life and things are easy. Everyone has setbacks. Everyone has knocks everyone has you know punches to the stomach it's about not just about getting over those things because i think a lot of people can do that but then i think a lot of people then allow that stuff to sort of infest and negatively impact them for years and years it's about not just getting through it but it's about getting through it in a healthy way and the fact that he can now stand there and say the guy that broke my jaw in a random attack is the fuel for me before i go on stage or before I write a song or before I perform what a brilliantly healthy way to view life yeah and I think what Tom's given us there that I think's invaluable is that that mindset is accessible to all of us you know if you're a kid listening to this and you're thinking you want to be different and there's a path you want to pursue like him wearing his Ugg boots flip the script and when people are making fun of you see it as something that yeah you this is something you'll be copying in two years time where if you're pursuing a certain career path like you was as a footballer and you decide this really isn't for me my heart's not in it flip the script and decide that that's a sign that there's a better pathway for you to go and pursue when you you know in a situation as you describe of you recovering from the trauma of the death of a loved one flip the script and think that I'm going to use that death as a way to get their name into the world and make a difference it's all about the ability to not get hung up on one thing but to see that have that mental flexibility to do the gymnastics to translate it into something more useful and helpful and profound for us and I think where Tom is especially impressive is he's still in the trenches he's still in the heart of his career he's almost at the start of his career in many ways he's still a young guy I often think this reflection and this honesty and this ability to look at things and really see them for what they actually are rather than what you think they are i think a lot of people get there but they often get there at the end of a career or in their 60s or even in their 70s or perhaps even later for him to be there now and to see things for the value they can bring rather than the opposite i think that is pretty rare actually yeah yeah yeah you're right and it's free yeah but i think it's i think it's really powerful and and i don't know like as you're saying it I don't know my mind's going to that conversation that we had with him about neurodiversity you know whether that sometimes that people that have dyslexia may see it as a stigma or as a difficulty to be overcome whereas he's seen it as a superpower that allows him to connect the dots in a very different way and I don't know if that if that's what we're hearing him explain there just the ability to interpret things as in the moment is actually incredibly powerful.

55:31I mean, there's a really good book by a guy called Eli Parissier called Filter Bubbles. And what the concept is that when you do a search on Google, the algorithms give you the answers that you think you want based on what your search history is. And what Tom's really good at doing is actually breaking out of those filter bubbles of how we think reality is and being able to interpret it in a very different way but again that comes down to having the courage of your convictions to take the path less trodden to not get caught up in trying to conform or being part of the group but you know letting the group coalesce around you and where you're heading i really enjoyed it mate yeah me too thanks right thanks damien well i really hope that as always you enjoyed today's episode listen i only ask just one very simple thing from you.

56:24Please share something from this episode, share a clip, share a thought, share the link to the episode with someone. So please remain humble, remain curious, remain empathetic, and we'll see you very soon for another episode of High Performance.

56:52Thank you.