Andre Agassi, Tennis Legend, Author of Open
[0:00]Hi, I'm Zibi Owens, and this is Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[0:15]As a mom of four kids in New York City and a writer myself, I know all too well how short
[0:19]everyone is on a time, so I'm here to help.
[0:21]I'm going to interview authors and writers of all types about their work, especially as
[0:25]it relates to parenting and family issues.
[0:28]Hopefully you can listen while doing 8 million other things, and fall in love with these
[0:31]talented scribes and their fantastic books, essays, and songs like I have.
[0:35]Plus get some tips on surviving parenting.
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[1:02]I am beyond excited to be talking to Andre Agassi today.
[1:05]Andre Agassi really needs no introduction, but just as a refresher, Andre used to be
[1:09]ranked number one in the world in tennis and won eight grand slam singles championships.
[1:13]Now, married to Steffi Graff, Andre has two children and is involved in launching charter
[1:17]schools with the Turner Agassi Foundation, and is on the board and one of the initial
[1:23]investors of Square Panda, a product innovator in AI education, plus Andre Agassi wrote
[1:28]one of my favorite books of all time, it's called Open, which I'll talk about tonight.
[1:33]Hi, Jimmy, how are you, Andre?
[1:35]Hi, thanks so much for doing this.
[1:37]This is such a treat for me.
[1:39]Oh, sweet, you appreciate all your kind words?
[1:43]Are you, uh, is this something, uh, coming a little bit by your podcast?
[1:46]You don't mind.
[1:47]Well, I actually just started my podcast.
[1:50]I'm a writer, so I do a lot of writing for magazines, and I've been doing a lot of online
[1:55]writing, especially about parenting lately.
[1:57]I have four little kids, so that's my main focus.
[2:01]I was going to write a book called Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books, um, but my
[2:06]agent said, yeah, exactly.
[2:08]But my agent said, you know what, that might be better as a podcast, and you should just
[2:11]write another book.
[2:12]And so I said, well, actually, I really want to write a book called Forty Love about
[2:15]tennis and falling in love and everything.
[2:17]So that's how this came about, um, and the podcast is going to feature, um, authors and
[2:24]books that I've loved or articles I read that I think are amazing, um, and I'm hoping
[2:28]to sort of distill those things for the moms who might not have time to read the
[2:31]full thing, but want to taste of it, or even just as a preview so they can go buy it
[2:35]themselves.
[2:36]Oh, nice, very nice, all right.
[2:39]That's my, um, very ambitious.
[2:42]I know, so, so we'll see, but this will certainly, certainly help, um, so what made you
[2:50]write open this amazing book?
[2:53]Oh, it's a good, good question, because I never really saw myself as ever eventually
[3:00]writing a book.
[3:01]I kind of always looked at it like a, like a glorified press conference or, or something
[3:05]when I would read other autobiographies and then, and then I really got, I really got
[3:10]to a point where, um, I just kind of wanted to understand my own life's lens.
[3:17]I wanted to, to sort of, um, make sense of my life, if you will, uh, for my own, for my
[3:24]own, um, uh, desire to understand it in this context.
[3:28]The life I've lived was sort of never gave me a chance to take much in and, and, and,
[3:33]and I, and I went about the process, I think, in a way that, uh, really was, uh, organic.
[3:39]I, I, I, I finally read a book that I fell in love with, called The Tender Bar written
[3:44]by J.R.
[3:45]Mulringer and, and it, and it hit me that a person is born and can really be, really
[3:50]be a powerful tool to impact lives.
[3:53]And, uh, and I knew I wanted to do it with him and probably wouldn't have done it without
[3:57]his, you know, dedication and collaboration and when I finally talked him into it, he moved
[4:02]to Vegas for two and a half years and, um, and we decided to do it and then decide later
[4:08]if it's something we're really going to turn over or not.
[4:11]And it wasn't really designed in the beginning to be something I was going to hand the world
[4:15]unless, uh, unless I truly believe people would be better off, uh, in their own lives for
[4:21]sharing a bit of, uh, my experiences as it ties to their journey.
[4:26]Have you been pleased with the reception?
[4:28]You must get just raves about it.
[4:30]I mean, I know it was one of my favorites of all time.
[4:34]Yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm proud of it.
[4:36]It feels like I get more proud of it as time goes on.
[4:39]I mean, I feel like I live a lifetime sense of the book, but, uh, but as it relates to
[4:46]words living long past us, I assure you that's the case and that warning was given to me
[4:52]by my partner, um, a collaborator J.R.
[4:55]and he just said to me, you know, listen, uh, every word will live past us and,
[5:01]as a result, um, let's choose carefully and, uh, and, and, and anybody that has read it
[5:07]has only sort of, uh, you know, they, they five and so drawn at different, you know, parts of the
[5:13]journey, um, that I think really reflects something that makes me very proud because my goal
[5:20]was to sort of say, you know, tennis was maybe the platform that I had, but, um, but we all deal
[5:25]with fears. We all deal with, you know, identity. We all deal with, you know, taking ownership of
[5:32]our lives. We all deal with so many same themes. And then I, mine was with so extremely, um, and
[5:38]publicly that, that pulling the curtains back, um, um, um, was something that, um, you know,
[5:45]was really, uh, anxious about in one text, but then, but then we're very proud about, um, you
[5:51]know, in another. And you, you mentioned, uh, at the, at the very end of your book, the part of
[5:56]the reason for doing it was to help your kids out and have them learn more about your journey.
[6:00]Is that true or? Yeah, why I definitely wrote it, uh, through their eyes, meaning, uh, meaning,
[6:08]you know, they were the first filter I used in anything that,
[6:12]eventually, uh, you know, made the, made the cut because it needed to be me, you know,
[6:18]I mean, I, one of my great fears before my children were, um, you know, old enough as it's somehow
[6:24]something may happen to me where they wouldn't know me or who, or who I was or, or, you know,
[6:31]how I felt or what I believed or, or what I went through and, um, achieved overcame, you know,
[6:39]failed at, you know, I just, this is just my story. I wanted it to be able to read well through,
[6:45]through their eyes. I wanted to really be true to me and for them first and foremost, you know,
[6:51]that was, there's no question, but then as you, as you get into it, you realize that this is,
[6:57]this is broader and has bigger, you know, implications to people's life, um, you know, even,
[7:03]even across, you know, cultures. Um, and that's one thing I've seen to stay pretty true.
[7:10]It's great. In, uh, in the book, you describe the physical agony of getting up to play many
[7:15]times. One quote that I loved was when you said, hey, it brings me to my knees, love gets me on my
[7:19]feet. Uh, can you describe these opposing forces and how you spent so much of your career
[7:25]sort of pushing through pain, um, to achieve such greatness?
[7:29]Yeah, you, you, you dedicate your whole life. You know, to be, uh, uh, uh, an athlete, especially in
[7:35]the sport of tennis, uh, and, and, and, and, you know, well accomplished, you know, you're doing,
[7:40]you're giving your whole life to it. It's starting from a child. So you, you really kind of spend
[7:45]a 30-year life not preparing for two thirds of your life and much of that wear and tear, um,
[7:51]you know, goes, goes on your body and between the twisting and the turning and the sprinting and
[7:56]the stopping and the jumping and the starting. I mean, all of it is just, uh, just an, an ongoing
[8:02]abuse that you try to recover from sometimes on a daily basis. And then when you add years upon
[8:08]years and you add some physical limitations as well with the, with the anatomy of my particular
[8:16]back and hips, you know, it was just, I got to a point where I played long past when my body told me
[8:22]to stop and it was getting, you know, all too obvious, you know, towards the end. And, you know,
[8:28]I found myself sleeping multiple times on the, on the, on the, on the floor, uh, just for
[8:34]the sake of what I couldn't abide by in a, in a, in a hotel room, you know, mattress. I found myself,
[8:41]uh, you know, just having much harder time standing up straight after some long matches. And,
[8:47]you know, I start the book with, with the end, which was my last, uh, basically my last match and,
[8:53]and, and, and, and, and, you know, started with me trying to get a boss of floor. It's like my eyes
[8:59]open. I hear the kids in the other room and, and, you know, it's my body sort of the pain, but
[9:05]brings me to my knees. It takes me to the floor and it was the, it's the love and, and, and also
[9:12]craving for caffeine that gets me to my, that gets me to my feet because, uh, it was, you know,
[9:18]it's hard. It was like, uh, it was literally a five minute process to, to, to get up, so I don't do
[9:23]anything to startling to, to, to, to my, to my body and with, with the days of objectives.
[9:30]Another quote that I love that you said was one thing I've learned in 29 years of playing tennis,
[9:34]life will throw everything, but the kitchen sink in your path and then it will throw the kitchen
[9:37]sink. Can you, can you speak to what you meant by this and how you've, you've worked your way
[9:43]through that as well? Yeah, you know, it's, um, where, you know, one of the smarter tennis is, uh,
[9:49]is a, is a, you know, eat what you kill, kind of kind of sport. You know, you don't,
[9:56]you know, if you, if you want to survive, it's going to come at some of the elsees.
[10:00]You know, demise and with that sort of intensity, you know, you have to suffer through
[10:08]so many personal limitations because you just don't know what the other person is doing.
[10:16]You know, when we're out there competing, it's a result of so much preparation and the
[10:22]scoreboard just tells kind of one part of it and it's kind of a judge and jury for that
[10:28]moment. But what you do before, what you do, you know, after and recoveries, what
[10:36]you do and all your preparation, I mean, you're always chasing this ghost because you're
[10:40]thinking yourself, well, some of the else is working harder or some of the else is
[10:43]doing, doing more. And so these little setbacks that you get along the way, whether it
[10:48]be physical or discouragement, you know, and failures, you know, you just, you live it alone
[10:54]and you live it very intensely because you literally believe you're the only one
[11:02]really going through this. You don't have the objectivity to recognize that this is
[11:06]the reality of, you know, the life chosen, you know, and so you constantly feel like
[11:11]you're getting hit with obstacles and pressures and challenges and your whole day becomes
[11:16]about what you need to do to be at your best and to make sure you get one day, one
[11:22]day better and never try to get two days better because that's when you risk taking
[11:28]steps backwards. And so it's his ongoing 24-hour sort of negotiation with yourself that
[11:34]it's almost like post-traumatic. You suffer so much internally that nobody knows that
[11:41]you kind of, you know, it exposes itself in some odd ways. And for me, it didn't
[11:48]allow my personal choices, things that I chose to escape some of the pains, the pressures,
[11:57]some of the decisions I made with my, you know, with my judgments on decision-making
[12:04]friendly chose to be friends with, you know, bad decision or, you know, I'm not to criticize,
[12:15]the mistake of a failed marriage. But when you fail yourself, you know, it's impossible
[12:21]not to fail somebody else. And so, you know, when you thought it couldn't get, couldn't
[12:27]get harder, it couldn't get worse it did. I'm sorry. You worked through it so beautifully.
[12:37]I love how you weave the day-to-day of parenting throughout the book and scenes that
[12:41]anyone can relate to, like, the kids begging for a dog and having played AIDS, not being
[12:45]able to sleep past 7.30, which, by the way, I thought was really late, which is great. And
[12:50]then, like, they don't see scenes. I did mention in the book call, you got to sleep
[12:54]in the 7.30 because of my wonderful wife. Yes, that's true. And that's nice. Always good
[13:01]to give credit. We're credit is due. But so funny that there you were, right, preparing
[13:08]for the final of the year's open, but they're just kids, right? It's like, you're just
[13:12]their dad. What was it like for you to be so revered? And so in the public eye and yet
[13:17]at home, you know, just be the guy who runs the bathtub. I mean, I feel like Roger Federer
[13:21]must be going through some of this today with his four kids. Like, how do you manage that
[13:25]difference? Yeah, it's, uh, everything everybody's wired differently. You know, I mean,
[13:31]I know Roger to a certain degree. He seems like, as down to earth as a person as you
[13:38]can be. I mean, certainly he is a respect for, for cultures and people and he's a deep
[13:46]knowledge of, of history in both life and tennis. So I would imagine there's some real
[13:52]context that he has off the court. Other, other, you know, other people in the public
[13:56]eye, you know, they might choose, they might believe what they read. I don't know. For
[14:01]me, I, I relished getting away from the hat I felt like I had to wear when I was in
[14:07]the public eye. You know, I, I never felt really authentic. Um, when I was out there,
[14:14]um, I mean, I did come to terms with this being a talent of mine, but loving tennis was
[14:20]not who I was. I actually hated it for most of my life for a lot of reasons. Um, and, and
[14:26]I would get out there and, and struggle with my purpose and reason. I found my reason
[14:31]finally and, and giving choice other children through education and, and that became my,
[14:36]my distraction from myself when I was out there and when I had children, it actually,
[14:42]actually in some kind of odd way, made it a lot easier for me because I was able to really
[14:48]escape the, the who I was. Um, that it was a relief to me to have the responsibility
[14:59]of being a dad and, and, and, and to quite honestly feel normal and to feel like tennis
[15:08]just went away a good day or a bad day, just like disappeared when, when your kids come
[15:13]running down the hallway because they hear the elevator open up at the hotel, you know,
[15:19]and they think it might be you. It's like it's, you know, so it was a, it was a real
[15:24]asset. I was really blessed to have five years where I could have them, you know, with
[15:30]me during some of those times when I think I would have felt, felt pretty lonely, not, not
[15:37]having them. Um, in the book, you describe not liking school and not doing well in school,
[15:44]something that I'm sure many kids and parents can relate to. You, you said, I don't seem to
[15:49]learn or process facts the way other kids do. I have a steel trap memory, but trouble,
[15:54]concentrating. I need things explained twice three times. How did that experience make you
[15:59]feel and how do you think that experience of your own has tied into your passion for providing
[16:04]education now to students around the world? Yeah, I think my lack of education has been a big
[16:10]inspiration to that. Um, he's the biggest reason being, you know, I, I mean, I, I described very,
[16:18]particularly in the book, you know, the life I was living as a child, it was, it was a life of
[16:24]a professional, it wasn't the life of a, of a kid, you know, and so I was always getting pulled
[16:31]out of school on Fridays for tournaments in Southern California. They just seven years old to drive
[16:36]down play all weekend, drive back late Sunday, get up, go to school and, and, you know, I always felt
[16:42]how we felt behind. I never felt rested. I never felt ready for it. In our house, it was wake up,
[16:50]play tennis, brush your teeth, go to school, and in that order, you know, it was really, it was
[16:55]really the way it was. So school wasn't a priority to my father, um, um, whatsoever. And, and so I was
[17:03]always kind of a behind and I was always tired and, and I might even had some learning, you know,
[17:10]deficits, you know, and, and, and as a result, I never quite knew why I felt the way it felt,
[17:16]but I, I shunned away from it. Um, I, I, I, I resented it. I felt like resending school was loyalty to my
[17:24]dad, you know, and I believe tennis was what I had to do with I never had a choice. So as a result,
[17:32]that lack of choice eventually, um, as my own, as I grew up and I got started to sort of grow into
[17:39]my own voice, I, I was pretty clear with how much I resented, I'm not having that choice. And,
[17:45]you know, I never really liked how tennis made me feel as a child. I never liked that it affected
[17:51]family dinners, depending on how good you played that day. I never, I never liked, you know,
[17:56]how it made me feel every morning when I, when I was having a go to school. And, you know,
[18:01]so there's so many things early on I didn't like. I didn't like the relationship that established
[18:06]a tennis seemed to, to put a wedge in between my siblings and, and my father. And, and so there's
[18:12]so many moments growing up where I just, I just resented not having that choice and, and the pressure
[18:18]being on me to be the one to do it. And so I think when I really hit my lowest point 27 years old,
[18:25]I'd fallen from, I was convinced that getting into one of the world was going to be my answer,
[18:29]you know, and then somehow there was going to be some fulfillment in that, in that,
[18:35]in that goal and objective. And I just remember getting to number one and literally feeling nothing
[18:41]feeling like just empty. It was weird. It was like a number one. It was almost worse being number one
[18:46]because it was, I was, I was, I was let in on this dirty little secret that it doesn't change,
[18:52]it doesn't change darn thing, you know. And, and so I had to, I had to go through a real
[18:58]tailspin in my life. And I did and I, and I self inflicted with choices of drugs and choices of
[19:07]lifestyle and, and found myself in a marriage that I, that was quickly failing and failed 140 in the
[19:15]world. And then that's when I saw on TV after I had one of my worst losses. My coach basically
[19:22]told me we're going to quit or start over. And I just remember that moment. It was such a,
[19:27]it's such a epiphany of a moment. I mean epiphany doesn't change our life. What we do with them
[19:32]is really what changes our life. But my epiphany was seeing so many people out in the streets and
[19:39]wondering what they did if they looked, what they did, if they even chose what they did. You know,
[19:43]I mean, did they choose their life? Did they have a choice in where they were born and what was
[19:48]nurtured and what their strengths and weaknesses are? So I kind of started to go, you know what?
[19:53]Just because I didn't choose my life doesn't mean that I can't take ownership of it and I can't
[19:58]find my reason.
[20:00]And so that was my epiphany and I searched for my reason
[20:05]from that day forward, which led to me seeing 60 minutes
[20:09]piece on kit knowledge's power program,
[20:12]which is one of the most renowned charter school operators
[20:16]in the country.
[20:17]And I saw these people changing these children's lives
[20:21]by rolling up their sleeves and giving them choice.
[20:24]I saw what it meant for a child not to really have choice.
[20:26]Here I was vitting about being number one in the world.
[20:30]One other kid who don't have a choice to can't escape
[20:33]the downward spiral of their own neighborhood
[20:37]and gangs and prisons and drugs.
[20:40]And so I said, you know what?
[20:41]That's what I want to do.
[20:42]It was like overnight I took out a 40 million dollar mortgage
[20:45]and I said about the Herculean task of building
[20:48]my own charter school and trying to figure it out
[20:50]and trying to pay for it and trying to do so many things.
[20:54]But what it did do, it gave me my reason.
[20:58]And I think lack of education,
[21:01]seeing children who really don't have choice in their life,
[21:04]my own disconnect with the lack of choice in my life,
[21:07]I think those are probably the working components
[21:10]to what has made me so passionate about education.
[21:15]And now you have what 65,000 school seats
[21:18]and 80 charter schools.
[21:20]It's amazing how you've expanded like that.
[21:22]How did that happen?
[21:24]Well, that was spun off of 15 years
[21:28]of building my philanthropic school in Las Vegas.
[21:31]You know, I started to realize not being an educator
[21:34]and operator, I kind of said to myself,
[21:36]you know, well, what am I?
[21:38]If I'm not an educator and an operator,
[21:39]I realize I'm basically a facilitator for these children
[21:43]and, you know, I don't, I'm not in a classroom teaching
[21:46]I'm not in the back of house organizing and operating
[21:50]and, you know, I'm putting people in right places
[21:53]and trying to make the best decisions.
[21:55]And so one of the things that was hardest
[21:58]about that whole philanthropic experience
[22:01]was 1,200 kids in my school and 3,000 on the waiting list,
[22:05]you know, and the need was so much greater.
[22:07]I looked at it like I was twice the failure,
[22:09]I was a success and I needed to figure out a way
[22:12]to expand this mission.
[22:15]And then I guess sometimes when you,
[22:18]I don't know when you dream, when you're awake
[22:21]or when you pray hard enough or when life just,
[22:26]sometimes puts the right people in your life
[22:28]at the right time and after my book was written,
[22:33]this, my now partner had read it and he called me
[22:38]and said, you know, I share your same passion
[22:41]and frustration for education.
[22:43]And I think, I think together we can do some
[22:46]interesting things that went down the net with them.
[22:48]And we ended up through his background
[22:51]of inner city development and building.
[22:55]We put together an out-of-the-box model
[22:59]that sort of said, you know, let's not wait for government
[23:02]to be efficient anymore.
[23:03]Let's not rely on philanthropy
[23:06]because we both have realized that it's not scalable.
[23:09]I mean, here you are with a waiting list
[23:10]and let's go to the private sector
[23:12]and let's sell a model that doesn't write
[23:15]the backs of our teachers or our students
[23:17]or anything that we facilitate for these great operators
[23:22]an ability for them to scale and so that's what we did.
[23:26]We put together this really interesting business model
[23:28]that allows us to bring capital to a table on day one,
[23:31]go with an operator to where they wanna expand.
[23:34]There's obviously a need, it's not a software issue.
[23:37]There are plenty of great teachers
[23:39]inspired for friendly learning environment
[23:42]and it's a hardware issue.
[23:44]The charter school can't access public dollars
[23:47]to build their facility, but once you have your chartered license,
[23:50]then every child that goes to that school,
[23:52]the money from the state follows a child to that school.
[23:55]So there's a revenue model on day one
[23:58]in these communities where a charter is now expanding to
[24:02]and so if we could bring the capital to build a facility
[24:05]and then we cannot play landlord in their life
[24:07]and allow them to fully incubate and stabilize
[24:13]and then through the taxes and bond market,
[24:16]be able to get them a purchase power to buy back the school
[24:20]for a price that satisfies a like-minded investor,
[24:24]which is an investor that says,
[24:25]I'm not looking to make huge returns.
[24:29]I'm not looking to give away my money
[24:31]or I'm tired of giving away my money,
[24:33]but I do wanna see, I do wanna be responsible
[24:36]in my, I do wanna see social impact.
[24:39]I do wanna be responsible
[24:42]in what I do.
[24:43]So if we walk the tension between return on investment
[24:47]versus social scalability and sustainability
[24:51]and with that model have deployed close to $1 billion
[24:56]over five years and built over 80 schools
[24:59]and this week I go to Florida actually
[25:00]to open up another one.
[25:03]So it's really been exciting
[25:06]and it's been a journey that I'm incredibly proud of
[25:09]and continue to find ways to impact the lives
[25:14]of so many kids that don't have the luxury
[25:18]that other kids do, your education should not be determined
[25:23]by your zip code, it's just not the way it should work.
[25:27]No, you're absolutely right.
[25:28]And I read that you're developing,
[25:31]you're trying to develop a new measure for dyslexia
[25:36]that could be a universal sort of symptom check
[25:39]to make sure that kids get the help that they need.
[25:41]Is that, can you tell me about the readability
[25:43]initiative you're involved in?
[25:45]Yeah, so I'm involved in a, I started a company
[25:48]with a few, with, I mean, I'm a very, very early,
[25:53]early investor with a call square panda
[25:57]and it's a platform that allows us
[26:02]to give real time intervention kids
[26:05]as it relates to early childhood reading.
[26:07]So, I mean, just back up a step from there
[26:10]and say that as I've seen all these schools get built,
[26:13]as I've spent time with all these leaders
[26:15]and operators and teachers and people that are,
[26:19]you know, in the leads, as it relates to day-to-day
[26:23]educational life, the same thing keeps coming up,
[26:27]which is the early childhood reading literacy,
[26:31]like the earlier child reads, the earlier they can processing,
[26:35]can comprehend content as opposed
[26:38]to just fanatically figuring out what to heck the word is saying.
[26:41]We're not, we don't, we have an evolved to read.
[26:44]You know, reading is about seeing something
[26:47]associating a sound with it, tying it with another letter,
[26:49]pronouncing those two together, making a word,
[26:52]then go into the auditor where you have to say the word
[26:55]and then you say the word and then you associate it
[26:58]with this meaning, there's like six or eight things
[27:00]going on in a brain just to read.
[27:04]And the great news is, is that we have so much science
[27:08]and neuroscience behind this to understand these batons
[27:13]and how they're getting passed back and forth
[27:15]and where a child struggles, because when a baton isn't lit up,
[27:19]as much as other areas with these saltwater,
[27:22]like, I won't call my shower passes,
[27:24]they're very non-evident, they just wear it,
[27:26]they get a child to interact with the game
[27:28]or to do something, and then you can actually predict
[27:32]a high percentile where the struggling points
[27:35]are gonna come with a child and then you can help meet
[27:37]them where they are and develop those muscles.
[27:39]So, so I put this in my school to test it
[27:43]and I was amazed at how fast some of these kids
[27:47]that really struggled got caught up the speed
[27:50]and even went past their peers
[27:52]and in these case studies, I was able to do it my school.
[27:55]So that merited my complete commitment to this expansion
[28:00]because when you wanna talk about scalability,
[28:02]if you can create a platform that is in the tech world
[28:08]that really allows for children to personalize
[28:14]in self-directed reading and learning.
[28:19]It's just a two to seven.
[28:21]Now you're talking about real implications,
[28:23]but this doesn't just have implications
[28:24]when it comes to reading.
[28:26]It has implications when it comes to red flagging dyslexia,
[28:30]as an example, because earlier to take this dyslexia,
[28:33]I mean, you can people,
[28:35]a lot of people don't realize it.
[28:36]They don't know they have it to a sixth grade.
[28:38]You know, by then, it's costing $14,000 a year remediation,
[28:42]but if you can recognize these sorts of things
[28:45]and by age of four, I mean, now you're talking about
[28:49]getting it, managing it, remediating it,
[28:53]and then not ever having to worry about it ever again
[28:56]and an incredibly short period of time.
[28:59]The success that we're having on that end
[29:02]has language teaching possibilities
[29:06]when the brain is most, you know,
[29:11]when you can mold the brain,
[29:12]and it's like it's elastic when you're really young.
[29:14]I mean, the second language learning acquisition,
[29:18]huge implications there.
[29:19]So anyhow, this has been about a couple of years
[29:22]in ways of big business in China
[29:25]and United States and it's growing and scaling.
[29:29]And I believe it's kind of what I'm doing
[29:32]with the schools seem pretty one-dimensional of sorts,
[29:37]you know, because they're stand-alone schools
[29:39]that are affecting 1500 kids in perpetuity,
[29:43]say any school, but this is about reaching, you know,
[29:47]hundreds of thousands, if not millions.
[29:50]That's amazing that you're doing that.
[29:52]I know for sure I'm going and getting these,
[29:54]the score of Panda starter games for my little kids now,
[29:56]for this, for sure.
[30:00]That's going back to tennis for a minute.
[30:03]You know, I am married to a former tennis bro
[30:05]who watches the tennis channel religiously.
[30:08]And the tournaments are just back to back-to-back-to-back.
[30:11]And I'm wondering how you feel about sort of the insanity
[30:15]of the tour schedule and what it does
[30:17]to players' bodies these days.
[30:21]That's pretty.
[30:21]It does appear that way.
[30:23]I mean, I can honestly say that I think
[30:30]to benefit a lot more from a more sustained off season.
[30:35]For a couple of reasons, there's a lot to be said
[30:37]for the quality of the sport.
[30:39]When you know you can properly recover from the season
[30:43]and prepare for the seasons.
[30:44]So I think the quality will raise.
[30:46]I also think the fans will look forward to it more.
[30:48]And I think you make it work.
[30:51]We're pretty fragmented in the ownership
[30:53]of these tournaments.
[30:55]And some guys, they want to be out there
[31:00]grinding away because the more they play,
[31:01]the better chance they have for the ranking.
[31:04]So you're almost taking away opportunities
[31:07]in some respects.
[31:07]In other words, if you talk to the top,
[31:10]I don't want to speak for any player.
[31:11]But if you speak to it, if you were to just generally
[31:13]speaking, you talk to the top 15 guys in the world,
[31:16]they're going to want entirely different schedule.
[31:18]And the guys 75 to 100 in the world.
[31:21]So it's kind of hard to make everybody happy,
[31:25]but you would love to see the sport move forward
[31:28]in the best interests of its own future.
[31:30]But these guys have short careers.
[31:33]And they're getting longer, of course,
[31:35]as we've seen with Roger and Rafa.
[31:38]And I know guys are playing in the 30s now.
[31:40]But even if you play in your mid 30s,
[31:42]it's you get a window of time and then your time's over with.
[31:46]And guys want their opportunity to be out there to play.
[31:51]I didn't think of it like that.
[31:52]And how did you find coaching versus playing?
[31:58]It was interesting.
[31:59]It's when I played, I never felt pressure at all.
[32:03]It was never about pressure.
[32:05]It was, I felt stress, like stress to take every box
[32:10]and make sure everything, organization, you just
[32:13]you don't want curves, you have your rhythms,
[32:15]you have your style of going about getting ready
[32:20]for practices for matches.
[32:22]You know where to spend energy, you know where not to.
[32:26]And so you manage your day.
[32:28]And all the details that go into making your day
[32:30]the best they can possibly be.
[32:31]And that was stressful because you're constantly thinking
[32:34]about it.
[32:35]But then once you get out there, everything's in order.
[32:37]It's like, you know, you just hit the gas pedal and just go
[32:39]and hope for the best.
[32:41]But coaching was the exact opposite.
[32:42]You know, I never felt any stress.
[32:45]I didn't really have to do anything.
[32:46]You know, it wasn't me executing.
[32:48]Wasn't me executing any game plan.
[32:50]It was, you know, or anything like that.
[32:52]But you feel a huge amount of pressure
[32:55]because you see some of these hopes and dreams.
[32:59]You see somebody who is doing, you know,
[33:02]everything possible to make themselves
[33:04]the best they can be for that moment
[33:07]and the expectation of the line, you don't, you don't.
[33:10]And you know, if you say one thing, you know,
[33:12]and it's wrong, or it's not taking a step
[33:17]in the right direction, it's like you feel like,
[33:20]you know, you have this little lever
[33:21]with this giant crane, you know, and you touch it wrong.
[33:24]The crane can just stick and destroy something
[33:27]or it can build something, you know.
[33:28]And so you really choose wisely.
[33:31]You really listen more than you talk.
[33:34]And you try to learn more than you teach, you know.
[33:38]And I think that part was, that part was different.
[33:42]And I got to say challenging.
[33:45]And anything problem solving is something
[33:50]I find, you know, enjoyable.
[33:52]Well, thank you so, so much for being on mom's,
[33:55]don't have time to read books.
[33:57]This has been so interesting to chat with you.
[33:59]I really can't thank you enough.
[34:00]Oh, I could chat with you forever.
[34:03]This is fun.
[34:04]Well, good luck with this moving forward.
[34:08]And I know I'm rude to cross one way or another.
[34:11]And thanks for your time.
[34:13]Oh, thank you for your time.
[34:14]Thanks so much.
[34:15]Take care.
[34:16]Awesome.
[34:17]Okay.
[34:18]Thanks so much for listening to tonight's episode
[34:21]of mom's, don't have time to read books.
[34:24]I'm Zibi Owens.
[34:25]You can read more about me at zibi Owens.com.
[34:27]But please subscribe to my podcast.
[34:30]Mom's don't have time to read books on iTunes,
[34:32]Stitcher, or Podbean.
[34:35]Thanks so much.
[34:36]Bye bye.