WHAT IS A LEGACY COACH?

The Legacy Coach CHICAGO (March 31, 2011) Legacy Coach Scott Garwood, left, with NHRA Funny Car driver Jack Beckman IMG_1967.JPGIn today's professional sporting arena, as athletes, including race-car drivers, strive to improve their performance on their respective turfs and achieve their goals of becoming champions, they have turned to a new resource to guide them on their journey - The Legacy Coach.

A Legacy Coach - not to be confused with a Life Coach - helps these professionals to overcome their own limitations to reach higher levels of success and break out of the pack to live the life they want. An expert in the power of our minds and human behavior, Legacy Coach Scott Garwood, of Chicago, has been working with the stars of NHRA Full Throttle drag racing, in particular Funny Car racers Matt Hagan, Jack Beckman, Ashley Force Hood and Top Fuel driver Morgan Lucas, among others. He is also expanding into the NASCAR, IndyCar and sports-car-racing arenas. Although for years this profession may have been considered mystical, and even mind-controlling, Garwood can point to tangible results because of his guidance. He is certified in NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), Hypnotherapy, Master Coaching and is a third-degree Black Belt and instructor in martial arts. He uses his skills to coach headlining recording artists, business titans and world-champion racing teams, and is a regular speaker on success and life fulfillment. Jack Beckman, who finished fourth last year in the NHRA Funny Car class, says he’s seen marked improvement in his performance since working with Garwood. “What I like about Scott is he’s not giving me any advice on driving a drag race car. I instructed that for more than 10 years and I still do it on a part-time basis at the Frank Hawley School. “I think that it’s a process that just never ends,” Beckman continued, “and you’re always fine tuning it. I liken it to a batter in baseball. Once you’ve got the fundamentals of the swing down, it’s working on the mental game and then making slight improvements throughout your career and continuing to hone your skills. So, for me, this process of trying to become the best race-car driver out there will never stop. “I have a tremendous amount of confidence in Scott. He is one of those people who, by just speaking with him, telling him what’s on my mind, always helps me feel like I’m applying that process to get the best results.” For additional information, please go to http://www.thelegacycoach.net. Following is a Q&A conducted with Garwood, who has assisted numerous individuals in the discovery of their own unique internal gift, their Legacy, while creating and living a life that supports this higher purpose. 1. Q. What is the difference between a Life Coach and a Legacy Coach? A. I’ve been asked that a few times. Legacy-coaching clients live at their highest personal potential, which creates the highest level of success and fulfillment in their lives, in whatever they choose to do. I think maybe what a Life Coach does is help you discover what you want to do in your life. And, once that is achieved, the coaching stops. That’s a big part of what a Legacy Coach does, and when you figure that out it’s great. But if you don’t know how to do it, and you don’t have somebody there with you for the next three, four, five years, as you’re working through it, something’s going to stop you. Just today a current client shared a story with me: In the past someone helped her create her vision of what her ideal life would look like. She did what was recommended and it was a wonderful vision. At the end of the process, the person said, ‘Now go do it!’ And their relationship was over. The wonderful vision she had enjoyed quickly subsided and she was stuck until recently. Today we spent some time on taking the next steps towards making her bed and breakfast and wellness center a reality. The most important part of what I do is help people take action over and over and over. And, through that constant action, before they know it, they’re there and they’re living it. Without that, most things would stop us. Maybe that’s the difference 2. Q. How did you decide this was your life’s path? A. In 17 years of working up the ladder in the corporate world at one point something told me that I’m just not happy and everything I thought was important about climbing that ladder just wasn’t. I think it clicked at that time that we’re only here on this earth once - although maybe that’s debatable for some. I needed to find out how I wanted to live during that time. From that point on I went on my own journey and had my own mentors and figured it out. 3. Q. Did you study for this, take courses? A. At the time when I knew I wanted to do something but I didn’t know what it was or how, the first thing I did was ask my wife on my birthday many years ago to get me (life/personal coach) Tony Robbins’ CDs. I listened to those CDs and they did some really good things for me. I learned that our mind has the power to help us do anything we want to do, and so I just kind of started searching for how to improve one’s mind. I happened upon a success academy in the Chicago area and I started with that academy to quit smoking, and it turned into developing who I am, and that is a Legacy Coach. 4. Q. Would Tony Robbins then be a mentor? A. I’ve not met him. I’ve learned from the CDs and did some of the exercises on the CDs and that lasted for two or three months. Then I moved on with life and put aside what I had learned, as ‘life’ continued to get in the way. As my life progressed, I learned it was critical to have somebody there with you guiding you, and that’s why I found my own coach. 5. Q. So, you feel you have made the right decision as far as your own legacy goes? A. Absolutely. There’s processes and tools that help you figure out what your legacy would be. And as I was going through this journey one thing that probably solidified it for me was I started coaching people for free for two years. When you do something for free and it’s above and beyond your normal job and you come home and you’re tired, it’s very easy to put it off. But when you’re that motivated and that passionate about something and you do it for free for two years, that pretty much told me that this is it. 6. Q. What do you feel is the best advice you have ever given in NHRA that had a good result? A. The best advice is - and it will sound familiar, but how to do it is even more important - to trust yourself. And when you trust yourself you can get through no matter what’s in front of you, no matter what your fears are, no matter what’s going on in your mind at the starting line, no matter what decision you think you should make even if it doesn’t feel right. When you trust yourself, then that’s when the real answers come out, and that’s when you do your best. 7. Q. What types of advice do you avoid? A. I avoid telling anybody to do what works for me or somebody else. The key to highly successful coaching is helping people figure out their own answers. We learn these answers growing up and especially when we’re very young. So, for example, if someone were to ask me what should I do in this situation, if I told them what I would do it wouldn’t work. I would help them to figure out their own answer and then it would work. So, the advice that I cannot give is to do what I do. 8. Q. Is this a spiritual exercise? A. Spiritual in the sense that there’s a true belief in yourself. But not spiritual in the sense of believing in something else or somebody else. 9. Q. How were you approached? How did these drivers find you? A. Over a year ago, as I was updating my own coaching plan, I made a decision as to whom else I wanted to work with, and I picked two groups of folks. One was artists (rock stars and musicians), and the other was NHRA folks, because I was just so passionate about drag racing. I still remember my first race in 1994 in Pomona (Calif.) when two Top Fuel cars lit up for the first time on Sunday and my whole world changed. And, I think most people reading this can share the same experience. I wanted to work with the folks in the NHRA and help them figure out their own thing and get better at what they do. I didn’t know anybody in the sport and I didn’t know anybody who knew anybody, but I knew that there were a couple of e-mail addresses I could get to, and I just started e-mailing those people and after two attempts with Tommy Johnson Jr., he replied. 10. Q. Are you just handling NHRA drivers, owners and crew chiefs at this stage? A. Yes, I am just working with NHRA. That was my initial choice. But I found myself expanding into other motorsports arenas earlier this year. I dedicated 2010 to the NHRA, but I’ve learned in working with motorsports professionals that what’s more important is not who they are, what they drive, what they do, or who they are as a celebrity, but who they are as a person. So, if there was someone in some other form of motorsports who was a wonderful person with whom I wanted to work, then I would definitely do it. And I am currently on that path. 11. Q. How private are your sessions? A. My clients can do whatever they want. They know early on that trust is paramount to what I do. Without that I couldn’t be successful. They know that anything they tell me is not going to leave me and that’s crucial in maintaining that trust and that bond. At the same time, they can say whatever they want about the experience. After we create some successes together, I ask the clients if they would help others and spread the word, and everyone so far has wanted to do so. 12. Q. How do you balance handling a number of drivers on one weekend? A. I reached the point around the NHRA U.S. Nationals in 2010 (Labor Day weekend) where I had enough NHRA clients and knew that if I picked up another one or helped someone else I couldn’t give each of them everything they needed. At that point, I told potential clients that, at least for this year, I could not take them on. My other current clients deserve everything they can get from me. At the same time, especially in the NHRA staging lanes, each person I work with is at a different point in what we’re doing together. At one time I had six that I had to run back and forth to before they went down the track, and that was quite a challenge. I knew that this could work with multiple folks when all six drivers did very well for themselves in the same round. 13. Q. What do you try to accomplish with each driver? A. When we first meet they choose exactly, specifically what they want to improve. And, for some it’s their reaction time. They say they want to cut their reaction time in half, be more consistent, or they want to accomplish this at a certain number of races. We write that down and make sure that that’s first and foremost in everything we do and it gets us closer to that objective. Each driver, each crew chief, or each person has their own objective and we try to meet that objective. In doing that, what they quickly realize is that this affects every part of their lives because usually what we’re working on is true self-confidence. And when you have true self-confidence every part of your life changes. 14. Q. Is there a difference in maturity when you deal with certain drivers, as some may be in their 40s or older, and some in their 20s? A. Absolutely. If we’re just talking drag racing, it goes beyond just age as far as maturity goes; it’s experience. Working with younger folks with less experience is good, because they have fewer negative experiences to reduce their confidence in themselves. At the same time, they have less knowledge of what to do when it needs to happen. Just like all of us in life, the longer we go through life the more experiences we pick up that shape us and hold us back. When you have many, many years in drag racing, then all those negative experiences weigh more and you have more to think about. And that’s exactly what you don’t need when you’re making tuning decisions or driving decisions. So, along with experience, it’s critical to pick up the tools to turn those experiences into positive learning to become even better, and only experience can give you that. The less to think about the better. 15. Q. What are your biggest rewards? A. One person I was working with, who was working specifically on reaction times, was all over the board and the times were generally high until we started working together. When that person became the first driver to beat the best ‘leaver’ off the line all year, it was pretty rewarding. There was also a client to whom people looked up to for his ideas and it was a very big deal for him to give me a call. But he knew that to get more consistent he needed somebody else to help him think. One of the biggest things we can’t do on our own is look inside our minds and check ourselves. He just knew he needed an outside perspective. So, when we did that and he was able to bring in all these aspects he already knew, put them all together very quickly and become extremely consistent, every time we meet now he says, ‘You know, I’m exactly where I want to be.’ There was another driver who was quoted in a major newspaper recently describing how every part of their life was changing, and we had only known each other for two months at that time. 16. Q. Do any of your clients argue with you? A. They argue in a way that is very powerful. When they don’t take an action that we decided would move them forward, that’s arguing with me. Most of them don’t outright say anything, that’s just not the way our relationship is, but if they don’t take the action that will get them somewhere, then that’s telling me that they don’t agree. So, then we have to do something different. 17. Q. How powerful to a driver is this self-knowledge that you’re able to help bring to them? A. Extremely powerful. When you understand yourself you’re able to tap into what you’re really good at, your strengths, and exploit those to become even better than you knew you could be. Without knowing what those inner strengths are, you can’t tap into them and use them. 18. Q. Why should race-car drivers take advantage of such a program? A. From what I’ve learned, most race-car drivers want to win and want to be champions in whatever sport they’re in. So, they would want to know and discover what could make them even better at that, and when they do, then they have the best opportunities for themselves to win championships and to win races in whatever sport they’re in. But, what I’ve also learned over the years is that race-car drivers want to be able to do it themselves. When you’re able to help them understand that they’re developing themselves and they’re doing all the hard work and making it all happen, then it’s even more of an accomplishment for them. It’s not like we’re handing them tools to be a better driver, a better tuner or a better owner. They already know how to do that. 19. Q. Can you name some success stories? A. I think the most recent one is Morgan Lucas at the NHRA season-opening event in Pomona. Morgan, though already successful, to my knowledge had not been where he wanted to be as a driver or a team owner for a couple of years. And we were able to in less than 24 hours turn that around from within and he ended up winning that race and had four excellent lights (reaction times) during eliminations. With his excellent focus and determination, he turned it around in one day, and that was pretty successful in his mind. 20. Q. Did he thank you? A. Absolutely, without a doubt. We thanked each other. 21. Q. Describe what is ‘Living Your Legacy.’ A. People often ask me what it means to ‘live your legacy’ and I used to think that was a tough one to answer. Since every one of us is an individual with our own views, desires, definition of success and fulfillment and our own view of what our ideal life would be, it had been difficult to answer this question in a way that could relate to each individual. Along the way, however, I learned to be vague and ask more than tell, which allows each of us to create our own interpretation and experience. You will know you are living your legacy when you aren’t concerned about what is happening tomorrow and aren’t thinking about what happened yesterday. You are living in the moment today and enjoying those often forgotten details of what makes life wonderful, like the fresh smell of the crisp morning air, or that look that your child gives you when your eyes connect. 22. Q. What is the legacy you would like to leave? A. All through my own process I’m extremely confident that I’m living it now, and that is to help people find their legacy and be the best they want to be, and live each day to its fullest. I’ve learned that those are my gifts and that’s what I’m able to give to others every day.