Aaron Golub, The First Legally Blind College Football Player on ”Deciding to Succeed”

Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning

Our next guest became the first legally blind D1 athlete to play in a game when he played football at Tulane University. He was named team captain and went on to become an NFL free agent. Now he helps organizations and teams create leadership strategies that overcome adversity through speeches, workshops, and strategic partnerships.

Watch this inspiring interview on YouTube here https://youtu.be/sPFQCn3VvJw

On today’s Episode #283 we will cover

✔ How Aaron Golub became the first legally blind D1 athlete to play in a game when he played football at Tulane University.

✔ The key take-aways from Aaron's TEDx, on “Finding Diamonds with Your Disadvantages” that led him to uncovering his true potential.

✔ When Aaron knew he needed to step up and do a bit more than the person next to him, to reach those higher levels of success.

✔ The actions Aaron took with football, that have now transferred into his personal and business life.

✔ How you can reach Aaron to speak or work with your organization.

I am honored to have this chance to speak with someone who has learned many of the concepts we talk about on the podcast, like building a vision, and carving out a happy, fulfilled life, all without the use of his eye-sight.

Welcome back to The Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning Podcast, where we cover the science-based evidence behind social and emotional learning (for schools) and emotional intelligence training (in the workplace) with tools, ideas and strategies that we can all use for immediate results, with our brain in mind. I’m Andrea Samadi, an author, and educator with a passion for learning specifically on the topics of health, wellbeing and productivity, and launched this podcast to share how important an understanding of our brain is to our everyday life and results using the most current brain research. If there’s a tool, strategy or resource that I find, that could be helpful to improve productivity and results, whether we are a teacher in the classroom, a coach or in the modern workplace, I will share it here.

He started his journey as a speaker in high school. Aaron was asked to go on Good Morning America when he committed to play football at Tulane, he knew immediately that he had a message that would impact millions. This experience threw him in the deep end at 17 years old. Since then he has traveled the world sharing his message.

Aaron leaves organizations and teams with both strategies to create true change but also with impactful insights that will allow them to rethink their past beliefs. Aaron is never one and done, he is there by your side to help you implement and act accordingly.

He works in a speaking, workshop, and consulting manor. Whether you want Aaron to come in for a keynote, breakout sessions, day-long workshop, or longer-term consulting, he has a structure for all.

Aaron’s biggest accomplishment and what he is most proud of is when he was named a team captain of the Tulane Football Team and went on to become an NFL free agent.

Successful organizations and companies like Pinterest, Deloitte, PlayFly Sports, Evolution Mining, and many other events and teams invest in him regularly.

He has appeared on Good Morning America, as well has been in CBS, NBC, Sports Illustrated, The New York Times, Entrepreneur, NPR and many others.

When I first came across Aaron’s work, I think it was by accident, as I might have been on an email list for the work that he does. It didn’t take me a minute to read what he’s accomplished in his life to write back to him that I was hoping I could have him on our podcast.

Then I listened to his TEDx, on “Finding Diamonds with Your Disadvantages” and saw that this young man was LIVING many of the practices and principles that we write about on this podcast. He even quoted the quote I opened the last episode with that “we must be willing to do things that others aren't willing to do.” We set up a call to speak, so I could learn more about him, and see if he would be open to sharing his story for those who tune into our show, to see how he’s been able to overcome adversity, how he did it, and what would could learn from his life’s story.

I also want to let listeners know that if they find Aaron’s message as unique and helpful as I have, that I’ll include his website, so you can reach out to him, to see if Aaron could work directly with your team or organization. He’s nothing short of amazing: inspirational, motivational and creative and innovative.

Let’s meet Aaron Golub, and see what we can learn about overcoming adversity in our daily life.

Welcome Aaron, thank you for coming on the podcast and sharing your unique and inspiring life story with us.

To start off with, I think it’s true that in life there are no such thing as accidents. I think you agree with me on this one after I listened to you speak. Your TEDx is about finding diamonds with your disadvantages. I thought about this for some time this morning while hiking…

I do think that your story (that’s already reached millions) is one that should be heard by as many people as possible, so thank you again for coming on the podcast and spending some time with me here.

Q1: I saw something you posted on Twitter as I was looking to learn more about you, and you have a post there that outlines your story and you say “growing up I wasn’t athletic or confident.” Can you start with what life was like?

Q1B: What is long-snapping and how did you play football without full eye-sight?

Q2: At what point had you had enough of the challenges you face? How did you get to the point where you learned to see the diamonds where most people could only see the disadvantages? I know this took time…

Q3: Life is difficult for all of us. Most people run into some sort of huge life challenge at some point. You’ve learned specific strategies for overcoming adversity. Can you share what they were?

Q3B: Where did your courage or sense of self come from?

Q4: So as you began playing football in high school, trying to find your place, what was that like, and when did you notice that you still needed something else that would come from you to reach higher levels of success with your sport?

Q5: I thought your strategy of cold calling EVERY college coach in the country was brilliant. Probably because I’ve spent years in sales, and no one likes cold calling, but it’s another difficult task that takes you to places where the diamonds are, where most others will give up. I want to know how you did this? Did you just get a list of D1 schools, and then look up the coaches and then call them? What did you say?

Q6. When did you learn to stop looking at challenges through the eyes of being a victim, and that the world is out to get you, and start thinking that things in life happen for you, not to you?

Q6B: You definitely didn’t just rise to the top without having to face more adversity and challenge, right? You were ranked as one of the top players in MA, and then what happened?

Q7: So now you’ve found the team that’s the best fit for you, and you had an overturn with the coaching staff and you had to do something else that most people wouldn’t want to do. You had to have that difficult conversation of “are you going to give me a shot?” How did that conversation go?

Q8: Was there a time when things shifted and it was almost like you looked back and things became easier for you? The challenges that you face on a daily basis just seem like things you can handle?

Q9: At what point did you start going into companies and organizations to help others overcome adversity and challenge?

Q10: What’s a message you want people to take away from today?

Q11: If someone hears this, and would like to contact you to work with their organization, what’s the best way?

FOLLLOW AARON GOLUB

Website https://aarongolub.com/

YouTube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCchzgREz-wfcjD0gmwkuTEQ

Twitter https://twitter.com/aaronjgolub?utm_source=hoobe&utm_medium=social

LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaron-golub-33b22aa8/

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/aaronjgolub/?hl=en

Aaron’s TEDx “A Diamond in Your Disadvantages” April 4, 2022 https://www.google.com/search?q=aaron+golub&oq=aaron+golub&aqs=chrome..69i57j46i13i512j0i13i512l2j46i13i512j0i13i512j0i22i30l4.2349j0j15&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:dc6399b3,vid:o75LnVDXayc

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