Protect Your Energy, Keep Moving

Hey Team!

Fall has officially arrived on the west coast. The leaves are changing, the mornings are crisp and the evenings are getting shorter. I absolutely love this time of year.

For about seven years in a row, my ex-wife and I would travel to Whistler this week to celebrate my upcoming birthday. Whistler is spectacular any time of year, but there’s something extra special about it right now. You get all the best parts of fall without the chaos of ski season. It’s this perfect balance between being surrounded by nature and still having the energy of a mountain town.

I haven’t embraced that tradition since our separation. This year, I’m changing that.

It’ll look different. I’ll be traveling solo, probably working pretty regular days and there won’t be the same birthday traditions attached to it. But I realized something: just because a chapter of your life ends doesn’t mean everything you loved inside that chapter has to end with it.

So, Whistler is coming back with a vengeance this year. Different circumstances, different version of me... same place I love.

From The Field

I’m still basking in everything that came out of Runningman and our Run Clubhouse activation. The DMs, phone calls, comments and reshares have continued, with people telling us how much they loved the concept and how well our team executed it. I’m incredibly grateful for every single message. Truly. Even my ex-wife sent me a note congratulating me and telling me how amazing it looked. That was unexpected, but received with the same gratitude.

Naturally, our conversation with Sara Blakely received a ton of attention. She was probably the most recognizable person who sat down with us, so that makes complete sense. But interestingly, some of the conversations that have stayed with me most were with people whose names you might not immediately recognize.

Maddy, aka Ghost Runner, shared her journey through childhood sexual abuse and why she runs wearing a mask. She’s beginning to speak more openly about her experience, using the mask as a symbol to help people, regardless of gender, feel seen and heard. Her mission is to bring awareness to trauma, normalize these conversations and make it easier for people who have experienced abuse to speak up and find support.

Then there was Brooke Johnson, the first woman to skateboard across America. Brooke showed up with this infectious energy and a message that was equally powerful: don’t let other people decide what you’re capable of. She talked about the doubts people projected onto her, particularly as a woman attempting something so audacious, and why she refused to accept someone else’s limitations as her own.

Sitting down with Sara was incredibly cool. But Runningman reminded me that the biggest name doesn’t always carry the biggest lesson. There are extraordinary stories everywhere if we’re willing to pull up a chair and listen.

Thank you to everyone who has been following along with our Clubhouse Radio series. Sharing these stories has genuinely been one of my favourite parts of this entire experience.

A Mental Edge

It’s fascinating what can happen around you when you start stacking a few wins.

The people closest to me have been some of my biggest supporters and a major reason we’ve been able to accomplish what we have recently. But over the past week, I’ve also received a few random messages from people outside my inner circle that landed very differently. Each arrived around a celebratory moment, and each had this diminishing tone to it.

A lesson I learned a long time ago came rushing back: very seldom does a message require a response at the same velocity it was received.

Our instinct can be to fire something back. Defend ourselves. Correct the record. Match the energy.

Don’t.

Slow it down. Let the emotion leave the room. Decide whether the message deserves a response at all and, if it does, respond thoughtfully rather than reactively. When you refuse to match someone else’s energy, you remove much of its power.

I don’t know why we sometimes default to scarcity when someone else is winning. Personally, I want my friends, peers and even my competitors to win. Someone else succeeding doesn’t take anything away from me. My job is simply to execute better, keep showing up and let the outcome take care of itself.

So the next time an unsolicited comment lands in the middle of a moment you’re proud of, remember: you don’t have to pick it up just because someone put it down in front of you. Protect your energy. Keep moving.

Quick Reminders Before You Start:

I woke up this morning to a pretty cool surprise. Wellworthy published an article about what we’re building titled, OPS RUN Launches a Digital Platform for Finding and Joining Run Clubs. We didn’t know it was coming, which somehow made it even more special. Every time someone takes the time to learn about what we’re building and share the story with their audience, I’m incredibly grateful.

There will always be things competing for your attention and energy. Be intentional about what you pick up, what you leave behind and, sometimes, what you choose to take back.

Catch you on the Start Line,
—Matty