Ep 75 - Discovering How Mindset and Balance Pay Off for Boyd Martin

Boyd Martin is a man of extremes. If he's participating, you better believe that he's giving 1000%. In today's episode, we chat about how that approach to life can be both a benefit and a hindrance to success. Boyd shares how he has changed the way he sets himself up for growth and sustainability over the past few years - trust me, a lot of it is very applicable to veterinary medicine. Regardless of what you do for a living, hearing what Boyd has learned over his many years in the horse industry will shed new light on the idea of resilience and hard work.

About Boyd...
Boyd Martin is a three-time Olympian and one of the most successful international athletes in the equestrian discipline of eventing. He is currently ranked third in the world and operates his business out of Windurra USA in Cochranville, Pennsylvania.
Website
IG @boydmartineventing
Check out this awesome video made by Purina for Boyd and Windurra.
Showcasing Boyd and Thomas!
...
Hear more about the Martin Family's story from my good friend, Silva Martin, in Episode 5.
...

Transcript

Stacey Cordivano  0:07  
Do you feel like it's possible to find joy and positive change within veterinary medicine? Are you looking for a community that's striving for fulfillment rather than perfection? Hey there. I'm Dr. Stacey Cordivano. I want veterinarians to learn to be happier, healthier, wealthier and more grateful for the lives that we've created. On this podcast I will speak with outside of the box thinkers to hear new ideas on ways to improve our day to day lives. Welcome to The Whole Veterinarian.

Hi there. I'm so glad to be back with you all for season eight. We are starting off with a bang. for funsies I asked chat GPT to write an intro for today's guest and I can barely get the words out but here's my best shot because it is funny. Welcome dear listeners to another exciting episode of the whole veterinarian Podcast. Today we have the honor of hosting a truly remarkable guest Boyd Martin. Boyd is not only a seasoned equestrian, but also an accomplished eventing writer widely recognized for his exceptional skills and achievements in the world of competitive horse riding. With numerous accolades and a passion for the sport that knows no bounds. Boyd Martin brings a wealth of experience and insight to our podcast. Join us as we delve into his journey, explore the challenges and triumphs of his career and uncover the invaluable wisdom he has gained along the way. So saddle up and get ready for an enlightening conversation with the one and only Boyd Martin. So this is what I would have written although I'm certain he'll like this intro less than the last one. Today's guests is a three time Olympian two time gold medal winner at the Pan American Equestrian Games and has one to many three day events to list. He's a tried and true Aussie using words like shoe Mazal, but chose his deep commitment to the United States by wearing an American flag suit on the joggers strip and Kentucky and supporting the Eagles no matter how badly their season ends up Gilbert's he'll borrow a toothbrush from just about anyone if he forgets his he rambles on way too long when giving speeches and works his tail off every day. He is the husband of the amazing Silva Martin and together they have three awesome kids, one of which is calm and quiet. But considering that he's only three months old, he's still got time to come around. If you want to hear more about their inspiring journey to get to where they are now make sure to check out Silva super popular episode from way back in season one. I'll link it in the show notes. I hope you enjoy this conversation with Boyd Martin as much as I did. I was surprised more than a few times and that always makes for a good conversation. If you liked this episode, please share it with a friend and hit the subscribe button if you don't want to miss any upcoming episodes. Also, let us know what you think you can connect with me anytime on Instagram at the whole veterinarian. Talk to you soon. And please enjoy. Latin performance is proud to support the whole veterinarian. For nearly 30 years we've stood beside veterinarians with advanced nutrition for the health of your patients and practice. A platinum performance we know the power of nutrition starts within

I don't usually do a live intro because it makes me nervous. But get get out of yourself. I'm gonna do a live intro for you. Okay, hey, everybody.

Boyd Martin  3:38  
Are you recording? Are you recording? Yes, I am. Alright, carry on. Hey, everybody,

Stacey Cordivano  3:42  
thank you so much for joining me today. You may or may not know my guest today in certain circles. He's very well known. And others people don't have any idea who he is.

Boyd Martin  3:54  
Thanks a lot. Thanks a lot. Nice. Eloquent introduction, right. You know how to make your guests feel special.

Stacey Cordivano  4:00  
I do. That was my goal. It was to warm you up. So yeah, my guest today is Boyd Martin. He is a very accomplished 3d event rider. He's been in a few Olympics and a few other things for the USA. But today, we're talking about all things. We're talking about all the things today, boy, you're ready.

Boyd Martin  4:20  
I'm an open book, man. You're far away. And then except you're gonna get to ask your questions, too, right? Sure. Yeah. Is it a one way street or it's back and forth thing?

Stacey Cordivano  4:30  
This is a conversation people like this podcast because it's not scripted. So yeah, well, it's very back and forth. Okay, so the first thing I want to start with was, I heard about a goal last year. And it was an ambitious goal. And it was that you wanted to be the number one placed event writer in the world. Is that true?

Boyd Martin  4:51  
It is true and I sort of regret saying it but then I also said basically where this came is I usually send out a email to all my good friends and family members and sponsors and owners and sort of go over the year in review, and, and then also sort of the year ahead of us. And sometimes I feel like, you know, I think it's great to have these goals and ambitions of looking forward. And in the past, I've often just kept them to myself. And then and, you know, fortunately, or unfortunately, I rattled off my goal, at the beginning of 2023, of trying to be the number one writer in the world. And, you know, part of me looks back on it and thinks, God, you come across a bit egotistical and you know, sometimes I feel like you're better off keeping your goals to yourself. But then other times, I do think saying them out loud, makes it maybe a little bit more of a conscious, okay, I definitely want to do this, you know, and I think saying that I wanted to be the best in the world was sort of a good thing. But then it will also put, put a bit of pressure on myself. And in the end, I didn't quite reach my goal, like, third best in the world of rank number three. But, you know, to change topics a little bit is I decided to quit drinking about three years ago, and I didn't tell anyone, I didn't tell my best friend, I didn't tell my wife, I just said to myself, alright, I'm not going to drink anymore. And in that one, I actually think was better, you know, because if you go around telling everyone how you're going to stop drinking, and say, come up short and fail, and then everyone thinks you're a loser. And in that situation, I, I'm glad I didn't go around. And I still haven't drank any alcohol, which I also don't want to, you know, eventually maybe I want might visit drinking alcohol again, when my career's over. But yeah, I think sometimes when you sort of make a statement like that, and you, you know, eventually maybe change your plans or change your idea of what you think makes you happy. Also sort of set yourself up to sort of explain yourself afterwards. So it's, yeah, I don't know what the best thing is, I think sometimes saying something out loud, or telling people or writing it down, sort of really commits you to this mission. And then I think often sometimes, quietly, just talking to yourself about what your ambition or what your plan is, has a better way. So I'm, I'm no psychologist, but I've done both ways. And I can see positives for both and negatives for both.

Stacey Cordivano  7:21  
Yeah, I think the research would back you up and saying that both visualization, and also outward accountability is important for goals, but I hear you on, you know, keeping some of them to yourself and sort of reflecting on why they're important. When I found out that you had stopped drinking, it was actually pretty inspirational to me, and I use it as you know, a time to read my drinking habits as well. So I'm curious if you could talk us through what led you to that decision? Because, I mean, it is a big life change. And I feel like it has made a difference. Probably. Yeah.

Boyd Martin  7:56  
So it's a good question. You know, to be upfront, I love to have a drink. I love to have a beer. And I think, you know, in all honesty, I'm a man of extremes, you know, with whatever I do, I go as hard as I can. And, and definitely drinking alcohol was one of them. And not to say that I was like a ridiculous drunk, but I was for sure drinking every single night. Just just be a drink. You know, 678, Miller lights, no problem, you know, finish work, finish writing about five, knock back two or three, maybe one or two before dinner, one or two at dinner, then a couple, you know, and that was seven nights a week. And to be honest, I'd still wake up and work hard all day, you know, and I definitely think that there was a an accumulative effect when I say an accumulative effect is that you know, day to day looking at yourself, you're, you know, doing the work that you had in front of you, you were competing, you were doing everything to a high standard, but deep down inside, you know, I feel like I've got a window to really have a crack at this and be as good as I can. And, you know, one of the, you know, at the beginning, I used to just stop drinking in in January to lose weight, you know, and I found, you know, my biggest thing was, if you cut out alcohol at the beginning of the year, my weight would drop, easily 6789 10 pounds within six weeks, just just by stopped drinking and then I found cheese asleep a lot better. And honestly, I felt like I was just a lot happier to you know, and, and then the biggest thing I found was, you know, not even knowing it is every day, you know, as a tiny bit hung over and get slow to get out of bed. And, you know, you get into this routine of just getting through the day, and I feel like many many people are in a in a place in their life where they just sort of just got to get through this day and you sort of I don't want to say do that. A minimum, but you're not firing on all cylinders, you're not energetic, you're not optimistic, you're not looking for an extra project or hustling as hard and you're sort of putting stuff off, feel like crap, I'm not gonna I'll did it tomorrow, or cheese or a ring that person, but I couldn't be screwed to do it now, you know, and this mentality of just just getting by, you know, and I didn't even realize it was in that circuit. And so anyway, I felt like I went a couple years of stopped drinking just for a couple of months to get my weight down after Christmas and stuff. And then I thought to myself, you know, kind of those three months before, in January, February, March, there's just a lot of other positives coming out of it. And then well, and then usually, my big event is the Kentucky three day event, which is the end of April, and basically at the after the Kentucky five star event, I just go straight back into drinking hard. And then a couple of years ago, I just thought, you know, what, can't you enjoy the moment and then sort of celebrate without, without drinking alcohol and, and then I'm fine. I thought, yeah. And I just felt like all of a sudden, then, then it was a couple of months went by, and then six months went by. And then before I knew it, it was I looked back, and there was a year that went by where I didn't drink. And I sort of looked back, and I thought, You know what, that my life is a lot better without it. And I have no problem with anyone. All my friends drink, and I go to social occasions and dinners and restaurants and cocktail parties. And I don't know, I just I'd be lying if I said there's moments where I do miss it like, but then the, the hour or two of pleasure and the disturbance of causes afterwards. I just there's for me in my life at the moment, I just think there's there's just way more negatives and positives than for me drinking alcohol. And again, I can't I've got no self control, you know, I've got there's no no button or no. Yeah, there's no moderation, you know, so it's, it's not like a normal person that could have a couple of glasses of wine once or twice a week, right? It's either 100 or zero. So I'm better off without it. And you know, my life, my career, who knows, this could be my last year, if I get hurt really badly, you know, like, I've got this Olympic Games this year, as you know, I've got a real chance of being great. And I don't want to look back on all this and think I could have tried harder, or Jeez, what if I just did that, you know, I don't want to have regret when it's all said and done. And so that's sort of where I'm at. And I'm better off not drinking. So

Stacey Cordivano  12:41  
I think it, it feeds into what I want to talk to you about also, because you've been very vocal about a morning routine that you have. And it seems to me that that would be very difficult if you were drinking every night. So you have this like very detailed morning. And it interests me because, you know, I do this because veterinarians struggle with all the stress and all the things and it leads to burnout or increased suicide risk or leaving the profession or equine vets becoming small animal vet, so they don't have to be on call, you know, all the things. And one of the things they always say is like increase your self care. And for a lot of people, I think that sounds like crap. That's just like another thing on my to do list. But when I look at what you've done, it's like incorporated it into this lifestyle. And I'm curious how that came about. And like how it plays out for you and how you think it affects the rest of your day and your ability to ride 15 horses the rest of the day, or or whatever you do.

Boyd Martin  13:49  
Yeah. So basically, again, a bit like the drinking thing is when I hit about 39, I'm 44 Now when I hit about 3940, I started just getting injured a lot. So I you know, I've broken bones forever. But then I started, like, I just started every time I fell that I had a serious injury and I tore my groin, like three or four times in a row and had hip surgery. And it got to a point where I you know, for for the first 20 years of my career, I could stay up all night and party and work like a champion all day and it was just fine. You know, and then all of a sudden, you know, keeping your weight down was started to become an issue and I started getting injured over and over and over again. And and I knew that I had to start making some life changes if I wanted to sort of continue, you know, my career. So then I started sort of treating myself a bit more like an athlete of having like a routine and a plan and so, you know, basically I try and block off an hour and a half every morning have a sort of a routine like he's said that some healthy things for my body and you know to go to start by, you know what, you know, instead of drinking coffee in the morning, which I issues do is try and drink tea so you know trying to hydrate yourself. And then beyond that I, you know, went down and went through a series of stretches. And then I worked on, you know, had some personal trainers and physiotherapist helped to help me each morning and go through exercises that would help with my, my writing my core strength and my balance and stuff like that. And so it was all about sort of my body. But what I found, Stacy is it was fantastic for my mental health as well, you know, I'm sure you're a mother and a lot of people probably listening to this as you're wake up and it's frantic, and kids are screaming and you're running out the house and you're yet then you've got to go to work and you're bustling, and then you take phone calls, and then you've got to pick the kids up. And then you know, there's not much meantime, if that makes any sense that this whole idea of blocking off an hour or for me it's an hour and a half of time to focus on yourself. And I like listening to some music and like, I just found also it was great time to think of okay, what do I want to get done today? What What goals do I have? Or cheese? What a good idea, you know, like, it's a creative time to think of jeez, what if I could do this, or what if I could do that and you know, a series of, you know, basically a time of silence. And now, the painful part is, you know, I have to get up now at five or 530. And once you get into that routine, it becomes easy that you lose the luxury of all the comfort of sleeping, but you know, it's to me, it's just that that agonizing moment of actually dragging yourself out of bed. And I feel like once you get in the habit of doing this as its, it gives you clarity and comfort. And I don't know, I just feel like I start my day, on a just a positive way, a clearer way I feel good. I feel like if I try and do all this exercise and stuff, I mean, it doesn't make any sense anyway, because it's, I start riding horses all day. But by the end of the day, just something always else comes up, you know, Archie's are going to do this and the phone rings in there. And so I don't know. And I feel like everyone's morning routine can be slightly different, I think just the fact that you're you're blocking off a window of time. And this, this window of time, I just work backwards from when I need to get started. So if I've got to leave for a show at four o'clock or five o'clock in the morning, then I'll get up at 330 and do this or if Sunday and I'm not writing and my family gets up at 730, then I'll you know, I'll start at, you know, 530 or six, you know, and you know, so you just basically figure out when whenever I got to really start doing stuff today and then I'm gonna pull back from that an hour or an hour and a half and, and block off this time. And it's not the same thing every day. Like I this morning, I did an hour session of yoga with my my yoga trainer. And tomorrow morning, my physiotherapist is coming here. And the next day, I'll just do my own thing of you know, get on the elliptical for 20 minutes then to do my stretching, and then I'll do a bunch of exercises and, and then I every morning I jump in my cold plunge jump in that for three minutes every morning. And again. It's a bit like getting up earlier, Stace. It's three minutes of just making yourself do stuff that you don't feel like doing and, and again, the thought of doing it, it's painful. But then once you do it or you get it done, you just feel invigorated. And I truly believe that every day, you got to do stuff that you don't feel like doing to sort of progress, you know?

Stacey Cordivano  18:47  
Yeah. And that that feeds into like the idea of resilience training and resilience, I feel like in at least in veterinary medicine, or I don't know if their generation or what has gotten a bad rap because it used to be like, Oh, I worked with this awful boss, and he makes me you know, work 90 hours a week and I get paid crap. And people were like, just be resilient, you know, and it was like, you know, it got this bad rap. But I do think that there is part that we're missing, which is like what you're talking about is doing hard things or things you don't want to do. And then realizing that you can do them to build more resilience. And I know you mentioned like, that routine for your mental health has been great. Is that part of what helps you bounce back? Like when an event doesn't go when a ride goes bad when you fall off? Like does that play into that and what else does play into that for people? You know, this isn't completely applicable for veterinarians but it's not that far off, right? We have a bad day we like lose a patient under anesthesia or, you know, something happened. How do you bounce back from Hi, Haley? How'd you bounce back from those times? Because I know you have them in your career and I have to imagine that that morning routine plays into it. But are there other things that play into it?

Boyd Martin  20:02  
For sure it builds you'd take the ice plunge, for example, for three minutes every day, or some people have a cold shower. So for sure it builds mental toughness, you got to learn to fight resistance, May it make any sense. So say I get in the ice plunge in the morning, and you've jumped in there and everything's telling you to jump out on their garden and it'd be doing this and and then you just somehow calm yourself down and take deep breaths and, and concentrate on your breathing. That's the same as me going into a showjumping ring at the Olympic games where you know, the whole world is watching you and inside your friggin terrified, and you're nervous, and you can't but what goes wrong, and then you can take some deep breaths and just try and be ice cold and deal, you know, in the moment, and so that would be a big thing for me, obviously, I'm doing all this stuff for my body. And these, you know, these things I've stumbled across by accident, like I'm No, David Goggins or anything like that. But you know, if you look at the stress and the pressures of a veterinarian, I've dealt with 1000s of vets in my life over the years, and, you know, like, there's a mixture, isn't it, it's the same as my job is, it's not just working on horses, it's, it's dealing with the people that own the horses, and having the ability to communicate with them. And then it's also this, this challenge of time management of trying to figure out a case but gotta know, I've got to be somewhere in 20 minutes, but I don't feel like I'm there yet. At the same time of like, having this animal that's not cooperating or being in a moment of like, I really have no clue what's going on. And how do I handle this bullshit to the owner? Or, with this puzzle? Is there a way that I can figure this out. So, again, I'm not a vet, but I've dealt with a lot of vets. And I don't know, I also think that there's a huge amounts of pressure and the you know, for me, the biggest thing with a vet is this unbelievable ability to have this sort of balancing act between being super knowledgeable, and knowing all the textbook stuff and getting a university degree and all that, but then it's also a feel thing too, it's like playing guitar, you know, where you got to be a horseman or horse woman at the same time, and, and trying to sort of find that middle ground of it might not be a clear cut case, or a textbook case of, you know, trying to sort of wrap your mind around, you know, and you know, and going back to this morning routine of the quiet time of hour by itself, cruising away with some music on and then all of a sudden, you think, Damn, what if we tried to block that part of the horse's leg instead of that part of the horse's leg, which would not have no block out, it's past him, but not its ankle and let you know, like, it's sort of, I don't know, like, it gives you this moment of God, what about if I did this or cheese, I remember meeting so and so at the University of wherever, and they had a case like this and kind of rode by the, you know, like trying to get to where I'm going with this. But like, having this this frantic ferris wheel, you call that treadmill thing where you just sort of going from case to case hamster, hamster wheel. And, and to me, there's one thing that the great great vets have the great great vets really, really care about figuring out the case. And, you know, having someone that really, really cares of getting the result or the correct diagnosis, or, like no, they don't care how long it takes, you know, like, even if the thinking at the back of their mind blocking this horse is going to take another hour, but I'm going to figure it out. To me, that's the, that's the great vets is that they just don't give up and they don't get to a point in their life where they're just happy with, I think this is probably it, let's just go with that sort of thing. So it's sort of, you know, I think it's probably like my sport where you're, you know, you're constantly striving for excellence. And even if it means there's moments of unprofitability You know, where you could be going on to the next case, or I could be hopping on the next horse and, you know, not just jumping from horse to horse, the horse to horse and having a 30 minute window for each horse. And, you know, and if it's not going how I want it to go, you go well, I just better get on the next one and leave this one at that today. You know, like I've tried to try to have this this plan where, you know, you've got to deal with getting thrown curveballs every single day because like my sport and your your work is like you just you don't know how long each thing's going to take and yeah, stay calm and there's got to be a calmness about it and you know, when things aren't going your way and, and like my job I do think there's a moment where you go to admit to yourself or admit to your client or whatever. It's like I had a Don't think I've got this one right but and not don't have an ego you know of, you know, I've gone to three Olympic Games and if I'm struggling with a horse, there's there's multiple people I'll always talk to about where I'm at the struggles that I'm having with the horse that we're, you know, and not being so proud of. I know this program is not about being a vet, but like, the worst one is when a vet sort of makes a statement, okay, this is the problem with the horse. And then it's probably not that problem, but they're so sure of it, or they're trying to convince themselves that they weren't wrong at the beginning that they are just trying to try to make that case suit the, their their first assumption of the horse, you know, it's the same as me, when I try and select and buy horses, there's a moment where you're going, oh, man, I got this wrong. And you got to be a champion of admitting or you need enough to admit it out loud. But like, You got to always just go back and make sure that you didn't have an error of judgment somewhere early on, in the case where it's, you swear that it was the pauses knee, and then all of a sudden, was blocking out to the foot?

Stacey Cordivano  26:07  
Yeah, no, I think that's a big thing. And I think that's something people develop as they go on. But I also even what you're talking about with, like, you know, really devoting yourself to the case, I feel for some people, because I know that there are vets who have gotten that way because they are so overworked or like they are not the boss, and they are told to be on a certain schedule. And do you like you may not know this because of the area we live in. But there's a veterinary shortage crisis, especially for equine vets. Do you know that? Do you get that sense? Or no,

Boyd Martin  26:43  
it's funny you say that. So a little bit like so. I work with a physiotherapist a couple mornings a week. And it's the same thing in human physiotherapy. Like, there's just a massive, massive shortage of and from what I understand with physiotherapist is because of the health insurance thing that there's just not the money. And you know what, at the end, there's no incentive to get involved in it. And I'm guessing a new Tom May is that because it just takes a decade of university degrees and hundreds of 1000s of dollars to become a vet or what? Why wouldn't? Because I would imagine it's a career that would be a lucrative career if you really put your heart and soul into it. It's not well, okay,

Stacey Cordivano  27:27  
when you say put your heart and soul to it, does that mean work seven days a week? Because, yes, I think it can be the way it is structured. Now. I think that is how you make money is by working way too much. And so, you know, we're graduating between one and 4% of all graduates go into equine. And then the research shows that within five years, half of them leave either to small animal or something totally different. There's a lot of reasons. It's not just money, but we are paid the practice vets. Okay,

Boyd Martin  28:00  
so here's two comments, I think, I would think that one of the tough things of being a vet is that say with my job, you know, about this time, it's about five o'clock in the afternoon, my days, sort of done. And I'm guessing one of the struggles with a vet is you could be planning a dinner out tonight with my wife and you get an old dress that you got Bernie looking after the kids, and you get a phone call from one of your clients and who says hey, I think my horse is colicky. And then you're like, you know, this is the one time you know, and so that would that would be frustrating to me. So I did that. And then the other part I I think's wrong is, so sometimes we, you know, take a horse to a university practice like the new Bolton center. And I would say that this is my guess. And you're going to tell me if I'm wrong, that a lot of the people that sort of Dr. Dean Richardson sort of schooling as we're presenting a horse that's got an injury or whatever, to me that, I don't know if they've got a passion for horses, to be honest, like I worried that they sort of for some reason got into veterinary school. And they're because they're a genius. And they're very smart at the textbook stuff. And they've a steal, stole the tests, and then they got accepted to Penn university or whatever. But you know, when we turn up that they're sort of nervous or worried about even picking up a horse's leg. And I don't know, like, I feel like to be a great vet, there's got to be a huge passion for just horses, you know. And

Stacey Cordivano  29:29  
yeah, I think some of the students you see have to be there because it's a requirement and so they're not equine focused, right? So you're seeing some that will never touch a horse again. The other thing though, that we see is people that are really passionate about horses that want to keep riding, and then the way that equine practice is currently structured, they can't do that because they're on call half the time or they make 75 grand instead of 100 grand or 120 grand starting out, right and so how can they afford to have a horse on a pretty dismal salary, like we have new salary research coming out and it's better, but it's still, you know, 20% lower than pretty much any small animal job that you could get working less hours and not being on call at all. So, you know, fundamentally there are some big differences that cause that. And I do think some people I mean, I've talked to them in the last couple of years doing this kind of work. I love equine, I thought it'd be equine, but then I saw what it was like, and I want to keep riding my horse. So I switched to small animal, you know. So I think it's we have a lot of issues to face. But you know, I think some horse owners are starting to realize it because they're struggling to get veterinary care, depending on the part of the country. But you know, where you go, Chester County and Aiken. That's not the case. So it is kind of interesting. I was curious if you had kind of started to hear about that or not. But