Order of Man - MICHAEL CHANDLER ｜ Family Man and Fighter

00:00:00.160 Gentlemen, I cannot tell you how stoked I am to have my guest on today, Mr. Michael Chandler.

00:00:04.800 If you're not already familiar with who he is, Chandler is a three-time Bellator MMA champion

00:00:09.500 who only recently made his debut in the UFC after long-term speculation of him making the switch

00:00:16.360 over to UFC. But on top of all that, Michael is a devoted family man. And we spent about half of

00:00:22.080 our conversation today talking about what it means for him to be a husband and a father,

00:00:26.920 but we also cover overcoming a very public loss, why every man ought to bet on himself,

00:00:33.580 three traps that you need to avoid when on the losing side of the equation. And of course,

00:00:39.400 Chandler's upcoming fight in November with Justin Gaethje and the conflicting aspirations and how

00:00:45.500 to deal with it of being a family man and a fighter. You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest,

00:00:51.440 embrace your fears and boldly charge your own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up.

00:00:56.600 One more time. Every time. You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong.

00:01:03.920 This is your life. This is who you are. This is who you will become. At the end of the day,

00:01:09.340 and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.

00:01:13.380 Gentlemen, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Mickler. I am the host and the founder of the

00:01:17.800 Order of Man podcast and movement. It's good to be back with you here this week.

00:01:21.440 I say back because last week I was at Origins Immersion Camp, which is a week-long jiu-jitsu

00:01:28.560 camp. Echo Charles was there. Jocko was there. JP Donnell was there. Of course, Pete Roberts was

00:01:34.040 there. Dedeco, Alexei, Ricardo Laborio. I mean, the men that were there, it was phenomenal. It was

00:01:41.700 phenomenal. Lots of good instruction. I'm feeling a little banged up and beat up this week, but all for

00:01:46.600 a worthy cause, which is to make myself more capable. So I am back to it and I'm glad to be

00:01:51.640 here. And on the note of origin, just wanted to make a quick mention of a couple of things that

00:01:55.940 I used this past week and I continue to use. Number one, their joint warfare. This is good on

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00:02:05.340 be aching a little bit based on your daily activities and regimen. So it's been really good

00:02:10.980 for my elbows specifically and my fingers as well. Just helped rebuild the cartilage and all the

00:02:15.620 nutrients and everything that you need to make sure that your joints are working properly.

00:02:19.360 That's called their joint warfare. And then I also use Jocko greens. This is all of their

00:02:24.940 vegetables and fruits and everything else that you don't get on a daily basis in a powdered form.

00:02:30.440 Both my oldest son and I take a Jocko green smoothie every single morning. And I feel better. I feel

00:02:37.680 good because I'm getting the nutrients that I need. So if you're interested in the joint warfare or the

00:02:42.740 Jocko greens or anything else that they're doing for that matter, go to origin, main.com that's

00:02:49.040 origin. Main is in the state main.com. And then when you check out, use the code order because you're

00:02:54.360 going to save some money. And if you're going to buy it anyways, you might as well save some money

00:02:57.520 again, origin, main.com use the code order or D E R at checkout. All right, guys, let me introduce

00:03:05.400 you to my guest today. I've been working on this one for a while. And finally, we were able to

00:03:10.540 have a conversation. Michael Chandler's a hard man to get ahold of, of course, because he's busy

00:03:15.320 and he's got a lot going on all good things. But we were able to pin him down and get him on the

00:03:19.320 podcast. He's a three-time Bellator MMA champion who in 2020, I believe, or early 2021, I think it was

00:03:27.860 2020 signed on with the UFC. He won his first fight against hooker in which he won a performance

00:03:34.980 of the night. And then subsequently lost to Charles Oliveira for the UFC lightweight championship.

00:03:41.080 But he is scheduled to fight Justin Gaethje, which I'm very, very excited about in November. But,

00:03:46.840 you know, not only is Chandler an extremely successful fighter, he's also a devoted family

00:03:51.320 man to his wife and his son. And we spent a lot of time talking about the dichotomy between the two

00:03:56.960 and how he handles it and how he's come to terms with living on, you know, both sides of the equation

00:04:03.040 in some ways. So, I hope you enjoy this one, guys. I know I certainly did. Here we go.

00:04:09.380 Michael, what's up, man? Good to see you. Are you in Florida now?

00:04:12.820 I'm in Florida. Yeah, I'm down here training for a week and then I go back home for a couple days,

00:04:17.400 spend my last couple days with the family and then down here in Florida for nine weeks training

00:04:21.900 for November 6th. Yeah, man. I'm excited for you. How's things been going?

00:04:26.560 Good, man. You know, fought for the title in May, which was obviously the, you know,

00:04:31.780 the epitome of opportunity in this sport, fighting for the UFC title. Fell short, lost the fight.

00:04:38.180 But luckily, I've had a couple months now to, you know, recalibrate, reassess, refocus. Spent a lot

00:04:45.440 of time with my family, which is such a good thing, but it's also a tough thing, too, because,

00:04:49.520 you know, you come, now you come, you go away from them again. And I'm down here in my training

00:04:54.120 camp home down in Florida. And it just reminds you of those painful feelings of what it's going to be

00:05:00.240 like being away from the family, especially when you've been with them for so long. I was in

00:05:04.240 training camp for like 16 months, essentially four fights back to back to back. So I almost

00:05:10.280 numbed myself a little bit to the pain or the, you know, the pain of being away from my family.

00:05:18.440 But then I got to spend a ton of time with them. So now it's even harder. So it's always a constant

00:05:22.980 up and down ebb and flow each different season of this career that I've been in now for 13 years.

00:05:27.900 But it's, it's a huge blessing. And I get to do awesome stuff like talk to you. And I can't wait

00:05:31.920 to get this conversation going. So, man, it's such a weird dichotomy because you hate to say things

00:05:38.260 like, or even allude to the fact that maybe your family is distracting you from training because

00:05:43.220 that's, that's not the right thing to say, but it's such a weird dichotomy to want to be fully vested

00:05:49.820 and, and, and there and present with your family. But somebody like yourself who is so driven and so

00:05:56.160 motivated and has so many goals and ambitions within your career, it's gotta be a really strange

00:06:01.720 thing with both desires, just tugging on each other. It is too, because it's, it's the two

00:06:08.020 extremes. You know, I take being a father and being a husband so seriously, but then also when it comes

00:06:14.780 to my training and all of the, all of the hours and the disciplines and the training and the recovery

00:06:20.260 that it entails and the sacrifice that it entails, they're two complete opposite ends of the spectrum.

00:06:27.120 And, and they really truly, for me, I've never had to live with them, both coinciding. I've always

00:06:33.060 kind of been away from my family for, you know, eight weeks at a time, 10 weeks at a time. And I,

00:06:37.860 and I'm luckily for me, Florida is not very far from Nashville. So I'm able to go home every weekend,

00:06:41.360 but there's a, there's a part of you every single day that wonders, you know, everybody you've heard

00:06:47.680 it probably a thousand times on this podcast and just listening to other people. You don't want

00:06:52.420 to miss your child growing up. You don't want to miss those milestones. You don't want to miss that

00:06:56.360 time. Same thing with dating my wife. And, you know, when I, when I stood there at the altar with

00:07:01.940 her and promised her, I was going to love and protect and take care of her and serve her the

00:07:05.900 rest of my life. That was a promise that I made that I want to be good, want to make good on.

00:07:11.380 So how do you leave her for weeks at a time and months at a time? And whenever we adopted my son

00:07:17.040 back in 2017, he didn't know what I was saying, but I looked him in the eyes and said, buddy,

00:07:21.260 I'm going to love you and serve you and lead you and take care of you the best of my ability for

00:07:26.120 the rest of your life till my dying breath. So you make that promise, but then in order to put food

00:07:31.460 on the table, in order to, to truly serve them and take care of them and set them up the way that you,

00:07:36.940 you know, that you need to, it also, one of the byproducts of that is me being away. And so it's a

00:07:43.300 constant, you know, revolving door of emotions that I do really well with a lot of the times,

00:07:49.460 but admittedly do not do well with sometimes because I want to be a man of my word, especially

00:07:54.460 I want to be a man of my word to you, let alone my wife and my son, who I, who I made this commitment

00:07:59.940 to. So it's, it's a, it's a hard, it's a hard process, but it's a, eventually I'll look back

00:08:06.060 when I, when I retire and I take those gloves off to the last time in some arena somewhere.

00:08:10.620 And I will know without a shadow of a doubt that I did everything that I possibly could within

00:08:15.680 the sport of mixed martial arts. And I put my best foot forward. And sometimes that was being

00:08:20.320 self self ish so that I could be self less for my family. And I just, uh, I pray that when that day

00:08:26.840 comes, I, uh, you know, I don't have any regrets and it's, uh, I'm doing the best that I can.

00:08:31.640 That's why you just got to pray for wisdom every single day and, uh, how to, how to handle it all.

00:08:35.780 Yeah. Wisdom. And I think also the ability to communicate it effectively. Cause I wanted to

00:08:41.540 ask how your wife handles it all. You know, you, we obviously, as men that have conflicting desires

00:08:48.080 at times, uh, can, can justify is not the right word, but come up with a scenario, why it makes

00:08:56.200 sense and why we're okay with it. Uh, but then our wives may interpret that differently. How does she

00:09:01.240 handle that when you're gone for eight, nine, 10 weeks? Yeah, no, it's a good question. And I do

00:09:06.120 think the word justify is, is a word that you kind of have to, you kind of have to look at and say

00:09:10.760 that, that kind of what it is, but it's, but it's justifying through love and it's justifying through

00:09:15.840 purpose. There's a difference between justifying why you didn't do something because you made an

00:09:20.600 excuse or why you have to do something when it's really an excuse and it's somewhat of an empty

00:09:24.860 promise. But, you know, luckily for me, my wife is a career woman. My wife, um, works full time and

00:09:33.020 has two different jobs and, and, and it's not because she needs to work. You know, I've, I've

00:09:37.760 been afforded the great opportunities with the sport of mixed martial arts. She could be a stay-at-home

00:09:41.420 mom if she wanted to, but she, she was a life, she spent her, her first, you know, 20, 20 something

00:09:47.860 years of her life in medicine and working towards medicine and works in medicine now. So she

00:09:54.100 understands it, you know, as much as a, as much as women and men are, are different in so many

00:09:59.640 areas. I think me and my wife are very equally yoked when it comes to work. And, you know, we

00:10:04.680 even, we even kind of came up with this saying in the last couple, couple months, like grind until

00:10:09.560 we're 50, you know, like we want to just grind until we're 50. We've made it, we've made a

00:10:13.420 commitment. We're going to grind until we're 50, both hoping, hoping and knowing that hopefully it's

00:10:18.120 before 50, but grind as hard as we possibly can till one day we could say, you know what,

00:10:22.860 I'm not going to take this job, this opportunity. I'm not going to take this, this, uh, this

00:10:27.500 appearance. I'm not going to, I'm done. I'm going to be done with fighting when I want to

00:10:31.580 be done with fighting, not because I have to continue to do a paycheck and same, same thing

00:10:34.980 with, uh, same thing with her, you know, so we, we've, uh, we're very equally yoked when

00:10:38.760 it comes to supporting one another's workaholic tendencies. You know, I, I, I identify myself

00:10:46.060 as a guy who tries not to, but I, I very much toe the line of workaholic workaholism, you

00:10:54.340 know? Um, for sure. And, uh, and, and my wife does as well. So in a, in a weird way, since

00:10:59.920 we're both wired that way, we, we find empathy and we find grace in certain scenarios. We're

00:11:05.320 like, we're like, just today I was speaking to her on the phone and she added three more

00:11:08.580 things to her plate that I, I probably, I can't tell her she's doing anything wrong because

00:11:13.760 I probably would have done the exact same thing. I find these moments of grace and almost

00:11:17.820 just, uh, empathy because I also understand why she does it or, and, and, and when she

00:11:23.680 does it. And I also trust her to make the right decisions for her, her wellbeing, you know,

00:11:28.780 because me taking away her career would absolutely send her into a downward spiral. I want her to

00:11:34.500 have her career. I want her to be away from me. If she has to be away from me to go work

00:11:38.600 because that's her purpose. So it's a delicate dance and, um, we've done a pretty good job

00:11:43.140 of it. And, uh, I, I can't say it hasn't been tough at times because it sure as heck

00:11:47.080 has. And, uh, but we worked through it just like every marriage.

00:11:50.720 I do like that. You're talking about the fact that you understand each other. And although

00:11:54.840 you're on different pursuits, you're walking through life together, but you understand

00:11:59.100 what she needs. She understands what you need. And so there seems to be just some level

00:12:03.520 of understanding and, and, and comprehension about, okay, well, yeah, he's going to do this

00:12:08.760 thing. It doesn't mean he doesn't love me. She's going to do this thing. It doesn't

00:12:11.760 mean she's not interested in the relationship. She just has her own pursuits. You have your

00:12:15.660 own pursuits and it seemed to work out pretty well.

00:12:17.740 A thousand percent. And, and I think I try not to live in regret ever. Um, but I think

00:12:25.440 it's healthy to look at the future and how you could regret something. And by unpacking

00:12:32.380 that, I mean, if I don't do, do everything I possibly can in this career, it's inevitable

00:12:36.540 that when I take those gloves off for the last time, I will look back and I will regret.

00:12:40.480 And it's kind of like me going to the UFC. I was in Bellator for a very long time. I was

00:12:45.020 in, I was an indispensable asset. I was kind of the, one of the faces of Bellator. I was

00:12:48.800 being, I was being taken care of very well, but I knew that the 40 something year old Michael

00:12:53.940 would be laying on a pillow at night that felt like a cinder block every single night, because

00:12:59.160 it would constantly be wondering what if I would have went to the UFC. Same thing with

00:13:03.860 this career. If I don't pour everything into it, I don't want to have, I don't want to

00:13:08.020 take the chance of me having those regrets. I mean, I could very easily be in Nashville.

00:13:11.720 I own a gym in Nashville, Tennessee. I don't have the coaches or the training partners or

00:13:16.800 the, the opportunities that I have in Nashville that I have here in Florida. Therefore I make

00:13:21.520 the sacrifice to come to Florida to mitigate that risk of having that regress at the end

00:13:28.300 of my, at the end of my career. Same thing with my wife. If I said, Hey babe, we are taking

00:13:32.980 care of bank accounts are doing good. Investments are doing good. You don't have to work. Why

00:13:36.840 don't you just spend more time at home and take that away from her? It might be okay for

00:13:42.000 a second. She'll stuff it down. Might be okay for another season. She'll stuff it down, but

00:13:45.960 eventually that boils over. And then now we've put ourselves in a scenario where by taking

00:13:50.540 away her purpose and taking away her passion and taking away her vision for what she wants

00:13:54.780 to be is not only going to affect her personally, but it's going to affect our relationship.

00:13:58.960 And that's not a place that you want to be. And, and that hasn't happened, but I could

00:14:03.580 very well see so clearly in the future, the regrets and the, the turmoil that would ensue

00:14:11.180 had we made those decisions based on, you know, taking those things away from her. So that's

00:14:16.060 what we've, what we've done. And we keep throwing ourselves more and more into things. And it's

00:14:20.120 a beautiful, crazy chaos, but we do pretty well in the chaos.

00:14:23.780 Yeah. You know, you talk about regrets for her and, and not only would there be her regrets,

00:14:29.500 there might be your regrets for potentially being the one who, you know, caused that for her not to

00:14:35.240 be able to chasing and pursue her dreams. But then also there would be a level of potential

00:14:40.320 contention, right? So, well, you know, the reason I left my career is because Michael asked me to,

00:14:45.800 or Michael wanted me to do this, or he wanted to take this direction. And I see this a lot with

00:14:49.920 couples where they don't talk about these issues. They don't communicate it very well.

00:14:55.620 And then there's just a lot of animosity and contention that builds up over years,

00:15:00.340 if not decades. And you see marriages that have lasted 30 years, all of a sudden, you know,

00:15:06.020 they, they crumble because they never had these conversations and there's just this contention

00:15:10.160 that is just built up between the two. Yeah. And that's a, and that's a place. And there's been,

00:15:14.800 there's been moments, you know, don't get me wrong, you know, not to get too personal into our

00:15:18.800 relationships, but obviously we, we, we moved, you know, we, we started our life together in San

00:15:24.080 Diego. We moved from San Diego where she had friends, had a job, had everything. And then we,

00:15:29.140 we moved because of my career. And then we made another decision based upon my career. So it's not

00:15:35.360 a hundred percent 50, 50, when it comes to us making decisions, obviously, if I am the breadwinner and I

00:15:40.400 have a short window of opportunity to make the greatest impact that I possibly can with this,

00:15:44.620 with these abilities that God has given me. So therefore the, the decision-making,

00:15:48.800 kind of lends itself towards my career. So there's, I mean, it's, it's, it's constant,

00:15:54.300 you know, my, even to this day, I just now signed my, signed my bout agreement a couple of days ago,

00:15:59.840 two days ago for this next fight. And we, it's been kind of in limbo for the last couple of weeks.

00:16:05.540 So you don't know exactly when you're going to get the phone call, when you're going to training

00:16:09.040 camp, when you're leaving your family. So my, my career upends a lot of, um, a lot of the,

00:16:15.580 the normalcy and kind of the security of, of, of not having to make quick decisions. We constantly

00:16:21.200 have to do that, you know? And, and I think one thing that we, that I think couples, a lot of times

00:16:24.700 forget to in, in relationships is we kind of think we come together and then we make every decision

00:16:30.220 based on, on this union that we've created, you know, before God. And, and, and while that is

00:16:37.760 extremely true, we all, we both still are children of God. She has her own life goals, ambitions,

00:16:44.500 passions, and purposes. And I have the exact same thing. So we should also be pursuing those things

00:16:49.400 to the best of our ability and never letting each other hold each other back. And there's been so

00:16:54.100 many times where, man, you'd be surprised as a man, if you stay, if you stay silent and stay quiet on the

00:17:00.320 things that you may or may not disagree, that you may, may disagree with only to let your wife go

00:17:05.960 pursue something. It, even if it does or does not work out, no matter what you gave them the

00:17:11.260 opportunity, you gave them the keys to the kingdom to go do what they felt in their heart. And I think

00:17:17.480 that gets missed a lot of times in marriages because, because we, we think, okay, now we're

00:17:22.760 married and now we have to make every decision based upon this marriage. And while that is always

00:17:26.500 true, we should always be thinking about the healthiness of the marriage and the thriving

00:17:30.060 nature of a marriage. You're still two individuals that need to continue to

00:17:35.280 pursue those passions. And, and even me now, a man, one of my favorite books of all time is John

00:17:41.620 Eldridge, Wild at Heart. And he says, every man needs a battle to fight and an adventure to have

00:17:46.640 and a beauty to win. Well, I won the beauty, right? I got her and I love her and she loves me. And thank

00:17:51.840 God we have a phenomenal marriage, but I'm still always, even after this career is done, I need,

00:17:56.140 I need an adventure to have and I need to, and I need a battle to fight. So if she takes those

00:18:01.380 things away from me, it's going to only end up in me becoming a subpar version of myself. And,

00:18:07.540 and there's another book that he, that John Eldridge and his wife wrote called Captivating.

00:18:12.920 And I'd be lying if I said I read it, which I probably should have read it just to understand

00:18:17.820 the woman's soul more. But there's another three things that a woman is designed by. So

00:18:24.980 us as a marriage, it's such, those are two great books, one for the male, one for the female to

00:18:29.860 realize how we are designed because we are designed differently, uh, in so many different

00:18:33.880 ways. And it's, it's about, it's about the yearning to learn about your partner, the yearning

00:18:40.240 to learn about his or her, uh, aspects of life and, and to make them the best person they possibly

00:18:48.180 can be because, you know, happy wife, happy, happy life. You know, you've heard it said a thousand

00:18:52.620 times. I want my wife to be as happy as possible so we can thrive and have a, have a blast together.

00:18:56.480 I'm glad you're talking about wild at heart because that book actually transformed my life

00:19:01.000 as well. John's been on the podcast a couple of times now. He's, he's an incredible, incredible

00:19:06.020 human. You did say something I wanted to challenge a little bit. You said, you know, if I allow my

00:19:10.360 wife to take that thing away, I, I would contend that maybe we as men don't allow our, our wives

00:19:18.700 to take it away necessarily, but we, we give it away, right? We say, well, I guess I'm not going

00:19:23.700 to pursue my dreams because, and we come up with all these reasons. And then what we end up doing,

00:19:28.420 I think a lot of the times is looking back on it and saying, well, my wife, you know,

00:19:32.360 she wanted me to do this. And we put it on her shoulders when it was us who actually relinquished

00:19:37.740 control or gave up a bit of ourselves or a bit of our dreams. And then now we're putting the

00:19:42.880 responsibility on her shoulders and it's not hers to bear. Yep. And, and you, you use the perfect word

00:19:48.780 earlier communication. You know, if I think it's communication and trust, I think, I think my wife

00:19:54.180 and I have, have a, a huge trust in each other's abilities to make decisions already knowing that

00:20:02.760 we've already thought about how it's going to affect the family, how it's already going, how it's

00:20:06.300 they've already, I've already thought about how it's going to affect my son, my wife, our income,

00:20:10.760 our future, our, our household. I've already thought about those things. And by her even questioning it,

00:20:15.740 of course, me as a man, I'd probably be like, after almost 10 years together, how do you not

00:20:19.720 understand that? I've already thought about that. So instead of getting defensive about it, right?

00:20:23.100 You, you, you need to build that trust. Does your wife always know that even if you're making a

00:20:30.560 selfish decision, you've already thought about those, those things and, and how it's going to

00:20:36.300 affect all those different things. And it all, it always comes back down to communication. You know,

00:20:40.900 us as men were not the best communicators. I was a horrible communicator. Um, and even just a problem

00:20:47.300 solver and a DS and a bad deescalator, you know, I grew up in a household where my mom and dad are

00:20:52.800 still together to this day, but their, their conflict resolution skills were, were not always

00:20:57.400 the best, you know, they would, they would, they would fight, they would, they would fight, there

00:21:00.300 would be conflict. Um, you know, it wasn't, it wasn't nasty fights, but it was more just disagreements

00:21:05.260 and they would, and they would come together and they would disagree. And then dad would say, okay,

00:21:09.040 I'm going to bed. You're always right. And mom would say, okay, fine. I'm going to hang out here

00:21:12.760 for another couple of hours, hang out with the kids, put the kids to bed. Um, you know, so I never saw

00:21:17.580 two adults and human beings saying, okay, I believe X and you believe Y let's figure out,

00:21:23.860 let's hear each other out. And let's, let's deescalate this because no matter what, I love you.

00:21:28.060 And I want to figure out how I can, how I can make you maybe see my viewpoint, but I also am open to

00:21:32.720 seeing your viewpoint. And so that's how I was kind of raised or through osmosis. That's, that was

00:21:38.120 what was ingrained in my mind on how adults, how adults and relationships worked. And, uh, so I had

00:21:44.940 to do a lot of, a lot of work and it took a lot of courage to, to break out of that shell and break

00:21:50.100 out of that thinking. And, and trust me, I still, to this day struggle with it. I still, to this day

00:21:54.500 need to be better at it. Um, but communication is, is paramount when you talk about having a healthy

00:21:59.740 relationship. So, um, that's something I'm working on every single day.

00:22:04.000 Yeah. As, as am I, as are all of us to varying degrees. I think that's one of the things that

00:22:09.020 we talk about on this podcast all the time is just making sure we're communicating. Uh,

00:22:13.640 we're keeping the other person in mind. That's important. You know, one thing you talked about

00:22:17.000 a minute ago is you were talking about your transition from Bellator to UFC. Uh, you know,

00:22:21.540 you were at the top of your game in Bellator as high as you could go multi-time champion.

00:22:28.680 And why make that shift over to UFC? Why the timing? Tell me a little bit about that transition

00:22:35.420 for you, man. Um, well, I'll start out, I'll start out by saying it was, it was the best decision

00:22:41.340 I could have possibly made. Um, and, but it was a scary one, you know, but you can't get to the

00:22:46.080 position. You can't get to the position of saying, wow, I made the best decision possible without

00:22:51.380 taking that leap, without taking the chance on yourself. Yeah. I mean, I, I could have spent the next,

00:22:55.540 you know, four or five years, my last couple of contracts with Bellator, I helped

00:23:00.180 kind of build the organization, you know, not from a managerial standpoint or anything,

00:23:04.000 but I was one of the, one of the homegrown guys, one of the guys who has been in three of the biggest

00:23:08.180 and best fights in Bellator history, millions and tens of millions of views on, on YouTube that

00:23:13.200 they've gotten from my past fights with Eddie Alvarez and a couple other ones. So, um, I kind of

00:23:17.640 became the guy who helped build this organization and I loved them. They loved me,

00:23:23.360 but it just got to the point where I, I just felt this yearning and it, and it goes back to a

00:23:30.560 decision I made when I was 18 years old. So to, to go back to that moment, I wasn't a huge standout

00:23:37.480 wrestler. I wasn't a state champion, but I was, I was, I was pretty good, pretty talented. And I had

00:23:42.460 a work ethic that, that would rival anybody's. And I, and I knew I could compete at the division one

00:23:46.860 level. So, um, I was getting scholarship opportunities, full ride scholarship offers to division three

00:23:53.000 and division two, uh, NAIA junior college schools and everybody around me from mom and dad to coaches,

00:23:59.520 to, to my teammates, to, to everyone in my circle said, you know, why don't you just take this

00:24:05.460 opportunity, take this full ride scholarship. You're not going to have to pay for school.

00:24:08.780 I can have to do anything, but for some reason inside of me taking that more safe, more stable route

00:24:16.520 didn't sound as appealing as walking onto the university of Missouri, taking a chance on myself,

00:24:23.040 taking a leap of faith. And maybe I go to the university of Missouri for, and I'm there for

00:24:27.480 five years and I never set foot on the mat with that black and gold singlet as a starter. Maybe I

00:24:32.040 ride the bench for five years. Maybe I'm just a training partner for five years. Heck maybe like

00:24:36.100 a lot of the guys I came with, they, I would quit after a couple of weeks and say, shoot, you know,

00:24:40.760 it was coach's fault or it was this guy's fault. You know, they, they didn't, they didn't pay any

00:24:45.000 attention to the walk-on, but for some reason I took that chance on myself. And that was the single

00:24:50.880 most important decision that I ever made in my athletic career. So then you fast forward 12 years

00:24:57.480 later, here I was in the same exact position where I could take the, the more safe, the more secure

00:25:04.300 route, be the big fish in a, in a, in a smaller pond, be taken care of, be one of the, one of the top

00:25:09.320 guys, or I could basically throw myself into the lion's den. That is the UFC lightweight division,

00:25:14.880 with some of the biggest names on the planet. And, uh, you know, obviously it comes down to

00:25:19.660 contracts and the money has to be right. And so you have to make the right decision financially for

00:25:23.260 your family, of course. And, uh, it was, it was the right to sit. It was, it was the right, it was

00:25:27.960 the right opportunity with the right offer and, uh, took a chance on myself, but it was, it was so scary

00:25:32.660 because essentially I had, I had worked all this time and, and, and I knew my position where I was.

00:25:38.140 I had the security of, of longevity with, with Bellator, but I had to like, once again, I was

00:25:44.720 in a position to look to the future Michael and say, the 40 year old Michael is going to be laying

00:25:48.220 on a bed at night with 40 pound cinder block underneath his head, not being able to get a

00:25:53.240 good night's sleep. If I don't take this chance on myself, 18 year old Michael did it. And it was the

00:25:57.360 best, the best decision he ever made. So now 30 something year old Michael needs to walk, walk

00:26:03.140 another mile in, in those footsteps, take a chance on myself. And it it's worked out extremely well.

00:26:07.900 And God's giving me an awesome platform now. And it's, it's been a blast, man.

00:26:12.140 Well, I, you know, we've watched your, your couple of fights in UFC. I say we, my, my two oldest sons

00:26:17.000 and I, you know, we enjoy watching you fight and we love just your energy and the way that you show

00:26:21.540 up and the way that you train is amazing. Uh, as you came into UFC, you know, you, you've made some

00:26:27.580 bold assertions as to what your career is going to look like with UFC. And, uh, what was it?

00:26:32.980 Several months ago, five, six months ago had, you know, a little bit of a setback with Olivera.

00:26:37.060 Tell me about that and where you go after making these assertions coming into that fight, not

00:26:43.740 going the way you wanted it to after the first round, that first round was solid for sure. Right.

00:26:48.800 Yeah. And then, and then now where do you go from here and how does that change things? How do you

00:26:54.340 pivot, et cetera, et cetera? Yeah. You know, falling, falling short in this sport is, is very tough.

00:27:00.120 You know, I, I, I grew up in, and I was a wrestler before the sport of mixed martial arts,

00:27:04.820 which, which is such a hard sport, but when it comes to failing, it teaches you how to fail because

00:27:09.560 you get the opportunity to get back in the wind column very soon, very quickly. You know,

00:27:14.420 you could lose a wrestling match on Wednesday, but then on the, on Saturday, you get another

00:27:18.840 opportunity to throw yourself into another tournament, get some wins, have some success,

00:27:23.160 get your hand raised with the sport of mixed martial arts. I fought in May. I'm not going to have

00:27:27.280 the opportunity to get my hand raised again until November, you know? So there's such a long time

00:27:32.520 where doubts and fears and insecurities. And I told you, so's can creep in, especially when you get

00:27:38.360 to the platform that is the, being a UFC fighter, it's just such a bigger platform. All eyes are on

00:27:44.220 you. Every move you make, every word you say, people dissect it and they go through it with a

00:27:48.880 fine tooth comb and you hear a lot of doubt and a lot of naysayers. Um, but it's for me, once again,

00:27:56.600 I always, and this is why I think it's so important for people just from a, just from a

00:28:00.500 self-improvement standpoint, just to see where you're at today and look back in your past and

00:28:06.000 see where, where there has been a similar occasion, a similar circumstance that you're going through

00:28:11.520 currently. And for me, I lost my, I got shot out of a cannon. I was a world champion within 18 months

00:28:17.080 of me coming into the sport, beat Eddie Alvarez, top three guy in the entire world booked as, you know,

00:28:21.880 the new kid on the block, the next best thing, uh, coming into, to mixed martial arts. But then

00:28:26.840 I have suffered my first setback and immediately I made three mistakes. I wanted to hide from everybody.

00:28:32.040 I wanted to hide from my loss. I wanted to hide from the media. I didn't take interviews. I didn't

00:28:35.380 want to be even shown. I wasn't posting on social media. And then the second mistake I made was that

00:28:40.660 I had skill amnesia all of a sudden in my mind, I thought, okay, because I lost this fight, I lost

00:28:46.520 all of the skills that I had acquired over the last decade and a half, um, in, in wrestling.

00:28:51.800 And I lost, I lost my, my speed, my quickness, my stamina, my power, my cardio yet really the only,

00:28:57.520 I didn't lose any physical attributes. The only attributes I lost were mental, my self-image,

00:29:02.560 my self-concept, the way that I saw myself. And then the third,

00:29:05.000 And that translated to your skills.

00:29:07.460 Yeah. And then it translates to your skills because then you start, you know, finding,

00:29:11.300 finding reasons to believe the lies that, okay, well, you're just not as good as you, as you thought you

00:29:15.280 were, you know, and then you make that third mistake of finding yourself in the jail cell of,

00:29:20.000 of self-pity, you know, blaming other people and, and justifying and getting a little bit lazy.

00:29:26.860 And, and if it wasn't for that ref, if it wasn't for that judge, if it wasn't for him,

00:29:30.800 if it wasn't for her, you know, um, and those were, those are three mistakes that I made. So,

00:29:35.140 and I've had setbacks since I lost that first fight. And that first fight actually turned into two

00:29:39.640 more subsequent losses. I went 688 days without winning a fight, almost two full years without winning

00:29:45.160 a fight, which is for a fighter, a, almost basically a career death sentence. And I came

00:29:49.800 out of that and won another world title, but I've had losses along the way. And I've always gone back

00:29:53.660 to that moment. And those three things reminding myself, I can't hide. I can't forget how good I

00:29:58.620 am. And I can't wallow in self-pity and start blaming other people. So when I lost this last fight,

00:30:03.560 it, you know, it's, it's much easier to lose a, a title. It's, it's the hardest thing,

00:30:10.120 but also much easier to lose in a world title fight in UFC, because you know,

00:30:13.520 you're fighting essentially the best guy in the world. Charles is the best of the best.

00:30:18.660 Um, it could have been Poirier. It could have been, um, any of these, any could have engaged.

00:30:23.080 You could have been any of these top guys. And they're all a Nats eyelash away from beating

00:30:26.860 each other at any given moment. You know, they're the top of the, of the, of the crop when it comes

00:30:31.700 to, to the guys at one 55. So it was, uh, it was a setback and it was tough, but it was also like,

00:30:37.800 okay, well you lost, you got caught. It's a game of inches, you know, uh, you look at all the

00:30:42.420 positives that happened in the fight. You can look at how big the promotion was, how big

00:30:45.920 it built my platform and, and just having that opportunity. And even just the experience I've

00:30:50.760 only spent, I've only spent six or seven minutes in the UFC.

00:30:54.860 And that's wild to think about is like how it's easy to say how little a time it is when you're

00:31:01.260 sitting on the sidelines. It's a lot different when you're actually in there and somebody's trying

00:31:05.960 to, you know, strangle you or punch you and kill you essentially.

00:31:08.740 Yeah, no, for sure. And those are thoughts that we had too. Hey, you know, there's some

00:31:13.640 guys inside the top 10 that, you know, 10, nine, eight number that, that would be a little

00:31:17.960 bit easier fights than Justin Gaethje. Why don't we go get one of those, go get it, go

00:31:21.440 get a, it's never a tune-up fight in the UFC. All these guys are tough, but there's, there's

00:31:25.880 a little bit easier fights than Justin Gaethje. And there was that thought my, maybe my management

00:31:30.020 threw it out there. And I was like, man, as I said, I'm not here for a long time. I'm here

00:31:33.720 for a good time. I want to fight every single one of these top guys that I possibly can

00:31:37.700 and test my skills. Win, lose, or draw, either way, every fan that is there is going to see

00:31:43.200 the passion, see the masterpiece that I'm painting and be entertained, be on the edge of their

00:31:46.960 seats when Michael Chandler steps inside the UFC octagon. So I want to fight the best guys I

00:31:50.920 possibly can. That's why I called out Justin Gaethje. I wanted to fight him. He's the number

00:31:54.900 two guy in the world. I think it puts me kind of in that position to have another title shot

00:31:59.260 very soon after, if not right after. So take the, take the biggest risks you possibly can

00:32:05.280 while you have the ability and have the opportunity. And that's what we're doing.

00:32:09.080 So that's your, that's your fight in November. Then it's Gaethje.

00:32:12.500 November 6th, Justin Gaethje.

00:32:14.380 Nice, man. We'll be watching that.

00:32:15.800 Yeah.

00:32:17.300 All right, man. I got to hit the pause button really, really quickly on the conversation between

00:32:21.780 Michael and I just want to share with you something about creating your new reality. Now,

00:32:27.540 everything in your life is a result of the choices that you make. So, as I said, in my last

00:32:32.800 Friday field notes last week, making better decisions will inevitably lead you to better

00:32:39.220 results. And that's exactly what we're talking about for the month of September inside of our

00:32:44.100 exclusive brotherhood, the iron council. We're talking about creating your new reality. And

00:32:50.560 we'll be drawing from Don Miguel Ruiz's book, the four agreements. A lot of you guys are familiar

00:32:54.920 with that work. So when you band with us, not only are you going to be participating in this

00:32:59.480 discussion about creating your new reality, but you're going to be completing challenges and

00:33:03.920 assignments that are all designed to push you further than you've gone before. And of course,

00:33:08.820 you're going to be able to reap the benefits that come with it. So if you want a great and

00:33:13.620 lively discussion, and also most importantly, you want the accountability and the camaraderie

00:33:18.820 and the brotherhood that comes with it, then join us inside the iron council. You can do that

00:33:24.180 at order of man.com slash iron council. Again, order of man.com slash iron council. Do that after

00:33:31.900 the conversation for now. I'm going to get back to it with Michael. One, one of the things that I'm

00:33:37.560 curious about is obviously, you know, anybody who's followed you or knows a little bit about you

00:33:41.960 obviously knows you're an exceptional fighter, your work ethic. I mean, look, I see you on Instagram

00:33:48.020 doing your workouts and it's unreal to me and most normal people. So I don't think that's a question,

00:33:54.220 but I'm really curious about your, your skillset or your, your thoughtfulness about

00:34:02.680 marketability. Yeah. Like, like how do you show up where, where you actually draw a crowd where people,

00:34:10.500 cause you're, you're an easy guy to root for. There's a lot of people who are great and exceptional

00:34:14.280 fighters who are hard to root for. Cause you know, they're a holes or whatever else you're,

00:34:19.680 you're an easy guy to root for. Is that something that you're thoughtful about that you're mindful

00:34:23.820 about is the, the performative aspect of the game? Not when it comes to, you know, promoting for the

00:34:31.760 fights and trash talk or, or saying certain things that are going to get people to talk. I mean,

00:34:36.260 truth, truthfully, it's so, it's so interesting too, because now that there is such a large crowd of

00:34:42.260 witnesses, seeing everything that I say and everything that I do, there's a lot of people

00:34:46.800 who just think I'm in genuine or I'm not my genuine self or I'm being fake or, or I sound scripted or I

00:34:52.540 sound, you know, I sound like I wrote it all down and then we're just regurgitated. But the funny thing

00:34:58.420 about that is by me being my authentic self, some people just don't understand or don't, can't quite

00:35:05.240 grasp that this is just who I exactly am. This is exactly who I am. I'm being my authentic self

00:35:10.480 because a year or two ago, I did some work with a, a mindset coach named Jim Hensel, um, who works

00:35:16.340 with Rich Froning and a bunch of other CrossFit people. Um, and, and one of the biggest things that

00:35:21.920 we always came back to in me trying to find my, find, find a way to organize all my values and me

00:35:29.720 being the most successful I possibly can is me always showing up as my authentic self. Um, I have an,

00:35:35.720 I have a tendency to shrink at times, um, to, to not make myself found too over, overconfident or

00:35:42.280 overboisterous, not to, not to make other people, other people feel insecure around me. Um, I have,

00:35:47.820 I have an ability to, to show up into a crowd and shrink and not be my authentic self. You know,

00:35:53.080 so I've made a promise to myself after going through that is no matter what, be your authentic

00:35:58.440 self, be exactly who you are. And if, if that means you need to show how confident you are,

00:36:04.280 you need to show how eloquently that maybe you can speak or answer this question, just do it.

00:36:08.740 Don't mince words. Don't be afraid to, to rub people the wrong way. Cause at some point

00:36:12.820 pleasing everybody only leads to disaster, you know? So I don't think a ton about,

00:36:17.940 about the marketability aspect. I just, I just try to be my authentic self and let the cards fall where

00:36:25.360 they may. Uh, I think it just goes, it just, it just so happens that, you know, a guy like yourself or,

00:36:29.940 or guys, guys like us who have similar values, similar, similar interests, uh,

00:36:34.280 we love our country. We love, we love what we're doing. We're passionate about what we're doing.

00:36:37.740 We're passionate about our, our marriage. We're passionate about being fathers. Um,

00:36:41.860 and we're passionate about finding the best version of ourself that resonates with a lot of

00:36:45.760 people. You know, it resonates with a lot of people. I was just a small guy from a small town

00:36:49.180 who was taught to do small things. And I somehow didn't listen to the limits, the limiting beliefs

00:36:55.160 in the story that was, that was being told to me that I was going to eventually live out. Um,

00:37:00.280 and I was able to break free of that. And I think there's a lot of kids, uh, especially

00:37:04.120 young men around this country and small towns everywhere and big cities everywhere around

00:37:09.160 this country that, that, that, that, that, that story and that, um, kind of that thought

00:37:14.960 process resonates with. And I think that's where I've gained kind of the biggest platform.

00:37:19.780 And I really enjoy it because I think, I think we were all born with so much more than we give

00:37:23.920 ourselves credit for, uh, so much more talent, so much more abilities and so much more

00:37:27.860 capabilities. And, uh, I lived way under those way under those for, for so many years. And I'm

00:37:34.600 trying not to do that every single day now. That that's not, you know, uh, I really like,

00:37:40.420 and I think this is part of the reason people enjoy watching you fight and watching your career

00:37:44.420 is because you talk about being this small town kid. And one of the most interesting comments that

00:37:49.500 I get from other people who listen to this podcast is, is they say things like, you know,

00:37:54.180 I would like to hear from a regular guy. And, and when I hear that, I think Michael Chandler's a

00:37:59.840 regular guy, you know, Jocko Willink, Andy Priscilla, like David Goggins. These are all regular guys.

00:38:06.620 Like all of us are regular guys. It's just that you've taken your skillset and you've improved it.

00:38:13.460 You've adjusted it. You've developed it. You've enhanced it. And what would you, would you say the

00:38:19.220 same thing? I do. Yeah. I would say the exact same thing. Um, and it is true. I, whenever some,

00:38:26.720 some kid from some, uh, you know, some small town who, who had dreams of, of leaving those

00:38:32.400 County lines and going somewhere that was, that was me. You know, I was, I was a wrestler for crying

00:38:36.400 out loud. I wasn't the star quarterback. You know, I wasn't a star point guard of one of the big sports

00:38:41.160 that, that people, you know, and then go to the NBA. And, and it's, so I think for, for me,

00:38:46.920 I always had that kind of just blue collar work really hard, small guy from a small town, uh,

00:38:52.900 kind of mentality. I didn't listen to that. Thank God. Um, but I think I am just a regular guy who

00:38:59.700 somehow found himself where I'm at today, sitting here talking to you. And, uh, but it's only because

00:39:06.420 I, I didn't make it too big. I didn't make it bigger than it needed to be. I still look at myself

00:39:13.700 as a normal guy. I still was walking through target just yesterday and three dudes, three

00:39:17.720 younger dudes came up and they were so pumped to like meet me and take a picture. And I was like,

00:39:22.620 Holy cow. Like, this is just, this is nuts. Cause I'm just a regular guy. I, I, I wake up in the

00:39:27.640 morning. I put my, my pants on one leg at a time, just like everyone else, just like the rock,

00:39:32.660 just like your favorite rapper, just like your favorite country artists, just like the Jeff Bezos.

00:39:37.580 You know, I, I, we all are, are just human beings on this earth, trying to figure it out,

00:39:43.680 figure out exactly what it is that makes us tick. What makes us passionate, what makes us,

00:39:47.560 what makes us want to wake up in the morning, excited for me. Thank God I found it for now,

00:39:52.240 you know, over the next couple of years, I'll be, you know, I'm going to retire in the next couple

00:39:55.320 of years. And then I move on to the next thing that drives me the next thing that, that,

00:39:59.780 that I can live out my purpose. But, um, I've, I just think we, especially this day,

00:40:06.300 this day and age in the social media, even this opportunity to be on your platform,

00:40:10.000 this elevates me even more because I continue to get more and more opportunities like this.

00:40:15.980 And I have a large following on social media, but you got to remember that, that large following

00:40:20.540 that 1 million followers started at one, just one, you know, and then I went to 10 and then I went to

00:40:25.060 your mom. Right. It's like, exactly. Right. It was my mom, my couple of high school buddies,

00:40:29.880 you know, a couple of guys that train with that's where it starts. And I think this has been a long,

00:40:36.060 long process as well. I think this, the, the idea of looking at somebody's chapter 20 instead of

00:40:43.220 in comparing yourself to someone's chapter 20, if there's a 20 year old kid, who's a, who's a young

00:40:48.620 mixed martial artist who has the goal of becoming a UFC champion, he can't look at where I'm at today.

00:40:53.160 He has to look back at my chapter one, where I started and I was just a regular guy and I still

00:40:58.440 am just a regular guy. But with the age of social media, everything is just constantly being thrown

00:41:03.160 in your face. And we see other people's success constantly. And we're seeing an 18 year old kids

00:41:07.280 making 250 grand a month, selling gummy bears on Tik TOK and doing silly videos. So it's, so the,

00:41:12.900 the idea. I don't know about that actually. How do we do that? Exactly. But these are the kinds of

00:41:17.500 things that are happening and it's so great because people can, you know, pad their wallets and, but,

00:41:22.600 but how do you become a, a, a, a thriving spirit, not just a thriving bank account and a thriving

00:41:29.720 number of followers, but how do you have, how do you have a thriving spirit? And unfortunately,

00:41:34.720 we're going to, we're going to continue to grow up in a day and age where it almost becomes

00:41:38.520 so easy to become successful that we're, that we're forgetting that hard work, doing things

00:41:44.040 right and operating with integrity are the, are the three most important things that you can possibly

00:41:47.800 do. So I don't know, I kind of went on a tangent, went, went that way, but I think it all still goes

00:41:53.060 back to looking at yourself as just a normal human being, uh, just a regular guy. And, uh,

00:41:58.620 I just pray I can keep that same mindset and humility throughout the rest of my life.

00:42:02.900 Yeah. Well, I, I think that's going to work because you're aware of it. And so you wrote,

00:42:06.680 I wrote that down. I'm just taking notes as you're talking, as you're saying, you said,

00:42:09.940 you're not making this bigger than it is, but then there's the other side of it too. And I think a lot

00:42:14.180 of guys buy into this, that they'll say to themselves, well, I am just a regular guy. And

00:42:18.500 they'll put so much weight on that, that they limit themselves to what they could be. And you said,

00:42:24.020 I didn't buy into that. Where does that mentality come from? Does, is that something that is inherently

00:42:30.300 you? Is it relationships that you've had? Uh, a lot of the guys that I've had on the podcast

00:42:35.240 have what I would say is a healthy chip on their shoulder where they they've had an experience and

00:42:41.700 they vowed never to let that happen again. Where does that mentality for you come from?

00:42:46.060 Man, I tell you what I've, I've, cause I, cause I talk about this story a lot cause it's my story.

00:42:50.960 And I do, I always get asked that question and I can honestly say there's nothing in my past or in

00:42:57.380 my circle of family and friends, teammates, training partners, um, that would ever point to

00:43:04.060 me making that decision. When I say I'm the only person that made my, made that decision that I

00:43:08.680 know of from where I grew up, I am literally the only person that made that decision of, of the people

00:43:14.280 in my, in my high school, in my town, I was the only person. So it didn't make sense that I could,

00:43:19.880 or it didn't make sense why I did it. All I can say is that you, you pray for wisdom and you pray

00:43:27.460 for discernment and you pray that you can make the best decision possible, whether that decision is

00:43:32.360 the scariest thing in the world, whether, whether you see an open door, but you're afraid to walk

00:43:37.200 through that open door. But for some reason you, you have to make that decision. That's why it's

00:43:41.460 important to just pray for the discernment. He who lacks wisdom, pray for wisdom and it will be

00:43:47.120 given to you by, by your God. I think it's James one, five. And that was a, that was a scripture

00:43:51.700 that my, my, um, my father-in-law actually actually sent me as I was going to my meeting

00:43:56.780 with the UFC. Um, because, uh, that's pretty cool. Your father-in-law sent that to you.

00:44:02.020 My father-in-law sent that to me and it was just so cool. Cause it's, and it was, and it was really

00:44:06.320 actually the first time that I really read that scripture, I think, but it, it, it holds so much

00:44:11.000 weight because instead of just trying to have wisdom or instead of just praying, you know,

00:44:15.500 God, let your will be done. Just pray for wisdom, pray for constant wisdom and discernment because

00:44:20.260 now since making that decision, now the proof is in the pudding by making that decision. My life

00:44:26.100 has changed to a trajectory that I never thought was possible as that is as that young 18 year old

00:44:32.380 small guy from a small town who was taught to do small things. My, the trajectory of my life

00:44:37.000 is not just 10 fold, but a hundred fold, a thousand fold bigger and more impactful in a

00:44:42.840 bigger platform than I ever thought was even possible. Um, so it's having gratitude for that,

00:44:47.560 but, um, I think it goes back to praying for the praying for wisdom and the discernment to

00:44:55.380 make those decisions and, and just on kind of unbelievable courage, if you will. Cause to me,

00:45:03.220 I look at that 18 year old, that was unbelievable courage. I don't even believe that that young man

00:45:08.380 was able to make that decision, that kind of courageous decision. Um, so pray for unwavering,

00:45:14.600 unwavering and unbelievable courage, you know, um, in, in your decision-making in the, in the

00:45:19.460 path that you're going to go down, because it will, it may not, you may not see it today or tomorrow

00:45:24.080 or next week, but eventually it's going to, it's going to come to the point where you make that

00:45:27.520 decision. You look back and say, it was that decision that was the catalyst to me becoming the man that I

00:45:32.140 was supposed to be. Hmm. You, you obviously talk a lot about your faith and God. And one of the

00:45:39.140 things you said earlier is that you have these God given ability abilities. Uh, and then there's

00:45:44.180 this other side of things where, yes, I believe that's true. And I believe all of us have these

00:45:48.540 certain abilities, some different than others, of course, but then there's also the enhancement

00:45:53.100 of those abilities. Cause there's a lot of people out there who have given, been given abilities,

00:45:57.760 but don't use them. Don't train them. Don't develop them. So how do, how do you find that

00:46:03.580 relationship between what God has blessed you with naturally and what you feel like you've

00:46:08.300 developed or have the responsibility to develop? It all goes back to mindset. A hundred percent.

00:46:15.220 It goes back to mindset. I mean, I've, I've been an athlete now since I've been fully investing

00:46:20.700 myself in athletics from, from the time that I was 14 years old, I've seen so many young men

00:46:26.720 that were more talented than me. They were the most talented kids on the teams. They were the

00:46:30.340 most talented kids in college and now the most talented kids in mixed martial arts, uh, young

00:46:34.720 men in mixed martial arts. But the, the people who consistently show up when it, when the lights

00:46:40.740 turn on, that's either just an innate inherent ability to just show up and do it and not think

00:46:47.820 twice. Um, I think some of that is God given, or some of that is just the way people are, are,

00:46:52.020 are designed. You got certain people, you know, there's a guy on my team who's fighting next

00:46:55.880 week, actually, who he, uh, he doesn't take training. I don't want to say he doesn't take

00:47:00.300 training seriously because he trains hard and whatnot, but he doesn't, he doesn't overthink

00:47:04.760 it. He, if he has a bad, you never see him have a bad day. You never see him down on himself.

00:47:09.300 Whereas me, I'm over here in the corner wanting to kick a hole in the wall, rip it off, rip it

00:47:14.220 off my gloves. And like, and, and, and I'm not saying I'm right or wrong or I'm more passionate

00:47:19.200 or less passionate than he is. But then, but then fast forward to his fight night, when the lights

00:47:24.020 come on, he goes out there and he performs so dang well. And he performs, he overperforms

00:47:29.680 under the lights. Whereas so many people underperform whenever, whenever the lights

00:47:33.640 come on. So it all goes back to that mindset of being, being able to show up when the lights

00:47:40.260 come on, but also just realizing that, man, this whole thing is a journey. You know, I went

00:47:46.020 early in my career. It was such a blessing to get shot out of a cannon to become top three

00:47:50.900 and world champion within 18 months of beating Eddie Alvarez, who was the number three guy in

00:47:55.060 the world at the time. It was, it was unheard of. I was a thousand to one underdog, right?

00:47:59.380 So I beat him and I immediately put myself in this position of world champion, the guy who's the new

00:48:04.540 guy who everybody's saying, Hey, I, he needs to go to the UFC. He needs to go fight Benson

00:48:07.860 Henderson. It was the champion at the time. And immediately I went from loving the sport, having a

00:48:13.980 blast, enjoying the process to trying to be perfect every single day. Because as soon as I won that belt,

00:48:20.900 I showed up to practice. And if a guy lands a punch on me, all of a sudden, now I'm not perfect.

00:48:26.580 If the guy gets a takedown on me or I don't get a takedown on him, all of a sudden, now I'm not

00:48:31.220 perfect. I focus so much on being perfect instead of just showing up and trying to be successful that

00:48:37.160 day, trying to be better that day, better that day and embracing the process. So I think that's,

00:48:42.320 that's one of the aspects that doesn't get enough attention because so many people,

00:48:46.720 and, and, and there's this idea that people, that people boast about of being a perfectionist.

00:48:52.400 I'm just a perfectionist. You know, I got to do that. That to me is always going to lead to pain

00:48:57.520 and to failure because you're never, ever going to be perfect. You're never, ever going to perform

00:49:02.500 perfectly. You might perform near perfectly. It might be a, a flawless performance, but it's never

00:49:08.020 going to be perfect. And that's what happened to me. As soon as I won that first world title,

00:49:12.380 I took, I took on the pressure of the entire MMA media that was touting me as the next big guy.

00:49:17.760 And then all my training partners and all my coaches and all the, you know, my, my coaches

00:49:21.620 from back home at Mizzou who, who, you know, were excited for me to go into mixed martial arts. I

00:49:26.380 started shouldering all this pressure, which, which propelled me into perfectionism when really I just

00:49:32.200 needed to be so focused on being successful, um, instead of being perfect. And, and, and that goes,

00:49:37.440 also goes back to now that I'm saying this, these young men or young women who are pursuing something,

00:49:44.820 who have a lot of talent. It's so important to work hard and be mentally, be mentally built up

00:49:49.820 your self-image, but also who you're surrounding yourself with. The idea, the idea of success,

00:49:55.620 not perfection came from my best friend and mentor, Chris Patterson. One day I called him just freaking

00:50:00.880 tears in my eyes, just probably cussing up a storm, not very happy, you know, just, uh,

00:50:08.320 and he's just like, Michael, well, it sounds like you're trying to be perfect. I'm like, yeah,

00:50:11.620 I gotta be, you know, I gotta be perfect. I'm the world champion. I'm this, I'm that. Ariel

00:50:15.480 Helwani said this, this, and he's like, well, sounds like you just need to focus on being

00:50:19.460 successful and not be perfect. You're never going to be perfect. And without having that type of person

00:50:24.040 in my life, that type of mentor, that type of voice, that was probably his straight discernment

00:50:29.000 from God and to have that wisdom in that moment to excel or, or spread into my soul at that moment,

00:50:36.980 I immediately was like, okay. And immediately I felt a lot less pressure that 800 pound gorilla

00:50:42.400 had been on my shoulders immediately fell off and I was able to turn things around and get better,

00:50:47.840 you know? So, um, working hard, focusing on your mental health, your, your, your, your mindset,

00:50:53.620 and then surrounding yourself with the best people possible. That's kind of the recipe to go from

00:50:57.440 extremely talented to extremely talented and a guy or a gal who can perform whenever the,

00:51:02.860 whenever the lights come on. This, uh, this concept of, of perfectionism is very interesting

00:51:08.400 because what I've seen in, in myself, just as much as anybody else is that if we want to be perfect,

00:51:14.780 it's usually a perception thing. Like I want people to see me away a certain way, right? It's

00:51:20.500 manufactured. And then what I think it causes people to do, at least this is what's been true of me

00:51:25.260 is I won't put myself into arenas where I can't be the best, or I can't be perfect. I've even thought

00:51:32.720 about that to a lesser degree, of course, than you with jujitsu over the past three years, which is

00:51:37.540 how long I've been training jujitsu. It's very easy for me to go to a default position or a default

00:51:43.920 submission attempt because I know I can get it. Like, but how is that going to serve me if I'm not

00:51:50.320 willing to do experiment to try something new or to get caught, uh, or, or, or to put myself in a

00:51:55.520 vulnerable position where somebody else might get the better of me? Like, we don't want to deal with

00:51:59.860 that. We just want to deal in the arena where we know we can get, and that's it. Yeah. You know,

00:52:04.740 and, and unfortunately, you know, we all have to admit that that's derived from, from ego, right?

00:52:10.720 You know, it's, it's, uh, and I've done it too. Trust me. I only say that I'm not calling you out.

00:52:16.500 I'm calling both of us out and all of us out as, as men, especially, you know, we, we default to

00:52:22.760 these things that we know are comfortable, but if you really were able to look back at all the

00:52:28.740 different decisions that you made, where you played it safe or where you didn't take a chance

00:52:31.780 or where you didn't go into an arena, where you knew there was a good chance or a high likelihood

00:52:36.580 that maybe you're not going to be, be successful. You're not going to get the gold medal. You're not

00:52:42.140 going to get the results that you want, but you become a better man, a better competitor,

00:52:49.020 a better father, a better husband, a more galvanized man by throwing yourself into that

00:52:54.160 fire, you know? And that's, that's one thing that the sport of mixed martial arts has taught me.

00:52:58.380 And people always ask me, why, why are you, you know, what are you thinking before you go out

00:53:01.720 there? Do you get nervous? And I really don't get nervous because I get excited about the

00:53:06.520 opportunity of throwing myself into an arena, literally and figuratively inside of a cage

00:53:12.260 inside of the fire, excited when loser draw that I'm becoming a, a better man and being galvanized

00:53:20.620 by the fire that I'm throwing myself into, you know, and, and it's, uh, I, I have an ego and I have

00:53:26.320 confidence and I am proud of, of who I am and what I've built and what I've done, but I never let

00:53:31.040 the fear of looking bad, hold me back because that, that was what a young Michael Chandler used

00:53:37.380 to do. I would shrink myself and I would pull myself away from things that I was afraid of

00:53:41.520 that are where I knew I couldn't be a hundred percent for sure. Successful. You know, we don't

00:53:45.680 follow people because of the virtual certainty of their unblemished record or that they're, that the

00:53:50.900 virtual certainty of them being successful. We follow people because they take chances and we

00:53:56.000 see them take those chances and it inspires us. And then even more so when they fall flat on their

00:54:02.120 face, just like I did back on when I fought for the UFC title, the way that I'm able to pull myself

00:54:07.260 back up, dust myself off May 15th, the sun, the sun went down and then it rose right back up on May 16th.

00:54:14.100 And I got another opportunity to move forward in the face of, of adversity and, and with complete

00:54:21.800 disregard to that previous failure and my future opposition. And that's an opportunity that I,

00:54:26.680 that I don't take lightly. That's an opportunity that people can see, um, that this small guy from

00:54:31.700 a small town, this normal everyday guy threw himself into the fire. Yeah, he fell short, but at least he

00:54:36.880 was the man in the arena who, who dare, who failed while daring greatly at, at best I walk out of there

00:54:43.700 with the UFC belt on my shoulder. At worst, I failed while I, while daring greatly, uh, the old,

00:54:50.160 the, a man in the arena quote, you know, um, it's just, it's, it's a metaphor for this life and it's

00:54:55.780 a metaphor for the sport. And that's why I think people are drawn to mixed martial arts because

00:54:59.620 what we do inside that octagon is a physical manifestation of the fights that all of us

00:55:04.380 are going through every single day. And I'm just so thankful that I get the opportunity

00:55:08.740 to having done, having done it as long as I have. And every single fight is another blessing,

00:55:14.640 um, and another opportunity to, to kind of just capture the attention and hopefully instill,

00:55:20.980 um, the taking chance, taking a chance mentality into other people, because it has served me well

00:55:27.400 over the last decade and a half. And, uh, I got a lot more chances to take a lot more bets on myself

00:55:33.160 and, uh, it's going to be a lot more fun. Man, you're so right about people wanting to see somebody

00:55:37.260 get back up. You know, you, you see, we see champions get knocked down and I'm talking about

00:55:42.340 champions in the ring or just champions of life get knocked down. And I kind of like hold my breath

00:55:46.440 a little bit and just look and say, okay, what's this guy going to do now? You know, what's he

00:55:50.680 going to do now? Cause that's really, to me, what actually matters. And that I think is more reflective

00:55:55.540 of his character than what he did when he was on top of everything. A hundred percent. It's the reason

00:56:01.000 the Rocky franchise is one of the biggest franchises of all time. If Rocky, there would not have been

00:56:06.980 four Rocky or what was it? Six Rocky movies or whatever it is. I always say four because four is my

00:56:11.840 favorite, but that's all that can, that's all matter, right? Somebody's going to be upset.

00:56:15.700 I just said that, but that's all that matters. Exactly. But there's not, there would not have

00:56:19.540 been so many Rocky movies if Rocky just won every single time. You know, it's, I hate it. It almost

00:56:26.680 sounds counterintuitive because of course, as an athlete, I want to win. I wish I was, you know,

00:56:31.420 actually, no, I don't wish. I, I, I almost said, I wish I was undefeated, but I don't because

00:56:36.000 the losses have are what has galvanized me, the falling short, the setback that has,

00:56:40.980 what has fashioned me through for better or worse through pain and through trial and tragedy and

00:56:47.320 triumph through, through it all, all the mixture of emotions, those losses and those setbacks and

00:56:51.580 those injuries and all that pain and the tears that were shed and the bad days, those were the

00:56:56.800 things that have fashioned me into the man that I am today. Um, so it's, it's exactly like what you

00:57:02.140 said. We follow, we, we almost are more intrigued when people fall short because we all have

00:57:08.800 shortcomings, we all have setbacks, we all have doubts and insecurities and fears. So when we watch

00:57:13.920 somebody from afar fail, we get the opportunity to be inspired by how they respond, you know? Um, and

00:57:21.040 luckily for me, I've, I've luckily and unluckily, I guess, whatever it is, it's all just part of the

00:57:26.520 process that I've had these losses and I've had these setbacks and I've had the opportunity to, you

00:57:31.040 know, hopefully touch some people with, with my performances, with my, with my wins, with my

00:57:35.100 knockouts, with my great highlights, but also with my setbacks on my career.

00:57:40.040 Yeah. You said lucky or unlucky. I, I think it's subjective. It's, it's, it's going to happen,

00:57:44.640 right? Like the loss or the win happens, either happens or doesn't happen. And here's how it played

00:57:48.860 out. And the way that you view it or, or, or how you define it is really just the way you're

00:57:54.320 looking at it. If you want to say it's unlucky, then yeah, that's unlucky. If you want to say it's

00:57:58.320 the most horrible thing that ever happened to you, then maybe it is, but you could view it a

00:58:02.380 different way. Yeah. It's the old Jocko good video, right? That's right. That's right.

00:58:07.660 That thing happened. Good. I had a bad day. Good. Right. And it's, and it sounds, it's almost so it's,

00:58:14.300 it's, it, it, that to me is, it's hard for maybe a lot of people to, to understand, but you only can

00:58:20.240 build, you can only build that kind of mentality by throwing yourself into the fire and having so many

00:58:25.660 failures that you eventually become numb to them. And you almost, you, you, you have the ability to

00:58:31.660 embrace them and you, you'll never be able to fully embrace change, failure, setback, um, and,

00:58:39.160 and losses without going through them and constantly putting yourself in situations where you have,

00:58:44.760 where you have maybe a 50, 50 chance of winning or losing, you know, we have 70, 30 chance of,

00:58:50.160 of losing, right. Put yourself into those kinds of situations, find ways to expand your human capacity

00:58:57.360 through failure, you know? So, um, because obviously as an athlete, I always want to win.

00:59:02.900 That's the goal. Every single time I don't train like I do and go away from my family,

00:59:07.020 really today, like the paycheck, but man, you gotta be, you gotta be okay with the uncertainty

00:59:13.260 that's about to happen. You have to be, you have to embrace the uncertainty and win, lose or draw.

00:59:18.020 I always go back to my God still loves me. My family still loves me. And most importantly,

00:59:22.340 I still love me because without, uh, without me truly loving myself and accepting myself,

00:59:28.320 those other two are not going to get the love and the attention that, that, that they truly need,

00:59:32.900 you know? And, and I, and I only say that because I've been that guy who didn't love

00:59:36.920 myself. Like I should have, I had all these, all these abilities and all these gifts and all these

00:59:40.920 opportunities and such a blessed life. Yet I kept looking at myself like I was less than looking at

00:59:46.240 myself. Like I was like, I deserve the short end of the stick, or I deserve to not be wildly successful.

00:59:51.840 Um, and I've gotten to the point now where I want people to live that abundance,

00:59:57.220 that abundance type of lifestyle and have an abundance mentality more than the scarcity of

01:00:01.620 mindset of my past. One of the words you use was, was numbness. And I, and I just want to be very

01:00:07.220 clear because, and I didn't take it this way, but you're not talking about numbness or indifference

01:00:12.120 to loss. Like each one of those losses stings, but you're not attaching weird sorts of meaning.

01:00:17.820 Like I'm, I'm a perpetual loser, or I shouldn't be doing this anymore. That's what you're referring

01:00:22.700 to.

01:00:23.560 Absolutely. No, great, great clarification, clarification, because yeah, it, and it brings

01:00:27.900 me back to one of my, one of my favorite ideas of all time. The great Zig Ziglar said failure is an

01:00:33.820 event, not a person. And that's what I mean by, by numbing yourself to it. You got to numb the emotion

01:00:41.100 out of it because we're all emotional creatures. You know, we have, we all have these emotions and

01:00:46.800 we have to be in control of our emotions. And we also have to, to know when our emotions are a good

01:00:51.260 thing and when they're a bad thing. And after a loss, it's okay to feel the emotions. I sobbed like

01:00:56.820 a baby after this last fight. It was just me and my wife. You know, I stayed up all night reliving

01:01:01.560 the moment plus the fight adrenaline, plus everything. I couldn't, I couldn't sleep. So I had many hours

01:01:06.520 that night to think about it, but I've changed my mindset to realizing that May 15th was an event

01:01:13.560 in which I failed, but I am not a failure. And the old Michael would have, would have immediately

01:01:20.360 started to attach. Well, I guess I'm not as good as I thought I was, or I guess the media was right.

01:01:26.600 This guy said I was going to eventually fizzle out or I didn't do this, or I should have done that.

01:01:30.700 And realizing that failure is an event, not a person. And realizing that every single

01:01:36.380 person that you look up to, every single person that you love, every single person that you admire

01:01:40.440 has at one time or another been a quote unquote failure. They went down a road, they threw themselves

01:01:47.280 into the arena and they fell flat on their face. And when you start to realize that every single

01:01:52.360 person that you look up to has failed and every single person that you admire has encountered

01:01:57.280 setbacks or even huge setbacks and like bankrupt people, your favorite businessman might have gone

01:02:03.480 bankrupt, your favorite fighter. If I'm your favorite fighter, there's not too many people

01:02:07.200 who have lost three fights in a row, lost six lost, went 688 days without a win and come back from that.

01:02:13.460 These are the time of, these are the type of epic failures or events that were failures that,

01:02:19.220 that most people would write off and say, well, that's just a career. That's, that's career

01:02:23.000 suicide is his career is over yet. We're able to come back, pull ourselves back. And now maybe almost,

01:02:28.920 maybe you could call me a successful success story. Maybe you can call me a work in progress.

01:02:32.920 Either way, I'm focused on the task at Hamill. I'm focused on not even winning belts and making

01:02:39.040 money and doing all these things as much as I am. The moment that I take my gloves off for the last

01:02:43.680 time, looking back at the last decade and a half that I fought and realized and being proud of the

01:02:49.520 man that I became with the opportunities that I had in the battles figuratively and literally that I

01:02:56.120 fought inside of a cage with four ounce gloves on. Do you ever, do you consider it strange or weird

01:03:05.460 or surreal that you fight other human beings for a living? You know, from the outside, looking outside

01:03:12.420 looking in, that's a weird thing. I'm not sure if you've been in it so long that it's like not even

01:03:17.020 a thing, or if that's something that you've considered before. Man, it's not. And it's,

01:03:22.980 and it's weird too, you know, like even when you talk about my faith, people will say, well,

01:03:26.120 how are you a Christian? But you also. Right. I was actually going to ask that. That's one of the

01:03:30.000 things I wanted to discuss. Of course. But, but I think for me, um, I've, I've just been engaged in

01:03:37.140 hand-to-hand combat, whether it was wrestling or fighting since I was 14 years old, you know,

01:03:41.620 21 years, I've been putting my hands on an opponent who's about my size and trying to either score

01:03:48.320 points on them, break them mentally, physically, spiritually, not really trying to hurt them.

01:03:52.200 And that's not, and truthfully, just to kind of get into the psychology of mixed martial arts,

01:03:55.940 I've never once wanted to hurt a guy in, in fighting. I've never once hoped that I break a

01:04:01.520 guy's arm, leg, knock them out, break, break as well. I want to knock them out, but I don't want

01:04:06.560 to inflict really bad bodily harm. I don't want to injure somebody. No, the best, the best goal is for me to

01:04:12.940 go out there, get a knockout, him come to me, get my hand raised, us shake hands, maybe buy each

01:04:18.780 other a beer later after the fight. Because man, if there's anybody out there that I respect

01:04:23.600 out of anybody, it's, it's the guys who do what I do. They train every single day to put themselves,

01:04:29.320 they tow the line, they put themselves in a cage and fight with four ounce gloves, you know? So,

01:04:33.680 so to me, it's never been a, a, I don't know. It's, it's never been something that I've looked

01:04:40.920 at as even hostile in, in the cage when you're watching it, man, you're like, gosh, Chandler

01:04:46.480 fights with hostility. He fights with violence. He fights with a tenacity that he looks like he wants

01:04:51.560 to rip your head off. And that's what I need to be successful in my sport. But in, in my heart,

01:04:58.300 in my soul, inside my DNA, it's, I don't look for fights. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not a confrontational

01:05:05.520 guy. Quite frankly, I'm a very non-confrontational guy. That's why trash talk hasn't really ever been

01:05:10.860 my thing. I'm much, I'd be much more nervous getting into a trash talk battle on camera than

01:05:15.960 I would be just fighting fist of cuffs on, on, on camera. So it's, it's, it's not surreal. It only

01:05:25.020 becomes a little bit surreal here, here and there when I see genuine, genuine respect and fan reactions

01:05:31.980 from, from people. Like I brought up these, these guys from Target the other day. It was, it's so

01:05:37.180 surreal and it's so humbling. Like these guys really thought I was freaking cool. Like these guys,

01:05:42.720 you know, these guys thought, and, and I, and I feel weird even talking about it because I don't want

01:05:48.220 to like, you know, brag on myself and I'm not any cooler than anybody. I think it's almost just

01:05:52.520 baffling to me that these young men were, it was like the way I would be if, if I, if I saw the

01:05:59.880 rock or I saw one of these, one of these guys that I like admire like crazy. Right. And it's just so

01:06:06.060 surreal to me because once again, it does go back to me still seeing myself as a small guy from a

01:06:10.740 small town who was taught to do small things. And, and it's just, it's baffling to me, but it's such

01:06:14.600 a humbling feeling. It's such a humbling experience for me, you know? So that's when it becomes a little

01:06:20.860 bit surreal, realizing that what I'm doing really is bigger than I think it is at times,

01:06:27.200 these opportunities and these platforms that I have, and these fights that I'm having that are

01:06:30.600 going to live on the internet forever and ever and ever. And then I think about 10 year old,

01:06:35.200 15 year old, 18 year old half, my son watching what his dad did for a living and then reading the

01:06:41.700 comments. And, you know, there's going to be some negative ones, but hopefully a lot of positive

01:06:45.500 comments of other people saying things about me because I can sit there and say, Hey son, I was this,

01:06:50.600 and I was that, and I won this and I won that. But the real, the rubber meets the road and you

01:06:56.120 really impact my, my child, my son will be really impacted whenever he hears who his dad is or was

01:07:03.580 from other people, from his peers, from his coworkers, from his, his support system, his

01:07:08.220 followers and his fans. And that's, that's my real goal for me because I can tell him how great I am

01:07:12.480 until I'm blue in the face, which I, I don't do often or probably won't do ever, but that's where,

01:07:17.840 that's where he's really going to be impacted and get kind of that view and that vision of what I'm

01:07:22.480 doing over these last decade and a half. It's amazing to me when you hear a man like

01:07:27.300 yourself who has that long-term vision, you know, I think so many people are so trapped and caught up

01:07:32.680 in what's happening now and how are people perceiving me and how much money am I making

01:07:37.220 today? And some of that, of course, you need to be aware of some of that, but if you can keep that

01:07:42.000 long-term perspective, like you're talking about it now, I think it causes us to make better

01:07:47.220 decisions in the moment. We're not so emotionally wrapped up in it. We're not pursuing the wrong

01:07:51.740 things that are, that are sexy and fun now that are going to have negative consequences down the

01:07:56.060 road. It just, it's, it's a level of grounding that more of us need to incorporate in our, in our

01:08:00.180 lives. A hundred percent. I think, and it kind of goes back to embracing the process, you know, not,

01:08:05.360 not even, what if the goal is just the process, you know, what is the goal? What if the goal is

01:08:11.780 just embracing the process? You know, it's not the, it's not the gold belt. It's the process for me to

01:08:18.560 get to the gold belt. It's not the million dollars. It's the process for me to get to the million,

01:08:24.240 the million dollars, you know? And, and I think having that kind of perspective helps you, as you

01:08:31.360 said, live in the moment more and also deal with adversity more, you know, just because I failed

01:08:36.280 today doesn't mean that I'm never going to win that belt. I'm never going to make that million

01:08:39.700 dollars. I'm never going to be that, be successful in this thing. I'm never going to be able to cap

01:08:43.700 capture and acquire that thing that I'm chasing just because I failed today doesn't mean I'm not

01:08:48.920 going to be able to, that I have to close the door on that. The sun really does come up again

01:08:53.420 tomorrow and I get another opportunity, another crack at it, another, another chance. And you got to have

01:08:59.440 that in my sport. I had a bad day today. You know, I might have a bad night tonight here in a couple

01:09:04.200 hours training again. So you just kind of, you kind of get that you roll with the punches, you know,

01:09:10.060 literally and figuratively, right? It's, it's metaphoric and it's, it's, and that's why I feel

01:09:16.060 so blessed that this sport is, is what it is. And it's, and it's different and it's impactful and

01:09:21.580 it's, and it, and it, it's, it has given me a great opportunity. So I'm forever indebted to the

01:09:26.620 sport of mixed martial arts, how big the promotion is and how big the platforms are. So it's,

01:09:30.780 it's a, it's an awesome, humbling feeling. Well, what do you say to those people to go

01:09:35.180 back to what you were saying a minute ago about how can you be a Christian and pursue this lifestyle?

01:09:39.140 What, what, what do you say to somebody who, who might bring that up or mention that or,

01:09:42.380 or think that? No, it's a great, it's a great thought. Um, I can tell you right now, I've spoken

01:09:47.480 at more churches about my career and about my, about my, my path than I, than I have in secular

01:09:53.920 venues. You know, I've, I've spoken at more churches, more men's, more men's conferences

01:09:58.900 and men's retreats than I have, um, in any other venue. You know, there's a, there's a place

01:10:05.400 in Christianity for, for my type of, of career. You know, first of all, I train with a lot of people

01:10:13.060 that are Christian. I train with a lot of people who love Jesus. I train and, and also I, in,

01:10:18.680 in a non, in a non-confrontational way without sugarcoating it, I would say to you, who are you

01:10:26.080 to tell me what my mission is and what my way of, of spreading the gospel is, you know, who are you

01:10:33.800 to say that just because I fight in the cage, that it must not be from God. Who are you? You know,

01:10:39.140 I don't think, I don't think Tim Tebow ever once apologized for running over somebody on the goal

01:10:44.800 line on a quarterback sneak, you know, maybe giving them a concussion, maybe flat back and

01:10:49.540 them, you know, I don't think, I don't think Christians in other sports who may, uh, you know,

01:10:55.380 be in other contact sports, I don't think they've ever apologized for doing bodily harm within the

01:11:01.180 confines of the rules of the sport. And mixed martial arts is no different. If mixed martial arts

01:11:06.260 is my vehicle to have a platform for my voice to be heard and in turn, and I don't talk about my faith

01:11:11.920 a ton. I don't, I don't, I don't preach the gospel on a lot of platforms. I don't, I don't talk about

01:11:17.380 my faith a ton. I think, I think people see the way that I live my life. They hear the little things

01:11:23.000 that I say here and there, the way that I refer to my faith or the way that I refer to the way that I

01:11:27.180 live. And, uh, that's my way of doing it. That's what I've, I've never felt conviction about it that

01:11:31.960 I need to speak about my faith for. And I've never, and I've never felt led to speak about it any more

01:11:38.320 than I already do. I feel, I feel confident and I feel, um, comfortable with the, the amount of

01:11:45.880 the amount that I, that I speak about my faith. And I think people can just see in the way that

01:11:50.740 I live and the things that I do. And, and if they don't, if they don't like it, they were never really

01:11:55.640 going to like it anyway, or I just eventually wear them down. You know, when I came into the UFC,

01:11:59.580 a lot of people didn't like me because I immediately got back up for the world title shot.

01:12:04.960 And I, then I fought Dan Hooker and then I got a title shot, my second fight in the UFC.

01:12:09.700 And everybody's like, I don't like this guy. Why is he getting these opportunities when all

01:12:13.000 these other people deserve it more? I completely agree with you for that, for, for that notion and

01:12:18.000 for, for that, that, that process, that thought process. Um, but eventually the amount of people

01:12:23.840 that have sent me messages or reached out to me and said, you know what? I didn't like you at

01:12:27.040 first, but now after hearing this interview or listening to this or seeing the way that you love

01:12:31.440 your son or seeing this about you, man, I feel like you're my favorite fighter now. And I, you

01:12:36.100 know, and I silently chuckle with a little smile on my face because these things take time. You're

01:12:40.780 not, you're not going to number one, you're not going to be everybody's cup of tea, but you're

01:12:43.780 also not going to be everybody's cup of tea right away. Eventually you just keep doing what you need

01:12:48.560 to do, be authentically yourself. And the ones that want to attach themselves and the ones that want

01:12:54.880 to pay attention and, and kind of jump onto what you're, what you're thinking about talking about

01:13:00.600 and what you stand for will eventually become a part of your, um, kind of part of your circle.

01:13:06.980 Yeah. Yeah. Well, brother, I'd love to get you up here to Maine sometime. I we're actually doing a

01:13:11.620 origins immersion camp right now. I snuck away for a couple hours. So you and I could have this

01:13:16.220 conversation. Uh, but we got to get you up here. Maybe when you're not in fight camp, Jock goes up

01:13:21.160 here and all the origin guys are up here. So we'd love to have you up here in person at some

01:13:24.640 point. I would, I would love to, man. It's just so cool. I love, I love your platform,

01:13:29.000 your message, what you're doing. So thank you for the great conversation. Thank you for what

01:13:32.920 you're doing. Um, as we continue to try to, uh, build men up and build great leaders because,

01:13:39.700 uh, without them, the world falls pretty quick. So thank you for being who you are and exactly what

01:13:44.660 this podcast and what this platform is. So appreciate you, man. Thank you, man. We're going to be rooting

01:13:48.780 for you, uh, come November. I used to say, good luck. It's not about good luck that I'll give you best

01:13:54.040 wishes. I know you're going to take it within your hands and God's hands and, uh, make the most of it,

01:13:58.360 whatever comes. So stoked about it for you, brother. That's right. That's why we say,

01:14:01.640 I'll see you at the top. That's right. That's right. All right, man. Thanks a lot. Appreciate

01:14:05.520 you, Michael. That's right. See you, brother. All right, you guys, Michael Chandler, uh, man,

01:14:11.820 what an incredible conversation. Uh, I feel so fortunate and honored to be able to have conversations

01:14:16.700 with guys like Michael and everybody else we've had on the podcast. And, and frankly, it isn't lost on me

01:14:21.780 that it's, uh, you who are making this all a possibility for me. And I want to do a good job

01:14:27.340 for you. That that's my, that's my sole objective is I want to give you the tools and conversations

01:14:32.320 and resources, uh, that you need to thrive in your own life. And I think this one will, uh,

01:14:37.400 will help you do just that. If you apply it, that's the biggest thing. I don't want us to be

01:14:41.280 a bunch of, as Andy Frisilla would say, learning zombies. I want us to apply this information.

01:14:47.820 So if you enjoyed the podcast, let me know, take a screenshot very, very quickly before this one

01:14:53.640 is erased from your, uh, podcast player, take a screenshot right now, and then you can post it up

01:14:59.560 on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, wherever you're doing the social media thing, let people know what

01:15:03.000 you're listening to. Uh, not only is it going to serve the people you care about well, but it also

01:15:07.700 helps us because this is a grassroots movement of reclaiming and restoring masculinity in this society

01:15:13.900 that is ever dismissive of it. Uh, it's, it's just a good way to build what we're doing here.

01:15:20.400 So take that screenshot, share it, tag me, tag Michael, send Michael a message on Instagram or

01:15:26.460 Facebook, wherever you're doing, again, the social media thing, let him know what you thought about

01:15:30.100 the show. Let me know what you thought about the show, tag us up, uh, and let's continue to grow this

01:15:34.560 movement. We've got a lot of work to do. This, the society that we live in, like I said earlier,

01:15:39.380 is increasingly dismissive of masculinity, but it's way worse than that. It's way worse than that.

01:15:44.900 And, uh, we, we, frankly, we have the solutions to it because we're talking about real issues,

01:15:49.920 important topics. And then most of all, we're calling each other to do the work about, uh,

01:15:54.740 fixing it. So make sure you subscribe, leave the rating and review, check out the iron council,

01:15:59.940 share where you can hit up Michael, hit up me on Instagram or Facebook or Twitter,

01:16:03.740 and let's keep getting after it. All right, guys, look back tomorrow for my, ask me anything with,

01:16:08.640 uh, Mr. Kip Sorensen, who is, uh, a new black belt, which I'm really excited for him. We're

01:16:15.140 going to talk a little bit about that on the podcast tomorrow. All right, guys, until then,

01:16:19.340 go out there, take action and become a man. You are meant to be. Thank you for listening to the

01:16:24.080 order of man podcast. You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant

01:16:29.120 to be. We invite you to join the order at order of man.com.

01:16:38.640 We'll be right back.

01:16:45.140 All right.

01:16:46.980 We'll be right back.

01:16:47.140 We'll be right back.

01:16:49.140 We'll be right back.

Order of Man - August 31, 2021

MICHAEL CHANDLER ｜ Family Man and Fighter

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