Greg Stewart spent the first 25 years of his life trying to prove to people that he wasn't disabled despite being born without half of his left arm. Once he changed his mindset, he found the sport of shot put and won two Paralympic gold medals.

Greg is a three-time world champion in para standing volleyball, a U Sports Defensive player of the Year in able bodied basketball, and he stands seven foot two. But the most interesting thing about him isn't his resume. It's the path he had to walk to get there. A path that ran through able-bodied sport, university, rock bottom, two lost jobs, and an eventual breakthrough: accepting himself exactly as he was.

In this conversation, Greg talks about what sport means when you spend years doing it for the wrong reasons, why failure is one of the most important things we can teach young athletes, and what the word inclusion actually means when you strip away the box-ticking. He shares the three values he brings to young athletes — trust, ownership and integrity — and makes a compelling case that the real problem in youth sports right now isn't the coaches or the kids. It's the parents... who he also believes are the solution.

Greg is 40 years old, newly married, a brand new father of a three-month-old daughter, and studying for his master's in counseling. He has more to say about sport, identity and mental health than almost anyone we've had on this show.

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Chapters

00:00 Opening

01:36 Introducing Greg Stewart

03:46 How Greg Got Into Sport

05:03 "You Can't Coach Height" — Using What You've Got

05:38 Starting in Grassroots: Soccer, Lacrosse and Everything Else

07:15 What His Parents Got Right: Encouragement Without Force

08:41 Did Sport Feel Like a Place He Belonged?

11:43 25 Years Trying to Prove He Wasn't Disabled

13:09 Leaning Into Able-Bodied Sport: What He Was Really Chasing

15:02 Having Success Without Having Joy

16:51 Chasing External Validation for 25 Years

17:16 Rock Bottom: Almost Failing Out, Fired From Two Jobs

19:36 How He Found Joy in Sport Again

20:26 Failure Is Important

22:26 How He Discovered Shot Put

25:24 Physical Health and Mental Health Are the Same Thing

28:12 Finding Flow State in Sport

30:07 What Greg Tells Young Athletes: Trust, Ownership and Integrity3

3:15 Are Parents Owning the Right Things?

35:19 Your Discomfort Is Leading the Way: A Message for Parents

38:17 Mental Health Support in Sport: What's Changed and What Hasn't

39:23 Why We Need to Let Kids Fail 41:20 Do All the Sports

43:18 Youth Sport Has Become Too Commercialized

44:13 The Coaches Who Shaped Greg

46:04 Ownership and Trust: Who Really Runs the Team?

48:38 What Inclusion Actually Means

52:03 Where Does Healthy Competition Belong in Youth Sport?

55:56 The Objective vs. The Purpose: A Crucial Distinction

57:42 Greg's Biggest Issue in Youth Sport Today: Parent Involvement

01:00:04 How to Bring Parents Along: Lead by Vulnerability

01:02:32 The Listeners We Really Need to Reach

01:03:30 The Mindfulete

Resources

Greg Stewart

The Mindfulete

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