The Secret to Winning Forever

Before coach Pete Carroll was an NCAA and Super Bowl champion he was lost. Not in terms of what to do, but how to do it. He knew he loved coaching football, but for some reason he wasn't getting the results he wanted.

When Patriots owner Robert Kraft fired Carroll in 1999, it prompted a months long period of reflection. During that time, Carroll studied UCLA basketball coach John Wooden and was encouraged to learn just "how long it took him to find his groove." Wooden did not win his first NCAA championship until his sixteenth season in Westwood and Carroll had just spent 16 years coaching in the National Football League.

Carroll spent the ensuing months following the same process Coach Wooden went through decades earlier, developing his personal philosophy in a full, complete, and systematic way.

"My life in the next weeks and months was filled with writing notes and filling binders," Carroll says, in his book "Win Forever."

Carroll finished his personal philosophy, and accompanying system in December of 2000. Later that month USC hired him to be their head football coach. He would go on to win three national championships before leaving to coach the Seattle Seahawks. Carroll attributes USC's decision to hire him and his subsequent success to developing, and clearly communicating, his personal philosophy.

It's only eight words: "If you want to win forever, always compete." That principle, Carroll says, is the basis for his entire system.

Like Carroll, I am a person fueled by a desire to compete. Passion, heart and high energy are some things I'm known by. But if I'm being honest, during graduate school, the dreams in my head have far outweighed my production in the field. It's time I take a step back, write my philosophy and begin to develop an accompanying system that when practiced, means I'm reaching my full potential.

"How many of you could stand up right now and share your philosophy with us in twenty-five words or less?," Carroll asks in his book.

Here's my first try: If you want to change the world, be courageous.