Not Asking for Myself

Well, I'm sure that when most people think of you, they think of you as that wonderful skater, Olympic gold medal, two-time world champion, and these are things that required a tremendous commitment and hard work on your part as an individual. But as you went to work on your foundation, the Always Dream Foundation, you needed to really inspire others and mobilize them and get them to believe in your cause and come along with you for the ride. This seems like a very different kind of challenge. Was it difficult for you to get out there and mobilize others instead of just doing that work yourself?

In a way and I think that's another reason why it's great to be working with Carol, my executive coach, because she's really helping me see other ways to help mobilize people and to really get them to follow and buy into what we're doing. And it is a lot different because, you know, as an athlete, it was such a self-centered goal and dream, right, and everything centered around how rested I was, how much training I did and whatnot. And then now, there's a whole 'nother world out there and now learning how to not ask for yourself, but, hey, I'm not asking for myself. I'm asking for these amazing children who aren't going to get what they need for success if we're not there to help them.

And how are you able to convince others to join and follow you and take up your cause?

I think it's just learning to be vulnerable and letting them see the passion and the motivation behind why I'm doing it. And I think if they understand the literacy crisis that's out there and if I can tell it in a story, in a way that it really hits home because it does. And when you know that one in five Americans graduate not reading at above the third-grade level and it's just like, okay, this is a fixable problem. Let's do it.