About Greg:
Greg Miller, Owner of Authentic Awesomeness, encourages people to be ‘Authentically Awesome’, by living and inspiring other to live a positive, energized lifestyle whether in sport, at work, or in everyday life; by not worrying about what others think, but improving yourself each and everyday spiritually, mentally or physically. He believes in investing our time, rather than just letting it pass. He believes in embracing our own uniqueness, our own goofy, whacky and weird selves. Greg Miller believes in embracing who we truly are without reserve, without the thought of “Is someone judging me,” because yes they are and WHO CARES!! Whether they are judging for better or worse, BE YOU!!
He is:
- Here to inspire others to be the best version of themselves.
- Master Trainer
- Motivational coach
- A 2008 10th round MLB Draft pick
Tell us a little bit about your hustle and your happiness journey.
Where to begin, my happy hustle journey began after losing my professional baseball career due to elbow surgery and poor choices. These poor choices cost me my dream that I worked all my life to achieve. I even wrote a poem about it and the poor choice. My journey of a happy hustler didn’t begin so “Happy” per say as I battled a strong addiction to pain pills and opiates in general.
I was in and out of rehab for several years, lost in the grips of space and time withno direction, no goals, and a will to live that became completely stripped. It was not until my best friend Ezekiel Boren, entered my life and told me exactly what I needed to hear, the TRUTH. I had become so accustomed to being Greg, “The baseball player,” that I had no identity anymore. I just lied to myself about who I was, and was living this unauthentic, self-deceiving type of lifestyle and mindset. It was not until I made a conscious CHOICE, to choose a different way; to think different thoughts; to FUEL my mind with positive thoughts and feed those thoughts that aligned with my true self, my AUTHENTIC self, that I began to RECREATE who I was and ultimately begin to build my own AUTHENTIC AWESOMENESS…. And that is how our company began - through finding my own Gratitude and Love for myself, which is the foundation for what our company represents. Gratitude, Self-Love and Self-Empowerment!
What do you do to de-stress after or during a long, stressful day?
I do a lot of meditation, even just sitting at my desk, I will close my eyes, count my breaths for some time, get myself centered and continue on with my day. It is very relaxing and calming - relax the mind and RELAX THE BODY! Working IN and not just working OUT, the body only does what the mind tells it to do. Because of this we call our workouts, workINs because it all starts with a mindset - it all starts WITHIN!
My favorite workout is to hang my Olympic rings in nature, on a big branch, or under a waterfall like I did in Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. I create a little circuit and get after it.
Where do you go for inspiration?
For inspiration I go to nature and connect with the things that are greater than myself. I also listen to a lot of motivational speakers, Tony Robbins is classic, but also guys like Eric Thomas, Bob Proctor, Dan Pena and many others.
What are you currently reading or listening to (podcasts, books, blogs, etc.)?
Currently I have just finished the “Three Pillars or Zen” by Philip Kapleau and am re-reading “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill. I find that life is a lot about repetition, and enhancing what already IS. Re-affirming and re-instilling what works, especially if we begin to lose our balance and our “way” so to speak. One other book, the one that changed my life is “As a Man Thinketh,” by James Allen. I listen to it in my car, before I go to sleep. It is awesome.
What is one piece of advice you'd give to someone just starting their happy hustle journey?
If there was just ONE piece of advice haha, even though that’s very limiting because there are infinite things to give for advice; I would have to say Perseverance. Life is not all rainbows and butterflies, and it is how we RESPOND to life challenges, as opposed to how we REACT to them. They say life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you respond; I have to disagree because life is ALL about how we respond to certain circumstances and people in our lives. Life is going to happen regardless.
What are some of your favorite quotes or words to live by?
Well I love Muhammad Ali’s “The man with no imagination has no wings,” this one is awesome. But I am a big Ralph Waldo Emerson fan and he has two quotes that stick out to me, one being “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment,” and also “Write it in your heart that everyday is the best day in the year.” But I also love ANY Bruce Lee quote, I can go on and on about quotes. Buddha is also one of my favorites and the fact is what we think, we ultimately do become. One of my favorite personal quotes is “Best Day Ever!” or BDE. Very similar to Emerson’s quote, but it means that each day is the best and only day, all we have is the HERE and NOW moment. There is no yesterday, there is no tomorrow…. There is only this current breath and current moment at hand and to live each day as its own “rebirth” so to speak, almost like being resurrected each morning, into a new day, a new opportunity to be BETTER than we were the day before.
In one word, sum up your life as a Happy Hustler.
AWESOME!!!
What are the three core values of your hustle and how do those values relate to your happiness?
Gratitude, Love and Humility.
These values are what allow more good to flow in my life. If we are our thoughts, then what we think we attract, so it comes down to what we choose to focus our energy on. I choose to focus my energy on being grateful, not only for what I DO have, and also being grateful for all future moments and things that will have, as well as what I have had in the past. Love is just a state of being for me. Loving myself first so that I may spread love to all others and Humility is just as simple as that. Being humble and realizing we don’t know, life is mostly a matter of opinion and perspective with very little truth. The only TRUTH we know of is the one we live, otherwise, we are all on the same journey looking to figure out the same things and which way is best to do this or do that…. Life is about trial and error and being humble enough to take risks, fall down, and be able to get back up that much better, that much stronger the next time… That’s what life is to me and why humility is so important.
Connect with Greg:
Website // Facebook // Instagram
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This feature was sponsored by APOP Studios’ Feeling Salty Workshops. Schedule your workshop today to let go of that negative baggage and build a happier you! Great for work and school events. Email info@apopstudios.com or find more information at: www.apopstudios.com/movingmindfully