Show Notes

• September 1, 2003 – the day life would be forever changed
• Strengthened bond with dad
• Dream call from Coach Beilein
• One-in-11.56 quadrillion
• Faith and the journey
• Being married, and becoming a dad
• Advice for anyone facing adversity
• Watch ESPN’s feature on Austin – Miraculous: The Austin Hatch Story

Connect With Austin Hatch

Website: https://austin-hatch.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/austin-hatch-530727a6/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/realaustinhatch/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AustinHatch30

Summary

Austin Hatch is a former college basketball player at the University of Michigan, a motivational speaker, and a survivor of two fatal plane crashes. His story was featured by ESPN in a 16-minute segment, “Miraculous: The Austin Hatch Story.” He discusses his story of tragedy, incomprehensible loss, and triumph.

Full Transcript

Brian  

Welcome to another episode of Life Excellence with Brian Bartes. Join me as I talk with amazing athletes, entrepreneurs, authors, entertainers, and others who have achieved excellence in their chosen field so you can learn their tools, techniques and strategies for improving performance and achieving greater success. Austin Hatch is a former college basketball player at the University of Michigan. He’s a motivational speaker, helping audiences around the country to learn from the challenges we face today, so that we can thrive in the midst of the challenges we’ll face tomorrow. Although Austin is a young man, he is definitely no stranger to monumental adversity. His life is a testimony for reframing adversity as an opportunity and the choices we have in life; about whether we’re going to let our circumstances defeat us or inspire us to overcome whatever difficult situation we might be facing. If you’re already familiar with Austin’s story, then you know the emotion that’s going to be packed into our show today. If you’re not yet familiar with the story of Austin Hatch, you will be and I promise your life will be changed forever. ESPN, in its 16 minute feature on Austin in 2015, described his experience as a journey of biblical proportions. This is going to be a particularly emotional show for me, because I knew Austin’s mom, Julie, and his dad, Steve. Welcome, Austin, and thanks for joining us on Life Excellence.

Austin  

Thank you so much for having me, Brian. I really appreciate it. Great to be with you.

Brian  

It’s great to be with you as well. Austin, as you know, I grew up with your mom, Julie, in Saginaw, Michigan. And your mom was one of the kindest, most amazing people I’ve ever met. And I’m not just saying that because she was your mom. She was well liked by everyone, was very athletic. And I don’t know if you knew this or not, but she was the homecoming queen in high school. She was that person. And your dad, Steve, was the same way. He was kind of a man’s man. Women liked him and the guys did too. He was kind of that stereotypical tall, dark and handsome, liked by everyone because he was such a great guy. Although your dad also grew up in Saginaw, he and I didn’t meet until we got to Alma college; your dad was a year older than both your mom and me. Austin, I share that to set the stage for your life growing up. Your parents had a great life as kids and they had a similar amazing life as adults; your dad went to medical school and became an anesthesiologist. He and your mom created a beautiful family with three children; your sister, Lindsay, you and your little brother, Ian. I don’t know how much you remember from your early childhood. But I’m guessing you had a pretty great life. You vacationed at your second home in northern Michigan, and were able to get there most weekends in the summer because, of course, your dad was a pilot. And then in an instant, everything changed. You were just eight years old at the time. Tell us what happened, Austin, on September 1, 2003, and how your life would be changed forever.

Austin  

Tragically, as you mentioned, we always we flew to Northern Michigan, very regularly from our home in Fort Wayne, Indiana and September 1, 2003 as we were preparing to land in Fort Wayne, the airplane tragically crashed and claimed lives of my mom, Julie, who was 38 at the time; my sister, Lindsay was 11, about to turn 12. A week later, my little brother, Ian, was only five – incomprehensible loss. That’s really the only way I can describe it. But my dad and I find a way to press on, find a way to keep living our life. That’s something you never get through but I think it’s just something you learn to live with and find a way to keep moving forward in the face of it. We just found a way to keep moving forward.

Brian  

I can’t imagine losing my mom, even today at my age, or losing a sibling, because I haven’t experienced either one of those. But at the time, at eight years old, your family was really your whole world. What was that tragedy like for you and your dad? And can you share a little bit about how your relationship with your dad strengthen through the loss you both experienced?

Austin  

Like you said, family is everything and they helped us through it. Obviously it was equally devastating to them in a different way; for my grandma and grandpa, my mom’s parents, I can’t imagine what it was like to lose a daughter, let alone two grandchildren. And for me, obviously losing a mom and my siblings is awful and terrible, horrific; whatever adjectives you want to use, but it’s different. I don’t know what it’s like to lose a child, or grandchildren and so on. My family they just pressed on and they just found a way to keep me living and keep moving forward. And my wife and I are expecting our first this fall and I can’t imagine. I mean, obviously, I’m not even a dad yet; I guess maybe I am. We don’t have a baby to hold our arms yet but I can’t imagine what it was like for my dad to to lose that and how he led me through that. He led me through that and showed me what it looks like to persevere and keep moving forward. And again, I don’t know how he did it. I can’t imagine this. My wife, we’ve been married four years, been together nine. He just he just found a way to keep living. He and my mom were together 25 plus, at that point. So it was just a challenging situation. But my dad made the best of it, I think, and showed me how to do the same.

Brian  

Austin, I remember running into your dad while skiing up at Boyne. I think it was 2004. It must have been right before he met Kimberly; we started exchanging Christmas cards after that. It was one of those situations where we hadn’t stayed in touch through the years, but friends, you know how you can not be in touch with somebody for a while and then you get back together and in about five minutes, it feels like you’ve never been apart. It really felt like that; we really had a special time up at Boyne. And so we started exchanging Christmas cards. I remember just a couple years after that, I think it was probably in 2005, the card that your dad and your second mom, Kim, sent had to have been one of the most beautiful family photos I’ve ever seen. I mean, still to this day I kept it; I actually looked for it in preparation for the show. I probably don’t have it anymore. But I did keep it for a while because it really stood out. It was the wedding photo of your blended family. I remember…it’s a beautiful photo, I hope you have it. But I remember feeling sad for a second when I looked at it, thinking about how your mom wasn’t in the picture, how Ian and Lindsay weren’t in the picture, but then thinking about how happy I bet your mom was that you and your dad had been blessed with such an amazing new family. Tell us what it meant for your dad to have found Kim and for you to have found a second mom and such incredible siblings who really just embraced you as as their brother and son.

Austin  

As you alluded to I’m sure my mom and siblings would have been happy that we had found a new family and had a great blended family and restored some normalcy. Not the same, obviously, but I feel like that was definitely a great thing to have; a great addition to our family. I thought about things, about my journey and everything that I’ve been through, and everything my family’s been through, and terrible that my family’s gone; I feel like things have turned out about as well as they possibly could have despite the challenges, despite the tragedies that we experienced. I think that mindset applies to both. Obviously, it’s awful. It’s incomprehensible losing my mom and siblings when I was just eight years old and for my dad too, but finding my mom, Kim, and having a blended family that we did, I think that was the best case scenario of the worst case scenario. Obviously, the worst case scenario is that the tragedy that happened [the] worst case scenario, [in] every sense of the word; but I think the best case scenario was finding a new family, not to replace the family that we had lost right away, but just to kind of fill the void a little bit.

Brian  

So you were emerging from the tragedy of the loss of your mom and siblings and starting to regain some sense of normal with your new family. Like you said, it wasn’t a replacement for your mom and your siblings, but it was your new family, and it probably seemed somewhat normal. Now I know that your dad was a star athlete in high school and in college, and sports was a big part of your life too. When did it first become apparent that you were a pretty good athlete? How did basketball in particular emerge as a strength? Now I know you grew up in Indiana, and maybe that had something to do with it. I’m sure your dad was a standout basketball player, football player. But when did it become clear to you that you were pretty good; you weren’t only enjoying it, but in fact, you were a pretty decent player?

Austin  

I think, maybe when I was 11 or 12 I could start to see that [I] was a pretty good player and I had to get a lot better, obviously a lot of room to grow. My goal was to play for Michigan, [I] wanted to play college basketball. That was the goal, but I really wanted to play at Michigan. I started going to work out at the gym before school. I think my dad and I started going to the YMCA on Depauw Road in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where we lived; we started going there and I started working out with a guy when I was probably 12, maybe like, sixth grade or seventh grade. A guy named Eric Vaughn, remember him clear as day. And we’d go to the gym, workout a couple of days a week; workout from six to seven and then go to school. That probably started when I was about, like I said, probably six or seventh grade. I started to have some success on the court, got pretty good, fortunately. Coach Beilein came to see me play one game in high school against Bishop Luers in Fort Wayne, Indiana. We had played a great game and actually ended up beating them – though they were a much bigger school than we were – and beat them for the first time. And in school it was just always a fun game to have them there. The gym probably held maybe 1,500 people total, [a] small gym. [It was] standing room only, just totally packed the whole [game] and so it was a cool game for Coach Beilein to see. Fortunately, we got the win. I had a pretty good game too.

Brian  

And obviously you made a huge impact on Coach Beilein and we’re going to talk about that in just a second. So fast forward just a little bit to June of 2011. Which you know that date well, obviously, that will stand out forever as a time – first – of great celebration and then of course, just unimaginable tragedy. You had just finished that year that you talked about, your sophomore year in high school, which included among other things, a stellar basketball season and including a visit from  Coach Beilein. You received a call from Coach Beilein, from the University of Michigan, that would be one of the proudest moments, I’m sure, of your dad’s life for you, and a time of great celebration for you and your family. Share, Austin, what happened on that call? What that meant to you, because I know that was a huge moment for you and for your family, and it was for Coach Beilein as well. And then talk about the sequence of events that would cause your life to change dramatically again, just nine days after that phone call.

Austin  

As you alluded to, June 15, 2011 – 1:45pm, Coach Beilein gave me a call and basically said, the coaching staff here at Michigan love the kind of kid you are, and we love the basketball player you are too, and we’d love to have you on our team on a full-ride scholarship to play for us at the University of Michigan. And I said coach, I’m coming. I’m coming out. I don’t need to come see the campus again or anything. I’ve seen it enough. I’m coming, let’s go. I think he  was telling me he’s going to offer me a scholarship and I think I interrupted him. I think I told him before he finished telling me [that] he was offering a scholarship. I think I said, Coach, I’m committed and I’m coming right now. So yeah, it was a great moment. Obviously, a lot of work had gone into that moment. That was the role of the goal, to get an opportunity like that. I’m just grateful that coach saw something in me, saw potential in me, that could help the team win on the court by scoring and rebounding, playing defense, things like that, and look forward to having a great career, hopefully. But then, tragically, nine days later, we were flying to Northern Michigan; this time, the same place we were returning from eight years earlier and as we were preparing to land the airplane, [it] tragically crashed and claimed the lives of my dad and my second mom and almost killed me too; put me in a coma for about two months. And by the grace of God I came out of the coma – nothing else – by the grace of God to come out of the coma and have a long road to recovery. But I had so many people that helped me along the way:  doctors, nurses, therapists, my family and friends; people across the country have prayed for me that I’ll never know, that I’ll never meet, those people helped me overcome it too. So life throws things at us. Those [are] challenges that we can’t control. But I really firmly believe – and this is a lot of my message today – while we can’t get through our challenges, can’t control the adversity we face, we can always control how we choose to respond.

Brian  

I want to give our listeners and viewers that sense of the inconceivable odds that we’re talking about. So again, you survived a second fatal plane crash. And I read that the odds of surviving a plane crash with one fatality involved is one in 3.4 million. And according to an MIT statistician, the odds of surviving two of those with multiple fatalities in both is one in 11.56 quadrillion. Now everybody probably knows what a quadrillion is, but I actually had to look that up. A quadrillion is 1,000 trillion, just unimaginable odds, like I don’t know how many [crosstalk].

Austin  

Yeah, it’s 1,000 trillion, or it’s 100,000 billion, or I think it’s a million millions.

Brian  

That’s right. So right, let’s say 11.56 million million; you probably have a better chance of winning the lotto like 15 times or something. So the doctors didn’t think you would live. The first accident, you emerged fairly unscathed, I think, but you certainly didn’t in the second one, and doctors didn’t think you would live. They felt like if you did, the quality of your life wouldn’t be great, to put it mildly. You talked about the injuries a little bit, you broke – the list of injuries is longer than I’m going to share on the show; we don’t have that much time – but you broke both collarbones, fractured your ribs, you had holes in your lungs, many other injuries, not the least of which was massive brain injuries. And then of course, if that wasn’t enough, when you woke up after being in the coma, at at some point, you learned that your dad and second mom had been killed instantly. I just can’t even imagine what that must have been like for you. I was thinking about this and I don’t think there’s a person on the planet who would blame you for being angry at your dad, at at God, at the manufacturer of the plane or planes – I don’t know if it was the same manufacturer of both. Austin, I know people who struggle with faith, or even the existence of God, it would be very easy for them to point to these two experiences and say, you know what, that’s why I’m sure God doesn’t exist, because he wouldn’t allow something like that to happen to an eight year old boy, and certainly wouldn’t allow it to happen to him again when he’s 14. How did you navigate through what must have been just an absolute whirlwind of emotions? What was it that caused you to respond the way you have and to use these tragedies not only to navigate through life on your own – which I am sure even today it has to be incredibly difficult, especially at certain times and on certain days as you’re reminded of certain things in your family – but you’ve used it to, not only overcome adversity yourself, but to help others work through the tough times in their life. How did that happen?

Austin  

I think it comes from when I learned to associate adversity with like, we can’t control the challenges we face, like in sports, you can’t control what the other team does. You play, you do your best, you’re going to lose the game sometimes. The ball is not always going to bounce your way. That’s life; the ball doesn’t always bounce our way obviously, and when it doesn’t, it’s either you can feel sorry for yourself and say why did we not get the lucky break here, or why did the other team [win], or why did this happen to me. Or you can just acknowledge the reality of the situation and say, okay, this is tough. This challenge – whatever I’m facing is challenging – but I’m going to find a way to grow from this and I’m going to find a way to get better from it. I’m reminded of how Coach Beilein at the University of Michigan would always say, whenever we’d lose a game, he’d say, we’re going to watch the film of the game and we’re going to find a way to get better from it. We would record every game and every practice. So we could literally watch the film, watch the recording of the practice or game and find ways to get better from it. And I think that’s kind of a life idea, though, I think it makes sense for us all to, metaphorically speaking, watch the film of what we experience, like review. Obviously, we’re not all recording every interaction we may have or every challenge, we don’t record the challenges we face, but I think we can replay them in our minds, and think, okay, there were things here that I couldn’t control but there’s some stuff here that I could control. What could I have done better? What could I have done to have an influence on the outcome of this? Or how could I have responded to this better? I’m reminded of how there are a couple [of] lines in the cadet prayer at West Point that I think are really good ways to live life and they especially apply to resilience, to overcoming challenges. The first line is, Lord – and this whatever you believe, from a faith standpoint, I think is this is just a great way to live life – the first line is, Lord, encourage us in our endeavor to live above the common level of life. Second line is, to never to be contained with a half truth and the whole truth can be won. And the last line is, Lord, make us choose the harder right instead of easier wrong. So I’ll go through them real quick. “Encourage us in our endeavor to live above a common level of life”; to overcome challenges to persevere I think we need to – whoever you pray to, whatever your faith is, doesn’t matter – but I think we need to pray for encouragement to do things a little bit uncommon; because it’s a lot more common to feel sorry for ourselves and it’s a lot more common to allow our challenges to control our life or define our life or be the reason we didn’t achieve a goal or be the reason we didn’t get to where we want to be; [it is] a lot more common to do that. The second line, “never be content with a half truth and the whole truth can be won”; I thought on my recovery; there are people that [say]- and I think with challenges in general, it’s easy to say, because I experienced this – this is going to be the reason I don’t achieve my goal or this is going to be the reason I don’t end up where I want to be. Maybe. It could be. What happened to me very well could have been the reason I didn’t get to Michigan, and it maybe would have been an adequate reason. But that’s a half truth. It could have been the reason but it wasn’t a guarantee that I wasn’t going to get to Michigan. So I think the whole truth is, okay, this challenge is tough, but I can find a way to overcome this. I can. It’s not going to guarantee you but it’s possible to find a way to overcome this. And I think that acknowleging that reality, acknowledging that it’s possible to overcome, is very important. And the third line is, “make us choose the harder right instead of easier wrong.” I think overcoming challenges is not right or wrong, but it’s definitely harder. And I think using our challenges to bless other people, again, it’s not right or wrong, but it’s harder to do that. And so I think, just my opinion, I think it’s important to pray for encouragement to choose the harder right. I think, from a life – this is not trying to be too philosophical here on the podcast – but from a life standpoint, if there were more people in the world who chose the harder right instead of easier wrong, I think it’d be a very different place. I just feel like man, if…and I think that now, in our business that we have here, as a husband with my wife, as you know, five months from now, a dad; choosing the harder right instead of easier wrong. I think you have got to learn to do that and create a habit of doing that consistently. I think that’ll help us overcome whatever challenge we face.

Brian  

So that last thing you said, I think, is really important. Because as you’re talking, I was thinking these things are really easy to say, and you and I speak about the same things; I write about things like that and sometimes it just seems like it’s easier said than done. One of the things about you sharing it rather than me sharing it, is somebody can’t say, well, geez, that’s easy for you to say you haven’t faced adversity, or something like that. I mean, you obviously have, and you’re practicing every single thing that you talk about. I’m trying to understand where that comes from, because it comes from somewhere inside of you in a way that most people are challenged getting to that same place. It’s really encouraging to me to hear your story, knowing that. I mean, everybody hears this, right? You can’t control what happens to you, but you can control your response to it; but you’re living that out. When people hear your story and they know what you’ve been through, it’s incredibly encouraging to hear you say that. You talked about faith. You mentioned faith a couple times. I’m curious about your personal faith. What role does faith play in your life in helping you to navigate through, again, what I’m sure still is an incredibly difficult journey.

Austin  

I think, without faith, what do you have? For me [this] tragedy, some could say I lost everything. People have said that and I get it, for sure. But I’ve got my faith and it’s been tested. I think one thing that I’ve learned is that it’s easy to view God in light of your circumstances, at least it was for me at times. I’ve tried to acknowledge all the good that’s been done in my life despite – I don’t want to say despite the losses, but I guess despite the losses is the right word. The tragedies I’ve experienced are obviously terrible but there’s a lot of good. There’s a lot of good in my life and a lot of good that I don’t deserve. I don’t deserve to have the wife I do. I mean, I completely out kick my coverage, right. I completely did, just like my dad did with my mom. It’s amazing. I’ve been blessed to have an incredible extended family; my grandparents, on both sides, and aunts, uncles, cousins, and the doctors and nurses who took care of me. One thing that I found also – not to get away from the faith standpoint, but in life in general, this is something that I’ve said in the past, being at engagements and stuff like that, this is just what I found from my experience – it’s hard to be grateful and negative at the same time. (Brian:  Yes.) It’s very hard to be grateful and negative at the same time, right? I’m so grateful for my wife, grateful for our life, now grateful for the chance to do what I’m doing in sharing my message across the country. And I’m grateful for the chance to be dad in a few months. There are all these things that I have to be grateful for, there’s still the loss, there’s still the negative. All of those things I mentioned, the great things in life don’t diminish the loss. But it’s hard to feel sorry for myself and focus and spend too much time and energy dwelling on them because I’ve got so many good things in my life. I just choose to focus on those. You can also focus on the bad. I mean, it’s like every night at six on the news, whatever network you watch, you basically get the same kind of stuff. I think the media’s figured out that America is addicted to negative information. You don’t really ever turn off the news and turn to your wife or husband or significant other and say hey, babe, I feel really good about the state of things in America, I feel like things are trending up. You don’t really ever do that, at least I never responded that way. Usually it’s, what bad thing happened today? What are they making a story out of? And I’m not saying the bad things are not important because they are, but I think it just makes for a better life to focus on the good. And I think if we just learn to not view God in light of our circumstances and just remember, none of us – at least this is just my opinion – none of us deserve the life we have. I feel, at least for me, I feel like I’m blessed and blessed much more than I deserve, much more. There are so many examples, in the Word it says, consider James 1:2-3; “consider pure joy when you face trials of many kinds, because the testing of your faith produces perseverance.” No one’s joyful when they experience challenges but you can grow from it, though. I think the joy is in the promise you have in heaven. The challenges you face don’t take that away from you, you still have that to look forward to. I know I’m going to see my family again someday. Obviously, it’s terrible that they’re not here, but how can you not just be grateful? How can you not believe when you know that you’re going to see them again someday? I just feel that if you don’t have faith, what do you have? Because things of this world are fleeting; nothing’s for sure, nothing’s permanent. I’ve obviously realized [that] you think your family is permanent, but unfortunately, my experiences have shown that it’s not, tragically, but faith is always there. So why wouldn’t you believe. It’s funny, people will say none of what happened – Christ died, the resurrection, whatever – say none of that’s true. But then how are there billions of people around the world that have believed for thousands of years? It’s just amazing; I just don’t feel like I deserve it. And again, just to go back to this the main point, it is hard to be grateful and negative at the same time. If you’re grateful that Christ died for us and, just my opinion, we have the promise of eternal life to look forward to someday, how can you not have faith?

Brian  

You’re right, you cannot be grateful and negative at the same time. You can drop the gratitude and suddenly turn negative but you can’t hold both of those feelings at the same time. It’s impossible. So what’s helped you – and obviously faith is part of it – but what caused you to focus on the positive when you had every reason…and again, nobody would have blamed you a single bit for focusing on the tragedy and the negative and the things that haven’t gone well in your life.

Austin  

I think it just makes for a much more enjoyable life to focus on the good. And I found, on my recovery, if I could increase the likelihood of making a successful comeback by simply shifting my perspective from the negatives to looking for the good, why wouldn’t I do that? And it’s the same in basketball; you’re supposed to think every shot’s going in. If you think you’re going to miss your shot, you’ll probably miss more than you’ll make. But if you make it, it will give you a slightly better chance of making more than if you think you’re always going to miss, so why not have that positive attitude? Why not believe that the best is yet to come? I mean, why wouldn’t we? For me, it’s like you were saying, what caused you to choose to have that perspective, it’s why wouldn’t I, why not? Why not focus on the good, why not be positive? Why not live life to the fullest? Why not bring energy to every situation? And I know you’ll understand this, my mom was the kind of lady that lit up every room she went in, every room. And there are some people they lighten up the room when they leave, though. [Chuckle.] So I want to be the person who’s like my mom; lighten up the room when I enter.

Brian  

That’s well said, and I obviously agree with everything that you said. I’m very happy that you’ve chosen that direction and one of the reasons is because you have an opportunity to impact people with your message. If you were curled up in a corner somewhere, you wouldn’t be impacting people in the way that you are, so I appreciate that. Have you ever wondered why you got to be the one who survived? And what responsibility or opportunity at least do you feel like you have because you survived?

Austin  

I have wondered that. It’s just the way things happen. I believe God saved my life for a reason. I think he kept me here so I can use what I went through to help others. I don’t know why I survived. That’s not a question I’ll ever know the answer to but I just think, I don’t know why, but since I’m here, I’m going to make the most of it. I just feel a responsibility to carry on my family’s legacy and make my dad proud, my mom proud, my siblings proud. It’s a little bit of a burden to have had my family’s – I don’t want to say a weight on my shoulders, but I’m the only one left. And so I think that the Hatch family name kind of rides on me and and on my wife; we’re going to build a family of our own here obviously, in a few months. It’s so terrible what happened and what we lost but I’m just grateful that I have this life to live now and grateful for the impact I can make on people.

Brian  

Me too. Austin, your dream from the time you were young was to play basketball at the University of Michigan. Your mom graduated from U of M and I’m guessing that was part of the reason that you wanted to become a Wolverine. For most people, that dream would have been crushed at the point that they were in a near fatal plane crash and had to re-learn to walk, talk and eat again. But you – as everyone listening to or watching the show certainly realizes by now -are far from most people. Tell us about the miraculous journey from June of 2011 to suiting up in a maize and blue basketball uniform and playing at Chrysler Arena.

Austin  

I was so blessed to be given an opportunity to play for Michigan when Coach Beilein offered me a scholarship June 15, 2011. And then the accident that happened tragically, nine days later almost took my life. I came out of the coma by the grace of God and amazing doctors too. I couldn’t have done it without everybody; all the therapists who helped me on my recovery, all my family, all my friends – I just feel such gratitude for the journey, what I learned from it and how other people contributed and helped me along the way – I couldn’t have done it without them. One big thing for me in life in general, we set goals for ourselves; I’m sure you have goals, I’m sure people listening to this have goals. And we may have a game plan of what we think we’re going to need to do to achieve those goals. But I can almost guarantee for everybody listening, who has a goal they’re working towards, life is going to throw some sort of, not roadblock, but little detour on the path to achieving that goal. It’s going to happen at some point, whether big or small. I think you just find a way. You mentioned the recovery, a lot of people would have seen that as a dead end; this is why I’m not going to make it to [the University of] Michigan. I think the thing for me in life, in general, it’s a lot more common to have, not an excuse, but have a reason for why something didn’t work. I didn’t get to Michigan because of this, or this second plane crash happened, that’s why I didn’t get to Michigan. I wasn’t going to let that happen, though, I wasn’t going to say this is why I didn’t achieve my goal. I was always determined to have it be, okay, this happened, I’m still going to find a way to achieve my goal. It’s not going to look the same as it would have before; the achievement wouldn’t have been the same. I just think I wouldn’t achieve the goal the same way I would have because a lot of times after experiencing a challenge, we’ll have to find a different way to win, right? If winning is achieving the goal, and you can win by achieving the goal with no challenge, that’s a win. But if you experience challenge, to still win the game, you’re going to have to find a different way. And so I did. I just [had to] find a different way to win and find a way to get to Michigan. I had a great experience there with Coach Beilein and my teammates. If we say we are laser focused on a goal, I think we’ll just find a way. I think to achieve anything in life, anything significant in life, you have got to find a way.

Brian  

You’ve obviously done that. As you reflect back on your basketball experience at Michigan – and I’m differentiating that because I know you had another highlight experience that I’ll mention in a minute and you’ve mentioned already – but in terms of your basketball experience at Michigan, what was the highlight? What was that moment that you reflect back on? And realize that you didn’t allow tremendous adversity to stop you from achieving your goal? What was the point at which you realized that?

Austin  

I think the day I set foot on campus, June 15th, 2011 and got out of the car, I recall it as clear as day, went to shake Coach Beilein’s hand, just say, great to see you Coach, so grateful to be here. And he just gave me a big bear hug just like the kind of hugs my dad gave me. And so that moment, for sure, was a big one – the first day I got there. And then my freshman year, I got into a couple games. Coach gave me an opportunity to play. I mean, he put me in at the very end, when we were already winning, we’re up by 20 points, with less than a minute to go, and I got fouled and made a free throw. It was pretty cool; it’s only one point, so not that significant but just in the grand scheme of things, I think about where I was three years and a half years before that moment; they didn’t know if I was going to survive. A lot can happen in three and a half years, a lot can happen if you put in the work. I’m just so grateful for Coach Beilein and all he’s done for me. I mean, that man really changed my life forever. It’s actually one thing I talk about when I speak; the integrity that he showed, to follow through on his commitment to me despite the change in circumstance. The integrity that he showed – that changed my life forever. I mean, if he doesn’t follow through on his commitment, I don’t meet my wife, we don’t get married, we wouldn’t have our family; so generations of the Hatch family name were impacted by one man following through on his commitment when there was a change in circumstance. I think about that when I speak to organizations; if we can all do that, if we can all have our follow through in our commitments it would be a no brainer, regardless of circumstance. The team’s going to win, however you define winning. So back to your question. So that moment: getting to Michigan, Coach Beilein, giving him a big hug, the free throw that I made for me personally, and then my senior year going to the national championship game against Villanova in San Antonio. It was a pretty cool way to end.

Brian  

It’s an awesome career. And you’ve said very nice things about Coach Beilein throughout the show and he obviously has equal admiration for you. It’s great that you’ve forged that kind of relationship. Austin, I know family is everything to you and you’ve talked about Abby already. You two met in Ann Arbor and seven years and one day after your second accident, you are married. You announced recently that you’re having a baby boy, which is awesome. How do you think your life experiences thus far shape who you are as a husband? And how you’ll be as a dad? I’m sure you’ve thought about that a lot already.

Austin  

I think more so than my life experiences, like alluding to the tragedies that I experienced, more than that, the way I was raised. Both my parents, especially my dad, because…and obviously it’s both my mom and my dad, those first eight years my parents crammed more into eight years than I think most people cram in their whole life, what they taught me and how they shaped me from the very beginning. The way I saw my dad just be a good husband, a good father and how involved he was in my life and how he was always present. The effort, the intentionality he had toward our relationship. He was busy, a doctor, treating 50 or 60 patients every day like crazy, busy guy, right? But he always made time for me. I say made time for me; I think there’s life-work balance and there’s work-life balance. I think my dad, the way he did it, it was life-work. Obviously, your career is very important, my career is important, [inaudible] is important. But being a husband and a dad, it was a priority. There’s an infinite number of lessons I learned from both my parents and just how loving they were and how supportive…there are so many things that I could talk about, from the kind of woman my mom was, just amazing. I think the thing, especially though…I don’t want to say that I wasn’t grateful before I experienced the losses that I did, but I think my life experiences have made me all the more grateful. I didn’t need to go through what I did to share that lesson with our kids but I really want to emphasize gratitude in life. Because when you think about it, pretty much everything in life comes back to gratitude; the way you treat people, the way you approach things, the way you go about business, the way you write, the way you look, the way you love your wife, your family. It’s like, man, if I’m grateful for my wife I’m not going to be a jerk to her. I’m grateful for our son, I’m not going to be a dad that goes halfway. I’m not going to be a dad that’s absent all the time, that’s gone all the time, doesn’t make any effort. I’m just especially grateful. I think that’s the thing that I’ve learned from the challenges that I face is just to have an immense amount of gratitude for everything; the big things and little things.

Brian  

I don’t know of anyone personally who’s experienced more adversity than you have. And yet, I remember Coach Beilein saying that you told him you’ve really only had two bad days in your life. I guess after talking to you a little more, I can understand why you truly feel that way. Those aren’t just words and it really comes back to gratitude that you’ve talked so much about. But what advice do you have, Austin, for people who are struggling or who are facing some kind of adversity, who just can’t get to that point of gratitude? Or for whom life just isn’t going that great right now? What kind of encouragement do you offer people like that?

Austin  

I’d say, set a goal. Set a goal, set something to work towards, that you can do that you’re working towards every day. And I think having goals is extremely important in life. Having reasons to get up in the morning, reasons to get out of bed, things to work towards. Set goals. For me, it was to get to Michigan. Coming out of a coma, I couldn’t walk. I’m going to get to Michigan one way or another. I’m going to find a way. So I think setting a goal is very important and find things to be grateful for, because since like the beginning of time, whenever civilization started, I think people that have had…the human race has had an innate ability to find what we’re looking for it right? Like, if people were looking for food thousands of years ago, they would find it, whether it was berries or whether it was hunting animals or whatever. Or if they’re looking for shelter, they would make it or they would find something; make a little hut or place to sleep, or somewhere that could give them some protection. Find what you’re looking for. If you look for the positive, look for reasons to be grateful, you’ll find them. But conversely, if we only look for the negative, we’ll find them too. Because there are a lot of reasons to be negative in the world too. Like I was mentioning, you turn on the news; there are plenty of reasons to be negative. So I think, set a goal, find a reason to be grateful. I think I alluded to this when we were talking a little while ago about the cadet prayer at West Point, the three lines are all great. But I think especially when it comes to dealing with challenges, I think the third one is especially important, and it’s “make us choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong”. But choosing the harder right, versus the easier wrong is different for everybody. Every person has a different career, a different life, a different family. If there are things in life where you could go one way, maybe put a little more effort into choose the harder right and I think you will thank yourself later for doing that. So I think for anybody on the call who’s dealing with something; first of all, I’m sorry you’re dealing with the challenges you’re facing but I just encourage you to set a goal, find a way, find reasons to be grateful, find things that you can choose the harder right instead of easier on those three things.

Brian  

That’s great advice. Thanks for sharing that, Austin. I’m truly grateful for your willingness to share your story and I have to tell you, I couldn’t be prouder for the way that you’ve taken your experience of tragedy and incomprehensible loss and used it to help others overcome adversity and accomplish their goals. Thank you so much for being on the show. I really really appreciate you taking the time to get together.

Austin  

Happy to do it. I hope the conversation will provide value for those who listen and I wish you and your family, those close to you, all the very best. And let’s overcome, let’s find a way, let’s persevere. The last line I’ll say, my dad always said, “Aust, go big or go home, man, go big or go hom – don’t waste your time going halfway.” Let’s go big.

Brian  

I love it and Go Blue.

Austin  

Go Blue. Yes, sir. Always.

Brian  

Thanks, Austin.

Austin  

Thank you.

Brian  

Thanks for tuning into Life Excellence. Please support the show by subscribing, sharing it with others, posting about today’s show with Austin Hatch on social media, and leaving a rating and review. You can also learn more about me at BrianBartes.com. Until next time, dream big dreams and make each day your masterpiece.