#158 Reza Abedi - Defecting from Iran in the Midst of the Revolution

Wrestling Changed My Life (Wrestling Podcast)

Wrestling Changed My Life

Sports

4.9 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 13 August 2020

⏱️ 80 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

ABOUT THIS EPISODE Reza Abedi was born in Kermanshah Iran and was a 2x Iranian national champion. Life was going great for Reza until the Iranian Revolution of 1978 took hold. Life became very different for Reza and his family after the Revolution. In 1982, Reza and 3 Iranian wrestlers defected from Iran. This is his story. In addition to the podcast, to read Reza's story, check out his book “American Wings, Iranian Roots”. SPONSOR This episode is brought to you by the Wrestling Changed My Life online store. We have podcast T-Shirts, Hoodies, Crew-necks, Stickers and more. Go to Store.WrestlingChangedMyLife.com to shop. ABOUT THE WRESTLING CHANGED MY LIFE PODCAST Hosted by Ryan Warner, the Wrestling Changed My Life Podcast features in-depth interviews with wrestlers and coaches to learn how the sport shaped and molded their lives. By stitching together stories of sacrifice, triumph, defeat and perseverance, the Podcast takes the listener deep inside the world’s oldest sport. New episodes are released every Monday and Wednesday. FOLLOW THE PODCAST WrestlingChangedMyLife.com

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the show folks. This is wrestling changed my life. Here we go.
0:03.6	My aunt was a she was very very intelligent woman educated and lived in Tehran and they said all women have to work the cover.
0:17.3	I mean what I say cover, Ryan, means you can not you can only see your face.
0:22.9	Now it's gotten better.
0:25.1	You can only see your face.
0:27.0	And my aunt said, are you kidding me?
0:28.8	I'm not gonna do this.
0:29.7	You know what they did to people?
0:31.8	They started putting fears in all women by throwing acid in their faces.
0:37.0	We can endure anything and adapt and pivot and change. Wrestling gave us that ability.
0:49.2	I would say nothing in life has impacted me or the things wrestling has taught me in terms of
0:55.0	self-reflection, resilience. Toughness. Some guys have it, some guys don't.
1:00.0	Adversity, 100% how to pick myself up and be a man after I failed.
1:05.0	And everything that has shaped my life and where I'm at today would not be there without the values and basically the lessons I've learned through the
1:14.7	sport of wrestling.
1:15.7	For me, wrestling saved my life because it allowed me to focus and channel my energy.
1:22.1	We're fortunate if you wrestled, because if you rustled,
1:25.0	natural talent helps, but it's 5% of the ingredient.
1:32.0	It pales in comparison to heart and technique and effort.
1:37.0	It humbled me.
1:39.0	Nothing can humble you more than wrestling.
1:42.0	I think it's the learning to... can't humble you more than wrestling.
	...

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