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The BetterLife Podcast: Wealth | Real Estate Investing | Life

#27: Simon Keith

The BetterLife Podcast: Wealth | Real Estate Investing | Life

Brandon Turner and Cam Cathcart

House Flipping, Multifamily, Real Estate, Wealth, Investing, Business, Real Estate Investing, Self-development, Entrepreneurship, Rental Properties, Health

4.8767 Ratings

🗓️ 11 September 2023

⏱️ 62 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Simon Keith is a business coach, keynote speaker, and former professional soccer player with the distinction of being the both the first athlete to ever play a professional sport after receiving a heart transplant as well as one of the longest-living organ transplant recipients in the world.

He is also the founder of the Simon Keith Foundation, which supports children who have undergone organ transplants and raises awareness for organ donation.

In this episode, Simon shares his journey through multiple organ transplants, the challenges of getting back into professional soccer post-surgery, and his entrepreneurial endeavors – including selling multiple businesses and turning a sleepy non-profit organization into a powerhouse driven by business principles.


Simon also speaks about:

  • His upbringing in a super-competitive household and the impact it had on his drive to succeed
  • His father's sacrifices, and how he learned to be a better father himself
  • Moving to London to play professional soccer, but eventually needing to return to Canada due to a heart issue
  • Undergoing a heart transplant in 1986 in Canada, where the procedure was still in the experimental phase
  • The challenges, complications, and short lifespan of heart transplants
  • His return to professional sports with a lack of nerve connections between his heart and brain, and limited cardiac capacity
  • Transitioning from professional athlete to entrepreneur
  • How he was able to extend the lifespan of his heart transplant to 32 years through his own unconventional methods and determination
  • Meeting the father of the 17-year-old who donated his heart to him
  • The need for non-profits to adopt entrepreneurial strategies – including branding, marketing, and profit-making – to attract talent and drive success
  • Receiving the Order of Canada, one of Canada's highest honors
  • The significance of choosing the right life partner for long-term success
  • The importance of checking one's ego and understanding that success comes from asking for help
  • His private venture that has the potential to revolutionize organ donation and transplantation


Simon’s charitable cause:

The Simon Keith Foundation, which “is dedicated to providing financial support primarily to youths who have undergone a life-saving organ transplant who desire a return to an active and healthy lifestyle, and strives to increase organ donor registration through public awareness campaigns”.


Connect with Simon on socials:

https://www.thesimonkeithfoundation.com

https://www.instagram.com/skeith1234

https://www.facebook.com/SimonKeithKeynote

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Everybody's fighting a battle.

0:04.0

The rich, the poor, the successful, the unsuccessful, the popular, the not popular.

0:08.0

Everyone's fighting a battle.

0:09.0

When you're at your darkest and it's tough, and you're, you know, the reality is if you find yourself by yourself,

0:17.0

there's a reason that you're by yourself is because it's time for you to tap into your character and you find out really quick what you're made of.

0:26.6

Welcome to A Better Life with Brandon Turner.

0:29.8

That is me, where world-class guests share their wisdom

0:32.1

on building a better life.

0:33.7

Join me as we explore the habits to the actions

0:35.8

and the beliefs that have guided their journey with the aim of helping you apply those lessons to your own.

0:57.9

Simon Keith, welcome to A Better Life.

1:00.8

Thank you. I'm good, man. I'm good. I'm living a better life too, by the way.

1:04.7

Good. Awesome. I've heard amazing things, but we've not connected before today, so I'm excited to kind of dig into your story. Your legend is what I know. So why don't we start early on? So I know you. I'll tell you what

1:12.8

I do know about you. I know you're a business coach leader today. I know you teach a lot of business

1:16.3

people how to thrive. We'll get into that. You are, when I get this right, a member of the

1:21.0

Order of Canada, which is one of Canada's highest honors. Is that correct? That's correct. Okay. We can dig into what that is later and why you got

1:28.8

that. You're also what I, I don't know, call it claim to fame, but you were the first person to play

1:34.2

professional sports after a heart transplant. That's right. That's correct. And you do a lot of work today.

1:38.9

I don't know if that's a claim to fame. Yeah, I don't know if that's a claim. That happened to me. A claim to infamame? I don't know that's the thing.

1:45.6

It's wild.

1:48.2

And I know you do a lot of work with the organ donation stuff today.

1:51.3

And I would love to dig in that because I don't know anything about that world.

...

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