by Tom Brady
Dab of coconut oil
1/4 cup raw cashews
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1/2 cup water
1 tsp. thyme (picked)
Pinch of red pepper flakes (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste
Rub red pepper with coconut oil. Roast the pepper over an open flame, turning periodically, until the entire surface is blackened.
Place blackened pepper in a mixing bowl and cover for 15 minutes (allowing it to soften and absorb flavor from roasting).
Peel pepper, but leave a few small flecks of burnt skin (discarding the rest). Cut pepper open to discard seeds, but do not run pepper under water.
Place pepper in a high-powered blender with cashews, water, lemon, and red pepper flakes (if desired) and blend until smooth.
Season with salt and pepper. Fold sauce into cooked pasta. Sprinkle thyme on top.
COOKING ASPARAGUS
1/4 pound asparagus
1 tsp. garlic (minced)
1/2 tbsp. coconut oil
Salt and pepper to taste
In a sauté pan over medium heat, toast garlic lightly in coconut oil.
Turn heat to medium-low, add asparagus, and cover for 4–6 minutes (until asparagus is slightly tender).
Season with salt and pepper.
BRADY BOWL
This recipe is quick and easy to prepare, but still combines a variety of delicious flavors and interesting textures.
MAKING LEMONGRASS CURRY SAUCE
4-inch lemongrass stalk (smashed)
2 cups water
1/4 cup raw cashews
1/4 cup raw Brazil nuts
1/2 tbsp. lime juice
1 tsp. rice wine vinegar
1 tbsp. curry powder
Salt to taste
In a saucepan over medium heat, bring lemongrass and water to a boil, and simmer down to about 3/4 cup of total liquid.
Strain and put into a high-powered blender with nuts, lime juice, vinegar, and curry powder and blend until smooth. Season with salt.
PREPARING SWEET POTATOES, BROCCOLI, AND KALE AND ASSEMBLING BOWL
3/4 cup quinoa (soaked and cooked)
1 cup kale (chopped)
1/2 cup broccoli (small florets)
1 medium sweet potato
1 tbsp. shredded carrot
1/2 tbsp. garlic (minced)
1 tbsp. tamari almonds (chopped)
1 tbsp. coconut oil
Salt to taste
2 tbsp. water
2 tbsp. lemongrass curry sauce
FOR SWEET POTATOES: Scrub sweet potato under cold water, dry, and bake at 375°F for 25 minutes. Let cool and cut into wedges, then toss with 1/2 tbsp. coconut oil and salt. Lay wedges cut side up on a perforated sheet pan lined with parchment paper and bake at 375°F for 35 minutes (until crispy).
FOR BROCCOLI: In a small sauté pan over medium heat, add 2 tbsp. water and broccoli. Cover and steam for 1 minute. Remove broccoli and wipe pan dry.
FOR KALE: In a small sauté pan over medium heat, toast garlic in 1/2 tbsp. coconut oil until golden brown. Turn off heat, add kale, and cover for 1 minute (until kale is wilted).
Arrange all components side by side in a bowl. Serve 2 tbsp. of lemongrass curry sauce and almonds on the side.
GREEN JUICE
This alkalizing green juice is a great way to start the day.
1 bunch broccoli stems
1 cucumber
1/2 pound kale
1 green apple (optional)
2 stalks celery
1/2 lemon (peeled)
2 inches fresh turmeric
1 inch fresh ginger
Put all ingredients in juicer and extract juice. Drink within 15 minutes (on an empty stomach) for best results.
SMOOTHIES
These smoothies are ideal for refueling after a workout.
BLACKBERRY ACAI SMOOTHIE
1 cup blackberries
1 acai pack (3.5 oz)
1 medium banana
1/3 cup raw coconut water
1 large medjool date (pitted)
1/2 tbsp. raw cacao powder
Blend all ingredients in a high-powered blender for 1–2 minutes (until smooth).
NOTE: Frozen raw coconut meat can be purchased online, or can be extracted from fresh Thai coconuts using proper tools (which are also available online). Alternately, an additional banana or 1/3 cup cashews can work as a substitute (just be sure to blend fully if using cashews).
BLUEBERRY BANANA SMOOTHIE
3/4 cup blueberries
3/4 cup almond milk
1 medium banana
1/2 tbsp. flaxseed (ground)
1 tbsp. chia seeds
1 tbsp. hemp seeds
Blend all ingredients in a high-powered blender for 1–2 minutes (until smooth).
ORANGE COCONUT SMOOTHIE
2/3 cup fresh orange chunks (peeled)
2/3 cup raw coconut water
1/3 cup coconut meat (from young coconuts)
1 medium banana
1 inch fresh turmeric
1 lemon wedge (peeled)
Blend all ingredients in a high-powered blender for 1–2 minutes (until smooth).
GREEN APPLE SMOOTHIE
3/4 cup apple (chunks)
1/2 cup raw coconut water
1/3 pound fresh spinach
1 medium banana
Handful of wheatgrass (fresh)
1 lemon wedge (peeled)
Blend all ingredients in a high-powered blender for 1–2 minutes (until smooth).
AVOCADO ICE CREAM
This modern interpretation of ice cream is just as delicious but much healthier. Try topping with coconut flakes, cacao nibs, or toasted almonds.
MAKING AVOCADO ICE CREAM
1 avocado (ripe and soft)
1/2 cup raw cashews
1/2 cup coconut meat (from young coconuts)
1 1/2 cups dates (pitted)
1 cup raw cacao powder
1 1/4 cups water
Blend all ingredients in a high-powered blender until smooth.
Put mixture in freezer until ice cream reaches desired thickness. (For quicker ice cream, freeze half of the water into ice cubes before blending.)
Scoop ice cream into 4 dishes and serve with your choice of topping.
TB12 ACTION STEPS:
• Focus on eating real food, preferably organic and mostly plant based.
• Eat some percentage of your vegetables raw—that is, uncooked.
• Shop and eat locally as much as possible. Most supermarket foods have traveled long distances and been frozen and thawed before reaching the shelves.
• Try to eliminate or cut back on foods that cause chronic inflammation, including fast foods, processed foods, and the five W’s: white bread, white pasta, white potatoes, white milk, and excess white salt.
• Supplement your dietary regimen by taking, at minimum, a multivitamin and a B complex.
A good night’s rest is critical to my on- and off-field performance.
CHAPTER 9
BRAIN TRAINING, REST, AND RECOVERY
BY NOW IT’S CLEAR THAT my method for sustained peak performance focuses on pliability, hydration, nutrition, and supplementation. The goal is to strengthen through workouts and lengthen and soften through pliability sessions, which exercise my muscles but prevent any added inflammation in my body. But just as important to creating a healthy inner environment are our thoughts, emotions, and attitudes. Are they positive or negative? Does it matter whether you eat and drink well if your thoughts are angry or you go around feeling like a victim? What if you have a positive attitude but you eat poorly? The bottom line is that unless you create a healthy inner environment and a healthy outer environment, you won’t achieve overall health and well-being.
That’s why another amplifier of pliability is brain fitness, starting with maintaining the right mind-set and attitude, whether it’s during a game or in life, and doing actual exercises to train and develop you
r cognitive focus.
IT BEGINS WITH THE RIGHT MIND-SET
During the season, one of my biggest priorities is making sure I have the right mental toughness and attitude. As I said earlier, much of the success I’ve been lucky enough to have in my career I owe to a lifelong “will-over-skill” mind-set. Maybe you’ve noticed that my competitive drive on the field extends to everything I do. When I’m asked about what motivates me, it always comes down to the coulda/shoulda question. If I don’t play my best, why am I disappointed? Because I coulda, shoulda played better, done better, worked harder, prepared more. It could be my effort, my execution, or my mind-set—it doesn’t matter. In the end, for me it’s less about the outcome than it is about whether I put in the best effort relative to our team’s potential. Some games we may win by a big margin, and in others we may be outscored, but the ones I remember best are the closely fought games in which, no matter what the scoreboard says, our team put in our best effort.
Regardless of the outcome, I always ask myself whether we did the best we were capable of, and what we could do differently and better next time. To me, that’s a big part of creating the right mind-set. Mental toughness is an attitude centered on doing the best you can in the present, while believing you can do even better in the future. For example, during a game my process may have been right, but the outcome wasn’t. So what changes do I need to make in my process to create a better outcome? My motivation has never been connected to externals such as individual accolades or breaking records. Those things have honestly never mattered to me. If I leave practice knowing my throwing mechanics were off, I will refocus my energy to work on the corrections I need to make to sharpen those mechanics. I always want to do better. As I mentioned earlier, I love what John Wooden said—that “Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best you are capable of becoming.” For me, it’s always about what I can do better in the future. That journey is never-ending. In many ways I don’t think I’ll ever be satisfied.
At the same time, I consider mental toughness a learned behavior. When I look back on my career, I have always given my best effort, and never accepted the place I was at—not at Serra High School, not at Michigan, and certainly not in the pros. At certain points, I could have chosen not to keep trying to reach my goals, but I never backed down, and I had a lot of people who supported and encouraged me when I faced my own personal doubts. Together those experiences and people honed my mental toughness in ways they never could have if I hadn’t faced those challenges in the first place. In so many ways, the worst experiences I’ve had in my life have been my best experiences, because I learned the most—and learning turns everything into a positive.
Earlier I said I’ve never thought of myself as a naturally blessed athlete (and neither did anyone else!). The thing is, though, if you’re naturally the best at something, you’re never challenged, and you lose the opportunity to develop the right mental toughness. In general, that’s how things have gone in my life. It may look easy to some people, but it’s never been easy. And because I found that challenges bring out the best in me, today I think back on them as gifts. I fought hard to get to where I am today, which means I know what it means to fight hard. When you’re in a Super Bowl game and your team is three touchdowns down and the clock is running, mental toughness is what makes the difference in the end. In turn, the right mind-set and attitude give us opportunities to do the best we can and to realize the potential that’s in every one of us.
KEEPING POSITIVE
Each day when I wake up, I can choose what I want my outlook to be. I’m naturally a very positive person, and in regard to my health and everything else, I realize I’m an active participant in my decision to feel as healthy as possible at all times. I really don’t like leaving much up to fate—certainly with regard to my football career. If, like me, you’re serious about your peak performance, you need to work hard at the things that are within your control: your work ethic, how you treat your body, and your attitude. Especially your attitude. Things happen sometimes that I don’t welcome or want, but I make the choice to remain positive. That is something within my control. I don’t like to focus on negatives or to make excuses. I am never a victim. I gain nothing if I get angry or frustrated. You can make life a lot harder for yourself by focusing on negative things in your path or making excuses for why things didn’t go your way. Or, you can refuse to take things personally, let them go, learn from them, and become the best version of yourself. It’s a choice. It’s actually your choice. If I throw an interception or have a bad day or make a bad business decision, by staying in that place I will just make things worse. Wisdom, someone said, is about knowing the difference between the things you can control and the things you can’t.
Today, if things go my way, great; and if they don’t, that’s okay, too, since I always have the chance to overcome them in the future. Whenever my team loses a game, it’s an opportunity to learn something. A game is always an experiment. You walk onto the field armed with various strategies, ideas, and hypotheses about how the game will play out, based on things you’ve studied. But in the end, you don’t know what’s going to happen. If we’ve lost but I’ve learned something, the game turns into a positive experiment. Sometimes in the moment it doesn’t feel that way, because the emotions are running so high—but you try to learn and move on. I’m not a robot. In fact, I’m actually a very emotional person. But I’ve learned to use losses in games as ways to be better the next time I take the field.
In all my years playing football with Patriots coach Bill Belichick, he and I have almost always believed we could do better. Sometimes by a little, sometimes by a lot. Other times we knew our team didn’t give our best effort. Usually what I learn afterward, through reviewing game tapes or thinking back on how I felt and what I did on the field, is a greater positive than whatever benefits might have come from winning.
Of course, I’m not naïve, and I know that terrible things can happen in people’s lives. As a public personality, it’s been my privilege over the years to help serve large numbers of people. Sometimes I get the chance to meet with men, women, and children who are going through difficult situations in their lives, whether they’ve been in an accident or are dealing with disease. Almost always I’m the one who comes away feeling inspired, especially when I meet people who’ve been dealt a tough hand and are still facing their challenges with resilience and a positive outlook.
It’s not always possible, but again, if you can learn from experiences that don’t work out, they become positive events. When your team is losing in the third quarter, there’s not a whole lot to be positive about. That’s when I think, If we can manage to come back from this, imagine how incredible a story this is going to be for our fans, for our team, for our families, for our kids, and for our grandkids. Sometimes—not always, but sometimes—a story like that has a happy ending. Look no further than the last quarter of Super Bowl LI. One of my main thoughts during the second half was how much sweeter the victory would be after we came back and won.
CENTERING YOURSELF AND GOING INTO THE ZONE
Cultivating the right mind-set and attitude also means making the time to center yourself, which will give you a better chance of getting “into the zone” during competition. At TB12, our body coaches recommend that every client set apart some time every day—five minutes, ten minutes, half an hour—to bring themselves back to center. For some people, this takes the form of meditation. My wife has been meditating for years and has developed the ability to take a moment to free herself from distraction. Other people find different ways to recenter themselves in order to help get into the zone.
A good way to recenter yourself is by letting your brain get lost in a task or hobby. It might be gardening, painting, drawing, doing crosswords, or taking a walk. Spending sixty seconds doing something you love is better than spending no time at all. I know a businessman who’s on his phone pretty m
uch all the time who insists on hand-washing his family’s dishes most nights after dinner. It’s one of the few times he lets himself zone out. For me, reading magazines, listening to music, driving in my car, lying down in my bed, or working in my garden are the things that help me recenter.
Don’t ever forget that attitude and mind-set are within your control. When I run out before a game for the first time to warm up, a lot of times I’m pumped up. To get into the game mind-set, I might let out a scream. Other times, if I don’t scream, it’s maybe because I’m too pumped up, and I want to balance that energy out. But no matter what I do, I’m always trying to rebalance whatever energy or emotion I feel. If I’m too up, I want to rebalance and settle down. If I need more energy, I will scream, yell, or work myself into a lather to create room for my best performance.
THE THREE-PART TB12 BRAIN TRAINING AND FITNESS PROGRAM
We’ve discussed mind-set, so now let’s talk about the other ways we can train the brain. We focus a lot on our physical fitness, but most of us don’t pay nearly as much attention to the fitness of our minds. The only time we go to a neurologist, after all, is when we get a head injury or a headache that won’t quit, and even during our annual physical, doctors almost never test to see if our brains are working properly. But building and strengthening our brain functioning, and making sure we give our brains the right daily workout, is another critical component of sustaining peak performance.
The TB12 Method has three ways of training the brain. The first is through the neural priming that takes place during pliability. Remember that by creating a physical stimulus—what we call “positive and intentional trauma”—before and after a workout or game, my brain and body learn how I want my muscles to function during practice or game competitions. Muscles naturally tighten when they contract or when they take a hit, but if I train my brain, and by extension my muscles, to remain in a long, soft, primed state, they’ll perform more optimally, with lower risks of injury, by absorbing those forces.