J.J. McCarthy, “Nine,” and the Identity You Take Into the Arena

There are days I really miss sports.
Not the trophies, not the cardio, not the drills.
I miss the atmosphere.
The smell of the gym.
The way the air gets heavier before a game.
The chance to finally show what you’ve been working for.

Growing up in sports taught me something that I didn’t understand until years later:
every athlete has a performance.
But as adults, or teens in treatment, or people working through recovery and life… we forget that. We think performance only happens inside painted lines. We think competition ends when the whistle blows.

But your life is still testing you.
Your mind is still testing you.
And every single day you are stepping into an arena, whether you see it or not.

This week I was thinking a lot about J.J. McCarthy.
Not because he’s perfect or because his stats always match his work…
but because he knows who he is when he steps into the lines.
He even has an alter ego: “Nine.”
A version of himself who shows up when the pressure hits.

You might hear “alter ego” and think it’s fake.
But it’s not.
It’s identity.
It’s the same thing you see in Kobe, in MJ, in Deion, in every fighter who has to tell themselves the truth when nobody else will.

And here’s the truth:
Most of us are held back by the boundaries we put on ourselves.
Not our talent.
Not our environment.
Not our story.

We decide we’re “not that guy.”
We decide “that’s just how I am.”
We decide the past defines us, or the future scares us so much that we freeze.

In my book MENTAL: A Health Collective, I write:
“The work you avoid becomes the wall between you and the person you’re trying to become.”
And that wall usually shows up in your identity long before it shows up in your performance.

When we live in the past, we get depressed.
When we sit in the future, we get anxious.
But when we step into the present with intention, effort, and honesty… that’s where the psychic change happens.
That’s where we get to reinvent ourselves.

So here’s the question:
Who are you when you walk into your lines?
And if you don’t play sports anymore, what are those lines now?

For me, the lines are my day.
The alarm clock.
The journal.
The work I do with kids.
The videos I make.
The book I wrote to save somebody else’s life.

That’s my performance.
That’s where I get to show what I’ve worked for.
And the more I show up, the more I become the person I’m trying to build.

You don’t need a stadium to have game day.
You need purpose.
You need identity.
You need the courage to walk into the lines and say,
“Today, this is who I am.”

So let me ask you this, especially if you’re a young man reading this:
Do you have an alter ego?
Not a mask.
Not a character.
A version of yourself that shows up with confidence, discipline, and intention.

Who are you for your family?
Who are you at school?
Who are you at treatment?
Who are you when no one is watching?

Because if you don’t choose that identity, life will choose it for you.
And I promise you, you won’t like the version it hands you.

Build it.
Name it.
Walk into the lines with it.
Your work is your performance. Your life is your arena.
And you are allowed to reinvent yourself every single day.