A Conversation with Legendary Olympic Track and Field Champion Jackie Joyner-Kersee

Jackie Joyner-Kersee is one of the greatest female athletes to grace the planet.

Need proof? 

Her Olympic record alone sets a standard that others have been trying to match for the past 20 years: three gold medals, one silver medal and two bronze medals across four Olympic Games (1984, 1988, 1992 and 1996) and a heptathlon score of 7,291 points in Seoul that has yet to be matched. 

She was also a four-time gold medalist at the World Championships and a star basketball player at UCLA.

In this conversation, Joyner-Kersee talks extensively about how self-discipline, rooted in her deeply held Christian faith, served as the foundations for elite competitive success,

Bonham: It takes a lot of self-discipline to be an elite athlete, but who modeled that concept for you when you were growing up in East Saint Louis?

Jackie Joyner-Kersee: It was my mom. My family modeled it, but my mom was a strong believer in being a disciplinarian. She would tell me that in order for me to do anything, there were certain things I had to accomplish first. If I wanted to go to the community center or if I wanted to go to the track, first I had to make sure my homework was done. Then I had to make sure my room was cleaned up. If everything was right in her eyes, then I was able to go play.

I saw my mom work hard day in and day out. She got up early in the morning to get ready for work, catch the bus and make sure she got to her job on time. She always told us she’d be home at 3:30 and she was always home at 3:30. She made sure there was food on the table so we could eat. That was a living example of example and doing the small things.

Bonham: How did you see discipline play out in your youth and throughout your athletic career?

Joyner-Kersee: As a student, discipline helped me get to school on time. School started at 8 o’clock, but I would get there at 7:30. That discipline overlapped into what I was doing athletically. If you have an event scheduled for a certain time and you’re a minute late, then you are disqualified. If I was working a job and I was supposed to be there at 9 o’clock, I wouldn’t just show up at nine. I’d get there before nine. All of this has helped me understand the importance of discipline.

Discipline is also about respecting other people’s time. My mom was a strong believer in that. My coaches would usually pick me up and she didn’t want them waiting for me. If they were going to be there at a certain time, it was not their responsibility to come to my door to see if I was ready. No, I was supposed to be ready to go before they got there. That’s showing respect for them. Discipline has played a major role across the board in my life. 

Bonham: What did you have to do in order stay disciplined as an Olympic caliber athlete?

Joyner-Kersee: I had a routine every day. I was at the track at 7:30 in the morning doing my warm ups before (coach and now husband) Bobby (Kersee) would get there. One of the things that Bobby would request of us is that we do our warm ups so that when he showed up, we would be ready to go. That helped me get prepared for competitions where you have to be warmed up and ready to go before the race. I had to train for seven to eight hours a day. It was tough to do, but I had to discipline myself to go through that because it was the same thing I would have to do when I competed. It’s like going to school. You read, you study and then you have the exam.

Sunday was always our spiritual day. We didn’t train on Sundays. I always made sure I was going to church and that those things were a part of my lifestyle. 

Bonham: What are the benefits of discipline?

Joyner-Kersee: Time management is one of the great benefits of discipline. It helped me a lot when I got to college. That’s where you really need time management. I had to get to class on time and schedule my day. That was crucial. 

Bonham: How did you make sure you stayed disciplined?

Joyner-Kersee: It’s a mindset. It has a lot to do with goal setting. Goals were and still are a part of my life. When you have goals, you know that there are certain things you can and cannot do. That’s where the discipline comes in. I knew that a lifestyle of partying and going out wasn’t something I didn’t want to do. I knew it would distract me and get me off the course of what I wanted to do.

Bonham: What were some challenges you faced as an athlete?

Joyner-Kersee: With me being an asthmatic, my discipline was really tested. I always had to make sure I took my medicine on a regular basis. I had to respect the disease. I couldn’t live in denial. I was considered to be this great athlete and I didn’t want to believe that I had asthma. But there were times I was extremely sick and I wouldn’t take my medicine so I had to discipline myself to take my medicine and do the things I had to do to keep my asthma under control.

Discipline became a big part of my survival. You know that you’re a world class athlete but then you get out on the track and can’t even run a mile or even a lap. Then you start questioning. You start doubting. Talk about having faith. Then I realized I had to start treating asthma the way I treated my training. Asthma became one of my opponents. I’m trying to beat it and these are the things I have to do on a daily basis. I look at my pulmonologist as my friend and not my enemy. I started using him as a coach. He and the nurses were trying to help me. That was the mindset. Then I started keeping a journal. I would write down the days I was feeling great. If they’d just cut the grass at the track, that was a red flag. I knew that would be a problem. If I had a bad day, I’d write it down and begin to question why I had a bad day.

I did a lot of visualization. This is easy to say and difficult to do. You have to weed out toxic people in your life. They might be the coolest person. They might be your best friend. But emotionally, if you’re on a roller coaster all the time, it’s not really a good situation. That’s tough but that’s where the discipline comes in and you start realizing that you’ve got to figure out a way to get out of that relationship. You have to learn how to say no and sometimes that’s saying no to the people closest to you.

I always try to focus my energy on the things I have control over because if you succumb to the things you have no control over, it zaps your energy and you lose your focus. I’m not trying to control anyone, but it’s making sure I’m controlling my own destiny. 

Bonham: What role has spiritual discipline played in your life?

Joyner-Kersee: I am a firm believer in faith and the discipline to believe that I could travel to California and go to UCLA and go on to make Olympic teams. It took discipline to hold strong and believe in myself and for others to believe in me. That was a test. It took discipline to separate myself from negativity and not to let the drug-infested community suck me in. That took a lot of discipline for a girl growing up in East St. Louis where there was (population) people and to go onto a place where millions lived and to go out there and know that I was going with a dream in mind. It took discipline to not fall victim to the things that might pull me away from that dream. 

Bonham: How can leaders be more disciplined?

Joyner-Kersee: When I was younger, I told myself all I wanted to do was to improve a tenth of a second or a half of an inch if I was running or jumping. If I made a C, how could I take that C and turn it into a B. The steps are realistic goals and small steps to get there. In some cases, you might go leaps and bounds, but I think it’s so important to take the small steps and appreciate those small steps while you’re struggling so that when things start to get a little easier for you, you won’t forget the discipline it took for you to get there. 

Bonham: How has the Bible inspired you to a life of discipline?

Joyner-Kersee: In sports and throughout my life, there have been so many challenges. You think about the patience of Job. I lost my mom when I was a freshman in college. I dealt with being an asthmatic. I had the dream of going to the Olympics. People would tell me I had to be patient. I had to wait. Not that I can compare myself to Job, but there’s the understanding of that kind of patience and discipline. At nighttime when I went to bed, I wouldn’t pray for patience because I realized I was already living through it. I was being taught to be patient. When the opportunity presented itself, I would be ready. I was thankful for the things I had gone through so that one day I could share with others and help them. 

Bonham: How does the concept of purpose fit into your outlook on life?

Joyner-Kersee: I truly believe that God gives us things that we can handle. If we don’t handle things properly, it will be slowly taken away. I don’t know quite yet what my purpose is, but I know that God is using me as a tool in the way He thinks I should be used, not what I think my purpose is. That purpose is still being defined. So that’s why I live each day with the understanding, I don’t know what tomorrow is going to bring. Mom would always say, "Jackie, don’t tell me about tomorrow. Take care of today."

Taking care of today means staying disciplined. If you’re worried about tomorrow, you’ll get off track from the purpose that God has before you. That’s where the mental and emotional discipline comes into place. I’m not going to let one over take the other. You have to understand that you have a purpose and you can’t take your existence for granted.

Bonham: How has your faith helped you deal with tragedy in your life such as losing your mother and your sister-in-law and fellow Olympic champion Florence Griffith-Joyner?

Joyner-Kersee: That’s where your faith comes in and your belief in God and not losing sight of what my mom would have wanted for me or even Florence. We have to be strong for one another. Even in dealing with the loss of a mother or a sister-in-law, having a brother, having sisters, there’s strength. It’s so important because when I’m strong, I’m giving them strength too. We all feed off one another.

Check out Chad Bonham’s book Glory of the Games featuring Olympic athletes such as Shannon Miller, Dave Johnson, Josh Davis, Tamika Catchings, Ruth Riley, Michael Chang, and Tobin Heath.

  

Lead photo courtesy of Erik van Leeuwen.