What a Standing Ovation Couldn’t Give Him
Richer Soul Podcast • Episode 514• Dr. Jack Groppel
The Modern Problem
Most people who have built something real have, at some point, mistaken the next accomplishment for the thing that would finally settle an old account. Dr. Jack Groppel spent decades doing exactly that. He co-founded a company Johnson and Johnson bought. He filmed elite athletes for Nike and the Chicago White Sox. He briefed Congress. And underneath all of it sat a single, unfinished transaction: he was still trying to earn his father’s love.
The Hidden Pattern
Jack’s father never said the words “I love you” to him until Jack was 46 years old. So Jack built a childhood and then a career on the belief that the way to get there was to accomplish something. An award. A standing ovation. A congressional briefing. Each one bought him nothing lasting, because approval that has to be earned through performance was never the same currency as love that’s simply given. The clearest proof of this arrived at a sold-out venue in St. Louis, where Jack shared a stage with the broadcaster Paul Harvey and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, in front of his own parents. He gave what he calls the best talk of his life and got a standing ovation. His father’s response was that Paul Harvey had been the better speaker that day.
The Assumption We Carry
The assumption underneath achievement addiction is that the next accomplishment, if it’s big enough, will finally close the gap. It won’t, because the gap was never about the size of the accomplishment. It was about who was withholding something, and why.
The Clearer Lens
That night, Jack went to his father’s house and made him say the words out loud. And then something shifted. He describes deciding, in that moment, that he could no longer spend his life trying to please a father who might never give it freely, and that he would instead direct that effort toward his faith. The accomplishment didn’t change. The target did.
The Implication for Life
What followed was not more achievement. It was a near-fatal hospitalization in 1996 that forced the issue, a recommitment to faith, and eventually the adoption of a son from China in the same year Jack’s own father died and his company sold. Years later, Jack took that son to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. Near the summit, his son was too exhausted to speak. He simply lifted his trekking pole and said, “I got this, Dad.” Jack had spent a lifetime trying to hear something close to that from his own father. On the mountain, he got to say it back, to someone who could receive it.
One Question to Sit With
What are you still trying to earn that was never going to be given to you the way you needed it?
About Dr. Jack Groppel
Jack Groppel, PhD, is an internationally recognized authority in sport science and human performance. A Hall of Fame coach, scientist, and entrepreneur, he cofounded the Johnson & Johnson Human Performance Institute, where he helped leaders and Fortune 50 companies apply the same principles used to train world-class athletes. Groppel’s pioneering research in biomechanics and performance training influenced generations of athletes, including the Chicago White Sox, and Nike, and he was the founding chair of the USTA Sports Science Committee. Honored with the Distinguished Alumni Award from the College of Applied Health Sciences at the University of Illinois in 2025, Groppel has spoken at the United Nations, U.S. Congress, and global conferences.
Links
Website: https://jackgroppel.net/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackgroppel/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@jackgroppel1
Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@richersoul
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