Julius Thomas | This NFL Journey Makes No Sense (But It Worked)

What does it really take to go from the end of the bench… to the Pro Bowl… to walking away from millions to follow your purpose?

On this episode of the Intangible Podcast, former NFL Pro Bowl tight end turned psychologist, Dr. Julius Thomas sits down with Chris Spencer to break down the intangibles that separate average athletes from elite performers.

Julius shares his unbelievable journey—from struggling as a freshman athlete, to switching from basketball to football late, to catching touchdowns from Peyton Manning—and ultimately stepping away from the game to pursue a deeper calling in mental performance and psychology.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to the Tanger Podcast. I'm here with Julius Thomas. Man, um what a uh tremendous blessing to get to sit down and talk to you. Thank you. Um, but also um the work that you're doing now in in the field that I love today. Um, I actually probably should back up and say Doctor, um, Dr. Julius uh Thomas out. You know, um I've never had not I've not had very many, you know, guys that look like me in this space. And yeah, and I don't have a degree in psychology, but I was I've poured probably in the last um six to eight years into learning about psychology. Yeah, how do we take that and blend it into technology to actually help support young athletes? Yeah uh and so to to hear your story, to hear what you're doing in this world, man, I I thank you and I, you know, love to follow you, keep up with you. Um, but before we get into that, man, um, you know, I've had a chance to hear you talk today, yeah. Um last night. Um take me back to the peak, man, to the pinnacle of you know what society will say, you know, you are as a as an as an athlete, you know. Take me back to those day early days in Denver, yeah uh catching touchdowns, uh making pro bowls, making a lot of money. You know, what was that? What was those moments like for you?

SPEAKER_03 1:19

You know, it was um it was so interesting because my journey was so wild. And like, I'll take you all the way back to high school because I think it's important to kind of give you the whole framework of like, man, what did this, what was his athletic journey like? So in high school, I wasn't able to play football because I was having like bad growing pains in my back. So I missed my freshman football season. Uh, so I played freshman basketball, and it was terrible. I was on the freshman team at the end of the bench as a freshman. And I was actually writing about this the other day, and then it just triggered this thought was my very first game was against Golden Valley in uh the Central Valley of California, about two-hour bus ride from from our high school. I got in a game in the fourth quarter with like six minutes left and fouled out. That was my first high school game.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

Hey, you used all those fouls, man. I used all them fouls.

SPEAKER_03 2:25

Um and then I remember riding back on that bus and asking myself if I wanted to be a bench player, if if I if I saw myself as a person that should be down at the end of the bench. And I told myself, no, I I want to be out there playing. Yeah, and so that whole freshman year, I was grinding and grinding, and I only made it to the sixth man. I never made it to starting. And then from there, I got better and ended up getting a college scholarship to play basketball. One of the first people from Stockton, California to get a D1 college scholarship for basketball. And I was like, wow, amazing. What accomplishment! Yeah, I go to Portland State, and then I'm there. Uh basketball was hard. I was a shortest center in division one, and I was trying everything I could to play, and it was hard for me. And same thing, I'm at the bench, and then my second year I'm on the bench, and then my third year I started playing more, and then my senior year, I was a starter, and so you can see this journey for me. And then I decided, like, you know what, I I think I could be a good footballer.

SPEAKER_00 3:28

We're still talking about basketball. Yeah, we're still talking about the ball. We're still talking about basketball.

SPEAKER_03 3:31

Yeah, I'm 21 years old. I just became uh a starter, right? And so I didn't have these highs. Like, my my most of my athletic career was a mix of being at the end of the bench and being a really good player, then being the end of the bench being a really good player, and the same was true in the NFL. So when I got to Denver, it was a lockout year. Oh, yeah. If there was ever a person that didn't need a lockout, it was the guy that had only been playing football for 11 months.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

Bro, and you're talking to the guy who was a uh first-round draft pick, yeah, that had that five-year, and then lockout happened. I think I'm about to be a free agent, about to get paid, and then here we come with the lockout, and now I have to play an extra year under my old contract. No way with only a 10% bump.

SPEAKER_03 4:20

No way. I was hurt. Oh, that's no, that's hurt. Oh, that that the value lost in that year is crazy.

SPEAKER_02 4:26

Oh, hurt.

SPEAKER_03 4:27

I didn't know that that happened to people because I was just a rookie coming in, and and I was like, okay, I gotta find a way, like, what am I gonna be like as a pro? Like, I don't know. I was at Portland State, I wasn't playing in Alabama, I wasn't playing in Notre Dame, I wasn't playing in a big school. So I was a Division I double A back then, and here I am. I walked into the facility the first day, and they go, Oh, you're a basketball player, huh? We never letting you catch the ball. Like, oh shit. So my first team to the league, baby. Yeah, yeah. I ended up being a starter week one. Like, are you serious? A starter week one, Monday night football versus the Oakland Raiders, which is the same team I grew up being a fan of. Like, what is happening? My second game, I get my first catch, tear the ligaments in my ankle, and I miss two seasons. Oh, so here we go again, right? Yeah, that roller coaster, and then my third year, after pretty much a whole season of DMPs, is when things started clicking. And for me, I was so vindicated. Like when you ask, like, what does it feel like? I was vindicated number one for the belief I had in myself since I'd been a little kid, um, for the effort that I put in, right? Like to keep believing in yourself when you're at the bottom of the roster, when you're the uh active, inactive list, uh guy on the sidelines with the hat and the towel, right? Like, not for you want to be. I knew I could do it. I knew that God had set something before me that that I could be great in this in this in this game. And I was the only person believing it for a long time. And then to be able to come out and have some Pro Bowl years and to be a dominant threat in the past game and to be able to make plays for my team for me was like it was rage. It was years and years of being angry and feeling looked over, feeling like things weren't going my way. And so that vindication was awesome. I I got to have some amazing experiences. Got to catch Payton Manning's 500 touchdown, 51st touchdown. Uh, we set NFL records. Uh, I showed that I could be a dominant force in the NFL, and I was having a good time, but not all a good time. Like I had some contract stuff that was hard for me in the time. I took it really hard. I felt like the the organization, um they weren't honest with me and some stuff. So it was just always a mixed man, but I'm just very grateful.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

Well, you know, I I think um I always like to take things back to our upbringing. Yeah, you know, how we grew up, you know, to have that self-belief in yourself. Like what was your upbringing? What was the thing in your in your early childhood that shaped that kind of mindset? Um, because I truly believe that that is the foundation where you learn to overcome, you get the grit, all those different things um earlier, early in our in our childhood, and other things that start to distract us along the way.

SPEAKER_03 7:29

Adolescent development is what sets the conditions. No, no question about it. You know, as a psychologist, I'm I'm very clear that what happens to you in your family life and what those meaningful years are from you know zero to 13 or everything. And so for me, I had two parents that always wanted to push me to try to be successful in life. Yeah, and both of my parents went to college and they would always talk to me about we want you to be successful. They wanted me to be a doctor, they didn't care so much about sports. Uh, they were trying to push me to be a surgeon, but I was never into it. Um in the faith. Uh, so I went to Christian school growing up. I'm so grateful for my parents for getting me into that environment. Uh loved it. And I was always very ambitious. And I come from a place where not a lot of people are ambitious, and not a lot of people um are curious about what the world is like and how they can be successful. But I was a reader, and so I read books all the time. Like I was a guy that used to get made fun of from for reading books. I read books on the bus, I read books in the car, and like, so I was always reading these books around these people that were achieving things, and then I had my parents that were encouraging me to be my best, and then I knew that great things were possible if you had faith in the most high. And so I think all that came together, and it really made me resilient to the challenges that that could come before you in life. And when my parents got divorced, um, I think that really like brought me into reality that life is really hard.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

Life is really hard.

SPEAKER_03 9:07

Sometimes you're gonna have to take it upon yourself, and you have to go push, and no one's gonna come deliver it to your feet. So I just had to attack and had to be relentless, and that's still today what I always tell myself have relentless attack. If you have relentless attack, watch what happens.

SPEAKER_00 9:24

Man, in that same vein, you're talking about attacking. I mean, you have I I believe two of the unique moments in life, you know, as a as an athlete. And one is, you know, you play basketball and then you go out and football your last year, and then you end up being being drafted to the NFL. Um, that's the first, that's the first unique moment. And I talk about the second one here in a minute that I'm really excited about. But um, you know, how did you attack wanting to say, hey, I'm gonna step away from basketball and go play football? You know, what was that transition like? And how did you attack that with that same kind of mentality to get to get there and say, hey, you were a day one starter in NFL? Not many people can say that, man.

SPEAKER_03 10:08

You gotta be out of your mind a little bit, and you got to be really good at ignoring other people that try to tell you what reality is. Yeah, I'm not very connected to reality in using that as a limit. Never have been, never understood why. Like, oh well, why can't I? Well, why can't I? And so when I was switching from basketball to football in college, I had just played an entire college basketball season. And we lost a conference tournament, and I went and talked to the head coach, told him I want to play play football. He goes, Okay, well, if you're serious, you'll come to the first spring meeting. It's like April 1st. So it's like two weeks after the season ended. I'm like, this is gonna be a long year. Um, but I hadn't played since eighth grade. And so when I went out there, I thought I was gonna play receiver. I told him I want to play receiver. And so I get out there the first day, and the tight ends coach is like, hey, you're with us. I'm like, no, I'm not with you guys. No, no, no. That's a whole nother jump. It was gonna be enough jump playing receiver. And the head coach was like, No, I think you should try it. I think you could create some matchup problems. He was right, but I was not happy. So now, not only did I sign up to do something new, man, I was getting my ass kicked, kicked. Man, I'm talking about four string DNs was maxing me out, bull rushing me. Man, they was probably laughing, watching tape, having a good old time seeing those reps. Everything was hard. Like, I would have coaches and I would have to tell them, like, what does that word mean? And the coach would look at me like, my gosh, JT, you don't know nothing. I mean, nothing. And I remember asking myself, should I quit or should I keep going? So I talked to my dad a lot and I would tell him like how hard it was. And like how hard it was for me not to want to go back to the safety and the confidence of basketball. Oh, should I go play overseas? Should I give this up? Um, and then I have my first catch. My first catch in a spring practice. Um, I'll never forget the play. 61 wide dragging, five-yard drag. And then I caught that ball and I turned up field, and like here come the linebacker, here come the corner, shh, here come the safety, shh. And I'm standing in the end zone in practice going, WTF. I just score. And the whole team was like, what just happened? And in that moment, I was like, I know I could do this, I just have to keep going. So I created a process. So what I tell people is you have to have a process that matches your goals. And I knew that I was bad at football, but I had talent. And so I created a process of I have to outwork everybody and put in more to catch up. And so I was the first person in the building, I was the last person out of the building. Any coach that had any time, what can you teach me? What can you show me? And then I have to run routes every day. And I would call all the quarterbacks on the roster. Hey, are you free? No, I got class, second string. Hey, are you free? No, me and my girl going to the river, third string. And I just I got the reps. And and then God took care of the rest.

SPEAKER_00 13:14

Yeah, man, that's awesome, man. Um something that we do have in common. Um, I was we both played with a manning. Yeah, I was Eli Center at Ole Miss.

SPEAKER_01 13:25

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

And then you play with you play with Peyton. Tell me, like, being around those type of guys, you know, how did Peyton instill that confidence in you? Um, because I I talk about it all the time with young athletes of finding those people that's going to build you up, um, that want to see you succeed. And the mannings always was, you know, the guys that like wanted to see you succeed no matter what. So, how did Peyton help you in your earliest early success?

SPEAKER_03 13:51

You know, it's interesting because um Peyton was he he had a lot to say because he, you know, he wanted to run his system and this is offense. Um, but he wasn't always having like private one-on-one conversations with you or anything like that. But there was this one moment that was really um defining in my career. Um, and sometimes when you feel the most unseen is when you need a person to see you the most. And one of the things I tell people a lot are what are the skills and talents and abilities that you know about yourself that the world doesn't know about you yet? And so in my second year, when I was um getting DMPs, I was kicking ass in practice. And I couldn't come to grips with how I was kicking the defense's butt every practice, and I couldn't get an opportunity. And so we were in Kansas City, we're getting ready for the game, and we were coming down the elevator, and Peyton gets on the elevator, it's just me and him. And I was just like in one of those moments where it was, Am I am I ever gonna be able to do enough? And Peyton just randomly looks at me, he goes, Hey, I just wanted you to know that everybody sees you, we see what you're doing. And I was like, Oh, what people see? Oh, I thought I was just dragging these dudes day in and day out, and nobody was noticing. Um, but that that was just enough to trigger me to be like, keep going. And then as I started to become more integrated into the ones on offense, then we started to build a really close relationship because I had a very complex role. And Peyton would have what he would do to show me he had confidence and trust in me is he kept increasing my menu. I want you to do this now, I want you to do this now, and he just would not stop. He just kept making my role bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger until I ran. I had played every position, X, Y, Z, F, halfback, every protection, and I just kind of became this guy that he could trust to put anywhere on the field to create the matchups he wanted.

SPEAKER_00 15:54

Yeah, that's that's awesome. I need you to talk to my son, trying to get him to understand that. Oh, really?

SPEAKER_03 15:58

What part?

SPEAKER_00 15:59

Um, playing he's a receiver, but I think he's gonna be more of a that kind of like pseudo tight end guy. You can bring out the backfield, that you can put him on the backside of a three by one, get the mismatch on the safety, you know, digging out on the backside where you get the cut back, you know, get your hand, you gotta get you, you know. Yeah, that's what I think he's gonna be. But you know, I'm dad, yeah, former offensive lineman. He's gonna be a good thing.

SPEAKER_03 16:20

He's like, Dad, I wear the highlighter cleats, right?

SPEAKER_00 16:22

Exactly, exactly. Uh but anyway, man, you know, um the second unique thing that that I'm you know being on the other side, I respect so much for um is that you're at the pinnacle of your career, you're making good money, you know, making pro balls, and then you make this unique decision to step away. Yeah, you know, what was that? What was that thing that was eating it eating at you inside that that made you say, hey, I want to step away and go on a different path? Because again, it's the NFL. You know, just walk away from it.

SPEAKER_03 16:56

Yeah, you know, for me, um I really felt like my passion was was shifting. And so I've always been a person that was very big on following the passion, right? That fire inside of you to go pursue something. I've always been very clear on like, nope, this is what I want to go get better at growing. And when I had got to the really the peak of my career, it was the first time I really became aware of how much I was suffering internally. And I was like, wait, I thought I had all the stuff that was supposed to make this feeling not be here, sums off. And so I went down this journey into myself to figure out like, okay, what am I going through and why? But then I realized, oh, wait, I'm not the only person going through things, other people are. And then I started to feel really compelled for them to get help and get better. And then one day the spirit tapped me on the shoulder and was like, it's gonna be you, you're gonna be the one. And I'm like, what? Hold on, me, huh? But then it really came down to something of a spiritual test for me. See, I I I I trusted the Lord and I leaned on the Lord when He was giving me a calling and shifting my passion from basketball to football. But there was a lot in it. I was broke. You get to become a pro, you change your life, you can make a lot of money. And so he rewarded me. I trusted this little inkling in my spirit helped me become a millionaire and a pro bowler. But the spiritual test is would you walk away from it if he asked you to? It was a lot of faith to make this transition from basketball to football, but it was a tremendous test of my faith to walk away from millions of dollars. And I used to sit there and think, how much faith do you have? And I'm and I was reading the word a lot, and I was going, You're gonna be obedient. And so for me, it was if I could trust God when I needed help, I should trust Him when I'm in success. And so I decided that He was sending me to go do something. Um, and I've had that mentality from the moment I switched, and to even even now I still pray to this day, Lord, direct this career. I don't want, I'm off the wheel, I don't want it no more. Yeah, you you showed me graciously, here it is, here's it all. Didn't help you, huh? And I needed that experience. Um that's what made me step into the transition, and what's made me be intensely committed to studying psychology and neuroscience and uh clinical health. Um, so now that I can start doing the work I do today.

SPEAKER_00 19:37

Yeah, man, that's that's that's powerful because I've definitely definitely been in those shoes.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:42

Um we we don't have long, have to wrap up here, got to get you back to some other things. But um, I heard you talk about the other day, and I thought would be um early this morning, that I thought would be great for young athletes to to hear.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:54

Uh you talked about the the four Rs.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:57

Can you give us a quick rundown of those four Rs that hopefully someone, whether it's a parent or a young athlete who's listening to this podcast, can take that and write them down and put them in practice?

SPEAKER_03 20:08

You know, it's actually very interesting because I've never thought about applying those four Rs to sports. And you know, one of the things I do is uh mental performance specialist, sports site for the San Antonio Spurs. Like I'm working with athletes all the time, but I've always saw that as like what corporate teams need, but I never thought about that for youth athletes. Um, so let me think about how I would apply it to youth athletes. So there's four Rs regulate, regulate, relate, relate, refocus, and reinforce. Reinforce. And so the regulate piece is really important for an athlete because it's your thoughts, it's your emotions, it's your physical health and your behaviors. Behaviors. If you want to be a leader, if you want to be the person that gets to have a high responsibility and impactful role on a team, you have to make sure your mental health is good. And so you have to make sure that you have positive self-talk, you have to make sure that um the guardian of your mind is well manicured and orderly. You have to make sure that you understand your emotions, that you know how to regulate your emotions, and you know how to let your emotions inform you, but not rule you.

SPEAKER_00 21:20

Uh, it it resonated with me because I'm having a conversation in the car with my daughter. She plays volleyball, club volleyball, and her emotions start to get out of out of out of out of whack. And I said, Hey, what are you feeling right now?

SPEAKER_01 21:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

Why are you feeling what you're feeling right now?

SPEAKER_01 21:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:37

Okay, you don't know. Let's learn how to identify that because it's gonna become important for you to learn how to regulate. So go on, keep going.

SPEAKER_03 21:43

Yeah, so you got to be able to regulate those emotions. Uh, they're never gonna go away. Stop trying to wrestle them down. Yeah, that's you. Yeah, these emotions ain't gonna be the first time or the last time it comes up. Get good at dealing with it. And then you have to make sure that you have the readiness to be at your best performer. All that's part of what you regulate. What do you step into a room? What do people feel from you?

SPEAKER_02 22:05

Right.

SPEAKER_03 22:05

Are you conducting yourself in a way where your behaviors are saying are setting the tone? And then relate from a youth athlete's perspective, how are you relating to the people on your team and your coaches? Right. Coach is important. When you are coming in, are you uplifting your space? Are you a positive force in your team environment? Do you notice when other people need somebody to come pick them up? Do you notice that people are going through something and you can be there to help support them in those times? Right. Like if you can regulate yourself and you can relate to people in a very positive and effective way, now you're starting to become elite in your performance. Then you're refocused.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 22:54

And an adult and a 60-year-old executive. Refocusing is hard because you have to become aware when you're off track. And so you need to think about your goals. You need to think about the performance behaviors or the things that you need to be doing in your setting that help you move closer towards your goal. Everything else is not a performance behavior. Do less of that. Do more of these things that take you to where you need to go. Your interfering factors, what are the things about you, your past, what you learned in your home, what your parents do? Did those behaviors and habits get in the way? And then how well are you communicating with people around you? And the last one is reinforce. But really, it's about accountability. How accountable are you? If you have accountability and you're communicating well and you're behaving aligned with your goals, and you're handling these interfering factors, and you're relating well to people around you, and you're regulating yourself and how you show up every day. Now you have elite performance and you have elite well-being. And when you start to just stay there as much as you can, watch how you start to separate yourself from the other peers you have and watch what's going to happen to your future.

SPEAKER_00 24:06

Man, I when you said that this morning, I thought it was so so so profound to put him into those type of into that in those buckets of the four R's, man. So thank you for sharing that. My last question for you, Dr. Julius.

SPEAKER_01 24:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

If you had to go back and talk to your younger self, knowing what you know now and being where you've been, what would you say to him?

SPEAKER_03 24:29

If I could go back and talk to my younger self, I would I would say work harder and not just pick one area. So I'm sure a lot of the youth athletes that you work with can relate to this. I thought all I needed to do was work hard on my sport. There's so many areas. I I was cutting up in class, I shouldn't have been doing that. My my GPA that I got, I graduated from high school with 2.7 GPA. I just graduated from graduate school with a 3.85. You should not be going the other direction. My focus and effort wasn't there because me and my boys, we we weren't taking school serious enough. I would have taken the schools more serious. Um, I also would tell my younger self that uh what you feel right now, you need to learn how to master and deal with that. I didn't deal with it and I thought it was gone until in my mid-20s it showed back up. All those feelings I had in high school, being very angry and very sad about things, I'm stuffing it in. Body keeps the score. Yep. And but your emotional state is like a garage. Yeah, it's very big. You can put a lot of boxes in that garage. But if you stack boxes in that garage forever, eventually they're gonna spill out. And they spill out in ways you can't control, in ways that are detrimental to you. So I could go back into myself, I would say what I tell my sons give your best in everything you do, and become one with your emotions to master them.

SPEAKER_00 26:09

Man, you just preached for me, man. I really appreciate you. Absolutely. It's been fun to hear your story, um, to see that there's a lot of different paths. Yeah. And yeah, the still, the main thing still is the main thing from uh understanding who you are, being aware of who you are, and then how does those transition into real life? Those intangibles are very important. So, man, I really appreciate you joining me on Tangible Podcast.

SPEAKER_03 26:32

No, man, it's been awesome, man. Um hearing your story and getting to learn what you're doing and wishing you the most of success. Um, and just continue to pour into those youth athletes. I hope that this interview is something that they can use as a resource. Um, and it's amazing, man, to get here and be here at this event and get to chop it up with guys like you.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

Absolutely. Appreciate it, brother.