Israel Adesanya joined Logan Paul’s ‘IMPAULSIVE’ podcast in Puerto Rico and engaged in a deep and enlightening conversation.
Both Adesanya and the UFC Featherweight Champion, Alexander Volkanovski, recently signed sponsorship deals with Logan Paul and KSI’s sports drink brand, Prime Hydration, becoming the first athletes to sign with the company.
Adesanya lost his suitcase between flights while traveling to Puerto Rico en route for this interview. Expecting him to be still annoyed, Logan Paul said he was impressed at how Adesanya seemed so relaxed about the whole thing. The UFC Middleweight Champion shrugged it off and gave insight into his thought process, going into detail about how he is grateful for where he is now and the journey that took him there.
He compared where he was in the present to when he had to sleep on trains in China during his journey to reach the top of the sport. On the same morning as the podcast, he went for a bike ride at dawn and took a dip in the clear, blue ocean. Adesanya said that these were the kind of days he used to dream of and were a far cry from ten years prior, where his day comprised of taking people’s gas meter readings:
”I remember where I would dream of days like this. Like, I would literally be at my old job, sitting by the water cooler at lunchtime looking at the city, and people would be like, ‘What are you thinking of?’ and I’d just be like ‘Ah, nothing.’ I was thinking of days like this [the present day, on a beach in Puerto Rico].” Adesanya then described his previous job in more detail; it’s hard to picture ‘The Last Stylebender’ doing a job like that when you consider where he is now; one of the most recognizable athletes in combat sports.
”September 4th, 2013 is the day I quit that job. I was a metering and billing coordinator, so I was pretty much doing data input. [If] someone has a gas meter that was broken, I would get the technician to fix it. if someone needed a meter, I would get a reading, all that kind of stuff”.
I guess losing a bag at the airport doesn’t sound too bad when you consider the lifestyle Adesanya gets to experience now, ten years later, in 2023. It’s not something that he takes for granted; the UFC Middleweight champion said he feels gratitude. He explained how someone who comes from a low-income family in Nigeria, as he did, would kill for a job that he had in data entry; to have the opportunity to earn that kind of money. It’s all about perspective, according to Adesanya. Now he is a professional fighter – the best in the world at his weight class – he is grateful for the life which comes with that.
Paul asked what the flip that switched in Adesanya’s head was; what made him decide that data entry wasn’t for him and that fighting was his destiny? It wasn’t as simple as that, suggested the guest. Showing his frugality, Adesanya explained that the ‘regular’ job he had behind a desk in 2013 was a means to an end, as it meant he could live in Auckland, an expensive city in New Zealand. Doing the job enabled him to pursue his dream of being a fighter at City Kickboxing, where he still trains under the tutelage of Eugene Bareman.
His parents supported his decision to pursue a fighting career, even though they didn’t understand why he wanted to go down that path, given they were from an affluent background. There were no fighters from his demographic who had made it in MMA, so his parent’s reservations can be understood, particularly as in his culture, Adesanya stated that parents pressure their children to have a career that society would deem noble, i.e., a doctor or an engineer. What’s important is that his parents backed him in his endeavor all the way, and ten years later, in 2023, they’ll be glad that they did.
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