Claude Abrams

I couldn't find peace with who I was, and what it was I was called to do on a weekly basis, which is essentially if you break it down, observing violence.

Alex

Welcome to stories of men beneath the surface. I'm Alex Melia. Join me as we discover what it means to be a man in the modern era.

Today's episode is about putting everything we have into a lifelong dream. And what happens when that dream turns sour. When Claude was just seven years old, he crept downstairs to watch the historic fight between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman. He has been obsessed with boxing ever since. In school, everything revolved around boxing. And as soon as he realised there was an entire magazine dedicated to boxing, that was it. His ultimate dream was to work for boxing us. Claude initially worked as an assistant for the boxing promoter, Frank Warren, but it didn't work out. So Claude made plans to move to Australia.

Claude Abrams

One evening, I'm at home with my brother, and there's a documentary on TV on Australia. And I turned to him and I said, that's where I'm going to be in a few months. And his exact words were, what if the editor of boxing news offered you a job? And I said, that's the only job in the world that can keep me here. No word of a lie. But five minutes later, the telephone rings. And my brother picks up the phone. And he's looking at me as he's talking. And he said, I'll go and get him. And he puts the phone down. He said, It's Harry Mullen, the editor of boxing news. Now, given the conversation we just had, I thought he was a practical joke. So I picked the phone up. And sure enough, it was Harry Mullen, he'd heard that I was interested in working for boxing news. And so a vacancy occurred at boxing news. And he thought of me, called me up and asked me if I was interested, would I come for an interview. And I remember sitting in Harry's pokey little office, surrounded in boxing books and paperwork everywhere. And we sat down there, and we talked for about two and a half hours, just about boxing in general. And he said to me, right, I'm gonna get you to write a preview. I don't want you to use any books. I just want you to do off the top of your head. And I had a rickety old typewriter. So I sat down, and I just wrote this preview, I felt really confident when I was writing it. Not that I was necessarily a brilliant writer or anything, but I just felt confident I could articulate what I felt would happen in this fight and, and details of the two fighters, pull the paper out of the typewriter, handed it to Harry, and he sat down and he read it. And he said, When would you like to start? Or worked under Harry for 10 years, and then Harry fell ill and had to leave the publication. So it was that I took over as boxing news editor and I held that position for 13 years, I

Alex

think it says a lot about you, Claude, that, from the age of seven, you lived and breathed boxing all the way up into your 20s and 30s. I think it's just one of those sort of Hollywood, happy endings, the fact that you actually was able to get a job with boxing news. What would you say to men listening about pursuing their dreams?

Claude Abrams

I often look back on my days as boxing writer. And I thought to myself, Why did I ever get that job? The possibilities are the odds on me, at the age of 13. When I first got hooked on boxing or boxing news, the odds of me getting that job were massive, because they had three full time staff. And it was such a sought after position that every time there was a vacancy, there'll be a deluge of people wanting that job because it's a boxing fans dream and used to get letters on a weekly basis from people saying, you've got the best job in the world. And I honestly believe that I got that job for one reason only. And it's because I wanted it more than anybody else. Because I think they were better writers than me. And I think they were probably more suitable applicants than me, but I don't think there was anybody who wanted it more than me. And when I think about what makes reality happen, I think the the pivotal ingredients are having that strong intention for what you want to happen. The more you believe it's possible, the greater the chances of it happening. And I think the reason why, why I got that job is because there was never a time during that period, from seven, until what was I 19. When I got a staff job, there was never a point during that period where that desire waned. And so sometimes I often expressed to people that if you want something badly enough, you're going to get it, you can get it. And we talk about the law of attraction. And the law of attraction is that if you, if you picture something, and you picture yourself having it, then it's going to happen. And then they, so people go and do that they, they, they try to manifest by thinking about something and putting their energies into something. And, and where they actually go wrong, is that they do it for like a day or two days, and then they give up. And then where's the energy gone after that the energy dissipates. So if you can hold that energy in that towards and keep pointing it towards, where you want to be what you want to be, then that becomes a more powerful energy. And my my energy never ever dimmed. And that's why I succeeded. And, and it's not just me who did that, you know that in the boxing world itself, you there's countless boxers, who at the age of nine, or 10, said, I'm going to be champion of the world. And they became champion of the world, because they believed it. And they lived it. And they kept that flame. burning hot.

Alex

Seems like your purpose for your whole life was getting this job. And this was more important than friendships, romantic relationships, everything, would you would you say? That's right?

Claude Abrams

Well, I don't know if it was the purpose for my whole life. But it was the purpose of my life at that point. I sacrifice everything else for it. Everything else, all roads, lead to boxing news.

Alex

So for the listeners, Claude and I have been friends for four or five years now. And you're definitely someone who's got predominantly masculine energy. And there's a really interesting book that I've been reading. Well, suppose an interesting author called David Dado, and he talks about, there's a book he did called The Way of the Superior Man is last name dei da. And then I'm reading his follow up intimate communion now, and he talks about how men with predominantly masculine energy, their number one thing in their life is their mission or their purpose. And I think you very much personify that. I don't know what it was, was it serendipity? Or what the fact that you're speaking to your brother, I think this is the one of the most fascinating things about the whole story for me is, you're speaking to your brother in the living room, about the fact that this would be your dream job, if you were able to get it and then out of nowhere, five minutes later, you get that call? What do you say about that?

Claude Abrams

So most people would say, That's pure coincidence. I don't believe that's coincidence. I call that creation. I call that a manifested reality. And I think that was the moment at which the intention and the reality met, in that, that that one phone call that came through, we're energetic beings, as human beings. And every single second of the day, we're giving off energy. And the classic example, I think everybody's had an experience or this is where they thought of somebody and then they get a phone call from that person. Is that coincidence? Or is that energy at play?

Alex

On a percent, it also can be on the on the negative side as well. I'm thinking about when I moved to London, for the summer when I was 19. And I always remember getting a night bus back from a night out, it must have been about 4am. And I remember getting off this bus, pitch black. It was quite a naughty area. It's quite a sketchy area. And I remember getting off this bus and it was four or five guys, they must have been drug deal in a Sunday and huge guys, and they were looking at me and was walking down the street. And I just kept saying to myself, pretend you're you're not scared right now. Because they were all looking at me. And I just, I suppose I just walked with my head in the air, good posture, walked past and I was fine. But if I had been walking past with this sort of negative energy or this fearful energy, they would have probably seen me as easy prey and might have might have attacked me.

Claude Abrams

Absolutely. And you often find that people who become victims don't become victims in isolated moments. They, they, they can sometimes get attacked a lot. And then some people never get attacked. What can Could you put that down to bad luck? Or could you put it down to that energy being different? If you look into the animal kingdom? If there's an animal that despite lays for nobility and weakness. It's it's pretty much wearing a label that says pray. Because predators always look for the weakest of the animals that they seek out. So if your energy is weak, and your energy is making you feel like a victim, then that's how you're going to be seen. And that's the energy that you're going to be without even realising it. That's the energy you're projecting. And so if there are predators out there, you're going to stand out as an easy target.

Alex

As they say, Thoughts become things. So if you're having these negative thoughts, I'm going to get beaten up or this bad thing is going to happen to me,

Claude Abrams

with thoughts become reality. Yeah, I think that's a good way of putting it. I've always been a nonconformist. And maybe sometimes to my detriment. I remember when I was at school, my best friend got taken off the school football team. And I felt it was unfair, that he'd been taken off the school football team. So I withdrew my name from the school football team. I never played the school football team again. But I felt strongly for him. I just think it's something that I've always had, in me a sense of justice, a sense of doing what's right. If you've got principles, and you make exceptions for them, then you don't have principles. So I had to stand by them. And I've, and I've always done that. I've always done that. So in some ways, writing for boxing news was was a great job for me. Because, as you know, boxing is a murky world. But it was an opportunity for me to maybe have some impact on that murky world, because there's always wrongdoings and white things going on all the time, in every sphere of life, but it seems to happen a lot in boxing. And so I put a lot of that, my principles and my principles for the for the magazine, because even as a, as a magazine as a trade magazine, it had, it had a lot of values. And I loved boxing news almost as much as I love boxing itself. And I wanted to uphold those values for the magazine. So there were many times when I was pressured to try and take that magazine and a different direction. And I and I refused. Because I wanted to uphold those values.

Alex

I've always known you to be a very principled person, have you had situations in your life where you've stood up for things to your detriment, and you realise later on that you probably shouldn't have had that position on it, you feel like actually, I regret that I should have probably relented on this,

Claude Abrams

nothing comes to mind where I would use the word regret. Because I believe that everything leads to everything else. And so regret means that you've, you've made a bad decision, and you wish you could go back and change it. And I don't wish to change anything, because everything has happened, as has enabled me to be where I am now, and to be the person I am now. So I don't regret any of that. And I think all you can ever do is make the best decision you can make in that moment.

Alex

And also find interest in the fact that you dreamed about this position, all of your life, you get a position in the company, and then you become the chief editor. And then it feels like out of nowhere to a lot of people. But obviously, you've been planning this for a while you just said I don't want to be part of the boxing world anymore. You know, I know you've started doing some BBC commentating, you're always someone who was well respected in the boxing fraternity, everyone knew who you were, and you even getting TV work. And you just said, You know what I'm done with boxing. Now, how hard of a decision was that?

Claude Abrams

I was working as a pundit for the BBC, when they sort of made a comeback into boxing in the 2000s. And when I was editor, a boxing news, it was a great job because there was no outside interference. In the editorial, me and my staff made all the decisions as to what we're going to write about how we're going to write about it. When you start working for other people, sometimes you can get into positions where they're trying to dictate to you what you need to say and and what you should do. So I was always very wary of that. And I always made it very clear that I was my own person, and that my thoughts or my thoughts, and I never got swayed. And if I ever if ever felt pressure, that I would have to say something. Because it's the party line, then that's me. That's me gone. My independence. And my integrity meant more than any paycheck that I would get from anybody. But the BBC gig was was good while it lasted. And then I had an injury to my Achilles tendon. And I had timeout and I chose not to go back to the BBC, after that, I didn't really want the notoriety that came with being on television, it was never something that I aspired for. And there was, there was, there were a couple of boxes that were trying to make their way in media at the time, that I felt they could, they could have done the job, and I and I let them take the position that I had. And, but around that time, and maybe maybe it was a little bit after that, my love for the sport of boxing had started to diminish. And that was a difficult time in the sense that I was in a prestigious job, I had the security of, of a paycheck, I had a mortgage, I had a family. And at the same time, I knew inside me that I didn't feel right about boxing anymore. For whatever reason, I always describe it as a change in consciousness, that what I saw in boxing, when I started is not what I saw in boxing towards the end. And I started to see things differently. And I felt that to continue in that job, which requires 100% Passion, would have been a dishonest thing to do, because the publication deserved someone to lead it with 100% passion. And so I, at that point, decided that I needed to get out. And I couldn't just jump out there. And then because I had high bills to pay, and I had family to look after, and I thought it was the best way to leave boxing us. It was a difficult decision. And it took me from the point of conception, to the point of execution, about five years to actually muster the courage to say, I'm I'm leaving. And in that five years, I was like operating on 70% of what I should have been. And so it came as a relief to me the day when I handed in my resignation, because I felt a sense of freedom. But I didn't have to, in any shape or form, I didn't have to pretend, didn't have to pretend to be the editor didn't have to pretend to be a boxing enthusiast.

Alex

Can't imagine how difficult it must have been to give up your dream job. In any positions I've been in in the past. It's taken me five days, not five years to, to decide whether to leave on

Claude Abrams

what this was like. Imagine yourself in a marriage of 25 years. And you decided the marriage has to end. And that's literally what it was. And so it wasn't, I didn't want to be there anymore. Just had to find the right way to get out. I needed the right exit plan. And so I announced that I was going to go, my idea was to because boxing users was approaching its 100th year, and I wanted to take boxing us through to the 102 year. And so I did that. And then after the 100 year celebrations, I decided to leave

Alex

I find the direction that you went in after boxing is a fascinating one because I mean, I'm a massive boxing fan, as you know and not heard any stories of any boxing commentators or ex fighters doing think kinds of things that you did, where you left the profession, your dream job, you go with the mother of your your kids, and and obviously your two kids travelling, living, not necessarily out of a suitcase, but living outside of the UK for four years go into all so many different countries, doing yoga retreats, meditation, retreats, fasting retreats, me in all different kinds of people. How would you describe coming from this sort of masculine environment, you know, of constantly going into fights being around other fighters, and then taking this completely different direction where people are more spiritual. And, you know, you're I suppose you're embracing more of your, you know, the traditional notions of femininity with things like yoga and surrendering and meditation and things like that.

Claude Abrams

So I was always quite spiritual anyway, in when I was in boxing, even though the two don't seem to go hand in hand. And I think that's partly what led to me leaving boxing is that I couldn't find peace with who I was, and what it was I was called to do on a weekly basis, which is essentially if you break it down, observing violence, it was a difficult decision to to execute but an easy decision to make to get out. Now, boxing is rife with great champions, having left and then come back or stayed around too long and getting injured. You know, that was like such an incredibly common theme throughout my time in boxing, and I saw many young boxers turn professional looking bright and young and full of life. Energy and the world at their feet. And then I saw them right through to the end of their careers where they're broken, beaten, damaged men.

Alex

You look at David Haye, for example, who you were commentating on when you were on BBC TV. And then he always had this dream of I'm going to retire by the age of 30. Give it my career, then he comes back and fights Tony value, and then has this horrendous leg injury. And then as I felt so sorry for him what you're watching that, but I've seen this so many times with fighters like you, like you say,

Claude Abrams

yeah, when I used to think about that, I thought when I get out, I'm never coming back. I'm not going to be one of those people that returns to boxing. So when I left boxing news, I cut ties with everything related to boxing, every one and everything. And that's why I went travelling with my then wife, and my son who was about three at the time, it was a way of getting away from boxing. So some people could call that avoidance, and maybe looking back, it was avoidance. I wanted to go cold turkey. And I didn't want the temptation of boxing to be around me, because that would have made it much harder at that point in time. to sever ties. So when I went travelling, I didn't watch boxing, I didn't listen to boxing, I didn't read boxing, I didn't hear anything about boxing, for well over a couple of years. And I think it was I can't even remember, but I think even I've never been to a boxing show since live. And it was a good. It was a good six or seven years after I left before I even watched the live fight on television. And it enabled me to enabled me to break away.

Alex

So what was your purpose after you left boxing news and you left boxing completely? What did you turn your attention to?

Claude Abrams

So my purpose squat? It's a good question really. Because I often found you know, people, people that know that I went travelling a they thought I was on holiday for four years, which I wasn't. And B they thought, just like they did when I was working at boxing used, I thought I had the dream job. When I was travelling for four years, they thought I had the dream life. And the realities are that when you're travelling, and you have to bear in mind, I after two years of travelling, my daughter was born. So I had a second child. And there's no support system when you're moving around. So in that first year of travel, we lived in 53 different locations the first year, that's a lot. Second year, we slowed it right down because you realise, you know, the upheaval of changing all the time, especially for children who kind of they want safety and they want security. It was it was a little bit too much for my son. So we became more stable in the second year. And then we had a I had a daughter. But it was difficult. Because you're around each other 24/7. And I and I, I didn't wake up every day with a purpose. In fact, it was quite the opposite. I woke up every day thinking, what am I going to do with my day. So some people could call that freedom and on some level it is. And I can only relate to how I was thinking at the time. If I if I had my head on now back then it would have been different. But at the time. I often woke up thinking what's my purpose, I need a purpose. And he took me. So the first year I was just getting used to not going to work and not being in this job that I've been in for over 20 years. And it took me well over a year to unwind, which made me think how do people on a on a yearly basis, they work practically every week of the year and they have like two weeks to recover. And then they go back to work. Two weeks is nowhere near enough. So it took me over a year. And then the plan was I'm going to find something that fuels my passion. And then I will go towards that. And because I that didn't happen for like the first two and a half, three years, I had to keep travelling, because there was nothing to go back to. I just had to keep travelling.

Alex

It seems like when you were working for boxing us and you're in the boxing world, it's constantly having this purpose of an end it was part of your identity. But I'm, I'm almost like a human doing. I'm constantly going to work I'm constantly going to the office. And then when you completely detach yourself from that and you go travelling, then you realise who you really are and you become a human being again, because I think I've had those cycles in my life where I think our cycles, but I think maybe I'm just thinking right now maybe I've been a human doing for most of my life. And actually, I've started to really think about this in the last few weeks to last few weeks to separate the thing As I do for my human doing part of my day and the things I do for my human being part of my day and meditating every day, as you know, we've, you know, you and I and a couple of other friends have just come off a meditation retreat in Greece. That was all about being a human being, it was all about going inward and, and doing a lot of meditation and yoga and being with yourself and finding out who you are and, and how this progresses. But I think we do spend a lot of our lives being human doings. So definitely, I suppose in that year, it seems like you became a human being you started to unravel this identity of Claude Abrams, Chief Editor, for boxing news, boxing guy, ex boxer, ex amateur boxer, etc. And then you're left with whatever's left. From that, did you find that difficult?

Claude Abrams

Yet? It's so label isn't it? Me being editor of boxing news was a label, it was an identity. It takes you away from who you really are. We're all human beings. But we all identify with being most of us identify with being human doings, but we're all human beings. And once we peel away all those labels, we give ourselves man edits, boxing experts, whatever you want to call it, take all those all away, then we actually discover who we really are. So when I left, I didn't have any more labels left, I was like former editor of boxing news. But that didn't really mean anything. When I went travelling, nobody knew who I was. So I just became a man with his children travelling around the world. That's that's who I became. That's who I was. Anyway, that's what I've always been. But we, we live under the illusion that we are all these tags that we apply to ourselves, but that's not who we are. So that's the, that's where we go into the realms of ego. As opposed to the real, our real selves, it's quite likely that most people don't know who they are. Because we're living in a time now, where people don't actually know themselves. And people don't actually want to know themselves. Because sometimes it's people don't like to confront who they really are. They're scared of knowing who they are. So sometimes these labels, it's a safe world to have a label.

Alex

So if I was to ask you that question, now, many years later, since you've left boxing us, who are you? What would you say?

Claude Abrams

First thing that came into my head was, I'm a man like any other man, but I'm not because I think everybody's everybody is unique. Everybody is unique. But I'm, I'm no better or worse than anybody else, is a man living on this planet. That's, that's who I am at my core.

Alex

podstawy made me think about the power of dreams and the law of attraction to attract what we want into our lives. I love that he was willing to do absolutely anything to get that job made me think about my own journey as well, because I don't feel like I've ever loved something enough to do whatever it possibly took to actually achieve that. The only thing I can think of for myself was when I was at university, and I worked tirelessly my third year to make sure I got to one degree sleeping in the car, not sleeping at all, working in the 24/7 computer lab. There's a popular book around the law of attraction that I read many years ago. And it was a bit of a phenomenon at the time, it was called The Secret. And people thought that they could just sit back and sort of manifest anything that they wanted in their life. But it was flawed in many ways, because it didn't actually talk about the action you needed to put into making your dreams a reality. And the fact that Claude thought about it obsessed about it, but also spoke to the right people. So he was networking was good. He really improved his knowledge on boxing, he watched so many fights, he wrote all the time. And when that opportunity presented itself, he knew he'd put the hard work in to achieve that. Sometimes people think all of this stuff is bullshit. But I've just seen it so many times in my life that I feel like something must be true. But you might be asking yourself, was it just too much of a coincidence that he got the phone call that he wanted at the exact time that he needed it? For me, it would just be too much of a coincidence to for it to happen like that. A lot of times people talk about their dream job, their dream business dream career. But sometimes we don't talk about what it's like to actually leave a dream job. So you might be asking yourself, why did he actually leave that dream job? Well, clods of great friend of mine and I know from his story, that the reason why he left boxing is because he just couldn't ignore the violence anymore. The many people who've lost their lives through boxing, the many people who've had dementia and all kinds of other medical problems from being hit in the head so many times. Boxing is my favourite sport. I just love watching it. I love the spectacle. I love the emotion. I love the competitiveness. I love the journey that boxers go on. In order to become the best versions of themselves, but unfortunately, we cannot just ignore the damage that it does on people's lives. And Claude just said to himself enough was enough. I really respect the fact that he had an enormous amount of courage to just leave boxing and just completely go cold turkey with it in order to find out who he really was outside of his job. So the dream job wasn't actually his dream job. In the end, it had soured for Claude. Are you able to move on if things aren't right for you?