The Business of Life with Dr King
Dr Ariel Rosita King brings on a variety of International guests from various countries, cultures, organisations, and businesses to talk about turning
problem into possibilities! Let's turn our challenges in opportunities together!
The Business of Life with Dr King
Joanna Lohman: Widening the Trail: Soccer, Self-Worth, and Creating Global Impact
Meet Joanna Lohman, a former professional soccer player whose 16-year career spans seven teams across five countries, including the US Women's National Team. Her journey wasn't always smooth—failed leagues, championship losses, and being cut from World Cup contention led to a moment where she found herself back in her childhood bedroom in her mid-thirties.
This pivotal moment sparked an epiphany that transformed both her career and life purpose: "I don't have to be the greatest to be great." When Joanna stopped chasing stardom and focused instead on contributing her authentic strengths to her team, something remarkable happened. She became the Washington Spirit's star player and the first in team history to have her jersey retired. This paradoxical success came from letting go of outcomes she couldn't control and focusing exclusively on consistent excellence in her daily contributions.
Now an international speaker and sports diplomat, Joanna helps others "activate and amplify their unique impact" worldwide. Her work takes her from corporate stages in Paris advocating for equal pay to running programs combating child trafficking in Nigeria. Through her Champions Mindset program, she trains female athletes ages 12-16 to develop mental resilience that extends far beyond sports. Joanna's perspective on suffering in sports—that it provides "a safe and public space to suffer"—highlights why creating opportunities for young women in athletics is crucial for developing life skills.
Whether you're an athlete, parent, coach, or someone seeking to redefine success on your own terms, Joanna's message resonates: you matter, your contribution builds traction, and sport can be a powerful vehicle for personal and social change. Ready to discover how your unique strengths can create meaningful impact? Join us for this transformative conversation.
Music, lyrics, guitar and singing by Dr Ariel Rosita King
Teach me to live one day at a time
with courage love and a sense of pride.
Giving me the ability to love and accept myself
so I can go and give it to someone else.
Teach me to live one day at a time.....
The Business of Life
Dr Ariella (Ariel) Rosita King
Original Song, "Teach Me to Live one Day At A Time"
written, guitar and vocals by Dr. Ariel Rosita King
Dr King Solutions (USA Office)
1629 K St, NW #300,
Washington, DC 20006, USA,
+1-202-827-9762
DrKingSolutons@gmail.com
DrKingSolutions.com
Hi and welcome to another episode of the Business of Life. Today we have a very special guest, lady Joanna Lohman. Welcome.
Joanna Lohman:Thank you so much. I want to rock the shades for a hot second, just to let everybody know Looking good.
Dr King:Let that bright light in. I love it. Can you please tell our audience a bit about yourself?
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, I'd love to you introduced me. I'm Joanna Lohman. I was a professional soccer player for 16 years. I played on seven different teams in five different countries, so appreciate your international audience. Soccer is the most popular sport in the world, so I know we're speaking. Soccer is the most popular sport in the world, so I know we're speaking the same language. I became the first player in Washington spirit history to have her Jersey retired, and I was a member of the United States women's national team, who are five-time Olympic gold medalists, four-time world champions and possess transcendent leadership that has inspired dominance on the field and achieved historic drum roll. Equal pay, equal pay in the United.
Joanna Lohman:States. Yes, so I come from a lineage of boundary pushers, trailblazers, ceiling breakers, and it is literally in my DNA to carry the torch and to continue to widen these trails that were blazed by my ancestors so that the people and generations behind us can walk taller and easier on their path. So that's how I view my life.
Dr King:That's fabulous. I love the way you view your life. It sounds very exciting, but I'm also sure that it takes a lot of time, energy and work behind all of that, and sometimes, uh, peace, prayer and pushing even when people don't want to be pushed. Yes, this is wonderful, Um so, um, I understand also now you have another career that you're that you're involved in. Would you like to tell us more about that?
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, I retired from professional soccer in 2019. And now I am a high-impact inspirational speaker and I help people to activate and amplify their unique impact all around the world. So it's an amazing profession because I get to step on stage and influence, empower my audience by really telling the story of my career, providing them an experience to learn and to grow and to pull lessons that allow them to truly activate and amplify their impact. So it's it gives me the same feelings, Dr King, as it did before. I played a game. That's how I know I'm on the right track, because before I get on stage, I get those that excitement, those butterflies, the nerves. I even warm up. The same way, I'm like kicking my legs high, I'm running around high knees, and so when I get on stage, I know I have the level of energy and enjoyment and interest that's going to captivate the audience.
Dr King:I really love is that with your I won't even say new career, but with a continuation of what you've done all your life. You're doing the same, but you're bringing it all around the world, bringing that impact and having people figure out who they are and what their gift is and what their light is through the story of what you've done. They go oh yeah, that's something like that. Can you tell us more about that type of impact? It's really amazing.
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, I would love to, because it's something that I gained and learned throughout my own personal career. It was a very up and down journey for a women's professional soccer player of my age and generation, because there were multiple failed leagues in the United States of America. There were two leagues that went bankrupt, and so, while I'm playing in the heart of my athletic time, we know that most people don't have their whole lives to play sports. You have until you're mid thirties. So, like most of my athletic prime were during the years that they, the leagues went bankrupt, and so I never necessarily was able to, I would say, capture or tap into my own potential due to circumstance, potentially due to talent, you know, like just just the aspects of, of LIFE, life, and it wasn't until I got to the Washington Spirit in 2015, where I had this awakening, I had this epiphany. At that point I had almost made it, dr King. I was one of the last players cut prior to the 2007 Women's World Cup. I made it to three championship games. I lost all of them. I was a star in college but then really fell off the map because of these failed leagues, and so I moved back home with my parents at the age of like 34, which is somewhat embarrassing. And here I am having like a rager of a pity party in my childhood bedroom and I was able to have this mindset shift of but look how far I made it right. Like I made it to championship games 180 players don't do that a year. I was one of the last players caught part of the world cup on the best team in the history of sport ever. So there's still so much impact and so much accomplishment and what I was able to achieve and when I was able to have that mindset shift, it revolutionized my life and the rest of my career, because when I showed up for the Spirit, I no longer cared about chasing this elusive shadow of greatness. Like I was not going to be the next Mia Hamm. I had to admit that to myself. Okay, I was not going to be Mia Hamm's teammate. I had to admit that to myself. Okay, I was not going to be Mia Hamm's teammate. I was my parents' roommate at that point, right.
Joanna Lohman:So it was like a huge perspective shift of this is who I am and I don't have to be the greatest to be great, and I'll say that again I don't have to be the greatest, to be great, and when I embraced that concept, I didn't care if I played two minutes, 25 minutes, 90 minutes. I wanted to be my best, not the best, and I wanted to contribute that's a key word my best to the success of this team, which I cared about so deeply and intensely, and I would have done anything to do that right. I was bought in, I was committed, I was ready to contribute and I showed up consistently with this attitude. And what's funny is that when I let go of being the star, dr King, that is when my career began to flourish, because I stopped worrying about the things that were outside of my control, began to flourish because I stopped worrying about the things that were outside of my control. Let those go. I can't control the outcome. I cannot control the trophies, the medals, the stats. All I can control is how I show up. And, ironically, when I did that, I became the star of the team, I became the second leading goal scorer, I was on national commercials for the league, and so that mindset shift essentially completely changed my life.
Joanna Lohman:And that's the true story of what I want to tell people is that you don't have to chase that elusive shadow of greatness.
Joanna Lohman:You don't have to be the best, the goat right. You just have to know your strengths, execute your strengths, excellence every single day, and that is what will have traction for the team, the group, the company that you are a part of right, Because we're all a part of something bigger, and even beyond that. Once my career was over, that impact was then spread internationally. As a sports diplomat, there's always something bigger off the field. So, you know, my impact went from a 24 by eight foot goal to doing something with deep meaning for the greater good of the world. You know, going to Nigeria and and running programs for child trafficking, going to Botswana and Cote d'Ivoire and Niger to really help countries and individuals through some very serious challenges, right, challenges that I don't face individually in the United States of America. So, again, that's another way that I was amplifying my impact. So it's really about sending that message of discovering your strengths and working to be your best every day, and that, to me, is the greatest impact someone can make on this world.
Dr King:I think that's really interesting and I think what I really love about what you're talking about is the fact that it's not always great and you're not always your best and you're not always doing your best and you are doing the best that you can do, and that makes all the difference. And also the story about you being in your childhood home, because most of us, when we go back home and many of us have experienced that and many of us will continue to experience that sometimes, sometimes in our lives, that you feel like, oh my goodness, not only did I not make it, but I failed at something. So the fact that you, can you tell me more about when you were there? How did you go from that low of going back to your family home to that epiphany? Because I can't imagine that you went to the home and the epiphany happened right away. But what kind of work did you do in your inner self to get to that epiphany?
Joanna Lohman:The decade before I landed at my parents' house, I was a nomad traveling around the world trying to follow this dream of being a professional soccer player. I didn't know where the next meal was coming from. I lived out of a bag. I barely got paid. So there was so much uncertainty, so much stress to that lifestyle. And when I got home I knew where the next meal was coming from because, luckily, my mom was making it and she was right downstairs. I could do my laundry. I had a home base and that meant I actually had time to reflect on the career that I had.
Joanna Lohman:The decade where I was traveling around the world, I actually had time and energy and a safe space to be able to reflect.
Joanna Lohman:And as I did that, to be able to reflect, and as I did that, I was able to see these pieces of my career that were originally, to me, just huge failures, like I never reached my potential, I never made a world cup, I never made an Olympics.
Joanna Lohman:I was so close and I was able to reframe that with that time and that space and that safety to say wait a minute, joe, you've still made such an incredible impact, you've still accomplished so much, and look at the journey that you've been on and you're still standing up straight, you're still kicking it, and I think it was that deep self-reflection and that space and that time for self-reflection. I didn't have anywhere else to go. I knew where I had roots in the ground. I was in my home city, and that really enabled me to have to have that perspective shift which was so utterly important for me to move forward life, and so no longer did I see myself as a rejection, as a failure. I saw myself as someone who could continue to contribute a great deal and make a serious impact and continue to make an impact.
Dr King:Yeah, yeah, I really love that. I really love that. And now you're an international speaker, as you said, going all over the world. Can you please tell us perhaps your three I won't say favorite, but the one that sticks out in your mind the most of where you've spoken and some of the people that you've met just to bring us along on your journey?
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, I'd love to you know. One that pops into my brain is last fall I spoke over in Paris this was right after the Olympics and I spoke to it was actually an economic organization, oecd and it was a speech on equal pay, which those types of speeches don't come around very often, dr King, and I love that. I was the person that they chose to come and deliver this speech and I was able to take the audience on a journey dating back to 1999, which was a big year in women's soccer. That's when the United States women's national team won the women's world cup and a sold out Rose bowl stadium, like 96,000 people watching women's sports, it was the highest attended sporting event in history up until that point. And for anyone who remembers this infamous day, it was when Brandi Chastain hit the winning PK against China. The US won the Women's World Cup and she rips off her shirt flexing. You know these incredible muscles, the strength. Her shirt flexing. You know these incredible muscles, the strength, and you see the Nike sports bra blazing across her chest. And it was like overnight, women's soccer launched into the public consciousness and that was the platform for the first ever women's professional soccer league. So I was able to take this audience on a journey from 1999 to where we are now.
Joanna Lohman:And where we are now as a point where women's sports are growing exponentially right. They are breaking records on a daily basis. We are getting more viewership than the men in certain sports. In the women's NCAA final, we are just. The attendance is overwhelming.
Joanna Lohman:It's insane, the growth that we're seeing, and so it was beautiful for me to go on this journey with them and now to incorporate my daughter, who you got to see in the background before we put up this beautiful background, to have her as a part of my life, to know that my daughter, luna, has more opportunities now than I ever would have dreamed of, to know that she could make more money if she chooses to play sports than I could have ever imagined. It's, you know, it's. It's just so beautiful and it's and it's unbelievable as someone who really thought we would never get to this place, because when I played, it just wasn't realistic, right, like we got paid pennies on the dollar, we had one person coming to our games. It just it wasn't. It wasn't the environment or circumstances where I thought we could be breaking records.
Joanna Lohman:And so just to see the progress we made and to still know that there is still much more room and space to push for progress and to be a leading actor in that push for progress when it comes to pay equity, when it comes to investment in media, investment in resources, investment in dollars, access, opportunity that is my jam, dr King. Just building access and opportunity to play this beautiful sport around the world. That's why I travel, that's why I go to sub-Saharan Africa, that's why I'm in. A lot of these countries is to is to create a world where young women have the human right to play sport Right, and I know that resonates with you, I know that you I see you shaking your head Like it's it's something that will change these young girls lives forever I think that sports does make a big difference because I think it helps, especially during the teenage years and the pre-teenage years.
Dr King:I think it helps young people to develop confidence, but also to understand teamwork and, um uh, tenacity, um know, keep going even when it's difficult to go. And I think that sports in general makes a very, very big difference for young women of course, young men too, but I think for young women, um, especially team sports can make a very, very big difference for the development and their self-confidence and their emotional growth.
Joanna Lohman:Yes, yeah, I, you know it's.
Joanna Lohman:It sounds almost counterintuitive, but I always say that sport, the sport's greatest power, is to provide a safe and public space to suffer, because when you show up at sports, you, you suffer, you, you go through some painful experiences, you will trip, you will fall, you will get kicked and you will also lose, right Like you have a daily opportunity to lose and to win and to find out who you are through that suffering.
Joanna Lohman:Because you know this, dr King, like life is about suffering and suffering is sacred, suffering is sacred. In order for us to feel satisfaction, which is a key piece to happiness, we have to suffer. That's the only time we feel satisfaction is post-suffering, and so if we deny ourselves the ability to suffer or the training in suffering, then we're denying people a happy life. And so to not give these opportunities to young women, especially the young women who need it the most, who barely get recognized, who are unacknowledged, who don't necessarily get to exercise right or be a part of a team and experience this joy, it's sad that they don't get these key aspects of life, and I want to help even the smallest piece to be a provider of that.
Dr King:I think you've done that. Can you tell us more about your foundation that works with young people? Yeah, I would love our audience to know.
Joanna Lohman:Yes, I would love to share. It's called the Champion's Mindset. The Champion's Mindset is training the game inside the game. So I think the mind and how we shape our thoughts is completely under-trained and under-appreciated, because our thoughts drive our behaviors, which then drive our results, and so what's going on between our ears is really the key to your career and to your life. We call it metacognition is understanding your own thoughts and knowing that the human brain number one priority of the human brain is survival. The number two priority of the human brain is comfort, and so we're not hardwired to thrive, we are hardwired to survive.
Joanna Lohman:So what does that mean? It means that 80% of human thought is negative 80%, and if we have negative thoughts, then that's going to shape negative behaviors which will shape negative results, right? So how do we train our brain so that we are replacing negative thoughts with either neutral or positive thoughts? We are prepping ourselves for big moments, big games, big practices, because it begins before it begins, right? If we're not mentally prepping for these moments in life, then we're not as prepared as we need to be and our brain will kick back into the default, which is survival mode. And when we face challenge, change, adversity, pressure, which is sports to a T, then we're going to go into fight, flight or freeze, which means that we're not going to be in a high performance mindset. So this course is to really help young women shape a mindset that allows them to walk into any circumstance confident, comfortable and ready to kick some serious butt right comfortable and ready to kick some serious butt right. Um, especially young girls who I feel like one are, have so much pressure from society coming at them from all different angles social media, parental school, uh, friends, and then two, these young women who aren't necessarily supported by society, to to be vocal and strong and to have a voice.
Joanna Lohman:And so I want to be someone who supports that out of them and really I want to say, brings that out of them, empowers them to be the best version of who they can be and build the skills, tools, techniques to have a mindset that will drive them into a thriving lifestyle.
Dr King:And when did you start this foundation? And I'm just curious about how it works. How old are the young people and how does it work and how often do you get it? I think that you might have some of the audience really looking into wanting to be a part of that.
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, so it's a six month experience where we meet every two weeks, virtually, so I can open it up geographically to anyone around the world, and it's an hour long session held by me personally, and each week we have a theme or a module that we go over. It has worksheets and I am giving them the tools and the strategies to build a resilient mindset. So it's Sunday nights. It'll start March 30th, it'll run for six months and I typically do it once a year. First year was last year. I had 10 girls go through it, super powerful, running it back now for 2025, with even more students that want to be a part of the champions mindset, because people are starting to understand how important it is, and I envisioned myself doing it once a year Until I feel like I've changed the world, which is you know not fully ever going to happen, so I see it happening for a long, long time.
Dr King:This is great. How can, how can people register or find out more about this, especially since it's virtual and anybody from all over the world can actually be a part of it?
Joanna Lohman:So you can go to my website, which is Joanna Lohmancom. J O A N N A L O H M A Ncom, and there's a tab that says experiences and if you click on that tab you'll see the champion's mindset and it's for female athletes ages 12 to 16. So that's like the core group I'm trying to hit, because those four or five years are really formidable for young women.
Dr King:That's fabulous. Yes, it really is, and it's so important to have a person like yourself who is a mentor that doesn't necessarily have to be in a particular city, that town or the particular country to see what you've gone through and to be able to think I can do that too. Right, this is something that I can be a part of. That's wonderful.
Joanna Lohman:I, you know, I made it for the 14 year old Joanna Lohman because I didn't have that person when I was growing up. I didn't have that model or that, that guide mentor to help me through tough situations and there were a lot.
Dr King:As a youth athlete just trying to be the best you can be, you really would love someone to guide you and to lean on through all of that it makes all the difference how many, how many groups already have finished your six month program and maybe can you give one or two examples, without you know, with made up names, of young people that went from point A of maybe having a difficult time with life, to to being able to use what you had to give in order to make their lives better.
Joanna Lohman:Yeah. So last year I had a young woman who was an Olympic weightlifter and also, you know, very, I would say, shy, very introverted, may or may not have gotten along with her sister, and after our program she was telling me how much her relationship with her sister has grown, of how she's really started to reach out to her younger sister and wanted to build a relationship. She broke records in her Olympic weightlifting competitions. She was able to go in with so much more confidence, self-belief and also understand, dr King, that her worth was not attached to her results. Right, that's really important for me to tell these young women your self-worth and your love is not determined by a result you may get on the weekend, right, like that has nothing to do how you perform, has nothing to do with the person that you are. And so she was really able to holistically walk through the world as a much better student, a much better family member, community member and Olympic weightlifter because of the tools and strategies she was able to learn in the champion's mindset.
Dr King:That makes all the difference and I love the fact that you talk about that it's not the progress you make or the success in what you do, but who you are as a person, and I think, especially many teenagers I know that I, as a teenager, found that very difficult. Teenagehood is, of course, difficult for many of us. Is that growth period and so to to actually know that, to be told that, to feel that and to be brought through that, that understanding that it's not what you do, it's who you are, and that's what's the key that's invaluable. And, um, your program is it only for people that do high performance sports or is it for any young woman that anywhere in the world that's doing some kind of sports?
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, anyone in the world that's doing some kind of sports. That's important for me to open it up to anyone who plays it, regardless of skill level, and honestly, dr King, you're going to learn so much. That applies to off the field more than on the field, I would say. It's just how do you handle the challenges of life, because they're daily, and how do you have the tools and techniques to emotionally regulate, you know, to have confidence, to be able to set goals, to be able to build a holistic and balanced identity in life, to be a part of a team, and these are skills that translate to really all aspects of life. So it's for, I would say, any athlete who's a young woman ages 12 to 16.
Dr King:Thank you, and, believe it or not, 30 minutes has gone so fast. We have several minutes left. Is there another topic that you'd like to talk about with our audience?
Joanna Lohman:It's gone by really fast. Jeez, you're so, you're so easy to talk to.
Dr King:Thank you, so are you. I'm enjoying this conversation so much. So if you have when and if you have the time again, I would love to have a opportunity.
Joanna Lohman:Yeah, you know, I think I was a professional athlete for 16 years and I love. I love the game of soccer and I love it not necessarily because of the X's and O's, and what do I mean by that? I don't love it because I know where the midfielder is going to run at any given moment in a game. You know a defender when they should slide tackle. I love sport because it has the power to change the world and, for me, using sport as a vehicle for change is what really lights me up and gives me fulfillment and really, in the champion's mindset and what I do is that sport is just the vehicle. Sport is the vehicle to bring out the best version of you.
Joanna Lohman:And in a world that is, like, absolutely obsessed with stats and accolades and medals and trophies and you feel like if I don't win, I'm a loser, that is not true. Right Again, you don't have to be the greatest to be great. Because, let's be honest, dr King, very few of us are the goats, right, the greatest of all time, like, very like, 0.0000001% of the population. And we're making everybody else, the 99.999%, feel like they're not good enough, feel like they're losers because they're not winning the ultimate prize, and so we're losing. We're losing the contribution and the impact of the lifeblood of the people who make this world run right.
Joanna Lohman:Their impact, their contribution, is what builds traction in organizations. It is what builds traction in our communities, and so I just really wanna encourage anyone who may feel like they're not the star or the leader or the team captain or the CEO or the CFO, like you are important and you matter. I see you, I feel you and please, like you know, reach out to me. You know I love, I love what I do, I love traveling the world, speaking to different organizations, groups, and if I can come and inspire and motivate your people, like I am, I am willing and ready in this army, so let's go.
Dr King:Thank you so much. You are so inspirational. Thank you, we really appreciate you being with us and to our audience. Thank you for sharing this time with us. And remember if I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, then when? That's by Hillel and I've added if not me, then who? Thank you for being with us?