By: Mike Avila
The Unstoppable Mindset of Mike Avila
He broke his neck three times. He suffered paralysis. He came back to win 27 National Championships and build a successful business career. Now in his debut book, NOT TODAY: The Secret to Never Giving Up, he shares the philosophy that made it all possible.
There is a moment in Mike Avila’s life most people would never come back from. It was 1991 on Lake Mead in Las Vegas, where Avila had dominated water ski racing for a decade. Racing at over 100 miles per hour, his boat struck something submerged. The impact was catastrophic. Dragged underwater for 150 feet, he was left motionless on the surface. He woke in a hospital unable to lift his head. His neck, already fractured from a prior crash, was shattered again. Broken wrist, broken sternum, bruised heart. His right arm was completely paralyzed, with partial paralysis from ear to mid-thigh. By every clinical measure, it was career over. What happened next is why we are telling this story.
“I was done being scared. Done losing belief in myself. Done giving up. Not Today.”
Three Times Down, Three Times Back
Most people do not know that Avila’s record-shattering career was achieved despite injuries that would have permanently ended any other athlete. He broke his neck three times. After each crash, in 1982, 1990, and 1991, he came back. After the final crash at Lake Mead, living at his sister’s house and unable to feed himself, he describes becoming invisible. “Before the crash, people naturally moved out of my way in a crowd,” he writes. “Afterwards, I shuffled through saying ‘Excuse me’ again and again. I was a ghost.”
It was in that darkness the words arrived. Not from a therapist or a coach but from within. Not Today. “That guy can come back tomorrow and try again,” Avila writes. “But he’s not getting me today. Not Today. Not Today. Not Today.”
The Philosophy
NOT TODAY: The Secret to Never Giving Up is not a sports memoir. It is a manual for the human condition. The premise is simple. You do not have to win forever. You only have to win today. Avila applies this across every arena in which people break down, including addiction, grief, career failure, and broken relationships. After his 1991 crash, he refused prescription painkillers despite chronic pain. “I preferred to take it one day at a time,” he writes. “Not Today. I’m not going to rely on drugs today.”
“You may get beat, but you never lose unless you quit.”
From the Water to the Boardroom
Avila’s comeback extended far beyond sport. He built a multi-million-dollar construction management company from the ground up, generating millions in monthly revenue. He mentored athletes and entrepreneurs across the country.
NASCAR driver Aric Almirola, who penned the book’s foreword, puts it plainly: “He attacks life head-on every day. He is the most relentless person I have ever known.” At 67, Avila still competes in boat racing and still mentors. His greatest pride, he says, is not the 27 national titles or the Hall of Fame plaque. It is the moments when someone tells him he helped them hold on for one more day. NOT TODAY: The Secret to Never Giving Up is available now on Amazon in eBook, paperback, and hardback, a book about choosing to be fully, fiercely alive, one day at a time.
