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About Me

Tony Frank Pizza

What Got Me Into Coaching?

This is a question that always comes up in Discovery Calls. As cheesy as it sounds, it's truly been a culmination of all of my life's events, however, a few stand out in particular.

As a literature teacher, my class would dissect the likes of The Count of Monte Cristo and Fahrenheit 451 and the topic of suicide would often come up. I had no formal training, but thought to offer a safe place to share ideations if a student was struggling with those thoughts.

Little did I know that offering would bring in me in contact with two students and their parents in consecutive years. I didn't have any formal training, but did a lot of listening, empathizing, and understanding without judgement. Those experiences changed my life and helped blossom my passion. As alignment would have it, I was also concurrently attending a men's group and my soon-to-be mentor shared a book that helped me understand a little deeper about masculinity. When I reached out to him to thank him for the book, our chat lead me to sharing my love for helping others. He just happened to be an Executive Coach with over 20 years of experience and he had developed a year-long curriculum. It changed my life by putting a purpose to a feeling I'd always had.

A Little More About Me

My life probably isn't autobiography-worthy, but it's been a full one.

I grew up all over Salt Lake City with my four siblings after our parents divorced in 1988. I have lived in Utah for all my life with the exception of the five years I spent in the U.S. Marines. While the LDS church wasn't a big part of my life growing up, I was baptized in the religion and returned due to the familiarity coupled with homesickness I felt as a 19-year old living in San Diego. I was married in the LDS Temple and had two kids with my first wife, but realized fairly early on that the Mormon Church didn't resonate with my core beliefs at all.

I saw combat in Kuwait and Iraq as a field computer repair person. When I left the military to pursue my ambition of becoming a doctor, I quickly realized that my love for books, writing, and ideas overpowered my love of the field of medicine, and I pursued an English Major and became an editor at the University of Utah's nationally recognized newspaper. I did stints for the two dominant newspapers of the state before a nationwide journalism hiring freeze caused me to look for work elsewhere. That's when I found teaching and lovingly did that for 12 years teaching all aspects of English, economics, drama, debate, and history.

In my personal life, I have two nearly adult children of my own, as well as two bonus children when I married my sweetheart in December of 2023. Our relationship is as beautiful as it was complicated, as we moved in together quickly and lived together for 3 years before taking a year's break with no contact, then reconciling after becoming better versions of ourselves. We are happily co-piloting a lovely, albeit hectic life with lots of love and moving parts.

My hobbies and passions are rock climbing, reading, and playing the guitar, and I dabble as much as I can in camping, hiking, canyoneering, jewelry making, wood working, dancing, concert-going, and adventuring in lands both local and foreign with the love of my life.