WHY NOT?
The eight Hard Standards. The fuel that drives them. The full account of how Matt built two world-class careers in parallel — blind.
BLINDNESS WAS NEVER THE BIGGEST FIGHT.
Why Not? is Matt Formston's first business book. It distils four decades of work — in elite sport, in senior corporate leadership, and in the hard internal recovery that made both careers possible — into eight non-negotiable standards Matt has lived by. Trust is the eighth. It is the standard that holds the other seven together.
The book opens with a line most readers do not expect: blindness was never the biggest fight. The fight Matt is describing is the internal one. The years he spent chasing other people's validation. The Christmas Eve he woke up at 3am, covered in someone else's blood, with no memory of what had happened earlier that night. The afternoon, ten years later, in a borrowed room in Killara, when he spoke to a man living in the building who had wasted his life making excuses, and realised that man could be him. The Hard Standards were built in the aftermath of that realisation. The world records, world titles, AM, and corporate career came after the standards did, not before
Why Not? is structured around twenty short chapters and the eight standards that run through them. It is written without softening. The voice is direct, sometimes profane, always honest. There are no frameworks borrowed from other authors, no recycled productivity advice, no inspirational poster lines. Every standard in the book has been stress-tested against fifty-foot waves at Nazaré, against world-championship competition, against board-level negotiations, against the ordinary daily work of being a husband, a father, and an executive — blind, for fifteen years in parallel.
This is a book for readers who are tired of motivational frameworks that do not survive contact with reality. The Hard Standards survived Nazaré. They will survive your Monday morning.
WHY THE BOOK IS CALLED WHY NOT?
People have asked Matt the same question his whole life. Why did you surf Nazaré? Why did you play rugby and ice hockey? Why would you sprint for a world-championship finish at over seventy kilometres an hour on a bike you cannot steer? Not how. Why. The question carries an assumption underneath it — that blindness should have disqualified Matt from even trying, and that any decision to live fully needs to be justified.
Why Not? is the answer. The standards in the book are the tools. "Why Not?" is the fuel. It is the response Matt gives, internally, every time someone asks why he chose to do something they did not think he should have been able to do. It is the question his father asked at the dinner table whenever any of the Formston children said "I can't." And it is the question the book closes on — handed back to the reader.
EIGHT STANDARDS. NON-NEGOTIABLE.
A standard is what you do when no one is watching. It is not a goal, not a hack, not a tip. It is a non-negotiable. Why Not? distils four decades of work into eight of them. The book introduces them in the order they showed up in Matt's life — sometimes overlapping, sometimes colliding, always building on each other. They are listed below in the order they appear.
Know when to go fast and when to go slow. You need both. The skill is knowing which one the moment demands.
Rules only matter when they are enforced. A standard you let slide was never a standard. It was a fuzzy dream.
Brutal self-honesty. Strip away the excuses, the comfortable lies, the stories you tell yourself when no one is listening. The hardest work in the book
There are no shortcuts. The work you put in now is what makes your future self's life easier — provided it is the right work.
Know when to go fast and when to go slow. You need both. The skill is knowing which one the moment demands.
Real leadership comes from understanding people fully — not their KPIs, but their whole lives. What they want, what they dream, what they fear, what they will not say out loud.
You are not one thing. You are a parent, an athlete, an executive, a partner, a friend. Each role demands the full version of that version of you. Each one deserves it.
The eighth standard. Trust is the foundation and the amplifier of high performance. The formula at the centre of the book.
THE STANDARDS WERE LIVED FIRST.
Why Not? is Matt's first business book. It was written between training sessions at Wamberal on the New South Wales Central Coast, between board meetings, on flights between speaking engagements across the Asia-Pacific, and around the dinner table at home with his wife Bex and their three children. It is the book his keynote audiences have been asking him to write for years. It exists because the standards were lived first, and the book came after — not the other way around.
PEOPLE WHO HAVE SEEN THE WORK
I felt privileged speaking to Matt and hearing about his story and his thrill for big waves. But what stood out most was his empathy — not just talking about it but actually living it, and the way he owns what he has built despite the challenges. It makes you take a hard look at yourself. Matt is a seriously cool guy. Being around him made me more grateful and pushed me to want to be better.
Matt Formston is an absolute force. A true legend who constantly keeps the rest of us 'able-bodied' athletes honest. He is living proof that limits are rarely real — they are just stories waiting to be rewritten. Why Not? is raw, honest, and deeply inspiring. But what I love most is that it is practical. No fluff, no shortcuts, just the work. Matt does not just challenge what is possible — he shows you how to get there. His mindset is simple, powerful, and contagious: why not? This book will move you, shake you, and call you forward.
Invictus means unconquered. When we asked Matt to become an ambassador, it was because his story embodies exactly that — not the absence of adversity, but the refusal to be defined by it. Why Not? captures something we see in our Invictus community every day: that the standards you hold yourself to, especially when no one is watching, are the foundation everything else is built on. Matt does not just inspire. He gives you a framework. And for leaders building teams that need to perform under pressure, trust under pressure, and grow under pressure, that framework is genuinely valuable. Why Not? is the book I will be recommending to my network.
As an athlete, you learn that results do not come from talent alone — they come from the standards you hold yourself to every day. That is what makes Matt's story so powerful. Why Not? shows that success is built on discipline, mindset, and the willingness to do the hard work when no one is watching. There are valuable lessons in this book for athletes, leaders, and anyone chasing improvement in their own life.
I have watched Matt Formston chair a room full of senior corporate leaders and bring them to a shared purpose that none of them could have reached alone. That is not a small thing. Getting large organisations to set aside their own agendas, hold themselves to a common standard, and build genuine trust across competing interests takes a particular kind of leadership — and Matt has it in abundance. Why Not? is the book behind the person I have seen in action. The standards are real. The framework works. And the proof is not just in the world records or the Netflix documentary — it is in the room, in the work, and in what gets built when people finally stop making excuses and start holding themselves accountable. This book will challenge you. More importantly, it will show you exactly what to do about it.
Matt Formston is one of those rare people who genuinely ‘walks the talk’. I know this from working with him: the same focus, the same refusal to accept excuses, the same insistence on doing things properly. Why Not? is raw, honest and insightful, a must-read for anyone who wants to lead better and live better.
BUYING FOR YOUR LEADERSHIP TEAM?
Why Not? is built for leadership teams reading together. The eight Hard Standards land harder when a team works through them in parallel — same book, same week, same conversation. Bulk orders available for executive teams, leadership cohorts, board offsites, and corporate book clubs.
PRE-ORDER WHY NOT?
The eight Hard Standards. The fuel that drives them. Releases August 2026 from Wiley.
Bulk orders for leadership teams: see above, or enquire here