“I’ve had some acting gigs before, and I got a little bit of experience through high school,” says Hamlin, who is making a cameo on Hallmark Channel’s Countdown to Christmas lineup this year, The more the bettersay. “I have earned new respect for actors and for their craft and the dedication, the time and everything it takes to get the masterpiece and the results they get.”
But this isn’t just another side project for Hamlin. The project touches Hamlin because it is based on his own near-fatal experience.
On January 2, 2023, Hamlin went into cardiac arrest after being punched in the chest while making a tackle in a match at Monday night football against the Cincinnati Bengals. Medical personnel from both teams worked on Hamlin, performing CPR for nine minutes while he used a defibrillator to restore his heartbeat.
With the three-year anniversary of that life-changing moment approaching, Hamlin admits he still deals with the emotions of the day every time he takes the field.
“This is something I teach my 10-year-old brother,” Hamlin says. “Fear is real. We all experience fear. For example, everyone experiences fear. It can be more bad than good because you don’t know what to do with the fear. I think what makes people different is what you do with the fear. If you can persevere through the fear, you can’t let the fear get in the way of you, because every person experiences fear, it’s a human emotion to experience.”
Hamlin continues, “And so I don’t want people to shy away from it. I really want people to embrace it, to know that it’s real, and to know that everyone else is experiencing it too, in their own way. I think it’s just about what we do, and you have to know that. Everyone experiences it and you can’t let it stop you from doing what you want to do. I think that’s just a big summary of my whole process.”
While he doesn’t have all the answers about how things have changed, Hamlin knows it will take a while to sort through his thoughts as he tries to live in the moment.
“I’m honestly still in the process of figuring that out,” Hamlin said. I think it will take me about ten years before I can really say I have all the answers to that. I think I’m just getting into the moment of it all at this point, almost three years in fact. I’m still in the moment, I’m still figuring out all the unique things and chaos that came my way, and I guess I was just trying to navigate the world. But I think just being in the moment, staying present, just really maximizing everything I can around me is going to propel me forward and allow me to have a better understanding of that when it’s all said and done.
The incident transformed Hamlin in the way he lives today
“My life has really changed and it will be different forever,” Hamlin explains. “But there are reasons that I don’t shy away from. I’m looking forward to a deeper connection [to] my purpose and why I’m here and I allow that community and I allow that feeling, everything that I do, in terms of my actions and my movements, my partnerships, whatever I do, I really just let God lead the way, and it’s been great so far. I am grateful.”
The film features five real-life members of Abbott’s HeartMates community who have had heart problems similar to Hamlin’s and have overcome everything from heart transplants to open-heart surgery.
“They are truly my inspiration,” Hamlin, the program’s ambassador, says of the younger children he works with. “They allowed me to feel connected and understood and to see people at different stages of their lives experiencing things that might be a little different than me, but we’re all dealing with it in some way. It really gives me courage and inspiration to just continue with my work.”
Hamlin, who remains “extra prayed” since the hit, has become so close to some of the young people he works with that they are part of his new game day ritual.
‘I’ll call one of mine Heartfellows and just get a little bit of inspiration, a little bit of motivation,” Hamlin said. “They always text me before games. Zeke (who makes a cameo in the film) was the first participant in the HeartMates program. He texts me before every game and just gives me that motivation. His text will be something like, “Man, no matter what, win, lose or draw, I appreciate you. You mean so much to me,’ and in that way bring me back down to earth and realize that this is just a game, and I can have things in my life that give me purpose, even outside of the game of football.”
And while Hamlin will never know why this rare incident happened to him, he’s done asking, “Why me?” and embrace how his voice now helps others.
“I always try to find a positive outlook to keep myself going,” Hamlin says. There are so many moments in my life that I held on to, so it kind of changed who I am as a person. But I understand how I was used at that time.”
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