While Keith Thurman knows what he wants to achieve in a bustling junior-middleweight division, he also knows what he wants to do when he decides to walk away from the sport.

The 36-year-old has battled with inactivity, and had his first fight in three years when he defeated Brock Jarvis in three rounds in March in Australia.

Victory might lead to a fight with Tim Tszyu, and the Floridian certainly wants to return to the title mix.

But, post-boxing, Thurman has a very different idea about the direction he wants his life to take.

“There’s a lot of stuff that I could do,” he told BoxingScene. “I’m an avid meditator. I love mentoring and just giving back to communities. I really have a passion for speaking to the youth. I’d love to do some motivational speaking. I’ve got an engagement, actually, on a corporate event – not with the youth – but I want to diversify myself to corporate speaking and youth speaking. And for those purposes, just sharing my story.”

Thurman’s tale of hard work and commitment has been well told, and he tells it well. He is articulate, and can reel it off at speed.

“You know, a seven-year-old boy who found boxing; whose boxing coach was the janitor of his elementary school; who trained him from the age of seven to the age of 20 when he passed away,” he says. “Raised by my single mother… you know, spent time with my father who did martial arts and just planted the seed of some kind of combat sport in me. I dropped out of high school so that I can train in the morning when the pros were training. And luckily for me, they weren’t regular pros at my gym. We had [Ronald] Winky Wright and Jeff ‘Left Hook’ Lacy. My gym had two world champions.”

Just like that, Thurman’s education took a different turn. His university was a boxing gym, and the gifted Wright and heavy-handed Lacy were his lecturers. 

“So it’s like I’ve dropped out of school to go wake up every morning and walk through Wall Street and be with the best top investors,” he went on. “I tell people I left one education to get another education. And I live my life off of passion and that’s what I love to do. So whatever I do outside of boxing, it’s just going to be another thing that I’m passionate about, because I don’t move without passion in life – I got passion for the youth. 

“I got passion for mentoring; advising people. I have a passion for mental health. I watched my mother suffer through depression – bedridden depression – when I was a teenager, 14, 15 years old and so I understand mental-health issues.”

Time has moved on since Thurman’s teens and the subject of mental health has become a more prominent part of the conversation. In the often solitary and hyper-masculine world of boxing, strength was not showing pain or feelings; there was limited understanding and Thurman knew – as many teens do – to disguise pain.

“Now that I’m not a teenager, it was actually something I wasn’t really under,” Thurman said. “I didn’t have the empathy and the understanding of what my mother was struggling with at the time. But as I’ve grown older, as I’ve read more about psychology, got more knowledge about dopamine and depression and different things, and a better understanding of women as a husband; as a father... 

“There’s a lot more to Keith Thurman in general at this stage of my life, at this stage of my career. But overall, that passion for boxing – that passion for being in the ring – that passion for fight night is still there. And someone’s going to have to beat it out of me. 

“I tell people, I got 31 wins; 22 knockouts. I got one loss. But if you ask me, Keith Thurman is still undefeated. I’ve never seen defeat in the ring. No one’s destroyed me – took me out – destroyed my passion; destroyed my drive and my love for the sport. So yeah, if they want to see me gone, they’re going to have to put some hands on me.”