Blog
For a better world through sport
Tips and insights from decades of experience in Olympic sports and mindfulness to help you perform optimally in your field of play
Group Consciousness
One of the greatest coaches in NBA history, Phil Jackson, famously led the Chicago Bulls and LA Lakers to a combined 11 championships. He discovered that when he had the players sit in silence,…
Pitfalls in Striving for Outcome
For all of us who have worked in high performance sport, we know that performance goals naturally stretch us out of our comfort zone, while attachment to outcome has a pesky way of pulling us out of…
Accepting What Is
Acceptance is one of the hardest, if not the hardest, thing for high achievers, to um, accept. Attachment to specific desires & feelings and how things ‘should be’ creates a certain…
We Become What We Believe
Many of us have dreams, but don’t start them because we don’t think we can succeed. We stop short of our dreams as long as believe trying is a waste of time. Fear, worry, and rumination play a part…
Noticing
We often focus on our weaknesses, or the things we feel we need to change or improve upon. In striving to be what we are not, we introduce an idea in our mind of where we should be, and that we are…
The Resilient Journeyer
When we take on a new challenge, especially something big and meaningful, we know that it won’t be easy, but we set out, nonetheless excited and motivated by the challenge ahead. After the initial…
Our One Shots
Being present to opportunities is the essence of being able to capture our one shots – being present to the choices that you may not have previously been aware of. Waking up to these moments…
Choose Vulnerability
Vulnerability, composure, and courage. Building resilience in the face of difficulty. As high achievers and performers, we naturally encounter difficulty and challenges as part of living life around…
Performance without Expectations
One of our most powerful mindfulness practices – our open awareness practice, with or without noting – teaches us to become more aware of the space in which objects arise. An open, beginner’s mind…
The Power of a Silent Hike
Imagine a hike that may very well be unlike any other hike you’ve ever taken. Imagine yourself standing at the foot of an imaginary mountain, looking up. This mountain could be a metaphor for a goal…
The Essence of Engagement
To perform as our best selves, we need to be engaged. It is this very engagement that allows us to stand out. Let’s take, for example, when dozens of violinists show up for an audition, all…
Priming for a State of Flow
We’ve all experience moments of being in the zone. Time seems to stand still; we experience a sense of clarity, peace and euphoria. There is a merging of action and awareness. States like these are…
The “just hard enough” Point
Having high standards and a commitment to excellence is a big part of any high-performance culture / mindset. Big dreams inspire. Perfectionism or a refusal to accept any standard short of perfection…
Your Life is Now
In life, the most powerful question we can ask ourselves is … What’s Important Now? It keeps us present to what we do and why we do it. It reconnects us to the things that bring us joy allowing us to…
Incline your Mind towards Joy
Mindful meditation lays a foundation for performance enhancement in the establishment of mindful awareness, which is allowing or accepting things as they are. When combined with the insights and…
Your 20/20 Vision
Whether it’s through shoulder angels or Morgan Freeman voice overs, we narrate our life. It’s how we make sense of things. Sometimes the narratives are more negative than positive; other…
Interoceptive Awareness
You are about to walk on stage to perform in front of an important audience. Feeling anxious? Why? It starts with a cascade of chemical reactions that trigger your autonomic nervous system. Your…
Apple Meditation
What can an apple tell us about being a mindful performer? Well, a lot, as it turns out. It can teach us about performance anxiety, playfulness, sensory immersion and even multi-tasking. This was one…
The Mindful Duck
“Yes for sure we are getting a masters in adaptability right now. Steady hand on the wheel. Like a duck in the water. Cruising on the water with the feet peddling below… ha!” The…
Unself Yourself
I am at that point, standing at the edge of the unknown, deciding whether I should step back to a place of certainty, or take the leap forward, and risk falling. Perhaps you have been there too.…
Leadership Defined By Results
I attended a virtual conference in June originally scheduled to be held in Los Angeles. It was the Mindfulness and Compassion Global Summit. The opening keynote, “The Storm Makes You Stronger”, was…
When It Matters Most
It was the day of the Opening Ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, Korea. As you can imagine, the day was busy with people still arriving and conducting final preparations. There was…
Our Journey
First Water, as unique as its journey With roots in mindfulness and elite Olympic performance Like so many life plans, the path that we envision turns out to be quite different from the one we…