Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - Set Yourself Up for an Epic 2023 | Ask Me Anything (AMA) #3 with Dr. Michael Gervais

Episode Date: December 19, 2022

Here's the final Ask Me Anything (AMA) of 2022 with Dr. Michael Gervais!A couple weeks back, we took questions from our community on how to best support your life ambitions, resolutions, habits, and goals as you move into 2023.Your questions rocked.Dr. Mike was excited to jump into the studio to film this and we hope this supports your new year.Stay tuned as we'll be back in 2023 with more high-performance and wellbeing content. Let us know—what questions would you like Dr. Mike to answer? Leave your questions for the next AMA in the comments below or email [e-mail]_________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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stay present and engaged with my thinking and writing. If you wanna slow down, if you wanna work smarter, I highly encourage you to check them out. Visit remarkable.com to learn more and grab your paper pro today. Okay, welcome back to another Ask Me Anything and the last official AMA of 2022. This is going to be a fun one. We're focused on the practices and principles to help support your life ambitions heading into the new year. Now I'm really excited for 2023. Quietly, I've been looking forward to the natural reset that happens at this time of the year. For me, it's a spiritually charged month, a time to

reflect and reconnect. And based on the questions that we received, I can tell it's the same for many of you. I'm incredibly grateful for our community and the commitment that each of you take to live in alignment with your deeper purpose. It is obvious. And if you're looking to create change heading into the new year, it doesn't begin when the ball drops. It starts today. As you know, from listening to the podcast, our minds are our greatest asset. And if you want to learn more about how you can train your mind, I want to encourage you to check out our online psychological training course, where we pulled together the best practices to meet the unique intersection of high performance and wellbeing. We walk through 16 essential principles and skills for you to train your mind in the same way we train world-class athletes and executives.

We also just released a brand new version of the course with improved functionality and updated user experience and downloadable resources. I'm super stoked on it. And I think you're going to love it too. Over my career, this course has been one of the projects that I am most excited to share. And I hope that you'll find it to be incredibly meaningful in your life. So as a Finding Mastery listener, we want to hook you up with $50 off the Finding Your Best Course license. To sign up for the course and receive that discount, just head to findingmastery.net slash course. That's findingmastery.net forward slash course to receive

$50 off. Alex writes, Mike, what's the difference between intentions and resolutions as we go into the new year? It's a good question. There's a nuance here that's slight. Resolutions are this idea that I'm going to resolve to be a different person in the new year. January 1, I'm different. And intention is a daily practice of imagining how you want to be today. One is a thin slice and intention is a thin slice. It puts you in the power seat to say, how do I want to be today? And a resolution is this broad sweeping thing. 50% of people that set resolutions fail within three months. They don't really work. Dario writes, thank you for the opportunity to ask meaningful questions to help us become our best. I've struggled with trusting my abilities to lead in my role at the firm. This upcoming year, I will lead in the area of diversity and equity and inclusion. what could I say to myself every day to remind myself that I am capable? That question is far deeper than just the words that just came

out. When somebody's saying that I've lost my ability to trust myself, I mean, that can be really pretty deep. So the first thing I do is calibrate, like, is this a deep thing or is this like, no, I've just kind of lost my way in, you know, how well I can deliver. So is it deeper? Is it more surface is where I'd first calibrate. My inclination is that the precision of language is in many respects the tool for a psychologist like that is one of our tools is to have a rich understanding of calibrating language and snapping language into the emotions that the person's feeling and linking those around that That's one of our tools.

So I don't know if you mean confidence or trust, and they're different. Confidence is like this thing like, I think I can go do that. So losing confidence is very different than losing trust. Trust is more foundational, fundamental. So let's just go with the question that is about a deeper set here. Is that what makes this complicated, and I would go, this is where I would go with her. I'd say, okay, tell me about what it was like before you were two. She'd say, I don't remember. I'd say, well, what do you remember from a very early age?

As you've been able to piece it together, what do you think the first two years were like for you? And where we would go with that is where I'm working underneath the surface is that between the ages of zero and two is where trust is baked. And I'm using that word provocatively. The first two years of our life, before we could even formulate words, we established our level of trust in the world. So if our caregivers took care of us, if they were there when we cried, if they were there before we had stress, that we would say, oh, I can trust. The world is pretty good. I'm not thrashing to get my needs met. But for folks that it was hard from zero to two, that's likely what's coming up right now. What happens from the ages of zero to when we learn

that we, we can't trust other people because they're not reliable, that, that it forces us to take care of ourselves in a neurotic way. And again, I'm using that word provocatively too. So I would say I would want to understand where she's coming from and then I would work on self-trust. Okay, that's obvious. But how do we build self-trust? Is we purposely design a way to challenge herself every day to remind her to give evidence that, oh, I can do hard things. So we'd come up with a set of experiences to go challenge herself. And she'd come back and she'd learn a lot. We talk about it.

But that's the work. It's not like, let me say, what are the key affirmations that I can say to myself? Like, I do hard things. If you said that a thousand times, it's not going to make a difference. And if you say it three times right before you walk in to do something that you think is hard, it's not going to make a difference. Likely that affirmation stuff is really quite weak. Doesn't mean that it's, there's not a place for it, but this like, tell me what to say. And then I'm going to be okay. It just doesn't hold up. It's too flimsy. So we'd set up challenges

to go do hard things. And then over time, what naturally happens is somebody says, you know what, you're right. I think I was right all along that I can do. I do. I can trust myself. I do difficult things and like I figure it out. And those types of earning the right to trust yourself, we can't fake ourselves. So that's a long way of saying we need experiences to catalyze this ability for us to speak incredible and authentic ways that we can do hard things. And when we do that, that's the establishment of trust. So you don't believe in the efficacy of chanting a certain phrase to yourself or saying something to yourself in moments where you're the trust or the confidence drains out of you. Yeah.

So efficacy, meaning a word for power, like this, this way to the power that comes from saying something to yourself. That's what we're talking about, right? Yeah. Yeah. There's a place for it. Let's say that you are, that's why I was calibrating. Is this a more surface thing or deeper? If it's deeper, we've got to go build a body of work, right? And or historically remind ourselves of a body of work, but it's better to go forward and earn it

because it's real time rather than say, tell me times when. That's good too. But what you just described is more surface. And so let's say I'm going to go do something. Let's say it's surfing waves that I'm assessing are right above the playful zone, like the intensity's on, and I haven't surfed for a while. And so there's this question mark about if I have the goods right now to go paddle into some heavy stuff, it would be useful there for me to say, wait, hold on.

I got this. This is what I do. I love it. Let's go. Yep. I'm right on the edge. So that type of like working in the present moment is, is a great set of psychological skills.

That is awesome. But if I'm fundamentally in a place that is like, I don't know, I think that maybe I shouldn't even be on the beach, let alone like paddling out. So there's a depth to it. Michael writes, my question revolves around the art of putting together all the different practices that you teach with a large array of available material provided through finding mastery. What's the most effective way to pull it all together and beginning to put it into a formalized practice? Cool question. Easy answer is check out the course that we built. And literally, it has the 16 most essential practices and principles and skills for you to be your very best on a regular basis.

But one click down from that, it's the stitching and the weaving of them together. And so it's not like this skill alone is a game changer. Breathing alone will change your life. Meditation alone will change your life. Self-talk, yes and. It's the stitching of them together that is the big unlock. So easy answer. It sounds like a self-plug, but it is what I believe to be my most meaningful work to date is the consolidation and the weaving of those skills and practices together that hang together in a framework that are easy to practice.

Another way to do it is to identify the psychological skills that you want to get better at. Write them down so you can see them and then find best practices, whether in our podcast or wherever they might be, that people have said, this has worked for me and it's backed by science. So it's not this flimsy like, hey, this thing worked for me and it's backed by science. So it's not this flimsy, like, Hey, this thing worked for me. My, I learned it from whatever, like make sure that it's, it's worked in the real world from people that are in the amphitheater and it's been tested by science. This is a great practice. You know, just doing that, writing down the skills, figuring out what are the skills or the ways that you're going to practice those skills and heading into 2023, that would be a radical investment in yourself. So you can do that and or take the course that

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And when I'm traveling or in between meals on a demanding day, certainly I need something quick that will support the way that I feel and think and perform. And that's why I've been leaning on David Protein Bars. And so has the team here at Finding Mastery. In fact, our GM, Stuart, he loves them so much. I just want to kind of quickly put him on the spot. Stuart, I know you're listening. I think you might be the reason that we're running out of these bars so quickly.

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with something seamless, I'd love for you to go check them out. Get a free variety pack, a $25 value and 10% off for life. When you head to davidprotein.com slash finding mastery. That's David D A V I D protein P R O T E I N.com slash finding mastery. A listener writes, if you had to choose, what's the most important skill you would want every child to have? I'll tell you how my wife and I did this when our son was born. That might be an interesting framework. And I'll caveat it. I don't think there's just one.

I don't think there's the foundational thing. But I'll give you a couple of foundational ones that I think are really important. So when my son was born, my wife and I, we went through this exercise. So we're just talking about like how we want to be parents. And then it turned into a discussion about the core virtues that we wanted to help build, help support, you know? And so it's a good conversation and there's all these big words and, you know, we're thinking about so many ways and then it got almost overwhelming

because there's so many choices that we could make about the virtues and values that we would want to help instill. So she went away and she wrote like pages, you know, to try to get some clarity. And I did the same. And then we each got to three virtues that were kind of the core virtues for us. And then we shared that list and we agreed on two of them to keep those two in mind at all times. And now there's a whole bunch of other virtues that matter, but the two that mattered most of us were for him to be strong and to be kind. And so those are the ones that I think really matter. Now, those aren't necessarily skills, they're virtues. And I know the question was about skills. If I take this another direction and work on the skills, there's a handful that are foundational. One is honesty, like being

honest with yourself. It is so easy to make excuses, to defend, to blame. We don't really get anywhere. And so helping your child have a way to be honest with themselves. And so we have a role as parents in that, that we don't come over top in too big of a way or be aggressive or deeply disappointed because when they make a mistake or they do something and we ask them questions and all they want is our favor, all they want is to get away of this overly intense adult that is making them feel shitty, feel small, feel incapable, that

they'll short it. They won't go to the honesty because it doesn't feel safe enough to do so. So figure out a practice to help that person honestly reflect on their part of the experience. I think that's a big one. Another big one is awareness. So it's one of the kingpins for sure is to increase the awareness about what is actually happening inside of you. And so there's obviously a whole set of practices to help with that. But as parents, what we can do is we can ask questions. So where do you feel that?

If they're talking about being embarrassed or they're talking about being excited or they're talking about right after I took a shot at the goal and I missed or I stubbed my toe or like, you know, everyone stood up and applauded, whatever it is like, oh, where'd you feel that? So helping them have some awareness about what's happening inside of them from a feeling standpoint and a thinking standpoint. So I think that that's a great second one. And a third one is a fundamental belief about the future working out. And imagine the person, and I might be talking to half the population, let's say, that doesn't believe that the future is going to work out. Pessimism, if you will, a cynicism that drives through everything, well, it's really hard to make change if you don't believe the future is going to work out. So then what we do, make the internal changes.

What we do is we blame, we point, we defend, right? So I think optimism is a big one. Awareness is a big one. And honesty. And those three, I think think can carry people into highly charged highly emotional challenging environments to to to explore the upper limits of what they are capable of and honesty and awareness and a fundamental belief that the future something good's about to break something good's about to take place i, do you teach optimism to a child or do you just embody it and live it and they learn

by observing? Yeah. So it depends on the age, right? Let's say that, let's say you've got the zero to two or like a really young one, zero to six, somewhere in there. It is completely about modeling it. It is having a buoyancy about the future. It is having big eyes about what could be and constantly talking and living in alignment with that. At some point, you do teach it. You do teach the mechanics of it. But the best teacher that we have is the way that we represent ourselves with consistency. You can't teach what you don't have, but you do teach what you do have. You can't give what you don't have, but you do teach what you do have.

You can't give what you don't have, but you give what you do have. And so showing up is the greatest teacher and the relationship with your children is the mechanism, it's the delivery system for how they believe, the beliefs they hold about themselves and the beliefs they hold about their future. Brody asks, I'm curious, at the beginning of this year you said you wanted to be more the beliefs they hold about themselves and the beliefs they hold about their future. Brody asks, I'm curious, at the beginning of this year, you said you want to be more playful. What does that mean to you? What are some insights and keys to being more playful in a world that seemingly demands productivity and seriousness? Yeah. So last year, so every year I do this thing and I do it with, well, I like to do it with as many community members as I can.

And I call it the year of dot, dot, dot. And then each of us figure out like what comes after the year of. So last year, for me, it was the year of play. And actually, that was the second year that I had done it in a row. And I think I'm going to do it again, the year of play this year, because I didn second year that I had done it in a row. And I think I'm going to do it again, the year of play this year, because I didn't quite get it right this year. I didn't have as much fun and playfulness as I would have liked to. And so I'm going to take another run at it. But the question is great because that's what gets in the way of play for me is the need to produce, the need to have

results, the need to kind of be a quote unquote producer in the business world. And so it is intense. It's hard. And so I have to set a daily practice and a daily intention where before I get out of bed, I say, right, what am I about today? That's right. And I go through using my imagination, seeing and feeling the way I want to feel today. And I did that consistently well. I would wake up before I would get out of bed. I'd see myself having fun. It's easy for me to maybe over-rotate and be intense to meet a demand.

But intentionally seeing myself crack jokes, have fun, move a certain way that's more playful. And so I just want to be better at it. So I'm not going to say the world created a set of conditions that didn't allow me to be playful. I think that that's a broken model, that the external world is a certain way. So I can't be a certain way internally. I'm never going to ascribe to that. So what I wanted to, what I want to do next year is I think I'm going

to run it back and do the same thing, the year of play. And I'm just going to keep working on seeing and feeling myself, you know, doing that on a regular basis. And eventually it becomes more automatic, just like any skill that you want to build. Do you spend more attention and time on the feeling of playfulness or imagery or scenes of you being playful out in the world? Oh, that's cool. So the way it works for me, and this is using the science of imagination, the science of performance imagery, if you will, is I first conjure up the image and I'm trying to do it in a lifelike way. So seeing it in color, having texture, all of the senses involved in it. And then the final touch is that feeling of being, for me, playfulness. There's a buoyancy to it.

There's a expansiveness to it. There's a spontaneity that comes with it. So I want to feel that before I open my eyes and pull off the sheets and kind of jump into the shower. So it's both. It's seeing it like quick snips and frames. And then the deeper work is to have the emotion connected to it. Lori asked, Mike, on many podcasts, I've heard you reference first principles. Is this a defined list from psychology or is it something everyone defines for themselves? And how do we best use first principles in our lives?

Okay, so the first thing that comes up for me is no, there's not a list to choose from. Most of the spiritual practices or religions have guiding principles. And if you're thinking about it in that frame to reference a spiritual practice or a religion that feels right to you, the first principles are well articulated. So that's one place to go to if you're looking for like the deep work already done. Now, if we're together and you're to ask me that question. Is it Lori? If Lori and I were together and she would ask that question, I'd say, what do you think? And I, but I would say it not, that didn't come out right.

I would say like, what do you think? And I would imagine she'd say, I don't know. I don't, I don't know what that is, and I'd say, okay, what do you think the first principles are for you? And she'd say, well, and she'd go through probably three or four that felt organically available to her in that moment, and I'd say build from those. Start there, And you can reference the religions. That's cool. They've done a lot of deep work there.

And you can also work from like, what are the ones right now that feel organically available and like they're here? These are the ones I want to work from. And so in some respects, that's an easier place to start because it's already available. It's right underneath the surface. To make it more concrete, could you share a couple of your first principles? Yeah. Love is the first principle.

So I need to operationalize, define what love looks like. But it's a first principle. I want to make sure that, one, I have love infused and embedded in everything I do. So when there's a client I'm working with, that there's a groundedness in that. When there's a project I'm trying to solve, there's a groundedness of love in that. There's a love for the future, a love for people, a love for self, a love for nature. And so it's just the first principle for me to operate from. Another one is that everything somebody needs is already inside of them. So my partnering with them to help them unlock is they don't need me.

It's already in them. So the way that I think about them, the way that I regard them, the posture I hold for that person or for that team is that it's already in there. What are the questions i can help ask or what are the experiences that i can suggest you go do to know that that the answer you're looking for the the resource that you need is already inside you and so that's the second first principle i could keep going on and on but the principles guide the behaviors and the practices and the thinking. So principles first.

Katie writes, hi, Michael. I just experienced an amazing year of growth professionally and within the agency I work for. Now that our team is fully built, my question is, how can I best take them to the next level and help them grow? What are the best practices for positively managing teams through adversity? It's a cool question. Congrats. In our current climate, there's so many people that are talking about the stress and the headwinds and the ambiguity and all of the difficult nature that's taking place right now in business and in life. I think it's a great opportunity. Right now is like this magical moment to be alive, to capture the opportunity in just about every, on the field to have a look and a feel.

And they're nodding their head up and down as they're walking out like, I got it. Let's go. I can't wait to do this with you. That's a real formidable team over there. can't wait to do this with you. That's a real formidable team over there. Like, let's figure this thing out. Like, let's go. And there's a look and a feel behind their eyes and a slight nod.

And there's a posture where they're leaning into the challenge. And so that's like what the finished look looks like. You know, when you get to that place, it's like a lot of work has been done. That's cool. So if you take and work backwards, that what you want to do is make sure that people know how to rely on themselves, how to build themselves, how to back themselves, how to access the stuff, the body of work that's already in them. And when they can do that and they, there's a sense of groundedness and there's a sense of, um, sturdiness about them and they can also play. There's a buoyancy.

It's like a, it's the paradox and they can be there for their teammates. So you help them know where their evidence and their credibility comes from and then make sure that you're all along the way holding the standard of being great teammates together. So I would say it's both of those. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Momentus.

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A listener writes, what do you say to yourself most frequently throughout the day? Oh, what do I say to yourself most frequently throughout the day? Oh, what do I say to myself most frequently right now? I'm trying to think about like, I'm more aware of like what I'm saying and what I'm feeling than the themes that are emerging. So it's more of like this thin slice pivoting than it is this macro, what am I been saying for the last month or so? So that's where I first went is like, oh, that's, I never would think about it like that. But if the question were, how do you work with your thoughts? It's like, oh, I'm like, I'm aware, like, is this serving us right now? Is the way, I'm like, I'm aware. Like, is this serving us

right now? Is the way that I'm thinking about the person, the situation and myself in it, is this serving us? So that's how, that's the thin slice that's always taking place. It's like micro adjustment. And, but if I were to pull back and say, what are the themes? Like most of the themes are, um, okay, how do I solve this? Okay. What's my part in this? Okay. What's the solution here? What can I do to help this move along faster, move along with greater accuracy, move along in a way that feels grounded and buoyant. Those are the things I think about most of the time. And as I'm saying it, it's like, oh, you think about yourself a lot. Now I'm thinking about like, what is my role to help in the shared mission in the relationships I have? And that shared mission is different in different environments. My shared mission with the planet,

my shared mission with an organization I'm working with, with an individual, with the Finding Mastery team. And so it changes in that way. Lloyd writes, with all the challenging news around us, such as the economy, war, climate change, jobs, politics, observed a number of folks in my community and colleagues becoming more and more negative as time goes on. It's been challenging to keep an optimistic mindset.

How do we best show up in these moments and respond to people who are almost chronically negative? I find myself shutting down in these moments. I know that's not the right answer, but I'm having a hard time finding a way to respond in these situations. Help. It's a cool question. I'll tell you why.

That first order of business for me is that I don't hang out with people that are negative and critical and judgmental. I don't, I just like you, I don't, I don't want to be around them because I'm having to defend myself or I'm having to like distance in the conversation. And so I think the intuition Lloyd that you're sharing is right. And so there's a, there's a tension that comes with that. And so first order of business is like, I don't know what to tell you, but I just don't hang out with people like that. Second is me personally, I time bound how I get information from the outside world. And so I want to know what's happening in the world. It matters to me a lot. And I don't know how to trust some of the news sources. I haven't quite sorted that

out yet. And so I found sometimes that international news has a different perspective than national news. And so I find myself being more interested in the international take of what's happening nationally and internationally, but I time bound it. And it's like 15 to 20 minutes on a regular basis to go understand what's happening. But I don't spend more than that unless something is really gripping for me. So then the third is making sure that I, it's not about the others. It's about my response that I am doing things that give life, that I'm part of relationships and projects, that there's hope and excitement and challenge. And so I'm just making sure that I'm doing as much of that as I can. And that includes like when I go and do some fitness or some sport, or I'm reading something, like I just want to make sure that there's buoyancy in what I'm doing because, yes, there is more stress, reported stress now

than there was, let's say, three years ago. So I reported people are struggling more. And so the other rotation that I have through this answer is empathy will serve well. So oftentimes when people are struggling, they're flaring up. They're negative as a protection mechanism because they don't want to feel the way that they feel when they get quiet and they're honest about how scary it is or how sad they feel or how alone they feel. So having empathy for that is a way to get through the negativity and critical judgment. And it gets right underneath the surface. Now that empathy,

not everybody wants it. So, you know, but it is a place that I like to come from as well is to try to understand and convey what's happening underneath the surface. So understand what's happening for the other. So understand what's happening for the other, for the person, and then figure out a way to convey that back to them, um, to hold the, the regard for what they must be going through. Tim asks, Dr. Mike, how do you beat imposter syndrome? You beat imposter syndrome? Well, if you're feeling imposter syndrome, welcome to the club. It's actually kind of cool. It's a reflection that you are over your skis. You are traveling a little faster than you think. And I mean, honestly, the theme that has emerged from so many folks that I've worked with and so many people on the Finding Mastery podcast is that they have talked about how they've wrestled with it. And so in some respects,

like it's a scar tissue that you've been through some, some battles. So, okay. The, the question though is really like, I don't like how it feels and neither do I, and neither do many of the folks that, that report it. So how do you work with it is you remind yourself that you don't have it all together. You remind yourself that neither do they, whoever they are. You attune more to the unfolding present moment and what's happening now when your mind begins to go to, are they going to think of me in a way that I hope they don't? And that's what imposter syndrome is. They're going to figure out that I don't have what it takes. And so when your mind goes to there, you quickly go, oh, this is the feeding of that seed. This is the watering of that seed, the imposter syndrome seed.

And when your mind goes to that, you kind of wink at it, like, okay, I see you. Come on back to whatever the task is at hand. And that's why mindfulness and meditation are such powerful practices, because the mechanism is when your mind wanders to whatever, that you quickly, gently bring it right back to the one thing. And so I think left to my own devices, if I didn't have a meditation mindfulness practice, I don't think I'd have the right mechanism to come back. So just kind of a quick recap. Welcome to the club.

It's cool. Like you're going for it. That's awesome. So are many folks that are trying to do something special in this short amount of time we have together. And then the other is like, how do you actually work with it, is people don't have it sorted out. You don't have it sorted out. There's a humanity in that embracement.

And when your mind does wander to water that seed of, are they gonna, how are they thinking of me? That you just quickly come back to whatever it is that you need to focus on. Is imposter syndrome more common when you're reaching for the stars, when you're stepping outside your comfort zone, or is it something that everyone experiences? It is universally available.

But those that are stepping out into the edges, into the fringe of their capabilities, those that do that on a regular basis, it's like a demonstration that I want to get better and I'm willing to go to the uncomfortable place. And when I'm in that uncomfortable place, I'm trying to figure out and unlock something. And whether it's walk on stage or raise your hand in a boardroom or say something intimate to somebody else, or you're just walking down the hallway and you have this awareness of what people might be thinking of you and they might find you out. That's what imposter syndrome is. And that becomes a limiter.

That becomes a constrictor to the required, necessary, deep attention to do anything well. So if you're going to sit on the couch and not go for it in life, well, then you don't really need this finely tuned, deep focused attention because the tasks that you're doing are not demanding it. But if you want it, if you really want to find out what you're capable of and have this quote unquote high performing life, and you want to have a life of purpose and meaning and really understand what you're capable of in this short amount of time, then yeah, this becomes a problem.

And the problem is I want to do something special. And these, this internal resource that I've got a limited internal resource, all of us do, you can only focus on this moment. And if I choose to put my gaze on what might they be thinking of me, it's like I lose track I've got a limited internal resource. All of us do. We can only focus on this moment. And if I choose to put my gaze on what might they be thinking of me, it's like I lose track of the ball as I'm required to catch it. I lose track of it whereas it is in space. So it's more of a problem for those that want to get after it, but it is universally available to all of us.

I think it's a bigger deal than is spoken about. I'd be hard-pressed to find somebody that doesn't understand the way it feels to worry about being found out that you don't have it all put together. Listener writes, any suggestions how to get better at enduring something? What we're talking about is mental toughness. So mental toughness is the ability to stay in something when it's hard, to have the discipline of mind, to be able to work with yourself in a way to stay in it when it's difficult to be in it.

That's mental toughness. It's born in optimism, this fundamental belief that it's going to work out. I just got to stay in it a little bit longer. So the work is to train your mind to be more optimistic that it's going to work out and to embrace that when you're inside of a difficult moment, that it requires a discipline of mind to stay in it just a little bit longer to unlock something, to figure it out till it starts to make sense, whatever that thing is that you're working on. If you want to be more mentally tough, you just got to go do hard things.

And most of the hard things that are available for us, they're not the physical things. That's not what this is about. That's the old way of thinking about building the capability to be great is to go do physical things that are hard. It's like, I don't know, leave that for 1990. Leave that for early 2000s. It really is about working with your emotions and being in a vulnerable space where you don't know how it's going to go.

That's what this is about. That's how you build mental toughness is to stay in those spaces that are emotionally charged, where you don't have control. You don't know how it's going to go, but you keep staying in it. You keep having the discipline to stay in it just one more moment, another moment, and to work with your thoughts, to work with your emotions in an unfolding way when it's emotionally charging.

That's how you build it. One of the people I think about when I think about mental toughness, Marshawn Lynch had a practice. He's one of the great running backs in the NFL. And he had a practice where he would and this is on a podcast that we talked about it he would undress himself completely naked look at himself in the mirror and say what type of man do you want to be

and talk about like being so honest with yourself and so intentionally purpose about stripping it all down and getting very clear about the person you want to be it's a great practice and you know what it showed up day after day after day in the way that he would compete in a very rugged sport and being recognized by his peers by the entire locker room of being incredibly mentally tough because he got to the truth and he was working from the truth and he had his principles locked in stripped stripped his clothes down as the way he described it, squared up in the mirror and said, who's the man that I want to be?

That's mental toughness. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned that recovery doesn't just happen when we sleep. It starts with how we transition and wind down. And that's why I've built intentional routines into the way that I close my day. And Cozy Earth has become a new part of that. Their bedding, it's incredibly soft, like next level soft. And what surprised me the most is how much it actually helps regulate temperature. I tend to run warm at night and

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slash finding mastery. A listener writes, any suggestions for people who want to follow in your footsteps, Dr. Mike? Yeah. I mean, I would say first, don't try to follow. I'd say, you know, be relentlessly curious. And eventually what takes place is you'll find the things that you love. Like there's a, there's a consistency of curiosity that, that led me to this field of sports psychology. And then when I opened the research and the books and was talking about the psychology of excellence with people, I was like, this is fascinating.

I didn't ever have to be prompted to study. I loved it. And so if there is any following, it's following the interest that you have through curiosity and take that as far as you possibly can go. And people ask all the time, like, did you, when did you know you wanted to work with elite athletes? It's like, I never, that was never it. I was not interested in working in pro sport. I was interested in working first to understand how did the best in the world unlock what's inside of them. And then the second was,

I just wanted to work with people. I didn't care where they were on the planet, what level of success they had, but they were fundamentally committed, as committed as I was, to understanding it and unlocking it. I didn't care if you're a pro athlete or not. It just so happens that in elite sport and pro athletics, lots of people congregate around this idea about how do I unlock? What am I capable of? How do we organize our day to get

better? So I never thought about working in pro sport. I never thought about, you know, who do I look up to to follow their footsteps and their path? It was a deep curiosity to say, what are the things that I'm interested in? I didn't know for a long time. And then I tripped into these conversations about like the psychology of excellence and it just took off for me. that I'm interested in. I didn't know for a long time. And then I tripped into these conversations about like the psychology of excellence and it just took off for me. Philip writes, Dr. Mike, how can I position myself to carry through my goals for 2023 and stop procrastinating on them? Procrastination, I'll tell you my experience in procrastination first, and then I'll get to the science, is that whenever I had something that I knew I needed to get done and there was a deadline

on it, I would find myself pushing it all the way out as far as I possibly could. But I'd be thinking about how I wanted to write something or do something. I'd be thinking about it a lot. I'd be thinking about when I was surfing or thinking about it when I was, you know, driving, like it was kind of underneath the surface a lot. So there's like this micro hydration of exploring how I'm going to actually do the thing later. But I wouldn't start. I wouldn't officially start. And then I would find myself kind of boxed in where there's like two days left or there's 12 hours left or 45 minutes left before I had to turn something in. And I'd find myself right before that phase, cleaning my office, cleaning my room,

vacuuming, dusting. And I knew that I had to get something turned. It was crazy making and it was hard, but I would do some of my best work. So I don't know if that is common for people, but I would find cleaning before I needed to do something was the last thing I should be doing. But it was like I needed to just take this extra last pass at organizing my external world to just get this clarity on the internal world before I go deliver the thing. And it was also doing something else, which is creating all of this adrenaline because I had to be great to get it done in the next four hours, say. So on the science side of it, what I was actually doing was I was spending time thinking about

it from multiple different directions. I was using different contexts, driving or surfing or walking with something or doing something. And I was having multiple creative ways of thinking about it that the environment was sparking new ways of trying to solve the thing that I was going to go do later. So that's kind of interesting. The second thing is like pushing it back and pushing it back. I used to think that I was really disorganized. I used to think I was a bit lazy. I used to think that, you know, there's something wrong with the way I would

organize. If I could just be more efficient, I'd be better. And which is, you know, it's not true. Those are not true for me because what was happening is I needed a spike. I needed this jolt of adrenaline to get my brain to light up in a way that I could do my best work. Now, the problem with that is that there's also a neurochemical called cortisol. So cortisol and adrenaline, with the right amounts, we can do some of our best work. They're stress responses, if you will. And so if I didn't monitor this well, I would have so much adrenaline and cortisol overflowing,

like on a two-week process, it was finals, or it was the end of the quarter, or whatever it might be, that I would have so much adrenaline cortisol overflowing like on a two-week process. It was finals or it was the end of the quarter or whatever it might be that I would be exhausted. The second part of this is that if I didn't organize my way, if I didn't organize myself in a way that also I was being a good teammate to others, that that became another problem. And so what I needed to figure out is that I need to have the right optimal levels of activation, adrenaline and cortisol, so that my brain is switched on to do its most creative, critical thinking. If you spill over with too much adrenaline, too much cortisol, because you've kind of blown your timeline, that's a problem. Or if you don't know how to manufacture it, which is what I'm working on now, manufacture that optimized ideal zone, right,

of attention and focus and care and deep focus that you create an artificial way, which is procrastination, to get that internal state. So the work now is to not need those external environments to have the optimized internal state. Muhammad writes, Dr. Mike, what is the change you hope to see in the world in 2023? My hope is not specific to just 2023. To love the life that you lead and to be able to be deeply connected to purpose and meaning, have a relationship with yourself and others that matters.

And you leave this place better than the way you received it. So that's my hope, wherever it is. And the way through that is to work from the inside out, to have an available set of tools and resources, psychological skills, if you will, to be able to navigate the challenges that take place in the world. And when we don't have those skills and tools, we feel hopeless. We feel overwhelmed. We feel pessimistic. We feel defeated and deflated, depressed and anxious. And so the hope is that we live that life that I'm describing.

And the mission is to help people invest in their psychology so that they can live more connected to the unfolding present moment. And that's where life happens. That's where wisdom lives. It's where all the good stuff that we have as available for humans, it's where all the things that are available as humans to experience the riches of life take place in the present moment. So that's it.

I mean, I feel like it's a big ambition. It's a big hope I have. And I'm just kind of chipping at it one day at a time. Jack writes, Dr. Mike, what do you think about the motto, new year, new you? I think it's serving a purpose, which is to help people think about being better. The new you. That's cool. That's kind of how it works. But those are man-made constructs. 2022 to 2023 is a man-made calendar construct.

The truth of the saying, though, is that you don't need a new year to be the new you. This moment is available to be the best you can be, your very best. What do I mean by that? It's each moment we have millions of options on how we choose to engage with that moment. We have millions of thoughts, millions of ways that we can interpret something. And so new year, new you is really about this moment being your very best. The new you is available right now. The new you is available again right

now. And it's available again right now. Each moment we are completely new again. And we string together all this weird history, you know, that we've experienced. And some of that history is, you know, led us to protect ourselves. And some of that history has led us to protect ourselves, and some of that history has led us to be bold in the unfolding moment. But new you and new you is really about being you now again and again and again. The present moment is the way to access that. And if you're not living fully in the present moment. You have no access to being the new you again and again. You're literally being the old you brought into a new moment that you're half in. If you're half worrying about what they think or half worrying about how this might go later, you're only half

you in the unfolding moment. And so it's confusing to think about the concept new year, new you, because we can be the new you each moment. And I think waiting for later to be the new you is a mistake. It's available right now. How do you do it? Work on being fully present. The new you is constantly unfolding and it's whether you step into it and how you embrace that is how well you can ride the unfolding present moment. All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us.

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