High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 424: Controlling Your Olympic Moment with Dr. Anne Shadle, Certified Mental Performance Consultant

Episode Date: April 18, 2021

Dr. Anne Shadle is a graduate of the University of Nebraska, where she earned her B.S. in Exercise Science. During her undergraduate career, Shadle was a member of the Huskers’ national powerhouse track and field team. She was an NCAA National Champion in both the indoor mile and the outdoor 1500 meters. Following graduation, Shadle ran three years professionally for Reebok and was a 2008 Olympic Trials semifinalist.   Shadle went on to earn her Masters Degree from the University of Missouri in Sport Psychology. She also earned her Ph.D. in Health Education and Promotion. Her research focused on understanding the psycho-emotional challenges, preparations and responses of Olympic Gold Medal-winning athletes. Shadle is a certified mental performance consultant (CMPC) and is a member of the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee's (USOPC) Sport Psychology registry. She also serves as a performance consultant for the NBA and has been part of the performance enhancement and mental health programming for the NBA.    In this episode, Anne and Cindra discuss: What it means to control your Olympic moment The top findings from her research with Olympians Mindset strategies she used as a professional runner The mindset characteristics the world’s best Obstacles that get in the way of our success HIGH PERFORMANCE MINDSET SHOWNOTES FOR THIS EPISODE: www.cindrakamphoff.com/424 HOW TO ENTER THE PODCAST GIVEAWAY TO WIN $500 CASH: www.drcindra.com/giveaway FB COMMUNITY FOR THE HPM PODCAST: https://www.facebook.com/groups/highperformancemindsetcommunity FOLLOW CINDRA ON INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/cindrakamphoff/ FOLLOW CINDRA ON TWITTER: https://twitter.com/mentally_strong Love the show? Rate and review the show for Cindra to mention you on the next episode: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/high-performance-mindset-learn-from-world-class-leaders/id1034819901    

Hey, my name is Cindra Campoff and I'm a small-town Minnesota gal, Minnesota nice as we like to say it, who followed her big dreams. I spent the last four years working as a mental coach for the Minnesota Vikings, working one-on-one with the players. I wrote a best-selling book about the mindset of the world's best and I'm a keynote speaker and national leader in the field of sport and performance psychology. And I am obsessed with showing you exactly how to develop the mindset of the world's best so you can accomplish all your goals and dreams. So I'm over here following my big dreams and I'm here to inspire you and practically show you how to do the same. And you know, when I'm not working, you'll find me playing Ms. Pac-Man.

Yes, the 1980s game Ms. Pac-Man. So take your notepad out, buckle up, and let's go. This is the high performance mindset. Simone Biles once said, surround yourself with the dreamers, the doers, the believers, and the thinkers. But most of all, surround yourself with those who see greatness within you, even when you don't see it yourself. Michael Phelps said, If you want to be the best, you have to do things that other people aren't willing to do. And today's guest, Dr. Annie Shadle, said either the athlete controls the environment or the environment controls the athlete.

This is your host, Dr. Sindra Kampoff, and thank you so much for joining me here today for episode 424. I'm so grateful that you are here and that you tune in each and every week. And if you know that mindset is essential to your success, then you are in the right place because every week we talk about various topics

related to mindset. And yesterday, I went live with Annie's podcast episode over on the High Performance Mindset community on Facebook. So we'd love for you to join us over there. We post these live as we're doing them. And what's great about that is you can watch the video if you'd like, but also ask us questions as we are having the conversation. So head over to Facebook and join us at the High Performance Mindset Community.

Today's episode, we're talking about controlling your Olympic moment. Controlling your Olympic moment is when you want to perform on demand at your best. Maybe the stakes are high. Maybe there's some pressure that's involved. And today we talk about these characteristics of the world's best athletes and how you can control your Olympic moment, whatever that might be. Dr. Annie Shadle is a graduate of the University of Nebraska, where she earned her BS in exercise science. During her undergraduate career, Annie was a member of the

Huskers National Powerhouse track and field team. She was also an NCAA national champion in both the indoor mile and the outdoor 1500 meters. Following graduation, Annie ran three years professionally for Reebok and was a 2008 Olympic trials semi-finalist for the United States. Annie then went on to earn her master's degree from the University of Missouri in sports psychology and she earned her PhD in health education and promotion. Her research, which we talk about today, focuses on understanding the challenges, preparations, and responses of Olympic gold medal winning athletes

for us to really learn about what it takes to perform on demand. Annie is a certified mental performance consultant and a member of the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee's sports psychology registry. And she also serves as a performance consultant for the NBA. I know Annie personally because we both serve on USA Track and Field

Sports Psychology Committee, where we work with athletes to help them mentally train for the trials and to compete at their best at the Tokyo Olympics. Annie and I discuss what it means to control your Olympic moment, the top findings from her research with Olympians and what we can learn from that, mindset strategies she used as a professional runner, and the mindset characteristics of the world's best and how we can replicate those, and then obstacles that get in our way and what to do about them. Fun fact, Annie and I grew up about an hour away from each other and competed at the same meets, although not at the same time. Without further ado, let's bring on Annie.

Thank you so much, Annie Shadle, for joining us here on the High Performance Mindset Podcast. How are you doing today? Having a great day. You know, springtime is here and track season is here. So all those things bring me joy. I know. It brings me joy, too. I love the spring and I love track and field. And I'm really looking forward to talking with you today. We've been having this conversation on our calendar for a while.

So I'm just really excited to dive into your work and share it with everyone on the podcast. So thank you so much for joining us. Yeah, thanks for having me. This is fun. So if you are joining us on Facebook, you can ask us any questions there. So just post it under the comments and I'll make sure to be looking at there throughout our conversation. So and if you haven't joined us yet, make sure you head over to the High Performance Mindset Facebook group where we'll be posting these live. So as we dive into the conversation here, Annie, tell us about what you're passionate about and what you're doing right now.

Yeah. So what I am passionate about, that's a hard question for me to answer. But really, my interest is always in people. I love people. I think people are super interesting. And I definitely love to see people happy, healthy, thriving. My area that I love is, is athletics and performance, high performance. But at the heart, I really care about people and just want to see people happy, healthy, thriving in their life, moving towards their goals, moving through that adversity and just happy, healthy and fulfilled in their lives. That's beautiful. And people really need that because I think given everything we've gone through in the last year, for sure, it's hard to kind of get there sometimes. So tell us a little bit about what you're doing now in terms of your

career. Yeah, so a little bit about my background. So grew up in Nebraska, from Nebraska, went to the University of Nebraska, ran track and field there. During that time, I was definitely interested in more of the exercise science side. So how do we train our bodies? How do we optimize our performance physically? And then kind of through those experiences, thought more about this mental side. So at Nebraska, definitely learned a lot about high performance and, you know, what it really takes to be the best. And the environment that I was in at Nebraska definitely, um, led a lot of curiosity. Um, so my own,

my own goal setting of wanting to be the best track and field athlete that I could, um, always wanting to better my times when races, uh, pretty competitive. competitive. And at Nebraska, the culture is excellence, and excellence is expected. So I think just that environment that I that I really grew up in, just kind of fed that own mindset into myself and the own curiosity of what do the best athletes do. So at Nebraska, on the track and field team, it was pretty much a powerhouse when I was there still as a, still as a powerhouse. So, you know, my peers were Olympians, Olympic medal winners. Um, Priscilla Lopes is a perfect example of that. Um, so she was bronze medalist in 2008, a really good friend of mine. And I was very

curious to know, like, what do the best in the world do? And even the best athletes at Nebraska, you know, what do they do? And through just interactions with teammates and paying attention to even other sports, other coaches at the University of Nebraska, that curiosity of what it takes to be the best definitely was sparked there. And as I moved through my career at Nebraska, was fortunate enough to go on and race professionally. So I was two-time national champion at Nebraska. And that kind of paved the way for me to pursue my athletic dream of being an Olympic, being an Olympian, and kind of through that journey of professional athletics and all of the nuances that you kind of go through,

psychology came up more and more. And I understood the challenges that athletes face. And even in my, with my teammates at Nebraska, understood injury, understood hard times in life, all the things outside of sports, as well as all the stress and pressures on you within sport. So that was just probably even magnified on the professional level. And so after my professional career, I returned back to school to study sports psychology. And from that kind of those passions of my own experiences have led me to my research area of really wanting to understand high performance. So not only within the individual what it takes, but also those environments, those cultures of winning leadership, right? So all of the things that go we can think of that go

into high performance. Yeah. Oh, excellent. There's so the things that go, we can think of that go into high performance. Yeah. Oh, excellent. There's so many things that we're going to dive into today in this episode. And I think the first question that I want to ask you, Annie, is when you think about your own success, and we grew up in similar areas, which is pretty fun, basically an hour away from each other, didn't compete against each other, but yeah, I was a track and field athlete as well. Um, and I'm just kind of thinking about your success, two-time NCAA champion and all American miler. Um, you're competing at the university of Nebraska, you know, you ran professionally. What do you think was, you know, a key mental factor or some key mental factors in your success in

general? I would say that growing up in Nebraska, so I was small town, Nebraska, South Sioux City, Nebraska. And I think the environment that was shaped for me there. So early on experiences, I had coaches, male coaches that were very invested in me as a female athlete. And I think in South Sioux City, we're still still another powerhouse in girls basketball. And I loved basketball. That was kind of my sport. One of my favorite coaches in basketball, he was my favorite coach, was Coach Farrell. And I had him in seventh grade as a basketball coach. And he really, you know, was positive, encouraging, made basketball fun.

And I think all of those things of having environments where the coaches cared about you, you had fun, they worked with you, right, as opposed to kind of what I see more now is like pressures on younger kids, um, from all different areas, from, from coaches, from parents. And I didn't grow up like that. My, my dad was also my coach in, in high school. My parents are both educators. And so they knew about the adolescent development. Um, they knew what was appropriate for kids, what was developmentally appropriate for kids. And I didn't have the pressure to play, to only focus and choose one sport. And I know that's a huge battle right now. And I'm a huge, I understand like wanting to

choose one sport, but I'm a huge component of multi-sport. I was a multi-sport athlete that led me kind of to develop my body in a way on my own time. You know, I didn't have coach. I had coaches that pushed me, but not not pushed me in ways that that wasn't OK for me. Right. So they worked with me. How are we getting better each year? And I think that kept me healthy.

And I think it kept kept me healthy and I think it it kept me from being burnt out yeah so I'm hearing supportive environment not a lot of pressure you were you know it was supported that you were able to compete in lots of different sports it's not like you had to specialize in this one thing. So it allowed you to flourish and not get burnt out. Yep. Sure. Yeah. So I'm thinking now, you know, you have this incredible opportunity to work with a lot of athletes, USA track and field you've been involved with for several years and a lot of Olympians yourself that you work with and other high performers. What do you see them do differently from a mental standpoint than other people? several years and a lot of Olympians yourself that you work with and other high performers, what do you see them do differently from a mental standpoint than other people?

Yeah, great question. One of the things I think that I've noticed and observed that's backed in research, because I like to be research-based as well, is the best performers are very clear and decisive about control. And they spend their time and their energy on the things that they can control. And I think athletes have this up against them, even working professionals where we do this comparison game. And, you know, this person got this, this person had this opportunity. And that comparison game is pretty draining, right? It takes away from the things that we can control, what our preparation needs to be, the things that we need to do day in and day out to improve ourselves. And so the best performers are very clear and decisive and spend their time on the things that they can control. Awesome. Awesome. That's a

powerful statement right now, because I think in sport, there's a lot of things we can't control in terms of sometimes meets are canceled. And just, you know, the whole last year with COVID, but even things in our daily life, there's so many things that are outside of our control and your language there clear and decisive about what they can control. The clear makes sense to me. What do you mean by this or decisive? Yeah, decisive. So like when you were sharing what you just shared, I was thinking about opportunity. Right. So, yeah, there's been a lot of challenges. But what are those opportunities that present themselves? And I know some of the work with last year with the Olympics being postponed was, okay,

what does this give us an opportunity to do, right? What are the things that maybe we haven't had a chance training-wise, mental skills training-wise to dive into? And so thinking about how do we use this time that we now have as opportunities? And so I think some of that decisiveness is where do I look for opportunity? What ways do I continue to improve? How do I use various resources to help me and support me towards my goals? Awesome. So one of the things I really want to dive into today, and I know we

could talk hours and hours about this. So we're at the beginning of the call, we're like, well, let's see, let's see how far we get. But you've done some incredible research with other researchers about controlling the Olympic moment. And I want to talk about the research that you did, specifically, you know, how it might impact those who are at the Olympics, but also, you know, for those of us who may or may not go to the Olympics, right, but are in similar sort of like high pressure situations, because I think there's so much applicability to your research to us in everyday life and other performers. But let's just get started. And maybe tell us a little bit about how you conducted the research to start.

Yeah. So this research was based with the 2012 Olympic medal winners. And really kind of at the beginning of that, it was wanting to understand from the athlete's perspective and a coach's general, we were able to identify what high performers do in terms of setting goals, achieving goals, maintaining emotional control, cognitive control, right? There's lots of things in the research about what things athletes will face. But I wanted to know like more specifically, right? So injury, right? Like we know injury often faces athletes and, but how do athletes get through that?

And kind of back to the environment, what are these environments that actually allow people to be successful? What are those coach athlete relationships like? And really wanting to understand as we kind of dial in on a granular level of what are these stories, what are these experiences, what part of like a grounded theory can we identify in terms of what's going on with these Olympic athletes and coaches and specifically at the Olympic games. So that was kind of the model

for what we wanted to better understand and kind of dial in on. Yeah. So you named it controlling your Olympic moment. Yes. Tell us what that means to start. Yeah. So kind of a little more about what we were looking at. So using some frameworks, right. So theories and frameworks, I'm going back to my research side, but I like research theories and frameworks help us better understand and predict behavior. Right. And so kind of the theories that we pulled into, we're looking at self-determination theory, which is totally one of my favorite theories ever. I always kind of draw back on when when trying to understand motivation and individuals. So self-determination just has a little bit of a of an education sessions. So self-determination looks at a couple of different components to, for what is a self-determined person, right? So there's specific needs. So for an individual to

be self-determined, motivated, do the hard things that it would take to be an Olympic medal winner, an Olympic champion, some, some things are needed, right? So one of those things is autonomy, right? So being able to choice and say and what you're doing, right? So the athlete has autonomy in that, right? They are able to like make choices. And if we think about that at the Olympic games in the Olympic moment, you know, maybe I'll be able to have communication with my coach if it's a field event, but in a race, right? Like you can't really stop in the middle of your race. So in those moments as an athlete, I have to have the autonomy to make these decisions. So if we even pull that back a little further, if I kind of examine what's going

on in the sport world, a lot of times coaches are often directing, directing, directing. And oftentimes, you know, we've got to be able to like let the athlete figure some of those things out, right. So we really want to build autonomy in our athletes, right. So when it comes down to those, those final seconds in a game, and there's no timeouts left, you're at you've trained your athlete, and you've given them opportunities to make decisions. So when those moments happen, they know what to do, right? So that autonomy becomes pretty clear in these Olympic games that, you know, you've got to be very comfortable with making these decisions, being able to make those choices that will lead to those performances. So that piece of self-determination, autonomy.

Yeah. Next one is belonging. So I matter, right? So it matters that I'm at practice. It matters that I'm there. What I'm doing matters. Kind of, you have that why answered. You feel connected with your training group. You've got a relationship with your coach, a good relationship with your coach. So that sense of belonging is important, right? And then the last part is that competence piece. So do I have the knowledge and skills necessary? And how do I build these sports skills if we're talking specifically about the Olympic Games and controlling this Olympic moment?

Do I have the knowledge and skills to do what I need to do? Am I capable? Do I believe in myself, right? To be able to get done what needs to get done. And so kind of those three things lay the foundation for intrinsic motivation, which is that inner driver, right? So it's the strongest form of motivation. It's me pushing me, it's me going after it. That doesn't mean we're not supported, but it means that like, I'm the driver, and I'm driving myself. So the strongest form of motivation. And oftentimes, you know, this came up in our research of, well, this Olympic medal is this very extrinsic value, right? It's this external reward, right? And so how do you, how do you,

how do you relate that to these Olympic athletes that are going after these Olympic medals? And really what, what we discovered through the research is that, that external extrinsic reward, I guess the reward is external. So there's differences there, but we won't go into that. So that external reward of this Olympic medal, right? The way that the athlete internalized that was in the mastery, right? And, and how do I get better? How do I continue to improve? And thus the, that Olympic medal is now, is now symbolic, right? So as opposed to this external reward, um, it kind of shifts that perspective, if that makes sense. So, um, these athletes were able to, um, it kind of shifts that perspective, if that makes sense. So, um, these athletes were able to, um, that Olympic medal symbolized all of these things, right?

It symbolized the, uh, perseverance. It symbolized the sacrifices. It symbolized their hard work. Um, so it wasn't obviously like that's, that's at the end of the day, that reward, but that process of what that symbolizes was more powerful for them. Yeah. Oh, there's so many follow-up questions I could ask you. I have your report open and I want to read a part of it. And in it, okay, you say that intrinsic motivation is the strongest, most powerful, and most impacting, enduring, lasting of any of our motivational experiences. And then you also described how autonomy is key in developing that. And it's experiencing the opportunity to make key important decisions for oneself, about oneself, and by oneself. So two questions I have is like, give us a sense of maybe between now and the Olympics,

how could athletes develop that? Yeah, you know, one of the things I've been talking to the athletes that I work with a lot about, and so some athletes have a lot of just some worries, some anxiety about where am I at, right? So some athletes had the opportunity to compete last year, other athletes didn't. And so one of the things that I've been working with, with a handful of my athletes is how do we take these early, early in season opportunities, right? So these are like data points, these, these competitions are data points to help us direct kind of where we need to go in training and what we need to do to get to our end goal, right? So I don't know if that if that makes a little bit of sense. But in terms of, of how do we use this to better inform what we're going to do down the line, right? So

in those decision makings, right? So I'll use an example of long jump, just because it kind of came to my mind, right? So we know what we're up against in a long jump, right? We're going to have three jumps, and we're going to have to come back for the final and get three more jumps. And so what are the ways that we know we need to adjust ourselves on the runway, right? And how do we take each one of these jumps as an opportunity to prepare ourselves kind of down the line? So what in that way do I need to learn how to adjust my body, adjust my steps mentally where I need to get myself if I foul, if I've got a scratch, if I jump far, if I don't jump far, how do I manage all of that? Right. So all of those early competitions are opportunities to practice what you're going to be up against. Right.

So, um, if we take a, uh, a running example, right. So what are these race tactics that I'm going to need to work on? Right. And, and oftentimes if we haven't competed for a while, sometimes we forget some of those nuances, right. Um, we might fall asleep in the middle of a race or not respond, right? Because we're not ready for those things because we haven't done it. So just kind of using some of these earlier meets to be able to help strengthen

that decision-making. So when we get to the Olympic Games, when we get to that Olympic final, we're like very comfortable with where we need to do, what we need to do to respond to competition or make the adjustments so that we can put up a far mark. And I was thinking, Annie, about, you know, how I really like the ways that you describe the three components of the self-determination theory. And I was thinking about, all right, somebody who's listening that is a coach or who is a business leader or they're not in the sport. And I was thinking developing your autonomy by helping other people that you lead make decisions, right? Or they have the, they're creating this motivational climate where they can make decisions on their

own. I'm thinking about the belonging, like I matter. And what I'm doing matters and how that's important for us to feel no matter what we're doing. And then this competence, do I have the knowledge and skills and continuing to develop those knowledge and skills and sometimes reminding ourselves, like why we have those knowledge and skills. Can you, can you think of any other applications to beyond sport of the, just, I'm even thinking this little part of the self-determination theory and what you found in your research and how that applies? Yeah, I think ultimately, I guess what I've been thinking about lately, resilience obviously is a big piece, right?

We like, there's a lot of research and resilience. Um, and really it kind of comes down to the individual, right? So, um, and that self-determination kind of feeds to that of, um, it kind of comes down to the individual, right? And there's times that we go through adversity and hard times and question, like, am I even good at what I do? Like, should I be doing this? I know it's right. Like, am I actually improving? And sometimes we do have those like doubts in our mind, right? Or we go through things where we're challenged and it kind of makes us question some of those things. And so I think, you know, if I think about business and I think about, you know, some of the issues that might occur in business, I'm thinking about my brother-in-law and just speaking with him about his business and different things that he goes through. And ultimately, it's like, what are my goals? How can I better help whatever that is, whatever our organization's goals are? How do I identify my strengths, right? And how do I best bring what I can do for the team to that? And that kind of comes back to the individual and choice. Yeah, that's great. There was, there's so many

things in your report that we could talk about, but one of the things I want to talk with you, and then you can add anything else from the report and the research findings that you thought were helpful. But I want to read this part where you talk about athletes having a protective bubble to shield the athlete from the threat of challenges, including those from maybe intended supporters like USOC officials or plans or USA track and field officials and plans or sponsors or agents or coaches or family or friends or the Olympic Village, etc. Tell us why it's really important to have a productive bubble when you're there. Yeah, I think, um, there's a lot of things that, that, um, can distract us. And there's a lot of, uh, there's a lot of things when you're in that elite

level and, you know, working with professional athletes. And even if I step outside of my work with some track and field athletes, I've worked with, um, NBA, major league baseball, um, some national women's soccer league. And I just think about the pressures that are on athletes. Right. And, um, to be transparent, like there are people that aren't in your corner, right. And athletes get burnt and there are lots of, you know, I trusted this agent and I shouldn't have, or, um, you know, I trusted this person and I shouldn't have. And, um, I'm many athletes probably feel this as well. And I know athletes even at the collegiate level has had felt this of, um, you know, I love you.

People love me when I'm up and just ignore me when I'm down. I don't matter. Right. And really, really hard experiences psychologically, if you haven't been through that. Right. So I come from, from a family and an environment and I've been very, very blessed and lucky to have good people in my corner. And as I've been more involved in sport, I've heard not great stories, right? And so I'm a person that isn't actually a trusting person, I'm going to give people the benefit of the doubt. And sometimes, you know, you get burned a little bit. So I think about various athletes who are high profile who have, you know, they have a lot coming at them, right? They're in the spotlight. Everyone wants a piece of them. Everyone kind of wants to

take credit for their success. I know athletes feel that too. And again, I've watched this with the NBA as well of just like people just taking advantage of young, vulnerable kids. And those things like definitely bother me. And so I think about like, who are the people that are actually in your corner and care about you and love you, right. And who have been there for you and haven't let you down. And usually for some of these athletes it's a very small group of people, right. And so having that routine, having those safe people when, when on, right, we can imagine how stressful the Olympic Games are and having that sense of normalcy and having people that love and support you unconditionally definitely helps strengthen that resilience piece, right? So if I go back to research, because, you know, I like research, resilience models, right?

Like one of the resilience models, a key important piece of that resilience model is social support, right? And obviously there's tons of research and connection and support and having those feelings, those positive emotions of love acceptance, especially when we go through hard times or stressful times, just that social support is really important. But even more, it's like the quality of that social support is really important. Um, but even more, it's like the quality of, of that social support is, is exceptionally important. Um, the one thing I will mention from, um, this study and then the current study that I'm working on, uh, with, with that trust, um, it, with this specific study with controlling the Olympic moment, uh, uh, a question that was asked, what was, what was, what is the, what was the most important relationship to you in winning this Olympic medal? And the number one

was the coach athlete relationship. So, um, having trust in their coaches, um, that was like having a good relationship with your coach. That was what they, um, shared was that was the most important relationship for them. Yeah, that's helpful. What are I mean, your your findings are so robust. So what would be another top finding that you think really would apply to the people that are listening? Yeah, I think the man is a lot. There's a lot in there. I know. You know, one thing that I think stands out is like the cognitive and emotional control. Right. So when we're all of us are under stress, and sometimes things can come at us, and we can feel very overwhelmed, just in general. And so when we can take that time, take that space to really slow our thinking down, to kind of take that, that downtime, but that, yeah, the cognitive emotional control, I think it is really key. Right. So, um, you know, where is my head? What am I thinking? What emotions am I experiencing? Um, and how do I, how do I, you know, work through some of those things and get myself into the mindset that I need to, to perform

and get done what, what my goals are. Right. So yeah, definitely. There's a lot that can come at individuals, but really staying focused towards those goals, kind of blocking out those distractions and being able to stay focused on, on what your intention is and what those goals are. So when you think about cognitive and emotional control, what are your thoughts on, you know, how you might teach an athlete to be are your thoughts on, you know, how you might teach an athlete to be able to do that, you know, at the Olympics, which happens only four years,

this time five years, you know? Right. Yeah. Yeah. So I think a lot of, a lot of that is, is individually based, right. There's broad things that, that probably are going to face every athlete, but I'm, I'm of the, the, uh, theory and framework that athletes know themselves, especially at this professional level. And so being able to understand, um, and, and from my perspective, um, again, once you're at that elite level, athletes have a lot of pretty good self-awareness. Um, and so being able to have some of those, um those conversations and work through what, what things have been challenges, right. And what things do you anticipate to be challenges?

Because again, they've, they've been in high pressure situations. They've, they've competed for a number of years. They've had those experiences. And so they, they can usually identify things that can kind of derail them or destructive patterns of thinking or different doubts that come up at various times or just even emotionally, right? How they might get just a little caught up emotionally sometimes about different things that might upset them or frustrations that they have. Right. So kind of being able to work through those and just kind of stay focused on, on what can I do, right? Like, what do I need to do to kind of move forward towards my goals? And I'm thinking about that. It's easy to get frustrated or upset on things that you can't control, which would be, you know, how what you said about being really clear on what they can control, what they can't. And I thought your, Annie, your question about like, what do

you expect the challenge to be? And then helping them identify that, because that's likely maybe going to be the thing or a thing that could get in their way of just performing at their best. Yeah. And this is why I really love to have, you know, like I get, I like to get to know my athletes pretty well and then I'll bring things up. So, right. So as the practitioner who's helping them navigate, I can bring things up too. Right. Of like, okay, so before this, right. Like this, these are things with that maybe tripped you up a little bit. And so how are we going to better plan for that? Right. And how do we get ahead of that? And so, again, just really giving, I guess I'm out of the empowerment framework too.

Right. So, right. We're going to face our challenges. That's, that's like, this is not like sport is not easy. Doing hard things is not easy. And so how do we better just prepare? Right. So if we can kind of accept that things are going to be hard, there's going to be challenges,

but also kind of in the end, um, you'll get through it. You can do it. Um, just got to figure out a way, way forward. Right. So, um, I guess, I guess another conversation that I've had, um, and I've, I've tried to make pretty clear to the athletes that I work with is like, you know, I want you to call me on those days where it's like, everything's terrible. Right. Because, and you're going to have those moments if you're going to train and, and, um, compete

for an Olympic medal and make an Olympic team, like there's going to be hard days. Right. And, um, you might have a day where you freak out and you're like, I just, I can't, I don't know if I can do this. Right. And it's like, great. Those are great. Cause like, I want to be there on those days,

um, to kind of help you get through that day when you have those, those major doubts and, and, um, you know, get you back on track to where you need to be. And I think, you know, every athlete has those days and if they say that they don't have those days, okay. I hope not. But like, from my perspective, uh, working with athletes at an elite level for many years, you're going to have some days where you have some of those questions and, um, definitely Olympic year brings various stressors, um, to athletes, right. And training for this time, you've been training for five years and it comes down to the moment, right. And, and the Olympic moment is, Olympic moment is different for some people, right?

Because you've got to make a team to get to the Olympic Games. And in the United States, it's extremely difficult, right? And so there are these kind of moments of panic of like, oh, gosh, can I actually do it? Is my training where it needs to be? Are all these things, you know, is everything lined up? Can I actually do this? It's like, great, guess what? We're going to get through those days. We're going to have

conversations and then we're going to get you back on track because one of the things of being high, being high performers, right. And having, having high goals and having high aspirations and having that high achievement striving is that leaves us vulnerable to failure. Right. And, um, right. We think like everything's great. Like it's great to have these high goals, high aspirations. We really value that. But the vulnerability of that is when things don't go our way. Right. And we have these, and that holds people back. But, um, you know, part of the jam of, of having these high goals and having had those high aspirations is is when we don't make when we don't achieve that. Right. And for me, I think in my career, I had a mentor that said to me very strongly one day of like, we can't be afraid of the days that we fail, Annie.

And I was like, whoa, OK. And I was like, you're right. Like we can. And pretty, pretty firmly. It was like, like, those are the days we learn the most. Right. And you cannot be afraid of the days that we fail. Cause those are the days we learn the most. Um, right. Um, but I think, I think one of the things that we overlook is the, the, the vulnerability of, of having high goals is that we might be disappointed because we might not achieve those expectations and that's OK. Right. And we just keep moving forward. Yeah, that's awesome. A couple of things I heard you just say, Annie, you know, first, like the moments of panic when you're training for the Olympics and how that's normal and natural. And I thought that was just like powerful, you know, just that, um, it, maybe when it happens, then you realize that you're not alone.

Um, and there was one question that I was going to ask you at the beginning, but we just kind of dove into your findings, but I, I ask a lot of people on the podcast, you know, what, what is your, what is your definition of failure? And what does it mean to you? And it's really interesting because there's a wide variety of responses. But I thought you just said something really that was a gem. Those days that we maybe fail are the days that we really learn the most. You know, and then to not discount vulnerability when we're going after high goals, especially when there's high goals that maybe we've put out there, we've said out loud, you know, we're trying to make the Olympic

team or I'm thinking about for me, I have a goal this year, impact positively impacting a million people. And like, that's a really high goal for me. And, you know, sometimes I'm like, even saying it, I'm like, yeah, right. But, you know, I guess what would you say in terms of if you're working with an athlete or performer that really is vulnerable and maybe has shared their goals, what advice might you give to them about this kind of the vulnerability piece of going after a high goal? Yeah, I think if I even, usually where I go with that is like, who do you want to be? Right. Like this is, this is like your life or your choices. Who do you want to be? Like, what do you want to do with your life? Right. So kind of back to that value-based. Um, and I know for myself, it's like, um, you know, I have high goals. I think I always

have. Uh, my mom said to me one time, like, I just don't understand why you like to do such hard things. For me, it was like, I can't really tell you. But you know, she sees the other side when I when I don't achieve what I want to achieve. And then that is upsetting to me, right. And so parents don't like to see their their kids kind of suffer or move through that. But you know, that's kind of, that's kind of that. Um, but I would, I guess I would say, um, in terms of helping someone through that, it's like, like, who do you want to be? Right. Like what do you want to do? And then I, I think that, you know, for myself in terms of like wanting to set high goals, um, and wanting to achieve big things. You know, when it doesn't go my way, like for sure, I like feel upset and feel sad for a while. And what's

always, what's been interesting to me in my own personal life is like mentally I can understand, right? Like I understand, like, yes, this was a hard day. Yes. You know, I didn't achieve what I wanted to achieve or, you know, yes, I did learn a lot, but emotionally is like where I get caught. Right. So like cognitively I'm like, yep, I get it. Yep. I know I need to move forward. Okay. This was an area where I need to get better. Right. And I, and I know where I want to improve and how I want to improve, but emotionally it like impacts me. Right. So kind of moving through the emotion of, of what those failures do, it becomes a little bit more challenging, right? Yeah. I really like, I don't know if you've read Susan David's book called Emotional Agility.

Oh, yes. Yeah. But I love her book where she talks about being flexible and just not getting stuck in those difficult emotions. And that's kind of what I think about to myself when I'm struggling with something. It's like, okay, you know, I can feel what I need to feel right now. But, you know, I also try not to get stuck too long. What do you do when you're kind of feeling the emotional difficulty when maybe you don't achieve that goal? And I'm thinking about, gosh, just you as a high level athlete, but also as a professional now. Yeah, I think it's great. And I'm thinking about, gosh, just you as a high level athlete, but also as a professional now. Yeah, I think it's great. And I love, I love Dr. David's work for sure. And for me, I think I'm a pretty, you know, like I kind of said, the cognitive and emotional side, right?

So like, I can think through things and then emotionally, you know, can get stuck sometimes. But I also know, when I work through the emotion, it definitely shows me like what I care most about. Right. And so if I, if I, you know, if we take, um, you know, setting a high goal, right. So like Olympic games, um, even just something even we're striving towards in our, in our personal life and we fall short kind of the emotion that comes with that. Um then kind of working through that emotion to figure out like, okay, like, where do I need to get better? What do I want to do? What am I actually really passionate about? And how do I, you know, move forward then with like, what learning I've taken from this? And I think, I think for myself, I've got it. Yeah. This has kind of been a recent,

I guess, thing too, of like really having stern talking, talkings to, to myself. Right. And it's not like a negative self-talk, but it's just like stern talkings too. Right. If you think about, you know, when we go through hard times, the way that we can like give pep talks to other people, or we can support our best friend, or, you know, help encourage and, and, and share with the people that that we're helping or working with, you know, another perspective, right, is to kind of be able to do that to myself. And I still love to run. Running is kind of my therapy. Like I love that. And so if I'm working through a problem or kind of feeling emotionally stuck, it's like

being able to go for a long run and just kind of work through that emotion and have a stern talking to, right? Like, what are your goals? Okay. Well, you know, things aren't going to be easy. You know, you're going to like go through hard times and you know, how do you stay on track with that? Right. And, and how do you, who can you talk to that can help you answer this problem or answer this question? Um, and just kind of, um, have those stern talkings to, to myself of, of reminding myself of my value and kind of my goals and, um, where I'm going in my life and, and all of those things. So that's, uh, I guess that's how I get myself unstuck. Wonderful. Um, You know, Annie, when you think about just working with high level performers about mindset, what do you hear yourself saying over

and over again? Kind of what I was just kind of sharing there is like, I think too, and if we're coming back to like controlling the Olympic moment, like you're going to be with yourself on the start line or, um, on, on the runway or, um, in the ring, right. On the basketball court, um, wherever, whatever that performance domain is in front doing a presentation. And it's like you versus you, right. And so you and you better be on the same page, um, for sure. Right. And so if you think about that, just having that, being able to like coach yourself through those tough moments. And I think that's a skill that absolutely everyone can work on. Right. So really kind of digging deep within ourselves and doing what we would naturally do for the people that we love most, being able to like talk ourself through those difficult, those difficult or challenging times. Yeah, you versus you, and you got to make

sure you're on the same page. And, and being able to coach yourself. I was, Annie, this week, I did a face to face workshop. And I was so excited that it was face-to-face. It was like, oh, it's so wonderful to be face-to-face again. But we were talking about, it was with business leaders and executives, and we were talking about this word potential. And it's really interesting, right? Because I guess to me, when I think of potential is, you know, it's unlimited, it's endless. Like, do we ever really reach our potential? You know, it seems like once we feel like we reached it, we actually see that we have more. And, and then I had them consider, you know, what gets in the way of potential. It was really cool, because,

you know, there was this like silence. And it was like, well, I do. And it makes me kind of think about what you just said. It's like you versus you and being able to be on the same page and coaching yourself. And now we're the most difficult person to coach. You know, it's a lot easier to maybe coach other people, but it can be really difficult to coach ourselves, especially in a moment that feels like a lot of pressure or can feel like a lot of pressure. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. So Annie, before we wrap up, can you tell us about maybe a unique way that you teach mindset or the mental game? And I know we've talked about a lot already. So is there anything that you're thinking about related to that? Yeah. Interesting. That's a good question. Yeah, I don't, I don't, I think I like am pretty adaptable. And so it kind of depends on the person, right? So if I'm working in a group,

it kind of depends on what's going on there. I think, you know, kind of whatever I'm, whatever, I don't know, that's probably not a good way to say it, but I'm like, whatever feels right. Right. But you kind of have that intuition of like, okay, this is going to go over really well. This is going to resonate with this group of people. Okay. Or this person. Right. And so kind of following my gut. And this is, I think where I have like a pretty good toolbox of, of teaching. Um, and so I kind of go to that depending on like which group of people I'm targeting and working with or the individual person. So I think that's been important for me of just that adaptability and being able to like share different stories or use different teaching methods to work with an individual person.

Yeah, that's excellent. Is there anything that you wanted to share with us that I haven't asked you today? And I know there's a lot of things you could share, but just curious if there's anything top of mind. It's like, oh, I wish you would have asked me that question. That's a great question, too. Yeah, I think we covered a lot of really good stuff. It's been really fun to kind of chat and talk. And I'm sure we have a lot more a lot more that, that we can talk about. Absolutely. So here's what I got from the conversation as I kind of summarize and wrap up. I really like at the beginning when you were talking about, you know, the, the things that really differentiate high level athletes and you

said being clear and decisive of what they can control and just avoiding the comparison game. And you shared with us how we can do that. We talked a little bit about the self-determination theory and how your findings of your 2012 Olympians really helped us understand autonomy and belonging and competence. And then we talked about having a strong coach athlete relationship. I'm thinking in the workplace, that's like a strong employee boss, maybe even a relationship, you know, that we can apply that way. Having cognitive and emotional control is really important. And then this moment of panic and how that's normal for Olympians. And then professionals, right? Like Olympians, right? We have these

moments of, oh, I have this huge presentation and oh my gosh, is this even going to make sense to anyone? Like, is this going to fit like what they want? Right. So our boss wants this PowerPoint presentation tomorrow. So kind of those moments of panic of like, trust yourself, just like slow yourself down. Right. Get back to awesome. Yeah. Love it. Love it. And then when we were talking about vulnerability, going after heart goals, and how what you said at the at the end there about taking a step back and realizing when you're disappointed, well, this is, you know, to show you kind of information about what you really care about, and really thinking about what did you learn. So Annie, how can people reach out to you if they want to learn more about your work, your research? Tell us how we can connect with you.

The best way is just email me. So my email is ashadle1 at gmail.com. I'm not the greatest at social media, but if anyone, you know, wants to do that for me or has ideas, let me know for sure. Awesome, Annie. I'm so grateful that you spent some time with us today. So thank you so much for joining us here on the podcast. Thanks so much for having me. Way to go for finishing another episode of the High Performance Mindset. I'm giving you a virtual fist pump. Holy cow, did that go by way too fast for anyone else? If you want more, remember to subscribe and you can head over to Dr. Sindra for show notes and to join my exclusive community for high performers where you get access to videos about mindset each week. So again, you can head over to Dr. Sindra. That's D-R-C-I-N-D-R-A dot com. See you next week.