High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 442: Being in the Present with Chris Benard, 2-Time Olympian Triple Jumper

Episode Date: July 4, 2021

Today on the podcast we have Chris Benard, a two-time Olympic triple jumper, who just made his second Olympic team. He will be competing at the Tokyo Olympics in a few short weeks. He holds a personal record of 17.48 m (57 ft 4 in) in the triple jump. He has represented the United States at the 2016 Rio Olympics along with multiple World Outdoor and Indoor Championships. Bernard is an eight-time NCAA All-American where he competed for Arizona State University. He trains in Chula Vista at the Olympic Training Center. In this episode, Chris and Cindra discuss: His Olympic Trials performance two weeks ago that landed him on his second Olympic Team Strategies he uses to deal with pressure How he avoids being victim to his thoughts Why having joy in the process is essential Ways mindfulness and meditation has changed his life and performance, and His meditation practice   HIGH PERFORMANCE MINDSET SHOWNOTES FOR THIS EPISODE: https://www.cindrakamphoff.com/429-2-2-2-2-2-2/ 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 TO FOLLOW CHRIS: https://www.instagram.com/flyylikechrisb/?hl=en https://twitter.com/FlyyLikeChrisB 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 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 Miss Pac-Man. Yes, the 1980s game Miss Pac-Man. So take your notepad out, buckle up, and let's go. This is the high performance mindset. Flo Jo once said, when someone tells me I can't do anything, I'm just not listening anymore. And Chris Bernard, who we have on the podcast today, said everything we do, all we do, is based on our habits over time. Welcome to the High Performance Mindset. Thank you so much for joining us here for episode 442 with Chris Bernard. I'm so grateful that you are here, and if you know that mindset is essential to your success then you are in the right place.

And today we have on the podcast Chris Spenard, a two-time Olympic triple jumper who just made his second Olympic team. He will be competing at the Tokyo Olympics in a few short weeks. He holds a personal record of 17.48 meters or 57 feet and 4 inches in the triple jump. He's competed representing the United States at the 2016 Rio Olympics in the triple jump and he's also represented the U.S. in multiple outdoor and indoor world championships. He's an eight-time All-American where he competed in college for Arizona State University and right now trains at Trula Vista at the Olympic Training Center. I wanted to have Chris on the podcast to share with us how he trains his mind and how he was able to create this zen moment at the Olympic trials a few weeks ago, despite all the pressure or distractions. He reads and studies mindset so he can perform his best under pressure and on

demand. And as you're listening, I'm going to encourage you to think about how you can train your mindset in a similar way, maybe for pressure you experience at work or home or in sport. And in this episode, we talk about his Olympic trials performance a few weeks ago, how he was able to connect with these Zen moments to help him land his second Olympic team. We talk about specific strategies he uses to deal with pressure, how he avoids being a victim to his thoughts, how having joy in the process is essential, and ways mindfulness and meditation has changed his life and performance. If you'd like to see the full show notes as well as a transcript of the interview, you can head over to

cindracampoff.com slash 442. And if you haven't already, we'd love for you to join the Facebook community for the High Performance Mindset Podcast. Each one of these episodes, we go live on the Facebook page, so you can leave us any questions or comments there and interact with us. And to find that page, you can head over to Facebook and just search High Performance Mindset Podcast, or wherever you're listening, you can scroll up to Facebook and just search High Performance Mindset Podcast, or wherever you're listening, you can scroll up on the show notes and you can find the

link right there. If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave us a rating and review. That helps us reach more and more people each and every week. All right, without further ado, let's bring on Chris Bernard. Chris, I'm so excited to have you today on the High Performance Mindset Podcast. Congratulations on qualifying for another Olympic Games last week in Oregon. How are you feeling today? I feel great. It feels great to have qualified and it's definitely an honor just to be on the podcast. So thank you for having me. Absolutely. And, you know,

to kind of get us started, this is your second Olympic Games that you're going to be headed to. So, you know, tell us a little bit about your experience kind of leading up so far to the trials last week. It was a lot of, I would say, mental practice more so than physical practice. I had like a couple small injuries leading up into trials. And like me being a veteran at the sport at this point, I would say my self-talk was very along the big picture of what I was trying to accomplish. So I would be at practice and I would have like a little feeling of a slight like pain somewhere. And my older self, my younger self would,

all the way would be pushed through it. Like, like all you have is hard work. You can't let a little injury hold you back from getting to working right now. But the veteran like in me was more saying like, no amount of work that you could do between now and trials is really going to make a difference. So what's best for me to do is to be recovered, to be confident in where my body's at physically and to be sharp mentally. And if I'm poking at little injuries daily, I'm not going to be that confident in my recovery. So recovery has to come first. So really balancing that, because I would say before the little injuries happened, my

whole mindset for leading into trials was get as sharp as possible, be as strong as possible, be as fast as possible. But realizing what was actually going on with my body and how pushing through it might put me in a worse place, it definitely switched to me more being like trying to be mentally ready, making sure I'm meditating, making sure I'm staying calm, making sure that I'm not trying to get ahead of myself in my, in my comeback to full training and just taking it one day at a time. I would say it was hard to be confident in myself during that time because I wasn't doing everything that I could to maximize upon my ability for this big moment

coming up. But at the same time, I knew I had to be confident in what I was doing if I wanted to be ready at all. So it was a lot of balancing. There was a whole lot of balancing, I would say. Yeah. Well, I appreciate you sharing that with us. I think, first of all, it just shows that you're human, you know, that, you know, it was difficult for you to be confident. But I also heard just so much wisdom there that a lot of times when we really want to

do really well at something, we might push and push our body more, but because you have been to an Olympics and you've been doing this for several years, you're able to kind of take a step back and like maybe train your mind to be calm, then maybe keep pushing your body. Oh yeah, absolutely. And I can like, that's, that's what I'm like, I feel fortunate to have because I self-talk I've realized is such a big component in just an elite athlete and people in the first place, like what you're telling yourself or how you're justifying things to yourself is really, I think what determines your future a lot. And I think a lot of times people make justifications based off half the information or just not, not a lot of information, but they have to feel confident in it just because

they have to believe in themselves. So I feel fortunate to be able to like, really be able to get a full understanding of what's going on and then take confidence in the fact that I do feel like I'm making a good informed decision. Yeah, that's wonderful. And, you know, Chris, one of the reasons I really was excited to have you on the podcast is that you spend, you know, time training your mind and you've read a lot of great books and just what you just said there is very wise. You know, your self-talk determines your future. Tell us a little bit about, you know, your the Olympic trials experience and how you specifically used your self-talk to help you not only, you know, make the finals, but really competitive finals where several of the athletes had had seasons best.

Right. It was really competitive. So tell us a little bit about that. I would say it was that whole week of being in Eugene was almost like a blur, I would say. I had been working so hard on being in this stillness in the moment. It was almost like the days leading up to it were completely unimportant or like there was nothing for me to really have to hang on to or grasp onto because I knew really why I was there was just to be ready on prelim day and on final day. So it was kind of like, it didn't really matter what I felt or any thoughts that I had. I would just be kind of going through this like roller coaster of like analyzing everything but and like knowing that a thought might bring me down or knowing that a thought might put me up but not giving any energy to anything at all so it was like i was there experiencing everything

but just in this like zen zen mode i was trying to maintain because it was with trials. There's no guarantees like that. You really like people will always speak things into existence. But I'm a realist and I take more comfort in the reality of the situation. So I'm going to go through the gambit of emotions of I might make it. I might not make it. And being able to be accepting of both sides, I feel like is what keeps me calm. So having that understanding of it while being out there, I would say like the whole time, I think my poker face was that nothing was wrong. Everything is cool. I could have good conversation with anybody. I can bring the energy that I know I need for me to be in my happy place. But that was all amongst me bouncing off negative thoughts,

bouncing off positive thoughts, and just trying to like, I guess, remain in the moment. Yeah, that's beautiful. And you know, I think Chris, that I've heard an athlete told me that the trials feels like you can just cut the atmosphere with a knife. Like it's, it's so tense. And so, you know, it's really easy to get really high or get low or, you know, be distracted by all these other things happening or, or maybe even distracted by when someone says to you, oh yeah, it's really tough to make this team. And then all of a sudden you kind of go in this downward spiral yeah what was what was distracting me or what I noticed that was like it was like um I would I'll say it was stimulating me or like getting me a little just more stimulated was people just being like are

you excited like oh you got to be excited I'm so excited to watch you not always just be like chill like please chill like I'm happy you're excited for me but if I get excited a week out from competition I'm not gonna have any energy on the day of competition like I need to because I mean I'm at this point I'm fully aware that the subconscious knows exactly what's going on it knows how big of a moment that's coming up and the more pressure that you put onto yourself for it, for it, the more responsive I think your subconscious is going to be. So I mean, I noticed that I was probably like nervous for the competition two weeks out. And if I have nerves in the, for the competition, that means that I'm operating at a heightened level of like,

I would say operation or just like at a high heightened so like if I'm already like prone to being at like a heightened level and I'm feeding into this excitement I'm about to go out at practice and go at 150 percent when I only really need to be going at 80 percent so just kind of like being understanding that but then like not trying to like shoot anybody's excitement down was another part of like the whole like balancing act of like understanding the reality of the situation and like taking that for what's going on rather than like feeding into all the outside stimulus. Absolutely. So Chris, what do you do then to balance that, you know, allow people to be excited to watch you, but, you know, especially if you're feeling nervous a

couple of weeks beforehand, you know, that it's just kind of wasted energy. What do you do to intervene with yourself there? I would say it now, because I'm comfortable with like the person that I'm trying to be, it's, I cope with it by just trusting how I feel in those moments. So if I do feel like this, like your excitement is slightly overwhelming, it's like, okay, I'm not wrong for feeling that. Like it, that is how I genuinely feel. And that's where my, that's where my zone of happiness is. So like embrace it, like say, thank you, but don't feed into it. Or if you do feel like, if you know yourself to operate well at a high excited excitement place then slap them back give them a big hug like i'm so excited too but more so just like knowing where

you're comfortable at based on like like past patterns like where you've noticed yourself to perform well at and then really trying to stick to that and trusting like trusting your gut trusting your subconscious and like trusting the things that have consistently made you or made me happy, I think is what helped me like stay grounded with myself rather than like feeling like I needed to latch on to somebody else for my own happiness or for my own stability. Yeah. And Chris, in sports psychology, we talk about a theory called the individualized zone of optimal functioning, which is just a really fancy way of saying that we all are levels of high performance, we have different energy levels. And so some of the people that you

compete against might need real to get really, really pumped up, right. So kind of what you're saying is that high five, you know, and getting excited when someone says they're excited. But it sounds to me that you really desire and do best when you're more in kind of this, you kind of said Zen moment. Tell us a little bit about how did you do that? You know, at the Olympic trials, when there's, you know, this such a tense atmosphere. Give us a sense of like, how did you tap into this Zen moment and really be present and kind of bounce these things off of you when people might say or do things? I think that meditation was like the big difference maker in that department. And I would say for whatever reason, the pandemic, I think made me, I guess,

more aware of stimulus or like during that time, I was just a little bit more tapped in with my emotion, I think just because I didn't have a distraction from my emotion. So it was like, I just had to live with whatever that I was feeling. And in past, in past meets, I would say that I would, I would do a decent job of keeping myself in my happy place. And, but I wouldn't, I think if I were to ever be knocked out of it, I wouldn't really know exactly how to get myself back into it. And I think I was starting to get the understanding of that while in the pandemic because I was noticing that I was anxious about stuff that I wouldn't be normally. And it scared me because I would think to myself, okay, if I feel like this and I can't get away from it, what happens if I'm at a competition and I'm having these feelings in the moment and I need to be able to focus? Like, I didn't like the idea of potentially being out of control in a situation where I needed to be in control. And I let that in itself

worry me during a time where control didn't even matter. So just kind of like being able to, I guess, grasp that and relate it to potentially being overwhelmed in a competition made me start meditating more consistently, like months and months and months ago. So now I guess like leading into these high stimulated competitions, once now that I'm practiced in being in the moment, that's all I really could do. It was like, it was like, I was out there feeling all these things or noticing thoughts that normally bring feeling, but not feeling like a victim to the feeling. It was like, this is just another gambit of thoughts that you're having in this moment. How you're actually feeling is how you're actually feeling. Like you feel like being out here for a track meet.

You don't really want to be anxious about anything. You really just want to be focused on what the task at hand is. So all the other thoughts that were happening, they didn't really matter. And I think just practicing, like being in the moment and accepting of whatever you're feeling in that moment, I think helped me to just, I guess, like really be still, or like, I guess, safe and not feel panicked by what was actually going on. So yeah, meditation, meditation, I think was a big difference maker. I don't think that, I think it's hard to be able to handle moments like that without practice. And I don't think people see meditation as practice, but it's a literal like practice of being in the moment.

Like you're sitting there, like training your brain to be okay with whatever's going on in that moment. And I think in those moments when people try meditating, they don't see how it translates to them potentially being in an office meeting and being nervous or them to public speaking and being nervous. But it absolutely does because those are, it's just another moment to where you need to be in control that you haven't practiced it. So yeah, meditation, I would say was huge for that. Excellent. Well, gosh, if people don't start meditating, if they don't already, there's every reason to start. And I'm thinking

about Chris, like, the triple jump is so interesting because you watch your competitors right and and and maybe your competitor jumps really far and then um you know you might have some thoughts about what you have to do next right where it's like if it's 100 meter dash or at 800 you're competing you're competing in the same you know at, at the same time. So it's a little bit different, I think. Absolutely. So you said like, you noticed the thoughts, you weren't being victim to the thoughts, and you're just like noticing for what, what, you know, what it was, but the meditation practice allowed you to do that. Tell us a little bit about your meditation practice. And what did you start doing several months ago that you think allowed you to really thrive in the moment of the trials? I would say, well, I started meditating, like, I was almost like I was freestyling, where it was like, it was in the beginning of like 2020,

while like indoors, and I was just, I had heard of people starting to meditate so they had better focus. And I was already, I had started practicing, I guess, like mindfulness in 2015. And not even just off of like me understanding that I wanted a little bit of difference in my life. Like noticing how like in certain moments, because I'm not really paying attention, they're not going as well as I would like them to. So maybe if I started to pay attention a little bit closer, these moments would, would go by, uh, smoother. So it was like, that was like the first domino of me growing like this mindfulness. And then it's almost like stuff just started to fall into place. Like, um, I guess like under, like feeling a connection with psychology to follow that and then and then hearing about meditation and and seeing how it affects people but like

and hearing how it affects people but actually understanding in those moments why it affects them that way i think that's a big difference like you hear about it and you're like okay that sounds cool but then when it when it clicks for you in your mind, it's like, oh, no, like I see why people do this. So as I started to feel that way, I started to like just like find opportunities to sit down for 30 minutes in the dark. And like what I would do before I had any type of like guidance, I would just like tell myself, count 50 deep breaths without any distractions to sit there. Don't worry if your legs start to feel numb. Just count out 50 deep breaths without any distractions. Just sit there. Don't worry if your legs start to feel numb. Just count out 50 deep breaths. That seemed like a simple good meditation practice that I came up with just kind of out of what makes sense out of meditation to me at the time.

And then progressing forward after then getting into the pandemic, I, I started to want, um, a little bit more guidance in it. So I, I, I started using the calm app and I liked that. And then I started using the headspace app because it was free, um, through like the USATF sponsor. And ever since I got onto the headspace app, um, I just started, I started just doing the guided meditations a i liked the affirmations that it was giving me and um i i liked that i didn't i didn't feel like i was just freestyling i felt like i was doing something for uh production or to be productive and um like moving forward from that the i was like reading a little bit on it too and it was basically telling me like the more you do it the better at it that you get and that made a little bit on it too. And it was basically telling me like,

the more you do it, the better at it that you get. And that made a lot of sense to me as well, especially in the way that I like to play video games. Like if I play a video game and I keep playing it, it's because I get better at it and the game starts to get more enjoyable. And that seemed like the same way that meditation would work. Like the more you do it, the better it gets, like the more clear thoughts you have, the, the, the more life just makes sense. So as I started to do that, it just made sense for me just to continuously keep meditating. And I had nothing better to do. I was like, there was nothing to do. So it was, it was, it was honestly something that made my day go by smoother. So it was like, like I don't know it really just started to

make make sense to uh to continue to meditate and so I started off just doing like different courses I actually did a course on the first course I did on meditation was on anxiety because I was having a lot of it during the pandemic a friend of mine had passed away and I was just kind of like having emotions that I couldn't really disperse. And it just seemed like it made sense that it was anxiety and like that you're having trouble like being in the moment and just kind of like going from there. And at that point, it didn't really matter what I was meditating on in my mind. It just, I just knew that I needed to be practicing this. So yeah, I think I, I think it has just been snowballing from there.

That's wonderful. Well, what I appreciate is he gave us really practical ways that you, you know, anybody who's listening can, can start meditation. I love the Headspace app. The Calm app is a great example of like ways that you can just get started and, you know, that you did start it in 2015 just by practicing mindfulness. And if people aren't sure what mindfulness is, it's just, I'll use Jon Kabat-Zinn's definition, which is like acceptance of the present moment, like your life depends on it, you know, and just like accepting what it is. Yeah. So when you think about the trials in 2016 compared to now, how do you think meditation helped you? I don't think the athlete that I was in 16 would have been able to thrive in 2021. Because I think that I would have gotten to this point of overthinking no matter what, just off of the way that I think. So if I would have went through the whole pandemic in the same

2016 mindset, I think I would have been completely overwhelmed and indecisive during this 2021 period. In 2016, it was a harder team to make, but it was a simpler time for me mentally. I wasn't considering how my life would move based on the decisions that I would make. I was more just comfortable with wherever life was going because of the age that I was at and just because I was young enough to really not be worried about it. Like, Oh, if this doesn't work, I'll do something else. Like I got time now feeling like, it's like once I turned like, I guess 30, especially turning 30 during the pandemic, like it really, it, it hits you like it, like you, you realize like this life thing is something that can be, I guess, controlled. And like some of the small decisions that you make implicate a lot for your future.

And I think that that can become pressure as you start to understand that. And I think a lot of people started to understand that during the pandemic as well. That's, I think a lot of people made a lot of, I call them pandemic decisions where they were in just this confused mindset and they just needed something to grasp onto so

they committed to something that they probably wouldn't have under normal circumstance so like um just kind of feeling that way about things and uh knowing how i handled it i think it would have been very tough to have handled it that same way without the practice thing that I had done. So just the development from 2016 to now, I think really put me in a good position to be able to make this team when the time came. Yeah. I appreciate what you just said about the pandemic and even how you're different now because of meditation. And I think that it was such a difficult time. I think for as an athlete, you couldn't compete. So you weren't getting that maybe dose of adrenaline, but also that confidence and knowing where you were in terms of your competition, you know, and there were so many things that were changing, including the trials

date. So, so many different things you had to deal with that were outside of your control. Yeah, it was, it was different. Yeah. And I, I know that every individual had to handle it their own way. And I definitely get curious on how just people handled it different or like how, how people's circumstances made them feel like they had to move certain ways. And I definitely don't hold it against anybody for making these pandemic decisions because you do what you have to do to feel happy in the moment. And sometimes, I mean, it is what it is and it's always going to be what it is. Like you kind of, you kind of got to just live with their decisions. And sometimes I wish I made some more pandemic

decisions. Like I wish that I did maybe put myself out there on a limb for my own happiness, just to see like, like what happens when I'm vulnerable or like what happens when I'm like, uh, like, I feel like I need to grasp onto something, but I did more of the route of just kind of trying to stay low and trying to stay consistent rather than, uh, trying to, or like figuring out how I could change for, for these circumstances. Yeah. And, and obviously staying low and consistent helped you get to the Olympics again. So when you think about your experience in 2016, and now going back in about a month, tell us, you know, what, what you'll take from that experience in 2016 that will

help you do well in a month or so. Oh, yeah. How I like to describe 2016 and what I learned a lot about it is I describe it as I was, well, first of all, trials was such a big moment for me. I really, Olympic trials in 2016 changed my life. I saw what it was like to kind of like take control of something and like not even purposefully. It was just off of the fact that I wanted something so bad. I kind of just lined up my mental and my physical to be able to execute to the best of my ability for that day. And all I really did was trust. I trusted everything that I had been doing leading up to that moment. And when it was time to execute upon that moment, I had no other worries. Like I really kind of splacked out and executed and had a great

competition. And I did exactly what I had to do to make the 2016 team. So with that being said, I didn't really understand in those moments what I did. I just knew that it worked. And, but then once I started to understand why that worked, I now more understand why I didn't do well at the games. So once I, once I got to the games, there was just so much stimulus, so much going on, so much potential FOMO. There was like, it was really like, I was, I was really at the trials. I was on the inside looking out, like I was myself looking upon the world and how I can affect it. And then at the, at the games, I was on the outside looking in, I was trying to see how everything around me was, how I could be like, I guess, a part of all that stuff, like how I could have just this ultimate experience without even understanding like what I was really even

there for or like without even really caring what I was even there for. It was like, if I could do this, I could do this and I could do that and still have a great performance, then perfect. But I wasn't sure how that was going to work until I put it to the test. And I would say that I was definitely more a victim of trying to do everything, trying to have the full experience, and not really understanding where I operate the best for competitions of that magnitude, but at the same time, not caring. So now leading into this one, I already started like shaping my mind to be prepared for the task at hand. And that I would say I started at trials 2021. That's why I was even meditating. It was like just to be, I knew I needed to be a certain

level of prepared and I was willing to do whatever I had to, to get to that level based on my understanding. And now I think I can to that level based on my understanding. And now I think I can take that same understanding and bring it to the games. So if I only have five days to prepare while in Tokyo, well, then like two weeks out that I need to make sure that I'm visualizing on what I need to be doing during that five days. And I need to just kind of like start trying to have an understanding based on the information that I have about what I'm getting myself into, basically understanding how I'm going to prepare myself rather than just hoping that I'm prepared once I get there. So yeah, if that means download podcasts for the weeks leading up so I can stay

in my level of normalcy, then so be it. If that means I have to bring a certain food, if it means I have to figure out how my sleep is going to be leading up to it, like any type of variables that I know affect me in a positive way, then like maximize upon that. And I think that's more understood based off of how I performed in 2016 and where I'm at now. Yeah. So one of the things I'm hearing is that you're going to go in executing and caring for yourself, like making sure that your mind and your body is ready to execute. Whereas maybe in 2016, it was more like the experience of going to the Olympics. And sometimes people will say like, that experience was so overwhelming because, and I appreciate what you said about FOMO, you know, like you were, you were looking out, you might've been comparing yourself to all these right athletes and just like being the best you and focusing on what you could do that day.

Yeah. That FOMO is real. You don't want to you see everybody just smiling, going around and doing every little part of it. But you just want to have that, too. And I think in the moment you're you're doing it right. It feels like you're doing it right. But then after you have your performance, you kind of think to yourself, like, maybe I maybe I shouldn't have gone to that basketball game. Maybe I shouldn't have gotten McDonald's for the fourth time at the Olympic Village. Like, maybe I should have been a little bit more focused at practice like I don't know you start it's it's fair to kind of start to take a little bit of like what's the word not like not necessarily credit like taking a little bit of time off based on the fact that you accomplish something and it sometimes it feels right to do that at the games because it's like, it's kind of offered to us as in a reward. Like it feels like it's the reward. You qualified for

the Olympic games. Here's your reward. You get to go. But in reality, the games, isn't the reward. The medals are supposed to be the reward. I mean, the games is a small reward. Yes. But if you ask any Olympian, nobody's going there to just be an Olympian so like I don't think that I I think if they could I think if most of us could understand that more then we would I guess understand the goal at hand more so and how to work towards that rather than just uh taking the the small reward that we already just got. Yeah. So good. So Chris, I know you've spent some time, obviously you described a little bit about your meditation process and we really appreciate that. Tell us maybe some of the resources you could share that you've read or

what else do you do to help you get some clarity on your mindset and help you develop that? Yeah, well, I read a lot of just like random things. It takes me a long time to get through them. And I don't know if it's because of the depth of the information or because like I'm just like scatterbrained at times. But like what comforts me about the things that I read is that as I'm reading them, they're making sense and that it, it, it seems like it's resonating to what's going on in my life. And I think that's usually all I need to feel for me to continue to read it. So like, like the book I just read, finished reading recently was a total meditation by Deepak Chopra. And yeah, it was, it was really good. Like just the explanations around why meditation benefits you. Like, um, it just, it resonated

like I would read it in the morning and feel like ready to go for the rest of the day. It's like, it, it gave me a validation to kind of how I was thinking already. Also, The Power of Habit. I like that one a lot. After that book, actually, I feel like it kind of changed my life because I didn't even finish the book, for one. I read through most of it, and I just kind of started to feel like I was understanding it. But just the fact, I never thought of habits in a the way that they should like uh that book really made it clear to me how everything that we do is a habit every feeling that we have is behind a habit and like where we're at in our life is all based on habits that we've made over time even habits from when we were children, and then those just kind of developing on top of themselves into

us being comfortable as adults. Like after reading that, it's like, I had this clarity of like how small decisions make a big difference. And like, if you really do want something, it's want something big. It's as it's, it sounds harder when it's just this big old idea. But if you think of it as a small habit decision every day you kind of get there over time without even realizing it so I like that one a lot as well um also I like the as a man thinketh um just because it it was such a simple book it's like a little pamphlet but it just gave so much perspective on life. And when I hear about perspective on life, but from such an old time and how it could still resonate to now, it makes it just seem so much more real. And like, it's like, it's just, it seems so much

more tangible. Like, oh, you, what you're, you came up with this then, and you don't even know anything about what's going on in life now. And it still resonates like no that's that's solid information so like yeah stuff like that um off the top of my head i can't remember much more but yeah i feel like i just i read just like random like i'll go on like my library app and i'll just look up like psychology stuff and just look for a title that i guess like uh my eye. I like a lot of Malcolm Gladwell novels as well. I haven't finished Outliers yet, but I like what he's talking about in it. Like just the concepts that Malcolm Gladwell gets into, I feel like are really, really good as well. Yeah, that's excellent. So we got Power of Habit, Total Meditation, As a Man Thinketh um as people are kind of just so i can kind of summarize what

you said but all great resources so chris i know you train with other olympians and high performers obviously you compete against them you know for people that aren't olympians but um want to kind of adopt this olympic mindset what are some the, the ways that you see some of the best of the best think, you know, what, what do you, what do you think people do differently? You know, for those that maybe make the games versus those that don't, do you see any differences there? Yeah, it's, there's a lot of differences. It's, but like, it's, it's almost like it's it's almost it's they're so individualized sometimes it's hard to try to use somebody that makes it regularly as an example of like the right way to think because they're they've really got themselves figured out to such a to such a high level

that it really won't necessarily apply to like the up and comer. But like for me, what I, what I noticed was important for me as I was developing was that I, I knew myself as an individual. So that goes into my mental preparation, but that also goes into my physiology or like my, my genetic makeup and like my levers. And like the more you can individualize your training the better you will be at maximizing upon yourself and that goes into mental training and physical

training so I think just like paying attention to the details like you really have to see this sport or whatever you're doing as a passion like if you're if you feel like you're having trouble retaining knowledge about it then like you might not really be into it enough. Like this stuff kind of, when you, when you get to doing it at a high level, it's because you, you really enjoy like the intricacies of it. And you really like, you, you want to pay attention to the small details because you know how big of a difference that it makes. And if you're thinking of it that way, then those little things, they come to you very easy. You don't, you don't feel like you're, you don't feel like seeing the trainer to do some pelvic floor exercises to make sure your core is stable and your triple jump. It doesn't seem tedious.

It seems like what needs to happen for you to jump further. So I think as you, I think as people start to get an understanding of like where their passion actually lies because it to be a great triple jumper you don't have to be passionate about triple jump you could potentially just be passionate about movement and how it applies and how different specific specificities within movement make you triple jump further that could be your passion it's like but just finding what the small thing is that that drives you to continue to want to do it, I think is what's really important to setting yourself up apart from other athletes. Yeah. And I think that also applies not to just athletics, but business life. It's like finding the small things that you're passionate about

and going forward with those. And I actually heard in your answer is like that the people that you see who make the team, they know themselves. They know themselves from a mental standpoint. Maybe their mental preparation might be slightly different, but they really know themselves and they're purposeful with what they're doing. They're just not going through the motions. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Chris, thank you so much for joining us. I love hearing about your experience at the trials and the Olympics and so much insight. Tell us a little bit about how people can follow along with your journey. Maybe if you at is fly with two Y's like Chris B on both on both platforms fly like Chris B. My Facebook name is Chris Bernard. That's usually where I do most of my updating or usually I do most of my updating on Instagram. But it also posted Facebook. So, yeah, if you feel like following me, following along, then definitely go do that. And the second question was my preparation for Tokyo, right? Or what I have

coming up leading into it. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And just so from here on out, like there's not a lot of time. It's only like a month left, I would say. And I'm kind of just like sticking to the same script, like making sure I'm mentally sharp. Now that now that I've competed at trials, I feel like I can I can try to enjoy this a little bit more and like and not feel like just the the pressure of like having to get through a trial. So now, like at practice, I'm going to try to actually like put my shoulders down and like enjoy practice and like get my get as the best of work that I can get in just try to be as sharp as possible um physically mentally and ideally things will just take care of themselves we continue to not put too much pressure on myself understand like what's gonna happen is gonna happen um I'm really just like I'm a I'm a small piece to this balance of life but I'm still part of the balance so whatever happens is just part of the balance so I'm a small piece to this balance of life, but I'm still part of the balance. So whatever happens is just part of the balance.

So yeah, sticking with it, staying true to it. The good thing about trials is it validates how I was moving leading up to trials. So now I can really just take comfort in the fact that I feel like I'm making the right decisions for myself. So that's what I'm going to do. And ideally, it just works out the way that it's supposed to work out in a way that I, the way that I want. And if it doesn't, it doesn't, but either way, I'm going to keep on sticking to my guns. to you if you have any closing thoughts for everybody. But I love that you said like self talk, self talk determines your future, and making sure that you're really powerful about that self talk, especially about yourself. You talked about like leading up to the trials that you could have

pushed your body more, but your wisdom was like, okay, take a step back and really focus on this mindset, make sure you're as healthy as you can for the trials, which I think is, was a differentiator. And just like you making the team, you're talking about meditation, and just your practice on that, and just like noticing the thoughts that you have, but not being victim to them and how the meditation helps you do that. And then we talked about knowing yourself and being purposeful, following your passion. And even how you know that you're going to go into the next Olympics more with this trusting mindset and focus on execution. Thank you so

much, Chris. What other final message do you have for people who are listening? I feel like I kind of said it all. I feel like a good final message is that we all have the answers for ourselves. I really believe that we all have the capability of getting to where we need to get. It's just that we all have a lot of outside distractions that kind of make it cloudy. It makes our reality seem a little bit tougher than it even has to be. I guess from my practicing and like my mindfulness, I feel like a lot of people would benefit

from being mindful themselves and just trying to get a little bit more tapped in with their emotion. And like, I know a lot of people are tapping with their emotion, but they only to the level of like understanding that they are having it, not understanding why they are having it. So yeah, just asking why, uh, having a great understanding of you for yourself, I think it's just really benefit beneficial for everybody. So hopefully anybody listening to this, they just, they can take a little something from it and, uh, and find a benefit for themselves for them

moving forward. Because I do really believe that, uh, that my path, uh, to this point, um, the decisions I've made, anybody could like benefit from having the same understanding of things. And it's, it's, it's not that complicated once you finally simplify it for yourself. And I, I don't know, I guess I just think anybody could benefit from it. And a lot of people can simplify it if they just, I guess, give it a shot, give mindfulness a shot, give meditation a shot, give mental health a shot. I think it's really important for people. Thank you, Chris. What a great, powerful message. I appreciate you. And I appreciate you being on the podcast today. Thank you so much. Sandrara, thank you so much for having me.

It is absolutely an honor. You have no idea. Like I was really excited just to come on here and talk to you. So I knew it was gonna be a great talk. Thank you so much. 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.com.

See you next week.