High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 666: The Mindset of Champions with Michael Urban, Director of Mental Performance for the L.A. Clippers

Episode Date: February 25, 2025

Welcome back to the High Performance Mindset Podcast! Today, we’re diving deep into the world of mental performance with a special guest who works at the highest levels of sport and business. Joining us is Michael Urban, the Director of Mental Performance for the L.A. Clippers. With a career dedicated to coaching elite athletes, coaches, and corporate leaders, Michael specializes in evidence-based mental skills training to help individuals sharpen their focus, enhance resilience, and unlock their full potential. Before working with the Clippers, Michael played a key role in developing the mental performance program at Clemson Athletics, where he worked closely with student-athletes and coaches to strengthen their mindset for success. Beyond sports, he also brings his expertise to the corporate world, guiding executives and CEOs to build a high-performance mindset in business. With a Master’s in Kinesiology with a focus on Sport Psychology and Motor Behavior from the University of Tennessee and his certification as a Certified Mental Performance Consultant (CMPC), Michael is passionate about helping others achieve their biggest goals and become the best version of themselves. In this episode, we’ll explore the strategies and techniques that fuel high performance—whether on the court, in the boardroom, or in everyday life. Get ready to take notes because Michael is here to share game-changing insights on mental toughness, resilience, and peak performance. Let’s dive in! HIGH PERFORMANCE MINDSET SHOWNOTES FOR THIS EPISODE CONNECT WITH MICHAEL HERE EMAIL MICHAEL AT [e-mail] REQUEST A FREE MENTAL BREAKTHROUGH CALL WITH DR. CINDRA AND/OR HER TEAM TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE MENTALLY STRONG INSTITUTE Love the show? Rate and review the show for Cindra to mention you on the next episode.

Welcome back to the High Performance Mindset Podcast and welcome to episode 666. Today we are diving deep into the world of mental performance with a special guest who's worked at the highest levels of sport and business. Joining us today is Michael Urban, the Director of Mental Performance for the LA Clippers. With a career dedicated to coaching elite athletes and coaches and corporate leaders, Michael really specializes in evidence-based mental skills training to help individuals sharpen their focus, enhance resilience, and unlock their full potential. Before working with the Clippers, Michael played a key role in developing the mental

performance program at Clemson Athletics, where he worked closely with student athletes and coaches to strengthen their mindset for success. And beyond sports, he also brings his expertise in the corporate world, guiding executives and CEOs to build high-performance mindset in business. Michael has a master's in sports psychology from the University of Tennessee and is a certified mental performance consultant. And in this episode, we explore the strategies and techniques that fuel high performance, whether on the court, in the boardroom, or in everyday life. So get ready, take some notes because Michael is

here to share game-changing insights on mental toughness, resilience, and peak performance. So let's dive in. Welcome Michael. Michael Urban, I'm so excited to welcome you to the High Performance Mindset, and I can't wait to learn from you today. So just thank you so much for being here. Today we're going to talk about nine ways to grow mental performance culture, and I can't wait to dive in. So welcome to the show.

Yes, Cinder, thank you so much for having me. I've been a longtime listener of your podcast and excited to be here and talk with you today. Awesome. Well, I love that you're even learning from others like through the podcast. And so I want to start with just asking like, why should people care about what we're talking about today? Why should they really care about growing a mental performance culture within their workplace or their sports team or maybe even their family? Yeah, absolutely. It's definitely something I'm really passionate about and had a lot of experience in recently, but you know for

me when I think about the mental performance work and I think we're a little different than most other fields is like our work you have to build trust first and then the work comes right. A lot of other places you get you get paired first and you kind of trust progresses throughout your work. And I think with the mental performance cultures, you need to have trust. So these are kind of experiences that I've learned and being in my different stops and things that I try to do daily

to make sure we do build that trust. And then so we can advocate for the field of mental performance and hopefully continue to see it grow. Yeah, awesome. I agree and trust isn't always easy to, you know, develop. And I think about the importance of mental performance and people might just think of, hey, it's only important in sports. But obviously we perform every single day. And so, you know, if you're listening

and you're a leader or a CEO or a mom, you know, or a dad, you know, we perform every single day and our mind is what really pushes us forward and really identifies and fuels us. Right? Yeah, absolutely. It's, you can get your mind to work for you rather than against you, then I think your life anywhere, anywhere you perform is going to be advantageous for you. Yeah, absolutely. So Michael, you've worked in some really cool places, IMG Academy in Florida, Cal, Clemson, you've worked with surgeons in the corporate space and now obviously with the LA Clippers. And so I'm curious when you think about all of these different spaces, why is a culture

of high performance really important in all of these different spaces you've been in? Yeah, yeah. I've been really fortunate to be around kind of different places I have and different experiences and you kind of, you get to see a lot and you see a lot of different people, a lot of different experiences and people from all different countries and backgrounds and stuff. And, you know, I think the one commonality is that we're all searching for ways to be our best, right? And like everybody's trying to do the best they can, no matter if you're, like you said, a doctor, a surgeon, an athlete, a teacher, a parent, a coach, right?

And everybody wants to find a competitive edge. And I really believe that the mental performance side and a high performance culture can be a competitive edge to whatever we're doing, like whatever it's, hey, I want to be a better parent today. Like, OK, how can how can we help with your communication or that part? So I think we're constantly in the pursuit of trying to get better. And I've noticed that at all of my stops and with everyone I've interacted with, and getting better looks different for each person as we know.

But I think if you have a high performance mindset culture where people can thrive, then you can really help people be their best. And to me, there's nothing more rewarding than supporting people that are trying to be great Yeah, I absolutely agree with that and have the drive to be their best self, right? Not better than anyone else, but really their best I'm curious when you think about like in each of these spaces and you've worked with some of the highest performers in each of these spaces What do you think those at the top do differently than those maybe who don't thrive?

Yeah. Yeah. There's a couple things. There's one, like they have belief in what they're doing and they find belief in what it is. And I talk about like kind of a believing versus dreaming, right? A lot of people that dreams, they feel good. It's like, yeah, oh, maybe someday I'll do this, you know, but what I've seen in the

highest performance, they really believe like in their purpose, you can feel it in your stomach. You know what you're going to do. You know what you're capable of. And the other thing that that I see them do really well is they want to learn. And the higher up you get in the more professional athletes that you get is like, they want to know if you can help them and they want to learn. And I think that's a really good place to be because I think early on, what I see with

younger athletes is that I got to figure it out. I know what I'm doing. I'm good to go, you know, and you get the more mature at the higher level and they want to find that edge to get better. So kind of their growth mindset that they have is they really want to learn from their mistakes. They don't view it as a threat. It's it's an opportunity for them to get better. And then, you know, the other thing is they're the best athletes I've been around are all in and they're they're all in on what they're doing. They're all in on they're trying to dominate their process, right.

And figure out like, OK, well, what am I doing this leading up to it? And how can I get that? And that goes back to the learning and believing in what they're doing. Awesome. I completely agree. And I like the way that you said is like dominate the process, like the process of getting better and the small steps they need to take to really be at their best. So as we kind of dive into creating a culture of mental performance and you said like trust

is everything. How do you think we develop that trust, whether if it's like us working in the mental performance and you said like, trust is everything. How do you think we develop that trust, whether if it's like us working in the mental performance space or, you know, even leaders developing trust with their people or coaches developing trust with their athletes? Like, what do you think? How do we do that? And what's that really about? Yeah, absolutely.

So, you know, I always think, you know, when teens talk about, you'll hear coaches talking like, oh, this is our culture. This is what we do. This is what we're about. And I love that. But I think first and foremost, as a mental performance practitioner, you need to think like what you're about and how do you want them to experience you? And that's, I think, the biggest thing, because when you look at human behavior, you think we judge ourselves off our intentions. They other people judge us how they experience us. Right. And somewhere in there is a gap. And that's when misconceptions happen.

And I think the misconceptions are the biggest, the most harmful thing to trust. Right. So I need to think not only I know my intentions are good. I like I believe that I'm in it for the right reason. I'm doing that. So I want to go a step further and think about, okay, well, how do I really want them to experience me in our work together? What do I want you to feel when you work with me? And this is gonna be different for everybody. I'm gonna share kind of three things for me that's important to me. And I think this is a great framework to ground yourself in and hopefully it closes that gap from

misconceptions. But for me, the number one thing is I want you to know that I care. And I want you to know I care about you as a person. I care about you as a performer. And I'm clear, like when I share this with teams, I don't have any ulterior motive. I don't have anything else. Like I'm not asking for tickets. I'm not asking for an autograph. Like I'm good. I get a salary, I get paid, I got food. I'm not I'm not asking for tickets. I'm not asking for an autograph. I'm not asking like I'm good.

I get a salary. I get paid. I got food. Like I'm set. So my job is to genuinely care for you. And if I can care for you as a person and performer, that's going to give us a good platform to build a relationship. Right. Maybe you don't care back at me right away. Maybe you don't invest back at me right away. And that's totally fine.

But my full time job is going to be start to care for you. Right. And so that's, that's the first piece that I'm like, it's very important for me. Um, the second piece to that is I'll tell you these are all times. I want to grow together. Right. I don't have all the answers. I don't want all the answers.

I had more answers coming out of grad school than I do now. Uh, after being in the field for six years. That's so true. Oh, I had it all figured out. I was like, yeah, you couldn't tell me anything. I was the man. And now I'm like, do I know what I'm doing on a day-to-day basis? It's one of those things is like, I have no idea what it's like to be an NBA player.

I have no idea what it's like to play college basketball. Even if I did, I don't know what it's like to be in your shoes, right? But what I do know and what I do know really well is how the brain works. And I know how the brain works under pressure. And I know how to help the brain work for you and perform at your highest level in whatever space you're in. And you are already very talented and you are already a high performer for working together. So if you take your experience and you know yourself

and what it's like to play at the level that you're doing, and I take my experience with the brain and we got a good relationship built off of care, then we can grow together and explore things together and figure out what's best for you. And the third step to this, and this is what I tell everybody I work with, some people don't like this part of it and that's okay. But the reason is I want to win. Like I want to win just

as bad as anybody else. Like I'm sick when we lose. Like I want to, I want to win just as bad as a coach. And, and I think there's nothing better than winning it. Like going in with people that you're working with together and you beat somebody and you move on like in locker rooms good after. I want to win. And I really believe, like I said earlier, that the high performance mindset, mental performance is a competitive edge and it will help you win. And so if there's anything that I can do for my role to help you win,

I'm all in. I'm all in on that. All right. So those are the three things I want you to know. I'm invested through winning. I'm going to grow with you and I'm going to care about you as much as I can. And I think that is a good platform that helps us one, build trust. But it also allows me to kind of draw back to myself day to day like, okay, are they experiencing these three things for me? Because my intention is really good, but are they really experiencing these three things? And that's going to put us in a good position to start the trust process.

three things and that's going to put us in a good position to start the trust process. Yeah and I like your perspective Michael about like how the mental performance culture really starts with you and examining the ways that you want to be perceived. As I was listening, I was trying to think about what I would say and you know you said care, and win are the three things you want people to experience you. What comes to my mind is I want people to experience that I'm passionate about what I do. And I want people to feel like I'm really practical, like here's how to do it. And then I want people to feel like,

oh, she was there for me. And so I just wrote down the word service, like how can I serve you? And what's fascinating about this is actually all of these things are reflected in my purpose statement that I wrote. That's awesome. I know, which is like the purpose of my life

is really to help people play big and provide practical strategies and live with a service mindset, you know? And so what's fascinating about that is I also wonder if that's the same for you. If you were going to write a purpose statement to guide you, would you use care, grow and win in that? And, you know, like I think that's just a cool like connection there. Yeah. Yeah. That's a really cool connection. I appreciate you sharing that. I will say I felt your passion every time we've talked and every time I listen to this podcast. So it definitely, you definitely live in accordance with that. And I do, I do feel that for me with like, I care and that's everywhere in my life, you know, that I want to do. And

I think grow together, but I'm always like, I'm that guy, how do we get better? What can we do differently? I want to grow. I want to see how good I can get. But yeah, that's great. I used to hide my energy. And there's this moment about 10 years ago where I was at a Tony Robbins event, of all things. It was in Florida.

It was called Date with Destiny, which was an incredible event. It was like seven days where you know, where you're just like fully immersed in this culture. And one person said to me, like someone I didn't really know, but I just met in one of these kind of, you know, you do an exercise and you talk to someone about it. And one person said like, your energy is contagious. Like that's your superpower. And I had always tried to kind of hide my energy, especially when like working with football players, you know, like I don't want to be too passionate or like perceived as

ditzy or something like that. And so I would try to act more masculine if that even makes any sense. Yeah, absolutely. That's actually really not who I am. And so that one comment from a stranger, and then when you're in this kind of like seven day event, you just think more clearly because there's less like, you know, all this like stuff in your head. And then you're like, yeah, why do I not embrace this?

And I think I've been embracing it since then. Yeah, yeah, that's so powerful. The fact that just a stranger can bring that up to you and it has changed the next 10 years, like, yeah, good for you. Like that's amazing and good for you. And it makes me wonder how often we do that. Like do we minimize ourselves a lot for other people or perceptions? Right.

Because we don't really want to stand out, you know, or look different or seem different or there's this idea that you have to be a certain way or I think about my mentors in doing sports psychology, a lot of them were like men. And so it's like, I think I just kind of took that on. So yeah, cool connection here. Care grow and win. And so a culture of mental performance really starts with you. How could people determine maybe their three words that they want

guiding them on how they want to be experienced by people? Yeah, absolutely. I think this is a really good I'm big on on reflection, right. And thinking back, I do a lot of core values, exercises and figure out like, what do I really want my behaviors to be? So what I would encourage people to do is go back and think, you know, when they've been in their best environment, when they've been in the best situation they were in, when

they've been around people where they felt like they were thriving, whether it's just in life or that's in work. And what would the words be that people describe you as? Right? Like if they got one word to describe you. What would that be? Would there be common themes from a group of 30 people? Would there would there be common themes from even five people? Would you go to your family and say, hey, how would you describe me

when I'm at my best? Right. And then you really want to see if that that aligns with what you feel like. OK, yes, there's me in my past, but also going forward, right. Is this who I'm aspiring to be? Is this the best version of Michael Urban that I can get? And what I find is the more authentic you can be, the more you can just be yourself. You know, like you were saying, it's interesting.

We get we get so caught up trying to fit in and everybody we idolize stands out. Right. Like think about all the professional athletes, the actors, they all stand out. They're all they're all one on one. But yet we're trying to fit in with everybody else and we're going to guide our life. So people that stand out. So I think it's one of like, well, who do I really want to be at my best? And what does that look like for me to and what words come to mind for that?

And then what to and then, you know, taking that one step further, like, OK, if I want to care, what's four or five ways that I can show you care if I never told you care syndrome and we sat here and talked in two months, you'd be like, man, you really did this. And Michael, like these were the ways you show actually showed it to me, right? Like I'm a I'm a less caption more action kind of guy. So, you know, don't talk about too much, like show me with it. And I think identifying three to four behaviors that you can check off once you identify your words and what's important to you.

Do you think these words could actually be your core values and then your definitions of like those core values? Or do you think the words maybe are different than your core values? When I've done core value exercises, these growth and grow will always come up. So that's the commonality. But I think they're similar. So some core values are absolute integrity, I'm authentic like those ways, and that does show up in, I do my work so they can be interchangeable.

And I think the definition, this is what I challenge people to do is when you come up with your definition for a word, like I want your definite. I don't want an urban dictionary definition and that is a pun because my last thing. I know that's funny. But I don't want to like, I want to know what you really believe, like what's in your heart on it. And I'm never going to challenge you on that, right? You know, we could have very different definitions that Karen's stuff. So I do think they can be the value piece and your definitions. And I do see it all interchangeable because at the end of the day, it's just who I am.

This is just as a person, right? And this is what you've got to get every day. But when you even shared that with me, that these are your three words that describe you, you know, how you want people to experience you. It also made me feel like I understand you now. And I think sometimes we kind of hide what's most important to us or these ways of how we want people to describe us,

because I don't know, we're holding ourselves back. So I'm gonna encourage every leader, every athlete, whoever you are, write these down and then define them like Michael's suggesting. Michael, when you were talking about, you know how the brain works and how mental performance can be like a competitive advantage.

And when you describe that for people, like if you're working with a Clippers athlete and you said, hey, I understand how the brain works under pressure, tell us about that and why that's really important for us to even understand that. Yeah, absolutely. So why, one of the things, this is a really kind of good way to, to get people in. It's, you know, I'll ask teams, uh, corporate clients, anyone I'm working with,

like what percent of your job, your role is mental. Right. And usually that comes to, usually 70 to 80%. Right. I don't argue with them. Like it's, it's your belief in that. Yeah. And they say, okay, well, you know, who spends 80% of your time training them the mental side and then it's right.

And there's no one in there that does that. Right. And so Arver did a study. I'm sure you're very familiar with this. It might've been a salary podcast previously. Right. But on average, we have 60 to 80,000 thoughts a day. Right. And you ask people, how many thoughts do you have? I love the people that are like a lot. I have a lot of thoughts. They don't even give you a number. Yeah. But so on average, of 60,000 thoughts a day,

what they found is 70 percent of those 60,000 thoughts are negative, unhelpful, unproductive. Right. So 70 percent of your time. So we look over the course of, let's say, a basketball game for two hours. You might have 5,000 thoughts in that time. And 70% of those on average are going to be negative, unhelpful, unproductive, but you're trying to perform at the highest level in the top 1% of players in the entire world. And you're doing it at a good, good level, right? Cause you're here, like they

don't need me. It's a competitive advantage, right? Like, and that's, that's what we get back to is like everybody's successful in their own way. And this is just how to find an edge. So then it's really about, okay, if you're under pressure and now we're viewing that as a threat, we're viewing that as like, oh, well, what if, right? When you see a lot of performers comes down to what ifs, what if I miss? What if this doesn't work out? What if the coach doesn't play me the way I want to?

What if they think I'm bad? What if they trade me? What if, right? And we just are on the negatives know, I'm like, well, what if it's the best game of your life? What did you go, what did you go out there and shoot 10 for 10 from three? Then what? We don't talk about that. Right. And, and I think the, the number one thing to understand with the brain too, is that your brain is designed to keep you alive. It's not designed to keep you happy. And I think you have to fight for

that. Right. So in the, in the pressure situations, like that's where we need to fight and we need to rewire our neural pathways or connections to become more optimistic in that time to see ourselves, see art, see the growth that we can have. And then you know what? It doesn't threaten me because I have room to grow. It excites me. Awesome. Mic drop right there. Another pun. I'll take that. Yeah. Oh yeah. I like it. I like the puns. I thought about so many different things as I was listening to you. I was thinking about this elite gymnast that I work with who, if

I told you his name, you'd know who he was if you watched the Olympics. I can't tell you his name, right? But we were just talking about how he's like 1% of the world in gymnastics. And when he retires, how then he can become the 1% in the world at whatever job he works toward next, right? If it's financial planning or you know Whatever it might be and I just think about people who listen to this podcast want to be their best self You know and even just when you said like you're the top 1% of the world you want to train your mind to Think more productively and optimistically and if it's 70% and then under threat then it's even going to be more Because your brain's purpose is not to help you be a high performer then it's even gonna be more because your brain's purpose is not to help you

be a high performer. Right. You're fighting against your brain and it's also the most powerful thing for you. And I think we're always in a constant battle and there's always those inner voices in our head, and I get them at night. I was talking about this other week,

I'm like, man, am I good enough? Why didn't I do this? Like, man, it's 11 o'clock and now I'm trying to go to bed. And it's there though. And it's what drives you to be unbelief too. Yeah. And I also think when you're really pushing yourself outside your comfort zone, like those thoughts can be even louder, you know what I mean? And when I think about times where I'm really trying to do something different and stand out or, you know, that's maybe when

the, for me at least, the self-doubt gets louder. And I agree with you that I've been doing this for a long time, but the more I do it, the more I realize I don't know. Yes. Yeah. The more questions I got, you know? And I've just decided, Cintra, that asking the right questions is having all the answers.

All right. That's all I want to do. Ask the right questions. having all the answers. All right, that's all I want to do. Ask the right questions, you'll have all the answers. And the other part that you were saying with the voices, you know, sometimes you got to stop listening to yourself and start talking more and talk to yourself, right? And don't let those voices creep in there. Hi, this is Cinder Campoff and thanks for listening to the High Performance Mindset. Did you know that the ideas we share in the show

are things we actually specialize in implementing? If you wanna become mentally stronger, lead your team more effectively and get to your goals quicker. Visit freementalbreakthroughcall.com to sign up for your free mental breakthrough call with one of our certified coaches. Again, that's freementalbreakthroughcall.com

to sign up for your free call. Talk to you soon. Yeah. And then when you said like you got to fight for your mind or fight for, I don't know exactly what you said, but I was just thinking about- Yeah, fight for your brain to be happy. Yeah. Isn't that so true? Yeah. How do you do that? Or how do you help other people kind of fight for their reign to be

successful? You know, it's easier helping other people than myself. I can be like, wait, I can help you through this, right? Let's walk through that, you know? And what I really enjoy with working with performers is the journey together and finding out and being okay with like, okay, this is where it's at and talking through whatever you're thinking through. What led you there? I always want to know what led up to the moment.

Right. Like it wasn't the moment where you failed. Like what led up to it? And I tell athletes this to they have a hard time. It's like you don't stink. Your process stunk. Right. And so like what was leading up to that. And I think that's where we can figure out, okay, can we change the thought process? Can we change the way I prepare?

Can we change the way I was talking to myself? Can we change the way I was perceiving the environment I was in? Can we change the communication I was having with my athletes? And that's going to fight to make us more comfortable. And I think for me as a person and just myself too, that I have to fight for to keep my mind positive and going right and feeling like you add value is being able to act in align with my values again. Like I, I, you're probably going to hear a lot of times here, like if I can do behaviors

from my values and I can use that to guide my day to day, I'm okay. Like I will stay on track, I'll be good. And that's when I think you become happy in your life and not just with your life. And I think we find, we find habits with our life at times, but if I can, there might be bad moments and there might be losses and there might be things that really hurt me, but I'm really happy in my life

when I stay in line with my values. What is the difference between happy in your life or happy with your life? Yeah, so this is how I conceptualized it is for me is happy with your life is, oh, everything's going well right now. Maybe I got to play golf, which I love to do. Maybe I got to go out, go fishing. I got a vacation coming up. I'm really happy where I'm at. And then what you find is working with athletes, especially our professionals, is like, well, if I say that something bad is going to happen and you get people that are just waiting like, well, I can't be too happy because then something bad is going to happen. So I think you're happy with what's going on in kind of like the moment to moment.

I think the happy in your life is when you're comfortable in your own skin. You're ready to you're out in your own skin, you're ready to you're out of, for me, a pursuit of excellence and just constantly evolving, trying to figure out how I can get better and interpreting when things all go well, when it is a bad time, it's just a bad moment. It's not a bad life. And so I take that and I kind of go day to day. I'm like, all right, man, I'm really happy and what I'm doing, even though today was really hard. It can be, both can be true.

Well, it can be true. I think that's a powerful statement of happy in your life, not just happy with your life. Yeah. So Michael, we've been talking about this idea of, you know, creating a mental performance culture and I'm thinking about what you said earlier about trust and helping people think about how people want to experience you. How do you think this idea of like psychological safety plays into mental performance culture?

And maybe to get started, tell us what does psychological safety actually mean to you? Yeah, absolutely. I think it's one of the most important things that when you talk about, OK, I'm coming in, and you're good, and you get the trust, you do that. To me, create a psychologically safe environment within our mental performance work.

That's in team sessions, and that's in the individual sessions is the most important thing you can do to go day to day. And so there's two different kind of realms that I'll talk about within this. And the first one I think about is setting up in the team culture. And so there's one thing that I do with a lot of groups. I don't do this with every group, but I do it with a lot of groups that we want to do. But the three signs of a thriving culture are eye contact, proximity, and physical touch. And that's from Daniel Coyle's book Culture Code. I recommend one of my favorite reads. Not better than

Beyond Great though. I will say that. I got you there. Thank you Michael. Yeah, there you go. But those are three things. So one of the things I actually do to start every session with a lot of my groups, and I'll teach this on the first time I meet with a team. And I call it NBA hugs. And so we go we go through it and like I will I will break down every second of the NBA hug and how it's supposed to be. So when you move like when you move up to the person, you got to have you got to make eye contact with the person. That's the number one thing you you walk up to someone you're making eye contact. So we're already locked in right in the in the back of my mind showing you a little

trust. Right. Then we get close. And, you know, when they hit with their hand out, I tell them, hey, don't hook your hand. That's for losers. Just keep your hands straight out, you know, and go right there. And then you go around the back and hit them on the back just a quick like an NBA like you would see on any NBA player if you watch these games, how they hug afterwards. And so we're trying to we teach that. and then on the back, you know, make them get a little on the way out.

And then what happens, so we, I teach all that and then they practice and I make every single person get up in the room that I'm working with and they go NBA hug every person. So now you have a touch point with them. You're, you're, you got high contact, you got physical touch, there's proximity. And what you notice is the change in our room after we do that. So you come in and you're like, I think one of the hardest things is getting into a session, right? So you come in there and we're changing the room and everybody seems a little happier, it's a little more relaxed, there's a little more energy in the room. And that's how we start that. And then I'll move into the psychological

safety part here that you wanted to ask about. Yeah, that's cool. I got a quick question about that though. Very cool. And then do you start like the every workshop with an MBA hug where everyone has to give each other a hug? I do. I do.

And they know it. And you know what's been really cool? Some teams have just adapted it and they're like, Oh, we do that now for introductions. Like everybody goes out and like, Oh, NBA hugs. Like that's what we're doing. It's like part of what they do now. Like, and that's so it is. So we will start every workshop with it with teams that I implement with.

Um, and, and it's really, it becomes a really part, like you talk about culture. All right. That's what we do. Yeah. Is it called NBA hugs only because like in the NBA you see it more often there or yeah. Yeah. I stole it from I'm like man like every time I watch an NBA game you know how they always hug after I'm like I don't know what to call this we're gonna call it NBA hugs so. I like it. I trademark it yeah. Yeah and I'm thinking about a couple

years ago there was a study done and I can't I can't you know am I right off the top my head like look think about who wrote it, but how actually the team that won the NBA championship had more physical touch than the team that didn't. So maybe you know more of those details, but I think this just shows you the importance of really what you just said, eye contact, physical touch, and proximity. So yeah, tell us a little bit about those three things you think in that psychological safety.

Yeah, absolutely. And there was a really cool study done on Steve Nash years ago, too, and how many high fives he gave out. Talking to that part. But when you think about psychological safety, to me, it's there's three things your brain is always wondering, right? It's are we safe? Are we connected and do we share a future?

Those are the three questions we're always asking ourselves. And now if I feel like, Hey, we're safe here and we're connected and you and I are sharing a future, I'm going to be able to be more vulnerable and be able to be more open and I'm going to let you help me along the way. Right. And, and I think mental performance, I'd tell you, I'm like, you shouldn't trust me right away. Like you shouldn't just come in and tell me everything right away. Like let me earn that and we work together.

So when I break that down to number one, are we safe? The number one thing I think anybody can do when working with high performers or other people is you have to be willing to see their side and you have to be able to like whatever your perspective is, and you're like, I could disagree with you to the most deep down. I want to actually go see your side and I want to see where you're coming from. I want to see what you're taking in, because I value your thoughts. Right. And I value how you're interpreting it. I value your experience as a performer, as a human. And like I said, I don't have all the answers, so I want to make sure

even though the research would suggest doing it this way and this is a route we can go, I want to make sure I'm really seeing your side. And I need to step across and take in what what you're talking about. For the second part. Is are we connected, right? Are we connected? And that goes back to the relationships that we build that goes back to our NBA hugs that goes back to handshakes, you know, outside NBA hugs, I also create handshakes with a lot of players. But I think, are we connected?

And so this is how I kind of piece the connected piece together. When anybody asks me about relationships, this is how I talk about it in a way. I think about it as trading coins and dollar bills with people. And I think about when you ask questions to people, if I were to ask, hey, how are you? That's the dollar question. That ain't that much. But it's, I'm investing a dollar in you. Right. And what you find, what you file with this is 98% of people. Hey, how you doing today? Good. You good. Conversations over.

Right. You keep walking, you know, and I could be the worst in the world that day. I'm like, yeah, I do it. How are you? Right. It's not an honest. Yeah. I don't think today. Yeah. So what I try to do is if someone tells me their day is good, I'll follow up and say, well, what's good about your day? Tell me about it. I want to know.

And now what that's doing to them psychologically is I'm investing in the good part of their day. Like they're associating a part of their day with some kind of happiness. I'm asking about it and I'm genuinely caring about it. So now it's like a $5 question, right? And then you keep building up and over time, there's going to be a time where you have more than $20, $30, $40 questions. But what you find is over time, you're also investing money. And I tell people, there's going to

be a time when I'm going to need something from you. There's going to be a time when I like, maybe it's the heat of competition, it's the fourth quarter, you're not doing well and I need to be able to go up to an ad minute and you have my trust, I have your trust and we go. But you can't do that if there's not money in the bank to withdraw from. So I constantly think about that. And, you know, I'll get a lot of people with athletes are like, I'll ask a bunch of questions and they won't ask anything back.

Yeah. You owe me 30 bucks by the way, man. Like, cause you ain't asking no questions back, you know? And then it makes, Oh, my bad, my bad. I was like, no, no, it's fine. You know, that's fine. Just know that I'm up 30. Just know I'm up 30. Yeah. Yeah. And I think I was, uh, actually just working with this leader earlier today where he, he just didn't even know we were getting this feedback from his people. And now it's so easy to just answer the question but not give back and ask a question in return, right?

And what you're saying is like, ask a deeper question than just superficial. Yeah. What's a hundred dollar question? Oh, that depends on a person now. But it depends. So you know, what I start to find is like, you know, I might ask people, there's a lot of times I have questions of the day, you know, or something like, uh, one thing I like to ask is like, walk me through a time in your life that you're really proud

of yourself, right? Like if you were really proud and that might not be a hundred, but they then, you know, they're going to go, if you, if you have enough built up, they're going to be, uh, more in depth, you know, another question I asked this like a $60 one probably that is good for a lot of reasons, but really gets people thinking is like, when's a time you were wrong, but it was right. And so now you can kind of understand what are people evaluate where their morals were their values like what, what type of a thinker are they. And so you're kind of learning that way. And then that's, you know, I find when you get more

towards the family past experiences, the most vulnerable part, that can be more questions. And then that's how you talk about maybe someone opens up then about like, you know what, I do feel a lot of pressure and I do, I do struggle under this because that's hard to admit. It's hard to be vulnerable with that. And so I feel like that's all feeding into those questions. But also subconsciously, you and I have been on trust like, man, Mike really cares. Yeah.

He's like really invested in me, you know? Yeah. And they owe me two grand, but that's okay. That's no problem. I think about asking these questions even to teams, right? I'm just thinking about the Clippers or other, I was thinking about a football team I worked with in the fall that, you know, we, we really worked to build that kind of trust and vulnerability with each other. And even if just someone got up in front of a hundred guys and said, you know, here's the time I was really proud of myself or here's a time that I was wrong, but it was right.

Right? Like you just, you learn, you get to really understand a person in a deeper level with the deeper, with the the hundred dollar questions. Yeah, absolutely. And that to get them to open up and that's why all those little, you were just following up like, well, okay, well, it's good about your day. That's what keeps them coming back and, and that part, and then you, yeah, you really get to know them.

And then all of a sudden, you know, other people feel connected to them too. And it's, it's really powerful. And it kind of, when we talk about like creating a psychologically safe environment, that's a great way to do it. And then, you know, I think the next step to that, and this goes into some question asking is, but people want to know, do we share a future? Like are we in this together? And what goes into this to me is, you know, there's times where I really disagree with

the way someone's going about their performance. And but if they're dead set on it, I got to be able to accept some of that and then be knowing, like willing to know where am I sacrificing and what can I just help them help them bring in. But for me, Sandra, I always want to include your voice in our future. And I want to build that together. It's you and I working on this together. It's not my way. It's not your way. Whatever you believe is, I want to build that together. It's you and I working on this together. It's not my way. It's not your way.

Whatever you believe is, I want to include that. And so the other thing, and this is probably more $50 questions, but I try to always ask what and how questions that I rarely ask why. I rarely ask why, you know, what is it that contributed that? How do you see this impact? How does this help you? Now, why did you do that? Why did why did you show up this? Why are we late today? No, like walk me through what contributed to be like today. And I think that allows them to have a voice and then okay, we're working through that

together. Yeah, so great. I knew our conversation was going to be awesome. And then in cycle, I knew it. So three things that you can do to create more a psychologically safe environment, safe, connected, do we share a future? I'm thinking about, Michael, like leaders who want to create psychological safety in their business or on their team. How do you think keeping these three things in mind?

Because you've worked, you know, you do some work in corporate. What do you think about like safe, connected, do we share a future? How could a leader use those three things? Yeah, I think, again, it's gonna go back to the initial reflection, right? And I think you're thinking back to your team meetings.

Think about when you're in an environment, think about who you're leading in the corporate space, think about what you want or, you know, is there someone, is there someone that you maybe need to invest more time in? You know, and you think about that, is there someone that I really need to spend more time with? Maybe they're not performing at the level I want them to, maybe they are, or whatever that part is.

I think the other thing is, a of times you see in leadership is people get leadership and the power comes with it. Right. And that's natural. I think the idea of leadership is to give power away. I think it's to empower other people and to give power away. I want to be in that position to give as much power away to my staff, to support them and challenge them, but I'm going to give them the equal amount of support. So I think it's one of those areas that,

all right, well, where can I let go a little bit? Where can I empower my staff and allow them? They don't have to do it my way. We want them to do it a good way. It's productive for the company, but not, it doesn't have to be just because you did it that way. That's how everyone else did it. Not a fan of that philosophy,

because I think there's a lot of different perspectives. I think the idea of a team, when you think about this in the corporate space, the idea of having a team to me should be diversity of thought and diversity of opinions. Everybody should not be aligned at things. I want to know different perspectives. And so inviting those in and allowing yourself to be comfortable enough with yourself and your values and who you are as a leader. So welcome differing perspectives and challenging thoughts and like let's create that because diverse diversity within teams of thought is what's going to make us better.

Yeah. So I think kind of working through those things could really help in the Corpus race. And the last thing I would say to that syndrome is thinking about going back to our reflection piece as well. If me as a leader, these are my four or five ways of what I'm about. This is what I want to do. If I had my staff sit down in a room and then come up with four or five things that I'm about, would it match with what I say I am? Where would be the gap? What would they say? Maybe that's the exercise they do with their team.

It's like, okay, where as in the leader, where forward you experience me as and have your whole team put that together. And you might think it's X, Y, Z. And they might say, oh, it's kind of closed off. It's it's not open. It's my challenge might be might be aligned. But that's where you need to figure out also how to close that gap then.

Yeah, absolutely. So powerful. You know, I'm thinking about what we said, like three signs of a high performance culture, right? Physical touch, eye contact, proximity. And I was also thinking about how leaders can use that. And you know, maybe they don't give each other hugs at work. Maybe, maybe they do. Maybe, maybe hugs at work. Maybe, maybe they do.

Maybe, maybe they love an NBA hug. Maybe they do. But I think a fist pump or a high five, you know, can be something that you could do. Tell us a bit more about maybe how you think leaders, coaches, or, you know, corporate leaders or just any kind of leader could use physical touch, eye contact and proximity to guide them. It absolutely does not have to be the NBA hugs. You know, what you find is any type of just high five, fist bump, something good that's like, okay, hey, you know, you're there. And we go back to our basic human needs when we were born, right? Like human touch is number two, right?

I think it's number two, right? It's water, food and physical touch, right? Because you want to be nurtured. It builds trust, it builds cooperation. So anytime you can do that. If, Cedric, if you and I are meeting and we're there, like, you know, this is a really easy thing, but get away from behind your desk. Come out into the open room where there's a more open space.

You feel a little closer. You have my undivided attention. Right. And now we're we're proximity. There's not a big barrier, actual physical barrier between us. We're a lot closer now. You know, same thing with depending how you're setting up with your coaching staff, we're setting up with your offices like, are you visible? Are you stopping and are you having intentional two minute touch points? Two minutes.

Like, you know, I know every coach and everybody's very busy and I got it, you know, but it's it's one of those. It's like, OK, there's this, you know, I think even even for me is like if I'm thinking about someone or someone across my mind, I'll just I'll shoot him a text and just let him know, hey, mad thing, I hope you're doing well now. Is that a physical is that proximity? No, but it's it's actually like an investment in in what you're doing. Anytime someone does a good job, you can give them a high five and if they feel comfortable too, right? But you know, you were talking so he just a put your hand on the back or get closer in that way or anything that

That they feel comfortable with. Obviously, you have to work through that part. But any ways that you can do that, switching up, we sit by at lunch, switching up or you go to breakfast. Who can I just take to get a coffee today that I haven't talked to in a while? And that's going to bring you closer in proximity already. And the eye contact piece to me is any time I try to talk to someone,

you have my full attention. One of the best feedbacks I've gotten is people say when they talk to me I feel like they're most the most important person in the world and that's that's I love that, you know And it doesn't matter who it is could be could be a grad student could be Our head coach could be a manager could be someone that I just met for breakfast randomly ran into it But like I want you to feel like you're the most important thing in these 30 minutes I got for you. That's awesome. Great suggestions that anybody can use. Tell us about the Steve Nash study. I don't know about the study in high fives. Yeah. So there was a really cool study that came out and I want to say it was 2008. Now I do not quote me exactly on this. I'll send

you the study. They tracked Steve Nash throughout the whole season and the amount of high fives he gave per game. I want to say it was in like the four hundreds per game. And this was coming up on one of his MVP years. And what they did is they studied all the teams, all the NBA teams, and they used the amount of physical touch that the team had preseason to predict the outcome by the end of the season. And what they found was the teams that had more touch and more closeness with each other, more high fives, they outperformed all the other teams that had lower.

So the way that they predicted the end of the year results from preseason was very close based on just high fives within a team. And Steve Nash led the league. I'll send you the article and you can look at that, but it was a really, really amazing amount to see. You're like, how do you give any high fives in a game? But it was constant high five, high five. And he knew like the value of that. And just to see that the winning teams have more physical touches. That's awesome. Great way to end. I loved our conversation. I learned so much. Here's a couple of notes that I took. Okay. Yeah, let's do it. Just a way to kind of summarize. At the beginning, we were talking about the power of trust and just

how that's so important in developing a mental performance culture We talked about belief versus dreaming and really helping people think about Dominating their thoughts right now the best best do that. We you shared with us, you know your care grow and win Three words and we encouraged people to really take a step back and think about how they want people to describe them. And even what you said about asking people, hey, what are four words that describe me and is that consistent? I thought that was really useful and useful.

We were talking about 70% of our thoughts are negative, harmful or unproductive and then under stress how our brain goes to fight or flight and sees that as a threat and the negativity can even be louder. We talked about fighting for our brain and really continuing to think powerfully about ourselves and our future. Then we talked about physical touch, eye contact, proximity is three signs of a high performance culture. And then, right, what you said about psychological safety, the importance of feeling safe, connected,

and do we share a future? So awesome value that you just provided everybody who's listening. I want to thank you and honor you for being on the podcast, but also like bringing it today. Yeah. Yeah. I must have blacked out. So I listened back. I'm like, oh bringing it today. Yeah, yeah. I must have blacked out, so I listened back. I'm like, oh, it sounds like a good session.

Do we just do all that? You know? We just do all that in like 40 minutes. How can people reach out to you and just follow along more with your work, or if they want to connect with you and work with you or learn more about what you do, how can they do that? Yeah, absolutely. There's a few different ways.

Always feel free to email me. It's MJUrban, U-R-B as in boy, A-N-1-6 at gmail.com. I'm also available on LinkedIn. That's just at Michael Urban and Instagram and Twitter. Pretty active on there as well. And that is M underscore urban 14. But would be happy to connect with anybody or have any follow up conversations

and would look forward to continuing to learn from others too. Awesome. Michael, thank you so much for being on the iPerformance Mindset. I appreciate you and everything that you brought today to our conversation. Thank you for having me and making this dream come true

after being a long time listener. Keep listening. Thank you so much. Bye. Yeah. 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 enjoy 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-B-R-A.com. See you next week.