High Performance Mindset | Learn from World-Class Leaders, Consultants, Athletes & Coaches about Mindset - 76: Be Mindful

Episode Date: November 1, 2016

High performers work to understand themselves including their thoughts, feelings, and actions in the present moment. They work to be nonjudgmentally aware in the present moment. They know this mindful practice allows them to improve their performance, happiness, and reduce the stress they experience. My Gritty Affirmation this Week: I work to notice my thoughts, emotions and body in the present moment. I free myself of the habits that don't allow me to reach my greater potential. I quiet my monkey mind by staying in the present moment.

Welcome to High Performance Mindset with Dr. Sindra Kampoff. Do you want to reach your full potential, live a life of passion, go after your dreams? Each week we bring you strategies and interviews to help you ignite your mindset. Let's bring on Sindra. Sindra Kampoff joins us today. It is time for High Performance Mindset on Minnesota 93. Good morning, Dr. Kampoff. It's great to be here. Thanks for having me. It's Monday morning. Absolutely. Nice looking one here for us, too, in the dryer of the next couple of days, I suppose. So the topic we're talking about today that we can relate to sports and career and life in general, really, really life in general, which is nice about this topic is it really relates to everybody,

is being mindful. And you're going to start with a question when it comes to mindfulness for us today, right? Yeah, let me start with a quote first, and then I'll start with a question. So most people don't realize that the mind constantly chatters, and yet that chatter winds up being the force that drives us much of the day in terms of what we do, what we react to, and what we feel.

And this is a quote by Jon Kabat-Zinn and really kind of addresses what we're going to be talking about today. So the question is? The question is, what do Phil Jackson, Joe Namath, Arthur Ashe, Misty Maytrainer, Kerry Walsh, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, Russell Wilson all have in common? I'm going to guess it has something to do with mindfulness. I'm guessing it has something to do with our topic. Maybe we shouldn't have told people what the topic was. But they're all top level athletes in their sport and they practice mindfulness training daily. An example I can give you is Phil Jackson, who won 11 NBA titles as a coach, was nicknamed actually the Zen Master. And while a coach at the Chicago Bulls, he hired a meditation teacher named George Mumford to work

extensively with his players. And one of them was Michael Jordan. And one example that Jordan gave of when mindfulness really helped him is it was during the sixth championship and the second three-peat. And he said, you know, it was when I got a rebound and my thoughts were so positive. The crowd got quiet and the moment started to become the moment for me. Things started to move slowly and you start to see the court very well. You start reading what the defense is trying to do, and I saw that moment. And when I saw that moment, the opportunity to take advantage of it,

I never doubted myself. I never doubted the whole game. And he's describing in there how he was able to take an intense present moment focus. And, you know, mindfulness training is a, I would describe as something new, newer in sports, but, you know, it's not just in sports that it's happening and that athletes are using it to get an edge. Even in the Silicon Valley, you know, companies like Google, Twitter, Facebook are encouraging their staff to practice mindfulness, not only for like to reduce their stress and inner peace, but to get ahead. And last year, I actually took, last December, I had a lot of stress that was happening in my life for whatever reason.

And so I took a mindfulness class. I went up to the cities every Monday for several months. And I just felt afterwards, I felt calmer and happier and less stressed. Something I practice, work to practice every day now. So let's get into a good definition of mindfulness. How do you describe mindfulness? What is that? I would describe it as paying attention in the moment on purpose and to do it non-judgmentally,

which I think is the really difficult part because if you're anything like me, you can judge yourself or others or the situation. And I would describe it as just being aware of the moment and what you're thinking about and feeling and doing. And you're not trying to change it. You're just noticing it so you can become aware of it. So what are some good ways or what's a good way for us to practice mindfulness then and keep it literally top of mind?

Yeah, you know, I think you have to train yourself to pay attention to your thoughts and feelings and actions. And when you do this, you know, you'll notice when, for example, maybe habits aren't helping you, or you'll notice when you do need to reduce your stress. You'll notice when, you know, you're doing something that's not helping you so that you can be more aware of what's going on in the present moment. So I think it's just about noticing what's going on in the moment for you and doing it in a non-judgmental way. Well, it sounds easy, but it's not really easy to be mindful, is it? It's not. It's very difficult.

I think it's especially when you're working to practice it every day or that you're really just making it a practice. You know, the Buddha refers to you're really just making it a practice. You know, the Buddha refers to your mind as a monkey mind. And he says that your mind is like a monkey in search of fruit in the forest, like moving from tree to tree. And I get it. Yes. You know, I feel like my monkey mind is happening too often. And you know, your mind can be restless, easy, distracted, hard to control. And so I think this is one way to calm your mind more often. So how do we begin to practice this? Yeah, you know, there are several ways that you can practice it.

And I'll give you a few. Okay. It's something you can do every day. So you could take, you know, 5, 10, 15 minutes in the morning just to quiet your mind and notice your thoughts, your feelings in your body. And you could engage in a practice, maybe just like slow walking, like mindful walking. I laughed because I tried this one morning and I felt I realized my brain was going in 12 different directions. And I was constantly trying to bring it back in. Yes. Yeah. That was hard. It's very difficult. And I think especially,

you know, once you start doing it more often, it's going to get easier for you. So, you know, that's one example of something you could do every morning. You could, while you're driving, just notice how you feel. You know, notice the tension in your body. You know, is your stomach tight? You know, is your shoulders raised? Just notice what's going on in your body. You could take a break every hour at work where you just walk around for one or two minutes and

you just become aware of what's going on for you a lot of the elite athletes that i work with they use an app called it's a good one wait a minute is this the one i just downloaded probably that i gave you last week but this is a good one you should write down for when you're as you're listening it's called stop breathe think no, it's a different one. And this app actually helps you train mindfulness and train present moment focus using mindfulness. Cool. So that's another example of something you can do to just train your present moment focus.

A lot of good stuff here because there's all kinds of different people. Some people are really good at staying focused on something for a long period of time, and others of us are like, hey, I've got three minutes to do this and then I've got 60 seconds to do that. And I mean, it's part of what I do for a living. And I'm thinking, okay, I have two and a half minutes

to accomplish this because I've got to get to this in time. And I kind of train myself to be jumping from one thing to another for four hours every morning. And then when I leave here, people will be like, you know, I'm at home eating lunch and you didn't hear this or you didn't see that. I'm like, you know, when I go home, it is as quiet as possible in my house. I can hear myself chewing because I'm tired of all the noise and distractions.

And for just that little bit of time during lunch, I need just to decompress, so to speak. I think it's so important for us in our world right now to practice something like this because we have so many things coming in in our mind. So many distractions. So many distractions. So many distractions. I think about my phone as a distraction. It's like so many things coming at me with my phone. And so that's why I decided to practice it every day

is because so many things coming at me and I really needed to calm my mind. Yeah. I'm a big fan of analogies and visual comparisons. So the Buddha thing is good. Stay in your own tree. Worry about the other tree when you get there. Don't be looking ahead to the next tree until you're done with this particular tree.

So how do we summarize mindfulness today? I would say that high performers are those who are working to reach their greater potential. They understand themselves and they work to understand their thoughts, feelings and actions in the present. And so they work to non-judgmentally be aware of the present. And they know that this mindfulness practice will improve their happiness, reduce their stress and improve their performance. Awesome. And of course, every week there's an affirmation that goes along with this topic and following along with Sindra on social media and through the website and podcasts and all that is great. Mondays, the affirmation goes out out what is today's affirmation i work to notice my thoughts emotions and body in the present i work to free myself of habits that don't allow me to reach my potential and i quiet my monkey mind and work to stay in the present awesome that's a good one monkey mind

some of our monkey minds are a little more askew than others. And I definitely put myself in that category where it's all over the place. And to kind of rein it in once in a while and be a little more mindful is just good training. So if we do want to follow along with you, and since the Mankato Marathon weekend ended and I've been sparsely collecting mileage, I guess I could say. I've been on a bit of a break. But I've taken that opportunity to start to get caught up on podcasts that I've missed out on, which is good.

I just listened to a really good one. So following along with those and listening to the podcasts and getting the affirmation is awesome. And everyone can do it. How do we follow along? You can head over to iTunes and that's actually where you can get the podcast to search High Performance Mindset. And you can download that free on your phone. And then you can head over to drcindra.com. You can get the podcast links there and some videos I've

done that I do regularly and then the links for the affirmations. Awesome. Well, thank you very much for being here again today. Thanks for having me. Good to see you. Cinder Kampoff with us today. It's High Performance Mindset on Minnesota 93. Thank you for listening to High Performance Mindset. If you like today's podcast, make a comment, share it with a friend, and join the conversation on Twitter at Mentally Underscore Strong. For more inspiration and to receive Cinder's free weekly videos, check out DrCinder.com.