Episode #23 "Mind Over Miles: The Mental Game of Injury Recovery & Resilience"

Join me for an insightful conversation with Carrie Jackson, one of the world’s leading experts in mental performance and injury recovery. As a Certified Mental Performance Consultant, author of Rebound: Train Your Mind to Bounce Back Stronger from Sports Injuries, and host of The Injured Athletes Club podcast, Carrie has helped countless athletes shift their mindset, rebuild confidence, and return to their sport stronger than ever.

In this interview, we dive into the mental and emotional challenges of injury recovery, the power of resilience, and practical strategies athletes can use to overcome self-doubt and perform at their best. Whether you're an athlete, coach, or someone looking for inspiration in overcoming setbacks, this conversation will leave you with valuable tools to master your mindset and fuel your comeback.

Tune in for a discussion packed with expert advice, real-life stories, and actionable takeaways to help you break through mental barriers and take control of your journey!

Follow Carrie on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/feedtheathlete/

Listen to the Injured Athletes Podcast https://injuredathletesclub.com/podcast/

Rebound the book https://www.worldofbooks.com/en-gb/products/rebound-book-cindy-kuzma-9781472961433

On Top Of your Game https://www.worldofbooks.com/en-gb/products/on-top-of-your-game-book-carrie-cheadle-9780989691604?price=3.50

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Transcript

[Music] hi I'm Celia boothman founder of LTR coaching and I'd like to welcome you to the inspired triathletes podcast where I'll be bringing you stories from female triathletes and taking on topics that are important to women in the

sport hello and welcome to today's episode today I'm here with Carrie Jackson who is a performance and mental training expert she is a certified mental performance consultant and the author of on top of your game and co-author of rebound which is to help injured athletes and she coaches all athletes of all levels to master their mindsets So today we're going to just talk a little bit about some of the stuff that you um cover in the books um a little bit about the books and some tips for people that are wanting to develop their mindset and you know stuff that we can apply across Sport and across our daily life as well because I think you know sport is an amazing learning ground for all of us isn't it absolutely yes yeah and it's amazing that like all of the things that I work on with my athletes for their performance are really their life skills so you can apply them like you know in life we're sort of Performing as well it's a different kind of performance than sport but like it absolutely like some the things I get to work on across the board helping both yeah definitely so what what was it that prompted you to to start being start going down that route of mental performance and mindset training I um so I actually was not an athlete growing up I didn't come into my sports until I W it was later in college where I kind of found my groove with with sports um and at that time like early on I was racing I was racing cars and in my early 20s and then also um for a very long time was big into snowboarding and rock climbing my undergrad I thought I wanted to be a therapist and and as I this is literally as I was walking across the stage to get my diploma I realised I don't think this is what I'm supposed to do and what made me realise that was at the time the uh it was before the positive psychology movement and so the way that people were working in mental health was very much based in an illness model versus a wellness model it didn't make sense to me at that time I didn't realise that I didn't have the language for that but I just was like this isn't I don't think this is what I'm supposed to do so I moved to Tahoe I was on my way to grad school and then decided okay well if I'm not gonna do that I might as well do something else and so I moved to Tahoe and was doing my own sports and during that time realising some of the psychology behind my own performance and some of my like the climbing Partners performances and um and it was like oh this is really interesting but had no idea sports psychology existed as a field of study and then uh one day my mom went to an open house because she went on to get her Master's in counselling and is a therapist and um and she found a brochure it was like uh for sport psychology program she said oh you know I know you've been thinking about school again and like I saw this and thought of you and she gave me the program and I was like what is this oh my gosh and I had no idea it existed perf thing yeah it was amazing next open house I went to and signed up and that was and then like hit the ground yeah oh that's so cool that's interesting you come from that background as well CU I was originally into climbing as well and I loved snowboarding and Tahoe I went there with my dad it was so cool like really I had a great time there it's such a special place I miss yeah all of it yeah it was cool we spent a week there or something and just snowboarding and there was that bit across the border where you've got the Border haven't you and you kind of like one side there's casinos and the other like it's a kind of a weird interesting place to live because there's very much like a delineation like of like oh okay we entering a new world yeah definitely that's funny um so with athletes what are the common the most common mental obstacles that you find they face and how do you help them with that kind of thing yeah you know there's a few um I I think probably one of the most common has to do with our own uh like your own um like self-limiting beliefs uh and how that can sort of eat away at your feelings of confidence and courage and resilience uh in in being able to have an Optimal Performance um and I think part of that is just some sometimes and at all levels like from my recreational athletes to my Elite professional athletes just putting so much pressure on themselves for a specific outcome that um that they end up not performing to their potential because of that that pressure um so those are a couple big ones some some others like I get because I specialise in working with injured athletes I'm work with a lot of people coming back into their Sport and sort of building up their their confidence and and mental skills to both navigate that injury journey and also come back into their athletic life and their Sports and then um some people uh like experiencing burnout um you know so it's it it's it really is very dependent on the The Athlete but a a big one is just that recognition that I'm I'm not performing consistently or I know I could be performing better and I know that I'm the one getting in my own way are the kind of the main themes there yeah definitely that kind of little inner chatter that we all have and people think oh the elites don't have that you know I'm they're different to us but they're not are they no Still Human we exactly I remember I was working with a cycling team a women's cycling team professional team early on in my career and I did this activity where people were um like uh telling me the self talk that they had the chat some of the chatter and one of them like Olympic Athlete high level professional athlete was like hold me aside later and was like that was like the most eye opening thing I had no idea anyone else was feeling that same way and had those same thoughts and it's like oh yeah everybody everybody does it's just part of it's just how the brain works yeah and I think once you realise that it's kind of helpful because you don't think it's just me and I exactly go in a bit of a spiral then can't you like what is wrong with me like nothing there's nothing wrong with you it's very normal and other athletes definitely go through it yeah and it's not something that just disappear you know it's one of those things that you definitely have to work on as well yes practice yeah it is a practice unfortunately it's not one of those things where you can like okay check that off the list I will never have a negative thought again done if only yeah be good well it's kind of I suppose it's part of the whole thing is working that out and understanding it and you gain more I guess if you could just tick it off yeah yeah it would be nice it would be nice but you'd miss out on stuff you absolutely would right and we have that voice for reason like we wouldn't really want it to go away entirely even though it might feel nice for a while but it has a very important role and so understanding that and understanding a little bit about sort of how the brain works and that we have this negativity bias built in um can sometimes help provide some context for the thoughts that we're having and then we can question like oh but is that thought true or is this just a I call it are you feeding the monster feeding the athlete like I talk about that I think in both the books actually you know so which you know which one are you feeding right now and sometimes we have to stop listening to the monster and start feeding the athlete right so um the I kind of think of it like your your your brain is not the boss of you you are the boss of your brain but you have to come in and be the boss and tell it like no no no I I know what you're doing there you're trying to protect me but I've got this like and come in with that other voice yeah for sure that really helps to have that it's like separate in it as well from yourself isn't it kind of going this is the voice this is not my son did that the other day and I was like really impressed him he's 15 he like yeah he said I just listen I thought there was this Gremlin and I just said oh be quiet like yes amazing he like organically did one of the techniques to create we call it like uh psych creating psychological distance like that you personify it in that way or there's different techniques to be to to realise like I don't have to believe that voice like you don't have to believe every thought that comes into your head but it's really hard not to you have to train that yeah definitely I was like something's gone in somewhere because we'd have talked about that but I was trying there was me blabbing on telling him all this stuff and he was going you just sound like you're going M like but then he says something like that and you're like oh my God he's listening yeah it was quite a funny moment I said I won't bother next time I I can see you've got the skills to handle it so it's okay oh that's great yeah yeah so with athletes how can they kind of you mentioned people get a little bit fixated on their performance and results how can they learn to enjoy the process more and you know get into that moment rather than fixating on the outcome yeah what there's a few different things that I work on with athletes with that and and one is um getting very grounded in why you are participating in the sport and not why anyone else is right because especially like with my endurance athletes because I you know specialise in working with endurance athlete I work with all athletes all sports but I very much love my endurance athletes and so my triathletes and cyclists and Runners and um one of the things that's interesting about uh Triathlon in particular well all of those Sports actually is that you can very much get sort of pulled into this feeling of like I did a Sprint so now I have to do an Olympic well I did Olympics and I got to do a half well I'm not a real triathlete if I don't do an Iron Man you like just keep up right like setting the bar higher and higher but not ever really checking in with like but do I want to do that distance like just be you know because they're very any triathlete that's done those know like very different sports in a way like you know racing a a Sprint versus racing an Iron Man those are different you know different beasts that you're taking different like um goals that you're taking on and so so sometimes really getting grounded with like what what does this mean to me and and why do I want to participate in this because it takes time right it takes time it takes money it takes resources so why am I choosing to do that here and spend that time and those resources here because I could spend them anywhere and get very grounded in what what it means to you and and then from that place setting your your goals around how do you you know what do you want from your sport and I think the Trap that a lot of triathletes fall into is just setting the outcome goals versus also having the process goals right so the outcome goals like the what is it that you want to achieve right is it like do you want to get a PR in this race are you looking for a specific time or a specific placing or or just like to finish your first IR just like to complete an Iron Man remove that just out of my mouth but um so those are all outcomes right and it's fine to have an outcome goal but when you only have an outcome goal without like the milestone like the process the short-term goals and the process goals what happens is you'll be in the middle of your event and something happens where in your mind you start to see your outcome goal slipping away and now you're no longer your your focus is internal instead of external meaning like now I'm wrapped up in my thoughts and my fears and my what ifs and my already like feeding my disappointment instead of having my focus external and going oh what do I need to adjust right because you know many many triathletes will tell you like there's things that didn't go as planned and they still had an amazing race and it's because they were able to stay in the moment and and make those decisions in order to adjust as things went and having process goals helps you do that because your process goals are like what do what are the things that I need to focus on during the triathlon in order to accomplish the outcome goal so you're um so you're in the moment versus time traveling and getting hooked by that like am I going to make that goal not make that goal and that's where a lot of that pressure comes from and so it also both of those things call on you like getting grounded and why is this important to me and making sure you're effective with the types of goals that you set what they're really doing is helping you to redefine success because sometimes we're just taking in like the message just from the the cultural environment of where we live of the sport that we're in and we're just taking those messages and using those to determine what feels successful and not successful instead of us making that instead of you deciding like this is what it means to me therefore this is how I'm going to gauge my feelings of success but it's very hard to do that when you're like immersed in a culture that's telling you like no no this is how we define success yeah definitely there's a lot of that kind of societal pressure on how we should live and what yeah what what that should look like what success should look like and like you say at the end of the day it's our choice and we can decide what that means for us and I think like it's particularly hard for athletes when so I sometimes talk to athletes who dnf on an Iron Man and it's like you've invested so much time and effort into that one event and it's a big you know Financial commitment but there's always something that they can take from that experience and I think talking to people along the way and having them have that okay well you might not finish the Iron Man but look at what you've learned what you know what has been part of the journey what where are you now compared to where you were back then and you started yeah people can't always see that they kind of like they get like I didn't finish it's all about that rather than actually look what you did do though yes it's hard not to focus on like what you didn't do versus what you did do and and that's one of the really unique things about Iron Man in particular is that because of the way that the sport Works athletes inevitably put more pressure on themselves for that great outcome because of the time and the money that it takes to to get there so it's not like soccer or basketball you know where uh you have a a performance that didn't go the way you wanted it to and you're like okay well let's learn from that and we get to try again next weekend it doesn't work the same right like so it's it's like a year of your life exactly oh my God so it really calls on you like you can't just look at the outcome in terms of your how you feel about yourself and connect your self worth to that because it's so much bigger than that so when I work with my athletes that are Iron Man athletes I tell them like part of defining success is the fact that you got to the start line because that is a big deal in and of itself like all the decisions that you had to make to get ready all of the times that you had to rest when you really wanted to push so that you didn't get you know overtrained or injured or you know all everything that you did to get to the start line in a position to be able to race that is huge like so helping them see that because they don't you know it doesn't feel that way because it's like of course you want to do well on the day so it's very much how do we how do you like I tell them whatever Race Day brings that's what you're meant to experience that day and that is and that is part of your journey for whatever reason good or bad like that is just meant to be your part of your experience um and so kind of helping them open up their definition of of what it means to be a an you know an athlete and what it means to get to the start line in addition to what it means to get to the Finish yeah I love that um that idea of like you've got you know whatever you experience is what you need to experience because you've got learning from it you're going to have some learning and one of the things I think that you talk about in I think it's in rebound you probably wrote about it in on top of your game as well was that focusing on what you have got or what you can do and instead of all of the things that you can't do or that you didn't do yeah exactly exactly so in in rebound what was it that kind of inspired you to write that book or co-author that book on there yeah specialism isn't it it is yeah and it and it's funny it it took a while for the book to come uh but versus the thought that oh this is this is a place that needs to be addressed in the field so what was um so it first started with a very personal experience of injury so I had before I came into my sport psychology program I had injured my left knee and um had arthroscopic surgery like I had a torn meniscus and and I had a really hard time recovering from that injury um I really struggled with pain management during rehab I really struggled with feeling confident and trusting my need getting back into climbing and snowboarding and I I just struggled tremendously and and there was no zero support for the mental aspects of recovery and uh and I didn't even know at the time that there should be like that was before my program and so then I go and I study sports psychology and I'm at the like at the end of my first year in the program and I'm out snowboarding it's the last day of the season last run of the day and uh my snowboarding partner at the time was like Hey should we do one more and I was like and I thought about I had hesitated for like I don't know two seconds and I was like yeah let's do one more it's like no famous SL so and it was a total fluke accident like I ended up um tearing my MCL on the same knee so different injury same knee but as soon as you know they put me in the sled and take me start taking me down the mountain I thought to myself okay Carrie your recovery is now your sport and absolutely everything you were doing to put you know that you're putting into your sports now goes into your recovery and everything you're learning about Optimal Performance you're going to apply that to your injury recovery and I did and boy my experience from the first injury to the second was so profoundly different that I was like oh my God every athlete needs to know this and have access to this um because I can't I came back and had my best season ever and it was 100% because of the mental training that I was doing that got me through that period of time with resilience and then continued to serve me because IID strengthened those skills once I was back on you know in my sports and so um then I had the opportunity early in my career to work with a lot of cyclists and kind of specialised in working with cyclists and and then came into and then Triathlon and if you work with cyclists and triathletes there's you know inevitably you're going to be working with someone coming back from a crash and someone coming back from an injury and so I did a lot of that same work I did with myself on with them and was like okay this is like I recognised at that point wow at a time when athletes need the most support they're getting the absolute least and this is the problem and then fast forward like so I was working you know with athletes and and then I just came to the point where it was like there's textbooks for like professionals on psychology of injury and and there's research but there's nothing for the athlete this is a problem like what is there nothing so then it was like okay I need to it's time to write this book and then um my co-author Cindy kosma she reached out to me so she had interviewed me for as an expert for um like a subject matter expert for some articles that she had written so she's a freelance journalist and and and so sh I put something cryptic on Facebook saying that I was working on a new I was taking a sabbatical and I was going to start working on a new project and she guessed that it was going to be um a book about injury which is amazing that she did so we'd never met each other in person but she knew I was going on the sabbatical we were she's like hey we should chat and I was like okay and so we have a conversation and she said would you ever think about having a co-author and really that had never dawned on me like first and I was like No And then I was like huh no but I like it just didn't it's because I just never thought of it and so we're both on the like other side of this call thinking would I'm thinking to myself would be weird if I invited her to come to my sabbatical so I was going to like North Carolina and hang out for and she's thinking on the other end would it be weird if I invited myself sabbatical so we decided all right let's do it let's for a week of it we'll get together we'll work on the outline see if we work well together and if we do awesome let's do this project and if not the worst case is I have an outline for my book and we were both okay with that and so and then you know and then and then we have our happy ending have we worked together and have the book and do the podcast and yeah so it's um it was a wonderful collaboration yeah I I thought it was a great book really so many tips in there so much useful information um I wasn't actually injured when I read tell me that no I was but just because I because I'm a coach I wanted to help athletes who were in that situation and it was like oh this is really interesting and it I thought it would help me so I wish I'd known this when I did get injured because it would have helped me quite a lot exactly oh so yeah is anyone that's injured I definitely recommend you and even if you're not there's so many useful tips in there there great Tools in there yeah cross over and there's yeah there's like little things I remember from it and have sort of stuck in my subconscious somewhere that help so what advice do you give to athletes who are struggling with their confidence and when they when they've had an injury with injury a big one is um one of the things that happens for for injured athletes is they start to feel like they're no longer an athlete right so they're not um like the like who am I if I'm not carry the rock climber or carry the snowboarder and it's very disorienting and you feel like you're no longer connected to your athletic identity so so that's a big one is just that reminder for them is you are still an athlete and your recovery is now your sport and and athletes like that like it's very sticky and they and they resonate with that and it helps because because it does you know even in the language that we use like it does feel like you know like you're sidelined like okay great well you you go ahead and get better and and we'll you know we'll see you when you're back in action and like and you're just kind of like cast aside and um and so it can feel very disorienting when you like a lot of the decisions that you you know it's part of who you are it's part of what you do it feeds so many different needs that you have like for a lot of athletes it's like their stress Outlet their social outlet you know it's their um their competitive Outlet like all of these things so there's all these little losses that come with being injured that people don't always recognise so helping them realise yes this sucks and yes you would absolutely prefer not to be injured yet you are and this just happen to be where you are on your athletic Journey so how do we get you through this part of your journey so sort of stepping back and looking at your bigger picture versus you know looking at like when we're just looking under the microscope it can feel like big and scary it's like um the analogy I use sometimes is if you've ever seen a fly under a microscope it they're terrifying like you should look it up if anyone's never done like look what does this fly look like up close they're terrifying right but when you you know just see it on the wall it's like whatever it's a fly it's a tiny little fly so that's the you know that shift in perspective can be really helpful so that's one is like um because that's a you know so some common fears that come up with my injured athletes is like am I GNA be the same athlete I was before they're um worried about losing Fitness while everyone else is gaining Fitness um they're worried about like can I trust my body can I trust this part of my body to be able to uh push the way that I did before and Discerning like another one that's really challenging is is this pain that I'm feeling pain that's assigned to stop or is this a normal part of the recovery process so there's just there's so much you're navigating when you're when you're injured um that it it can be really helpful it's or just recognising like there's absolutely a mental recovery that come that needs to come with the physical recovery and oftentimes we're because because people get a lot of support for the physical and not so much for the mental we're often recovered and cleared physically before we're mentally ready and before we've built our confidence up to feel um excited and and strong mentally to go get back into your sport and back into your training yeah definitely I think I've been reading a lot about grief recently and there's a part of it there there's a bit of grief there for what they've lost and I guess they have to navigate at that as well absolutely who am I and yes yeah a little bit yeah it's like bit of yous not not you anymore exactly absolutely yeah so any mistakes that people make when they're recovering what are the common mistakes that you see and how can people avoid those yeah um sometimes one of one of the mistakes that's really interesting is is that um sometimes the templates that we use to become a great athlete when we're a healthy athlete don't work the same way we can't use that same template when we're injured um and so one of the things I sometimes see athletes struggle with is um they is that they don't know H the difference between like they they can push through the pain and sometimes they'll do too much too soon right and sometimes that's because there's a few different reasons right sometimes you just are there's you have an assumption that like okay well if I do this much PT um and it's gonna get me back in 12 weeks maybe if I do twice as much I'll get back in six weeks like doesn't work that way most people know that now but like sometimes people would just like they thought it would um speed up their recovery for some it's you when you start to see the light at at the end of the tunnel and you you have you start to like increase the intensity or what you're able to do and you feel good and you're excited and then you push a little too hard um and you don't feel it till the next day and then realise oh and feeling like that was a failure um I think is a mistake that people make and it's like you sometimes you can't know what your body's ready for until you push it um and now you know like you you feeling good in that moment doesn't mean go harder it means do it as prescribed and see how you feel the next day so um and then sometimes I see PE athletes push themselves uh it's almost like a like in desperation of needing the answer of whether or not I'm going to be the same athlete and they just push a little too hard too too soon with that and then sometimes it's because they're applying the same template from like and so what I tell my athlete my injured athletes is you're an athlete we know you can push through the pain especially you're an endurance athlete right like we know you can push through the pain you are good at that so right now when you're injured a sign of your mental toughness isn't whether or not you can push through it's whether or not you can hold back because that's going to be harder for you is to not do it and that is where you need to flex your mental toughness um and they're like ah yeah that makes sense so I think that's a big one is like is just either under adhering or over adhering to their recovery protocol and their physical therapy um either under adhering because they are afraid um and don't have the tools to know the difference between you know what am I really ready for and and and in that fear of re injury or doing too much too soon and it's hard to know that unless you've been in that situation before and been you don't know and every injury is going to be different as well isn't it yes exactly yeah I think that's confusing for athletes sometimes too it's like if they've been injured before and they were like I was fine mentally last time and now they're not it's very confusing and so kind of explaining what what's happening in the brain and why that can happen and that you you know we you just need some tools to kind of rewire some stuff so that so that we can so your body knows that it's safe because that's what it feels like your brain's trying to protect your body and it's gone into like overdrive yeah yeah there's like every little thing is like could this be that could that be exactly you're so hyper focused on that part of your body after you've injured it forever for a year right like still it's been years since my knee injury and I'll feel something and like huh what's that what's going on and now it doesn't scare me you know before it would but it's you don't you don't have that kind of hyper awareness of your you know earlobe unless you've injured your ear lob or your elbow or whatever yeah yeah yeah definitely I like that reframing as well of the your mental toughness need to because as you know like you say endurance athletes we're used to pushing through the pain we're used to ignoring a lot of those signs in our body and then when it comes to actually have to listen to your body and tune into that it's very hard to switch between the two and and be able to have both we definitely need to learn that

yes and and labelling it as mental toughness I think would help a lot of people because then they don't see it as like oh I'm being lazy you know we assign all these values don't we to exactly you don't see it as a weakness anymore you flip that entirely and go no no the and athletes like that yeah yeah this is hard to do it's much harder than what you do normally exactly yeah so how do you how do you help athletes you know if they're in an Iron Man event have you got any tips and tricks for people to get through that inj you know we talks about managing the sensations of pain or pushing through when you really want to stop is there anything that you use that helps athletes in particular there yeah there's a few different strategies so when you're um especially when you're like you're really pushing like Max effort right or you're having a moment in your race where you're really feeling it and and I think um a lot of endurance athletes know like sometimes that happens and like if and then it's your body kind of settles in again sometimes so I will say the first thing I actually usually say is that it's not always mental like sometimes those signals are your body's telling you you need to eat like you need to fuel or you need to hydrate so assuming that your um like that your level of Fitness is is there for the effort you're putting out and that you're hydrated and fuelled like so that you're you're not feeling those emotions because your body's like eat you need what are you doing we can't sustain this like you need to eat um there's definitely some strategies to use when you're at that sort of um you're put you're feeling it and you're pushing and your kind of brain is screaming at your body to stop we could just stop right now we could just walk at this moment right so a couple strategies that work really well one is called rhythmic COG Behaviour so basically what that is is like you're repeating something and a a either a word like a mantra to yourself with each foot strike or each pedal stroke um or counting your your steps or counting your pedal Strokes right to a certain number so you wouldn't just like count forever it would be like you count to eight that mine is eight I like counting to eight and then repeating that so people kind of find their different like what the number is that feels good that you count to and you just as you go you just are repeating that over and over so basically what it's doing is it's forcing your brain to process that information and not giving it room to process other information so you just like kind of get into this into this motion of like that's all I need to do right now is Count like that's what I'm doing so so that can be really effective for those moments um another one is what I call establishing an end so sometimes so sometimes what happens is you're you're really feeling it and you think oh my God how am I GNA you know run another you know seven miles or how am I going to ride another 25 miles or whatever it is you and the brain doesn't know that like oh you might settle in it's not going to feel like this the entire way but your brain's job is to kind of allocate its its energy resources so it's it's doing all these you know mental gymnastics of like we can't sustain this you better slow down even if you're physically capable but the brain's trying to like doesn't is trying to protect you so establishing an end means your um maybe P an example of that would be let's say you're running and and you pick a marker like you pick like I'm gonna run to the next tree and I'm gonna take a breath and then I'm G to choose where I run to next so your brain doesn't think oh my God how am I gonna run seven miles it goes okay I can get to that tree and then like okay what what can you get to next okay I can and sometimes the body will then just settle in right because you've calmed the the brain down a little bit it's like um if you've ever had the experience of running or or writing and and and you're on a climb and you can see the top of the climb and then you get there and then you realise it keeps going and you're like Soul crushed in like and all of a sudden you feel it in your body even though just before you and it's because of that but like the brain was like no we we allocated our energy resources for that we didn't know it kept going so we're just going to slow we're going to stop right now so it's this like interesting um thing that's happening in the brain with based on expectation of what you thought was happening what's happening now um that kind of messes with your yeah so having some of those strategies can be helpful what can you do then to turn if that happens and you're like oh my God there's even more you have to quickly do some mental gymnastic you do yeah and um and sometimes the most effective in that situation is to um kind of like call on sort of being absurd or or finding your humour okay and immediately right in that moment to to say to yourself oh my thank God I was really hoping there was more like so you just like go okay so what it does and that it provides a little bit of levity and just regrouping basically of like okay um another one I'll do is the three Rs which is I is regroup re um reset recommit or it's just like okay I didn't know that was there but it is there and I can do this and here we go like just like so having but but the most important thing is knowing what your strategy is going to be ahead of time like okay if that happens this is what I'm gonna do so you don't spend it it um like shortens your reaction time so you don't have to spend time in that moment thinking what oh my God what do I do now and going to your default setting which is gonna be like no that's not what was supposed to be there instead like oh I planed for this I know what to do yeah yeah I had like the first time I did Iron Man there was like a lot of um reading that I did around before and so I had those theories in mind of like you know breaking the breaking things down into sections and and all that kind of thing and I remember getting off the bike and on the run and I my brain was just like what are you doing you're so stupid why did you think you could do would you do

this that was my initial thought and then and then I was like okay just one mile one mile here we go and then once I got started I was fine but you know I mean it was a Turf obviously but yeah it was that initial like what are you doing why would you do that people don't do this why would you do this it is crazy though isn't it it is a crazy sport yes um so how about the role that self-compassion provides with being resilient a resilient athlete how would you describe that yeah um I think it's really one of the most important skills we can have and probably one that we train and talk about the least um and and that ability to have self-compassion means that what the skill that you've worked on is the is that sort of psychological distancing which is am I able to kind of step outside of myself and be and be a student of myself um like can I step out of myself and see this person in a way that I would see any other person and how would I feel about this person going through this challenging thing and the way you would treat that person when we make that separation is often very different than the way that we treat ourselves so that ability to have compassion and Grace with yourself and and finding that place where like oh I really like like myself and love myself and respect myself why would I treat myself that way right why would I say those things to myself but it takes that takes it takes work it takes effort um to do that and when you can do it oh my gosh like it's the most incredible feeling to be able to have self-compassion in a very genuine authentic way to be like to be able to go Hi man I know how meaningful this was to you and how disappointed you are to not get it and I'm so sorry you're going through this but you've done a tremendous job getting yourself to this PL like to be able to do that in a way where you really feel it is very powerful yeah definitely so really mean it because yeah yeah exactly right so I'll do that so sometimes I'll do workshops where like I'll have people um write down uh on a sticky note like um something that they do to feed the monster right like so a negative thought that they think about themselves sometimes and then I'll have them do a positive one too or like when they're feeding the athlete something more instructive or positive and so with the negative one I'll say okay so now you're G to turn to the person next to you and you're gonna say it to that person and there's like always this audible like what I would never and I'm like exactly you would never so why are you doing that to yourself why you treating yourself that way so we're so very hard on ourselves much more so than we are on others yeah definitely it's that little voice again isn't it the one that we need to tell stop right just give the monster a hug I think that's it the monster just needs a hug like you're okay I know you're scared but we're okay yeah I know oh that's great so you you also have a podcast um the injured athletes Club podcast so where can people find that and what was it that inspired you to to start that podcast really yeah it was um so it's uh you could we're all over right Spotify all the places you can find your podcast you can find the injured athletes club and um and it was definitely we started it before we wrote the book because we were um we wanted to build an audience basically for the book and so we're were like oh maybe we should do a podcast and um and we loved that idea of like kind of creating this ecosystem of being able to support athletes so we were like oh we'll have the podcast and the book and then we also have this amazing incredible um Facebook support group called the injured athletes Club that's full of of athletes that are either currently injured or have been injured and get it and like it's an Inc wonderfully supportive group it's amazing so we were like oh we wanted to kind of create this ecosystem but when I started the podcast I'd never listen to podcast before I like I guess I just start listening to podcast and I'm like this is great they're great it's a great way to like so um so yeah so that was kind of the Catalyst and now it's just um you know every year where we're like do we want to do another year and we're like absolutely like we just get it's just fun to be able to talk to people about their stories and share that with other people yeah and so people can find it on Spotify and And subscribe and like And subscribe yes exactly five star review yes what I just want to ask you a couple more questions so are you seeing any Trends in sports psychology or anything that you see evolving in in the area at all you know um I it's still sort of in its very early stages but I think it's going to be very interesting to see how people in the field start um using AI to help uh sort of like the different ways that we might be able to use it to facilitate athletes performances or be more effective in the work that we do I think a lot of people are afraid like it's gonna take over and we're there's not gonna be room for us I'm like I don't know if that's the way to think of it like I think that maybe are there ways that we could like are there things that we could do with it that are really going to help serve the athletes that we work with in in combination right like that it's um that there's still value in like having the person that can do you know kind of do the assessments and and and has that depth of experience um but are there ways that we can so I think that might be an interesting Trend that we're seeing I definitely see more um like in the year so I've been doing this for 20 plus years there's definitely been a shift in um like early in my career I had to oftentimes I was needing to the way that I would have to Market myself is like actually explaining what I do um so it wasn't like everybody knows what firefighter does you don't have to explain like why that's an important thing and and it was very much part of the process was like educating and so and there's that's still true but not to the same extent like it's definitely you know we hear about it a lot more like almost every major league baseball team has someone that you know they have all whole departments now and um a lot of universities are now um having that support also so it's it's definitely um the shift towards mental health and the understanding of specifically what people in the field of sport psychology do and and what and what we do in mental training and what makes someone qualified to do that versus someone that's just hanging up a shingle and saying hey I can work on your mindset that there's very much a difference of like in terms of the field of study and like um making sure that you're not doing harm because you don't know all the Ty and research and um and have the experience uh to be able to say that so that's definitely like a shift that I've seen also yeah as I mean it's so powerful isn't it it's like it's something that we didn't really think about for a long time and then I think people have realised how important it is and how much more we can get from ourselves if we do tap into that so it's it's really great to see that coming and I think the AI I've just I did a podcast about AI actually about Ai and coaching interesting not long ago because we I wanted to talk about it because it is interesting and I think there's stuff that you know it's like everything isn't it when mobile phone smartphones come out it's like there's some great things about it and there's some not so great things about it and we need to pick the tools that serve us and use those and not get sucked in and you know have it cause us harm and we need to be able to make that distinction I guess with it yes absolutely I remember you know I used to be a professor in graduate school for sports psychology and um I got early on when online learning was just coming onto the scene I was asked uh I applied for a position um at a university that was all online and I went through the training and I was like I can't do this like the way that I work with my students um it this doesn't make sense I can't I can't be effective online and then and I said thank you so much for the opportunity I decided this isn't a good fit for me and then it was probably a year later or not even a year maybe where I realised okay this isn't going away this is now like so maybe the thing to figure out instead is how can you be effective in this space and versus saying like nope it's never going to work it'll never be effective it's going to ruin our lives like so I think sometimes that's what people are kind of doing with AI like this is the worst thing that could happen instead of like okay well it's not going away so maybe I start to figure out how to use it as a tool and and in what ways is it beneficial and in what ways is it detrimental and understanding what what where that line is yeah and I we're still sort of figuring it out I think with absolutely so many things yeah very true yeah so if you could give one piece of ad advice to athletes everywhere what could it be that's a really hard question and one piece of advice I know and usually I would struggle with that and I had the immediate thing that came into my head was stop stop being so hard on yourself yeah just yeah like stop being so hard on yourself you're doing amazing you're doing great things you are a beautiful worthy person stop being no matter what your result is so stop being so hard on yourself oh that's amazing I love that thank you [Laughter] oh thank you so much for your time today it's been really great chatting with you I've really enjoyed it um and people can find your book rebound and the other book that you wrote was on top of your game which I also recommend that's more about performance um isn't it yes yeah yeah that one's definitely more for that that book I I wrote when I had a string of athletes that were experiencing such debilitating performance anxiety that they were starting to consider quitting their Sports and then we worked together and some of them came back to have the best season ever and they just didn't have the tools to know how to deal with their the pressure that they were putting on themselves and and the performance anxiety so um so I yeah so that one's like uh athletes who are in competition healthy and rebounds for the your come back from an injury yeah and they're both great books you can find them if you Google and I'll put some links as well for that and I'll put a link to your podcast in the in the show notes as well so yeah thank you so much my pleasure thank you thanks for listening today have a great day take care bye for now

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