I'm honored to have recently been named the recipient of one of the most prestigious international awards in the field of applied sport psychology (not quite an Oscar or the Nobel Prize, but still pretty cool!). The Association for Applied Sport Psychology (the largest professional organization in our field) has named me the Distinguished Applied [...]
At one level, I’m always amazed at how so many of us allow their past selves to have such a big impact on who they are now and how they think, feel, and engage with their world in adulthood. At another level, I’m not the least bit surprised because our childhood experiences that shape our [...]
There’s no doubt that living a balanced life is one of those highly coveted goals to which we all aspire, along with happiness, inner peace, and love. Yet, in this day and age, balance is also more difficult than ever to achieve. Between career, family, self-care, technology, and everything else in our busy lives, it [...]
Here’s a question for you: Would you rather take the bad road or the good road? The answer is rhetorical and self-evident. Here’s another question: How frequently do you take the bad road? If you’re the least bit human, your answer is probably “With more regularity than I would like.” “Fork in the road” is [...]
There are many aspects of our lives that impact the direction we go as we progress through childhood and into adulthood including parents, peers, and of course these days, social media. As members of various concentric circles of influence (i.e., family, community, popular culture), it is normal (though not necessarily healthy) to adopt the norms, [...]
To what do you aspire? Who do you want to be and what kind of life do you want to lead? To be happy, successful, impactful, rich, famous, loved? We all want to find and experience that elusive “Holy Grail” that we believe will fulfill our aspirations. However, as is commonly expressed in both ancient [...]
I always find it amazing that love relationships ever come to fruition and sustain themselves for an extended period of time. Relationships seem so complicated, particularly those of the romantic, “I’m looking for my soulmate” variety. There are so many aspects of a relationship that determine whether it works or not. And how do we [...]
Let’s begin with a basic reality of life: We are all victims of our upbringing and the culture in which we grow up. We didn’t get to choose our parents, siblings, extended families, where we lived, where we went to school, the activities we participated in, or the conditions of our early lives. Rather, our [...]
An unfortunate reality of being human is that so much of the way we think, the emotions we feel, the behaviors we engage in, and the manner in which we interact with others is governed by unconscious forces of which we have little awareness or control: Primitive instincts (e.g., fight-or-flight), Emotional baggage (e.g., low self-esteem, [...]
I have seen an interesting pattern emerge over the last few years with the young (meaning typically under 25 years old) clients with whom I work. On the plus side, all are thoughtful, deep, well-liked, and nice people. They are accomplished students, athletes, and performing artists. These young people are driven by generally healthy values [...]
