DR. ED GARRETT – PROFESSOR OF SPORT & PERFORMANCE PSYCHOLOGY AT CALIFORNIA BAPTIST UNIVERSITY – EPISODE 774

Website – https://www.cbuonline.edu/ops/facultydetails/86

Email – egarrett@calbaptist.edu

Twitter – @cbulancers

Dr. Ed Garrett is a Professor of Sport and Performance Psychology at Cal Baptist University.  He also serves as the Program Coordinator for the Bachelors in Sport and Performance Psychology as well as the External Liaison for Community Engagement.

Dr. Garrett has worked with athletes various capacities for the past 30 years. His focus is on the intrinsics of athletic performance and helping athletes play smarter, not harder. He has spent time with the Colorado Rockies, the 1996 Summer Olympics, and multiple years as a club, high school and college coach. Dr. Garrett specializes in increasing confidence through a variety of cognitive practices.

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You’ll want to have a notebook handy as you listen to this episode with Dr. Ed Garrett, a Professor of Sport and Performance Psychology at Cal Baptist University.

What We Discuss with Dr. Ed Garrett

• His path to Sport & performance Psychology
• “I started to see what I felt was a gift to be able to relate, to connect, to help, to impact that I could possibly help change a life, grow a life, develop a life, impact a life well beyond the athletic field.”
• “I think it’s a matter of playing smarter, not harder, and really figuring out how to maximize your full potential, both physically and kinesthetically and cognitively in what you do.”
• “You never picked up a ball because you wanted to work. You picked up a ball because you wanted to play.”
• “It’s very easy to look at an athlete as a commodity and not as a person.”
• Helping people be better versions of themselves using the gift of sport
• Helping athletes remember why they got into the game to help them regain the love of their sport
• “You need to control what you can control.”
• The importance of goal setting
• Set a goal…evaluate the result
• Gaining control of your intrinsic motivation as you achieve your goals
• Put your goals on your bathroom mirror and on in your locker
• Working proactively to head off potential problems
• “You always have something in the back of your pocket that you can give the athletes to work in or work with in that moment.”
• Teaching both group and individual sessions
• “You definitely get a lot more out of an athlete on a one-on-one basis than you typically do in a group setting.”
• Asking coaches what their needs are and tailoring his work to those requests
• “Finding applications or tools or teachable applications and moments that support a coach’s vision or direction.”
• Being careful not to overstep his bounds and communicating constantly with coaches
• “Where your feet are, is where your mind needs to be.”
• “Don’t let it thoughts come and go. Thoughts come and go in our mind all the time. It’s a matter of how long you live in those thoughts”
• “It’s more about the journey than it is the destination.”
• “So much of life goes unnoticed that not noticing becomes a habit.”
• “Worrying is such a useless emotion.”
• “Whatever level you want to compete at, that’s a goal and a dream. Do whatever you can to accomplish that. We need goals and dreams and a passion behind that, but we have to be realistic with it too.”
• “If you get a chance to play past your high school years, that’s a blessing. That’s a gift. Enjoy it, don’t put a monetary value on it or don’t put a future career path on it. Take it one day at a time. Enjoy the experience.”
• Helping athletes that develop the yips
• Learning the common language of the different sports so he can better relate to the athletes and coaches he works with
• Your identity does not exist solely in your athletic performance

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THANKS, DR. ED GARRETT

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TRANSCRIPT FOR DR. ED GARRETT – PROFESSOR OF SPORT & PERFORMANCE PSYCHOLOGY AT CALIFORNIA BAPTIST UNIVERSITY – EPISODE 774

[00:00:00] Mike Klinzing: Hello and welcome to the Hoop Heads Podcast. It’s Mike Klinzing here with my co-host Jason Sunkle, and tonight we are pleased to welcome Dr. Ed Garrett, Professor of Sport and Performance Psychology at California Baptist University. Ed, welcome to the Hoop Heads Pod.

[00:00:14] Dr. Ed Garrett: Hey appreciate you Mike. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:17] Mike Klinzing: Very excited to have you on.  Looking forward to diving into, I’m sure a lot of the interesting work that you’ve been able to do across the course of your career with athletes, coaches, teams. Want to start by going back in time to when you were a kid and tell us a little bit about some of your athletic background, how you got into sports as a kid, and just what are some of your earliest memories of, of being an athlete and participating in sports?

[00:00:40] Dr. Ed Garrett: Wow. Great question to start and first thank you for having me on. I appreciate it, both you and Jason. Thank you very much. I think sport, performance, psychology cognitive health, mental health is something that needs to continue to be talked about. So I really appreciate the opportunity to come on with y’all.

Well I started with a baseball when I was a young boy and growing up in Southern California grew up with the Los Angeles Dodgers in my backyard basically. So that kind of ignited me to get into sports. I played a ton of sports when I was growing up. Everything from football to baseball.

Racquetball. Golf, volleyball. I did a lot. I just loved being active. And back in those days you didn’t have cell phones, so you, you had to go outside to just create life and experiences. Th that is a knock to this generation. We have to get out more. But the reality is that you created your fun and your fun was outside until the streetlights came on.

And so you played a lot of different games. You were very active. And so I just started, just started young with just picking up a ball and a bat and a glove. And from there it just ignited into just a wonderful journey that has carried multiple decades. When I got into college, I really fell in love with, actually, earlier than that.

I fell in love with coaching, felt I have a gift or had a gift to do that to really instruct and impact those that wanted to speak the language of sport. Ended up getting a bachelor’s degree in physical education. Thought I would be a coach for the rest of my life. And kind of went down that route and did some collegiate coaching, some collegiate athletic directing, high school coaching, high school athletic directing, and a couple masters later.

I knew when I took one class in sport and performance psychology. Now, this was way back in the nineties. Sports and sport and performance psychology wasn’t new, but it was new-ish. I mean, it had been around for a while, but it was really, really starting seventies, eighties, really starting to push.

You still didn’t have a lot of universities that were offering as a major, really teaching it full board at that time. I took a class in sport and performance psychology in my physical education course and just said, you know what? If I ever had an opportunity to get a doctorate, that’s what I was going to pursue.

There was something fascinating about trying to help athletes figure out why they do what they do and so there was just, there was an interest to serve and help from that capacity. And so in and out of coaching realized that that probably wasn’t the direction I wanted to go, and was given the opportunity in 2009 to pursue my doctorate in sport performance psychology.

Again, even in 2009, there weren’t a lot of universities that were offering sport performance psychology as a doctorate. And so I pursued what was called a cd, a little different than a PhD, a PhD’s doctorate of philosophy. Cd is a doctorate of psychology and pursued that with sport performance psychology is the focus.

And man, the rest is really history. Right out of that. Ended up working for a University in Mississippi that I enjoyed, thoroughly loved and smaller D three school. Got a chance to craft my art, utilize my past experiences to really impact and shape what I did within sport and performance psychology with the athletes that I was working with.

And then in 2017 had the great fortune of coming back home to California. And ended up starting as a professor at, at California Baptist University. And we now have a master’s program in sport performance psychology. We now have a bachelor’s program, both online and ground in sport performance psychology.

Typically have a good sized cohort that we have working with the athletes. Along with being a, a professor I oversee or work with nine of the programs at cbu. In their division one programs. So a lot of athletes, a lot of different sessions that I work through. In fact, I just finished one just to jump on this podcast.

So you don’t get a chance to rest much, but the benefits are pretty incredible because you’re working with some really cool athletes, some elite athletes helping them navigate their athletic career. So there’s a ton more I could jump into. But I don’t want to take up a full hour and a half of your podcast just history wise.

It’ll probably come out as we talk, but I’m blessed to be able to have life experiences. I’m a parent. I’ve been an athlete I’ve been a coach, I’ve been an athletic director. I’ve been an NCAA official. So I wear a lot of different hats that I bring into the counseling room or on the sidelines that brings about, I think, a different look than just someone that maybe just played sports and then got a degree and then went out there and did it.

There’s a lot of life experience that that really goes into it because we’re trying to, with this form, performance psychology, we’re trying to help the holistic athlete. It’s not just the athlete on the court, on the field. It’s what they do outside of that and how they’re going to navigate life when the air finally leaves the ball, you know. So that’s it in a nutshell. How does that work for y’all?

[00:05:41] Mike Klinzing: All right. I want to go back to a couple of things that you said and just touch on them. First one, you said that when you first got into coaching, you knew that that was kind of something. You were good at, you had a talent for that was going to be something that you enjoyed.

What was it about coaching, if you can think back to that time that really stood out to you, you’re like, oh man, I really like this aspect of it, or some part of it that really grabbed you.

[00:06:03] Dr. Ed Garrett: Yeah, no, that’s a great question. You know, for me, from the collegiate game, it was recruiting. Man did I love recruiting.

I loved going to meeting with parents and with athletes and talking about the university I was at and the program we were building. I think it was at that time that I really, really started to grasp that I might like coaching but I love connecting and I was good as a coach.

I was not, And I think now knowing what I know from the sport and performance, the cognitive side, boy had I have known that I might have still been in coaching because coaching or athletics in general, it’s 90% mental and 10% physical. I work with so many athletes and yes, there’s that physical component, but there’s a huge, huge just untapped area within the cognitive that really enhances that performance as well. I think we spent so much time just working on the physical as a young kid, building up, going through club, going through high school, going to college and then beyond, and so much physical. We don’t just spend the time on the cognitive.

So I really, that recruiting aspect, it was me just really connecting with people. I started to see what I felt was a gift to be able to relate, to connect, to help, to impact that I could possibly help change a life, grow a life, develop a life, impact a life well beyond the athletic field. And so it was really that recruiting side that, that I thoroughly enjoyed.

[00:07:38] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, it’s interesting. I think the connection piece, when you think about the way that the coaching profession has evolved in the last 30 or 40 years, if you go back. You think about it was sort of the my way or the highway coach and the relationship part of it. Not that there wasn’t coaches that were doing that 30 or 40 years ago, but certainly there was a lot more acceptance of sort of that fire and brimstone and you get to do it this way because I said so, and it was just more of that.

And it’s interesting the way that the coaching profession has changed and evolved to where every coach that we talk to on here talks about how important it is to develop relationships with players, not just as athletes, but actually as people and connecting with them on a human level. Human level, which is what you’re talking about when you think about what you do today and what you’ve learned and then you look back on yourself as an athlete and your experience as an athlete.

Do you ever go back and sort of self-analyze and think, Boy, I wish I would’ve known this. You talked about knowing wish you had, knowing things as a coach, and we’ll get to that in a second. But just as an athlete, do you think about some of the things that you’ve learned over the course of your career that you wish you could have applied back when you were an athlete?

[00:08:51] Dr. Ed Garrett: Oh, daily. You know, I’m probably the worst at, I psychoanalyze myself probably hourly. You know, the challenge of working in this profession. Yeah. And to kind of piggyback off of the way we kind of used to you know, growing up in baseball, you got hit by a baseball, your coach would always say, don’t rub it.

You know, don’t show weakness. Understanding where we are collectively community mental health wise. Some of the negative ways we would’ve carried things as young coaches, probably because that’s how we were taught back then. You know, it was the same to just use a phrase, a good old boy kind of mentality towards athletics and things have evolved.

Things have changed. Now. I don’t believe we’ve become softer. I think there’s those out there that would love to say just the opposite. But no, I think it’s a matter of playing smarter, not harder, and really figuring out how to maximize your full potential, both physically and kinesthetically and cognitively in what you do.

You know, at its simplest level, as a young boy, it was just about wanting to play. You know, I share with these athletes all the time. You never picked up a ball because you wanted to work. You picked up a ball because you wanted to play. And somewhere in our careers, it became work. And the same can be true, even for my coaching career, it became work.

I understand the college coaches that I work with are under tremendous stress based on how long their contract is or what their contract. I mean, they’re putting food on the table and they have to be careful. And we talk about this a lot of times because it’s very easy to look at an athlete as a commodity and not as a person, but as a commodity. And mostly because your livelihood, your career, your bread and butter on the table is going to depend on whether you’re putting dubs on the schedule. And so somewhere down the road, I think I lost the mindset when I was a young athlete or an older athlete and a younger coach where it was focused more on the w.

It was focused more on the scoreboard. I’m a big proponent of let’s just get rid of scoreboards. Just from the standpoint that there’s such an extrinsic in our sport that the athlete focuses on. And so easy to lose concentration and motivation when you’re staring at that scoreboard.

And I say that tongue in cheek, we’re never going to get rid of scoreboards. I understand that, but you understand the concept of what I’m trying to say. It can be a distraction. But that’s where my focus was. And somewhere down the road, I lost, I think, a part of me in really remembering the good talents, God-given abilities that I had, and the joy of the sport.

And it became a business. And so it robbed me of keeping my focus. on others, and it was more on self. I think every coach experiences that to some extent a little bit, some hang onto it, master it really well, some realize, hey, this is not the direction I want to go. And that they find a way to pivot and make a choice or not a career choice, but just a choice or a new direction in their coaching.

I never had that understanding. I wish, there’s a lot of things that I know now that I wish I knew then. And I think that’s probably something every mature coach would say when they get into their forties, fifties, sixties. It’s like, man, how did I not know that? You know, that John Wooden mentality.

Why did I not know that back then? I mean, that man was brilliant. In the way he approached things. I think you also have a lot of society, more so now than you did back then, a lot of society dictating who you should be, the identity of who you should be within athletics. And what’s associated with that can be a little bit of a challenge.

But yeah, it took me stepping out of coaching, stepping out of athletics as a player to really just kind of evaluate what do I want to give back to the athletic world, the arena that I’m in. And it definitely wasn’t going to be that physical education, that coaching, that athletic director, athletic training side.

It was more of the counseling side. How can I help people be better versions of themselves using the gift of sport? So it’s been a journey but I’ll tell you what, these last couple years working within the, the psychological, the cognitive side of athletics have been so rewarding.

[00:13:07] Mike Klinzing: Let’s start with that fun concept because when you say that, it’s definitely something that I can relate to on a personal level more so as an athlete I think, than as a coach.

But I know that I’ve talked to lots of former college athletes and they talk a lot about how man, high school sports was so much fun and I just played because I loved it, . And then I got to college and it felt so much more like a job. And so I’m sure the athletes that you’re talking to to at at Cal Baptist are, are sharing some of those same things that colleges much practices are much more difficult.

It’s a much higher level of play. There’s more pressure you talked about with the coaches and the fact that the athletes have to perform in order to be able to help the coach put food on the table. So when an athlete comes to you and says, my. It’s just not fun anymore. I feel like it’s work all the time and I’m not enjoying myself as much as, as I should or I’m not getting out of it what I hope to get out of it.

What does that conversation look like, and again, I know we’re generalizing here, but just what, what do you say to an athlete that tells you, man, my sport used to be so much fun and now I feel like it’s kind of a grind.

[00:14:12] Dr. Ed Garrett: You know, that’s a great question. Every athlete is different. Every situation is different.

Even within sport and performance psychology, what we do within our field is very proactive. We are coming alongside the athletes starting to work with them from the beginning. And, yes, many times they will struggle. They will have successes and failures for whatever reason within the human mind.

And as an athlete, we love to think of the failures. Well, we don’t love to think of the failures. They just exist in there. And many times it’s hard to let those go. And so if you’re dealing with an athlete that maybe has struggled a little bit you know, I see a lot of freshmen that come in, doesn’t matter the sport.

They were all that and a bag of chips when they played in high school and travel ball and club and all that kind of stuff. And then they come in and they failed to realize that the college coach recruited all the bags of chips throughout the whole state and so you’re not the flavor of the month anymore.

And so you’re coming and you’re competing against athletes that have been in college in your position for the last three years. So there is that little bit of a reality check when you leave high school because you were the prom king and the prom queen and everything was great.

And you ran the school. You ruled school. And now you come to college and, and classes are harder. The demand is harder academically because you’re going into a field that you’re going to need to do the rest of your life. And then maybe, depending on the level I know from NAIA and JC all the way to D one, there’s tons of pressure across the board.

Some greater, some less. It depends on, on really where you are in the mission of that athletic department. But you. I deal with athletes a lot that, that just lose a love of the game, possibly. Now that’s something we counsel and work through.  I never want an athlete to lose a love of the game, but we try to figure out where that’s stemming from.

At the same time, we’re going to work on trying to help the athlete remember why they got in the game to begin with anyway. It is, sometimes it is as simplistic as remembering you picked up a ball to play, not to work, and how can we bring about that fun, that enjoyment, that emotional stimuli that we’re seeking on why we do what we do?

So some athletes just in the busyness of being a, a student athlete, forget that and you have to take them back. There’s different applications and things we can use in that situation. And again, everybody’s a little different, but reminding the athlete of why they enjoy what they do.

And I think a lot of their identity gets wrapped up in being a starter. And I try to remind them, look, we need to control the controllables. You can’t control the who’s in control of the starting lineup, it’s the coach. Well then why are you putting your emphasis and your energy into the coach and the starting lineup?

You need to control what you can control. And when the athlete starts to realize that they are actually in control of a lot more than they think they are. They start to recognize that they can find joy in that control. And so even just something simple as having them start setting goals, we do a lot of goal setting here at California Baptist with our athletes and with my private clients and whatnot.

A lot of goal setting because goals are self-regulated. I monitor them, I can evaluate them, I can determine their success and so therefore it grows my motivation. So at its core, when the athlete’s not feeling connected or loved, chances are it’s a lack of motivation and what they want to do and reminding them why they chose to come play that sport or come at that university, come to that university in the first place.

And when you can help them learn that they start to reignite the flame and, and, and grow in their joy whether that’s freshman year, that senior year, I’ve seen it across the board all, all four levels or whether they’re super seniors still trying to help them remember why they picked up that ball in the first place.

[00:18:08] Mike Klinzing: What type of goals do you set with them? So you’re talking about performance goals, are you talking about goals of sort of mentally, and what I mean by mentally is not, you’re not talking about necessarily statistical goals, but just. More things that they’re aspiring to. Just walk me through, like what a goal, what a goal setting might look like for an athlete who wants to have more fun or wants to get back to their roots.

[00:18:30] Dr. Ed Garrett: Sure. Great question. You know, textbook wise, you’re going to see something called process performance and outcome goals. And really you do want to look long term. Okay? Maybe that athlete wants to be player of the year. Okay, that’s your long term goal. Great. What are we doing today to accomplish it?

And I’ll have the athlete kind of back up, but at its simplistic level we love setting weekly goals and one to two weekly goals that the athlete, the athlete comes up with. I need to stress that as a cognitive coach, my job is not to develop those goals for the athletes. They’re to shape them and mold them and guide them.

But I want the athlete to make sure that he or she understands they are in control. He’s in control, she’s in control of these goals because then they take ownership of them. So we definitely want them measurable, timestamped. Okay. So if we’re looking today, you know within this week you know, what are you trying to accomplish?

So I have athletes that set their goals on Sunday. They will let me know of those goals, or within their team, maybe we’ve established an accountability partner, somebody they’re close to that they want to share those goals with somebody that’s going to be on the field every day or on the court every day.

And then we’re going to evaluate the over the course of the time, how we hit those goals. So I like using percentages or whole numbers. So I’m working with CBU softball right now. One of the athletes we’re working with is over the course of this week, she wanted 60% quality at baths.

Okay? Now that is measurable by the athlete’s standpoint. She will know. Each at bat that she’s in, in that game, whether it’s a quality at bat. And we have discussed this pre-competition to really kind of define what a quality at bat looks like. And so that’s one example.

So at the end of the end of the, the series or the week of play, she can evaluate whether she hits 60% no different than if I was looking at, I want to make 30% of my free throws. Well, that’s very measurable. And so that may be a very easy, tangible, measurable goal. We look for goals where I can be on the sidelines, I can be on the wherever, and I can evaluate it myself.

Anybody can come in and evaluate it. The more difficult ones are what I call the warm fuzzies, those intrinsic ones. You know, I’ll have athletes that’ll say, I want to be happy. Or I want to be happy this week in my company. Well, define happy. How do you measure happy? Show me what tools go towards happy.

So those are very vague. We can measure happiness in other capacities. Again, happiness may be, if I get 60% of my quality of bats or 30% of my free throws, I’m happy. So there’s happy can be measured statistically in other ways. And so what we do is one to two goals very similar. And I also share with the athletes.

It does not need to be anything on the court, on the field.. I try to drink. I’ve got it sitting right here. I try to drink four yetis of water a day. If I’m more hydrated, I’m healthier, I’m probably going to perform better tomorrow. and it’s very measurable. You can walk around and follow me and see if I’m drinking four Yetis or four hydro flashes, four, whatever of water.

I’m going to be in bed by 10 o’clock every night. The athletes listening to your podcast just heard that and went, Ooh, that’s a hard one, Dr. G . But, if I’m in bed by 10 o’clock, I’m getting eight hours of sleep, which means my immune system while I’m resting, is now recharged. I’ve also got greater clarity of focus, which means my per my chance of being injured is lessened because I’m more attuned to what I’m doing with my body.

So I can measure, I can come by and say, are you in bed? Yes, I am. Okay, great. You hit your goal. Now we evaluate those goals at the end when they’re done, and I share with the athletes, we’re going to evaluate whether you did or didn’t. Either way, we’re not going to be mad or we’re not going to over celebrate. Yes, we’re going to grow in our confidence because we did hit it, but if we didn’t, we’re going to evaluate it.

What athletes fail to recognize is they got a result. And I think that’s important for your listeners to hear. They can set goals, well, I didn’t get my goal. Well, you got a result, and let’s evaluate that result. So why didn’t we get 60% of our quality of bats? Why did we not make 30% of our free throws?

Let’s evaluate maybe our, our goals were too high. Maybe we need to go back to 50% and maybe 20%. Okay, well let’s evaluate and get going there. We don’t just throw it in and say, well, I’m done. This doesn’t work. No, you’re missing the boat. Even if we hit one of two goals, you’re still batting a 500. From a baseball standpoint, that’s pretty darn good.

So we want to look at that and evaluate that and be realistic with the emphasis that once that athlete starts hitting those goals, She or he is in control of her intrinsic motivation, self-motivation there. And now they start feeling better about their performance because they’re hitting their goals.

They’re hitting something measurable that is not controlled by the coach, not controlled by the scoreboard, not controlled by the s i d and the stats produced. They control that. So they govern their own motivation, which helps them enjoy the game more. So goal setting is very simple. It’s very elementary.

I don’t think we do it very well. You know, again, being a high school coach, we set goals at the beginning of the year. We put them in the folder and the folder never came out again.  and so I have athletes set goals every week on three by five cards. I got a bunch sitting right here in my office.

And those three by five cards, one, they do it on two different cards. One gets hung on the bathroom mirror. And so any of your athletes listening to the podcast set goals, put those two goals up on your bathroom mirror. And they go, why doc? Why Dr. G on the bathroom?  Well think about it. You’re going to go in there in the morning, you’re going to go in there at night.

You’re going to see those goals at least twice every day. And then the other one goes in your team locker. Well, I don’t have a locker. We’ll put it in your gym bag, put it with your cleats, put it with your shoes, because you’re going to put your shoes on. Now you take that goal out, now you see it there. So you see it pre and post practice.

You see it pre and post day. Now four times every day you’ve seen those goals, you’ve recited those goals, they’ve become a part of you 20 times that week. You’ve been living and breathing and eating those goals. And we recognize them. They become a part of us and recognition is 90% of the battle. That’s what we work with in sport and performance psychology.

So if we can get that athlete recognizing it, living in it, breathing it, they understand, they control it, they help their self-motivation, their confidence continues to grow, the more they hit it and then they learn to evaluate it, not give up on it just because they didn’t hit that goal. Now that might be a long-winded answer, but you can see how goals, if you work with it, can be very self-motivating.

[00:24:53] Mike Klinzing: Absolutely. Over the course of the season. when you’re working with a particular athlete, and again, I know it’s different for everyone, but just in general, when an athlete sets a goal, like the ones you mentioned of having the quality of bats or shooting a certain free throw percentage, as they start to reach those goals on a consistent week to week basis, do you reevaluate and reset the goal at a higher level like you talked about, or, and or do you then add maybe another goal to the mix?

In other words, over the course of a season, let’s say? Are you talking about We have. These weekly goals and there’s one or two? Or does it over end up being, over the course of the season, they might add and it might scaffold on top of each other where you end up with 5, 6, 7, 8. I don’t know what the number is, but just I guess, yeah.

Are we adding to the goals as we’re going along, is my question?

[00:25:42] Dr. Ed Garrett: Yeah, great question. I probably should have clarified that a little more. Of course. We have the end of season goals that we’re really trying to accomplish. So maybe it’s a shooting percentage, maybe it’s a batting average, something along those lines that maybe it’s an accolade.

The downside is you can only put yourself in position to be player of the year. You don’t do the nominations. So you have to be careful there. I want to put myself, I want to give myself statistics that would be counted towards that position. That’s the way we want to phrase it. And so you have those season ending goals you want to get to and then Yes, we scaffold kind of backwards towards that.

So you know, if we want to increase our quality of bats, then maybe this week in practice we’re hitting an extra bucket of balls after practice and that’s going to help, that’s going to better our chances of having greater quality at bats. But the goals change weekly. Sometimes we may want to hang onto a goal for a week or two.

We may need to increase or decrease it, depending on, on, on how much is really pushing the athlete. I heard somebody say one time, the goals typically need to be set at a 75% success rate, 25% failure rate. So in other words, there needs to be that push. I don’t want to say I want to wake up in the morning.

That’s not a realistic goal. Okay? That’s not a motivating goal. I hope I wake up in the morning, otherwise this podcast is going to be worth a whole lot more money because I’m dead and you can archive this kind of like a Mona Lisa. But, but the reality is, I want to be able to wake up in the morning, well, great, there’s no motivation there.

But if I say I want 60% quality of at-bats but I know I’m probably only living in about. 50, 45% quality bats. Well, now there’s a chance, there’s a push. So if the first game, and if I’m using softball as an example and we’re playing a double header, the first game I only had about a 40% quality of bat, well then my focus now shifts to what do I need to do in game two to to reach that 60%?

Well, I need an 80%. Well then I better make sure when I’m on deck I’m paying attention, I’m really dialed in so I can have a good second game of quality of bats. So I hit my goal. So, We’re evaluating goals each week. Sometimes I will have my athletes come back and go, you know what? I was so made motivated on this one goal, Dr. G, can I continue it next week? Yes, you can. I’m never going to tell an athlete not to and get rid of it, especially if they felt it worked. If it felt it gave them the motivation or it gave them a great focus or a target, then let’s keep it. But we’re not going to keep it all season long. I don’t want the same goal every week.

Athletes need variety. Many athletes need variety. They need a little bit of change. They like structure, but boy, when they get a little bit of change, they like to respond to that and depending on the sport, there’s a lot of change that takes place. Living here in southern California, we’ve had more rain than we’ve had.

I don’t know. I mean, in decades. I mean, it just continues. It’s raining today, it just continues to come down. And so these outdoor sports are experiencing change that is out of con they’re control. They’re not used to canceled games or, or having to move games or start games, stop games because of the weather, like some parts of the country might be.

And so it’s a great example here of how these athletes are having to deal with change. And so we, we may, we may set a goal towards that granite. You never understand whether the weather’s going to do what it does. But, but addressing some of those things. So really what’s going to enhance that performance and how that athlete’s going to be in controllable controllables weather’s not a controllable, so we have to focus on what we can control.

And yes, the goals may change week to week. They typically do. It just depends on if that athlete really enjoys it.

[00:29:26] Mike Klinzing: How long is a weekly session with an athlete?

[00:29:30] Dr. Ed Garrett: So every, again, everything’s a little different. So are we talking individually with the athlete and not the team itself?

Is that what you’re saying?

[00:29:37] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, I’m talking individual. So when you’re having one of these individual meetings where you’re talking goals with an athlete, you’re going over the weekly goals, you’re thinking about what they just did in the previous week and how they met their goals or didn’t meet their goals, and then you’re kind of refocusing on what’s coming up in the week ahead.

How long does that typically.

[00:29:52] Dr. Ed Garrett: Sure. Most, most sessions with athletes are anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes, maybe an hour. It really depends. I have athletes right now that are super seniors and I’ve been working with for five years. I have other athletes that are freshmen. Some of them need a little, or transfers, they might have never dealt with sports psychology or cognitive coaching, so they might need a little more in those sessions.

Some athletes come in and they have the tools. They’re using what we’ve taught them to use. And so that session might be just a 20 minute session where we’re just checking in. And so our goal within sport performance psychology, many times honestly, is to be fired. I know that sounds kind of weird but if we’ve done everything we can to help that athlete given them the tools, built that proverbial toolbox, and then taught them and walked with them on when those tools need to be utilized and the athlete starts to see it and they craft their practice around it and they craft their games around it, and they see where the benefits of those psychological tools can be applied. Then we become a fan and we we’re coming around for support. So the athletes that I’ve met with on one-on-one basis this week, I’ve met with many softball athletes, and I’m just using that as one example today.

I walked onto the softball field today and coach was doing his thing, and you know, coaches were all doing their, and I’m just, I’m just doing small little check-ins. Hey, how are you doing? Hey, how’s things going? Hey, how’d that test go? A lot of it within our profession, within sport and performance psychology is different than a counseling session that you may have.

We are very much boots on the ground. We’re very proactive in that check-in. And so if we can head things off or be present with those athletes earlier on, very similar to what you might say with, with an athletic trainer. Athletic trainer is going to be at practice and so they can diagnose and see things that are happening immediately as opposed to waiting till the next week before they get into the athletic training room, they’re there presently on the field and can kind of work with things.

We do a lot of that within our discipline as well. I have several grad students that will come alongside me and we will observe athletes. We’ll be there present. We may not have any athlete that comes and talks to us during a practice and that’s fine. But they know we’re there.

And so if they need to check in, they can. And so we definitely work on more of the proactive side. So I may meet with an athlete on Monday or Tuesday with the goals if they have that particular session. Maybe some athletes just go every other month or twice, twice a month with their sessions. And then it’s a matter of being in that dugout or on the sidelines or on the court.

If there’s a moment where we can have a teachable moment or a moment of clarity or a moment of recognition where I can ask that athlete, Hey, why did we just think that or do that? Or, why’d you, why’d you process that? Or why’d you behave that way and help that athlete connect what they’re trying to do, sport and performance psychology wise to actually what they’re doing on the field.

So every athlete’s a little different to answer that question. It just depends on their needs. It’s rare that I’m meeting with an athlete every. You know, especially at the D one level, they’re, I mean, they’re just all over the place. They are so busy between, between study hours and traveling, study hall, traveling, the meals, team meals and then class and then whatever else is going, team practice sessions, scout session, whatever’s.

I mean, they’re busy. So we try to get more and more connection in there with the athletes that really want to take advantage of it. Some of us. Meet weekly? I’d say a vast majority of the athletes are once to twice a month depending on their particular needs. And then if they need to bring in a new one, they can they can bring in a new time to meet with me if they need to.

They can always schedule that. So and I don’t know if that came through my mic, that’s probably an athlete wanting to schedule with me right now, so , but we didn’t hear it, but yeah, I’m sure. Oh yeah, sound effects are coming in all the time. You’re good. Yeah. The email dings or, or the cell phone text, little dings come in and, and which is great ‘m blessed to be in an environment where I can serve, I can help others.

So that’s really a joy. But yeah, it really just depends on the athlete and the need, and then being in proximity, being around so the athletes know how to connect with you and how to reach you.

[00:34:01] Mike Klinzing: So if you’re working with a particular team in a group setting, then are you meeting with.

every athlete from that team, is that something that is mandated or is it something that the players opt into? Just what’s the process for them getting involved with you beyond whatever team sessions their coach might schedule?

[00:34:24] Dr. Ed Garrett: Sure. Great question. So the other half of the equation, I apologize, I didn’t talk about this, we do a lot of team sessions.

I just was doing a team session before I jumped on with you today. And, and team sessions vary in length. Some coaches depending on their practice schedule they may look at me and go, Dr. G I know we were going to do 30 minutes, but you got two. And so you try to find those little nuggets.

You always have something in the back of your pocket that you can give the athletes to work in or work with. Excuse me, in that moment. Some sessions involve, let’s go to the locker room, pen and paper, or we’re doing an activity or, or some sort of learning experience there in the locker room. And those may take 30 minutes.

May take an hour. Typically preseason with most coaches, we will have one session a week during preseason up to about four or five weeks, and then they kind of stagger out. Maybe then it’s maybe one a month or, or once every other month. It just depends on the coach’s need and really their flexibility with the sessions.

I teach my graduate students in the field that this is not our team. This is the coach’s team. We are here simply to help him or her get the most out of their athletes, enhance the athletic experience. And so we are there at the. At the calling of the coach, at the need of the coach. And again, every coach is a little different.

Some coaches don’t mind me standing on the sidelines during practice. Some prefer me just to come around when it’s scheduled and, and we honor that. We want to be there to assist and help because at having been a former coach, I’m so busy with X’s and O’s. I, I don’t know if I really have a lot of time to deal with the cognitive which continues very much so.

Mike, I would argue it continues to grow and, and these athletes coming in collegiately with this generation are going to continue to express that need of more and more. I know I meet with a lot of athletes as well. Excuse me, not athletes, recruits, I meant to say recruits that, that might be visiting the campus.

And so now working with the coach and, and working with our athletic department to find times where they can just come in and I could share with them a little bit about what we do at C B U and how we offer the cognitive work within our athletic department as just part of the recruiting stops, similar as if they were visiting with academics and things like that.

Ho hopefully that kind of answers your question a little bit. There’s team sessions, individual sessions. It really just depends on the coach’s need or the athletic department’s need what they require. But, but definitely a lot of one-on-ones. I think that’s where the rubber meets the road for the athlete.

Because an athlete if I was meeting with a men’s basketball program, collegiate men’s basketball program just to pick on them real quick, the chances are, are very slim that any one athlete is going to raise their hand and go, yes, I’ve got a problem with that. They’re, they’re just not going to admit that in the group

They’re not going to admit that they’re not going to talk about that. They’re not going to engage in that. Now, maybe over the course of time as trust and rapport is developed with me as their cognitive coach, maybe we unpack and peel back some of the layers of that onion collectively in a group, and we grow within team dynamics that will eventually happen.

but the athlete themselves, him or her, is going to feel more comfortable having a one-on-one session because now they can address either what they didn’t want to say or what they need to elaborate more on or more personal attention towards a particular area of their performance. So you definitely get a lot more out of that athlete on a one-on-one basis than you typically do in a group setting.

But it really just depends. Again, every athlete is different.

[00:38:05] Mike Klinzing: All right. Let me ask you about the group setting. So when you’re working with a particular team and you’re going to set up and do a weekly session or a monthly session or however you set it up with the coach, is that something where you’re coming to the coach with, Hey, here’s something that I think is important for us to address.

Is it the coach coming to you saying, Hey, it seems like maybe some of our athletes are having an issue with this, or is it more collaborative where the two of you are sitting down and kind of planning it out together? Just how do you go about. Figuring out what the topics are that you’re going to talk with the different teams about in a particular session?

[00:38:41] Dr. Ed Garrett: Great question. You know, part of what I’ve done a little bit within what I do, I’ve done some marriage mentoring, and because I see the family as a team and husband and wife as co-head coaches, thank you very much. So understanding that dynamic, I see that same play of family, kind of the family systems, those that understand psychology, understand that terminology and how it plays within athletics as well.

So just like if I was sitting down like I sit down with my beautiful bride and we discuss what’s going on for that month or what’s going on for that week, and we all work together towards that. I do the exact same thing with a coach. I mean, so I will come in pre-season, off season and say, coach, what are your needs?

What availability do you have? And let’s begin to go from there. And I want the coach to understand that I am there to support, again, his or her vision, mission, direction for the program. And I will then be responsible for finding applications or tools or teachable applications and moments that support that vision or direction.

Sometimes the coaches just go, what do you think we need to start with? And not so much Klan, but it does give me the ability to kind of go, well, I’ve seen a trend this way, or I’ve seen this. And then at the same time, if I’ve done my job I’ve, I’ve been able to build a rapport and trust with a coach.

So that mid-season I may come in and go I’m noticing this. What if we did this session or what if we went this direction? And so a lot of times if I’ve established good trust and rapport with the coach, they’re open to that and open in saying, you know what, that might be good because I’m noticing it too.

And chances are the coach is noticing it. He or she just hasn’t had a time to either to vocalize it or communicate with me on it. And so therefore it’s kind of stayed in the backside, but then as I’m present, we have an open dialogue. The coach will typically go I saw that exact same thing, or, my coaches have been sharing that with me.

Yeah, let’s go ahead and tackle this topic. So I think anybody in the field of sports performance psychology, if they’re doing it correctly, if they’re working this profession, definitely make sure that they are putting the coaches’ interest of his or her program first, and therefore opening up a dialogue early in the preseason or early before season starts to say, what do you want to accomplish this year?

When do you need me? Where would you like me? Even with the coaches I have rapport on, I’m still yearly asking, can I come to practice? Am I allowed to be at games? What would you like? Even though I’ve already been doing it for the last five years, I still want to make sure that the coach is okay with that.

That they understand that I’m there, like I said, to support them. I don’t want to overstep my bounds. I don’t want to overstep my boundaries. And, and make sure that I’m there, like I said, at the discretion, at the calling of the head coach in whatever he or she has and their needs for that particular program that year.

[00:41:42] Mike Klinzing: All things being equal, let’s say that the coach is amenable to getting your input. What are, what’s a topic or two that you really enjoy talking with athletes about that you maybe have the most fun with that, that you really enjoy? Maybe you get the athletes to open up and you really get some good dialogue going.

What are a couple topics that you really enjoy teaching?

[00:41:59] Dr. Ed Garrett: I’m going to teach you one right now, Mike. Okay. And this is going to be interactive. And so mindfulness is the science of being in the moment. And so I’ll have athletes and I’ll give you an example. Okay? I, now, obviously we’re on a podcast here, but work with me on this.

So I’m assuming you’re wearing shoes. Mike, are you wearing shoes right now?

[00:42:17] Mike Klinzing: I am. I’m actually wearing some flip flops.

[00:42:19] Dr. Ed Garrett: Wonderful. What’s inside those flip flops? Some feet. There you go. There you go. And are your feet in yesterday? Are your feet in tomorrow? Where are your feet at, Mike?

[00:42:30] Mike Klinzing: Right now, my feet are right here in front of me because if I don’t listen to what you’re saying, this is going to be a really terrible podcast.  So I have to be right here.

[00:42:36] Dr. Ed Garrett: Amen. There you go. And so the point of that is what you just said right here, where your feet are, is where your mind needs to be. And it helps athletes understand they need to be in the moment. They need to be present. So much of athletics drifts into that strikeout they just had, or that missed shot they just had, or the worries of the travel that’s coming up or playing the opponent they don’t like, as opposed to taking advantage of the moment.

And so I will teach athletes, and I guarantee you, Mike, you’ll never look at your feet the same way your feet will be with you forever. You know, especially on the athletic field. And so I help those athletes say, Hey, if you find yourself, if you recognize your mind, drifting, spiraling down a rabbit hole, going in a direction that you know cognitively is not going to help you be any better, I want you to pause.

I want you to look at your feet. And I want you to remind yourself where your feet are is where your mind needs to be. That’s the science of being in the moment. And so the great thing about that tool, we’re all going to be wearing shoes when we step on the court. We’re all going to be shoes when we step on the field.

And where our feet are is where our mind needs to be. Not on the last play, not on the next one. Be present. And it takes practice, Mike, it’s not something that happens easily, but I guarantee you now with this small little tools, you’re driving around Cleveland as you’re driving or you’re going different places where there’s going to be moments where you’re going to catch yourself going, oh man, why’d I do that?

And at that particular moment, stop, pause, look at your feet, and let your feet be an application, a tool to remind yourself, be present. So I love helping athletes be in the moment. Enjoy the moment, which probably takes us back to your initial conversation with me in regards to that joy aspect.

They’re probably not enjoying the moment. I teach athletes all the time. You don’t have to go to practice. You get to go to practice. If you’re looking, I love movies and if you’re looking at the Rookie, Great Baseball movie and in that movie, and I don’t want to give away the cliffhangers or anything, but in that movie, as he is trying to make it through the minor leagues and wondering if he’s ever going to be a, a major league baseball player, he kind of gave up on baseball.

He wanted to go back and he saw a couple kids, young kids Rec league just playing and it reminded him of the love of the game and that it’s a game. And he walks back into the dugout, the locker room the next day and finds Brooks, one of his teammates, and he goes, you know what we get today? Today we get to play baseball, we get to be here, we get to be in the moment and at that particular moment you saw his game change, his demeanor change. And so I love helping athletes remember what that moment’s supposed to look like. And so that’s one of the things that we try to tackle is just be focused in the moment. The mind’s going to take you so many different directions.

Don’t let it thoughts come and go. Thoughts come and go in our mind all the time. It’s a matter of how long you live in those thoughts. Some thoughts we want to stay in longer. Some thoughts we need to learn to just let go and move on or be present in the moment. And so if I can help the athlete switch as that simple tool, Hey, be present, Mike, be present.

But I have to do this. Be present. Because so much of life goes unnoticed that not noticing becomes a habit. And that’s the challenge the athletes face. What did you just miss? It’s more about the journey than it is the destination. Enjoy today. Enjoy the moment. Be 1% better today than you were yesterday, and that will help you grow in the love of the game.

So that’s one example of just using the feet. We’ll use breathing techniques. There may be different things that the athletes write down trigger words. I mean colors, different things that can help the athletes stay present or emotionally where they need to be. So just different tools, but that feets always one that, that, that people probably appreciate because they can see that outside life, man, I’m going to fail this test.

Are you really, just because you failed the last one doesn’t mean you’re going to fail this one. Be in the moment, do your best you can with this test. Man, I’m stuck in traffic. Well, appreciate where you are right now as opposed to where you could have been or where you aren’t. I think worrying, we do so much as a society and we do it within athletics, but worrying is such a useless emotion.

We need to find ways to stay present more and enjoy our experience. That will give us the most out of the game.

[00:46:55] Mike Klinzing: I love that and I love it from an athlete perspective, and I love it. There’s another topic, Ed, that we’ve talked a lot about and. I know you’re at the college level right now, but I think at the high school level, when you start talking about high school athletes and you start talking about the parents of high school athletes, I feel like, especially on the basketball side of it, I’m sure it permeates other sports as well.

But I think there’s this feeling of, when I’m in fifth grade, I’m worried about am I going to make my middle school team? And when I’m in middle school, I’m worried about what AAU team am I going to be on? And when I’m on an AAU team, I’m worried about am I going to be a high school varsity starter? And then when I’m playing high school basketball, I’m worried about, well, am I going to be able to go to college and play basketball?

And everything is always about what’s next. And I think it speaks very completely about how you have to enjoy the journey. And I think so many people just sort of, I don’t know, wish it away is the right way, but they just don’t enjoy both from an athlete standpoint and from a parent standpoint. We don’t always enjoy that process of just, hey, you’re not going to get to do this for the rest of your life.

You only get to go through this experience once and to always just chasing what’s next. I feel like it robs a lot of athletes and their families of the joy, because they’re always trying to get to that next little goal, whatever that may be. And I think that that advice that you just shared to me would be invaluable for high school athletes and their parents.

[00:48:21] Dr. Ed Garrett: Oh, very much so. I mean, I do a lot of parent sessions and, and having been a parent of athletes I’m always pointing the finger back on myself. I think as parents we get into that mindset of, of the next LeBron James or the next you know, fill in the blank, the next superstar.

And whether we’re doing that through our own absence of making it that far as a parent living our dreams and goals through our children. There is a lot of that. Sometimes we rob our, our athlete, our child of those experiences of just enjoying the game because we do apply pressure.

Even at the collegiate level, I still counsel athletes at the collegiate level whose parents are still applying pressure. Not so much scholarship related, just, you should be starting over so-and-so. I hear those little things. I mean, it, it doesn’t stop. And so it is challenging.

I work with parent groups at club level, at high school level, just reminding the parents, and again, like I said, I point my finger back at myself, but reminding us that this is a joy of a journey. Stop focusing so much on the destination. What’s your child’s the superstar you think your child’s going to be?

If they are great. Okay. But have they enjoyed their experience? And so there is that challenge to bring the athlete back to the simplicity. You know, in softball, and I was just using this term, but they have a saying, see ball, hit ball, very simplistic see ball, hit ball, and, and trying to narrow it down to its simplistic nature as much as possible without over complicating things.

And so, yeah, it comes down to trying to find that joy, bring that joy back into why you do what you do. And so even at the high school level, as they start becoming a sophomore or a junior, or especially senior, am I getting recruited? Who am I getting recruited by? How many letters did I get?

How many letters did you get? Yeah, it’s unfortunately that recruiting process is a business. There’s companies that make good a good living off of recruiting kids to colleges and doing things. I don’t think that’s ever going to go away. I think you just have to be realistic. Athletics is still a game, even at the pro level, you know anybody in Cleveland, collegiately or professionally, it’s a game. Cleveland Browns, it’s a game at its simplest level. You know here in LA Dodgers, it’s a game. Yes, we want to celebrate the championships. Yes, we hope our team wins, but it’s a game and it’s entertainment at that.

And, so we need to be careful how much we push how much emphasis we put in that identity. Because every one of those athletes, their identity is going to fall apart and they have to be careful because it’s not going to be wrapped around that athletic experience anymore. And that’s a lot of challenge for these athletes, whether even the high schooler that’s going through and they think they’re going to make college, they think they’re going to make a D one program and they didn’t.

And then they start to question their identity, and they question their self-worth. And they question, well, I can go down a rabbit hole there, but they just lose a love of the game because they were taught at a young age, they need to be the next, this, this, and this. And not to diminish the drive and passion to do that.

I don’t want your listeners to go, oh man, again, we’re going back to the soft talk. No drive to be the best, drive to make the starting lineup, drive to reach that top level. Whatever level you want to compete at, that’s a goal and a dream. Do whatever you can to accomplish that. We need goals and dreams and a passion behind that, but we have to be realistic with it too.

When I’m recruiting working with athletes at the younger levels, I remind them hopefully you’re applying and looking at X amount of universities, not just one. and if you get a chance to get a scholarship, if you get a chance to play past your high school years, that’s a blessing.

That’s a gift. Enjoy it, don’t put a monetary value on it or don’t put a future career path on it. Take it one day at a time. Enjoy the experience. The true athletes that have made it to that next level that I’ve worked with, I’ve talked to they’re the ones that really love the game and they show that passion through it and it shows in the way they play.

So again, maybe that’s another podcast for another day. Mike . You can hear the passion in it for sure, but I mean it’s, at the end of the day, it’s a game. And are you enjoying it? Are you still having fun? I ask my athletes all the time, are you still having fun? And I want to make sure that’s still a yes because if it’s a no, then we need to talk.

What’s robbing you of that fun? Because it’s still a game. Does that help?

[00:52:59] Mike Klinzing: It does. What about with an athlete who gets to the point where they develop performance anxiety, and they just cannot, they cannot unlock what they’ve been able to do naturally for. Their entire life. What’s the process like with an athlete who forgets to do something that forgets how to do something that they’ve been able to do their entire life?

[00:53:22] Dr. Ed Garrett: Yeah. You know, the Yips are real in many sports. I mean, growing up playing baseball was always interesting to me. I was a catcher for many years and it never affected me. It was nothing I dealt with. But being a catcher, I’ve worked with catchers that would have the inability to throw back to the pitcher, and you’re just sitting there going, it’s the short distance.

I don’t get it. But those Yips are real, where something just  is affecting them or they go into a slump, slumps happen. For whatever reason, they just go into that. You know, every athlete is a little different with performance anxiety. And, and what I try to start with is figuring out where this came from.

Let’s get back to the roots of where this happened. Many times with the athletes, this probably isn’t their first experience with, with a slump or performance anxiety. They’ve dealt with it before. And so we’re going to work on trying to find a trigger or locate where that might have taken place, and then we’re going to start building from there.

How can we either use maybe something as simple as imagery or meditation or relaxation to quiet the mind, to bring them back to the simplicity of what they know how to do without complicating it? Letting the mind complicate it or pollute it with different things. It takes different time stamps or durations for each athlete.

Many times the athlete just needs to see a little success again and again. We may go back to the goal setting. Just see a little success to remind yourself, you can do this. You have done this. So that athlete that can’t hit, can’t do a lap anymore or can’t lay down a bunt anymore or can’t throw a pass anymore.

Well, were you able to do it before? Yeah. Have you done it before? Yes. Well, let’s start reflecting on those moments where we did grow it. Let’s relive that confidence, that emotions associated with the past successes, and let’s see if we can use that as a jumper cable to start invigorating a little more of a spark of, Hey, remind yourself that you can do this, that you have done this, and you will do this.

I think athletes that get into that performance anxiety or they get the yips or they start seeing slumps. They forget that they actually were able to do this just a little bit ago and they start to gain a lot of self-doubt, negative self-talk. They start to convince themselves that they don’t think they can come back.

And it’s at that moment hopefully as a cognitive coach, a sports psychologist, whatever at that particular point, that individual was able to come alongside and recognize it early enough to where we could start working with it. I had an athlete that was going through the Yips and reached out to me, but after counseling the first two or three times we found out that yips had been going on for four years.

Exactly. And at that particular point, I’m going, wow, this is not going to be a magic bullet. Just understand that this is going to take reps and time to overcome. What’s been implanted the neural pathways that have been implanted in the mind right there that, that have associated catching to I can’t throw just associated that.

And four years is a long time, but unfortunately that’s not that uncommon. I’ve seen that before. So hopefully if I’m connected with my team, I’m connected with the athletes, those are things that we can catch and be proactive of the minute it starts to show itself, and we can, we can head it off quickly and, and start to give the athlete different tools they can use that he or she can use in that moment.

And it’s going to be a progression. We ruin the athletes. It’s going to be a progression against the journey. It’s not yes to the destination, is you want to be able to throw back to the catcher without walking 10 feet in front of home plate and underhanding the ball back to the pitcher. I get it. But guess what?

That’s where we’re starting and then we’re backing up from there. So we’re going to go ahead and remind ourselves of what we were able to do, the confidence associated with being able to do that. So it’s a process. Every athlete’s a little different but there’s no greater joy than seeing that athlete finally, to be able to have that breakthrough and go, oh, that’s right.

I was able to do this and now I feel better.

[00:57:29] Mike Klinzing: Yeah absolutely. When you’re working with all these different teams and obviously your own athletic background, what’s it like working with teams that are involved in a sport that you played, you coached versus a sport that maybe you didn’t have much familiarity with?

Do you like it more or less? Just compare a little bit of, Hey, here’s a sport that I’m intimately familiar with, that I’ve played, that I’ve coached, that I know pretty well, versus maybe there’s a sport you’re working with where, man, I didn’t know anything about this sport before I got into it, and just how you approach that differently from a clinical standpoint.

[00:58:04] Dr. Ed Garrett: Well, I mean, the great thing about sport is it’s a language in and of itself. We have a wonderful counseling program and a counseling department here at California Baptist University, and they do wonderful things with the student population. But they’ve shared with me the challenges of working with athletes because athletes have such a unique language.

Another example would be the military. Military is a tough population. You need to understand that population. Definitely more from an empathetic than a sympathetic standpoint. I know what it feels like to lose, I know what it feels like to be hurt in an athletic context. I know what it feels like to be a starter and a non-starter.

So those are universal and it falls into athletics. Athletics is its own little club, its own little. And so because of that, if I’m able to speak that language and learn that language, I’ll give you an example. We are two time I’ve been blessed to work with the California Baptist University stunt program.

Stunt is an emerging sport off of cheerleading. It’s very competitive. It is very nail biting. It is incredible stunt. If you’ve never looked up collegiate stunt or I know a lot of high schools now have it and clubs have it. Please look up stunt. And so they did that in cheer and they kind of formed a new sport.

The NCAA has it as an emerging sport. Looks like it’s going to go through and it is very, very competitive. You compete against another team on the same mat together. And so it was a sport I did not know anything about. I’ve never been a cheerleader before. I’ve never been in that world. So I needed to make sure that I educated myself on that sport.

I watched YouTube videos, I studied language. I asked Coach and I had conversations with Coach asked terminology grew in the knowledge of that sport. At CBU, we are two time national champions in stunt looking to accomplish our third this year. I’m knocking on wood. I don’t want to jinx anything, but they’re doing quite well and, and, and so that’s one example of a sport that started to grow. And I was with it from the beginning when the store, the sport was introduced to cbu back in 2019, I believe. And so started to learn the language, developed a rapport with the coach, started to know the athletes, forced me to have to be around the gym more, understand, watch, observe not just YouTube and the internet, but really observe and understand.

I share this with my grad students. Get into those other sports that we may not know. I swam growing up, but until I got to CBU and started working with the men’s and women’s swim team, I didn’t know what taper meant. I didn’t know whether you breathe off the turn or not. I didn’t know what a dolphin kick was, though.

I didn’t know what the deck was. Those are just examples of terminology that I’ve had to teach myself and now becomes a common language. And so it doesn’t mean that I need to be the, the world’s best stunter or the world’s best swimmer. I need to know a little about a lot kind of mentality and, and so or a lot about, a little, excuse me, from that, however, the, however the phrase goes, I apologize.

I’m butchering it there, but basically I need to know, The terminology of the sport enough to start developing rapport and trust. And then of course, it’s up to me to grow more in that sport, in the terminology so I can continue that conversation and that journey I’m on with the athlete. So I always want to continue to do my homework the minute I kind of stop doing my homework in this profession.

That’s the minute I’m hanging out my clipboard, I’ll tell you that.

[01:01:37] Mike Klinzing: All right, Ed, I want to ask you one final two part question. Part one, when you look ahead over the next year or two, what do you see as being your biggest challenge professionally? And then the second part of the question is, when you think about what you get to do every day, what brings you the most joy?

So your biggest challenge and then your biggest joy.

[01:01:54] Dr. Ed Garrett: Wow. Great question. You’re going deep on me. Okay. You’re going Dr. Phil on me now. I appreciate that. I think the last couple years have really become the challenge in the sense that that mental health, understanding mental health really is a real thing.

I think that challenge is not having enough individuals in this field that can come alongside and help the performer. I just think especially within the field of sport and performance psychology, we may have kind of, and there might be those in the field that would agree with me that we’ve kind of hit a lull for a little while, not now, but prior to the pandemic, definitely with, we were kind of saturated with our field.

Most of the positions were kind of filled, but and we weren’t seeing a lot of individuals retiring or going the different direction. I think that’s changed. And so the challenge really is now post pandemic, which definitely brought mental health to the forefront. Really putting people in strategic places to help. Counseling centers are full. Our counseling center at California Baptist University is very full, has a waiting list, trying to get people in as early as they can. So there needs to be those, what I call gap soldiers that can step in and help maybe in specialties like sport, maybe specialties like the military.

In fact, I will say the military is one of the largest and fastest hirers of sport and performance psychologists in the nation. They understand that it is less expensive to bring in a sport psychologist or cognitive coach than it is to start to recruit a brand new group of a thousand cadets.

Because they want to enhance the performance. I work with the medical profession a university a medical university out here with their doctors and nurses and administrations to enhance performance. I’ve worked with CEOs to enhance the business performance. So I think the need is there.

It is not just athletically. And so the challenge is really being able to put those quality trained individuals that can step in as gap soldiers to fill those needs, whether it’s you know the business world or whether it’s the medical profession, or whether it’s sports or the military or performing arts.

So I think that’s one of the greatest challenges we have moving forward, which is why I think it’s a great time to get involved with a master’s program or a doctoral program, if that’s the direction you’re looking at going. Just because I think sports and performance psychology is really starting to take off. I, I’ve, I’ve said for years that every Power five in the United States is going to have a sports psychologist or a cognitive coach on staff. We’re getting pretty close to that now. And now you’re starting to see the trickle down to the, the D two s, the D three’s, the NAIAs the N JCCs see and, and then also the high schools.

You’re starting to see that. And so I think the challenge is going to be, are there enough individuals that are ready to step in and fill that gap? As far as joy I find no greater joy. Well, I love my family. I love spending time with them. So I’d be remiss to say I find no greater joy than just spending time with my family, which I do.

But professionally wise, being able to share the experiences that I have as a dad, as a husband, and then athletically combining the two, taking 30 years of experience in life. And really helping impact an individual that maybe wanted to quit give up was maybe at the end of giving it a shot.

Maybe contemplating, Lord forbid going down that road of taking their life or, or the challenges associated with depression and anxiety. You know, being able to come alongside that individual and remind them that they’re special, remind them that they can do this. Remind them that they have a purpose.

Their identity does not exist solely in their athletic performance or their talents that they do have a greater calling, a greater gift to give. And so when I’m able to come alongside and help that athlete, man, that just emotionally, it’s like nothing I can describe. You just know you made a difference.

And I think that’s one of the things that I can probably stress the greatest with your with your listeners, is finding a way to have a career, have a job where they’re able to help and serve and be able to help people be better versions of themselves if that’s what they want to do, and just be able to give back.

So I just love being able to take that knowledge and just help people grow and learn to smile and laugh a little more in life than what we currently do. So hopefully that’s a, that’s an answer you can tell. I’m passionate about what I do. I really enjoy using these God-given gifts to really just help people use the gift of sport, use the gift of performance to just continue to enhance their experience, enjoy their journey and again, maybe be able to make a difference in this world.

[01:07:08] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, without question. I think that’s well said. And you definitely, I can feel your passion coming through the mic without, without a doubt that we could tell that you love what you do and making an impact in the way that you do in a field that not everybody is, again, it’s becoming, it’s becoming, as you said, much more prevalent, but certainly is something that you can, you can sort of be on the cutting edge of, of what it is that you’re doing and be able to impact your athletes.

Before we jump out, Ed, I want to give you a chance to share how people can get in touch with you, find out more about what you’re doing, whether you want to share email or social media, whatever you feel comfortable with. And then after you do that, I’ll jump back in or wrap things up.

[01:07:50] Dr. Ed Garrett: Yeah I love to help and so does my university. In the department. If there’s anybody out there athlete wise coach wise, maybe even parent wise that would love to know a little more about this field of sport performance psychology, how it can be utilized, I never have a problem giving out my cell phone, giving out my email from that standpoint.

So, more than happy to share, share that with y’all. You can obviously locate me at California Baptist University, you can find me as a professor there. I enjoy that. All my information’s there. But simple email, egarrett@calbaptist.edu. The number you can reach me at is area code 601-667-9706 And again, if there’s athletes, coaches, parents listening to this podcast understanding the cognitive performance is key. And if you’re interested in enhancing your performance the joy you find in your performance, it definitely starts with a mind and works towards the body.

So you know, happy to work with anybody out there from that. And then if you’re interested in learning more about what we do within sport and performance psychology at CBU, you’re more than welcome to take a look at our bachelor’s or our master’s program and, and see if that’s something of interest as well, would happy be more than happy to connect anybody.

Talk to them about what our programs do and how we serve within the community as well, not just at CBU. We work a lot within the California community as well that we’re in Southern California. So again, an honor and a blessing to be with both you, Mike, and Jason in this on this podcast. Thank you very much for just providing a voice, a reminder that, you know what? Mental health is real. It needs to be talked about. We can’t spend the time as, as the good old boy coach is just rubbing it under the rug and hoping it goes away. It’s not going to go away. It needs to be discussed, and let’s utilize it to strengthen the way we perform, the way we enhance that performance, so that we feel better about ourselves and enjoy this journey that we’re all on together.

[01:09:55] Mike Klinzing: Ed cannot thank you enough for taking the time out of your schedule tonight to join us. Really appreciate it. Appreciate all the insights that you’ve shared with us tonight and to everyone out there, thanks for listening and we will catch you on our next episode. Thanks.