The Art Of High Performance Psychology - Dr Michael Gervais

1. 0:00 – 0:30

   Intro

   1. MGDr Michael Gervais0:00

      I love this struggle. I think that this is materially important for people to examine their life and say, "What am I doing? Am I living in alignment with my capabilities? Am I truly front-loading and investing in the skills for this small 80 to 100 years that I have here on this planet? Am I maximizing the way that I would love to live?" (wind blowing)

   2. CWChris Williamson0:22

      Michael Gervais, welcome to the show.

   3. MGDr Michael Gervais0:24

      Uh, stoked to be here with you, Chris. Thank you.

   4. CWChris Williamson0:26

      Am I right in saying that you worked with Felix Baumgartner?

   5. MGDr Michael Gervais0:29

      You are

2. 0:30 – 9:52

   Working on Red Bull Stratos

   1. MGDr Michael Gervais0:30

      right.

   2. CWChris Williamson0:31

      That Red Bull Stratos thing was one of the most inspiring periods that I think I've ever seen. Can you tell people the story, how you got working with them and, and, and what happened throughout that process?

   3. MGDr Michael Gervais0:45

      It was... It's one of the most meaningful projects I've ever been on. So we can start by just level setting that, I think for everybody that was involved in this project, it was life-impacting. And so the origin story was, um, I was part of the Red Bull High Performance Program that was being built out at that time. And we're probably about three or four years into it. And, uh, I got tapped by the Head of High Performance, Andy Walsh. And, um, so he tapped me on the shoulder. He's like, "Hey, you know, the Red Bull Stratos program, well, it's, it's come to a halt." I said, "What do you mean?" And he says, "Yeah, you know, like we've been at this thing like three and a half years, and uh, Felix can't continue." "What do you mean?" "Well," he cried. And I'm, I'm not sharing anything, Chris, that's not public, okay? So let's be very clear about that. But Felix is in the airport- airport, and he's like totally broken down that he can't handle, um, moving forward because he's, he's just terrified. Well, it makes sense. You know, he was n- none, none of the, none of the teammates were investing in his internal capabilities. And so this is a project that's never been done before. Uh, hardened, crusty old dogs that, you know, really have been around as test pilots and, um, aerospace engineers and like just a hardened crew. And they built the capsules, the technology. They had the strategy dialed in. They had everything like to nails. And then when it came to the internal capabilities, what had taken place is that he r- you know, raised his arms like two years in, like, "Hey, my chest feels tight. I'm breathing kind of funny when I'm in the suit." And so the suit is a special customized suit from NASA that... A- actually, I don't know if it was from NASA, but it was a specialized suit that there was two of them. They're about $2 million each. And, um, "I just feel tight." So they said, "Oh, okay, we'll see if we can make some modifications in the suit." So, right, we go to tech and kit first. (laughs) Uh, he waves his arms again, uh, about two and a half years in and goes, "Still I'm breathing funny when I'm in the suit." And they go, "Right, let's get your fitness up." (laughs) And so, um, he was doing all the right fitness stuff and he's like, "This isn't it." Like, "I'm fit." And then so he comes back and he's like, "Right, uh, I can't do this anymore." Like, "I'm terrified." And so that's when they brought me in. And so, you know, he had developed, quote unquote, claustrophobia. And as adults, we don't just develop claustrophobia, but he had developed that. And they bring me in because this XX millions of dollars project, um, brightest minds in aerospace team, four years in of these minds and this money were now at a screeching halt because we lacked the internal skills of the person, the only person that was going to go to 130,000 feet and jump from the edge of space. When the brightest minds in aerospace were not sure if he passed through a double sonic boom, because he was definitely, well, most likely going to do the speed of sound, that his arms and legs would rip off. And so incredibly-

   4. CWChris Williamson3:56

      I can't work out why he would be-

   5. MGDr Michael Gervais3:58

      Yeah.

   6. CWChris Williamson3:58

      ... concerned. I have no idea why he would be worried.

   7. MGDr Michael Gervais4:01

      (laughs) And so, uh, so that's why they tapped my shoulder and they're like, "Hey, you want to get involved?" And I was like, "Wait, let me get this right. Um, the brightest minds in aerospace weren't sure, and..." "Yes." "And he's terrified." "Yes." "And there's a lot of pressure, a lot of money on the line." "Correct." "Yeah, I'm in." (laughs) Like, this sounds perfect. And I say that glibly, but you know, it's as simple as applying good science is where my craft begins and ends. And so the craft of high-performance psychology is really anchored in the storied traditions of science and laboratories that are re- that require, um, some noodling to make that laboratory science come to life in real world and certainly in high-stakes environments. And so that's where I enter the picture and we just worked from the inside out and, um, invested in that part of his capabilities and made some significant, um, investments. And, uh, the rest is, you know, the rest is history as they say.

   8. CWChris Williamson5:03

      Can you go through any of the techniques that you used with him?

   9. MGDr Michael Gervais5:06

      Yeah. Um, there's a documentary, it was a recreation documentary that ESPN+ did where we did... It was basically he and I going through the work that we did. It was really cool. It was one of the first things on ESPN+. Um, I can't remember the name of the, the name of the show, but it was really good. And a lot of this stuff is in there. But the, the essence of it is, uh, systematic desensitization. Flooding is also, um, a- a more common term in psychology. And so it's taking systematically the, um, the acute stressor, the thing that you have some sort of fear or panic over, and then working backwards to be able to bite size, digest or metabolizing the smallest amount of fear relative to that panic. And then laddering up, laddering up, laddering up. (clears throat) And the way we do that is first you figure out what the thing is that somebody's afraid of.And in this case, we couldn't work from a managing fear, we had to work from extinguishing fear, which is a totally different ballgame, right?

   10. CWChris Williamson6:12

       Why is it fear?

   11. MGDr Michael Gervais6:13

       Well, managing fear is like, I'm working with it, but in that level of hostility, we need to extinguish it so that he knows that he has completely worked. He... Okay, I'll take it in other terms, like, managing the fear of holding a snake if a snake is the thing, versus like, "No, no, listen, I'm good with the snake." So that's what extinguishing the fear looks like in more pedestrian language, for example. And so we had to work from that place. And so first you work in your imagination, and then you work in low-stress environments, and then you work in, um, rugged, and then you work up into hostile. And so the way that we did that was imagination, then, uh, the suit alone on the ground, then the suit in the capsule on the ground, having to manage the oxygen, um, gas exchange. Because if you get that exchange wrong while you're in the suit in a capsule on ground, that's one thing, you open the door. But if you're up above a couple thousand feet, we got problems, and he was going 130,000 feet. And then we did it in a pressurized capsule, where, um, it's j- it's- it's not the real thing. It's still rubber bullets, but, um...

   12. CWChris Williamson7:25

       Stakes are higher.

   13. MGDr Michael Gervais7:26

       Stakes are higher, you know, for a lot of reasons. And so we just gated that, um, and the best part of this story, Chris (laughs) , was, like, uh, th- the crusty old dogs, you know, like, God love them, they were sitting around a table when I first got introduced to the team. And, um, they're looking at me and they're sizing every part of me up. And then one of the old dogs kind of, kind of pushes his chair back and he goes, "Okay, Dr. Gervais, no disrespect..." and I'm going, okay, here comes the disrespect, right? (laughs) And he's, and he looks and he goes, "I've been doing this a long time. Never seen anybody come back from this. No disrespect, but we are not gonna have blood on our hands. And so I don't know what you're gonna th- do, what you think you're gonna be able to do to convince him..." and I was like, "Okay." Um, "... but the stakes are way too high, and I'm not into it." And then so you look around the table and there's, like, six other, again, legends in the field of pilot testing and- and aerospace, like, nodding their head, like, yep, that's right. (laughs) And so I go, "Yeah, me too." And they're like, "Well, what are you gonna do?" I said, "Well, what do you need to see for you to know that he has the capabilities?" And they- they said it, "He needs to be... He can't, he can't be in this suit for more than 30 minutes without, like, hitting the panic button. He needs to be in it- in it up in space, near space for six and a half hours, up to six and a half hours. So we gotta see that." "Great, no problem. All right. Sounds like a reasonable goal. Let's go to work." And so, um, if we couldn't do it, you know, on land for six and a half hours, why would any of us want to send him up into, you know, the hostile environment of- of the edges of space? So that was the, that was the mission, um, and it, this is not a stunt. This was something that actually had... The reason bright minds in aerospace were invested is because if we are going to get off this planet, if we need to, that we need to also understand what happens to the human body if we need to press the eject button at around 120, 130, 140,000 feet. Can the human body withstand that type of free fall? And so the answer is yes and no, but we needed to understand that, um, for the future, uh, of space travel.

3. 9:52 – 14:55

   Clashes Between Old & New

   1. MGDr Michael Gervais9:52

   2. CWChris Williamson9:52

      Rory Sutherland, vice chairman of Ogilvy Advertising, he says, "Silicon Valley sees everything as an optimization problem." What he means is that (clears throat) when you're looking at, um, reducing the number of passenger complaints during security at London Heathrow, they were talking about how can we narrow the aisles and speed up the number of security checkers? Uh, and Rory came in and just added 30 minutes from here, 45 minutes from here, 60 minutes from here, wait things, and it- it, 90% of the, uh, complaints went away. What I'm seeing similarly in your situation was that a lot of the engineering problems were focused on first, and the inner workings, the- the human psychology side of Felix, was kind of left to be spit- and sawdusted into operation, right? Like, grit your teeth and we'll get through it type thing. And I think that it's a really, the reason that I wanted to hear about this story is, it does feel like the meshing of two worlds. At around about the time that this is happening as well, right, you know, a sport like rugby, which now is a full-on professional sport, only 20 years ago when England won the World Cup the first time, uh, that, i- i- the- the guys would have jobs on the side. These dudes wouldn't be full-time in rugby, and if they were full-time, they'd be drinking, they'd be going out partying. So yeah, to see old world clashing with new, uh, I think we're seeing this in marketing and advertising, in consumer, uh, behavior and behavioral economics, in sports psychology, performance, music, all this stuff.

   3. MGDr Michael Gervais11:26

      And you're right on the money, is that the idea is that, um, that I was nodding to earlier that you picked up on, is that for whatever reason, when we're thinking about high performance, the people who set that table, it was set 40 years ago. And the avant-garde coaches and, you know, principals were like, "Yeah, psychology is important, but, um, put that at the end of the table for right now." Like, "We'll keep a chair there," but, you know, and those are the progressives. And they were curious to have good conversations about the psychology of the performers, but never implemented in a s- systemic way. And now what we're seeing is that chair is sitting, like, right next...... to the head coach or GM or president, vice president, CEO in meaningful ways about, okay, our, the thing that makes us special is the way that we work. It's not necessarily the widget when we're talking about human capabilities and human potential. Whether it's big business or big sport, it's the, it's the humanness of it and the ingenuity that comes from that. So, that doesn't la- yes, the environment's really important. There's two ways we work, inside-out and outside-in. And if we're over-indexing on outside-in, technology, you know, um, environmental conditions, which are all really important, but not watering or hydrating from the inside-out, those companies that do that, massive, ma-

   4. CWChris Williamson12:52

      No, they've got the competitive advantage, right? This is, this is the beautiful thing about looking at a sport or, um, having a, a, a chart in music, you know? You can see. The outcomes are there. The people that have the best per- um, performance based on their preparation are the ones that are going to perform the best when it comes to game day.

   5. MGDr Michael Gervais13:12

      That's exactly it. Yeah. And whether it's sport or business. Um, and right now, it's really fun to take a look at what's happening as, from this lens is, is that The Great Resignation is basically people saying, "I'm not working like this anymore. Are you kidding me? Like, I, I don't know my kids, you know, because I'm working 8:00 to 10:00 every day, and I'm trying to cram in a few hours or few, few minutes for dinner and wake up and drop off and tucking in." And, like, "No. I'm not doing this anymore." And that resignation is basically hand waving to say there's a better way to do life, and the leaders of company and the leaders of sport that are able to say, "Wait a minute." (laughs) Um, "The extraction model is busted. Let's get into the unlocking business." And that's where I'm placing my efforts, is to, you know, people are saying, "I, no, no, no, I can't give any more. I'm tired. I'm fatigued. My stress level is beyond, and I'm working my ass off for this thing, but I need, I need some kind of reprieve." And then what happens next year is like (laughs) new, uh, in sport teams, it's like younger athletes, more interesting contracts happening. In business, it's, um, you know, we got a 20% growth arc, you know, year after year. It's like, wait a minute. (laughs) And so, which is all good. I mean, those things are really part of the competitive landscape, and if you don't invest, and we call it front-loading, if you don't front-load the psychological skills, those stressors happen, the demands of the moment take place, and people go, "I, I, I, I actually don't have the goods to stay the long game here."

4. 14:55 – 24:13

   Determining Capacity

   1. MGDr Michael Gervais14:55

   2. CWChris Williamson14:55

      I find it very interesting, someone asked me a question the other day about, about front-loading discomfort and working out what your tolerances are, and (clears throat) Jordan Peterson had the same insight that working out how hard you can work in your 20s is a great way to be able to determine your capacity later through life. Because it's almost like you've pushed your limits so hard that you know where the sweet spot is, but it's still sometimes difficult for people to work out whether they are slowing down because they're leaving something on the table and they're selling themselves short, or whether they're slowing down because they're genuinely close to burnout. How do you advise the people that you work with to distinguish between the two, leaving it on the table and selling themselves short, or, "Dude, you're, you're nearly about to have a breakdown. You n- you need to back off the gas."?

   3. MGDr Michael Gervais15:42

      I think it's yes and. I think it's both of those and one more that I'll add, which is most, there's, like, 15 things I want to say to you, but most, most people do not have an accurate understanding of what the edges and staying at the edges feel like. So that deep, nauseatedly focused effort and attention at the edge and, and being able to stay there for longer than you thought possible is how we build capacity, psychological, physiological, spiritually. And so most people don't have that understanding because, one, it's overwhelming, and two, it is exhausting. And so in this conservation of energy, we know that the edge is where we want to get to, but we're not sure how much other expenditure we're gonna have on ourselves throughout the day or the years, so we play it safe and small. And so to, to the earlier insight about the 20s is where you go to the edge, I would say, yeah, I like that idea; however, it's when you get this right, which is run to the edge, stay there longer than you thought possible that you could, and by the way, people can do a lot more. Like, honestly, people can do a lot more than they think. And then you recover intelligently, and in that running to the edge and recovering intelligently, there's, there's a physics to that that we can talk about. Every unit of stress for unit of recovery. But where the physics breaks down, and this is why I love psychology, the beautiful science of psychology, is that it's invisible. And when we run to the edge and we're returning to high ground for recovery, the, the amount of, um, energy that is spent on maladaptive or, uh, thinking patterns that don't create vibrancy is a problem. So it's like we're running, uh, we're running to and recovering from with a leaky bucket. But when we invest in our psychology, not only just to dance at the edge of stress, but the climb there and the retreat back, we need that bucket to be rock solid. So, what am I saying? The way that you think matters. And unless you do a deep investigation in how you think and how you feel and how thoughts and emotions work together, uh, it just gets really...... tiring. And because it's the leaky bucket experience. And so, that's why I get really excited about this beautiful science of psychology, um, for sure.

   4. CWChris Williamson18:17

      What does that look like in practice? Someone coming back to their recovery appropriately.

   5. MGDr Michael Gervais18:22

      Well, the- the physics of it, like what- what are the activities of recovery or the- the returning back? The thinking.

   6. CWChris Williamson18:29

      Their- their thinking patterns.

   7. MGDr Michael Gervais18:31

      Yeah. Yeah. So, um, it's as simple as, "God, that was great." You know? Like, "Holy shit, I did some stuff today now. I can't wait." You know? Like, "I'm one step closer to being the human I want to be, and this is- this is flat out, this is what I'm doing." You know, it's so, it's like mapping your thinking patterns, and those are just squibby little examples, but it's matching your thinking pattern with your purpose and the vision that you hold for yourself. And then- and then if you can have clarity of your guiding principles, your first principles in life, your philosophy, if you will, and I'm not throwing around words sloppily, purpose, philosophy, and vision are materially important and separate ideas. And if you can have those three held close to the heartbeat of who you are and you're nurturing those with every micro-decision you have, oh man, I mean, that's the type of alignment that creates the flywheel that most people are looking for.

   8. CWChris Williamson19:31

      Why do you think it's important to have a personal philosophy?

   9. MGDr Michael Gervais19:35

      It's the guiding principles. So, a personal philosophy is that simple. It's like, what are your first principles in life? And it is the way that when you're clear about it, and I can give you a couple examples in a minute, when you're clear about it, choices and micro-choices become clearer. And so here's a- here's- let's do Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Okay? Let's- we could do Gandhi, we could do Mother Teresa, we could do Helen Keller. We could go on and on with examples. Let's do Dr. King though, is that we know his philosophy because every room he went into, his thoughts, his words that he would use to express those first principles, his thoughts and his actions were lined up towards equality, justice for all. And it would be a surprise if that wasn't what he was gonna talk about at dinner. And so that- that mechanism is that he had clarity, and that's why there's no rival. There's- there's no competitor for introspection. There's no competition when it comes to the investigation and sometimes the interrogation to look deeply within and become clear about first principles. And once you know those first principles and you can hold them close to the heartbeat, close to the sun, uh, you know, your essence, then- then the choices that you make become so much easier. And y- you d- it's not like you don't wander off, you know, and make some wild choices and mistakes or whatever and- and like lose your way from time to time, but there's something to bounce up against. And for a long time that's what religion held for many people. It's what the AA community holds for people. And it's also something that we can each do as a family, we can each do as an organization, and we can each do as an individual. What are your first principles? And if you don't know 'em, oh, man, it's (censored) . And I'm competing against you, I love it. That's great. (laughs) Let me take you out to deep water. You just don't know you're about to get drowned, right? Because you don't know your first principles and you're gonna be flailing your arms with the stressors that come from the deep water and people that know, like, "Hey, deep water is where I- I find myself. Like, deep water is where I go. Like, that's what we're trying to do here, but I'm gonna do it in this way. I'm not gonna grab your ankles and hold you underwater. That's not how I'm gonna do the deep waters, but I'm gonna swim next to you faster than maybe you think." You know, like, I'm being silly here, but like that's the idea of- um, of knowing your first principles.

   10. CWChris Williamson22:12

       Practically, how would people develop their first principles and their philosophy?

   11. MGDr Michael Gervais22:15

       Go to work. No one can do it for you, right? Like this might be a meditation process, it might be a written down process, uh, but you've got to get it out of your head for the most part. So, nobody can do this work for you. Um, when you know it, you know it. And so my challenge to folks that I work with is like, start with pages, then get it down to 25 words. Then whittle it down to maybe just a handful of words or a sentence. Um, I mean, Jesus got it down to a word, right? Love. Buddha got it down to loving kindness. Okay, those are pretty cool. Uh, Dr. King got it down pretty simply, right? Justice (laughs) . You know? I mean, equality. Like- like what... It's not that complicated. Like, what do you stand for? And then your purpose bounces off of that. And we know the Science of Purpose, right? I'm sure you and your community are really clear on the Science of Purpose, just how powerful that is, but you can't make this stuff up. You can't borrow somebody else's purpose. You can't borrow somebody else's philosophy. You might be inspired by it and go, "Oh my God, I love that." And then it's got to become metabolized for it to be yours, and then you become the animation of that. And when you are the animation of that, everywhere you go you become one of the most powerful people on the planet because most people don't do it. Most people are not true. The- the tuning fork is not accurate. It's off pitch, because what most people are doing, Chris, is that they are looking to the outside world for confirmation of the- their internal experience in life. So they're outsourcing, "Am I okay? What do you think? Does that seem okay? Does this look okay? Are we okay?" (laughs) You know, it's this constant mechanic... N- not mechanic, but mechanistic way of seeing if you're okay is checking into the micro-expressions and the body language of others.

5. 24:13 – 34:14

   Dealing with Elite Pressure

   1. CWChris Williamson24:13

      Speaking of that, you work with some very high-profile performers, a musician whose show makes millions of dollars a night or top flight athletes going for world championships and medals and stuff. How do you advise them to deal with the pressure of other people's expectations and opinions? Because we all feel this-

   2. MGDr Michael Gervais24:31

      Yeah.

   3. CWChris Williamson24:31

      ... but we're now talking about the people that feel this as much as it's probably possible to feel this.

   4. MGDr Michael Gervais24:37

      Well, we're working to dissolve it. We're working to dissolve pressure and kind of change that game. And so, pressure, for most people, is the experience of, "I need to think or do faster than I think I can do," you know, and it's kind of that simple. It's like this wall's closing in around me, whether it's mental, emotional, or physical. And so there are ways that, when you invest in your psychology, you can dissolve pressure. It doesn't mean you're going to dissolve it and extinguish it like we were talking about that particular fear earlier, but it is possible to do that work. So, um, how do you do that? You become very familiar with how your thoughts and emotions work together. And I have asked this question thousands of times to NFL draft picks, to just about, you know, every guest on the Finding Mastery podcast, is, "Where does pressure come from?" And world's best, hands down, over and over again, say the same thing: "From within." Okay. (laughs) You know? So then, how do we, how do we create an internal structure that you're working to master that? And most people say, "I like intensity. I like the way it feels to be on the edge, but sometimes it gets the best of me." Oh, okay, so we're not actually trying to, like, remove stress from your life. We're actually trying to amplify it purposefully and have all of the internal skills to map up against it so that you can get free. You can play, you know? You have the space, the internal space to be able to, um, eloquently adjust on the razor's edge of something that is consequential or rugged or, you know. Pressure is, um, is a bit of a luxury as we've come to learn. So, being able to eloquently adjust in those environments is really cool. That's the mark of mastery.

   5. CWChris Williamson26:37

      One of the things that I see a lot, patterns that people tell me about, is that as they're growing, as they're developing, they start to feel more lonely. So, a lot of self-work and personal development is done in solitude, and it takes you further away from the thought patterns which help you to connect with the people that you used to know as well. What's your insight there? What's your advice to people that are struggling with that loneliness as they start to level themselves up, as they start to go further?

   6. MGDr Michael Gervais27:06

      You got it. You're on it. There's a dark side to high performance. There's a dark side to exploring your potential. There's a dark side to mastery. I feel like we're not quite ready as a community to completely talk about that, but, um, loneliness is one of those tenets. And it doesn't mean it's bad. It doesn't necessarily mean that. It can be as the dark side, but there's a yin and yang to all experiences in life if you can pull way up and see the perspective. But how do you expect people to relate if you're the only person that has summited Everest? Like, how, how do you? How... I mean, there's a, a lack of words to describe those colors that you saw and the smells that you experienced and that level of feared fatigue. And so here's the, the... Loneliness is a, is a problem, but what happens to most people is that they come from their summit, you know, and they return back to the average because they want to be part of something. And so it's that inner struggle. It's a civil war. Do I go back to the summit and be alone and have that sense of isolation, or do I stay here in the comfort of my loved ones? And yes, physically there's... The metaphor will hold up, but more importantly it's emotionally and mentally. And so, I love this struggle. I, I think that this is materially important for people to examine their life and say, "What am I doing?" (laughs) "Am I living in alignment with my capabilities? Am I truly front-loading and investing in the skills for this small 80 to 100 years that I have here on this planet? Am I maximizing the way that I, I would love to live?" And we haven't touched the surface yet. We haven't really scratched it. There's so much more to go. It's so... But you have to be willing to touch the dark side and, um, know how to stay in it longer than you thought possible.

   7. CWChris Williamson29:32

      What are some of the other prices that people pay that we might not know about?

   8. MGDr Michael Gervais29:36

      Yeah, there's an agitation and a scratchiness. Um, there's a loneliness, like we talked about. There is a, um, there's a- an expensive part of it, because not everyone fi- reaps financial rewards to be able to be an explorer of themselves or, or the edges of the human experience. There is a- a- an agitation that comes with it because it's hard to solve it. It's like weaving a tapestry, and I don't think it's a puzzle because a puzzle suggests that, like, there's borders and edges. But it's more like a tapestry that's being sometimes scrapped together and sometimes thoughtfully put together that is materially important. And so that's hard to do.There's a resourcefulness required that other people may have not been able to see how to pull ideas and people and- and- and structures together. So there's, um, there's a lonely work and an aloneness. Those are two separate things. And nobody does the extraordinary alone. So, there is an aloneness. There is a loneliness, but it's too complicated. We need each other. And I'm talking about human flourishing in whatever capacity that you might use your imagination, could be sport, business, family, whatever, is that to align people in- in the unique way to create that two plus two is 22, not four, that- that to be able to do that is hard because you've gotta open up, literally open up the, um, mechanisms that most people work from, which is safety. You gotta open that up. And when you do that, I mean, it's- it's amazing, but those are some of the difficult, you know, and then you've got time constraints, money constraints, you've got other constraints that are normal for all of us. You got risk and rules and so on and so on.

   9. CWChris Williamson31:33

      One of the main tensions that I keep on seeing at the moment is between a fear of insufficiency being used as a driver and a desire for more being used as a driver, filling the hole, the void with accomplishments, uh, and that can... It- it's really, it's- it's nefarious, right? Because it still can be an intrinsic reward. It can still be an intrinsic driver. It's not necessarily something that you're getting from other people, but it's driven by a fear of insufficiency as opposed to a desire to maximize yourself. And this is a conversation that I keep on having with people that I know that are high performers, that if you dig down deep enough, there is a kernel of running away from something that they fear, as well as running towards something that they want. And the, um, relative ratio of those two, and oftentimes is a- a huge indicator of their quality of life and how much they enjoy their pursuits.

   10. MGDr Michael Gervais32:27

       Very cool, because in, there's two things when you say that that resonate. One is in 1980, 1990, early 2000s, it was about, you know, being your best, but that, you know, self-help industry, but the thought wasn't completed. It's for what reason? What reason are you investing in you? So that you can help others do the same, and so it's your best so that you can be a, um, you can create a rising tide for others. And so that's where we start to get into the- the- the more ancient and forward-thinking at the same time parts of humanity. It's- it's to create the rising tide. And then the other piece that, when you mention that, is that I think... This is gonna sound really simple, but it's the relationship you have with experience that's at the center of this whole thing of life. It's the relationship that you have with experience. And so it's nothing outside of you changes you. It's only the way that you work with that experience, your relationship with it, and your relationship with it is met by the quality of your philosophy, your unique philosophy, by the- the quality of your internal psychological skills. And we haven't- we haven't invested here yet. As a- as a nation, as a- as a humanity, really, we have not invested properly here. So, the relationship with experience is materially important, um, when we want to oversimplify what we're trying to do here.

6. 34:14 – 43:35

   Working with the Seattle Seahawks

   1. CWChris Williamson34:14

      What did you learn from working with the Seattle Seahawks about coping with intense emotions? It's a very intense sport. They've been to the absolute top of it. That's something I think as well, that people wish that they had more capacity with. Something very intense happens and they want to be able to deal with it.

   2. MGDr Michael Gervais34:30

      Yeah. Um, (laughs) you know, like being there, I was with the team for nine years and we got to win a Super Bowl and lose a S- Super Bowl, both dramatic (laughs) , both amazing. And, um, emotions are, let's start like kind of at the top, like emotions are one of the very special parts of being human. There's a difference between emotions and feelings, right? So emotions are the physiological structure of the way that you interpret something, and feelings is the way that those physiological, um, experiences are, uh, take place. So, the feeling of something and the emotions are related but separate, and it's- it's a unique quality that we have as humans to have this part of our experience be absolutely germane, and we're not very good at it, especially like the sandbox I grew up in was like, "Hey, suck it up, kid." You know, like, "Are you crying? You're not crying, are you? What are you doing? What? Come on, get it together, dude." You know, like, it was like a different sandbox than the way that I- I want to play now, which is like, "Yeah, I'm fucking feeling it. What- what- what's the problem?" You know, like, I want to feel everything with my wife, with my son, with my coworkers, with my partners. Like, I want to feel everything. I don't want to just be happy. I- I mean, do you want anything, uh, like just to be muted? Because we got a range of emotions and happy is just one. And so when you ask about that, the- the idea was to, at the Seattle Seahawks, is to invest in their inner life so that we have range. And when you know you have range-... you can go freely into all environments. And so, if you don't have range, or like, I don't have range in basketball. I, I played, you know, a little bit here and there and whatever, but if I'm going to go ... UCLA is known for, one of the universities in the States, they're known for great pickup basketball games in the summer. Um, greats and, you know, like Stephen Curry and, and, and show up in this gym. And I don't know if Stephen is still playing there, but like greats would show up and play. I don't have that range. I can't just say, "Hey, give me the rock." Like-

   3. CWChris Williamson37:09

      (laughs)

   4. MGDr Michael Gervais37:10

      ... but I might be able to go to a local place and play some pickup, but I don't have the range to go freely. But what's wonderful about psychology is that when you invest, you can go freely anywhere, and most people don't have that range. So much so that they show- (laughs) we show up to a dinner party and we're nervous. (laughs) We show up to give a speech, God help us, it's the number one fear for humans. Why would giving a speech be so dangerous? What do you think, Chris?

   5. CWChris Williamson37:39

      Well, I think ancestrally, it's because if you were to perform in front of the tribe and you were to mess up, that would lower your standing. Status is one of the key, uh, indicators of your success for reproduction and survival. If you do something stupid in front of the chieftain and 50 people around the campfire, then you look dumb. I think that's why it's wired into us.

   6. MGDr Michael Gervais37:59

      That, yeah, amen. And if you get kicked out of that tribe, we got problems, right?

   7. CWChris Williamson38:05

      Yeah.

   8. MGDr Michael Gervais38:05

      You know, and so that- it's the modern day saber-toothed tiger, if you will, is what other people will think of us. Fear of people's opinions, FOPO as we call it. And so, FOPO is, like, the number one constrictor of one's potential. It's easy to work with.

   9. CWChris Williamson38:23

      Do you think, do you think that, uh, it's fear of other people's opinions as opposed to fears of insufficiency that come from internals?

   10. MGDr Michael Gervais38:30

       Yeah. Yeah, I think we externalize it. Uh, I think that internal game that we're playing, that we're not enough, is built on not enough based on what?

   11. CWChris Williamson38:40

       For who?

   12. MGDr Michael Gervais38:41

       Yeah, right. And so, this moment right now is all what we get, you and me. Like, this is it. It's pretty good. It's fun. You're creating space to, to play, you know? Like, this is good. And so, if I'm performing for you, then I've probably got problems. Like, and there's a chance that you run the risk of not being good enough by your judgment, or I run the chance of that. But I think that's the game most people are playing most of the time, and so ... because it's hardwired. Our ancient brain is trying to survive, and modern day stressors are different than the ancient stressors when the brain was forming. And it hasn't changed much, the brain, but modern day environmental conditions have changed dramatically, so that we're playing an old game.

   13. CWChris Williamson39:26

       But we still have the same stress response to the saber-toothed tiger or to the chieftain that might kick us out of the tribe and we'll end up being homeless, to giving a presentation at work that almost everybody in the room doesn't want to be there for in any case.

   14. MGDr Michael Gervais39:41

       E- exactly, that's the problem. It's the ancient brain's response to a modern stressor.

   15. CWChris Williamson39:45

       Unfit for purpose, as it's called.

   16. MGDr Michael Gervais39:47

       Yeah, there you go. Unfit for purpose. What does that mean? I've, I've never heard it.

   17. CWChris Williamson39:51

       So, it's just a misalignment, right, between- it's Adam Hart's book, Unfit for Purpose, which was about how we're maladapted for the modern world, uh, a-anything that's hypernormal stimuli, right? So, you know, dopamine system, great, really good. Tells us that we need to go and get things. Dopamine system plus the world's best algorithms and a phone in our pocket, perhaps not so good. You know, hunger pangs, great. It means that we don't run out of fuel. Hunger pangs plus, uh, auromorphically-designed perfect fries from McDonald's, not so good 'cause there's obesity epidemics and stuff like that.

   18. MGDr Michael Gervais40:23

       Not good. Yeah. Yeah. I-

   19. CWChris Williamson40:24

       Um, so you do, you do have these, um, misalignments between what we're built for and what's happening.

   20. MGDr Michael Gervais40:29

       Very cool.

   21. CWChris Williamson40:30

       Um, one of the things that I think- that I really appreciate about your work is the, um, bifurcation between experiencing something, emotion, and what that means to us and how we interpret it and how it impacts our story about ourselves, thought patterns, performance, all of that sort of stuff.

   22. MGDr Michael Gervais40:49

       Mm-hmm.

   23. CWChris Williamson40:49

       Can you explain your, um, philosophy around this, around separating out what it is that our emotions tell us from how it impacts us and the way that we actually show up?

   24. MGDr Michael Gervais41:02

       Yeah, I, I think the ... Thank you. And the sensitivity is not necessarily separating them out, but we can try to decouple them for clarity right now. But let me, let me slightly pivot it to, to this idea, which is ... it's gonna hopefully relate to ideas, is this idea that we need to do more to be more. We need to do the extraordinary to be extraordinary, and that's a model that many of us have swallowed. And best in the world are waving their arms saying, "Mm-mm, I need to be more. Be more present, be more authentic, be more grounded, be more creative, be more," and let the doing flow from that place. And if I have that alignment, then, then it fundamentally flips the whole thing. And so, you're- so that's a framework that introduced, to answer your question, which is, um, the way that we experience anything is fundamentally related to the way that we think about ourselves, our future, and the experience. Now, who's responsible for that? I am. You are. You know, for your own experience. And if you can get clear on how you want to experience anything, the whole game gets easy. Like, honestly, it gets ... You know, like, so often we are unclear and then unskilled.... so somebody cuts us off and we respond. Okay, well, that response that you have, for me, that response that I have, if it's like a fight or flight, is a great moment to go, "Oh, look, I'm down in the animal part of my brain." Like, "What is happening? Well, I'm pissed off about this, that, or this. Okay." So this is my thinking pattern, as well as the alertness required to have to potentially swerve. Okay, so just because I've got this alertness on that I need to swerve, does that mean I should now automatically go into anger and flip somebody off? Because we don't know if they're late for grandma's funeral, we don't know what's up. So, you know, it's like using your internal cues to be able to better understand how to be more present, how to be less A, B and C, and more A, B and s- um, D, E and F, I guess. And then if we can be more and let the doing flow from that orientation, I'm going to say this again, that too is part of mastery.

   25. CWChris Williamson43:34

       I

7. 43:35 – 55:19

   Approaching Emotion with Curiosity

   1. CWChris Williamson43:35

      had a, uh, weird run-in. Uh, anger is an emotion that I very, very rarely feel, right? Um, for whatever reason that might be. Had a really weird run-in about a month ago, and it- I- I got angry, and it's such a bizarre emotion. It's kind of like, to me, it felt a lot like, um, eating a food that I've maybe only tasted a few times in my life. So I've got this emotion that arised inside of me and I was like, "Holy shit. Like, this is what anger feels- uh, this is what whatever tastes like, sriracha or some shit. This is like what- this is what it feels like."

   2. MGDr Michael Gervais44:10

      (laughs)

   3. CWChris Williamson44:10

      And uh... (laughs) Sriracha. And that was- uh, uh, the- the point that I'm making is curiosity, to me, seems to be such a solution to a lot of this. And this may be me retrofitting something that I find is a solution to a lot of problems, curiosity, just getting interested in what the outcome might be, um, but a lot of my friends that I know who are curious and who are genuinely interested in what might be on the other side of something, they have an impending breakup. It sucks. I don't want to- this is going to be an awkward situation, whatever, for me and whoever I'm with, for a while, but I'm genuinely interested to see what it's like to experience these emotions. And I think that this is what you were saying, which is, if you restrict yourself to just happiness or whatever, that's like restricting yourself to just one food type. You know, not every food type might- i- be good. It's like people eat hot food that's n- not necessarily great. And I don't know how far I can take the food analogy, but my point is that the- the range of experience that you have, the opportunity that you have to experience all of these things, in retrospect, is going to be beautiful the more broad that it is and the more three-dimensional that it is. And I think getting genuinely interested and curious about how it is to experience all that stuff is a pretty good fix for a lot of things.

   4. MGDr Michael Gervais45:26

      Hmm. Uh, I'm nodding my head, like grinning, like, yeah. I mean, 100%. So, wherever your mentorship of that idea took place, you know, maybe go back and thank them, because that is, um, the unlock. That's the keyhole to be able to, in a healthy way, detach, but not be aloof, but to be curious and watch. And there is- there's- there's an art to this though, which is, if you're constantly just being curious of the experience and not actually experiencing it, then it's a mechanism to save yourself and provide distance from the intensity of that heat or that em- emotion, and so people around you won't really know you because you're not in it, in a way. You're observing like the researcher, you're not actually part of the experiment. And so there- it's materially important to not be the mountaintop observer, but to be down in the city as well. So there's times when we want to observe and be curious, and there's times where we're like, "Hey, fuck, let's go." And so it's- it's having both of those things, um, as a, uh, what's the word I'm looking for? I want to say, like, it's a recipe, but it's not quite it. It's being able to do both of those that's materially important. And it sounds like your history- you've got a history of mindfulness. Thank you.

   5. CWChris Williamson46:49

      Yeah, I've sp- I've spent a lot of time doing it, which is great. And I've said, my friend Corey Allen, f- twelfth ever episode that I did on this show, he used a term called the m- he calls the mindfulness gap, which is the best way that I've described it. A brief beat in between stimulus and response. Call it whatever it is that you want to call it. If all that I ever get out of mindfulness training is the fact that I've got a mindfulness gap, the 1,000 sessions plus that I've done have been completely worth it. The fact that something happens and I'm not at the mercy of my programming around how I respond to it. Now, I might be after a beat, but I get to glimpse the brief interlude, right, between the two. Um, what you just said is very, very interesting. The fact that-

   6. MGDr Michael Gervais47:35

      Is it as good as the mindfulness gap? (laughs)

   7. CWChris Williamson47:37

      No. No. Nothing's as good as that, Corey. Corey, you won.

   8. MGDr Michael Gervais47:40

      (laughs)

   9. CWChris Williamson47:41

      Um, what you said was that people who get curious about the process, people who are, um, introspective, who do self-work, who are, um, interested in their own internal experience, right, that can come- that can become its own crux a little bit. That can become its own problem because it takes you out of experiencing the moment, and this flows forward into people who can't get out of their own heads when they perform, that I think there is a tension between cognition and intuition, right? I'm thinking about a thing, I'm feeling doing a thing. How can people pull themselves out of cognition and more into intuition or presence or whatever you would say?

   10. MGDr Michael Gervais48:23

       I think you're- I think we're talking- I think the answer is exactly what you would imagine it to be, is, it's a issue of courage to feel the thing, and the courage is because you might unravel.... you know, and that takes that vulnerability of unraveling is, is, um, you know, back to the ancient brain, like, there's a cost to that. And there's also a gift, which is, like, "Oh, there's a limit? (laughs) Okay." Um, and so it's t- the courage to go in and kind of shove the oars, if you will, into- inside the boat and be like, "I, I gotta ride this." And the fact that you, like, you know, turn it for just a moment that you didn't know anger and I, I, I was like, "Wow, how does that happen," you know, that you wouldn't know anger. Like, I, I, I wanted to go back to that. Like, how do you not know anger or not know it well? Like, I think you would have an unlock here that I'd love to learn from. So, I say vulnerability, like, you gotta go for it, that courage. And then how would you, how would you answer it?

   11. CWChris Williamson49:32

       So, the reason that I think anger doesn't seem to come up for me is that it, it gets split off into other types of emotions. So, um, self-blame, uh, would probably be one of those that would come in. So, you know, anger mi- something that might make somebody else angry, I would probably end up, um, maybe feeling self-resentment for. I would be like, "Look, you could've done, would've done, should've done better than that at whatever this thing is. That's why. It's your fault." Uh, and I'm working with my current coach, Vinny, on, um, where that voice comes from, right? Like, what is it?

   12. MGDr Michael Gervais50:08

       Yeah, yeah. So that would be actually a, um, a cousin to external anger. You know, internal anger would kinda have the same velocity, but you're s- it's a slight cousin to it, which is like, "Well, you should've." You know what? What is wrong with you? Like, Jesus, is that, is that really all you got? You know? So it's not like a- an aggressiveness in anger, but it is still gonna hang.

   13. CWChris Williamson50:30

       Yes. Yeah, so that would be, that's one way. And I mean, there's, there's probably, you know, it's one mechanism that I've maybe managed to identify.

   14. MGDr Michael Gervais50:36

       Yeah. (laughs)

   15. CWChris Williamson50:37

       And there's, there's probably, like, a million, a million more that I'm totally unaware of. But it is interesting to think that... Uh, and I was talking to a friend, I was playing disc golf the other day. It turns out... Dude, have you ever seen how seriously people take disc golf?

   16. MGDr Michael Gervais50:50

       Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Mm-hmm.

   17. CWChris Williamson50:51

       It is insane. They've got caddies, they've got one of those roll-on things with a million different discs in it. So I'm playing disc golf in Austin with my f- with my friend, and, uh, we were talking about this, and he said that anger is a- an emotion that he feels s- fairly rarely as well. And it just blows my mind that we can go through life having kind of like a set of blinkers on one side of the human experience, and that there's this, this, this bit over there that we don't really tend to see, or that we, we transmute it into something else, self-blame, right? You know, or self-doubt, or, or unhappiness, or whatever. Um, it's fascinating.

   18. MGDr Michael Gervais51:30

       Yeah, I think it's, I think it's great place to explore because, um, we... Anger is a secondary emotion, so one of the things I work on, I, I, I only have a couple clients I work o- on or work with a month, and then the rest is like the, the beautiful science of psychology at scale, right? To try to move as many people that, that want to be moved. And so, (clears throat) when I'm working with an individual, one of the things that we must spend time on is how do emotions work for you, and if we're gonna l- limit one of the core primary ones, we got problems. But, but anger is secondary. It's not a primary emotion, so it comes in response to either something around fear or something around sadness. So, when you're hurt, that's, like, on a sadness scale somewhere, and if you're scared or afraid, something there. Those are so difficult to deal with, and anger is so much easier. So, at some level, you're, you might be working at the primary level, but if you're, if you got that funny little offshoot around the subtleness of turning that anger inward, then it, then I would recommend that you go into the fearness of it or the sadness of it and explore those, uh, at tilt. And, um, you might find that (laughs) you want to do anger more. (laughs)

   19. CWChris Williamson52:57

       Yeah, y- you get this better outlet here, yeah.

   20. MGDr Michael Gervais52:59

       Yeah.

   21. CWChris Williamson52:59

       Are you right in, am I right in saying, is it fear, sadness, disgust, something else, something else? Is that the primary ones-

   22. MGDr Michael Gervais53:06

       No.

   23. CWChris Williamson53:06

       ... or is this a different model that you're looking at?

   24. MGDr Michael Gervais53:08

       Yeah. No, there's, early research was, um, you know, it was, it was seven or eight, and then we're starting to find there's, like, 256 emotions. And so I make it really simple. I say four. So I go, okay, and this is part of the work, right? Like, like, let me ask you, what would be the four primary emotions if you had four scales, and each scale you could go up five and down five? So, a scale of 10, and the up five would be, like, the most of that thing-

   25. CWChris Williamson53:40

       Mm-hmm.

   26. MGDr Michael Gervais53:40

       ... and then the down five would be the least, but it still hangs on that same scale?

   27. CWChris Williamson53:44

       Well, if you've said, uh, sadness on one end, I have to presume that there's got to be a- an opposite to that, so something like happiness on the other?

   28. MGDr Michael Gervais53:53

       Yeah. Sa- so sadness is a scale, and put that at a five, and then a 10 would be, like, grief, depression, you know, way up there. Right?

   29. CWChris Williamson54:00

       Yes, yes.

   30. MGDr Michael Gervais54:00

       And then happiness, good, that's a second scale. Third is?
8. 55:19 – 57:43

   Future of Performance Psychology

   1. MGDr Michael Gervais55:19

   2. CWChris Williamson55:19

      What's the future of performance psychology for you, if you could predict the next 10 to 20 years?

   3. MGDr Michael Gervais55:24

      There's gonna be a swing to, um ... it's happening now. There's a swing to it, which is awesome. I mean, there's an incredible investment. And it's going to get confusing, you know, at scale, because there's all types of range of skill around from scientists and practitioners around, you know, how to invest from a psychological perspective, uh, for humans. And then we're gonna try to, um, technologicalize it. Technicolog- (laughs) what's the word?

   4. CWChris Williamson55:55

      Whatever that is.

   5. MGDr Michael Gervais55:56

      We're gonna try to put technology around it, um, which will be good and an advancement. We're gonna see, as a third, um, string to this, we're gonna see VR come online in an important way around emotions. And it's gonna return also back to some ancient roots. So we're gonna have modern science, we're going to h- and there's gonna be some interesting offshoots of that. There's gonna be, um, range of investment of what psychology really looks like, and then we're gonna have some ancient traditions come, come back online. So what the future looks like, um, bright and big, and a seat at the table for, um, human potential. And I think that it's gonna be an exciting time for people to invest in this part of their life. And so relationships are gonna get better with self, with others, with the planet. And if we don't get those three right, we're gonna have a shitty experience here on the Earth. And then the last is relationships with machines. So that's at the center of the purpose of the company that, um, that I'm working to build, is building those relationships with all four of those. We're gonna have the smartest machine, smarter than the smartest human in nine years. And so if we treat that thing like, like another, if we treat it like it's gonna take over and we're afraid of it, and we don't properly nurture the relationships, EQ is gonna be solvable at some point for machines. If we don't have the right relationship with that, and they are that much smarter, they understand intelligence from both emotional and, uh, cognition, you know, we got, we got problems. And so we'll see. We'll see how this goes.

9. 57:43 – 58:36

   Where to Find Michael

   1. MGDr Michael Gervais57:43

   2. CWChris Williamson57:43

      Michael Gervais, ladies and gentlemen, if people want to keep up to date with the stuff that you do, where should they go?

   3. MGDr Michael Gervais57:49

      First, thank you for creating the space, Chris. Very cool. I, I, I haven't kind of blabbed about this much of, (laughs) you know, my stuff for a long time, so thank you. Um, findingmastery.net, that would be the place to go check out like what we're trying to, what we're trying to do for psychology at scale. Um, you can also, all of, all of the social handles are @michaelgervais, G-E-R-V-A-I-S.

   4. CWChris Williamson58:15

      Dude, I appreciate you. Thank you.

   5. MGDr Michael Gervais58:17

      Thank you, Chris.

   6. CWChris Williamson58:18

      What's happening people? Thank you very much for tuning in. If you enjoyed that episode, then press here for a selection of the best clips from the podcast over the last few weeks. And don't forget to subscribe. Peace.

Episode duration: 58:36