Leveraging Performance Psychology with a 3-time Gold Medalist

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Show Notes

#38: Gold medal olympian and entrepreneur Kerri Walsh Jennings joins Chris to discuss how she's optimized performance in her life and career. Specifically, she explains how she nurtures her body, mind, and spirit. They talk about why you should have range instead of specializing in specific skills, how self-awareness can change your perspective and your actions, and lessons from performance psychology that you can apply to your life.

Kerri Walsh Jennings (@kerrileewalsh) is a professional beach volleyball athlete. She holds the beach volleyball record for most Olympic medals - three golds and a bronze, has the most career victories, and the highest earnings of any female player. She and her husband Casey (also a professional volleyball player) started a company called p1440 built around the culture and sport of beach volleyball.

Selected Links From The Episode

Connect with Kerri Walsh Jennings: Instagram | Twitter

P1440: Website | Instagram | Twitter

Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized world by David Epstein

Seeking Health supplements

The Cold Plunge

Firefly Recovery Device

TENS Units for Pain Relief

Alpina Hotel in Gstaad, Switzerland

Full Show Notes

Who is Kerri Walsh Jennings? [00:15]

Experimenting with self-optimization. [01:37]

Expecting to be a pro-athlete since Kerri was a child. [02:38]

Generalization vs. specialization: which way should you go? [03:24]

Showing your kids your ambition. [04:47]

Having role models that are not exactly like you. [08:28]

How to make a living playing beach volleyball. [10:35]

Kerri ’s past side hustles. [13:12]

Getting 3 Olympic medals. [14:37]

Where do Olympians store their medals? [16:08]

Will Kerri Walsh Jennings retire this year? [16:37]

Winning for a whole year: how did she do it? [18:39]

How to sincerely be present in the moment. [22:00]

What’s more important: the mental or the physical? [25:56]

Lessons from performance psychologists that you can apply to your life. [27:30]

What is neutral self-talk (and how you can use it)? [28:40]

The secret to making positive self-talk easy. [30:49]

How you can train yourself to be self-aware and course-correcting in the moment. [35:35]

Kerri’s body-mind-spirit health routine. [39:46]

How to do a cold plunge at home. [44:27]

Winning a gold medal WHILE being pregnant (work-life balance athlete as a pro athlete). [46:41]

Life lessons Kerri shares with her children. [49:45]

The magical power of meaningful fatherhood. [52:42]

Travel tips and hacks from a pro athlete. [54:05]

Why Kerri started a company (p1440)? [57:05]

What athletes can teach entrepreneurs. [59:50]

Why you should document memorable moments every month. [1:02:31]

How to connect with Kerri and p1440. [1:05:12]

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