Peak Performer

Most people you meet and know are caught in linear time consciousness - the idea that we live along a line from birth to death and everything that happens is based on cause and effect. Someone must have made that thing happen; someone did something. And if that thing happened to me, then there must be a reason for it, either out there in the world or closer to home.
We think in terms of what happened yesterday or ten minutes ago and what will happen tomorrow. We regret or wallow in our past experiences, and we are pessimistic or optimistic about tomorrow. Regardless of our future outcome orientation, linear time is fundamental to our experience.
But what if time is simply a social convention?
Instead of being a fundamental aspect of reality, time merely allows us to count abstractions of reality like a ruler or weighing scales. In his 1979 book Disturbing The Universe, Freeman Dyson quotes Einstein: “People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.
The point here is that stress, anxiety, and even depression seem to be very closely related to our perception of and belief in time as a fundamental aspect of reality. Without time, there is no anxiety because tomorrow (and 10 minutes from now) doesn’t and will never exist. When it’s tomorrow, it’s now. The clock ticks on the wall, it gets light and it gets dark, and it’s still now.
Now is the only moment we have, and when we realise this – I mean, deeply recognise this truth – anxiety about what will happen tomorrow, or how we will be perceived by the audience, our clients, or our bosses, evaporates.
Controlling the controllable is recognising that all imaginations of disaster, all catastrophising about what will happen next is a waste of energy. It is a state of myopic obsession with thoughts. It is being in our heads rather than being in the game, in the moment. We are elsewhere and without presence.
The concept of “controlling the controllable” refers to focusing our energy and efforts on aspects of a situation that are within our control rather than worrying about elements that are not. This concept is grounded in various psychological theories and practices, particularly within stress management, cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT), and resilience building.
The idea is closely related to the locus of control concept, introduced by Julian Rotter in 1954. Locus of control refers to the degree to which a person believes that they have power and influence over the outcomes of their lives. People with an internal locus of control believe they have a significant role in shaping their life outcomes. They have a sense of autonomy and personal choice in what happens to them. They take responsibility and exercise choice regardless of the moment-to-moment outcome.
Those with an external locus of control attribute external forces such as fate, luck, or other people’s actions to the direction of their lives. This is not an either-or state, however (internal or external locus of control), but rather the degree to which we internally or externally attribute causes of personal life conditions.
“Controlling the controllable” aligns with an internal locus of control, as it encourages us to take personal responsibility for our actions and decisions. By focusing on what we can control, we may enhance our sense of agency and reduce feelings of helplessness and victimhood, which are often linked to stress, anxiety and depression (Seligman, 1975).
This Sunday at 9 pm, I’m holding a FREE 30-minute workshop on Controlling The Controllable. You can book your place here.
Slán for now, Larry


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Every Sunday evening UTC+1, you can join me live on Zoom for a 30-minute Mental Skills Workshop. I walk you through assessments and worksheets that I use with clients to help them develop the mental skills for life and work. Go here to get the Establishing Values Worksheet that I mentioned in the video. And go here to RSVP for the next Mental Skills Workshop.
About Values
Establishing Personal Values is the first step in the Goal Setting Process. Personal values play a crucial role in shaping individuals' lives and well-being. Psychological research supports the idea that establishing and recording personal values can lead to increased self-awareness, motivation, ethical decision-making, stress reduction, enhanced self-esteem, and more fulfilling relationships. These benefits underscore the importance of this practice for personal growth and overall life satisfaction.
When you become a member of The Mental Skills Academy, you get access to assessments, worksheets, course material and other free content. Open Membership is free, but you can upgrade to Pro or Pro+ to access coaching and mastermind sessions.



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Over the past number of weeks, we have taken a deep dive into the nine mental skills of peak performance. But performance is not only about objective achievement and attainment of reward and recognition; it is also about mental well-being. The nine mental skills we explored are;
* Mindset serves as the foundation, encompassing your fundamental beliefs about ability, challenge, and growth that shape how you interpret every experience.
* Motivation provides the energy for action and direction for sustained effort. It’s what gets you up in the morning and moves you through the day.
* Goals Setting creates the structure and accountability necessary for systematic progress. Based on your core values, goals provide the prospect of achievement.
* People Skills enable effective collaboration and influence, recognising that peak performance rarely occurs in isolation. It allows you to understand yourself and others.
* Thinking Skills involves managing your internal dialogue to support rather than undermine confidence and focus. It is how you speak to yourself on an ongoing basis.
* Mental Imagery harnesses your mind's capacity to rehearse success and prepare for challenges through vivid mental simulation. It is the preparation of your organism to perform at its best.
* Anxiety Management transforms nervous energy from a performance barrier into a competitive advantage. Anxiety is a natural occurrence, but how you interpret and respond to it matters.
* Psychological Flexibility represents the development to respond to challenging emotions in a way that maintains your effectiveness under pressure. It is to be malleable rather than rigid.
* Focus allows attention to be directed towards optimal performance without distraction and serves as the gateway to flow states where peak performance feels effortless and natural.
Get the full 30 Days of Mental Skills Series here [All Sessions]
The Mental Skills Basics Course
If you have been trying to achieve something but have failed. If you keep falling into the same holes and can't get out. If you've been struggling to get ahead for too long and want change, then this course is for you. In this self-paced course, you'll learn the mental skills of peak performance. (You’ll also get a free first draft of the book “The Mental Skills Handbook”)


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These final sessions serve as your roadmap for implementation of Mental Skills, providing a structured approach to developing these skills systematically while maintaining momentum through the inevitable challenges that accompany any meaningful change process. The journey from knowledge to transformation requires more than understanding—it demands deliberate practice, strategic implementation, and sustained commitment to growth. In other words, show up, do the work, and see positive results.
Your Daily Mental Skills Practice: An Evidence-Based Framework
To help you begin immediately, here's a structured daily practice that feeds the development of all nine mental skills while building sustainable practice habits. This program requires only 15 to 20 minutes in the morning and again at night, but creates the foundation for lifelong mental skills development. You can even use spare moments during your day to revisit some of these practices. Each component is grounded in extensive research from positive psychology, neuroscience, and performance science.
Your Daily Mental Skills Practice
1. Journal Daily
Buy a small black journal, size A5 is good, and write your thoughts daily. In the morning, before the demands of the day take hold, write in the present tense how you wish your day to go ideally. At night, write about how your day went. Be truthful about it–if it didn't go according to plan, say so. However, don't end on a negative note. If something didn't work out, find a positive aspect to that thing. Ask yourself, what did I learn here? What advantage can I take from this experience? Finish by identifying three things that went well today. No matter how shitty your day was, mine for the good. It’s there; you just need to see it. You've got to mean what you write–this is very important, because you can only move on from difficult conditions if you accept them for what they are. If you fall asleep on a negative tone, you'll wake up with it.
2. Meditate for 15 mins Daily
Meditate for 15 minutes, either last thing at night before you fall asleep or first thing in the morning before the day begins. Meditation helps you calm your nervous system and purge yourself of negativity. Meditation in the morning helps you “get out ahead of the day, so to speak. When you engage in meditation regularly, there is a compound effect that allows you to approach difficulty with composure.
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Meditation represents perhaps the most scientifically validated intervention for stress reduction and cognitive enhancement. Pascoe et al. (2017) reported that when all meditation forms were analysed together, meditation reduced cortisol, C-reactive protein (protein produced by the liver in response to inflammation in the body), blood pressure, heart rate, triglycerides (high triglyceride levels are associated with increased risk of heart disease, stroke, and metabolic syndrome) and tumour necrosis factor-alpha (produced by immune cells when the body detects threats or damage).
3. Monitor Your Thoughts
Human beings have a negativity bias, perhaps as an evolutionary survival mechanism, and so the inner critic is always waiting to pounce. So stay alert. When you catch yourself giving yourself a hard time, stop and ask yourself if your thoughts are true. Ask yourself, “is this accurate? It might be true, but am I so sure that it is?” Look for a counterargument. Ask yourself, what might be an equally plausible and less negative explanation for this situation?
Take time and tease that out. Understand that although these automatic responses may accurately reflect past experiences, they do not necessarily have to be true of future events. You have a choice, so learn to question these negative sentiments. You see, you've been conditioned by society and by your immediate environment to be hard on yourself–it’s supposed to motivate you, but it doesn’t, not for very long. Most of the time, other people are concerned for themselves and don't think that way about you. In fact, they don’t think about you at all, so treat yourself like you would a best friend.
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4. Mine for the Good
The world is shaped by our opinions, beliefs, biases, culture, and other factors. It trains us to notice threats even when our environment is overwhelmingly supportive. When faced with unsavoury conditions, acknowledge them and then look for evidence to the contrary. Ask yourself, what am I missing here? Where is the good in this? What am I supposed to learn here? Even when you are otherwise in good form, look for and acknowledge the good in your life. Be grateful for those ordinary, everyday things that make your life better, even though you regularly take them for granted.
As mentioned above, take a moment at night to reflect on three things you did well or that worked in your favour today. These things don’t need to be dramatic or stand out; they can be ordinary things that always go your way, but you fail to notice because it has always been this way. So instead of ignoring them, give them credit. Finish the day on a positive note.
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5. Visualise Daily
Most people go into their day on autopilot and end their day exhausted and relieved. They face tomorrow with the anticipation of “here we go again”. To a greater extent, they are not in control of their lives. The demands of life impress upon them, leaving them exposed to whatever comes their way. If we imagine at all, we tend to imagine things not going our way. We imagine all day long, often without realising it. What mental imagery asks us to do is see today and tomorrow as we would like them to be. We went into detail on this in chapter 7; however, it serves to repeat what research has shown us about the effectiveness of mental imagery conducted regularly.
How To Use Mental Imagery
* Find a quiet place where you won’t be disturbed. The location doesn’t matter once no one interrupts you. It can even be a toilet cubicle if necessary.
* Sit comfortably but upright, and close your eyes.
* Take three deep breaths, holding each one for a couple of seconds, and then exhale.
* See yourself preparing your equipment or materials. See yourself on the journey to and arriving at your venue or place of work.
* See yourself setting up or warming up in the space where you’ll perform.
* See yourself, either from your own perspective or from the standpoint of others watching, perform your task as you intend.
* See the crowd or the audience, see their faces and their positive response
Run through this as often as is necessary. All the while, remind yourself, either quietly in your own head or whispered to yourself, that you are well-prepared, you’ve done the work, you have the skills and experience, and you have the answers to problems as they arrive.
Trust yourself. Regardless of the outcome, you’re ready to go. See yourself perform your thing from start to finish and see the positive response you receive from others around you.
6. Technology Downtime
Don't bring your phone or other digital device to the bedroom. Leave them downstairs, or if you must have your phone for an alarm, make sure to turn it off and leave it out of arm's reach. Your mobile phone is a distraction device designed to grab your attention and keep it. This device, and all the applications that operate from and within it, is quite literally designed to capture and maintain your focus and attention. This is not good for you if you want to be effective and make good decisions.
Decide to make these tasks non-negotiable. Create a checklist and tick off these tasks every day. Set reminders in your phone for each task and make time in your day to execute them. You’ll be glad you did.
Mental Skills Basics Course
Suffering stress and anxiety is not a prerequisite for success in self-employment–there's a better way. Mental skills provide you with the means of coping effectively with difficulty and achieving your goals. I created the Mental Skills Basics Course to introduce business leaders, self-employed individuals, freelancers, consultants, and small business owners to the psychological and emotional skills associated with success.


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Have you ever been so completely absorbed in something that time seemed to slow down, speed up, or even stand still? You were playing a musical instrument, solving a complex problem, or engaged in a physically demanding activity and you then realised hours had passed in minutes. This is the experience of flow—what researchers call the pinnacle of human performance and the psychology of optimal experience (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). At the heart of every flow state lies one critical mental skill: present moment awareness.
Present moment awareness involves paying attention to current experience with an attitude of openness and acceptance (Bishop et al., 2004). Rather than being lost in thoughts about past regrets or concerns for the future, present moment awareness anchors your attention in the here and now. This isn't merely concentration—it's a broader, more flexible awareness that includes thoughts, emotions, bodily sensations, and environmental cues without judgement or resistance.
As defined by one of the leading mindfulness researchers, Jon Kabat-Zinn (1994), it means "paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgementally" (p. 4). This quality of attention creates the psychological foundation necessary for optimal experience to emerge.
Mental Skills Basics Course (Free)
The Gateway to Flow
Present moment awareness serves as the gateway to flow states because it directly enables several critical conditions that research has identified as necessary for optimal experience. When Csikszentmihalyi (1990) first identified the nine characteristics of flow, he discovered that each depends fundamentally on the ability to maintain present-focused attention.
Complete Concentration and Action-Awareness Merging
Flow requires what researchers call "complete one-pointedness of mind", where focus becomes laser-like and mental energy is entirely devoted to the task at hand (Nakamura & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). Present moment awareness creates this concentrated attention by training your mind to resist the pull of distracting thoughts and irrelevant concerns. When you're truly present, there's no mental space for worrying about other obligations or ruminating on past mistakes—all cognitive resources become available for task execution.
Loss of Self-Consciousness
One of the most remarkable aspects of flow is the temporary disappearance of the internal critic that typically monitors and evaluates performance. Present moment awareness facilitates this by reducing what psychologists call "cognitive fusion"—the tendency to become entangled with your thoughts and treat them as absolute truths (Hayes et al., 2006). When you cultivate non-judgmental awareness, you learn to observe self-critical thoughts without being controlled by them, freeing up mental energy for optimal performance.
Enhanced Feedback Processing
Flow states require immediate and continuous feedback to maintain optimal challenge-skill balance. Present moment awareness enhances your sensitivity to environmental cues and bodily sensations that provide this crucial information (Brown & Ryan, 2003). Athletes in flow, for example, report heightened awareness of their body position, breathing, and the subtle changes in their performance environment. This enhanced sensitivity allows for real-time adjustments that keep you in the optimal zone.
The Liberation from Linear Time
Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of flow states is what Csikszentmihalyi (1990) identified as the "transformation of time", where hours feel like minutes or seconds stretch into eternity depending on the activity's demands. This temporal distortion reveals a profound truth about the nature of psychological time that has critical implications for achieving peak performance.
Our conventional understanding of time as a linear, uniform progression is a social construction rather than an inherent property of reality. Clock time—with its rigid schedules, deadlines, and temporal anxiety—represents an artificial framework that we've imposed on experience. This becomes starkly apparent during flow states, when the usual temporal structure that organises daily life dissolves (Csikszentmihalyi & LeFevre, 1989).
Research into the neuroscience of flow reveals that this temporal liberation occurs because the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, which handles temporal awareness and cognitive control, shows decreased activation during optimal experiences (Dietrich, 2004). Simultaneously, the brain regions responsible for present-moment processing become more active, creating what researchers call "transient hypofrontality"—a temporary downregulation of the brain systems that make our sense of linear time.
To truly access flow states consistently, we must release our attachment to linear time concepts and embrace what might be called "experiential time"—the natural rhythm of engagement where duration is determined by the depth and quality of attention rather than clock measurements. This doesn't mean ignoring practical time considerations, but rather recognising that peak performance emerges when we prioritise present-moment engagement over temporal anxiety. When you stop watching the clock and start experiencing the moment, you create the psychological conditions where time can bend to serve your optimal experience rather than constraining it.
The Neuroscience Connection
Recent neuroscientific research reveals why present-moment awareness is so crucial for flow. Brain imaging studies show that flow states involve decreased activity in the prefrontal cortex—the brain region responsible for self-criticism and cognitive control—while increasing activation in areas associated with focused attention and reward processing (de Manzano et al., 2010). This pattern, called "transient hypofrontality," allows for the effortless performance characteristic of flow.
Mindfulness training directly supports this neural pattern. Research demonstrates that regular mindfulness practice strengthens the anterior cingulate cortex, which monitors attention and resolves conflicts between competing stimuli, while reducing activity in the default mode network associated with self-referential thinking (Katahira et al., 2018). This creates the ideal brain state for flow to emerge.
Practical Benefits for Peak Performance
Stress Reduction and Optimal Arousal
Present moment awareness facilitates a shift away from anxiety-producing thoughts about future outcomes or past failures, reducing rumination and worry (Jain et al., 2007). This stress reduction is crucial because flow requires a delicate balance between challenge and skill—too much anxiety pushes you out of the optimal zone into overwhelm. At the same time, too little arousal leads to boredom.
Enhanced Attention Control
Mindfulness training improves attentional control and sustained focus on specific tasks, as individuals learn to direct their attention intentionally (Jha et al., 2007). This enhanced attention control allows you to maintain focus even in challenging or distracting environments, a key requirement for accessing flow states consistently.
Cognitive Flexibility
The practice of present moment awareness fosters cognitive flexibility, allowing you to adopt alternative perspectives and interpretations of challenging situations (Chambers et al., 2009). This flexibility prevents you from becoming stuck in rigid thinking patterns that can disrupt flow, enabling more adaptive problem-solving during optimal performance.
Self-Compassion and Resilience
The non-judgmental attitude cultivated through present moment awareness promotes self-compassion, which supports overall confidence and self-acceptance (Shapiro et al., 2012). This self-compassion creates the psychological safety necessary to take the risks and embrace challenges that flow states require.
Cultivating Present Moment Awareness for Flow
Research by Moore (2013) demonstrates that mindfulness meditation enhances athletes' ability to access flow states by improving present-moment awareness and reducing self-focused attention. Simple daily practices such as breath awareness, body scanning, and mindful walking create the attentional stability necessary for optimal experience.
The key is developing what researchers call "attentional training" through mindfulness practice and concentration exercises (Nakamura & Csikszentmihalyi, 2014). These practices build the capacity for sustained focus that flow requires while teaching you to observe thoughts and emotions without being controlled by them. Equally important is learning to let go of clock-time consciousness during performance—allowing yourself to be guided by the natural rhythm of engagement rather than artificial temporal constraints.
Conclusion
Present moment awareness isn't just helpful for flow—it's essential. Every characteristic of optimal experience, from complete concentration to loss of self-consciousness to the transformation of time, depends on your ability to anchor attention in the present moment with acceptance and openness. By developing this fundamental skill through mindfulness practice and releasing attachment to linear time concepts, you create the psychological conditions necessary for flow to emerge naturally and frequently. In a world filled with distractions and performance pressure, present-moment awareness offers a reliable pathway to the transcendent experiences that represent the pinnacle of human potential.
Mental Skills Basics Course
Suffering stress and anxiety is not a prerequisite for success in self-employment–there's a better way. Mental skills provide you with the means of coping effectively with difficulty and achieving your goals. I created the Mental Skills Basics Course to introduce business leaders, self-employed individuals, freelancers, consultants, and small business owners to the psychological and emotional skills associated with success.
References


This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit peak.humanperformance.ie