The Mind Coach Behind Team GB & Ronnie O'Sullivan on Mental Resilience | Prof. Steve Peters

0:02So it's never too late to start saying I'm going to understand my mind, how it works, and I'm going to learn these skills. Never forget, once you've got more than two problems, you're not going to make it. Once we put things down and say, right, there's six things we're going to address, there's a sense of relief. You can't build resilience. Your mind is 100 % resilient. And maybe I should have put that. You're 100 % resilience. How do we stop resilience from failing?

0:31That is the voice of Professor Steve Peters, and this is High Performance. I'm Jay Comfrey, and as we head into 2026, there is no better time for this conversation because today we sit down with Steve Peters, the man behind some of the greatest sporting minds of our generation from Chris Hoy to Steven Gerrard, Ronnie O'Sullivan, the Liverpool Football Club, British Cycling, England Rugby, the list goes on. They've all worked with Steve to unlock their potential. But here's what's extraordinary about this episode because Steve doesn't just work with elite athletes. The tools that he's developed, the chimp paradox is a model that's transformed millions of ordinary lives and it's all based on hard neuroscience that applies to every single one of us.

1:14So prepare for today's episode as we deep dive into how your mind actually works, why difficult conversations feel impossible, why you sabotage yourself and most importantly how to change it all. Steve is about to break down the three systems in your brain, explain why your beliefs from childhood might be holding you back and he also offers us the stone of life what he calls the ultimate mind stabilizer so if you're heading into 2026 wanting to understand yourself a little better to finally crack those patterns that keep holding you back this is essential listening as we welcome to high performance professor steve peters

1:56steve welcome to high performance thank you for inviting me you've been described as the secret man behind some of the world's most successful people when you first work with someone what's the most important thing that you need to know about them from the off what they want and sometimes people don't know what they want or they give me something that they say i want this and then when you get into it it's actually something different so from my perspective it's being able to get inside someone's head and then when i get in there's the way i operate it's not for everyone I get inside their head and then I see the world the way they see it with the main key factors in it and then usually, because it's obviously not an overly happy world I work in as a psychiatrist, then you realise what's wrong and you want to get out so then you think, okay, these are the things that are really impressing me and then you feed back to the person, which is how I work and then we say, right, what will work for you?

2:50But I don't have a fixed process what I do is it's more the model I use is to give you the tools to do what you want to do. I'll give you some insights and question, is it this? So I would say to people, I sit the same side of the table as you. If you work with me, we work together and we explore your mind. That's how I do it. And I think a lot of people will see your name or see your CV and click on this episode because they think, actually, there is something that I'd like to unlock, but not everyone can get access to you. Are we able, and this requires real honesty from you as well, are we able to sit here for an hour or an hour and 20 minutes and actually have a conversation that will allow people to do some work on themselves afterwards?

3:30You can, because there's generally, when I do like public speaking, which is always a privilege, in the audience, when I first started, I asked people, what did you actually get from that? Because I needed feedback to know, obviously I have no idea. And it shook me a bit to think, everybody picks something different up. And then I realised, well, you just got to throw things out and if it resonates, people will pick them up. If it doesn't, they'll just pass by it. So I'm not too worried, but you try and keep it fairly general. As we said just off camera, my difficulty always with this is I ask for like five tips for the listeners, and I can't do this.

4:07So I always try and say to people, don't ask me to do that because I don't know what's a tip for you until I get to know you. And it may be exactly the opposite from working with you. And think, you know, so the answer is I can give generic things, you know like for example um know what your values are because we know that look and i'm a nerd i don't like to admit that uh but i'm a nerd who has to read to make sure i know what i'm doing rather than someone who's interested i am interested to learn and use this with people the research indicates simplifying it that uh if we know our values and we live by them you get peace of mind and there's nothing else gives peace of mind so it's a frequent thing that people ask me for is how do I get peace of mind and I say well you've got to go on your values when you go on your values and you monitor them which I make people do work and they start learning to do that they'll say yeah at the end of the day I look at my values and that settles me down completely.

5:06Well maybe we should start there then if someone's listening to this and they go right I need to find my values how do people go about doing that? I think there's lots of different ways it gets confusing because if you go on the internet you'll find that people define values differently but so I'm going with what I do and it's to say that a value is a moral stance with a behavior that's attached to it and what we're going to do is measure your behavior so for example nearly everybody says respect others you know there's not many people don't say that and when they say respect others and I ask well how would you do that they don't know you know because it is hard to say and so I give them ideas of saying one key one is to listen to people.

5:45So when you meet somebody, listen to what they have to say, feedback so you've understood. It doesn't mean you have to agree, but that actually empowers the person and it's respecting them and it's respecting the fact that they've got an opinion and you're willing to listen to that and understand it. So if you do that, my experience is if you measure that, people say it not only makes you feel good because you've got, you're living out a value, you know you're respecting now, it's not just in the air, but also they said you learn a lot because people tell you things you weren't really expecting or didn't actually appreciate.

6:17So what are the other common, you said we can speak here about generic factors, what are the other common challenges that you help people face? I think I'm going to go on what I've just said, because one of the common things I find is from neuroscience point of view, we can't deal with multiple problems. Our brain just does circle. So we just keep moving from one to the other without solving anything. So But going back to what I said, when I meet you at first, I'd like to get a piece of paper and say, write down all the things that you want to solve, all the problems you've got, whatever they are, just put them all down.

6:50And it can be current problems, things that haven't been processed in the past, worries about the future. Once you've got them all down, you'll feel a sense of relief that suddenly it's not endless. But if you've even got normally about three problems, your mind won't deal with it. It just moves one to the other. It never actually moves forward. Why is that? Because it's not able to process the information. So when something's in your head, we know if you talk, you objectify it, you move outside. So for example, expressing an emotion accurately. If you said, I'm angry, and it's not actually the emotion that you're really giving, and I'm saying, is it more disappointment?

7:29And you think, ouch, it's a better word. Then we know from research done that once you've given it a name, it's an entity, we can now start to process it. if you don't express it or express it accurately then your mind is still trying to tell you that's not the right word or I can't find the word so it just keeps going trying to find a word so the power of therapy is the fact that we talk out and on the model I've used of the mind is our human, our different system listens to what we're saying which is why sometimes when we talk we'll say stop that's ridiculous because suddenly we've expressed it and we're able to process it and put it into context or perspective, whereas in your head you can't do that.

8:10I'm going to ramble now, but I did a charity conference a long time ago and I tried to get this concept over and I live out in the wilds and there were a lot of apple trees and fallen apples, so I took a lot of apples in and asked them to juggle just to stop doing heavy academic work. And I could see the puzzle, I said, there's a reason. And everyone could do two apples, most people couldn't do three, nobody managed four, and I know they're probably the juggler, which they exist. and I said that's how your mind works never forget once you've got more than two problems you're not going to make it your mind's going to start stressing and going round and round now there will be exceptions to the rule but my experience has been once we put things down and they say right there's six things we're going to address there's a sense of relief because now we have a plan which is what the brain is looking for and can we get that sense of relief without sitting down with someone like you like can we do this at home yeah you can do it yourself I think it helps because, again, we're diving in a bit, but simplifying all the time, but the brain wants someone to understand us.

9:14We're built to be understood. When people don't understand us, our brain gets quite agitated. So if somebody gets where you're coming from, just one person, you get this, right, I'm okay now. So again, talking out with someone who can tease it out of you and say, yeah, I get this, can help on that aspect of what the brain needs. Whereas if I do it myself, say, and I write out all the problems, it can work. So some people can do it. But most people like someone to heal them and then acknowledge that. I really like the example you mentioned there, though, about taking an emotion and exploring it for the subtlety.

9:53We had a guest on that spoke about feeling jealous of a competitor. And then when she explored it, she wasn't jealous. She said she was envious because she wanted that and she felt that was more empowering. That's a brilliant example. So again, that's the kind of thing that might come to the door where you're listening and you challenge this. The reason we're not moving on is it's the wrong word. And then when you explore that, when we look at envious, I would push again. I have no idea who this was, I don't need to know. But I don't know where it's going to go, but I come underneath the envy, what's underpinning that?

10:23And sometimes it can be a feeling of low self-esteem, for example, and the idea that if I achieve something, that will give me the self-esteem, which we know doesn't work, because you just dismiss it and you've achieved it. It's very rare that you hold on to it and say, I'm so proud of this. You get unsettled to think, well, that was yesterday. I've even had Olympians saying, well, everyone's got an Olympic medal. So, you know, which obviously isn't true, but that's the way your brain works. It normifies what you've actually achieved and then usually dismisses it. Again, there will be exceptions.

10:58Would you just tell us more about the self-esteem thing? Because that I can imagine is quite a common challenge that lots of people have of dealing with low self-esteem. So I'm going to go again neuroscience because that's my background. So wearing my hat as a doctor, I'd be saying, right, let's look at what your brain is doing. And as you know, I invented this chimp model. And the reason I brought that in is to say, you've got to recognize there are two different systems operating. This is clear. so one of the systems here is meant for survival it's not an advantage to have high self-esteem because if you have a high self-esteem you leave yourself very vulnerable so having low self-esteem you're much more vigilant to potential attacks so actually it's an advantage to have self-esteem but it's not helpful it's not helpful so what i say to people is we're not going to lose that we're going to say right we'll challenge the low self-esteem and say what's its purpose and we'll replace it with something much more rational so we move systems and then we start seeing right how would you measure self-esteem and what you'll find is generally the reason we've gone into survival low self-esteem for protection is we're looking externally to see what we've achieved and what other people think of us rather than moving system which is it's not about other people it's what i think of myself and we're back to values and then suddenly self-esteem rises because it's not based on achievement, on possession, on what other people think.

12:25It's based on me and the way I'm conducting myself and living my life. I think what would be really useful, Steve, if you wouldn't mind this, would you tell us about how we can spot when we're in the chimp system and then you talk about moving it to the human? So how do we do that? The rule I always use, which works usually, is to just say, do I want this? Do I want to rely on what other people think for my happiness? so once I've got that question and nearly everyone says no and I say okay there's an alternative and that's own your own happiness so it's a skill now this is your difficulty so let's say my chimp brain would be concerned about what you think I'm saying and is it coming over well so my chimp would now naturally do it but then that's giving you my happiness so many many years ago as a psych I thought I'm going to have to be balanced myself if I'm going to help people.

13:20So I worked on myself. And these were epiphanies I had that said, you know, as long as I keep looking to you for my happiness, I'm in trouble. Because it only needs you to make one comment and I'm down. So I decided, no, there must be where I can take my happiness back and that's what I worked on. But that was a skill. It didn't happen overnight. And I'd have to check myself and think, hang on, you're giving them your happiness again. And then have to say, what do you want? I don't want that. That's a chimp trying to say I rely on you. to keep me in the troop. I want it to say I'm not in a troop.

13:52I'm not in the jungle. I'm a human being in a society and I own my happiness. So that skill had to be worked on. And you have to continually do it. It's a bit like getting fit. For me, emotional skills, you've got to keep practicing. Otherwise you go off. So it's not something you learn and then that's it. It's something you practice every day. But I think this is actually a powerful thing just to pick up on for a moment because we all know people that go, oh I'm not very resilient, I'm a natural worrier, I'm just the kind of person that cares what other people think. I just want to get across that you're talking about this is a skill, this is a learned behavior that just because you think a certain way now doesn't mean that's the only way your brain can think.

14:33Again, I think it's important to understand how you find yourself, which I try and do with people and that is, and I put these in the books, the blank piece of paper exercise. So when I started working on this, it became obvious that if you think about it, if we remove this influence of this primitive survival system, which thinks for us, and we remove the center of the brain, which is like stored information and automatic behaviors, you're left with yourself. You're left with a part of the brain we can actually control. It's the only bit we can control. So then I say, let's imagine I've surgically removed them, and you're left.

15:06You've got a blank piece of paper. How do you want to be? And you would say confident, happy, carefree, compassionate, sense of humor. And what I keep saying, you've just described yourself. It's an epiphany if people can grasp this. You've now told me who you are. I've got you. What they then say is, which they say to me, but Steve, I'm not calm, I'm not. And I say, yes, you are. Don't confuse what the brain is doing. It comes in and takes over, hijacks you, and presents to the world someone who's anxious. But for you to tell me when you walk in, how's your week? Oh, I get so anxious. Scientifically, that's just inaccurate.

15:43it. So I correct people and say, that's not possible. It's not on your list. You don't put the perfect me anxious. And you say, that's clearly the influence of either the chimp or the computer system. So now we need to learn how we manage that to prevent it presenting to the world. And if you think, there's some obvious things that if you look, you'll see it. Reality is, your partner, if you've got one, or your brother, sister, if they're close, our best friend knows you and they'll tell you this is you I've seen the calm, confident but then they say but when you get into this situation and they're describing what I saw 30 years ago the brain shifted and it went into a system that we're given during fetal life and so I'm saying move back again in the fetus this chimp system and computer system start taking off so they're operational within 8 weeks of fetal life so we can measure them moving.

16:40Whereas the human sisters I'm calling is you. You don't come into being until around three. So you don't really exist, which I always joke about because you have no memory. So it's telling you, you weren't there, you know, for three years. And we know this, anyone who's got kids, they're just little robots. It's depressing because you spend loads of money on expensive holidays. And you say to your kids, did you love that? And they're like, what? We went where? We did what? We can't remember. But at three, you come in because the system that we operate with is rational, logical, and so they say, why?

17:13So the second they have the why questions, you've arrived. And it's important that parents then prime that system because, again, if you use that system predominantly in neurological terms, it myelinates, which means it's preferential and uses it at speed. Whereas if you push them back to a chimp system, which is dominance behaviour, you'll end up myelinating the chimp system and the child therefore will preferentially use that. So they'll use emotion as the basis of going forward rather than logic. You know we have a mental health crisis among young people in the UK. What's happening then from the age of three when they start asking why to the age of 12 or 13 when they need to seek therapy?

17:52Yeah, I mean, I don't want to make people guilty. I'm going to. But you watch and observe people and what happens is, I'm exaggerating for a fact, but the parent or teacher or whoever's in charge or guardian will the child say why, why and it becomes incessant and then you hear them say because I said so and if you think that stripping it down to what it is is a dominance you will do because I said there's no collaboration, there's no empowerment it's total dominance and removing so what you've done is you've said to them that's how my system works, the chimp system, I dominate, you do so they moved into the chimp system so then they agitate and rebel but you created that Now, it's not as easy as I'm saying it.

18:36I understand that children are in chimp mode a lot. But if you actually sat down, and it's hard when you're a busy parent or a teacher with 30-odd kids, to say, can I explain why I'm saying this? The child may not understand still and still kick off, but you're actually sowing seeds that the child's learning that when you have a question why, I'll answer it as best I can. I don't want you to do that because, and it can be simple, don't eat sweets because they're not that healthy compared to your food. and if you eat sweets, you won't eat your dinner. You know, they'll kick and say, well, I will eat my dinner, you know, so then you have to persuade them.

19:09But it's reasoning rather than just going, right, he's the sweets taken away, you will wait, and then you have tantrums, and you're promoting the chimp behaviours. So they'll carry it on. So the danger is, if we use this parent system where you are the judge-jury executioner, it's a subtle one, and I've pushed this in the books, to say what we tend to do with children is we compliment things they do instead of asking them to compliment themselves or criticise themselves. So we're not building analytical self-awareness, self-criticism, self-complement. If you do that and the evidence is overwhelming and you can start as young as four, so you ask them when you paint a picture, tell them what's good, what's not so good, what would you improve on?

19:55You can still give approval after they've given a constructive opinion. 10 years on they don't get thrown around by things like social media because they're the judge not what people say whereas if we keep saying that's a wonderful picture what we're doing is externalizing again approval so what you've now got is they move through life looking for your approval because that you're priming that so they won't actually then say well i'm actually pleased with what i've done or i think i could have done better here in a very objective way which is a skill and we have to teach children but the evidence is if we do that at 14 they then become more self-supportive more self-critical and the resilience stares that is some of the most powerful parenting advice i've ever heard on this show you know well it is but i'm interested steven that i'm like my children are a little bit older than four and i'm thinking can this you're going to tell me you've ruined them go no i'm wondering like can you undo some of these habits yes Yes.

20:51Yeah, it's not as easy. We know there are windows of development. And so we do know, and I'm speaking very generally, that between around four and eight, we know that there's a big influence on the child's brain and its development, depending on what we stimulate it to. So the more we activate the brain during those years, we know the pathways operate better later on. But that doesn't mean you've lost it. It just means there were windows. I mean, I'll give you a simple example. If you've got parents who are bilingual, will easily speak two languages by the time it's five, you know, because the brain is easy.

21:24But you try bringing in at 10 and the brain is already reset to English or whichever language you've got. And then it finds it mostly a bit more of a struggle unless it's adept at doing that. So we find a second language more difficult. So, and it's similar with all concepts in the brain, you're priming them. And the brain then is more or less starting to fix around eight, nine year old, but it's still pliable. You can learn a language at my age. You know, it just means it may be a bit more difficult because you primed your brain at three or four. How much do you know about the impact of social media and the fact that so many young people seem to now get their validation from what they see online or the things they share?

22:09Well, as I say that to me, I'm generalizing and there's lots of factors. So I'm sure there's a lot more to what I'm giving you. But we're saying right from the beginning, we've learned that external validation is the way things work. From parents, teachers, school, we've learned, we're given grades, we're given results. Instead of saying, what do you think? What do you think's important? What do you feel you're doing well at? How would you improve yourself? And then a child that does that is able to criticise. I won't give any names, but I did this a long time ago with a group of coaches in sport many years ago.

22:44And one of the guys, a wife was about to have a baby. And he said, my child will not be what I call the fridge door syndrome. And that means you put the picture on the fridge door because you approve of it instead of the child deciding. And six years on, true story, he came to me and said, I've got to speak to you, I've got to speak to you. We went to a school open day, first parent evening, and they said, why can't all children be like him? Because he doesn't mind trying anything. He doesn't get upset if he can't do it. So I was pleased, but I was quite surprised. I thought it was a backhanded compliment because he said, so what you do actually works.

23:18I thought, well, that's nice to know. I spent my life doing it. But it was nice to hear that because it was evidence, again, small anecdotal, but that we can change it. Just said, we can actually change the way people start assessing themselves. Like I gave you an example, own your own happiness. You can start learning and that's going to give you resilience. We've talked already about values. That's going to give you peace of mind. So it's never too late to start saying, I'm going to understand my mind, how it works and I'm going to learn these skills and I'm going to keep going brilliant so it's never too late but there is something as well Stephen this is a bit of a personal request in many ways that I often struggle with sort of difficult conversations with people so even though I might own my own happiness I'm often conscious of the happiness of other people that if I say no I might cause upset or disappointment and I really struggle to have those conversations Why are you worried about them being upset if there's something you're saying which is honest, genuine and coming from your heart?

24:20Because sometimes being upset is not a bad thing. It sort of jolts us to think, oh wow, that's upset me. If the person blames you, then obviously I'd say they're doing chimp mode. You can't do much, but you're likely that they'll go away and reflect on that. so if you said something to me and it hurt and I thought wow you know after I've got away from you and I start reflecting I mean well the guy actually might have a bit of truth in this so actually you've done some good but the fact I might get upset you know I don't think that should worry you because you have to think sometimes you've got to say things which are uncomfortable I'm not sure in what way you're upsetting people sure well I mean I don't think you are I don't think you are upset but I think you worry you almost write a story in your head that this is going to be awful, they're going to be disappointed, I'm going to have let them down.

25:08But Damien can't say no, basically. But that's a belief, you see, of that if I say no, or whatever it is, that that person is upset and therefore I'm in the wrong. And my job is not to upset people, and I'm challenging that belief. To say your job is to be honest and using integrity. I'm being, again, sweeping generalised statements here. But if you said to me, Steve, I resonate with that, then do what you're doing. If they get upset, that's not your problem. If you've been reasonable and honest, then you have to say that's reasonable, that being upset might help them in the long run. So the idea then of exploring beliefs is interesting because as you're saying it, it was that line you said there about beliefs, that my belief is that if I don't comply or if I don't help you when I could do, that means that you might not love me, you might not come back and ask me for help again, I might disappoint you and I don't like disappointing you.

26:01how do we start to rewrite some of these beliefs that we might have had since we were kids? But you've got the nail on the head. It's coming back from way back when, so you've got to look and say, how did you learn that? You know, and I don't want to do this on camera, but if I were doing an analysis of you, you start thinking your own insecurities. Sometimes, I don't know why you're doing it, but if I gain approval from them, don't upset them, then that's better. Yeah. So you're not approving of yourself. Just going back to the conversation we just had, you're getting external validation for you being this great person, this good person.

26:40And then your belief is if they're happy of what I've done, that makes me a good person. Instead of saying, actually, it doesn't make you a good person. It makes them happy. That's all it does. But it could come at a cost. And the cost is to you and to them that, you know, sometimes not being happy is not a bad thing. You've mentioned resilience a few times. And in your new book, A Path Through the Jungle, you start the book by talking about two key attributes, robustness and resilience. Why were they so important that that was the first message you wanted people to see in that book? The reason was that these are only my terms as well.

27:18So as I'm saying, I'm not trying to say I'm right. I'm not. I'm saying when I'm working with people, we need to know what the term really means. so if you work with me to be robust means you have a plan you know it's like saying is this toy robust it's been manufactured so we test it out we think it's robust then we hand it to the kids and then we find whether it is or not so the robustness is you having a plan so you say right here's my plan of when I leave this room I'm going to rely on my values I'm going to rely on working in reality I'm going to be able to get perspective now we're going to go outside and test it So robustness, everyone can do.

27:57There's no excuse for not having plans. It's just a lot of work, but it may need a lot of guidance. When you've got robustness, going out, resilience, I'm defining as a skill. So it may not work. You're going to have to learn how to be resilient. But I'm going to contradict myself. When I wrote this, everyone says, build resilience, build resilience. The science doesn't actually back that. what it does, which I do say, but people don't like it, is you are resilient. You can't build resilience. Your mind is 100 % resilient. And maybe I should have put that. What I'm really saying is you're 100 % resilience.

28:33How do we stop resilience from failing? We are resilient. We have very resilient brains. But what we have is parts of the brain, like your little gremlins, which reduce resilience. So it's not truly building resilience, but it's an easier concept to say, right, we'll build a skill and therefore we'll see more and more resilience come. The reality is we're removing things that are stopping resilience. And what are the biggest things that we do to impede our resilience? Well, the brain has certain areas which I talk about one bit called the what if button and it literally is an area of the brain which uses what if and it depends how we use what if.

29:13But if we use it emotionally, it'll ask questions like what if I fail my GCSEs? What if I fail my driving test? What if my partner leaves me? And these are emotional questions. And we often sit with them. We don't answer them. So if you don't answer them, then your resilience is going to start tumbling. And it goes through your head. And instead of sitting with the problem, you've got to say, well, let's look at, you know, what's the solution there? So what if my partner leaves me? And then you've got to challenge it. Now, if someone says to me, I will fall apart and life's not worth living, if that's non-negotiable I have to say let's look at the consequences and let's work very hard on not let them leave but if I say right let's really challenge that belief and rationalise it most people start saying okay it's not what I want I will go through grief, I will be upset I'll survive, there is life after, that can actually help the relationship because you then and again I'm exaggerating and I'm generalising, you're not as needy so there's no reason to then and try and control them and stop them leaving, which is what we do when we haven't got a plan in case they leave.

30:19So we have plans if it goes wrong. Now that's a different question if. If my partner leaves me, it's an emotional question. Oh, I'll go through. If my partner leaves me, what's the plan? He's now actually using that what if button from the human rather than the chimp. So the button's available to both, but it's a different what if question.

30:46so it sounds like like we've heard a term from one of our guests about pre-mortems almost work out what the things that could kill me and then plan for how i deal with them yeah yes it's this it's the principle of the brain is when you use the human system it always says let's start with what we've got and and then we move forward what's the plan to use what's presenting to me whereas the chimp doesn't do that it can't it starts with uh what I want and it compares to reality, which is not a good way to start. But that's how it does. And that's what most people go through the day with. Hence, you get road rage.

31:22You're saying, I want the traffic to flow smoothly. No one jumps in. No one cuts me up. Everyone's, you know, it's so, I'm glad you're laughing. It's so ridiculous. It's a ridiculous concept. There are always going to be idiots on the road or people having a bad day or people making mistakes. But our chimps don't interpret any of that. It's just, I am not getting what I expect to happen. So here we go. And that's ridiculous. So you can set off in a different mode by saying there will be idiots, there'll be people who make mistakes, and there are people who might regret what they've done. But again, do you want to go into chimp mode?

31:56So we're not realising then, generally, and again, I'm generalising as well. We don't realise that our thinking is what's tripping us up. We're here going, all the world's tripping us up. Idiots on the roads are making me unhappy. Lake tubes are frustrating me. Partners that won't listen are angering me. Children that don't get ready for school in time frustrate me. And actually so much of that is our interpretation of those things. Yeah. And this is probably, you've hit what I really do with people. And that is to say, you know, when I mentioned the human and chimp is, the bottom line is whenever I work with anyone, I take them away from their world.

32:28Because I keep saying, if we can get you in a room and get your robustness and prepare for resilience. If someone's in a good place, nothing touches them. If someone's not in a good place, anything can touch them. That's my philosophy. And I stick to that. So I say, if I can get you in a good place and show you how to run your mind, nothing's going to touch you. The kids won't touch you getting late for school because you'll deal with it. Someone cuts you up, you won't have road rage. In fact, nothing's going to get to you. Now, I'm not wanting people to be robots, but I'm saying you'll manage any feeling you get any emotion but generally most of the negative emotions won't appear.

33:06They just don't happen. And I get that from people that say, normally I'd go mad and suddenly nothing happened. So is there a technique, would you tell us the technique then, Steve, about how, because I'm thinking it might be like before you get in the car, almost saying to yourself, there's going to be idiots, there's going to be crashes, there's going to be hold-ups. let's just deal with that in a calm way is that the kind of I mean keep it simple because although the neuroscience is very heavy and I've simplified it just so people can access their mind it is complex and the devil is in the detail but if you keep it simple so you say to me I get road rage so I would say first of all stop you don't get road rage your chimp gets road rage on your perfect blank piece of paper you don't write road rage so you'll say now that's crazy so we're saying right recognize it's not you you need to understand what the chimp's doing and correct it and say that's not helpful so have a relationship with this part of your brain so then I'd say right when you're setting off I'm being simplistic to learn the emotional skill is before you set off say right we know it's going to happen we know these events are possible so when they happen I'm going to program my computer with some beliefs such as and I'll give you an example which is a true story I did a conference and a guy come watch those acute people which I encourage and he's, they were challenging, but this guy didn't.

34:27He just said, I get road rage and it's really bad. And I, I didn't know what to do because I've got like 20 seconds. So I said to him, I'll tell you what, drive your car, put your hands up. And he did drive in the wheel and I said, right. Okay, I've cut you up, show me what you do. It was quite, it was perfect. He waved his hands and started blaspheming. I said, what do you look like? And he laughed and he said, a chimp. I said, well, that's fine then. If you want to look like a chimp, do it. Let me know how it goes. And he never had road rage again. and paradoxically he said, my chimp didn't want to look like a chimp.

34:58And he said, it stopped me to say, don't look foolish. So you actually use the chimp against itself. That's amazing. So what we're saying then is to the audience listening to this, you choose what to believe. Exactly. You have to decide, I want to go to work and enjoy it. I want to self-good, good place. I want to end in a good place. But I'm preparing for anything that might happen. But anything that happens, I'm going to program my computer because it works quicker than chimp and human. So your computer's going to come in, not you. You're not going to talk to your chimp. It's going to do it.

35:29Because the chimp, the way the brain's structured, the chimp must consult the computer before it reacts. And that's done in a fifth of a second. It's very fast. So if you primed it with what I call the autopilot, which goes, I don't want to look like a chimp. Someone cuts you up. As the chimp is about to screech, it pauses. And then you'll say, nothing happened. Because the computer took over and advised the chimp and then said, no, we pull back. And we can prime you to say, when someone cuts you up, just pull back. And then I want you to talk about, and it may not resonate with you, how good do you feel at being able to pull back?

36:03And if someone says, do you know what, I feel empowered. Yeah. It's no different to my previous existence as a forensic. It's like, can you get people with anger management problems and they'll say, and they're against their chimp. And then I'll say to them, would a strong man get in a fight or would they walk away? and I'm being again simplistic to do it and the guys that go actually a strong man walks away they said you feel so good you just don't engage it and they said it actually changed me and I perceived myself then as this powerful guy but again it may not resonate but this is why I keep saying it, it's up to people, anyone listening to make the mind up to explore their mind and say let me start understanding and they don't have to use my model, the chimp model.

36:51I think there's lots of good stuff out there. And so I encourage people to get something that resonates with you. And I'm an academic, I'm a professor in a university and therefore I've gone evidence-based. I want to see, I would say if something works for you and it's not evidence-based, I'm not too worried. What about dealing with pressure? Because that's a common feature that we've met in our high performers that a distinction is those that can lean into pressure rather than lean away from it. Let's say it's somebody that has to perform on a certain day. If you take the Olympics, where you have to turn up on that day and that's going to determine a gold medal or otherwise.

37:32So how would you help them prepare for that key moment? For other people, it might be an exam or it might be a presentation in the non-sporting world. Again, I have to work with a person. So I'm going to be very generic and say, right, is it helping you? Is it helping you to think I have one chance? Is that actually helping? You know, and the reason you laugh is most big, well, not really, no. So why would you choose to focus on that? You know, you do have a choice. You do have a choice. And again, here's a skill. So we're going to say, what would help? So if you got an Olympian, what's going to help them to get the best out of it?

38:13And it's clear then it's just process driven. You know? so then we say right what would stop you sticking to process now i don't know what they're going to say they might say the crowd you know it's all right saying don't focus but i go into an olympic arena say like it's a track and field event and you've got a thousand people and you know cameras then there's millions of people watching and then they go back to it is one chance you know and so we have to say right how we're going to manage that so we're going to learn how do you get into complete focus and you remove it. Now, I can only, I can give you a famous person because they've gone public about this and obviously he's a good friend and that's Chris Hoy.

38:54When I first started working, I went to Privilege to Athens Olympics and he had to do the kilo and I'd gone really well with Chris straight away. He's a very easy guy, very easy guy if you don't know him, a real gentleman and when we got there, we had primed him to go focus, focus, focus because it was an event which he could easily do by focus. So heart and soul into it. And on the day, he said, after the event, he got his gold and he said he forgot where he was. That's how well he'd done. But we primed that for twice a day, 20 minutes at the holding camp. I know he's gone public about this and given me permission to speak.

39:32And he spoke on here about it as well. Yeah, right. And I remember him saying he looked up and saw the flags and remembered it was the Olympics. Now that's perfection, which he was, you know, a guy who could really commit to it. So there's an example where he's not a super being in the sense of, well, it must have been natural for him. It wasn't. He worked on it and he worked hard to say, right, I'm going to get there. He bought in and just going to complete what I call computer mode. Now, that's not as easy in a footballer. So we have to use a very different technique because you can't stay in it.

40:04It's not as easy in someone like snooker, where I'm involved heavily, golf. they all have their peculiarities so again I've got to go to their world having got them in a good place and say right you've chosen to do this sport or this business or this career and now I have to understand the nuances so I'm no expert in sport but I go to each sport and think what is it you're perceiving as the stress points or the distraction points and then I work with them on what they are perceiving We've had some incredible conversations on this show with footballers who talk about the kind of unrelenting pressure of being in that world.

40:43And, you know, I know some of them have gone public of, you know, your work with the England team, with Raheem Sterling, and he was very happy to speak about how you gave him some freedom. When you work with... I have to say one of the nicest guys around. Is that right? He always started, I'm going to embarrass him for this, isn't he? Yeah, he always started by saying, kind of, thank you for seeing me. And I thought, you know, it should be the way, Raheem, you know, it's my privilege to meet people. But he was such a genuine man. and he gave me his England football shirt, which I've still got signed.

41:13And are you okay to talk about what you worked on with him? I mean, he's spoken, hasn't he? Yeah, I wouldn't go into detail, but I'd say that, again, Raheem was good in that. He would tell me what was troubling him, what he didn't want, and then what he did want. So it's easy to say, right, this is what I want to do. And then I would, exactly what I'm saying, I would say, let me tease out, what beliefs have you got that are holding you to have these behaviours that are not helping? and he'd say, well, yeah, but, and then he'd give me X, Y, Z and I'd say, can we challenge them? And then he'd change the belief and go, you're right, you're right.

41:45Don't know why I'm thinking that. So when you work with a footballer, is it... Let me give you an example to make it concrete. This is not what Raheem did, all right? This is working with others. If you've got a striker and they go to get a goal and they miss, and they miss, and they miss, and the crowd are unforgiving, we know that they're unforgiving. So now they've got this, you know, hissing booing. They're feeling they're letting the team down. They feel like I'm not scoring. And then finally they score. But in the meantime, they've been so unsettled emotionally that they're making erratic decisions.

42:21They're saying, I start taking chances, which causes us to lose the ball and it's dangerous. You know, so we go through all this. And then you say, well, I'm being simplistic again. If you take a top strike, and I did the work on it, I took out all the top strikers and looked at teams like Spanish, Italians, where you had high fly teams and said, let's look at theirs. What's the strike rate? What's the success rate? It's as simple as this. And it was something between one in four and one in eight. Right. And I said, so let's look at your strike rate. And it was one in five. What's it telling you?

42:57That in itself made them relax. I'm allowed to miss it. The crowd are going to boo. But remember, they will cheer when you get your one in five. Keep going. that made them so they said, I'm more rational in my approach. I'm not getting nervous or anxious about, am I going to miss again? I'm just saying, just strike. And that confidence to think, I'm allowed to have a go, I'll do with the crowd, they'll be okay. They're meant to boo. Those beliefs then all changed. So if you're working with someone in that position, my experience was once we'd nailed all the beliefs and they tried it, they said it's great.

43:31We think that one of the biggest attributes we see time and time again from people that sit in your chair, you know, so-called high performers, is optimism, is this ability to keep on going even when they get things wrong. Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. Again, I mean, it's beliefs you have, and I try and get this to people to say, you know, if you're going to see life as opportunity, it'll be great. If you see it as threat, it's going to always be defensive. So it's a choice. You have a choice. You can say, right, what opportunities can I see in this? You know, there's always learning opportunities, but people don't know how to find them and they don't even know that they're there and once you start training people and teach them and say what happened today what was the opportunity it can be simple things I know it sounds crazy like I'm a coffee addict here and we go and the coffee machine's broken and there's no coffee and I think okay now most people go into chimp mode and think this is crazy, this place and it's so unhelpful and you think what's your learning opportunity and most people would say I have no idea I didn't get any coffee.

44:33And I say, how about when things go wrong, how do you want to come across? You know, or if they don't resonate, how do you want to get perspective? Is it going to matter? And they go, not really. Apply that now for the next week with me and tell me where you suddenly thought, get perspective, get perspective. Or does it really matter? And they say, wow, you know, because if that's what they keep doing, they say it's a different world I live in now because I'm not getting complaints I'm not getting uppity I'm not getting annoyed or frustrated so I'm being again simplistic but it's the principle that when you've got to get someone to learn so the opportunistic thing and then being very positive I think it's more to me of learning to make sensible choices and that makes the world opportunistic it makes it more interesting otherwise you're on defence all the time and feared before we finish and move to our quick fire questions I want to talk to you about stone of life you describe it as the ultimate mind stabiliser and I really do want people to come to the end of this brilliant conversation and have a genuine understanding of how they could try and think differently and I think the idea of the stone of life is so powerful would you talk to us about it yeah what I tried to do when I did this work and I thank the students at Sheffield Medical School who challenged me every step of the way when I brought it in and they loved it, but they were relentlessly unforgiving, which is great.

46:06And I had to prove it evidence-based. But they were saying, it's great to have these like what I call autopilots. So let's go back to your road rage. Do I want to look like a chimp? Well, that's great. But you're going to have to have an autopilot for every single thing that happens. Like there's no coffee, what's the autopilot? I said, well, autopilots help in specific circumstances like road rage, but there are the sledgehammer ones which apply everywhere, virtually everywhere. And that is, there are three areas which, again, my patients taught me this. And I thought there are three things that everyone who has resilience is demonstrating.

46:40And if we can get that, which I then started teaching people, this is the stone of life, three areas. This is the basis for being stable. And one, we've talked about values, because that gives you peace of mind. The other two go together. That is, I've talked about reality, where it is what it is. There are certain rules of life. So again, I'll divert to a common one that I get is people want to be popular. But the rule of life is, and again, I'm generalizing it. One in five people don't like you. It doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter. Generally, I would say they're the same miserable people, don't like anybody.

47:17But why are you going to worry about that? You can't please them, so stop trying. One in five people love you. And no matter what you do, they're going to love you. So make your world around them. It's great. All right. Both are deluded, but they're great delusions. And three in people, if you're reasonable, they like you. Men are big great, buzz and buddies. So if you use that as a rule of life, that's the truth of life. You put that on a reality check. You know, you can't negotiate that. But people have to work these out. That's one of mine. They may not agree with me. In which case, they might say 50 % of people are not nice, 50%.

47:52Okay, well, that's still going to be a rule. So you have to work out what's your truth. you know not everyone's going to be nice to me is a truth you know there's always an opportunity in every experience is a truth these are solid things you can fall back on so and i work out because they're solid and they apply to everything so again nothing really matters in the end might not resonate with some it resonates with me yeah so therefore i can apply that to road rage It's not going to matter at the end of the day. So why am I investing in it? So that's a sledgehammer. And I can use that anyway. There's no coffee.

48:31Nothing really matters in the end. And if it resonates, I can use that anyway. So I prime people with the truths of life. And they're unique to the person. And then the final bit was perspective. We know that the chimp system, neuroscientifically, has no perspective. It has no time awareness. so that's why if we go through like a grief reaction and we lose someone close and the chimp system is in operation when we wake up it feels like it's happened today even though it's 20 years ago and it's the same powerful emotions it doesn't respect time which is a problem when it comes to decision making because it can't see time I won't give some context or perspective the human can't not use time so we use another area of the brain which brings time in so if we switch to the human and give perspective then we get a big big stabilizer you know everything comes and goes you know whatever situation I'm in now we'll move on contextualize it and looking at your life in general and will it matter in a week's time that's a good perspective and most people say that resonates so there's a lot you can do with using I like people to have their own perspective and then you use that remind yourself let's bring this in So if you start your day with perspective, values and the truths of life before you set off, you'll set off in human mode.

49:52That's amazing. Is that right? I love it. More than all right. Thank you very much. Steve, can I ask you one question here? Because we were intrigued to do this. A common question we ask our guests is how much of their success they would attribute down to their mental skills and how much of it is down to their physical skills. To give you a context, the great runner Michael Johnson told us it was 100 % mental. He attributed his success to. Usain Bolt suggested that his was 100 % physical. Kelly Holmes told us it was 80-20 in favour of the mental over the physical. So we've had a real spectrum of responses.

50:31What would your answer to that be? First round, I analyse them. I don't think there's a real answer for people because, like you're saying, if you say him is in a good place anyway then he doesn't need that not everyone needs to if you say well actually I'm okay whereas if Michael Johnson was saying I wasn't in a great place and I knew that was going to sabotage me but I believe that was my strength so you can see how people are going to give different values or percentages for me I think I've been very lucky in that my chimp is my success not me and people always blame the chimp and that's my fault for the way I presented it but I said my chimp wrote the books I didn't write them there was a moment where my chimp sort of like told me and said you know how long do I sit here before you recognise what I'm telling you and then I asked my chimp why are you doing this it's ridiculous sounds like crazy but my chimp would come up with stuff and I think that's really clever I hadn't thought of it and my chimp thought it's generated I didn't actually do it and so my chimp does this a lot and it does it when I'm talking to people I don't actually consciously you'd be aware my chimp will say something oh that's true so i'm actually one step behind so i think that's unusual uh but it's the way it works so when you say my success my chimp successes but i think um i think what i've been able to do the reason it's successful is as human beings we all need to be in a good place and most of us are not or we have moments where we're not in a good place and we all know what it's like and it's gut-wrenching and therefore someone who's got a background in psychiatric health you've got this advantage of saying let me try and help you mentally or psychologically so you're going to be successful if you can do that because you're giving people what they really need so it's not a i don't think it's about me i think it's more the people i work with uh that's because i would say that you're the success i just give you the tools.

52:32I think it's so good because this whole conversation really has been about helping people to reframe things. And you've reframed the fact that we talk about having a chimp as being a negative thing. Well, if there's no chimp, there's no chimp paradox. If there's no chimp paradox, there's no Dr. Steve Peters sitting on our podcast, right? Exactly. Final question before we go to the quick fights. How do you know when it's your chimp? Right. So I was saying you have to ask, do I want this? Yeah. And if you say, no, I don't, then you know, it's the chimp. But it might say, like, I'm on a diet and someone offers me, I don't know, something I really want, cheesecake.

53:08And I think, yeah, I want this. But actually it's fooling you. Because if you say, well, what will you feel like in an hour's time? I'd say, pretty bad, actually. So you can be fooled. The chimp can take over and say, yes. But your chimp said something that helped you when you were writing your book, did you say? Yeah, but it kind of hits moments where it doesn't help. It's not a little angel by any means. No, no, it's quite, it comes deviously trying, fool me. So I've had to work it out because like that with the cheesecake, I would say hang on, you know, I don't want this. So it was you that was talking and fooling me to believe and it was us that wanted cheesecake.

53:43A chimp is actually a cheeky bastard because I should eat less crisps, right? But what my chimp says is, and I talk about crisps a lot, it goes, well, you've earned these crisps today. And you believe it. It's not the chimp's fault. You believe it. Yeah, but it's because he tricks me I want to believe him because I bloody love crisps, right? Or procrastination is a big one for me. I want to believe the chimp because actually going and watching the telly is sometimes a bit more exciting than the thing that I actually have to do. But again, you could always ask the question, right, in an hour's time, two hours' time, what will I feel if I do this?

54:18And what will I feel if I do what I think I should do? What would make me actually feel good? And then you've got it so that you can get around it. But just again, important. people have this idea the chimp's this bad thing and i keep saying it's the best thing you've got it is your best friend it doesn't always help but best friends often don't you know but you've got to say it's not helping give me something else and the chimp will there's nothing it does that's not trying to help that's an important concept it never is against you it's trying to help but these techniques and methods are just a bit suspect and don't often help and the other is you can't just go home tonight and I say this and shout and lose your temper with your wife and go, sorry, it's just my chimp.

55:00You're 100 % responsible. It's an accountability model. It's not an excuse model. You're 100 % accountable. You know, so no excuses. You have to learn to manage it. If you don't, you've got to apologize. Say this is unacceptable. But don't blame your chimp. It's not the chimp's fault for being a chimp. You know, you're the one who has to manage it and understand it. Are you ready for some quick fire questions? I don't know if that was a quick fire. Yeah, it's been brilliant. No, thank you. I don't know if I can do quick. I warned you. It's like throwing a stick for a cat. It's not going to go, you know.

55:34All right.

55:38As we come towards the end of this conversation, what's the killer question that we should use to get people straight after this thinking about their own thinking? I think it's got to be that they have to recognise the advantage. They've got to look and say, what is my mind or emotions doing which is not helping me or other people around me? And if they think, yeah, I could improve on this and it's worth it, then they'll do it. But if someone says there's no reason to do anything, I'm happy with where life is, whether I upset people or not, or myself, then it'll be nothing. So you have to want to be helped.

56:10You have to want to do it. You've got to see something you really want to change. What is the most valuable habit that you have in your work? Reflection all the time. probably four times a day I will stop in my tracks and reset basically around the stone of life and think get some perspective get some reality keep in human mode and so I do that maybe four times a day and that settles me down again What do you say to yourself then? I go through truths of life like you know you're set off in a good place let's remain in a good place and is it going to help if you start losing it? It's not going to help so I remind myself and I talk to the chimp and say what do we want to do?

56:49And the chimp will say, be happy. I say, okay, I don't overreact. So I talk all the time. But I do that probably four times a day, but it's only for a couple of minutes. What is your definition of high performance? I don't think there is one because if you look at, I'm going to take really bad examples, someone who's pretty unpleasant will give you a definition of success is financial and at the cost of everybody else. Now I'm not saying that I'm not against people who make money that's up to them but i'm saying at the cost of everybody else knowing uh but they'd said that's high performance it's not for me to judge that's not what i would say what's your version whereas if you say high performance is um for me personally helping other people we said this before we started recording you know i thrive on this because i feel if i can help someone i get a big kick out of being the support behind the scenes you mentioned it the beginning i like that role being in the limelight is not so comfortable and i'll do it but i'd much prefer to be behind the scenes and get someone to succeed because for their successes i feel i contributed something to it and it's made them happy so helping others what's the first thing you'd like someone to do when they get to the end of this fascinating episode really stop for even 60 seconds and think has what I've heard made me think there's some work I could do.

58:14It's not a big thing. I'm not asking people to do half an hour a night. I'm asking people to start looking at maybe five or 10 minutes a day, which is not a lot, to start reflecting and get something, as I say, it's not necessarily the chimp model, but get something that they can start work on and chip away. Because the way I try and explain it is if you are aiming for the moon and you move one degree today, by the time you hit the moon you've moved a million miles so if you're aiming for disaster and not happy life and you move one degree by changing one little thing a belief a behavior you know you'll be so far down the road four years five years on people and i've had this people say different partner because they've started working slowly but surely the partner can't see it person who work was often said i don't feel i've moved but the the actual partner of the work person i'm working with says definitely so little changes and the final question what would you like to say to someone who's listened to this incredible conversation but they actually think that their chimp is so strong that they're beyond help welcome to the rest of us i think we all feel that at times get help is and again there are lots of people out there they may not use this model but you know there are so many good clinical psychologists therapists of all kinds nurses are often trained in therapies there's a lot of independent people you just got to get someone who understands you and works with you and you're on the same page so i would recommend people and doctors we do it as well is reach out and get some help reach out

59:57Damien Jake thoughts on that episode? Loved it loved it it was like listening to an encyclopedia of the brain and somebody just picking out the best bits and giving it in a really practical way what did you think? Look coming into this I've listened to a lot of conversations he's had before and in all honesty when he talks about elite athletes it kind of left me cold because I was thinking well I'm sure you can get the best out of elite athletes but they want to be helped they've got all the resources and all the time and they're working towards a single specific goal. So I was very keen that that conversation was for the parents, it was for the partners, it was for the kids, it was for the colleagues.

1:00:32And I really feel that we got there. And the biggest revelation for me was a conversation about young kids not telling them when they're doing well and not doing well. And I kind of know, right, that every time Flo does some brilliant singing in the choir or some great dancing. When Seb scores four goals in a football match, I praise them. And then there's a voice in my head going, hold on, you're attaching praise to pleasing other people, specific outcomes, all of this stuff. But I've never known how to not do that. Because who doesn't want to tell their kid they did well at scoring a try in rugby, right?

1:01:06So now it's so great. I'm just going to say, what did you think of how that went? What did you love about it? What did you not like about it? Where do you think you could do better? Then afterwards, go, do you know what? I thought you were great. that's a total change in terms of how our will parent flow and zeb for sure i love that and that well that builds on what i took from it about we're already resilient we don't build up resilience we don't armor plate it we already we start resilient and then what we actually do is erode it and sometimes it's through letting little habits little beliefs get in the way of it and i think when we can recognize that that you know i often use that line i've said it to you that we don't need to be resilient if we're in the face of kindness we only need to be resilient when it's around unkindness but what i've never thought about was actually the kindness starts with us being kind to ourselves and just by using that stone alive technique that idea of having perspective what the truth's alive and going back to our values like i like the fact that steve didn't talk about happiness he spoke about peace of mind because i think we'd all like more of that But yeah, it was great.

1:02:12And I came into this conversation thinking, we're going to talk about how to ignore the chimp and that the chimp is bad and that we've all got this thing that we need to try and get rid of. And I love the fact that at the end of it, he's like, the chimp is good. Embrace the chimp. We all have one. We all need one. Work it to your advantage. So thank you, mate. Thank you. Well, what a cool way to prepare for 2026. Genuinely, one of the most practical and important episodes we've ever recorded. And as you head into the new year, I would encourage you to do what Steve suggested. Just stop for 60 seconds and ask yourself, is there some work I could do?

1:02:47Not hours of therapy, just five or 10 minutes a day, just chipping away. Remember, one degree of change today can become a million miles in the right direction over time. And if this episode resonated with you, please do share it. Please send it to someone who needs to hear this heading into the new year. And if you hit subscribe, you'll never miss a single conversation. From all of us here at High Performance, here's to a year of understanding your mind better managing your chimp and becoming the version of you that you know you can be i look forward to catching up more in the new year and thanks for listening during 2025

1:03:38you