Dr. Alex Auerbach is a Sports Psychologist and Director of Wellness and Development for the basketball team, Toronto Raptors. Before working with the Raptors, he was the Director of Clinical and Sports Psychology for the University of Arizona. He’s a huge fan of Mindfulness and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy —also called ACT — for optimizing both the performance and mental health of athletes. He works with athletes on self-awareness, and emotional regulation and helps them understand and even name and ground their often difficult feelings. Mindfulness is a core pillar in all his work.

He shares some of the great research that’s been done suggesting that mindfulness can lead to optimal performance and, possibly, to the all-important flow state. There are so many stressors in the life of a professional athlete — and these tools are a great way to help manage stress and tension as well as being more resilient to the ups and downs that are a natural part of life.