The PrimeLife Podcast

This evening I had a great conversation with Cork's Super Featherweight and Ireland’s youngest ever professional boxer, James Power!

In this episode, we talked about his journey from starting out as a young kid in the boxing world, through his amateur years, and then finally signing his contract with Sheer Sports Management as the youngest ever pro boxer in Ireland.

James's boxing career has been put on hold over the last few months due to the pandemic but this hasn't stopped him from setting out huge physical and mental challenges for himself that have kept both his mental and physical state fresh and ready for his return to boxing shortly.

A man with an old head on young shoulders, James shared some invaluable lessons with me on the mental game and mental performance that he has cultivated and developed over the

many years of boxing and it was a pleasure having him on the show.

No doubt this man will excel in the boxing world and represent Ireland with the Irish people supporting with pride right behind him.

When we practice mental imagery and visualization on a certain skill, we are activating the same neural activity in our brains as if we were carrying out the skill physically.

I often get asked, "how do I keep a cool head and stop any negative self-talk in the middle of a game/race?"

This evening I had a great conversation with one of the world’s leading mental performance coaches, Graham Bethart.

Graham has worked with some of the NBA’s best athletes including Aaron Gordon, Ben Simmons, Karl Anthony Towns, and Andrew Wiggins (to name a few) He has also worked with professional organizations such as True Ventures, Silicon Valley Bank, and the Utah Jazz.

In this episode, we talk about his journey into mental performance coaching and how he ended up working with professionals and some of the top athletes across the USA.

Graham’s work is all about helping athletes play in the present moment and firmly believes that if you can play in the moment and focus on the task at hand, you will ultimately play at your best.

We talk about how important it is for athletes to practice mental performance skills but how a lot of these skills don’t come naturally and take time and hard work to master.

Graham shares with us some mental skills and actions that you can implement and practice in your game to help you bring you back to the present moment and play at your best.

I really enjoyed this episode with Graham and I have no doubt I will be having him back on the show in the near future.

’A man often meets his destiny on the very road he takes to avoid it’’. Jean De La Fontaine

You’re standing over a golf putt & all that’s going through your head is ‘’ don’t miss it, don’t miss it, don’t miss it’’. All your energy & mental focus is on ‘trying not to fail’. Your arms tense up. Your hands start shaking. Your heartbeat starts to rise. And so, most likely, what happens? You miss the shot.

This is called playing in a fear-based state of mind. It’s natural. Your mind & body is tapping into it’s ‘fight or flight’ system. It believes there is a threat and so the body tenses up limiting itself both physically and mentally. We see this in all sports and even in some workplace scenarios like presentations.

How do we stop this? We need to neutralize the fear.

We want to arrive at a place of peace with both outcomes. We want to be ok with either winning or losing. To do this you need to think about the worst-case scenario. Missing the putt. Missing the penalty or losing the game. Visualize yourself in this scenario and sit with it. It may be uncomfortable and feel weird but just sit with it, embrace it and feel it.

The navy seals call this ‘emergency conditioning’. After you have sat with that feeling and feel comfortable with the idea of losing, start focusing your attention and energy on the enjoyment of the game.

Focus on the process. Play for the win. Don't play so as not to lose.

When you do this, you're no longer running away from the ‘fear the failing'.

Now if you miss a shot or mess up, you’re ok with it. You have familiarized yourself with the situation. You won’t overreact and let your ‘fear of failure’ and emotions take over.

We want to be able to play for the win but not by running away from the fear of losing.

Neutralize the fear and then start playing for success.

Let go of any expectations and focus on the process.

In this episode, I sit down with a renowned international free diver and breathwork specialist, Claire Walsh. 

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Claire spoke about her journey into the world of freediving and how the sport has brought her around the globe, diving in some of the most beautiful dive sites on the planet.

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With the wealth of knowledge and skills that she has obtained over the many years of freediving she is now coaching people from all walks of life around the importance of breathwork and how it can have a huge impact on our general wellbeing.

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Her love and passion for both freediving and breathwork is infectious and I have no doubt she will help many people along the way.

In today’s episode, I sit down with former professional rugby player, traveler, and extreme adventurer, Damian Browne.

After 16 years playing in The Celtic league, English Premiership and French Top 14 Championship, injury forced his hand and he made the tough decision to retire. During his downtime from the intensity of professional sports Damian indulged his passion for travel and adventure, visiting more than 50 countries on 6 continents and challenging himself in different ways with a 3-week expedition into the high altitude Pamir mountains in Afghanistan, summiting Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, climbing Mont Blanc, France and Gran Paradiso, Italy. Damian is also on a quest to scale the highest mountain peaks on all seven continents around the world with only Mount Everest and Mount Vinson left to complete.

In April 2016 Damian took on the might of the Sahara desert, completing the 6 day, 257km Marathon des Sables, also known as 'The Toughest Footrace on Earth'. After the race and a period of reflection, Damian committed to taking on the incredible challenge to row across the Atlantic Ocean, alone!

18 months of physical, mental  and technical preparation led to the 14th of December where Damian kissed goodbye to his parents and shoved off into the unknown. 63 days, 6 hours and 25 minutes later he crossed the finish line of the Talisker Whiskey Atlantic Challenge arriving in Antigua 28kgs lighter and much hairier to a heros welcome. Having endured 9-meter swells, a badly cut head, capsizes, encounters with Whales, sea & pressure sores, losing an oar and complete steering failure with over 2000 nautical miles to Antigua, Damian said, "A hell of an experience, hell of an adventure and hell of a challenge. It was exactly what I wanted from the challenge, I wanted to be pushed to my limits mentally and physically and I sure got what I wanted and then some".

This man has a mind of steel and has developed an unbreakable mentality by pushing his mind and body through difficult situations and challenges that he has set out for himself. He firmly believes that setting out personal challenges and overcoming them no matter how tough or miserable they may seem is the key to building resilience, confidence and self-worth within yourself.

Damian shares some incredible stories from some of his extreme and daunting expeditions, along with many actionable and valuable mindset techniques that he had used and continues to use in order for him to get through some of his toughest and grueling experiences in life.

What an incredible human being! I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did.

In today’s episode, I sit down with professional speaker, goal-setting coach, and author Gerry Duffy from Mullingar. Gerry has coached some of the top leaders from Facebook, Google, and Coca Cola to name a few.

In this episode Gerry talks about his inspirational journey from being four stone overweight at the age of 27 to running 32 marathons in 32 days and winning the 2011 UK DECA Enduroman Iron distance challenge, (10 Ironman Triathlons in 10 consecutive days), an event dubbed the ‘’The toughest ten-day endurance challenge in the world’’.

Gerry believes that in order to grow and develop as human beings, we first must be brave enough to step out of our comfort zone and then courageous enough to challenge ourselves with being uncomfortable. In 1995 when he took up running for the first time, Gerry discovered that  ‘life rewards effort’. 

Gerry firmly believes that human beings can do far more than we give ourselves credit for and is keen on leading by example. 

In today’s episode, I sit down with ultra-endurance athlete Shane Finn from Kerry Ireland. Shane cycled and ran across the USA in 36 Days to raise money for Spina Bifida Hydrocephalus Ireland. This was by far one of my favourite conversations to date! What he has achieved over the last number of years is a reminder to us all that the human mind and body can adapt to any situation when the right training, beliefs, purpose and mindset is put into place.

In 2010 Shane ran his very first marathon and since then has run 12 marathons in 12 days, run 24 marathons in 24 days, completed multiple Ironman triathlons and cycled and ran across the USA in 36 days.

In this episode we touch on the following topics; his journey and story into becoming an ultra-endurance athlete and why he decided to run and cycle across the USA in 36 days. How he prepares both physically and mentally for endurance events and how these skill sets can be easily transferred over to real-life scenarios. We talk about his nutrition and training plans and he maintained enough calories per day during his journey across the USA. We touch on the importance of having discipline when motivation starts to run out and he builds emotional resilience and a strong mindset with every decision he makes throughout his day. He also shares some valuable insights into how we can cope more effectively when living in isolation and practicing social distancing during these trying times.

I hope you enjoy my conversation with the great Shane Finn.