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Jeff Greenwald, MFT - Guest
Jeff Greenwald, MFT is a world champion athlete, licensed psychotherapist, best-selling author, and one of the world’s leading mental coaches for athletes. With over 25 years of experience helping youth, college, and professional competitors thrive under pressure, Jeff brings a rare blend of elite performance insight and clinical expertise to his work. He is the author of the international bestseller The Best Tennis of Your Life, which has sold over 80,000 copies worldwide, and the new book The Mental Edge for Young Athletes—a groundbreaking guide for building confidence, emotional resilience, and a stronger mindset in sports and life. Jeff has worked with athletes across every major sport and consulted for national teams, Fortune 500 leaders, top junior academies, and competitive athletes at all levels of sport. He is a two-time ITF World Champion and was inducted into the Northern California Tennis Hall of Fame in 2019 for his contribution in the field of sports psychology and success as a world-ranked tennis player. Through his writing, coaching, and speaking, Jeff empowers athletes and their families to navigate the mental game with clarity, courage, and lasting confidence. |
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W. Keith Sutton, Psy.D. - Host
Dr. Sutton has always had an interest in learning from multiple theoretical perspectives, and keeping up to date on innovations and integrations. He is interested in the development of ideas, and using research to show effectiveness in treatment and refine treatments. In 2009 he started the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy, providing a one-way mirror training in family therapy with James Keim, LCSW. Next, he added a trainer and one-way mirror training in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, and an additional trainer and mirror in Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy. The participants enjoyed analyzing cases, keeping each other up to date on research, and discussing what they were learning. This focus on integrating and evolving their approaches to helping children, adolescents, families, couples, and individuals lead to the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy's training program for therapists, and its group practice of like-minded clinicians who were dedicated to learning, innovating, and advancing the field of psychotherapy. Our podcast, Therapy on the Cutting Edge, is an extension of this wish to learn, integrate, stay up to date, and share this passion for the advancement of the field with other practitioners. |
Keith Sutton, Psy.D. (00:24):
Welcome to Therapy on the Cutting Edge, a podcast for therapists who want to be up to date on the latest advances in the field of psychotherapy. I'm your host, Dr. Keith Sutton, a psychologist in the San Francisco Bay Area, and the Director of the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy. At the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy, we provide training in evidence-based models, including family systems, cognitive behavioral therapy, emotionally focused couples therapy, eye movement desensitization reprocessing, motivational interviewing, and other approaches through live in-person and online trainings, on demand trainings, consultation groups, and one-way mirror trainings. We also have therapists throughout the Bay Area and California providing treatment through our six specialty centers, each grounded in an evidence-based approach, with our Lifespan Centers, Center for Children and Center for Adolescents, where all the therapists are working systemically; our Center for Couples, where all the therapists are using emotionally focused couples therapy; and our specialty issue centers, our Center for Anxiety, where all the therapists are using CBT and EMDR for trauma; and our center for ADHD and oppositional and Conduct Disorder clinic, where we're integrating those four approaches.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D. (01:32):
In the institute, we have our licensed, experienced therapists, and for those in financial need, we have an associated nonprofit, Bay Area Community Counseling, where clients can work with associates, psych assistants, and licensed clinicians who are developing their abilities and expertise. Additionally, as part of our nonprofit, we also have the Family Institute of Berkeley, where we provide treatment, training, and one-way mirror trainings in family systems. To learn more about trainings, treatment, and employment opportunities, please go to sfiap.com and to support our nonprofit, you can go to sf-bacc.org to donate today to support access to therapy for those in financial need, as well as training in evidence-based treatment. BACC is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so all donations are tax deductible.
Keith Sutton, PsyD: (02:19)
Today I'll be speaking with Jeff Greenwald, marriage and family therapist, who is a world champion athlete, licensed psychotherapist, bestselling author, and one of the world's leading mental coaches for athletes. With over 25 years of experience helping youth, college, and professional competitors thrive under pressure, Jeff brings a rare blend of elite performance, insight, and clinical expertise to his work. He is the author of the International Bestseller, The Best Tennis of Your Life, which has sold over 80,000 copies worldwide. And the new book, The Mental Edge for Young Athletes, a groundbreaking guide for building confidence, emotional resilience, and a stronger mindset in sports and life. Jeff has worked with athletes across every major sport and consulted for national teams, Fortune500 leaders, top junior academies, and competitive athletes at all levels of sport. He is a two-time ITF World Champion and was inducted into the Northern California Tennis Hall of Fame in 2019 for his contribution in the field of sports psychology and success as a world ranked tennis player. Through his writing, coaching and speaking, Jeff empowers athletes and their families to navigate the mental game with clarity, courage, and lasting confidence. Let's listen to the interview.
Keith Sutton, PsyD: (03:31)
Well, hi, Jeff. Welcome. Thanks for joining.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (03:33)
Great to be here, Keith. Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (03:36)
Definitely. So yeah, I was interested in learning more about sports psychology. I was working with a client recently and just interested in working with some folks in that area. And, you came to mind as I had done some consultation with you in the past. You're here in Marin County, in the San Francisco Bay area, working with adolescents and I think adults and young adults around sports. And also, I would love to hear your thoughts and learn more about kind of your perspective on the work that you've been doing, and I've also know you've written some books. So I would, I would love to learn more about it, but first, I always like to start off with, you know, finding out about how you got into this work and kind of the evolution of your thinking of the approaches that you bring to this work.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (04:28)
Yeah. It's, interesting to go back for all of us, right? To go back and see the journey forward. You know in 2002, I was licensed as an MFT, and, and at the time I was doing-- I'd say started, sports psychology work and clinical. So it was 50/50, I would say for many, many years, probably, you know, 15... 10 to 15 years of, of both, but more and more, the space of sports and athletics and youth, was growing and growing and, you know, where we are now is quite remarkable from 1997 when I, when I started opened up mental edge, but also was doing the clinical work and, and now in 2025, how mental coaching and mindset coaching and so forth has all now been really normalized, with all the athletes coming out, you know, COVID and post COVID.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (05:35)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (05:35)
Really, you know, opening up about, about their challenges clinically and, and otherwise working with a sports psychologist or working with a therapist, psychologists. So it's been, I've liked the variety and I've, you know, early days just really loved working with families and, and, you know, get the, have the 10, 12-year-old boy baseball player coming in and just distraught and anxious, and both parents really, of course with youth sports, how it is, they're so, so involved and, and care so much and so much passion the parents and, and that, that not really understanding the impact right. On the, on the kids and seeing or seeing that. So I worked a lot, you know, with families in that regard and tried to educate the parents. And, and then, you know, just over the last, I'd say five years, move more into almost exclusive sports psychology and we can talk about the sort of convergence of clinical and where does it end and where does sports psychology begin. So it's and now I'm kind of wanting to come full circle again and do some more family work and it's just, it's a little more, it's rich and it's and the need is so, so is really there for that, that help that support. You know, with the craze of college competitive nature of getting into a good college and, and, and, all of that and the fear of failure. And now we have social media, so there's a, we can talk more about sort of how evolved, not necessarily in a good way, unfortunately.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (07:23)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Definitely. Okay, wonderful. Yeah. Tell me a little bit about the difference between the clinical and the sports psychology, or even what approaches are being kind of used or utilized in this work.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (07:37)
Yeah, I mean, so the, the peak performance, performance enhancement, work, you know, is, is really, there is CBT in there for sure, obviously. I mean, helping, kids, parents, you know, reframe and find new perspectives, et cetera, which is, is a more of a challenge now, I'm finding five years ago it was, it was not as big of a push and to really move the needle on, focusing on the process and mastery over outcome, which has become this huge elephant, you know winning will we win, and, everything else that's on it. So, you know, the, the clinical aspect, you know, is where we're getting, you know, deeper into that anxiety, right? And the, and the, and the relationships and at home and so forth, and performance enhancement work, you know, is dealing with focus and different focusing styles. People don't really know, if you're not really in the field, the mensions of focus as it relates to sports performance, and, and kids focusing styles. So that's kind of an interesting aspect of sports psychology, which is kind of beyond the CBT aspect. But also I've worked, I've worked with ACT for many, many years.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (09:02)
Mm-hmm
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (09:02)
I actually, about 15 years ago, I think I started with a motivational interviewing and bringing what I was doing, and-- it was really fun actually, was taking some of what a lot of what we know in motivational interviewing Act, CBT, a little bit of somatic work and, and sort of morphing that, applying it with athletes and coaches as well, and how to, how, how coaches can help communicate in a different way. So, the motivational interviewing was really, really effective. And but yeah, so, you know, obviously the clinical aspect is when they can't really utilize the tools.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (09:41)
Sure, sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (09:42)
They're, they're just stuck and, and so forth. Yeah. So, well.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (09:46)
Tell me about the different styles of focus or, or so on. That's interesting. I haven't heard of that.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (09:51)
Yeah. Well, so, and it's an assessment that I've used for many, many years that the Olympic Training Center had used, and I think still probably does. And it's, you know, these four dimensions of focus are sort of an internal narrow internal focus, a narrow, narrow external, and then we have a broad internal, and a broad external. So there's sort of different dimensions and, you know, a narrow external is, you know, your focus on the ball.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (10:24)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (10:25)
Simple is very, very narrow. And, but a lot of athletes are in their head. They're thinking about different things, technique, strategy, but also, of course, outside of that performance realm, they're thinking of what is, what are my parents gonna say? Sure. On the car ride home Which is the deadly time, for everybody. But...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (10:51)
So is that like the broad-- so is that like the narrow external and like the broad the narrow internal kind of thinking about like, oh, the pressure or so on, or how I'm feeling, or what, what's going on in the...
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (11:03)
So if you want specifically-- yeah, so the narrow internal would be your thinking, you know, don't lose, yeah. You're, you're really, on a thought and, but it can also be positive. You know, you, you're regulating, you're taking a deep breath, and so you're, you're internal is very specific. The broad internal would be more strategic. You're thinking, should I, you know, pass more. Should I take the shot you're internally evaluating, what does coach want me to do? So that's more of a broad... not so narrow,
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (11:34)
Like how kind of you, you and the team are working together or so on.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (11:37)
Mm-hmm .
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (11:38)
So you'd be sort of eval--, you know, a lot of overthinkers, so you know. You have kids who, and then you just have the regulation challenge, right. Where they just blow up and, and all of that. But, but then, you know, the overthinkers and smart, really bright kids tend to just get in their own way, right? And, and so it's just helping them understand these dimensions that they have a choice. So, in my book, The Metal Edge for Young Athletes, that I just released, you know, I talk about using a remote, you know, giving kids a remote control essentially, which they like, right? Like that they have, that we're putting the buttons on together, but they are the ones who have to press the button to change the channel, so to speak. Or, you know, their focusing style because, you know, as, you know, like giving kids agency and having them feel empowered to make those changes, you know, internally or otherwise, and the parent, because the parents are very involved in all of that. So we could talk forever about just that agency aspect, which is..
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (12:45)
Sure, sure. Yeah. And maybe you can talk a little bit about that because, I was mentioning as we were chatting before we started this, you know, often a piece that comes up for many families, or even just in my, with my own kids or other people that I know of kids is around, you know, the kids kind of wanna be like, ah, I don't want to do soccer anymore, or something like that, right? And kind of figuring out like, do we press and have them keep going with this? Do we say, okay, like, you can end, or... You know, I think that's sometimes a difficult place to figure out for parents, you know, is this something that would be good to encourage them to persist and not leave versus you know, actually this is something that they're just not enjoying. This is something that they used to enjoy, but now they don't anymore. They've, you know, developed in different ways or so on. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (13:37)
No, you're bringing up a, kind of a, crucial, you know, sort of challenge in the family because A) you know, kids will say, "I wanna, I'm gonna quit." They have a bad game, a bad match, and they: "I'm quitting." You know? And then, then that's more, they're emoting and they're and so on. And, that's you know, it's best to roll with that. You know, they're anxious, they don't know how to regulate, they're worrying all the time, fear of failure and all these things. So the anxiety is really dominating that. And that's really more the often contributor there, you know, in terms, I wanna quit and I don't wanna, you know, experience this and dread the games and all that. So, you know, that being said, the the pressure kids feel these days is big. And, as we said, social media is all... you know, they see themselves, are exposed. So, helping parents recognize their impact is important. And, and, you know, often I find they are open to hearing about giving kids space and not attacking them after, you know, right after the game and talking about it and giving them... coaching them and giving them tips and all this stuff. So it's helping parents, you know, step back... Because what happens is parents, you know, feel obligated and feel pressure too, right? With college and all the money they're spending and hiring, pitching coaches, and you name it. So it's a big pressure cooker. Yeah. And so helping them, you know, let the-- let their kids have some space and validate them and don't try to rush in and fix, you know, all those, you know, approaches that are so important. Because you know, if you're on the other side of it and kids are-- you know, the parents are more, interested and engaged on it than the kids are, that's not where you wanna be with this whole thing.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (15:55)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (15:56)
It's really challenging, but letting kids have more space with it. But if they say, I want to quit, and they're really dreading games and the whole thing, it's just finding out what's going on. It's probably anxiety, maybe the coach. The coaches can be sometimes negative, critical, domineering. And, they're just... and frankly they are-- it's kind of emotional abuse as well. It happens all the time. So it's really trying to find out what your kids and what do they feel and validate them and don't just rush in, of course and try to solve it, fix it...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (16:31)
So kind of giving that space and trying to understand what might be going on or, or so on. And then kind of figuring out how you might address those or really to help kind of evaluate what might be the best course of action.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (16:46)
Right. Because the kids don't have the tools, right. So it's, they don't have options. And so when their teammates are giving them a little, you know, hard time because they, you know, missed a shot, et cetera. So there's sort of anxiety of the teammates and maybe that relationally is tough. And the coach, as I said, and then the parents are kind of hovering and it just quickly becomes a pressure cooker that's no fun anymore. And that's the thing, I think it's like about 70% of kids by 16 are quitting sports.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:15)
Oh, wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (17:16)
Yeah. They're quitting and because it's not fun anymore.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:19)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (17:19)
And I work with a lot of tennis players too, and it's become a job sadly, you know, that, they're starting out at 6..8 and it's, it's work and... you just don't see the joy.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:36)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (17:37)
You don't see the fun and coaches are-- it's really, gotten crazy a bit.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:45)
Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. What was that movie? King Richard, about the Serena and Venus' family. Like, oh my gosh, I'm really falling down as a parent here. It's working... although, I know they had a lot of issues, but that, you know, idea of like, how hard should the parent be working on getting this thing to happen or not. And I know in the value in that situation was, you know, helping with their financial situation and such. But yeah, really also, I guess looking at the motivations too of, you know, is this something the kid wants? Is this something the parents' pushing for? Is this something, you know, right? Parents sometimes reliving their own youth through their kids or such.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (18:27)
For sure. For sure and also, you know, the temperament of the kid is very important, right? So you assess, you know, they're obviously introverted, extroverted. But there's, you know, what, what's the profile? Highly sensitive, highly intense kids who are-- they really need tools to manage that. And that's a big, you know, that's an opportunity. I see it as an opportunity, mostly. So, when kids are in that place, they often just like, as I said, don't have tools nor do the parents. So educating them, again, why I wrote this book. It is a super nuanced of these moments I try to capture, you know, in real time the conversations that I've had with parents and kids and so forth. And, but, assessing the temperament. You know, if kids are not that athletic, really, and they're more... They have a propensity for art or other things. So it's no-- pushing that boulder up the hill may not be the best thing. So yeah, I think it's important for parents to really step back and evaluate, you know, their child and their temperament. And the assessment I have also kind of assesses the, you know, rigidity and flexibility, you know, and so forth. You know and yeah. So, definitely that's an aspect of it, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (19:54)
And, I'm curious, it was actually one of the other reasons that made me think about doing an interview on this was because I was working with a kid in a family, and he was, you know, very good at sports. He was in fifth grade or going into fifth grade. And, you know, one of the things he really struggled with was when he did mess up, or, you know, it didn't quite go the way he wanted, even though he was oftentimes doing much better than some of the other kids in the situation, whether it be, you know, ski team or baseball or whatever it might be. He'd just get so hard on himself and really be beating himself up. And of course we use the cognitive behavioral therapy pieces, but I was kind of curious about, you know... Because with sports, you are not gonna win a hundred percent of the time, right? Even a good batting average is just, you know, hitting the ball one out of three times or so on. So I was just curious if there is, not a boilerplate, but like kind of standard, you know, pieces that we bring in and the way that kids can think about when things don't go the way they're hoping or they're not performing as well as they are, or they lose the game or so on. Because that is, that is inherent within the sports.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (21:08)
A hundred percent. And this is an aspect that's gotten, you know, even worse over the past, you know, decade really, the perfectionism and, you know, no room for error. And so... you know, you do often find critical parents who are over, you know, teaching their kids. And, so it can be-- but they also can be hardwired with anxiety, et cetera. Right?. But that perfection is, you know, I think that, you know, call-- naming it right is really important. And so when perfectionism hits, a little bit of externalization is useful, right? When it hits and having that conversation with young kids, you know, it works pretty well. And so you're on a team together and when that hits, because-- and of course the one-- the stats are now-- we have information, so using data, I mean, you know, if you win 55% of the points in tennis, in a tennis match, over the course of a year, just 55%, you're number one in the world. If you win, believe it or not, if you win just over half the points, you know, you win the match. And what-- but as we know, kids', amygdala is just totally a-- you know, activated and they're out there and it's emotional and they just, so all ration, you know, rationale goes out the window.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (22:31)
Exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (22:32)
But with consistency and then having a tool like, you know, deep diaphragmatic breathing and really, you know, using that, generalizing that, using it in the classroom, and getting, you know, just teaching them something even simple like that and explaining it so they understand it.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (22:51)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (22:51)
But finding a tool that can help them is-- because their amygdala is just, boom, it's on fire. And I talk about the, you know, fire extinguisher and they, you know, a lot of analogies are helpful, remote control, fire extinguisher... Give them agency again. Right? And now they feel, you know, that, that they have a place to go to in these moments, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (23:14)
Yeah. Some like locus of control [inaudible] outta control.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (23:18)
Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That's a huge one. And so, you know, these tools by themselves, if not contextualized and sort of worked with some of the externalization, and this is the art and the science of it, right? Sure. How to sort of teach it, deliver it, and, and have some accountability on using it. And so I have, you know, post game reflection and little bit of journaling. I try to encourage them and coming back to the call with me or our meeting and "how did it go?" And "how did you, you know, use that?" And "Give me specific examples."
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (23:56)
Yeah. Is there any guidance around the post-game reflection? Is there like any structure to that? Or is it just reflecting on what went well or didn't go well?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (24:05)
Yeah, and specifically related to the tools that you're teaching and how, you know, what got in the way of using it if they did or didn't use. Use that tool and just, yeah, Whole-- you know, sort of, you know, exploring that with them, those questions. You know, because often too, they'll say, let's say had they had a mediocre game,
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (24:29)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (24:30)
They're gonna focus-- it was the worst game of their life. And, you know, like, and they're gonna focus on the negative. And so helping them also pull out the positives and validating that and get-- and, you know, kids... we're in a position where we're not the parent, right? So the-- if we validate them and, specifically and it's received because they're working with us, then it can go a long way and you can get some real momentum once they start using. It can be a game changer, a life changer, because they are using these tools in the context of really pressure moments. So...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (25:08)
Yeah, definitely.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (25:09)
That's really, I think, an appeal because it-- these tools...skills, generalize obviously to their life, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (25:16)
Of course. Definitely. And I was thinking too, like in this case that I was talking about, the parents, fortunately weren't pressure and so on, were very supportive. But you were mentioning motivational interviewing. You know, the way I kind of think about it too, sometimes with the cognitive behavioral therapy, you know, we all have this ambivalence, and sometimes as a parent, as they're trying to help out, they might, the kid says, oh, I had a horrible game. And the parent says, "Hey, but what about this? You did this, you did that, right!" And the kid says, "Yes, but..." And unknowingly as the parent's trying to be supportive, they're sometimes eliciting that other side of the ambivalence.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (25:53)
Right. Right.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (25:54)
And so, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (25:55)
And then, and yeah, that's why it's really an underutilized skill. I think we know that as therapists, right? That, and I think even more now, because, you know, everybody's sort of a bit hijacked. I think, you know, with social, with social media or just in technology, things are moving really fast. And then you have the coach and the getting on the team and, you know... playing, it's just a, it's a lot. And so, yeah, the tools, the regulation tools and, and like you said, validating them, the kids, and not rushing to the answer and just exploring it and just holding the moment just a little bit.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (26:36)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (26:37)
It reduces the defensiveness of the kids, right? They don't feel the need to then go more extreme on something because--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (26:44)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (26:45)
So that part, has been, you know, a very-- it's been a big part of my work over the years: is trying to help parents, show up in the the best way, you know, when the kids show anxiety and normalize it and not get all worked up themselves and have--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (27:04)
I was gonna say, being able to sit with their own dysregulation, you know, because sometimes, I guess just with anxiety in general, sports are not, sometimes as parents are trying to help, sometimes they may be unknowingly reinforcing avoidance and giving the message that this is really bad, that you're feeling bad, rather than it's okay to feel bad at this.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (27:23)
Exactly. Exactly. Acceptance. Yeah. Right. We know, right, that accepting anxiety and not fighting it and you know, is really, really helpful. And so normalizing it all, every athlete feels it is part of the deal. And so when the kid's not finishing breakfast, the parents aren't just getting all upset about it and to just, yeah, try to, try to meet them where they are. And it's a big, that's a game changer in terms of the energy of the home and so on, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (27:52)
Sure. Can you speak to your, you've mentioned, or alluded to a couple times of the changes you've seen over the last 25 years, and I'd love if you have anything that you could share about differences that you've noticed. You know, I was working with one family where I think the kid was like in fourth grade, and they were like: "He can't even start soccer now because all these other kids have been doing it for years and have had like, one-on-one coaching." And especially in our area, there's a lot of people that will get very intensely into the sports and you know, advance the kids. I'd be curious about your thoughts on what you've noticed has changed over time and any of those influences.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (28:33)
Yeah, it's interesting. You know, the biggest thing I'd say about it is, what I dealt with many years ago, 25 years ago: fear of failure. One known example, it was early, you know, '98 I think or something... But, a tennis player lost a game, was the first game of the match, and he's throwing his racket and, you know. And I was new into the whole thing. And I, and by the way, I had a temper as a kid playing tennis, so I understand it, but I asked him, you know, "What, what were you thinking?" You know, "when you threw your racket?" And he said, "I was worried my ranking would drop." And I said, "well, what if that happened?" And he, you know, he said, "Well I wouldn't get into a good college." I stayed with him, "And then what?" You know, downward arrow.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (29:26)
Yeah, exactly. Downward arrow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (29:28)
Right? Yeah. And then, well, then I wouldn't get a good job if I, you know, didn't get into a good college, and I stayed with him and then, "Anything left?" You know, I thought it was over, you know, but no: "I'd probably be homeless." You know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (29:42)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (29:42)
Now that was an isolate-- but that, the level of anxiety and fear and consequences and "What are people gonna say if I win or lose?" And, you know, parents, friends, coaches, it's become more pervasive. It's become-- and it's become almost normal in a bad way. Like it's entrenched in society and youth sports that this is like, even kids, it's like they're hijacked. I talk to them and it's just normal. Like, yeah, like my UTR in tennis, there's a ranking UTR, it's, I need this UTR and the parent-- it's like, it's just more, it's not an exception.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (30:30)
Uh-huh.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (30:31)
People weren't maybe seeking out sports psychology. Certainly were not, the way they are now.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (30:37)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (30:38)
But it's just more like a language and a way of being and an acceptance of this is this pressure cooker is what it is, and...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (30:47)
And like more focus on rankings and so on, rather than just kind of enjoying the sport and, and focus on excelling versus... Or is it more, I guess maybe that one example you were giving was maybe not a majority of the kids, but now there's more of a majority that are catastrophizing on every move and how it's going to maybe affect their future.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (31:10)
Exactly. Exactly, and it's just, yeah, it's just more and more common. It's deeper and the-- you know, focusing on skill development, what I teach is a mastery mindset, right? Process. Because the fundamental challenge problem is that the one thing we don't control is if we're gonna win or lose.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (31:37)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (31:38)
It's the very thing everybody's worried about. And dread-- and thinking about, you know, if this, and if that, right? The what ifs, and it's-- you could have the best game of your life and you still lose. So I try to really train families, kids to create intentions and new metrics, basically. I'm trying to create a new metric system focusing on the things you have control over, obviously, right? And to be, you know, focused, you know, a little more focused, sustaining it or refocus to play a little looser to, you know, commit to what they've trained and not back off. And I talk, I call it, you know, permission to miss, give yourself permission to miss, which a lot of-- which really resonates with athletes, you know, that, and to give themselves that feeling and experience what that's like. But a new metric system juxtaposed to this, "Are we gonna win?"
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (32:44)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (32:45)
And, "What if we don't?" You know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (32:47)
Rather than like pass/fail, there's maybe some other things that they can be focused on that they're achieving, like more of the process necessarily than the outcome.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (32:55)
A hundred percent. Which is now, in 2025, significantly more challenging to move the needle on, takes longer and you have to be really, really clear about what you're doing to hold this system long enough to get the kind of movement, because we have so many conflicting voices about-- and in the media, what the kids see is Steph Curry, you know, having this incredible game and, you know, these amazing athletes, which is... 2% of of all athletes make it professionally less than that actually.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (33:38)
Yeah. Wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (33:38)
Mostly it's less than 1%, but, you know, tennis is 2%, but it's-- but they're being treated, kids are being sort of, this experience is being treated like everyone's going pro.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (33:50)
Yeah. Right. It's a lot.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (33:54)
So that allure and is...is... again, more commonplace now because of social media. Sure. And that's where we're getting...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:06)
Interesting.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:06)
...crushed.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:07)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:08)
The great experiment.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:10)
I was listening to an economics podcast about, I think it was, minor league baseball players kind of basically forming groups and whoever. If one of them made it, they would all share in some of the income from that in a way of almost like diversifying, because odds are so low. In that way, kind of pooling together their resources.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:31)
Well now just to piggyback real quick, Keith, on that is.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:34)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:34)
Now we have athletes being paid to go to college. Paid for... right? So there's-- now we've upped the ante on this whole thing.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:45)
Yeah. Now that they can get income and money for the rights of their, you know, the work that they're doing or being used in advertising or games or so on, like video games.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:56)
Yeah.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:56)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:57)
And it's a, you know, they get, they get paid to play for the college, right? So that's a-- and, you know, as a tennis player, it probably costs 400 grand now to get your kid from 10 to 18. Wow. Maybe a half, I mean, half a million dollars
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (35:15)
[inaudible]
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (35:16)
To hire the people and do the thing, tennis is particularly expensive, right? It's another level but you got pitching coaches now and the whole thing, but, you know, think about it. And then so colleges, so it's kind of a wash a lot of, even if they get to DI.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (35:32)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (35:33)
Now being paid is a big-- to that percentage who are getting paid. Okay. Now you're sort of in the, you know, in the winning column, I guess financially, but it costs a lot to get--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (35:43)
Well, not to mention just even the time parents are taking off to take the kids and, you know, oftentimes during working hours and so on, which I think there's probably also a socioeconomic kind of split in who is able to be involved at these high levels with the sports and the time commitments.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (36:02)
The sadness, isn't it that sports, music, sports, the arts is such an opportunity to learn these amazing life skills, you know, the pressure and the team building...for a lifetime of relationships, which many do have, but this path that is so... becomes so stressful, which could be so enriching for everybody. And that's again, why I just like, I have to write a book that-- because a lot of it's checklist and do this and do that. But, I think we need to call attention to this. That's what I think we need to call attention to this and teach people, teach them. And I think people are going to continually be more open to it because they're suffering. People-- families are suffering a lot.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (36:56)
Yeah. And teaching them what? Like..?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (36:58)
Tools...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (36:58)
Those tools and skills.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (37:00)
...and how to communicate and validate, you know, some of the motivation interviewing and, you know, teaching mindfulness and helping them learn what reframing really is and how to do it. And becoming aware, frankly. Just teaching awareness and that, give them hope because there is a way, there are ways and things that we can teach and they can learn to help them a lot.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (37:24)
Yeah. Build that resilience too.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (37:26)
Mm-hmm.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (37:28)
Yeah. And one thing you were mentioning earlier, you were saying about like kind of one measure of like, you know, kind of what the person's working on, or successors on, is if they were kind of following whatever, I guess program or strategy that they were trying to do rather than maybe falling back. And then you were saying kind of the giving the permission to miss. Are those-- were those two connected or were you, meaning like somebody having all their training going in and trying to stick with that during the game rather than maybe like kind of falling back to old habits, you know, in those moments and dropping off what they're maybe trying to work on and as they improve in their, their strategy or their technique or so on?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (38:07)
Right. So what you're suggesting... Yeah. The, the, that they lose the, you know, the intentions that they, these metrics, these intentions that they go in and then they fall back. Absolutely. You know, typically, certainly in the beginning...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (38:21)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (38:21)
...they fall back into the playing safe and worry and all that. And, and so it's the permission to miss and continuing to, you know, deepen that awareness and commitment and holding that up while they have the new metrics, placing... It's not, it's-- you can't, kids are gonna, they wanna win, the kids wanna win, of course, but, but if we can just balance the scale a little more. Where the, where the process and the skills and the commitment to those skills they've been learning matches and we can reduce this perfectionistic...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (39:05)
Yes. Yes.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (39:07)
...you know, pattern now we're-- the needle's moving, right? Permission to miss. In metrics, intentionality. We're moving the needle.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (39:19)
And putting those together. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. With the permission to miss too, I, it almost makes me think of, you know, almost like exposure therapy. Like actually sitting with the discomfort of having missed or so on. I don't know if that's just more of a mental kind of aspect of a cognitive level of permission to miss or also, you know, kind of feeling the discomfort and kind of riding that wave of missing or so on.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (39:49)
Yeah. That's exposure and simulation is an aspect, right. Of performance enhancement and helping coaches... and players, athletes to do drills that put them in situations to close out a match and, you know, having, you know, a few seconds left and they... and trying to put that pressure on them and use the tools while they're, you know, and-- You can never simulate a game exactly. But you can create structure to simulate that. So yeah, exposure is really important so they can-- but because what they do inevitably is try to not miss, right?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (40:36)
Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (40:37)
Of course. Which makes it worse. So kids double faulting over and over, they're getting stuck and we need to get them to commit and be, you know, give themselves that permission and feel it and let them see the anxiety wave drop, feel it drop.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (40:55)
Yeah, definitely.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (40:56)
They get-- they're in the avoidance pattern, right? So then, the-- they get stuck in that, right?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:02)
Yeah, exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:03)
Exposure's helpful.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:04)
Definitely. And do you also involve visualization? I feel like oftentimes, like, you know, kind of visualizing success or visualizing yourself going through it is something that I often, you know, attribute to more kind of that performance coaching or so on. I, I don't know if that's something that that is...yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:23)
Yeah. Visualization is a great tool. And, you know, the best athletes do it naturally. If you ask them do you visualize, they just laugh, like, I mean all the time, you know? They're picturing the shot and, you know, I used to as a tennis player, I don't know what you know about my background there.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:43)
Yea, no, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:44)
Yeah, we can maybe hit on that and if you'd like, but maybe, you know...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:48)
Actually, why don't you share that? Yeah, because you do have a background.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:51)
Yeah. I mean but what that point about... I think you were bringing up, I-- what was that point again?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (42:01)
Oh, it was about visualization.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (42:03)
Ah, yeah. So visualization, you know, the perfectionism interestingly comes in a lot with kids. So when I have them visualize and I do meditation with them in a little visualization and in their context of their sport, and when they do it on their own, often they say, "Hh, I see myself failing, missing." And so that perfectionism shows up quite a lot in the visualization. So, we kind of work through that a bit and, you know, giving, and that's exposure in and of itself. So having them be okay with it, that's okay. Like, just stay with that. And then, you know, let's see if, you know, without forcing it, we can get to the feeling of being loose and being focused, et cetera. So, yeah. But that's interesting how that comes up a lot. But I absolutely use visualization, pre-match, pre-game, three minutes, five minutes to see themselves, you know, performing those metrics. So it's not about only winning, you know? Some like to see the winning, you know, themselves winning, but it's more about the metrics and committing to those things. So yeah, as far as my background, so I played junior tennis, and I went to a tennis academy at 12 when...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (43:23)
Oh wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (43:23)
...my parents sent me to a, I said I wanted to be a pro tennis player and, at 12, and they, three weeks later, I was on a plane down to the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, which is now the IMG Academy and baseball, football... They have all the sports now.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (43:37)
Wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (43:37)
Which is a whole incredible thing. I was there in the second year that it was ever there. And lived in a motel with, you know, four other kids and from around the world, and there were 60 of us. Anyway, I did that, and then I played junior tennis and well, you know, all the nationals and went on to play college, UCSB, UC Santa Barbara, played there. And, I did well, I got better and better. I was kind of a late bloomer. And then I went on to play professionally for a couple years, two years, got world rankings and singles and doubles, but I did-- I wasn't making a living at it. So, I-- but then, yeah, and then I moved to Germany and played-- because I got a coaching job in Germany and I coached tennis and played for a club, which was really great. But that-- coaching tennis wasn't quite it for me. And I was journaling a lot, and I thought there was a moment in 1995, I was picking up balls on the court with these junior players and, you know, I'm like, I can't do this. Like, this is not a life, like, career here. But then I thought, what about, psychology? What about sports psychology? You know?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (44:49)
It dawned on me, and that's when I went, came back here in '95 to go to graduate school and so forth. And then the, the depth of it and the, my interest in the family systems and just, beyond just performance enhancement, which was really interesting at the time. But both, I really, you know, I saw, so I just, I ended up doing both clinical and specialized in sports psychology. But that was my path. And then I think the kind of, the interesting story, if you will, is that I then, you know, 12 years after stopping professional tennis, I went back and played and was playing the best tennis of my life, and I became number one in the world in my age group in the 35's.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (45:31)
Oh, wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (45:32)
And I was playing players in the top hundred in the world and going three sets with them at 35, 36 years old.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (45:38)
Wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (45:38)
And playing in a big tournament down in San Jose: SAP Open. I'm walking off the street. It's a funny story, but I won't, maybe another time, but--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (45:49)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (45:50)
So this sort of click-- this role as a, you know, married family therapist, and then I'm a player and I'm in a big tournament, and it's just been an interesting sort of--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:03)
Yeah. Kind of moving back and forth and, you know, between and bringing it together.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:09)
Yeah, right.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:10)
And I'm assuming, but I'm guessing, right, all this work that you were doing in helping other people with performance coaching and so on came to fruition and going back and playing yourself again.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:21)
Meaning using the tools and stuff?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:22)
Yeah, exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:23)
A hundred percent. Like, so I, so what happened was, you know, I experienced this other state, this other dimension, of focus and, and a feeling of freedom and gratitude. Frankly, gratitude was, I think the first... You know, it's interesting, I don't, you know, anecdotally, like in 1996 or so, you know, Christopher Reeves fell off his horse.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:55)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:56)
And paralyzed. Superman.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:58)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:59)
Superman, paralyzed. I don't know, it just hit me the juxtaposition of that. And, and I guess I just started to tap into gratitude and how we can all take things for granted and winning and losing and all of that, and will I win? And I, you know, what will people, all this stuff. And I just was able to drop into the state and started playing at a different level. I mean, completely different level. And I'm like, wow, this is interesting. This Works. And I just got really fascinated even more applying the mastery mindset and process. And being able to change the channel and so forth.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (47:44)
I imagine it's almost like transcending beyond just the, the minutia of, you know, and that being so important to, right, kind of the, the larger aspects and gratitude and so on.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (47:58)
And you still wanna win.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (48:00)
Yeah, of course.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (48:01)
You so that, because a lot of people talk, oh, process versus outcome. It's, no, it's, you know, it's meaningful and fun and to play like that and, and feel that control and mastery. Yeah. And, guess what? You win more.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (48:19)
Mm-hmm
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (48:21)
With less worry and effort. So it's just getting people to understand and experience this and then the, you know, the needle really moves quickly once they discover this themselves.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (48:34)
Yeah. It's hard to teach that. It's like that kind of acceptance, confidence, kind of like letting go while still having the mastery or the locus of control.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (48:45)
Yeah. It is. It's, and it's... It's really like-- but if you can get, you don't have to do the whole thing. If you can move the ball enough, where they can take it and do it, to run with the ball for a little bit.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:03)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:04)
And experience it. Now you're off and running and you can have that conversation and deepen it. So you don't, you just need the bridge.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:12)
Have that, that taste of it or that moment of it to be able to build upon.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:15)
Definitely. And then they know you're not convincing them or, you know, dancing, doing the dance and hoping they, it's, they felt it.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:26)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:26)
Because they really used the correct diaphragmatic breath.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:32)
Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:33)
They decided to, alright, I'll go all in on this thing for a week.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:37)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:38)
And they do, and then they play well. Feels different.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:42)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:43)
They win.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:44)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:44)
Now you're, you got a customer. Right.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:47)
Well, and it sounds like too, that it's such a great aspect because one, there is a drive, you know, especially at these levels of competition to have any type of edge. So I imagine, you know, there's people approaching you to also just get an extra edge, you know, by mastering their own psychology or so on. But at the same time also, right, there's those mental health benefits of actually making things more fulfilling and thus also kind of despite whatever their motives for getting into it is-- whether to get an extra edge or to relieve suffering or so on. It kind of all helps in either way.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (50:26)
Definitely. Definitely.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (50:30)
Any last pieces that you think would be really important for listeners to know? Different therapists that maybe, you know, aren't sports psychologists or so on, or any kind of things that they might be interested in learning more about or takeaways for working with their own, you know, athlete, clients, or so on?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (50:49)
You know, I just, I think about, you know, I was asked the question the other day for an interview about, you know, "If there's one tool or one thing you would sort of sum up what, you know, the most valuable tool?" And, you know, it's an interesting thing. I couldn't give her just one, I gave her three, but, you know, and, and it was the mastery mindset and really working with that, the permission to miss, and then the focusing dimensions, really understanding, helping kids recognize that they can shift their focus. And, you know, part of that is, as we know, I mean in adolescents in particular, young athletes, young kids, the mind reading trap, as we know in CBT is such a huge one.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (51:44)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (51:44)
They don't have an identity yet. They're forming it, they're borrowing other kids' and parents' and coaches' opinion of them, and they're so vulnerable.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (51:52)
Right.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (51:52)
We know that. And so, I just feel like giving kids, you know, a chance to really, when I say play on their own terms more and make choices and assert themselves with their parents. I try to really help empower the kids. So anything we can do to give the kids that, you know, permission slip to assert themselves with their parents a little bit in a right way, but starting to take more ownership and not be such a victim, if you will.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (52:27)
Yeah. Like having a voice or having some, again, back to that agency,
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (52:31)
Agency is huge, right?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (52:32)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (52:33)
And I think that those are the, you know, if you can move the needle in those areas, that's pretty helpful. And a tool, these tools, there are quite a few tools, but certainly borrowing ACT is great. CBT is always a, you know, a playground for us, we need to be there, but there's some other boxes too that we can integrate, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (52:56)
Yeah. And I love with ACT-- the Acceptance Commitment Therapy, just this idea, right? The harder we're fighting it, sometimes, the worse it's getting like quicksand. And so often I'm trying to get rid of that anxiety or trying to have that control is what becomes part of the problem. And so being able to recognize that and accept that, right part of these struggles are within, in the dynamic of what they're working on allows for some, some letting go and being present.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (53:23)
And that may be the hardest cha-- the biggest...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (53:26)
Exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (53:27)
We all have, right? As therapists to, you know, in what, in our roles to, you know, help kids accept what they don't want, what people-- we don't want instinctively. Especially now with the social media and the pressure to accept that you had a bad game and you made a bad, a mistake that cost the team, you know? And it's devastating. The kids' worlds blow up inside a bit. They recover, but yeah, helping them, that's the part that we're challenged with because of this level of the expectation and perfectionism as you know.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (54:02)
Definitely. Yeah. Well, this is wonderful and congratulations on the book coming out. We'll definitely link to, it sounds like there's some wonderful aspects in there that would be really helpful for both therapists as well as clients. I really appreciate your time. Thanks so much, Jeff.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (54:17)
Thank you, Keith. It's been a pleasure.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (54:19)
Take care. Bye-bye.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (54:20)
Thank you.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (54:22)
Thank you for joining us today. If you'd like to receive continuing education credits for the podcast you just listened to, please go to therapyonthecuttingedge.com and click on the link for CE. Our podcast is brought to you by the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy, where we provide trainings for therapists in evidence-based models through live and online workshops, on-demand workshops, consultation groups, and online one-way mirror trainings. To learn more about our trainings and treatment for children, adolescents, families, couples, and individual adults, with our licensed experienced therapists in-person in the Bay Area, or throughout California online, and our employment opportunities, go to sfiap.com. To learn more about our associateships and psych assistantships and low fee treatment through our nonprofit Bay Area Community Counseling and Family Institute of Berkeley, go to sf-bacc.org and familyinstituteofberkeley.com. If you'd like to support therapy for those in financial need and training and evidence-based treatments, you can donate by going to BACC’s website at sfbacc.org. BACC is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit so all donations are tax deductible. Also, we really appreciate your feedback. If you have something you're interested in, something that's on the cutting edge of the field of psychotherapy, and you think therapists out there should know about it, send us an email. We're always looking for advancements in the field of psychotherapy to create lasting change for our clients.
Welcome to Therapy on the Cutting Edge, a podcast for therapists who want to be up to date on the latest advances in the field of psychotherapy. I'm your host, Dr. Keith Sutton, a psychologist in the San Francisco Bay Area, and the Director of the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy. At the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy, we provide training in evidence-based models, including family systems, cognitive behavioral therapy, emotionally focused couples therapy, eye movement desensitization reprocessing, motivational interviewing, and other approaches through live in-person and online trainings, on demand trainings, consultation groups, and one-way mirror trainings. We also have therapists throughout the Bay Area and California providing treatment through our six specialty centers, each grounded in an evidence-based approach, with our Lifespan Centers, Center for Children and Center for Adolescents, where all the therapists are working systemically; our Center for Couples, where all the therapists are using emotionally focused couples therapy; and our specialty issue centers, our Center for Anxiety, where all the therapists are using CBT and EMDR for trauma; and our center for ADHD and oppositional and Conduct Disorder clinic, where we're integrating those four approaches.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D. (01:32):
In the institute, we have our licensed, experienced therapists, and for those in financial need, we have an associated nonprofit, Bay Area Community Counseling, where clients can work with associates, psych assistants, and licensed clinicians who are developing their abilities and expertise. Additionally, as part of our nonprofit, we also have the Family Institute of Berkeley, where we provide treatment, training, and one-way mirror trainings in family systems. To learn more about trainings, treatment, and employment opportunities, please go to sfiap.com and to support our nonprofit, you can go to sf-bacc.org to donate today to support access to therapy for those in financial need, as well as training in evidence-based treatment. BACC is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so all donations are tax deductible.
Keith Sutton, PsyD: (02:19)
Today I'll be speaking with Jeff Greenwald, marriage and family therapist, who is a world champion athlete, licensed psychotherapist, bestselling author, and one of the world's leading mental coaches for athletes. With over 25 years of experience helping youth, college, and professional competitors thrive under pressure, Jeff brings a rare blend of elite performance, insight, and clinical expertise to his work. He is the author of the International Bestseller, The Best Tennis of Your Life, which has sold over 80,000 copies worldwide. And the new book, The Mental Edge for Young Athletes, a groundbreaking guide for building confidence, emotional resilience, and a stronger mindset in sports and life. Jeff has worked with athletes across every major sport and consulted for national teams, Fortune500 leaders, top junior academies, and competitive athletes at all levels of sport. He is a two-time ITF World Champion and was inducted into the Northern California Tennis Hall of Fame in 2019 for his contribution in the field of sports psychology and success as a world ranked tennis player. Through his writing, coaching and speaking, Jeff empowers athletes and their families to navigate the mental game with clarity, courage, and lasting confidence. Let's listen to the interview.
Keith Sutton, PsyD: (03:31)
Well, hi, Jeff. Welcome. Thanks for joining.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (03:33)
Great to be here, Keith. Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (03:36)
Definitely. So yeah, I was interested in learning more about sports psychology. I was working with a client recently and just interested in working with some folks in that area. And, you came to mind as I had done some consultation with you in the past. You're here in Marin County, in the San Francisco Bay area, working with adolescents and I think adults and young adults around sports. And also, I would love to hear your thoughts and learn more about kind of your perspective on the work that you've been doing, and I've also know you've written some books. So I would, I would love to learn more about it, but first, I always like to start off with, you know, finding out about how you got into this work and kind of the evolution of your thinking of the approaches that you bring to this work.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (04:28)
Yeah. It's, interesting to go back for all of us, right? To go back and see the journey forward. You know in 2002, I was licensed as an MFT, and, and at the time I was doing-- I'd say started, sports psychology work and clinical. So it was 50/50, I would say for many, many years, probably, you know, 15... 10 to 15 years of, of both, but more and more, the space of sports and athletics and youth, was growing and growing and, you know, where we are now is quite remarkable from 1997 when I, when I started opened up mental edge, but also was doing the clinical work and, and now in 2025, how mental coaching and mindset coaching and so forth has all now been really normalized, with all the athletes coming out, you know, COVID and post COVID.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (05:35)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (05:35)
Really, you know, opening up about, about their challenges clinically and, and otherwise working with a sports psychologist or working with a therapist, psychologists. So it's been, I've liked the variety and I've, you know, early days just really loved working with families and, and, you know, get the, have the 10, 12-year-old boy baseball player coming in and just distraught and anxious, and both parents really, of course with youth sports, how it is, they're so, so involved and, and care so much and so much passion the parents and, and that, that not really understanding the impact right. On the, on the kids and seeing or seeing that. So I worked a lot, you know, with families in that regard and tried to educate the parents. And, and then, you know, just over the last, I'd say five years, move more into almost exclusive sports psychology and we can talk about the sort of convergence of clinical and where does it end and where does sports psychology begin. So it's and now I'm kind of wanting to come full circle again and do some more family work and it's just, it's a little more, it's rich and it's and the need is so, so is really there for that, that help that support. You know, with the craze of college competitive nature of getting into a good college and, and, and, all of that and the fear of failure. And now we have social media, so there's a, we can talk more about sort of how evolved, not necessarily in a good way, unfortunately.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (07:23)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Definitely. Okay, wonderful. Yeah. Tell me a little bit about the difference between the clinical and the sports psychology, or even what approaches are being kind of used or utilized in this work.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (07:37)
Yeah, I mean, so the, the peak performance, performance enhancement, work, you know, is, is really, there is CBT in there for sure, obviously. I mean, helping, kids, parents, you know, reframe and find new perspectives, et cetera, which is, is a more of a challenge now, I'm finding five years ago it was, it was not as big of a push and to really move the needle on, focusing on the process and mastery over outcome, which has become this huge elephant, you know winning will we win, and, everything else that's on it. So, you know, the, the clinical aspect, you know, is where we're getting, you know, deeper into that anxiety, right? And the, and the, and the relationships and at home and so forth, and performance enhancement work, you know, is dealing with focus and different focusing styles. People don't really know, if you're not really in the field, the mensions of focus as it relates to sports performance, and, and kids focusing styles. So that's kind of an interesting aspect of sports psychology, which is kind of beyond the CBT aspect. But also I've worked, I've worked with ACT for many, many years.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (09:02)
Mm-hmm
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (09:02)
I actually, about 15 years ago, I think I started with a motivational interviewing and bringing what I was doing, and-- it was really fun actually, was taking some of what a lot of what we know in motivational interviewing Act, CBT, a little bit of somatic work and, and sort of morphing that, applying it with athletes and coaches as well, and how to, how, how coaches can help communicate in a different way. So, the motivational interviewing was really, really effective. And but yeah, so, you know, obviously the clinical aspect is when they can't really utilize the tools.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (09:41)
Sure, sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (09:42)
They're, they're just stuck and, and so forth. Yeah. So, well.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (09:46)
Tell me about the different styles of focus or, or so on. That's interesting. I haven't heard of that.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (09:51)
Yeah. Well, so, and it's an assessment that I've used for many, many years that the Olympic Training Center had used, and I think still probably does. And it's, you know, these four dimensions of focus are sort of an internal narrow internal focus, a narrow, narrow external, and then we have a broad internal, and a broad external. So there's sort of different dimensions and, you know, a narrow external is, you know, your focus on the ball.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (10:24)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (10:25)
Simple is very, very narrow. And, but a lot of athletes are in their head. They're thinking about different things, technique, strategy, but also, of course, outside of that performance realm, they're thinking of what is, what are my parents gonna say? Sure. On the car ride home Which is the deadly time, for everybody. But...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (10:51)
So is that like the broad-- so is that like the narrow external and like the broad the narrow internal kind of thinking about like, oh, the pressure or so on, or how I'm feeling, or what, what's going on in the...
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (11:03)
So if you want specifically-- yeah, so the narrow internal would be your thinking, you know, don't lose, yeah. You're, you're really, on a thought and, but it can also be positive. You know, you, you're regulating, you're taking a deep breath, and so you're, you're internal is very specific. The broad internal would be more strategic. You're thinking, should I, you know, pass more. Should I take the shot you're internally evaluating, what does coach want me to do? So that's more of a broad... not so narrow,
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (11:34)
Like how kind of you, you and the team are working together or so on.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (11:37)
Mm-hmm .
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (11:38)
So you'd be sort of eval--, you know, a lot of overthinkers, so you know. You have kids who, and then you just have the regulation challenge, right. Where they just blow up and, and all of that. But, but then, you know, the overthinkers and smart, really bright kids tend to just get in their own way, right? And, and so it's just helping them understand these dimensions that they have a choice. So, in my book, The Metal Edge for Young Athletes, that I just released, you know, I talk about using a remote, you know, giving kids a remote control essentially, which they like, right? Like that they have, that we're putting the buttons on together, but they are the ones who have to press the button to change the channel, so to speak. Or, you know, their focusing style because, you know, as, you know, like giving kids agency and having them feel empowered to make those changes, you know, internally or otherwise, and the parent, because the parents are very involved in all of that. So we could talk forever about just that agency aspect, which is..
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (12:45)
Sure, sure. Yeah. And maybe you can talk a little bit about that because, I was mentioning as we were chatting before we started this, you know, often a piece that comes up for many families, or even just in my, with my own kids or other people that I know of kids is around, you know, the kids kind of wanna be like, ah, I don't want to do soccer anymore, or something like that, right? And kind of figuring out like, do we press and have them keep going with this? Do we say, okay, like, you can end, or... You know, I think that's sometimes a difficult place to figure out for parents, you know, is this something that would be good to encourage them to persist and not leave versus you know, actually this is something that they're just not enjoying. This is something that they used to enjoy, but now they don't anymore. They've, you know, developed in different ways or so on. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (13:37)
No, you're bringing up a, kind of a, crucial, you know, sort of challenge in the family because A) you know, kids will say, "I wanna, I'm gonna quit." They have a bad game, a bad match, and they: "I'm quitting." You know? And then, then that's more, they're emoting and they're and so on. And, that's you know, it's best to roll with that. You know, they're anxious, they don't know how to regulate, they're worrying all the time, fear of failure and all these things. So the anxiety is really dominating that. And that's really more the often contributor there, you know, in terms, I wanna quit and I don't wanna, you know, experience this and dread the games and all that. So, you know, that being said, the the pressure kids feel these days is big. And, as we said, social media is all... you know, they see themselves, are exposed. So, helping parents recognize their impact is important. And, and, you know, often I find they are open to hearing about giving kids space and not attacking them after, you know, right after the game and talking about it and giving them... coaching them and giving them tips and all this stuff. So it's helping parents, you know, step back... Because what happens is parents, you know, feel obligated and feel pressure too, right? With college and all the money they're spending and hiring, pitching coaches, and you name it. So it's a big pressure cooker. Yeah. And so helping them, you know, let the-- let their kids have some space and validate them and don't try to rush in and fix, you know, all those, you know, approaches that are so important. Because you know, if you're on the other side of it and kids are-- you know, the parents are more, interested and engaged on it than the kids are, that's not where you wanna be with this whole thing.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (15:55)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (15:56)
It's really challenging, but letting kids have more space with it. But if they say, I want to quit, and they're really dreading games and the whole thing, it's just finding out what's going on. It's probably anxiety, maybe the coach. The coaches can be sometimes negative, critical, domineering. And, they're just... and frankly they are-- it's kind of emotional abuse as well. It happens all the time. So it's really trying to find out what your kids and what do they feel and validate them and don't just rush in, of course and try to solve it, fix it...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (16:31)
So kind of giving that space and trying to understand what might be going on or, or so on. And then kind of figuring out how you might address those or really to help kind of evaluate what might be the best course of action.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (16:46)
Right. Because the kids don't have the tools, right. So it's, they don't have options. And so when their teammates are giving them a little, you know, hard time because they, you know, missed a shot, et cetera. So there's sort of anxiety of the teammates and maybe that relationally is tough. And the coach, as I said, and then the parents are kind of hovering and it just quickly becomes a pressure cooker that's no fun anymore. And that's the thing, I think it's like about 70% of kids by 16 are quitting sports.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:15)
Oh, wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (17:16)
Yeah. They're quitting and because it's not fun anymore.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:19)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (17:19)
And I work with a lot of tennis players too, and it's become a job sadly, you know, that, they're starting out at 6..8 and it's, it's work and... you just don't see the joy.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:36)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (17:37)
You don't see the fun and coaches are-- it's really, gotten crazy a bit.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (17:45)
Yeah. Definitely. Yeah. What was that movie? King Richard, about the Serena and Venus' family. Like, oh my gosh, I'm really falling down as a parent here. It's working... although, I know they had a lot of issues, but that, you know, idea of like, how hard should the parent be working on getting this thing to happen or not. And I know in the value in that situation was, you know, helping with their financial situation and such. But yeah, really also, I guess looking at the motivations too of, you know, is this something the kid wants? Is this something the parents' pushing for? Is this something, you know, right? Parents sometimes reliving their own youth through their kids or such.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (18:27)
For sure. For sure and also, you know, the temperament of the kid is very important, right? So you assess, you know, they're obviously introverted, extroverted. But there's, you know, what, what's the profile? Highly sensitive, highly intense kids who are-- they really need tools to manage that. And that's a big, you know, that's an opportunity. I see it as an opportunity, mostly. So, when kids are in that place, they often just like, as I said, don't have tools nor do the parents. So educating them, again, why I wrote this book. It is a super nuanced of these moments I try to capture, you know, in real time the conversations that I've had with parents and kids and so forth. And, but, assessing the temperament. You know, if kids are not that athletic, really, and they're more... They have a propensity for art or other things. So it's no-- pushing that boulder up the hill may not be the best thing. So yeah, I think it's important for parents to really step back and evaluate, you know, their child and their temperament. And the assessment I have also kind of assesses the, you know, rigidity and flexibility, you know, and so forth. You know and yeah. So, definitely that's an aspect of it, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (19:54)
And, I'm curious, it was actually one of the other reasons that made me think about doing an interview on this was because I was working with a kid in a family, and he was, you know, very good at sports. He was in fifth grade or going into fifth grade. And, you know, one of the things he really struggled with was when he did mess up, or, you know, it didn't quite go the way he wanted, even though he was oftentimes doing much better than some of the other kids in the situation, whether it be, you know, ski team or baseball or whatever it might be. He'd just get so hard on himself and really be beating himself up. And of course we use the cognitive behavioral therapy pieces, but I was kind of curious about, you know... Because with sports, you are not gonna win a hundred percent of the time, right? Even a good batting average is just, you know, hitting the ball one out of three times or so on. So I was just curious if there is, not a boilerplate, but like kind of standard, you know, pieces that we bring in and the way that kids can think about when things don't go the way they're hoping or they're not performing as well as they are, or they lose the game or so on. Because that is, that is inherent within the sports.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (21:08)
A hundred percent. And this is an aspect that's gotten, you know, even worse over the past, you know, decade really, the perfectionism and, you know, no room for error. And so... you know, you do often find critical parents who are over, you know, teaching their kids. And, so it can be-- but they also can be hardwired with anxiety, et cetera. Right?. But that perfection is, you know, I think that, you know, call-- naming it right is really important. And so when perfectionism hits, a little bit of externalization is useful, right? When it hits and having that conversation with young kids, you know, it works pretty well. And so you're on a team together and when that hits, because-- and of course the one-- the stats are now-- we have information, so using data, I mean, you know, if you win 55% of the points in tennis, in a tennis match, over the course of a year, just 55%, you're number one in the world. If you win, believe it or not, if you win just over half the points, you know, you win the match. And what-- but as we know, kids', amygdala is just totally a-- you know, activated and they're out there and it's emotional and they just, so all ration, you know, rationale goes out the window.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (22:31)
Exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (22:32)
But with consistency and then having a tool like, you know, deep diaphragmatic breathing and really, you know, using that, generalizing that, using it in the classroom, and getting, you know, just teaching them something even simple like that and explaining it so they understand it.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (22:51)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (22:51)
But finding a tool that can help them is-- because their amygdala is just, boom, it's on fire. And I talk about the, you know, fire extinguisher and they, you know, a lot of analogies are helpful, remote control, fire extinguisher... Give them agency again. Right? And now they feel, you know, that, that they have a place to go to in these moments, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (23:14)
Yeah. Some like locus of control [inaudible] outta control.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (23:18)
Exactly. Yeah, exactly. That's a huge one. And so, you know, these tools by themselves, if not contextualized and sort of worked with some of the externalization, and this is the art and the science of it, right? Sure. How to sort of teach it, deliver it, and, and have some accountability on using it. And so I have, you know, post game reflection and little bit of journaling. I try to encourage them and coming back to the call with me or our meeting and "how did it go?" And "how did you, you know, use that?" And "Give me specific examples."
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (23:56)
Yeah. Is there any guidance around the post-game reflection? Is there like any structure to that? Or is it just reflecting on what went well or didn't go well?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (24:05)
Yeah, and specifically related to the tools that you're teaching and how, you know, what got in the way of using it if they did or didn't use. Use that tool and just, yeah, Whole-- you know, sort of, you know, exploring that with them, those questions. You know, because often too, they'll say, let's say had they had a mediocre game,
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (24:29)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (24:30)
They're gonna focus-- it was the worst game of their life. And, you know, like, and they're gonna focus on the negative. And so helping them also pull out the positives and validating that and get-- and, you know, kids... we're in a position where we're not the parent, right? So the-- if we validate them and, specifically and it's received because they're working with us, then it can go a long way and you can get some real momentum once they start using. It can be a game changer, a life changer, because they are using these tools in the context of really pressure moments. So...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (25:08)
Yeah, definitely.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (25:09)
That's really, I think, an appeal because it-- these tools...skills, generalize obviously to their life, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (25:16)
Of course. Definitely. And I was thinking too, like in this case that I was talking about, the parents, fortunately weren't pressure and so on, were very supportive. But you were mentioning motivational interviewing. You know, the way I kind of think about it too, sometimes with the cognitive behavioral therapy, you know, we all have this ambivalence, and sometimes as a parent, as they're trying to help out, they might, the kid says, oh, I had a horrible game. And the parent says, "Hey, but what about this? You did this, you did that, right!" And the kid says, "Yes, but..." And unknowingly as the parent's trying to be supportive, they're sometimes eliciting that other side of the ambivalence.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (25:53)
Right. Right.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (25:54)
And so, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (25:55)
And then, and yeah, that's why it's really an underutilized skill. I think we know that as therapists, right? That, and I think even more now, because, you know, everybody's sort of a bit hijacked. I think, you know, with social, with social media or just in technology, things are moving really fast. And then you have the coach and the getting on the team and, you know... playing, it's just a, it's a lot. And so, yeah, the tools, the regulation tools and, and like you said, validating them, the kids, and not rushing to the answer and just exploring it and just holding the moment just a little bit.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (26:36)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (26:37)
It reduces the defensiveness of the kids, right? They don't feel the need to then go more extreme on something because--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (26:44)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (26:45)
So that part, has been, you know, a very-- it's been a big part of my work over the years: is trying to help parents, show up in the the best way, you know, when the kids show anxiety and normalize it and not get all worked up themselves and have--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (27:04)
I was gonna say, being able to sit with their own dysregulation, you know, because sometimes, I guess just with anxiety in general, sports are not, sometimes as parents are trying to help, sometimes they may be unknowingly reinforcing avoidance and giving the message that this is really bad, that you're feeling bad, rather than it's okay to feel bad at this.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (27:23)
Exactly. Exactly. Acceptance. Yeah. Right. We know, right, that accepting anxiety and not fighting it and you know, is really, really helpful. And so normalizing it all, every athlete feels it is part of the deal. And so when the kid's not finishing breakfast, the parents aren't just getting all upset about it and to just, yeah, try to, try to meet them where they are. And it's a big, that's a game changer in terms of the energy of the home and so on, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (27:52)
Sure. Can you speak to your, you've mentioned, or alluded to a couple times of the changes you've seen over the last 25 years, and I'd love if you have anything that you could share about differences that you've noticed. You know, I was working with one family where I think the kid was like in fourth grade, and they were like: "He can't even start soccer now because all these other kids have been doing it for years and have had like, one-on-one coaching." And especially in our area, there's a lot of people that will get very intensely into the sports and you know, advance the kids. I'd be curious about your thoughts on what you've noticed has changed over time and any of those influences.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (28:33)
Yeah, it's interesting. You know, the biggest thing I'd say about it is, what I dealt with many years ago, 25 years ago: fear of failure. One known example, it was early, you know, '98 I think or something... But, a tennis player lost a game, was the first game of the match, and he's throwing his racket and, you know. And I was new into the whole thing. And I, and by the way, I had a temper as a kid playing tennis, so I understand it, but I asked him, you know, "What, what were you thinking?" You know, "when you threw your racket?" And he said, "I was worried my ranking would drop." And I said, "well, what if that happened?" And he, you know, he said, "Well I wouldn't get into a good college." I stayed with him, "And then what?" You know, downward arrow.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (29:26)
Yeah, exactly. Downward arrow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (29:28)
Right? Yeah. And then, well, then I wouldn't get a good job if I, you know, didn't get into a good college, and I stayed with him and then, "Anything left?" You know, I thought it was over, you know, but no: "I'd probably be homeless." You know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (29:42)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (29:42)
Now that was an isolate-- but that, the level of anxiety and fear and consequences and "What are people gonna say if I win or lose?" And, you know, parents, friends, coaches, it's become more pervasive. It's become-- and it's become almost normal in a bad way. Like it's entrenched in society and youth sports that this is like, even kids, it's like they're hijacked. I talk to them and it's just normal. Like, yeah, like my UTR in tennis, there's a ranking UTR, it's, I need this UTR and the parent-- it's like, it's just more, it's not an exception.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (30:30)
Uh-huh.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (30:31)
People weren't maybe seeking out sports psychology. Certainly were not, the way they are now.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (30:37)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (30:38)
But it's just more like a language and a way of being and an acceptance of this is this pressure cooker is what it is, and...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (30:47)
And like more focus on rankings and so on, rather than just kind of enjoying the sport and, and focus on excelling versus... Or is it more, I guess maybe that one example you were giving was maybe not a majority of the kids, but now there's more of a majority that are catastrophizing on every move and how it's going to maybe affect their future.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (31:10)
Exactly. Exactly, and it's just, yeah, it's just more and more common. It's deeper and the-- you know, focusing on skill development, what I teach is a mastery mindset, right? Process. Because the fundamental challenge problem is that the one thing we don't control is if we're gonna win or lose.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (31:37)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (31:38)
It's the very thing everybody's worried about. And dread-- and thinking about, you know, if this, and if that, right? The what ifs, and it's-- you could have the best game of your life and you still lose. So I try to really train families, kids to create intentions and new metrics, basically. I'm trying to create a new metric system focusing on the things you have control over, obviously, right? And to be, you know, focused, you know, a little more focused, sustaining it or refocus to play a little looser to, you know, commit to what they've trained and not back off. And I talk, I call it, you know, permission to miss, give yourself permission to miss, which a lot of-- which really resonates with athletes, you know, that, and to give themselves that feeling and experience what that's like. But a new metric system juxtaposed to this, "Are we gonna win?"
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (32:44)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (32:45)
And, "What if we don't?" You know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (32:47)
Rather than like pass/fail, there's maybe some other things that they can be focused on that they're achieving, like more of the process necessarily than the outcome.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (32:55)
A hundred percent. Which is now, in 2025, significantly more challenging to move the needle on, takes longer and you have to be really, really clear about what you're doing to hold this system long enough to get the kind of movement, because we have so many conflicting voices about-- and in the media, what the kids see is Steph Curry, you know, having this incredible game and, you know, these amazing athletes, which is... 2% of of all athletes make it professionally less than that actually.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (33:38)
Yeah. Wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (33:38)
Mostly it's less than 1%, but, you know, tennis is 2%, but it's-- but they're being treated, kids are being sort of, this experience is being treated like everyone's going pro.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (33:50)
Yeah. Right. It's a lot.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (33:54)
So that allure and is...is... again, more commonplace now because of social media. Sure. And that's where we're getting...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:06)
Interesting.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:06)
...crushed.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:07)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:08)
The great experiment.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:10)
I was listening to an economics podcast about, I think it was, minor league baseball players kind of basically forming groups and whoever. If one of them made it, they would all share in some of the income from that in a way of almost like diversifying, because odds are so low. In that way, kind of pooling together their resources.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:31)
Well now just to piggyback real quick, Keith, on that is.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:34)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:34)
Now we have athletes being paid to go to college. Paid for... right? So there's-- now we've upped the ante on this whole thing.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:45)
Yeah. Now that they can get income and money for the rights of their, you know, the work that they're doing or being used in advertising or games or so on, like video games.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:56)
Yeah.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (34:56)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (34:57)
And it's a, you know, they get, they get paid to play for the college, right? So that's a-- and, you know, as a tennis player, it probably costs 400 grand now to get your kid from 10 to 18. Wow. Maybe a half, I mean, half a million dollars
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (35:15)
[inaudible]
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (35:16)
To hire the people and do the thing, tennis is particularly expensive, right? It's another level but you got pitching coaches now and the whole thing, but, you know, think about it. And then so colleges, so it's kind of a wash a lot of, even if they get to DI.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (35:32)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (35:33)
Now being paid is a big-- to that percentage who are getting paid. Okay. Now you're sort of in the, you know, in the winning column, I guess financially, but it costs a lot to get--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (35:43)
Well, not to mention just even the time parents are taking off to take the kids and, you know, oftentimes during working hours and so on, which I think there's probably also a socioeconomic kind of split in who is able to be involved at these high levels with the sports and the time commitments.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (36:02)
The sadness, isn't it that sports, music, sports, the arts is such an opportunity to learn these amazing life skills, you know, the pressure and the team building...for a lifetime of relationships, which many do have, but this path that is so... becomes so stressful, which could be so enriching for everybody. And that's again, why I just like, I have to write a book that-- because a lot of it's checklist and do this and do that. But, I think we need to call attention to this. That's what I think we need to call attention to this and teach people, teach them. And I think people are going to continually be more open to it because they're suffering. People-- families are suffering a lot.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (36:56)
Yeah. And teaching them what? Like..?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (36:58)
Tools...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (36:58)
Those tools and skills.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (37:00)
...and how to communicate and validate, you know, some of the motivation interviewing and, you know, teaching mindfulness and helping them learn what reframing really is and how to do it. And becoming aware, frankly. Just teaching awareness and that, give them hope because there is a way, there are ways and things that we can teach and they can learn to help them a lot.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (37:24)
Yeah. Build that resilience too.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (37:26)
Mm-hmm.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (37:28)
Yeah. And one thing you were mentioning earlier, you were saying about like kind of one measure of like, you know, kind of what the person's working on, or successors on, is if they were kind of following whatever, I guess program or strategy that they were trying to do rather than maybe falling back. And then you were saying kind of the giving the permission to miss. Are those-- were those two connected or were you, meaning like somebody having all their training going in and trying to stick with that during the game rather than maybe like kind of falling back to old habits, you know, in those moments and dropping off what they're maybe trying to work on and as they improve in their, their strategy or their technique or so on?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (38:07)
Right. So what you're suggesting... Yeah. The, the, that they lose the, you know, the intentions that they, these metrics, these intentions that they go in and then they fall back. Absolutely. You know, typically, certainly in the beginning...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (38:21)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (38:21)
...they fall back into the playing safe and worry and all that. And, and so it's the permission to miss and continuing to, you know, deepen that awareness and commitment and holding that up while they have the new metrics, placing... It's not, it's-- you can't, kids are gonna, they wanna win, the kids wanna win, of course, but, but if we can just balance the scale a little more. Where the, where the process and the skills and the commitment to those skills they've been learning matches and we can reduce this perfectionistic...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (39:05)
Yes. Yes.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (39:07)
...you know, pattern now we're-- the needle's moving, right? Permission to miss. In metrics, intentionality. We're moving the needle.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (39:19)
And putting those together. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. With the permission to miss too, I, it almost makes me think of, you know, almost like exposure therapy. Like actually sitting with the discomfort of having missed or so on. I don't know if that's just more of a mental kind of aspect of a cognitive level of permission to miss or also, you know, kind of feeling the discomfort and kind of riding that wave of missing or so on.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (39:49)
Yeah. That's exposure and simulation is an aspect, right. Of performance enhancement and helping coaches... and players, athletes to do drills that put them in situations to close out a match and, you know, having, you know, a few seconds left and they... and trying to put that pressure on them and use the tools while they're, you know, and-- You can never simulate a game exactly. But you can create structure to simulate that. So yeah, exposure is really important so they can-- but because what they do inevitably is try to not miss, right?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (40:36)
Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (40:37)
Of course. Which makes it worse. So kids double faulting over and over, they're getting stuck and we need to get them to commit and be, you know, give themselves that permission and feel it and let them see the anxiety wave drop, feel it drop.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (40:55)
Yeah, definitely.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (40:56)
They get-- they're in the avoidance pattern, right? So then, the-- they get stuck in that, right?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:02)
Yeah, exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:03)
Exposure's helpful.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:04)
Definitely. And do you also involve visualization? I feel like oftentimes, like, you know, kind of visualizing success or visualizing yourself going through it is something that I often, you know, attribute to more kind of that performance coaching or so on. I, I don't know if that's something that that is...yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:23)
Yeah. Visualization is a great tool. And, you know, the best athletes do it naturally. If you ask them do you visualize, they just laugh, like, I mean all the time, you know? They're picturing the shot and, you know, I used to as a tennis player, I don't know what you know about my background there.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:43)
Yea, no, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:44)
Yeah, we can maybe hit on that and if you'd like, but maybe, you know...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (41:48)
Actually, why don't you share that? Yeah, because you do have a background.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (41:51)
Yeah. I mean but what that point about... I think you were bringing up, I-- what was that point again?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (42:01)
Oh, it was about visualization.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (42:03)
Ah, yeah. So visualization, you know, the perfectionism interestingly comes in a lot with kids. So when I have them visualize and I do meditation with them in a little visualization and in their context of their sport, and when they do it on their own, often they say, "Hh, I see myself failing, missing." And so that perfectionism shows up quite a lot in the visualization. So, we kind of work through that a bit and, you know, giving, and that's exposure in and of itself. So having them be okay with it, that's okay. Like, just stay with that. And then, you know, let's see if, you know, without forcing it, we can get to the feeling of being loose and being focused, et cetera. So, yeah. But that's interesting how that comes up a lot. But I absolutely use visualization, pre-match, pre-game, three minutes, five minutes to see themselves, you know, performing those metrics. So it's not about only winning, you know? Some like to see the winning, you know, themselves winning, but it's more about the metrics and committing to those things. So yeah, as far as my background, so I played junior tennis, and I went to a tennis academy at 12 when...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (43:23)
Oh wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (43:23)
...my parents sent me to a, I said I wanted to be a pro tennis player and, at 12, and they, three weeks later, I was on a plane down to the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy, which is now the IMG Academy and baseball, football... They have all the sports now.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (43:37)
Wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (43:37)
Which is a whole incredible thing. I was there in the second year that it was ever there. And lived in a motel with, you know, four other kids and from around the world, and there were 60 of us. Anyway, I did that, and then I played junior tennis and well, you know, all the nationals and went on to play college, UCSB, UC Santa Barbara, played there. And, I did well, I got better and better. I was kind of a late bloomer. And then I went on to play professionally for a couple years, two years, got world rankings and singles and doubles, but I did-- I wasn't making a living at it. So, I-- but then, yeah, and then I moved to Germany and played-- because I got a coaching job in Germany and I coached tennis and played for a club, which was really great. But that-- coaching tennis wasn't quite it for me. And I was journaling a lot, and I thought there was a moment in 1995, I was picking up balls on the court with these junior players and, you know, I'm like, I can't do this. Like, this is not a life, like, career here. But then I thought, what about, psychology? What about sports psychology? You know?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (44:49)
It dawned on me, and that's when I went, came back here in '95 to go to graduate school and so forth. And then the, the depth of it and the, my interest in the family systems and just, beyond just performance enhancement, which was really interesting at the time. But both, I really, you know, I saw, so I just, I ended up doing both clinical and specialized in sports psychology. But that was my path. And then I think the kind of, the interesting story, if you will, is that I then, you know, 12 years after stopping professional tennis, I went back and played and was playing the best tennis of my life, and I became number one in the world in my age group in the 35's.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (45:31)
Oh, wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (45:32)
And I was playing players in the top hundred in the world and going three sets with them at 35, 36 years old.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (45:38)
Wow.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (45:38)
And playing in a big tournament down in San Jose: SAP Open. I'm walking off the street. It's a funny story, but I won't, maybe another time, but--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (45:49)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (45:50)
So this sort of click-- this role as a, you know, married family therapist, and then I'm a player and I'm in a big tournament, and it's just been an interesting sort of--
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:03)
Yeah. Kind of moving back and forth and, you know, between and bringing it together.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:09)
Yeah, right.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:10)
And I'm assuming, but I'm guessing, right, all this work that you were doing in helping other people with performance coaching and so on came to fruition and going back and playing yourself again.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:21)
Meaning using the tools and stuff?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:22)
Yeah, exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:23)
A hundred percent. Like, so I, so what happened was, you know, I experienced this other state, this other dimension, of focus and, and a feeling of freedom and gratitude. Frankly, gratitude was, I think the first... You know, it's interesting, I don't, you know, anecdotally, like in 1996 or so, you know, Christopher Reeves fell off his horse.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:55)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:56)
And paralyzed. Superman.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (46:58)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (46:59)
Superman, paralyzed. I don't know, it just hit me the juxtaposition of that. And, and I guess I just started to tap into gratitude and how we can all take things for granted and winning and losing and all of that, and will I win? And I, you know, what will people, all this stuff. And I just was able to drop into the state and started playing at a different level. I mean, completely different level. And I'm like, wow, this is interesting. This Works. And I just got really fascinated even more applying the mastery mindset and process. And being able to change the channel and so forth.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (47:44)
I imagine it's almost like transcending beyond just the, the minutia of, you know, and that being so important to, right, kind of the, the larger aspects and gratitude and so on.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (47:58)
And you still wanna win.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (48:00)
Yeah, of course.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (48:01)
You so that, because a lot of people talk, oh, process versus outcome. It's, no, it's, you know, it's meaningful and fun and to play like that and, and feel that control and mastery. Yeah. And, guess what? You win more.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (48:19)
Mm-hmm
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (48:21)
With less worry and effort. So it's just getting people to understand and experience this and then the, you know, the needle really moves quickly once they discover this themselves.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (48:34)
Yeah. It's hard to teach that. It's like that kind of acceptance, confidence, kind of like letting go while still having the mastery or the locus of control.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (48:45)
Yeah. It is. It's, and it's... It's really like-- but if you can get, you don't have to do the whole thing. If you can move the ball enough, where they can take it and do it, to run with the ball for a little bit.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:03)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:04)
And experience it. Now you're off and running and you can have that conversation and deepen it. So you don't, you just need the bridge.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:12)
Have that, that taste of it or that moment of it to be able to build upon.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:15)
Definitely. And then they know you're not convincing them or, you know, dancing, doing the dance and hoping they, it's, they felt it.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:26)
Sure.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:26)
Because they really used the correct diaphragmatic breath.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:32)
Yeah, yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:33)
They decided to, alright, I'll go all in on this thing for a week.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:37)
Yeah. Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:38)
And they do, and then they play well. Feels different.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:42)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:43)
They win.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:44)
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (49:44)
Now you're, you got a customer. Right.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (49:47)
Well, and it sounds like too, that it's such a great aspect because one, there is a drive, you know, especially at these levels of competition to have any type of edge. So I imagine, you know, there's people approaching you to also just get an extra edge, you know, by mastering their own psychology or so on. But at the same time also, right, there's those mental health benefits of actually making things more fulfilling and thus also kind of despite whatever their motives for getting into it is-- whether to get an extra edge or to relieve suffering or so on. It kind of all helps in either way.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (50:26)
Definitely. Definitely.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (50:30)
Any last pieces that you think would be really important for listeners to know? Different therapists that maybe, you know, aren't sports psychologists or so on, or any kind of things that they might be interested in learning more about or takeaways for working with their own, you know, athlete, clients, or so on?
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (50:49)
You know, I just, I think about, you know, I was asked the question the other day for an interview about, you know, "If there's one tool or one thing you would sort of sum up what, you know, the most valuable tool?" And, you know, it's an interesting thing. I couldn't give her just one, I gave her three, but, you know, and, and it was the mastery mindset and really working with that, the permission to miss, and then the focusing dimensions, really understanding, helping kids recognize that they can shift their focus. And, you know, part of that is, as we know, I mean in adolescents in particular, young athletes, young kids, the mind reading trap, as we know in CBT is such a huge one.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (51:44)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (51:44)
They don't have an identity yet. They're forming it, they're borrowing other kids' and parents' and coaches' opinion of them, and they're so vulnerable.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (51:52)
Right.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (51:52)
We know that. And so, I just feel like giving kids, you know, a chance to really, when I say play on their own terms more and make choices and assert themselves with their parents. I try to really help empower the kids. So anything we can do to give the kids that, you know, permission slip to assert themselves with their parents a little bit in a right way, but starting to take more ownership and not be such a victim, if you will.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (52:27)
Yeah. Like having a voice or having some, again, back to that agency,
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (52:31)
Agency is huge, right?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (52:32)
Yeah.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (52:33)
And I think that those are the, you know, if you can move the needle in those areas, that's pretty helpful. And a tool, these tools, there are quite a few tools, but certainly borrowing ACT is great. CBT is always a, you know, a playground for us, we need to be there, but there's some other boxes too that we can integrate, you know?
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (52:56)
Yeah. And I love with ACT-- the Acceptance Commitment Therapy, just this idea, right? The harder we're fighting it, sometimes, the worse it's getting like quicksand. And so often I'm trying to get rid of that anxiety or trying to have that control is what becomes part of the problem. And so being able to recognize that and accept that, right part of these struggles are within, in the dynamic of what they're working on allows for some, some letting go and being present.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (53:23)
And that may be the hardest cha-- the biggest...
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (53:26)
Exactly.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (53:27)
We all have, right? As therapists to, you know, in what, in our roles to, you know, help kids accept what they don't want, what people-- we don't want instinctively. Especially now with the social media and the pressure to accept that you had a bad game and you made a bad, a mistake that cost the team, you know? And it's devastating. The kids' worlds blow up inside a bit. They recover, but yeah, helping them, that's the part that we're challenged with because of this level of the expectation and perfectionism as you know.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (54:02)
Definitely. Yeah. Well, this is wonderful and congratulations on the book coming out. We'll definitely link to, it sounds like there's some wonderful aspects in there that would be really helpful for both therapists as well as clients. I really appreciate your time. Thanks so much, Jeff.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (54:17)
Thank you, Keith. It's been a pleasure.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (54:19)
Take care. Bye-bye.
Jeff Greenwald, MA, MFT: (54:20)
Thank you.
Keith Sutton, Psy.D.: (54:22)
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