On The Suite Spot, sports psychiatrist Dr. Derek H. Suite, MD brings together neuroscience, performance psychology, spiritual wisdom, and lessons from elite sport...practical tools for the people who can't afford to choke when the pressure rises.
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Science Soul Success
In this episode, we break down mindset as the internal lens that shapes how we interpret pressure, setbacks, and uncertainty, and why that lens quietly drives the actions we take or avoid. We connect science, psychology, and faith-based reframes to give you a simple way to guard your inputs and choose a steadier response when the moment matters.
Suite Spots • mindset as a collection of beliefs, expectations, interpretations, and habits of attention • how mindset shapes decisions after success, failure, injury, and disappointment • why “what was that all about?” actions start upstream in interpretation • guarding mindset by guarding inputs like social media and daily influences • training the mind like the body through books, programs, and people • the biology of mindset through sleep, stress, pain, illness, and fatigue • science, emotion regulation, and spiritual reframes that reduce fear • a before-you-leave-bed gratitude exercise to cultivate a better lens
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Welcome to the sweet spot. Welcome to the sweet spot.
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Welcome back to the sweet spot with Dr. Derek Sweet, a board-certified psychiatrist specializing in sports and performances. In the sweet spot, we explore what it takes to stay steady and perform when the pressure is on and the moment matters. Stay tuned for Dr. Sweet's Take Action Tuesday.
Greetings and welcome back. Welcome back to the Sweet Spot, Sweet Spotters. We're on a journey here. We're talking about mindset. I don't know if you heard the last uh podcast we did, or if you got in touch with it, we talked about mindset and what it means. We called it a lens, an internal lens through which you interpret any experience. We said that a mindset is a collection of beliefs. Remember that? We talked about it being expectations, like a belief with an expectation that leads to a kind of an interpretation that you make of the world, what you pay attention to. Mindset, the collection of beliefs, the collection of interpretations, expectations, and habits of attention. We said that mindset shape, it really shapes how we understand what is happening. Right now, each of us is going through something. We're dealing with something. We have an action that we have to take. It can be a small action, it can be a big action, it can be about taking no action. But we are in the middle of something that our mindset is going to determine what choice we're going to make. That's right. Mindset and actions are tied in together. This collection of beliefs and this collection of expectations, all the interpretations that are inside of you, everything you value, what you pay attention to, is determining how you're going to respond or not respond. We said that two people, two athletes or two dancers or two singers or two swimmers, two people, two business individuals can look at the same issue, the same problem,
and have completely different interpretations. Because you see, your mindset determines how you're going to respond to pressure. Your mindset determines what you're going to do after success, after failure, how you're going to look at uncertainty, how you're going to deal with an injury, a setback, disappointment, it's your mindset. Yeah. So we better get familiar with mindset, right? Because with the right, I mean it's obvious now to you that if we take the if we if we absorb the wrong mindset or we cultivate a mindset that is not in the best interest of our health, our wellness, our well-being, the best versions of ourselves, that mindset can lead to a really difficult way of being. So yeah, this internal lens through which we interpret any experience is the mindset. And I want that to land with you today before you take any actions. Or even after you've taken an action. You ever take an action and then ask yourself, what the heck? What was that all about? Why did I do that? Upstream somewhere was your mindset in action. And sometimes it works really fast, it's reflective. Upstream of whatever action you took or didn't take was your mindset, was your beliefs, your expectations, your interpretations, what you were paying attention to. So yeah, it affects your your attention. What it affects your emotion, it affects your decision making, your confidence, and your behaviors. In the work that I do when I sit with individuals to coach, to counsel, to do the things that we do in mental performance and mental health, we spend a lot of time on mindset because we understand that people make decisions based on what's in their mind. And that the confident person has a different mindset than the scared person. I've actually seen in sports and high performance mindset affecting how fast somebody recovers after they've encountered a disappointment or a setback when things don't go their way. Mindset influences, sweet spotters. Yeah, it influences how quickly you recover after something doesn't go your way. The person with a more optimistic and a growth mindset sees the obstacle or the setback as a challenge. They see it as something that they can overcome. They see it as an opportunity to dig in deeper, go higher. They may even go deeper into their faith, deeper into their prayer. They may even reinterpret it based on their faith. Is this happening for me or is this happening to me?
Big difference. Yeah. So guard your mindset. Think about what's in your mind. Think about what you're paying attention to because your mindset is around that. You're feeling strong emotions today. That's your mindset. What's there? What's in the belief? What are the values that you're you're swirling around in your head? What are they? So yeah. Mindset, mindset has dimensions and it has power. And you are driving the bus. This is your bus. The mindset is your bus. Remember the energy bus? We did that months and months ago. That book. It was cool. That was a great series. Go back and try to get that one. On the bus, you you are the you have gotta drive the bus. It's your bus, right? And the and your mindset, your beliefs, your interpretations, all of that is you are yours. And that's why it's important to examine them. Where are you getting your information? What's where are you getting your beliefs? Is it TikTok or Instagram? I speak to myself, I've gotta be so careful. Because look, I love uh social media, I I'm I'm shameless about it. I love it, but at the same time, I've gotta control that because the beliefs and the values and how I interpret the world, I can't let something else determine that for me. That's gotta be better shaped than uh a 30-second uh influencer telling me something, and I love these things. So, mindset is so sacred. You've got to understand, and we've got to understand that we we can't allow our mindset to be shaped for us. We've got to actively take actions to make sure that they're shaped properly. Now, just like if you go to the gym and you work out, you get better muscles, you get better strength, you get better conditioning. So the mind needs that as well. So, are you reading the right kinds of books? Are you looking at the right kind of programs? Are you speaking to the right kind of people? Are you being uplifted by what's around you? Or are you in a cycle of just either negative or same old, same old kinds of inputs and stimuli around you? Very important that you nourish your mindset, that the soil that you plant your mind in isn't on rocky ground, it isn't uh yeah, where a pla a place where the vultures can come and just eat eat up the seeds, the positive seeds that you have. You get that? So gotta take care of your mindset, and that's an active process. How are you actively, actively handling and shaping your mindset today?
Did you know that there's a biology for mindset? That there's a biological dimension. You see, because the brain and the nervous system they influence how you experience anything. Yes, your brain and your nervous system goes about the the world, what walks, walks around the world looking and interpreting and deciding what's what. And then making decisions and taking actions as a result of whatever you interpret. That's why your sleep is important. Because when you're not sleeping, your interpretations change. When you're not sleeping, you're more at risk. You can even have an accident on the road because your decision making is not sharp. When you're not sleeping, I don't know about you, but you can be edgy, you can feel a little tired, and decisions can come really, really fast. When you're not sleeping, it's not a good time to go to the casino. Right? Because that's the whole idea. Your decision making wouldn't be good. It's not a good time to get in a car, it's probably better to go get some rest. And that's why mindset is affected by biology. If you're fatigued, if you're under stress, if you're in pain, if you're not eating right, if you're ill, all of these things can affect your mindset and what kind of actions you're going to take. So here's the thing: your best may not always look the same, depending on what mindset you have, right? Your best might change when you're not sleeping, your best might change when you're under stress, your best actions might be different when you're in pain, and you've got to make room and space for those moments, and not judge yourself. Take a step back, understand what is the mindset that you're in right now, and determine if a different interpretation, a different way of believing, a different way of understanding can help you not experience things the way you're experiencing right now, or can motivate you to go even higher.
At the sweet spot, we talk about science, soul, and success. Well, the science of mindset is very clear. You believe and act in certain ways based on your nervous system and your brain's interpretation of the stimuli and the external world that it's seeing, and it's about making sure you survive. That's just evolutionary science. Psychologically, your mindset will determine your ability to regulate your emotions, whether you're gonna fly off the handle and be all I don't know, nuclear about things when things go wrong, or whether you're gonna quietly have balance or reinterpret things. And then spiritually, that's another place that we don't always look, but it's an important place. Mindset can be affected by the spirit. Absolutely. The ancient wisdom says this for you were not given a spirit of fear. That's a mindset to not be afraid. The ancient wisdom says that you can walk through the valley of the shadow of death, of doubt, of despair, of depression, whatever you want to call it, of darkness, and fear no evil. That's a mindset. The ancient wisdom says, Hey, today is the day that the Lord has made. Whoa. Is that a mindset? Or you better believe it. It is a mindset. And that's a tough one sometimes, isn't it? Today is the day the Lord has made rejoice and be glad. Do you know what that means? That means you've got to put it on. You've got to take it on. You've got to, just like you're gonna go work out and take actions, you gotta take that action. This is how I'm gonna be today. I'm gonna be upbeat, I'm gonna sing, I'm gonna smile, I'm gonna whistle, I'm gonna find something to be happy about. Listen, most of us have no problem with today's the day God has made. It's the rejoice and be glad parts that gets a little tough. And that's the psychological dimension of our beliefs, of our memories, of our expectations, of our self-talk, of our identity. There's a lot wrapped up in trying to rejoice and be glad and having a good day.
Something that you can do as an action in the morning is before you get out of bed, right? Before you get out of bed. This is what I do. I said, listen, man, I got 10 fingers. God, thank God I have them. On the first uh five, I'm gonna be taking each finger and thinking, what am I grateful for? Grateful for my job, grateful for my mom and my dad, grateful for my brothers, blah, blah, blah, my wife, my family, my friends, and then the other finger is gonna, other five fingers are about like, okay, what do I like about my life? What do I like about me? What I like about my life, like, what do I like about the world? Just to put my mind in that be glad mode, be grateful mode, to before the world and the success, the emails and the business and everything rushes in. I have taken a moment to nurture and cultivate my mindset. Do this before you leave bed, if possible, and see what happens over a month. Because your mindset and my mindset belong to us. Nobody is coming around to really help us be in a different mindset. We've got to own that. And you know, if you take on the right kind of mindset, the actions that you have to take or the actions that you have to stop become somewhat clearer.
And perhaps even easier because you know that you have power over what you choose to believe, you have power of how you're going to expect what's going to happen. You have power over what you're going to say to yourself. Maybe you have to pick up a book and read it. Maybe you pick up Ryan Holiday's The Obstacle Is Not the Way, or The Mountain Is You, or you read It Takes What It Takes, or you read the word sometimes. Psalm, one of the Psalms, uh whatever, whatever works for you, find it and use it to help shape your beliefs, to shape your expectations, to shape what you say to yourself today. Because that ties into your identity and what kind of action you're going to take. So, sweet spotter, believe in yourself. Trust that it's going to be okay. Trust that you can handle this. Take action. Sometimes you have to take one small step first, and then the staircase appears or the path appears. Maybe you have to make the path. Sometimes we're looking for the path, but maybe the path is made by walking and looking back, and then you say, Oh, so this is the path. But before you take that path, just kind of check in real quick on what the mindset is and where it's coming from. And is this something that's gonna make me better? Or is it something that's gonna hurt me or set me back? And a simple question like that, that simple two seconds, is all you need to take the best actions today. For science, for soul, and for success. Guard your mindset and stay in the sweet spot. One love.
Thank you for listening to the sweet spot with Dr. Derek Sweet. If today's message was helpful, please feel free to share it and subscribe. There's no cost to subscribing, and it helps others to discover the show. We hope you'll join us again for another inspiring message from Dr. Sweet and the Sweet Spot team. For susal and success, stay with the Sweet Spot.
