Dr. Jess Garza: “Every emotion has a purpose and power.”
Unlocking Performance Psychology with Dr. Jess Garza
In this episode of the MVP Interactive Podcast, our CEO, James Giglio speaks to Dr. Jess Garza, a performance psychologist, shares her unique journey into the field of performance psychology, discussing the common psychological challenges faced by high-performing individuals, including perfectionism and self-doubt. She introduces the concept of the ‘Cholla Effect,’ emphasizing the importance of managing interactions with difficult people. Dr. Garza provides practical techniques for emotional management, highlights the role of anxiety and shame in performance, and underscores the significance of intention-setting in achieving personal and professional goals. In this conversation, Dr. Jess Garza discusses the intricacies of mental resilience, the importance of empathy in high-stress environments, and the role of technology in performance psychology. She emphasizes the need for individuals to control what they can, understand their emotions, and manage unconscious expectations in the workplace. The discussion also highlights the significance of open-ended questions in fostering communication and clarity among teams.
Highlights
05:48 Common Challenges of High Performers
09:29 The Cholla Effect: Managing Prickly People
15:24 Techniques for Emotional Management
18:05 Anxiety and Its Impact on Performance
27:20 Empathy in High-Stress Scenarios
34:29 The Power of Inner Voices
41:52 Technology in Performance Psychology
45:06 Building Mental Resilience and Readiness
About Dr. Jess Garza
Dr. Jess Garza is a TED and Keynote speaker with 17+ years of experience. Dr. Jess holds a PhD in performance psychology, a master’s in clinical mental health, and a master’s in sport-exercise psychology. With an international presence, she captivates audiences worldwide. She has an unparalleled reach, Dr. Garza’s impact has extended to collaborate with prestigious institutions like the United States Congress, FBI, CIA, US Special Forces, corporate executives, Grammy Nominees, Olympians, and Professional athletes, an achievement that underscores her ability to harness mental acuity for professionals in the most demanding sectors. Dr. Jess Garza helps families, individuals and professionals in high-stress jobs master mental & emotional agility. Unlike traditional psychologists, she uses hands-on, scenario-based techniques in immersive workshops and keynotes to deliver practical skills for real-world resilience, mental readiness and interpersonal effectiveness.
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Podcast Transcript
James Giglio (00:01.585)
Welcome back to another episode of the MVP Interactive Podcast. Today we have a very special and unique guest, not traditional to our normal guests on this show, but we’re super excited to have Dr. Jess Garza as a part of our program today.
Dr. Jess Garza (00:06.126)
Okay.
James Giglio (00:17.979)
Dr. Jess holds a PhD in performance psychology, a master’s in clinical mental health and a master’s in sports exercise psychology. She has an impact and collaborated with prestigious institutions like the US Congress, FBI, US Special Forces, and even corporate executives ranging from Grammy nominees to professional athletes. Dr. Jess, thank you so much for joining us today.
Dr. Jess Garza (00:33.262)
Thank you, I appreciate it so much.
James Giglio (00:44.303)
Yeah, as I mentioned, I hope this comes off as a very positive way in the fact that you’re so unique to our typical guests. generally speaking, we sort of blend in the sports world and the technology world, but never so much in the clinical or the mental psychological space, which is obviously paramount to professional athletes as well as high level corporate executives. And so.
Dr. Jess Garza (01:09.992)
Yeah.
James Giglio (01:11.438)
I want to start off today just learning a little bit more about your background and sort of how you navigated into the performance psychology space.
Dr. Jess Garza (01:18.337)
That is an excellent question. I would say that if I started back, well even as an athlete for me, I was a gymnast and a soccer player. As a gymnast, I was a head case. I was terrified of the vars and I didn’t have anybody like me back then. When I was growing up, it was either you do it or you get out of the gym. Or you do it and you suck it up and you just kind of like pray and if I die today, this is where I’m dying.
And then it was probably my sophomore year in high school. There was a very small, very small little paragraph about sports psychology and it just clicked for me that that was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. So since my sophomore year in high school, I knew exactly what I wanted to do and pursued the route to it. Now when I went into my master’s program, they were like, this field isn’t really developed yet. I think there are maybe less than 30 in the world that were really like,
doing the work in an applied setting. And so for me, a couple of my professors like you also probably should get a counseling degree just in case. And my parents are like, you’re getting what? What are you doing? And I’m it’s fine. One day it’s gonna be a thing. And now looking back, 2025, it is a big thing in the last two, three years, especially with COVID, mental health, athlete readiness, all of it has just come full circle to being the forefront of what a lot of companies.
and organizations are pushing forth.
James Giglio (02:42.107)
Yeah, it sounds like you were really at that sort of genesis of the field in itself because in the 2000s particularly, I think more more celebrity athletes and even coaches were very open about having sports psychologists as a part of their daily or even weekly activity with themselves and with their players. So you really time that pretty well.
Dr. Jess Garza (03:02.666)
Yes, it was definitely interesting for me. At the time too, I didn’t even want to go into counseling. I didn’t want to work with people’s problems and what was wrong with them. What I really wanted to do was look at what was right with the individual, then how do you make that even better? So bringing the lesser strength up and then maximizing the strengths that they do have. And then following my dual masters, I did work in the gel systems for a while with sexual abuse, DUI,
James Giglio (03:19.351)
that’s great. Yeah.
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (03:32.297)
that type of population, was pretty heavy. And I had gotten pregnant with my first child. And the more that I started to grew, the more the gruesome stories started to develop between some of the inmates. And it became really jaded fast and I wasn’t being someone that could be helpful in the clinical setting. So I was told, maybe you should go look into working with the military. I’m like, no, I don’t wanna work with soldiers either. I just want athletes. Don’t give me anybody else besides them.
James Giglio (03:56.079)
Hahaha
Dr. Jess Garza (03:59.401)
But my professor had, one of them had submitted my resume in for me and got a call to go to West Point. And at the time my sister had lived there. So was like, yeah, I’ll go visit her. You know, it’s a free flight. So I did. And I fell in love with the campus at West Point. You get drawn in so fast. And I was like, my gosh, in a weird way, it’s not a weird way, but.
James Giglio (04:11.152)
Yeah.
I was just going to say it’s a beautiful campus there. Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (04:23.226)
almost in this altruistic way, it was me giving back to people who give back so much to our society. So I’m like, okay, well, if I can help them do one big thing, small thing that protects us as citizens, then I feel like I’m doing my small part in the world. And I had gotten an offer to go work at Fort Bragg with Special Forces at that time. And I’m like, this is heaven, like loved it, couldn’t get enough of it. Sorry. And then was gonna say then.
James Giglio (04:37.273)
Yeah, for sure.
Dr. Jess Garza (04:50.44)
I had offered a co-op to a military intelligence group in Fort Huachuca, Arizona, and fell in love with that population as well. It’s just, I think the high performance, high stakes is where I thrive best. I understand it from an athletic setting, from a tactical setting, and then even in a corporate organization where there are high demands, high turnarounds, high ROI stakes on the line, I feel like that’s where I’ve just married a lot of the work that I’ve done from the beginning to now.
James Giglio (05:19.334)
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And that’s actually a perfect segue to my next question, because, you know, obviously that background that you just shared that brought you into special forces and working with organizations like the FBI, but then running the gamut to, uh, to athletes and Olympians. Do you find that there is a common psychological sort of mindset or challenges that high performing individuals face? And, you know, how do you approach them? Do you approach them, you know, similarly the same or a little bit different based on the field that they’re in?
Dr. Jess Garza (05:48.784)
That’s a great question. think one, a lot of people feel like you have to know whatever segue sport industry to the T. I’ve either had to live it, be in it, to know it, and you don’t necessarily have to. What you do have to understand is human dynamics, individual value systems, belief systems, and operating systems. If I can talk the nomenclature, the language that that individual speaks or in the industry of itself, then I’m game in. I know how to…
to work with the individual because human behavior is human behavior across cultural dynamics, all the things. There’s like universal signs, if you will, or emotions that everybody operates from and then you add their value system onto it and then it can explain a lot more on why people do the things that they do. So from that level, it’s pretty similar. It’s a performance is a performance is a performance. I just need to know why you do it and understand you as an individual a little bit more.
and talk their language. So I sit and I listen and I observe and I don’t pretend to know. I have them walk me through what a day in the life is, what their performance based system is. And then I take my background in performance psychology, linguistics, all of that and then marry those two together. I will say across the board, perfectionism is a really big one. Imposter syndrome, even at the highest of levels are two of the main ones that people tend to
struggle with the most and then ironically self-doubt too. Self-doubt, I doing what I’m supposed to be doing? Is this, do I max out here or should I keep going? So there’s a lot of second guessing on should I do more or am I okay with just where I’m at? And those high achievers are never just okay with where they’re at. They always feel like they need for more.
James Giglio (07:35.975)
That’s right. I feel like you can develop a new bucket for entrepreneurs because you just nailed so many characteristics that we go through. On the outside, people hear me and some of the challenges that I feel that I face. like, what are you talking about? You published a book, you’re doing a great business. I’m like, I suck. I feel like I haven’t achieved anything. It’s funny, before the show, I had mentioned that my wife is also in…
Dr. Jess Garza (07:38.456)
Eh!
Dr. Jess Garza (07:41.728)
Yes.
Dr. Jess Garza (07:55.491)
Right?
James Giglio (08:01.87)
in the field and so that’s something that I have the benefit of sort of talking through with my wife. I try to keep, you know, church and state separated, but it is helpful to kind of have that insight to understand that, you know, these are intrusive thoughts and maybe not be.
Dr. Jess Garza (08:08.617)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (08:18.072)
Right.
James Giglio (08:18.614)
know, characteristics. And another thing that caught me, what you had said is I brought me back to a high school teacher who said, you know, my colleagues always stay in the age of 16 to 18 years old every year. And it was the one thing that I’ve learned in 25 years of teaching is trends change and music changes, but human nature doesn’t change. And
Dr. Jess Garza (08:28.323)
It doesn’t.
James Giglio (08:37.892)
Yeah, and I thought that was, it was powerful when I heard it at 17 years old, but you know, I hadn’t thought of that in a long time. And then you had mentioned that there are these characteristics that are just innate in all of us, that it’s true.
Dr. Jess Garza (08:49.091)
Yeah. And I think that helps with normalizing a lot of the behavior too, like when you do get those intrusive thoughts, that it’s like, okay, well, I’m not out of my mind. Like this is, I’m a human, so cool. Check that, that’s one. And then it’s just, am I doing this out of fear or worry or doubt? And then you just bring it back into the moment of figuring out like, where is it coming from? And a lot of them are like more emotional triggers that you didn’t realize are stemming up because every time that we elevate to a new level of growth,
James Giglio (09:01.84)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (09:15.916)
whether that’s financially, whether that’s on a product level or relationship level, these triggers come up to make sure either that part of us is healed or we’re ready to take on a new level of space to grow.
James Giglio (09:29.598)
That’s fantastic and again I think this is a good sort of segue to another topic and you know I understand reading your bio and doing a little bit of research that you you give a series of talks throughout the country and I thought it would be fun if we can sort of zone in on a couple of those topics and maybe educate our audience into some of those
Dr. Jess Garza (09:46.4)
Yeah.
James Giglio (09:51.889)
talks that you have and sort of the different narratives and sort of topics. And the first one that came to mind was something that you call the jumping choella effect. So I hope I said that right. But can you explain, cholla, sorry. Can you explain the cholla effect and how managing prickly people translate into better performance?
Dr. Jess Garza (10:02.186)
Joya.
Dr. Jess Garza (10:13.024)
That is a really good question. So I was on a hike in Arizona one day and I went out there for college. I played at Grand Canyon University and I was like this nice little shrub looked really soft and fuzzy and I went to go reach it and it literally just like the little spines on it jumped and pricked me and I’m like, oh my gosh, and I don’t know why in that moment that I was like, oh, this is just like people like people can be legit pricks and going up to them like you can walk around like I’ll give you an instance like the other day I went to Starbucks.
James Giglio (10:36.038)
Yeah?
Dr. Jess Garza (10:42.768)
and I had gotten my nice little chai tea, but the person at the window was just super abrasive. And I’m like, it’s six in the morning right now. Like, I don’t need this, you don’t need this. But the person was like here and I’m like, whoa. And then I’m like, okay, it’s not about me, it’s about them. But like, had I taken on their emotions, that little prick, not him or her in that moment, but the little like jab, like hello, or that, you know, abrasive remark would have stuck with me and like buried underneath my skin.
James Giglio (10:51.396)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
James Giglio (11:03.653)
You’re right.
Dr. Jess Garza (11:12.671)
it would have been something that I would have attached to and carried on to for the rest of the day. And I think that we do that a lot with people that we interact with in any business setting and or relationships that we interact with them. And sometimes we take on other people’s emotions as our own, but then we don’t clear them out. And so if I’m interacting with thousands of people throughout the day or hundreds of people throughout the day, or even my teams and everybody’s coming in with a wide range of emotions and I’m not recognizing who’s is who and I’m attaching to them.
I could be the happiest person in the morning and then all of a sudden I’m sluggish and I’m exhausted and I’m irritated and I don’t know why. And then I go home to my family and they’re like, how was your day? I’m like, it’s fine. And I’m like, you know, like you can become jumpy and they’re like, okay, well just asked you how your day was. But we don’t realize how to clear that stuff up. And when those prickly emotions or prickly people get underneath our skin.
James Giglio (11:56.816)
Sure.
Dr. Jess Garza (12:04.722)
We have to be really intentional about how to remove them and when to remove them. But if we’re not intentional about it, it just gets muddy and we start to, it just clutters. And I talk about it in a sense of emotional hygiene. Like we take showers daily or maybe every other day, wash our hairs, and then we brush our teeth daily. But we don’t emotionally clean ourselves on a hygienic level daily. We just keep building over and over and over again until it becomes too much.
And then it’s either burnout in corporate industries or even athletics. It’s exhaustion. It’s not being fully present. I mean, there’s so many things that happen when on an emotional level, when we start to build and become muddy and energetically heavy. And so that Ted talk that I did was all about how to remove those under prickly emotions in people and be intentional about it by one, either reframing it.
having situational awareness that it’s a them thing, not a me thing. So I can be like, you know what? James is a little off today. I don’t know what’s going on, but like that’s, I just gotta let it be him and not me attached to it. And I can then hold space for you and be like, okay, he’s having a moment right now. Like the person that was at Starbucks, like they’re having a moment and I can let them breathe in this moment and not attached to it.
James Giglio (13:21.54)
Right, right. Yeah, that is critically important, especially from a managerial standpoint. And I’m sure that you help executives sort of manage maybe difficult employees or quickly employees. And it reminds me of an interview that Robert Kraft of the Patriots had said that, you when he was going through a lot of the turmoil, whether it’s coaches or players and, you know, these are high profile folks and he said, you know, his assessment was, you know, owning the team for so many years that, you know, difficult people, yes, they can be challenging to work with,
Dr. Jess Garza (13:41.317)
Yeah.
James Giglio (13:51.457)
generally they are high performers. So it’s that balance of trying to really navigate that personality and what makes them tick, but then also help insulate those around that person to not take it personally as you’ve mentioned and sort of use that as motivation or growth into whatever achievement they’re looking to gain.
Dr. Jess Garza (13:53.925)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jess Garza (14:12.326)
absolutely. And I think that kind of falls too under this level of like, what is it, the unconscious expectations, where if I’m assuming on a drive level, on a managerial level, what ends up happening, it takes like one person to change the dynamics in a room, right? And oftentimes like we tend to follow the lead of our leaders. And so if they’re in an emotional state for whatever triggers that they had coming into work,
James Giglio (14:20.304)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Jess Garza (14:39.188)
maybe because of the demands that are above them, but the people down here have no idea that are underneath them, the pressure that is being put on that individual. And then it’s just, becomes too much to be able to handle for one person. So then it’s just like an attack that the other people typically feel on. But then it also takes one person to change the dynamic. And what ends up happening is we catch these feelings or emotions because we have an open loop system in our brain that we’re hardwired to pick up that information. It was a survivable method, still is.
James Giglio (14:55.398)
Sure.
Dr. Jess Garza (15:08.643)
from way back in caveman day to now, but we don’t necessarily always turn it off or recognize like there’s not an alert in this room right now. Someone’s just having an emotional trigger. I can disarm my emotional alert that says like I’m not threatened right now and I can come back and just like chill for a minute.
James Giglio (15:18.022)
for.
James Giglio (15:24.102)
Yeah, yeah. You touched on it a little bit, but in terms of those of us that don’t have your superpower, what are some of the, it sounds like you kind of really focus on scenario-based techniques and what would you train or advise others that maybe don’t have your background or such an awareness on hands-on exercises or techniques that you find really impactful?
Dr. Jess Garza (15:30.624)
All right.
Dr. Jess Garza (15:44.537)
Probably the biggest one is a deep belly breath, deep diaphragmatic breathing. It slows the brain down quite a bit, allows for more oxygen uptake to happen so that the emotional state isn’t constantly firing. Because when our emotions start to get triggered, our prefrontal cortex, which is where we make our decisions and analysis and thinking, all of the creativity, like all of that’s right up here. And when we start to have this emotional trigger, like worry, doubt, fear,
anger, it shuts that accessibility off, and then we just go through action mode. And so if I can slow that process down a little bit more and then assess, is this coming from me or is it coming from somebody else? And so the assessment part, and really taking an aerial view of what’s happening around you and being like, this something that I, because it’s a choice. We can choose to attach to whatever’s going on in the situation, or I can choose to just sit and watch for a minute.
And so I really have to assess, this something worth attaching to and letting underneath my skin? And that’s fine if you do, you just have to recognize like I chose that and I’m gonna, whatever the interaction is and outcome of that, I just got to acknowledge that that’s where I’m at. And then if not, then I’m gonna sit and be like, okay, this isn’t something that I’m gonna choose to attach to. And then you sit in it for a moment and then go back to, I call it the win method, what’s important now. And in this moment, what’s most important? Is it for me to like,
James Giglio (16:56.838)
Sure.
James Giglio (17:07.322)
Hmm.
Dr. Jess Garza (17:10.369)
go to X task, is it for me to take a deep belly breath, is it for me to ask a follow on question to get more clarity, because assumptions kill, and which is why those unconscious expectations have such a big impact, if I assume that they should be acting and behaving and thinking and doing a certain way, then I’m going to get even more triggered. And if I’m not communicating that, then now we’re just in the cyclic cycle of destruction.
James Giglio (17:35.631)
Yeah, yeah, you know, and I imagine it sounds like there’s a lot of those practices that have somewhat of an underlying anxiety-based trip, right? You know, and some of the things that you talked about, you know, I feel like, you know, high performance type of level anxiety that maybe, you know, creates these scenarios for them. But would you agree with that, that, you know, anxiety drives a lot of some of this behavior, or at least your techniques can sort of transcend, you know,
not only just the high stress situations, but maybe anxiety due sequence.
Dr. Jess Garza (18:13.085)
say that anxiety is a part of it. I wouldn’t say it’s the all be all in the sense that people tend to operate in two pendulums. They tend to either live in the past or in the future. And so if I’m living in a past experience, like if I had a managerial individual that I’m nervous, like they call my name, they’re like, Jess, I need you to see in the office. My anxiety would probably go through the roof because now I’m worried about, am I going to get in trouble? Like that’s typically the first instinct. Like why do they want to talk to me?
And it could be something good, it could be something bad, but my assumption is last time I went in there, they had feedback for me that I didn’t feel great with. And so now I’m thinking that I’m gonna just go get feedback again that I also not gonna sit well with. Because I don’t think that we usually have conversations when things go well, it’s typically for course correction. And so the culture that’s usually developed in an organization is just remedial feedback. And so when we talk about cultural changes, that’s one of the big things is having conversations
openly daily. mean obviously there’s time elements to being able to do that. But I think that’s when anxiety can happen. then shame is probably the other big one. Shame is a, I would say even more powerful than anxiety in that sense that drives a lot of that behavior. Shame can come from, when I talk about, when you were asking about strategies, shame is a big one part of expectations. And so there’s a long laundry list of words that I like to tell people that we speak in.
James Giglio (19:18.081)
interesting.
Dr. Jess Garza (19:35.641)
And I probably have already said like 10 of them right now. But we’ll talk in phrases like, you need to do blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. If you had only done it like this, you just need to, and so just and need to, have to, always and never is like those overly rigid statements. Anything within apostrophe T, so don’t, can’t, shouldn’t, wouldn’t, couldn’t, any of the ins.
James Giglio (19:38.266)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (20:03.122)
those all create really high expectations and when they’re not met can create shame. So if I’m like James, you should have said my background was da da da da. You should have asked me this question or not this question and then we could have done it this way. So now all you hear is critique and me pointing a finger, but that type of language doesn’t just happen from like me to you. We also internally do it to ourselves. Then I’m like, Jess, why did you answer it like that? You should have said it this way.
James Giglio (20:09.52)
short.
Dr. Jess Garza (20:30.352)
And if you would have done it like this, then the conversation would have been here. And so internally, that dialogue is just critical and shameful. And then that creates the anxiety that you were just talking about to then cause me to either make a mistake or be hesitant or worried. Yeah.
James Giglio (20:47.268)
Yeah, yeah, and remind me what was the acronym for when because that really stuck with me because I Yeah Yeah
Dr. Jess Garza (20:51.881)
no, that’s good. What’s important now? So in this moment, what’s most important? And maybe it’s just for me to sit. In this moment, maybe it’s for me to take a deep breath or to ask a question.
James Giglio (21:02.758)
Yeah, no, I love that. And gratefully, I feel like that was a subconscious practice that I try to take in on a weekly basis, you know, running my business where, you know, you do live in the future to a degree, whether it’s, you know, you’re worried about finances or, you know, invoices and projects that are coming or maybe projects that aren’t happening. And, you know, the one thing that I’ve been able to train myself over the years is really focus on the day and then live, you know, give these daily or weekly sprints that you just focus on. Don’t worry about next week.
Dr. Jess Garza (21:16.72)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (21:32.558)
Yes.
James Giglio (21:32.802)
Don’t worry about next month. Worry about what can you achieve today and throughout the rest of the week that is sort of going to alleviate those concerns that you have in the future, or least trying to avoid that. So I appreciate that.
Dr. Jess Garza (21:47.417)
No, that’s a good one. Yep. And then the way to course correct that too, because even like the example when you’re like, don’t worry about the future. even that don’t, our brains can’t process that word or the in apostrophe T. So it hears everything after it. So if I say, don’t worry about the future, my brain’s like, worry about the future. And so then that’s where my attention is on. So the phrase is to help. What I usually typically say is my intention is to focus on today. My intention.
James Giglio (22:01.347)
great.
James Giglio (22:06.384)
Interesting.
Dr. Jess Garza (22:13.776)
is to take a deep breath right now. And so the intention part is bringing you also back to the moment to allow them to assess what it is. And then I can only judge or critique that in which my intention was placed. So when I like work with an athlete, they’re like, well, I want to get X skill or I want to have a really good routine. I’m gonna use gymnastics as an example. I want to have a really good floor routine. And I’m like, okay, well, what does that look like? Well, I don’t know. I just, I want it to be really good. Okay, well, if we don’t even know what that looks like, then it’s gonna be hard to critique when it doesn’t.
go what it looks like and they can’t define it. And so then we’ll like break it down and it’s like, well, my intention is to, and then we’ll just focus on a pass. And then even in that pass, what does that pass look like? And so we’ll focus on three things. And afterwards, they’re like, yeah, but it didn’t look good. Well, was that what we were judging? Was our intention was for it to look good? And they’re like, well, no. And I was like, okay, what was it? And they’re like, well, to feel my arms and to stretch tall and like have a hard, a good run. And I’m like, okay, well, did you do that? And they’re like, well, yeah. And I’m like, awesome, let’s celebrate the hell out of that.
this is amazing, but this is great. And then they get excited and I’m like, okay, now if you want it to look good, that’s our new intention. So we would say, and now, which would be the transition, not like don’t do blank, it’s and now, my intention is for it to have tight legs so it can look good. Cool, now we can judge that and we can critique that. And then if it was still like not great bent legs, and we would say, okay, and now squeeze legs. So everything has a constant shift to the moment in one specific intention.
James Giglio (23:22.533)
Yeah.
James Giglio (23:41.669)
Right, now do you find it, I mean, it sounds like you really advise your clients and just your overall approach to things, really stating an intention as the baseline introduction to said topic. Is that accurate and do you find that as a great pause for the individual and their brains to say, okay, I’m not gonna worry about the negative, it’s my intention is to talk about the things that are going well or.
that didn’t go well and how we can approach it. Is that accurate?
Dr. Jess Garza (24:11.195)
Yeah, I would say my baseline for them is typically self-awareness. And so sometimes like we’re just catching it. We’re not even gonna like, we’re not even gonna attach anything. I’m not even asking you to implement anything. I just want you to like notice where your brain goes. And so one of those other phrases that I was talking about was the yeah, but I didn’t add that in the list of words, but that’s another one where I’m like, that was really good. And they’re like, yeah, but did you notice? And so I’m like, that’s another one of those high expectation words that can create shame.
And so I might just notice the phrases that you say to yourself. So let’s just catch them for today. So self-awareness is always my baseline. And then I’m like, okay, well, once we’ve noticed it, let’s start an intention to like, well, once I hear myself say, yeah, but then I’m gonna say, my intention is to sit with the compliment. Like when my coach says, that was great, or my boss says, that was great. And I say, well, yeah, but I could have done. And I’m like, nope, let’s just sit with it. You gotta sit for three seconds and you gotta say, thank you, and repeat the compliment. Like, thank you, I thought it was good too.
And they’re like, yeah, but I did it. And I’m like, I know, because your nervous system doesn’t, it doesn’t like those compliments. And so because we’re so used to the shame that we’ve gotten comfort in chaos, we’ve gotten comfort in shame as well. And so if I don’t hear that, then I think that there’s something wrong and my alert alarm system goes off. And so when I do get the nice compliments, then I’m like, this isn’t our norm. Like Jess, you should be messing up. Remember? Like that’s what we’re used to. And so I have to get my nervous system, not necessarily my brain, but my body.
to feel safe with those nice compliments.
James Giglio (25:40.773)
Yeah, well, that’s a great retrospective and introspective. so, you know, dealing with these high stress roles with these high performers, you know, obviously there’s a lot of unpredictable things that happen throughout one’s day. And it doesn’t matter, you know, whoever the person is, but what are some of the strategies or influences that you have towards the individuals that need to handle things in a very unpredictable manner when they just pop up?
Dr. Jess Garza (25:57.183)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (26:11.293)
that point when it is so unpredictable, it’s going back to trusting to train and controlling the uncontrollables or controlling the controllables, not the uncontrollables, because that’s really at the end of the day all you can. And when you talk about controlling the controllables, typically that is just yourself. I can’t control the guy to the right, to the left. I can only control me and my thought process and my breath and your rate of blinking. Those are like really the only thing like I can control how fast my eyes blink and I can control my breath.
and I can control my thoughts. At the end of the day, those are like the three things that I have control over. And so then I say, if in a high unpredictable, you’ve got to go back to basics and trust the training that you’ve done is there and you can go to execute. And so we talk about heavy, when we are in training modalities that you’re training as if it’s a high risk, high, know, stake situation so that it feels familiar when they’re in those unpredictable cases, which is why scenario based trainings are so
James Giglio (27:07.174)
interesting.
Dr. Jess Garza (27:09.193)
critical.
James Giglio (27:10.362)
Now do you run through exercises for people, almost like a training to like, whether it’s role playing or envisioning or thinking about a scenario and what’s that like?
Dr. Jess Garza (27:20.976)
I do. So I just did this with an organization not too long ago. A lot of their junior recruits, and even with the military, I did it with a recruiting battalion too, using the psychological principles of persuasion. And we would do different cases that they’ve had where deals didn’t go through. And we would put them back in that scenario and we would look at it from the persuasion of principles and from an empathetic level.
If I can understand, so empathy comes from three different levels. You have empathetic from a cognitive level, an emotional level, and empathic concern. And if I can understand someone on all three of those levels, I can typically influence them to whatever direction that I typically need them to go into in an ethical way, obviously. And so when we talk about negotiations and making connections with people, it’s people don’t understand people.
we understand I have to get from here to here, A to B, and how do I get to B? Most people jump the gun and try to already offer whatever it is that they’re doing without actually understanding the needs and assessing the individual or company. And so doing live demos in group settings and then having people come up and present and you can feel people get really nervous and shaky up front and then all of sudden they get disarmed because the environment becomes so comfortable and vulnerable and everybody’s there to learn that
James Giglio (28:37.306)
Thank
Dr. Jess Garza (28:43.47)
I have yet to see a group of, you know, from grown men and women down to like juniors that are just coming out of college for the first time that everybody on the same levels, like name tags are off. I don’t care if you’re the CEO or the newbie that just came in. Everybody is playing on the same field. And it’s really cool to see the integration of teams, either shared of experience scenarios, and then development through applied practices. I think that a lot of people are great about talking about theories.
but don’t know how to apply it in real life. And I think that is one of my superpowers that you could tell me about your industry and I can come up with a live exercise application and deliver it so that it applies exactly to what you need.
James Giglio (29:20.71)
Sure.
James Giglio (29:25.55)
I 100 % believe that because as you’re speaking, I am running through scenarios in different circumstances that whether I accidentally fell onto your strategy or innately, whatever, but I certainly see the benefit. And just as a way of an example, as you were speaking with working with associates and them worrying about deal flow or what have you, or sales, it’s something that I go through constantly where in my mind, winning is the expectation, right?
Dr. Jess Garza (29:52.037)
Right.
James Giglio (29:55.467)
an RFP or a project proposal, we’re gonna win it. We’re supposed to win it. But when we don’t, I still have those moments of, you know, real disappointment and to your point of thinking about an empathetic or sort of a somewhat rational justification of why.
Dr. Jess Garza (30:13.423)
Yeah.
James Giglio (30:14.032)
For me, I’ve trained to a degree. I mean, it always stings at first, but then I sit back and reflect and say, okay, maybe this is the universe telling us we wouldn’t be able to produce this project or something was off. So I’ve accepted things beyond my control that influenced the decision that had nothing to do with us. So yeah, that really stuck with me. So one of your talks,
Dr. Jess Garza (30:18.381)
Right.
Dr. Jess Garza (30:24.889)
Right.
Dr. Jess Garza (30:29.837)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (30:36.128)
Yeah.
James Giglio (30:40.77)
really speaks to managing stakeholders and the unconscious expectations. Can you expand on that and how it relates to organizational growth and how leaders can address that topic?
Dr. Jess Garza (30:52.89)
Yes, this is probably one of my favorite ones that doesn’t, I think people are timid to talk about or even address with higher stakes because you want to please them. You want to get the deal. You want to get the project. You want to, know, all the things. And so I think when you understand individuals at very high levels too, you can have a very candid conversation without them feeling attacked. And so
That’s also, think, one of my superpowers is I can sit at a table with high-level C-suites and eventually get them to open up within a couple of minutes about some vulnerabilities that they typically would hide and close doors, not ever talk about. But I think what ends up happening that stumps growth in a company is the assumption piece, especially with their lower individuals, that I own my own company as well. And I’ve felt this and I’ve experienced it.
I’m super type A, I’m a go-getter, I want deals, I want growth in my company, I want all the things. And when I hire someone who is more of a doer, which every company needs, and that is okay that that’s what they want, and I’m like, what do you mean? Why don’t you want more? You should get this, and you should do this, and why aren’t you calling it just because you feel like you should? And my expectation is I would do it on unconscious level just because I want to see how far I can push my limits and boundaries.
James Giglio (32:13.776)
Sure.
Dr. Jess Garza (32:14.006)
but they’re only on the paper doing exactly what I told them to do and that’s great, but I’m like, yeah, why aren’t we doing more than just this? they’re like, you didn’t ask me to. I’m like, well, I shouldn’t have to ask you. And so in my head, that unconscious expectation of like, I think people should operate on the same level of me, that was a belief that I had that I didn’t know that I was operating at. And so then it was putting pressure on them thinking that they were underperforming or not good enough. And I would never want an employee to feel that way.
but unconsciously I was putting that level of pressure on them. And so I’m like, whoa, let’s go back. You’re right. You don’t have to be at my level and that’s okay. And they don’t ever have to get to that level if they don’t want to. I definitely want to encourage them to grow to whatever capacity that they can, but it doesn’t have to be like me. And I think sometimes CEOs and even C-suite executives feel like it’s their way or the highway. And if it’s not done their method.
James Giglio (32:43.526)
Sure.
Dr. Jess Garza (33:08.128)
then it can’t be done any other way. And so we have to disarm those types of unconscious expectations that come up in language, that come up in behavioral mannerisms. And then just even listening to meetings after the meeting, I’m like, whoa, like we had five different expectations that came up that you never said out loud that you expected them to do. So let’s go back in the next, like when we recap this to everybody in the email, this is what you get to say. they’re like, oh, they’re like, that’s crazy. I didn’t realize they did that unintentionally. And I’m like, totally.
James Giglio (33:27.269)
Yeah.
James Giglio (33:37.156)
Yeah, I feel like most of us throughout our career have had a manager or a boss that, you know, definitely didn’t get the memo and, you know, they had the unrealistic expectation of, you know, the team and certain tasks and such. So, yeah, I can certainly relate to that. You know, my gosh, yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (33:45.108)
Correct.
Dr. Jess Garza (33:48.903)
Yes.
Dr. Jess Garza (33:53.791)
Yeah, and it drives burnout so high. then they wonder what’s, you know, and that’s the other thing. Like sometimes I think a lot of executives think that silence is a good thing, that, you know, like silence is them being busy and excited to work, but there’s also silence and burnout and silence and like lack of motivation. And so when you’re not hearing things that are going wrong or, you know, things that aren’t, you know, bad or whatever, some people are like, yeah, but.
James Giglio (34:10.608)
Sure.
Dr. Jess Garza (34:19.09)
you know, no talk is good talk. And it’s like, no, you should be talking. There should be more communication than you even want just to know the temperature of what’s happening in your lane or line.
James Giglio (34:29.316)
Yeah, for sure. I feel like another topic that we all can relate to is inner voices, right? And you give a presentation on what’s called seat at the table and talk to us a little bit about what that agenda is and sort of helping people navigate their inner thoughts or voices.
Dr. Jess Garza (34:36.584)
Mm.
Dr. Jess Garza (34:49.618)
This is probably one of my favorite presentations to do. I swear I feel like baby Einstein when it comes to emotions. I’m like, this is it. This is how everybody should operate. know, one of my own unconscious expectations. So when I do seats at the table, I talk about everybody asking themselves, what are like your six more dominating emotions throughout a day or throughout a week? And which ones are at your table most often? And they don’t often be bad. They don’t all have to be good either. So I usually say, know, frustration,
James Giglio (34:52.518)
Okay.
Dr. Jess Garza (35:18.779)
disappointment, shame, excitement, hopeful are usually all at my table. And when we identify the six that are at your table that are most dominant, and they might change day to day, year to year, whatever, month to month, I ask them to identify what is the emotion’s purpose and what is its power. Every emotion that we experience is a good thing. It’s not bad. Even the bad emotions, it is good to have.
we have to understand the purpose of why it’s coming up and then how much power are we feeding it. So for instance, I’ll give you like frustration and disappointment. Those two are kind of like sisters for me. When I experience disappointment, the purpose of it for me is to recognize when I didn’t meet an expectation of myself and so, and it’s of something in the past. The power that disappointment has over me is I…
start to shame the heck out of myself. I think about the worst case scenario and all the ways that I could have done it completely different. So I ruminate and I circulate on why that happened and I get stuck on that. Frustration for me, the purpose for frustration is to identify when an expectation hasn’t been met. And that could be with anything. It could be with an external or an internal focus. So the one that I usually use is if I was going to Chili’s.
and I wanted that nice beef hot queso that they have and they come out and it’s lukewarm. And I’m like, are you kidding me? Like I was craving it, I wanted it and it didn’t. Like they come out and it’s lukewarm. And the power that frustration has is I get super sarcastic and then I get stuck on that one thing. So I’m like, well, glad everybody else had a great dinner. I’m glad your food’s hot. How was yours? that’s nice. Wanna know how mine is? It’s super mildly warm. It’s great, loved it.
James Giglio (36:54.662)
you
Dr. Jess Garza (37:15.29)
And so now I’m just like, just so focused and isolated on that one event that I can’t get over it. And so I’m now feeding that level of frustration and has that emotion has more power than the head of the table, which would be Jess. Jess no longer has control, it’s frustration. Or sometimes I pass the buck and I go back to disappointment. And I’m like, see, now like I never get any food that I like and it just keeps bouncing back to these different emotions.
James Giglio (37:22.032)
Right.
James Giglio (37:25.677)
Thank
James Giglio (37:40.863)
yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (37:44.922)
I never get control over it again. And so when I recognize like, in this moment, you expected hot food and you didn’t get it. Now we have a choice. And so this is my technique in this, because it’s in any, everybody has these emotions. Like we’re all over the place with them. These emotions just want to be validated. So when you experience it, it’s an alarm that goes off and it’s like, hey Jess, remember like you expected this to happen and it didn’t, or you expected to perform this way and you didn’t perform.
James Giglio (37:58.852)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (38:14.369)
And it’s just this alarm that says, I just wanted to notify you. And I’m like, yeah, I got it. Like, I know that. But if I don’t shut off the alarm, like, in the morning when you’re waking up your kids and you’re like, hey, it’s time to get up. And they’re like, OK. And they’re like, seriously, it’s time to get up. And they’re like, OK. And then by the end of it, they’re like, OK, I got it. And then you’re like, fine, I don’t need to say it again. That’s kind of the same thing that we have to do with the emotions to turn it off. And the way you do that, it’s called the of course methods. You would say, of course I’m frustrated. Makes sense, because I wanted hot queso.
James Giglio (38:31.172)
Right.
Dr. Jess Garza (38:44.182)
And in that moment, it literally contains the emotion. It isolates it and it validates it in the whole body. Like your nervous system will go, like you heard me. Like I get it. Or let’s just say you didn’t get one of the proposals, right? And maybe you’re, I don’t know, what emotion would you typically feel?
James Giglio (39:04.634)
Well, I was just going to say, I maybe this is a little bit off topic, but since you shared, you know, sort of your reaction in that food scenario, I was thinking about when expectations, and this relates to the nervous system as well. What I was thinking was, you know, when expectations aren’t met on my end or I’m struggling with a conversation with a colleague or a client and they’re just not getting, like, I tend to get frustrated and then I get quiet and then I get very short. And in my mind,
Dr. Jess Garza (39:11.255)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (39:26.104)
James Giglio (39:31.396)
That’s me trying to protect the individual from me and what I really want to react as. But in turn, what I’ve realized is that must be miserable for the other person’s nervous system, seeing someone like biting their lip, quivering their, you know, and just like taking deep breaths and just nodding because, you know, I am boiling on the inside. And so…
Dr. Jess Garza (39:36.897)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (39:47.64)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, that’s interesting that you say it like that because you’re like, it must be so bad for the other person. But in reality, it’s actually bad for your nervous system. Like that’s you actually feeling the not the angst and stuff inside. So then I would say, well, why is it frustrating for you? Why was that scenario frustrating? No, why was it?
James Giglio (40:03.206)
Yeah.
James Giglio (40:13.222)
I’ll just make up a scenario where if I’m trying to explain how a production would work or the technologies we would use or why it would work and the recipient is like, I don’t think so, or I don’t get it. But like in my mind, and this is part of my ADD brain where it’s like, I already see the solution to the end.
Dr. Jess Garza (40:35.477)
Yeah.
James Giglio (40:38.392)
you know, my frustration gets, you know, in the way where it’s like the person’s not getting it. And it’s like, how are you not like in my mind, it’s so clear, but to them, it’s, it’s, it’s jarbled. It’s not clear. And so that would be a good example of something that I would have.
Dr. Jess Garza (40:52.629)
Okay, so in that one I would say, of course I’m fresh, it makes sense. I feel like they should get it. And so then we’re disarming your nervous system and then you would go into the and now. So it’d be like, and now ask an open ended question of like, where are they lost? Because you’re going more direct and you’re trying to lead them in a certain way. So that’d be like, okay, at what point did I lose you? And then bringing them back in that scenario to then give yourself some space to like.
James Giglio (41:15.793)
that’s great. Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (41:18.421)
Comment down and now that it’s an open-ended question, it gets the spotlight back on them while you get to go and collect your thoughts.
Yeah.
James Giglio (41:27.718)
All right, well, I’m gonna shift gears a little bit. Speaking of technology and what we do, I’m curious to know, and I hope that you’ve had some experience, I’m sure you have in terms of certain technologies or methodologies that are at the intersection of performance psychology. Have you implemented any particular technology or can you share the landscape of what’s on the horizon or what’s being implemented by others?
Dr. Jess Garza (41:52.049)
Yeah, there is. So even in the last 10 years, the military does a really good job of incorporating new technology with high populations and soldiers to be able to get the cool new things to look at, body dynamics and data analysis on them, as has professional sports too. So
There’s the ability to look at cognitive fatigue, how well someone’s rested. We’re looking at oxygen uptake, we’re looking at heart rate, all of the things from a body analysis to see how primed and cognitively ready they are. And then from a vision standpoint, there’s so many tools out there from like concussion protocols to looking at eye dilation movements and eye muscle reaction that we’ve been able to incorporate.
James Giglio (42:28.602)
interesting.
Dr. Jess Garza (42:41.981)
There’s programs like Synaptic that does these different vision goggles that can help an athlete block out their right eye if they’re right eye dominant. So their left eye muscle can move and work faster. So if I have someone that’s coming from up behind, I can be able to shift and have more peripheral vision training that way. We do a lot of near far quickness as well. Dynavision is another really good program that has for reaction training. There is, my gosh, there’s so many. There’s a lot of.
James Giglio (42:52.194)
wow.
James Giglio (43:10.31)
Yeah, I feel like a lot of what you’re speaking of is very relatable to what I see with F1 drivers and the agility testing that they go through. Yeah, yeah, and you know, despite me being an Eagles fan, I will give credit to the Washington commanders and their quarterback, Gant.
Dr. Jess Garza (43:17.808)
Yes, that’s exactly it.
Dr. Jess Garza (43:27.264)
you’re not gonna like me right now then, cause I’m a cheese fan.
James Giglio (43:29.94)
boy. All right. Well, if we see each other at South by March, we can, you know, buy the loser or the winner a drink, however you want to wager this. But, Jayden Daniels recently said that his success for this season was in part because of the virtual reality training that he did throughout the off season. And it really helped him, you know, plan for different scenarios and read defenses. And so I, you know, as a technologist, I absolutely love to hear that.
Dr. Jess Garza (43:36.156)
Done.
Dr. Jess Garza (43:47.719)
Yes.
James Giglio (43:59.335)
because there’s been many iterations of VR training tools that really haven’t scaled or caught fire the way that it should outside of maybe military. So I thought that was a big statement for not only athletes, but technology. Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (44:03.203)
Yes.
Yeah.
No, I think that’s huge. And it’s nice because it’s even getting down to the youth level too with the virtual reality of even baseball stadiums that they’re going to go play in or even looking at timing from like golf to baseball. mean, military, I’ve seen it for like decades now that we’ve had it with the VR systems and like looking at different locations and where we’re operating in. But it’s been, think tech has been a huge benefit to them. And then to the other side,
As much as it’s been a benefit, sometimes it can be a downside to the player because then they’re like, man, previously if I didn’t look ready or wasn’t physically ready, I could still go out there. now that kind of dictates who plays and who doesn’t. Where it doesn’t dictate it, but it has a big say in it because we’re looking at who’s most primed to go out and get the win that we need.
James Giglio (45:01.347)
Yeah, yeah, that’s great. so Jess, this has been so fascinating and I feel like we could probably continue talking for the next two hours and then you would have to bill me for the therapy session here. for our listeners, what advice for teams and leaders would you give to help them or those that are looking to strive a mental resilience and readiness?
Dr. Jess Garza (45:06.703)
You
Dr. Jess Garza (45:10.255)
You
Dr. Jess Garza (45:23.203)
I think the biggest part is asking more open-ended questions. Oftentimes because we’re on such big deadlines, we have times, we have meetings, we have all the things that we’re attending to. We’re multi-dimensional beings and so there’s a lot going on in our brain and sometimes we lead people into a certain way so we can ask more open-ended questions to ask for clarity and confirmation. We’ll get the answers that we actually need.
And most people think that if I have to ask open-ended questions, it’s going to take forever, and it doesn’t. It just leads to more clarity. And I wish that that becomes a little bit more normalized in organizations.
James Giglio (45:58.023)
Yeah, yeah. All right, so my personal takeaway is setting intention and asking more open-ended questions. And I will apply this throughout the rest of my career here at MDT. So Dr. Jess Garza, this was awesome. Thank you so much. Before we go, we’d to give our listeners the ability to reach out to you wherever you’re comfortable, whether that’s social media, your direct email, or LinkedIn. But if you’re willing to share, please do so, and so our listeners can find you.
Dr. Jess Garza (46:03.343)
Love it.
Dr. Jess Garza (46:21.088)
Yeah.
Dr. Jess Garza (46:26.355)
Well, great, thanks. You can find me on Instagram at Dr. Jess Garza or on LinkedIn as well at Dr. Jess Garza.
James Giglio (46:33.764)
Wonderful. All right, well, thanks for joining this latest edition of the MVP podcast and thank you again to Dr. Jess Garza and we’ll see you next time.
Dr. Jess Garza (46:41.144)
Thank you.
