Gary Keegan

So they lost that.

And he was open and curious about how that happened and what he needed to do to make sure it didn't happen again.

And that's Jim in a nutshell.

So we sat down.

uh three hours um i think i remember jim kept his overcoat on uh for the three hours so we got so engrossed to the conversation that he never even took his coat off and he said will you come over and talk to the team i think it was pre it might have been pre a replay against mayo the semi-final uh 2015 because i think we played kerry in the final so i went in and spoke to

to Dublin players and I had a flip chart and I had a marker and I remember the conversation I had a conversation I had around the three dimensions of time two that exist in your head and one that exists in reality that's the past

the present and the future and that's what I spoke to them about and the importance about being present and being on the next thing and then the next thing and let the last thing go and just that conversation general enough but focused and they seemed to think it helped them to win the semi-final and well they come back and talk to them pre the final and I did and they went on to win the final they seemed to think that I had a little part to play in that so Jim said look will you come and build a mindset program and I had some ideas as to

you know, what we did in boxing and what I felt would work.

And I felt that that was a huge part.

It just is such a huge part of, and it goes beyond the work that you're directly doing with an athlete.

You know, I feel if all a psychologist is doing is working one-to-one

with a player or an athlete well then they're missing context and if they're not let into the center of the conversation with the head coach and the coaches it's very hard for them to operate effectively and and then it's also you know there's a there's a danger there that that the conversation that's been happen happening at a one-to-one basis is absent of context and therefore may be

less beneficial than it could be.

So I went in and I started to build something within Dublin, but very much conversations with Jim and the coaches and sitting in on their sessions with the players and talking about language, consistency of language and meaning of words and all that type of stuff and how we did it.

So shaping the environment and the culture and the interaction between coaches and the players themselves was really important because

the coaches are probably the most important contributors to the confidence of an athlete.

And so therefore, how they communicate and how consistent they are and how consistent that is horizontally across the coaching team is a massive piece.

So what makes the job of a psychologist or someone like me in the space that's a performance coach, it makes it a lot easier if the environment is set up for success.

It's set up to get the best out of itself.

And so that interaction, I think, helped me to be successful in that space.