Hello and welcome to the psychology podcast with Dr Scott Barry Kaufman where we give

you insights into the mind brain behavior and creativity. Each episode will feature a

new guest who will stimulate your mind and give you a greater understanding of yourself, others, and the world

we live in.

Thanks for listening and enjoy the podcast. Today we have Patty Steinfoot on the podcast.

Patty is a mental conditioning coach and assistant instructor at the

University of Pennsylvania's Applied Positive Psychology Program.

His latest book is Breakfast with Bales,

The Incredible True Story of a Dying Coach

and his final message about life, learning, and leadership.

Patty is also a former professional football player.

Patty, it's great to have you on the show today.

Scott, thanks for having me.

Great to be here.

Lots of things we could talk about and I thought we could start by talking about your

experiences as a former professional football player and how that led to you to see new the psychology of sports in a new way.

Yeah, I think, you know, I found a lot of success with psychology myself as an athlete. I wasn't super talented. I was obviously physically the right size to be able to compete at least but I was definitely not the fastest or the strongest or anything like that.

I think my advantages I found came from my psychological skills and that was my first introduction to it I guess at the age of 17 and 18 getting drafted as a professional back home and then learning the hard way also that even once you get there it's still

not over there's still a lot of improving to do. I had the in glorious honor I guess of having a record by the time I finished my career

it was the longest time playing without actually getting on the field I had five years as a pro and was injured pretty much

the whole time. So there was a lot of frustration and...

But you were still getting paid? I was still getting paid. I was a professional.

...