Why positive thinking is overrated and what to do instead: US Open winner Dominic Thiem
A New Way of Being
Simon Mundie
4.8 • 523 Ratings
🗓️ 24 January 2025
⏱️ 8 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
“Always think positively" sounds like good advice - on the surface. But is it really possible, or even desirable? In this episode, Dominic Thiem and I explore why chasing constant positivity isn’t the answer.
Novak Djokovic weighed in on this idea in a 2024 interview, explaining why he doesn’t agree with the idea that we should always think positively. Novak's ability to acknowledge and allow challenging thoughts and feelings, and then recenter himself, is what makes him probably the 'mentally toughest player' in the history of the sport;.
Dominic Thiem, the 2020 US Open champion, shares a similar perspective. I caught up with Dom just before his retirement last year, and his insights on this topic were particularly insightful.
The full episode with Domi is here: https://pod.fo/e/276837
The paperback edition of my book, Champion Thinking: Get Out of Your Own Way, Find Your Peak Performance, is now available. Published by Bloomsbury, the link is here: https://www.simonmundie.com/book
🔗 My Free course on beating burnout and finding flow for peak performance is here: https://www.simonmundie.com/beat-burnout-mini-course
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Always think positively. |
| 0:07.7 | I saw someone post this on social media recently, a previous guess in fact. |
| 0:14.1 | And it sounds like it makes sense, but it's not actually possible or even desirable. |
| 0:21.6 | Case in point, do you know what thought you're going to have next? |
| 0:25.3 | Thoughts just come up, including so-called negative ones. |
| 0:29.8 | And it's how we react to them that is key. |
| 0:32.6 | Now, Novak Djokovic is probably the most high-profile athlete who really gets this. And he did an interview early in |
| 0:39.5 | 2024 in which he said that he doesn't like the idea or the belief that we should always |
| 0:46.6 | think positively. And his ability to allow difficult thoughts and feelings to be there and then |
| 0:53.0 | his ability to re-center is what makes him |
| 0:55.9 | so tough mentally, not trying to always think positively. And Dominic team, the 2020 US Open |
| 1:03.5 | champion, agrees with him. So I spoke to Dominic, who is a lovely guy, very deep thinker, just before he retired last year. |
| 1:12.0 | We had a great chat. |
| 1:13.1 | And what he had to say on this subject |
| 1:15.3 | is particularly valuable. |
| 1:19.8 | I've been lucky enough to, particularly, I think, Novak speak |
| 1:23.2 | about these type of things. |
| 1:24.3 | He speaks about how conscious breathing has really helped him. |
| 1:27.3 | And he spoke about |
| 1:28.7 | how people think it's about positive thinking, whereas he said, no, we're human beings. The mind |
| 1:34.4 | is going to go here, there and everywhere. And actually, it's our ability to not get lost in the |
| 1:39.4 | mind and come back to the present moment. That's what it is. Not positive thinking. I wonder if you agree with |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Simon Mundie, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Simon Mundie and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.