Alex Honnold just climbed the 1,667-foot Taipei 101 building live for the world to see.

No rope. No harness. No safety gear. 101 floors.

His first words at the top? "Sick." Then he took a selfie.

How does someone deal with the fear and pressure of knowing one mistake means death? Neuroscientists peered into Honnold's brain to find out: Neuroscientist Jane Joseph put Honnold in an fMRI machine and showed him disturbing images. Disfigured corpses. Pictures designed to make anyone cringe.

Even if we have no visceral reaction, our brain betrays us.

An almond-shaped region called the amygdala should light up. It detects threats and triggers our stress response.

Joseph expected at least something from the man who free solos 3,000-foot walls.

We're living in the era of the performative grind.

We’ve confused "show work" with "grow work."

One is optimized for being seen by others.

The other is optimized for actually getting better.

We've traded actual progress for the appearance of it. Show work is effort designed for the algorithm.

It’s the early morning cold plunge picture.

It’s the carefully curated stack of books on your desk.

The goal shifts from mastery to signaling expertise or achievement to an audience.

And over time...when you prioritize the image, you neglect the substance.

One key differentiator for elite performers?

They don’t see it as a sacrifice.

Going to bed early, skipping the party, putting in hours of practice...

That’s not giving something up.

It’s living in alignment with what they care about most. We often frame dedication as deprivation.

As if the road to greatness is paved only with pain and missed opportunities.

But elite performers flip the script.

They don’t think, “I’m missing out.”

They think, “This is what I love to do.”

We don't fail because we don't want it enough.

We fail because we are terrified of finding our limits.

Fear of not being good enough or measuring up.

We are terrified of the potential for failure. In running, the fear is visible.

You see the moment a runner eases off the gas.

They worry they won't last the distance, so they settle.

They trade the possibility of greatness for the security of finishing.

It's a protective mechanism in action.

The end of the year is for reflection.

After interviewing 75+ elite performers and reading hundreds of studies this year, here are...

25 lessons on peak performance for sport and life:

1. Do real things in the real world with real people. Your nervous system knows what’s fake 2. Chase belonging, not fitting in. One is performative. The other demands honesty.

3. Don’t let outcomes become a surrogate for character. Results are feedback, not a verdict.

4. Care deeply, but be able to let go. Enough attachment to show up; enough distance to stay free.

We think that positive self-talk is the key to high performance.

Just tell yourself "I can do this" and you will succeed.

A fascinating new study suggests we are missing a crucial ingredient.

It turns out, your body has to believe your mind.

They need to be in sync for self-talk to have an impact. Researchers recruited athletes from various sports, including soccer and CrossFit.

They manipulated two variables: what the athletes said to themselves and their physical posture.

Some used positive self-talk while standing tall.

Others used the same positive words while slumped over. The results were stark.

A new meta-analysis on the impact of goal setting on performance found:

1. Process goals had a large effect on performance
2. Performance goals had a moderate effect
3. Outcome goals had a negligible effect Two main reasons this works:
1. Focusing on the outcome tends to activate both approach and avoidance motivation. We’re pulled into a tug of war battle.

2. Process goals speak the language of our brain and body. They speak action.

It’s not that outcome or performance goals are inherently bad. It’s that we already have a hyper focus on them. We can’t escape them in most situations. It comes with the arena. Of course you want to win or run a 4 minute mile. But doubling down on them just brings more of the negative without the positive of what can we do about it.

A new study shows why it's far easier to maintain or rebuild fitness, than it is to build it in the first place.

Your cells retain an "epigenetic memory" of training.

Even after a long layoff, they are primed to adapt at a cellular level.

It's as if your body remembers, "I've been here before."

It's "old man strength" in action... Researchers tracked participants doing intense training for 8 weeks.

Then they stopped completely for 3 months, before training again.

The scientists analyzed muscle biopsies to see what happened at the cellular level.

For performance, the tortoise really does beat the hare.

A big new study looked at 34,000 elite performers found that:

Early success rarely predicts adult achievement.

Exceptional young performers peaked quickly but narrowly mastered one thing.

Exceptional adults reached their peak gradually. They engaged in broader, multidisciplinary practice early on. The data is staggering.

They studied Nobel laureates, Olympic champions, chess grandmasters, and more.

Nearly 90% of top youth performers do not become top adult performers.

The kids dominating the U12 championships were rarely the ones standing on the Olympic podium.

Early success is a poor predictor of long-term greatness. It might even be a negative signal.

If you don't feel valued, it's hard to be valuable.

When everything around you signals that no one cares.. your brain gets the message.

Why pour energy into something that doesn't seem to matter?

Motivation follows meaning. We love to blame individuals for lacking drive. "They're not hungry enough." "They don't want it bad enough."

But we ignore the environment screaming at them every day.

If culture says your effort is invisible here.

Then your brain will do exactly what it evolved to do: Conserve energy when reward seems impossible.

Work ethic doesn't exist in a vacuum.

Kobe Bryant was once asked if he loved to win or hated to lose.

His answer surprises most people: "I’m neither. I play to figure things out."

He realized that playing for the win or to avoid the loss both introduce fear.

They both pull you out of the moment. His aim? Stay "dead center." As Bryant explained:

"If you play with the fear of failing you’ll have the pressure on yourself to capitulate to that fear. If you play with “I want to win” then you have the fear of what happens if you don’t.

But if you find common ground in the middle, in the center, then it doesn’t matter."

Both are weaknesses because they focus on the uncertain future.

Kobe focused on the center to stay connected to the action, feeling nothing but what was right in front of him.

I've spent a long time studying world-class performers. Two characteristics I've noticed:

1. Consistency is emphasized more than short-term Intensity. They stack solid work month after month. Instead of trying to be heroes

2. They know how to flip the switch to compete. Instead of always being hypercompetitive, they can turn it on and off. Consistency over short-term intensity:

We love the story of the heroic effort. The strava workout or all-nighter.

But the best performers resist that allure unless it's necessary.

They know that shooting for heroic efforts all the time is a recipe for burnout.

When I was 18, I asked one of the greatest coaches in history for the "key" to success in the field.

He didn't give me a secret workout or a grand philosophy.

Sitting in his living room, he told me: "Read as much as you can. Never stop reading."

This advice is more important today than it has ever been. This wasn't just any coach. Tom Tellez coached Carl Lewis, Leroy Burrell, and a roster of world record holders and champions.

This was a master of the craft. And his "key" wasn't about drills or splits; it was about the mind.

He understood, fundamentally, that elite performance is built on a foundation of deep thinking.

Our brains are fried.

You try to read a book...can’t focus.
Sit with loved ones...your mind drifts to work or phone.
Feel a buzz in your pocket....but there’s no notification.

We’re not just distracted. We’re digitally disoriented.

Here’s what’s going on and how to push back: Psychologists call it: Digital Dementia.

It's the forgetfulness, lack of focus, and chronic mental fatigue caused by tech overuse.

It occurs because we're training our brains to live in partial attention: task-switching constantly, never going deep.

Our phones aren’t just distracting us. They’re rewiring how we think, feel, and engage.

When we were kids, play meant freedom.

No adults, no schedules, no supervision: just scraped knees, bad calls, and fun until the street lights came on.

That chaos built confidence.

Today, we’ve traded it for structure and safety...and our kids’ mental health is paying the price.

What happens to a generation that never climbs too high, falls too hard, or has to navigate conflict with peers? Everything is organized, supervised, optimized.

We’ve replaced pickup games with travel teams, and spontaneous play with “skill development sessions.”

Parents hover on the sidelines; coaches call every shot.
Kids are performing instead of playing.

And when everything is managed for you, you stop learning how to manage yourself.

We’re training a generation to fear failure.

Not because they’re soft or lazy, because everything they do is on display.

Every test score, every game, every rejection lives forever online.

When life becomes performative, failure feels like a public referendum on your worth. When I was a kid, you could fail in private.

You missed the shot, struck out, or bombed a test and only a few people knew.

Now, every misstep can be screenshotted, shared, and commented on.

The comparison game never stops, and the scoreboard is always public.

A study of over 70,000 people found:

Those who focused on being the best, driven by external measures had worse outcomes than those focus on getting better.

When extrinsic aspirations dominated intrinsic, it was “universally detrimental” to their well-being.

The people who thrive aren’t driven by comparison. They’re fueled by curiosity and growth. Psychologists Emma Bradshaw, Richard Ryan, and colleagues called it “the dark side of the American dream.”

Across more than 100 studies, they found that when external goals—money, fame, image, winning—dominate, well-being plummets.

People report more anxiety, burnout, and disconnection from what once made their pursuits meaningful.

In 1950, the average new home was 983 square feet.
By 1970, it grew to 1,500.

Today, the average new home is 2,408 square feet.

If someone from the 1950s walked through modern suburbia, they’d think we were all living in mansions, and that the American Dream had been achieved. By nearly every measure, we have more than ever before.

The once-luxurious is now normal. The rare is routine.

Yet we don’t feel more fulfilled.

We adapt, recalibrate, and move the goalposts.

That’s the paradox of progress: our circumstances improve, but our satisfaction often doesn’t.

One of the biggest mistakes that leads to burnout: letting work bleed into the rest of your life.

You check emails late at night. Slack pings during dinner. Your mind drifts back to the project while you’re with your kids.

Without transitions, you never truly recover. You’re half in, half out, everywhere and nowhere. Recovery doesn’t happen automatically. You need to flip the switch from work mode to life mode.

The problem is most of us just carry our work brain around with us.

The fix? Deliberate transitions. Practices and boundaries that signal to your mind and body: “Work is done. Now it’s time for something else.”

We all like to think we’ll stand up when it matters.

That we’ll do the right thing, run toward the danger, speak truth when others stay silent.

We imagine ourselves as Rambo or Jerry Maguire.

The truth: most freeze, comply, or stay silent.

What separates those who actually act? When the moment comes, most people freeze or fall in line.

Not because they’re weak, but because the pull of safety, conformity, and fitting in is strong.

Doing the right thing often comes with real costs—social rejection, loss of status, even danger.

With all that's going on in the world, it's easy to get locked into consumption mode. Scrolling & watching news all day.

A study after the Boston Marathon bombing found: Those who watched 6+ hours of coverage reported more stress than those who were directly impacted by the attack. What we feed the brain becomes the state we live in.

The brain is predictive. It uses past and present inputs to guess what’s coming next and primes your body accordingly.

Feed it a steady diet of alarm, and it will predict alarm everywhere.

You don’t just feel stressed; you start living as if everything is a threat.

If you want to feel less frantic, start by changing the inputs.