At the highest echelons of sport, all the athletes are supremely talented. All have devoted their lives to being the best they can be. All train as hard as they possibly can. And all are optimizing their sleep, nutrition and recovery to glean every extra edge imaginable.

So what distinguishes the gold medalist from the also ran?

Is it luck? Talent? Support? Resources? Of course every result is significantly influenced by some combination of these important variables. But all things being equal, the athlete with the mental and emotional edge will stand atop the podium every time.

Once the embarrassing last stop on a flailing athlete’s career, the world's top sports psychologists now enjoy a highly influential and respected role proactively honing the mental and emotional edge of today's most successful athletes, CEOs and creatives looking to elevate peak performance beyond the imaginable.

Enter Dr. Michael Gervais- the go to high performance psychologist everyone is talking about.

Director of the High Performance Psychology arm of DISC (Diagnostic and Interventional Surgical Center) Sports & Spine Center in Marina Del Rey and a key member of the Red Bull High Performance Program, Michael works in the trenches of high-stakes environments, where there is no luxury for mistakes, hesitation, or failure to respond. With the vision of helping his clients thrive under pressure, Michael has created a performance model — melding state-of-the-art brain mapping techniques with an approach grounded in high-performance psychology — that allows people to achieve their maximum potential, whether on or off the field.

Dr. Gervais' results are staggering. If you follow the NFL, then you might recall Michael as the guy Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll credits as integral in their Super Bowl win for the meditation, mindfulness and other crucial team building techniques he helped foster and instill into the fabric of the Seahawks organization and team culture that paved the team’s path towards incredible success.

You might also remember that Felix Baumgartner’s now-infamous Red Bull Stratos jump from an altitude of 128,000 feet almost never was simply because Felix simply could not overcome the high level of anxiety and claustrophobia he experienced every time he donned the jump suit. It was none other than Gervais who helped Baumagartner resolve the issue and get Stratos back on track. No Gervais, no history making jump.

In addition to the Seahawks and Red Bull's North American athletes, Dr. Gervais has worked with the US Olympic Team, snowboarders, golfers, basketball players, track and field athletes, an impressive array of top collegiate programs, and professional sports organizations including the NBA, NFL, NHL, MLB and UFC. In addition, his work has played an integral role in the US Military, as well as several collegiate and high school programs.

While Dr. Gervais’ roster includes some of the sports world’s most elite, this isn’t just about high performance athletes, its about high performance life. To coin his phrase,

5WPD 022: Tether Me Tightly