Coaching Culture How Elite Coaches Build Sustainable Excellence (Without Burning Out) | Brad Stulberg | Ep. 442
8 snips
Feb 22, 2026 
Brad Stulberg, performance coach and author focused on sustainable high performance, shares mindset shifts for long-term leadership. He explores presence, the trade-offs that beat balance, acute versus aspirational love, rituals like the Spurs’ team dinners, discipline paired with self-compassion, and using minimum effective doses to avoid burnout.
AI Snips
Chapters
Books
Transcript
Episode notes
Three Year Old Forced Presence
- Brad Stulberg's three-year-old demanded his full attention during a 90-minute backyard play session which prompted him to put his phone away.
- That moment led him to intentionally remove distractions and sit with boredom to be fully present with his daughter.
Creative Work Versus Launch Busyness
- Brad contrasts writing (high presence, low distraction) with book launch activities (travel, pitching, social media) to show how one project contains divergent modes.
- He notices a tangible nervous-system shift between creative deep work and promotional busyness and emphasizes awareness of that difference.
Schedule Phone Free Completion Rituals
- Create intentional moments of completion and presence to prevent the seasonality of busy work from eroding team meaning.
- Brad describes the San Antonio Spurs' tradition of multi-hour phone-free team dinners after big wins or losses to rebuild cohesion.
