#33 Dr Mustafa Sarkar and Clara Swedlund - Resilience: What it is, What it isn’t, and Why it’s Important for Sustained Success

I have the pleasure of being joined by Dr Mustafa Sarkar and Clara Swedlund.

Mustafa is Senior Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Psychology at Nottingham Trent University. His background is in teaching and research with most of his research focusing on the psychology of sporting and performance excellence, specifically looking at resilience in high achievers in sport and business. Mustafa works with coaches and organisations helping them to develop resilience in athletes and teams.

Clara is currently undertaking her Masters degree in Sport and Exercise Psychology at Loughborough University. Clara competes as a body builder and talks about how she applies the techniques she studies to her training and competitive mindset.  She also runs a blog that documents her journey to becoming a qualified sport psychologist and on it, she wrote a blog post that was based on an article Mustafa had co-written about resilience which is why they’ve come together on the Sport Psych Show.

We look at what resilience is; personality characteristics; the significance of environment; high challenge, high support environments; Cognitive Behavioural Theory (CBT) and psychological safety.