In this episode of The Last 10%, host Dallas Burnett interviews Dr. Megan Matthews Buning, a former All American SEC softball star and current clinical associate professor at Florida State University (FSU). Megan shares her journey from playing and coaching softball to becoming a certified mental performance consultant. They discuss Megan’s struggles with self-awareness, mentorship importance, and how she motivates others to handle pressure and self-doubt. Megan also touches on her unique role as a horse therapy owner, revealing her dedication to community service through her therapeutic horse, Valentino. This inspiring conversation offers valuable insights for leaders, coaches, and anyone looking to improve their mental toughness and performance.

Connect with Dr. Buning on X: https://x.com/DrBuning

Connect with Dr. Buning on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/megan-m-buning/

Connect with the therapy horse on Instagram! https://www.instagram.com/apalinval

Hey everybody.

We're talking to Megan Matthews Bunning today.

What an amazing woman she is, a former All American SEC softball star turned

clinical associate professor at FSU for all you Florida State fans out there.

She has some incredible stories like pitching to MVP

Honors in the SEC tournament.

Owning a therapy horse, which we're gonna get into, and overcoming a career

of doubts to inspire mental toughness.

She's a great new friend of mine.

You don't want to miss this incredible conversation.

Welcome the last 10%.

Your host, Dallas Burnett, dives into incredible conversations that

will inspire you to finish well.

And finish strong and strong.

as guests share their journeys in valuable advice on living in the last 10%.

If you are a leader, a coach, a business owner, or someone looking to

level up, you are in the right place.

Remember, you can give 90% effort and make it a long way, but it's finding

out how to unlock the last 10%.

That makes all the difference in your life, your relationships, and your work.

Now here's Dallas.

Welcome, welcome, welcome.

I am Dallas Burnett, sitting in my 1905 Koch Brothers

barber chair in Thrive Studios.

more importantly, we have an amazing guest today, a former All

American SEC softball pitcher, seven time SEC pitcher of the week.

She's now a clinical Associate professor and certified Mental performance

consultant at FSU, Megan Matthews Bunning.

Welcome to the show, Megan.

Dr. Megan Buning: Thank you.

Your gosh.

I need you to follow me around and be my hype man.

That was wonderful.

We like hyping it up.

We have great guests which you are now one of.

And so we've, I've been really excited about this.

I love talking to performance coaches.

I always learn.

I always learn something that I can take away and use when I

talk to a performance expert.

So I'm stoked about this conversation today.

So let's talk a little bit about your career.

You've had an amazing career, and so tell us how you got

into doing what you're doing.

But let's go back to the start and just share some of your experiences.

Dr. Megan Buning: So it's interesting when you see my

career, you think of it as amazing.

And when I think of my career, I think of a bunch of twists and turns,

and it's been a lot of hard work.

so, you know, starting back to.

When playing softball at South Carolina, I ended up having a,

looking back, a great career.

And when I walked off the field my senior season, I said, I'm

never going back to school.

I don't want anything to do with softball.

Yeah, and turns out that I went to softball first and played

with the British National team a little bit and a little pro.

So I didn't put softball down.

And I ended up getting my first coaching position while I was

at the championship game for the NPF, the National Pro Fast Pitch.

so I secured my first coaching position at Florida State while I was in Pennsylvania.

Drove straight from Pennsylvania to, home.

Picked up our stuff, got my husband, and then we moved

to Tallahassee within a week.

Oh

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, so I was very young, literally walking

off the field myself and entering into a big time coaching position.

So A, I did not stay away from softball, and B, after a year there

decided I am gonna go back to school.

So I started my master's degree in sports psychology here at Florida State

Wow.

Dr. Megan Buning: and was coaching full-time and going to school full-time,

and ended up finishing that degree.

was here at Florida State Coaching for three years and then left to go back

up to the state of South Carolina at Coastal Carolina and was there for

two years as an associate head coach and then went back into the SEC at

Ole Miss as an associate head coach.

now, right before I took that job, we had our first daughter, and so

we moved to Oxford, Mississippi, and she was three months old and we moved

eight hours away from everybody.

oh

Dr. Megan Buning: so no family support starting a coaching position

at an SEC school, as an associate head coach recruiting coordinator.

I was gone a lot and

about two years decided I had started my doctorate degree at Ole Miss and

'cause I kind of thought, I don't know if coaching's gonna be in my.

trajectory for a long time.

So I made it about seven years and after I got out of coaching, I stayed at Ole Miss

for a little bit and finished my degree and then had this random career shift,

'cause you go from coaching to becoming a researcher that teach statistics.

'cause that makes a whole lot of sense, right?

Oh

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

Yeah, that's exactly very interesting.

it's not surprising that if you love the game that you went from playing

softball to coaching softball.

that's, even if you weren't planning on doing that, which is kind of funny

'cause you were a student athlete and then you were, a student coach, and so

you just went and just flip flop that.

So that was really interesting.

But what's the biggest that, or the biggest kind of aha moment that you had?

or I would say you felt.

Was like a kind of cataclysmic shift going from this star athlete

to now trying to produce and create star athletes as a coach.

I would love to hear your perspective on that.

Dr. Megan Buning: So I don't actively coach anymore.

I will say, I think.

When I was coaching, the aha moment came when I realized that not the athletes

that I was in touch with at the time, even though they were still considered

a different, what's I guess, breed of athlete as what you see now because we

have generational differences, right?

But even at that time.

Those athletes were not like me and they were not going to be, motivated.

They were not going to be fired up.

They were not going to intake information like what I would and.

It took a little while for me coaching that first year to, to really realize

that, and that's why I started a master's degree because I said, you know what?

I wanna, if I'm going to coach, which I wasn't bought into me

being a coach just yet either,

Yeah.

Dr. Megan Buning: I'm gonna do this, and to be honest with you,

I thought I was pigeonholed.

I thought the only thing I could do was to coach.

Ah,

Dr. Megan Buning: And so I said, well, if I'm gonna do this, I

wanna be the best that I can be.

So I'm going to go back, I'm going to get this degree.

Sports psychology was interesting to me.

It made a whole lot of sense.

And so that's what I did.

And during that degree process, my, my thoughts on how to coach about myself,

self-awareness, getting into the research, I took a 90 degree shift in

how I viewed coaching in my athletes.

So I started to see a change there.

It's interesting that you said self-awareness.

You're, you were looking, you are saying, okay, I've noticed They

are different, which is fascinating to me that you had just gotten out

like just a couple years earlier.

and then in just that short period of time, you notice that much of

a difference in the athletes and their style and their motivation.

So you were kind of right on that threshold, of generational change.

And, uh, and so, but it's interesting, that you would start

saying, I see there's a difference.

But then you mentioned self, like self-awareness was

what was part of that shift?

So I would love to hear about that.

Like what awareness did you feel like led you to make that

shift in that, that change of

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, so self-awareness is something that in the work that I do

now, which I'm sure we'll get to, is a huge component on how to be a successful.

Performer and just in general in life and what you do?

I will say that I have had a higher level of self-awareness since I can remember.

And I think part of that was how I was raised.

my mom and dad were very good about when something isn't working.

We want you to look at you first.

What is it that you're doing?

How you're seeing the situation?

What can you change perhaps that could make this better?

And so.

Or more productive.

And so I kind of have already had that training of when something's

not going well, the first place I'm gonna look is what can I do?

what am I doing?

great.

Dr. Megan Buning: so that's always been a go-to.

And I didn't realize it, I don't want to make this false impression that I was

some angel child that grew up and was always looking at what can I do better?

It wasn't like that at all.

But as I grew into myself and got more experience, I started to be

more intentional with, okay, I want to look at what other people

are doing and put the blame there.

But I am going to intentionally choose to look at me first and

see what adjustments I can make.

Then we'll talk outside.

That's really great.

That's really great.

Well, that gives you motivation to change maybe how you would normally have coached

or approached other athletes, because if you're going, Hey, they're not responding

to what I would normally respond to.

Well then what am I gonna do to get them to respond?

Versus I'm gonna keep pressing hard to see if I can push them into responding like I

Dr. Megan Buning: Exactly.

And I think, I think that's so important too.

if you're listing the last 10%, you're leading a team.

I think that's a huge takeaway and just knowing different, the way that people

see things individually, whether it's at a generational kind of group level or

whether it's just individual personality just goes so far into, Essentially,

creating a message that's gonna resonate with that person or creating

motivation, that's gonna resonate.

So we're gonna get into that.

All right, so now let's talk a little bit about your work now at FSU and what

you're into and and, and some of the performance aspect of what, what you talk

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, so I'll back up just a bit because when I got

out of coaching, I went to Augusta University and I was the researcher.

I was a research professor, tenured all the things, but I didn't have

a, like I was teaching research to graduate students, a variety of.

professions, but it wasn't specifically to coaching.

And so FSU Coach interdisciplinary program launched in 2019 and it.

It was a graduate certificate program and, that's all that we had at the time.

in 2020, the program grew to where we could start, they could start thinking

about adding a master's degree program.

So the call went out.

The advertisement for the position of, teaching faculty, which

is what a clinical faculty is.

I, I don't have to do research anymore.

I can just teach and it's wonderful.

Wow.

That's great.

Dr. Megan Buning: But that call went out and I almost immediately, I had

probably five or six people that I know in the field send this, send

the advertisement to me and say, did you write this for yourself?

This is you.

so I applied and I ended up getting the position.

So I came back in the middle of COVID.

fall of 2020.

Moved the family back.

had two, two children at that time.

And, we started the master's degree in, I wanna say it was spring of 2021.

I can't remember.

It's been.

Pretty new, but now we have a fully online master's degree in athletic coaching,

and then we also still have the graduate certificate in athletic coaching.

And it's my wheelhouse.

I get to teach and work with people that are actively coaching people that want to

get into coaching or work with coaches.

And I get the question all the time, so I'm just gonna go

ahead and answer this for you.

Why?

Why do you like this type of position?

For me, it's about giving back to the profession, and I see this as a way to

help coaches that are in it right now.

Maybe not experience some of the struggles that I experience.

Like we don't have to always figure it out.

There are people out there that can help and so that's what I see my role

as is how can I help equip these?

Sometimes veteran coaches, sometimes new coaches moving into these certain

situations and help them network, mentor, build their foundational knowledge.

If you were to say, 'cause this is fascinating, I love this.

and your program is mainly for athletic coaches, but I see so many crossovers that

are useful for leaders at every level.

but if you were to say that there was, if there was one thing, is there

one or two things that you see from your seat in the ballpark when you

see coaches come in, whether they're veteran or just, novice coaches, is

there one thing that you're like.

If I can just get this piece of information to them, or they're

all seem to be stumbling over the same thing, is there one thing

like that stands out to you?

Dr. Megan Buning: I, I'm actually gonna throw two things, and these are

issues that I myself also struggled with, being in the coaching field.

One I've already mentioned is.

Coaches a lot of times, whether they're athletic directors or coaches or whatever,

or athletes that wanna be coaches, they think that's all they can do.

And so helping them understand what is their skillset, how does that transfer

into, maybe it's not on the coach, maybe it is into athletic director positions

or administration of some level.

but helping them understand what their skill sets are and

giving them that validation to.

You don't have to if you don't love coaching.

'cause coaching, let's be honest, it's not easy.

It's not well paid for the most of them.

if you don't truly love it, how can you use your skills in other

areas and still stay involved?

Right?

So that's one.

The other issue that I see is coaches that I come across the students, they do

not understand the value of mentoring.

And networking.

So two different things, mentoring and networking.

But some of the veteran coaches, I have them do, several exercises

in mentoring and mentorship.

We have a whole course on mentoring and mentorship and.

They, the veteran coaches sometimes don't realize that they themselves

are in a position to be a mentor.

So how do they do that?

And then the other coaches coming through, they're like, wow, I've never really

thought about how big my network is.

I thought I only, should have one mentor.

Well, no, we can expand that.

what's the point for these people that are in your circle?

and using those intentionally.

so those are the two big things that I see.

That's really good.

Now, how would you advise someone if they don't have a mentor and they're

wanting to get a mentor, is there any advice that you would give somebody

if I'm like, how do I pick a mentor?

Does a mentor pick me?

Or how does that work?

Like how should that

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

So I think, and this kind of goes into my performance work too.

Everything that we do for, and if you look at successful performers,

successful business leaders, all the ones, the one thing, they have more

things in common, but one big thing that they have in common is everything

they do, they do with intention.

So.

When you sit down to think about how do I identify a mentor, we wanna be

intentional with that thought process.

Well, let's sit.

We're not just gonna sit here and say, I need a mentor.

And then go, pick somebody off a tree.

We wanna think about what areas of my work that I'm doing, where

do I think that I am struggling.

So we wanna identify those gaps.

Yes,

Dr. Megan Buning: then we're thinking, all right, now who do I already know?

Whether it's, I've met them one time, I've heard about them, I know them very well.

Who do I know and how could I see them, if at all, helping me in these gap areas?

And then who can help me in the areas?

I'm already good, like I'm strong in these areas.

So I just need some, maybe some validation, some support,

someone to bounce ideas off of.

So what is the purpose of these mentors and how do they intentionally fit within

my trajectory of what I'm trying to do?

I think that's so important because, may be in a one part of

your career and need one type of mentor, and then you may be in another part and

so the mentor that I needed when I was 25.

Was someone to get me to see things outside of myself.

Dr. Megan Buning: You don't.

Can't imagine why at 25 that I would dip, and then, but

the mentor that I would see in my thirties and forties would be totally

different in terms of my needs in those.

Things balancing, work life or strategy or different things like that.

So, I mean, it just changes.

And as you go through your career and you're in different

seasons, it totally changes.

So I love your point about intentionality because I think that we can be

intentional at any one of those points.

And it's not just, it's not just one mentor forever.

It's like identifying those needs and being intentional.

I think that's really good stuff.

I want to get into the performance thing because the reason that we

reached out was because, I had someone that's getting trained to be

a referee, a professional referee, and they reached out to me and said, Hey.

You need to have Megan on.

'cause she was talking about performance under pressure and that was awesome.

And I said, okay, all right.

we gotta see if we can get Megan on the show.

'cause I was pumped and inspired.

So let's talk about this.

'cause I mean, I can see.

There's a lot of business owners, there's a lot of managers, there's a

lot of team leaders that are having to perform every single day under pressure.

And so I would love to hear.

Some thoughts that you would have and give to them, about how to be great.

under pressure.

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, so that's a big question.

And let, lemme,

Yeah.

Dr. Megan Buning: let me just preface this for your listeners, that performing

under pressure is a skillset and it is something that when I work with

clients, whether they're individual clients, they're companies, whatever

it is, this is something that we don't just come in and I work with you

one time and then you got it right.

This is something that people would hire me to come in and work with them

continuously until we get this skill.

So when I say skill, that's something that can be learned.

You can learn how to do this right.

so just to give you a brief overview of how I would go in and work with

people to teach them how to work better under pressure is, a lot of

times it starts with do they know what they already are good at?

So whether it's a strengths assessment or it's a trust, your training

type of assessment, I work with the clients, especially game officials,

and I've worked with over a thousand game officials at this point, and I

love working with that population.

yeah, I love it.

I, that's where I really try to target, but, When you're thinking about

performers, what happens a lot of times is they get into this pressure situation

and they forget what they know how to do.

They forget their training.

So you will hear a lot, and I, and somebody may correct me if I'm wrong,

and this could be originated from anywhere, but I always associate

this saying the trust, your training, with the Marine Corps.

Yeah.

Because under pressure they fall to their base level of training.

Right.

Yes, yes.

Dr. Megan Buning: have to know what that training is.

So we get into pressure situations and it's really easy for me to come

up and say, Hey, you know what?

You got this, you're good at throwing that pitch on the inside

corner and it's easy to gloss over.

So in that pressure moment, things inside my, in my body and in my

brain are at a heightened level of what we call performance arousal.

And it's no different.

If I'm getting up to do a speech and or even talk, like I am with you for

different people, it can create that anxiety, But what the key there is I

need, again, to be intentional, I need to think about what it is that I have already

done with specific examples or memories.

What's your evidence?

I always say bring your receipts.

So if I know that I'm good at public speaking, how specifically

do I know that it could be?

Well, I got up in front of the game officials workshop

that you were talking about.

And I had a standing ovation, or I didn't, but let's just say a standing ovation.

I had a bunch of people come up and tell me what a great job I did.

I know that I hit all the points that I was trying to hit, that kind of stuff.

So I need to bring the receipts.

Then we wanna connect the emotion to those memories, the evidence,

the receipts that I'm talking about to what it is that I'm trying to

remember, that I have already done.

So if I know that I'm good at public speaking because I got a standing ovation

at this talk, how did that make me feel?

So the connection of the emotion to the actual evidence is key.

All right, so I let myself in non-pressure situations, remember

what I have already done, remember what I am already good at with the

receipts and the emotion attached.

So now when I get into a pressure situation and things are going

on in my head, in my body, it's not a matter of just saying, oh,

you're good at public speaking.

No, it's, I'm good at public speaking and I know that I'm good at it because

X, y, Z happened, and I let the emotion attached with it come back.

That is more likely to get you through the pressure situations.

that kind of in pressure moment, thing that you can remember.

But I wanna back up to what have I done?

What are my receipts?

So a lot of times what I do with athletic performers is I have them, especially

this always hits hard with not only my game officials, but my sport athletes is

I have them literally write out in hours.

How much training they have done with specific parts of the game.

So we'll take a softball athlete, I have them go back and say, since

you started playing so years,

Oh

Dr. Megan Buning: how many hours do you think you have put into conditioning?

How many hours have you put into hitting?

You know, all the things Well, and it's gonna be a rough ballpark, but it gets

them to stop and actually think about how many hours they have put into their sport.

So then when they're done, some of them have put 5,000 hours in, for the total.

So then what we're able to do is say, this is where you are now.

You put in this amount of work.

Now, where is it that you want to go?

And we identify the gaps.

So how can they fill in?

Sometimes it's just continuing what they're doing.

Sometimes it's identifying specific things that they think that they could add.

but all of that comes back to.

Now I can trust my training because I have sat and I have seen what I have done.

Wow, man.

Dr. Megan Buning: so that's.

That is so good.

Golly.

That is so good.

There's Much there too.

I love it because you're identifying and You're taking the emotion and

twisting it in a way that's more helpful.

Because when we get involved in these pressure situations, emotion tends to

either just drive us, you know, anger, you know, we, overreact or we get fearful and

we, we just crumble under the pressure.

so you, a lot of times we'll see emotion used in negative ways, but then you've

taken it and totally turned it around where you're using that in such a

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

And and let me just say too, for your listeners, when you get into a pressure

situation and immediately you are having some of the negative emotions

and the negative thoughts, okay, A, we need to realize that's normal because

what's happening, and this is probably something that the game official that

reached out to you, remembers, is when you are in a situation that is new.

It's difficult.

It's something that you have not done well on in the past.

Maybe I was supposed to give a speech and I tanked, And that happened in the past.

Well, your brain is recognizing how you perceive the situation.

It's saying, hold up.

This is new, this is different.

This is hard.

You haven't done well on this before.

And so it's a defense mechanism.

It's trying to protect you, but what we need to realize in that

moment is, A, what is happening?

And B, do we need protection right here?

Is this a life and death situation?

Am I going to get hurt nine times outta 10?

The answer is no.

And so once you can acknowledge that this is just a situation that.

Yes, the stakes are high.

There's pressure there.

Yes, this is new.

This is different for me.

I'm uncomfortable.

And you acknowledge it for what it is.

Then your brain relaxes.

So if you push through that matter of seconds, usually what happens?

Your brain's okay, you got it.

And then everything settles in.

That's why we say throw the first pitch.

How do you feel?

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

I love that.

I love that.

Do you remember as a all American pitcher, do you remember going through that?

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

So every pitch, every game that I started or every time that

I came in, I always had that.

There was always this sense because there's always a pressure to throw the

first pitch, a strike, get ahead, set the tone, especially if you're coming in

with bases loaded, that kind of thing.

And I wanna come back to that bases loaded situation 'cause

that's a high pressure sit, thing.

But just to finish that thought is there was not a pitch.

I don't recall that.

I did not have that anxiety.

And so I, I didn't have the training that I have now or

the knowledge that I have now.

I had the FIOI had to figure it out.

And so the way I figured it out was throw the first pitch, just get that pitch out.

And as soon as I got that first pitch out, I started to

settle in if I allowed myself.

Okay.

Yeah,

Dr. Megan Buning: now here's the thing with pressure situations also.

So base is loaded.

Two outs, bottom of the seventh, whatever.

Anytime you come in with bases loaded, it's a pressure situation, right?

So I have a choice.

And when I think of mindset, everything that you approach

with your mindset is a choice.

And so I can choose to see this pressure situation as an

opportunity, a challenge, right?

So I can choose to see it as, so when I'm base is loaded, I came in thinking.

Oh, no, you're not.

You will not.

I am going to shut this down right now, and I saw it as a

challenge, an opportunity to show how good I was in that moment.

An opportunity to test my own skills against what I'd been practicing, right?

Or I can choose to see this as a threat.

What if I don't throw the first, the strike?

What if I walk this hitter?

What if I fail?

What if?

And I start, that's where we, I get in trouble.

So we wanna be intentional about making a choice.

And so part of what you heard me talk through is when I'm in a pressure

situation and I wanna trust my training, I am choosing to challenge my thought,

especially if I'm in a threat mentality.

Oh, wow.

I love that you're choosing to challenge your thought.

you know, it reminds me when you're talking about, About this,

it feels a lot like, Carol Dweck,

Dr. Megan Buning: Yes,

mindset,

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

But I, the reason that's come to mind and I was just,

I just got off a plane actually, and.

I've been reading this book on, on leadership, which will go unnamed

because I don't want to, you know, say this with the title, but authors

have been just ruthlessly slamming a lot of premier authors and research

from these other authors in talking about their SES and how it works.

And particularly they brought.

The growth mindset and Carol Dweck, and they said, well, our research shows that

there's nothing to even support that.

And I gotta thinking about that for a second.

I'm like, if you say that, you're literally saying you are locked into

who you are and you can't escape.

So you're either born with the genes that make you, you know, have a,

respond well or you're not, and there's nothing you can do about it, but.

To me, I'm in what I think your camp is.

And when you said that, I just, oh, man.

Choosing to challenge, your thoughts.

I think that, that feels to me like it is the path that's the key to change.

you're saying this is the mental habit and the mental pattern I'm going through,

and I'm taking a moment to be intentional, to say, to just ask a self a question,

is this actually true I know it's not true, and I'm here to tell myself,

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, absolutely.

the pattern.

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

And that gets, that also gets into brain science.

And so we talk about triggers and so when you are having that habitual

negative response, there is a trigger there and a pathway in your brain

where neurons have fired at the same, so they've connected to each other.

And as long as we allow that to continue happening, it's like muscles.

My husband's really good at explaining this.

he's a Neurophysical therapist.

Oh,

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, and he, you know, he listens to some of the stuff I

did talk about and he tells his patients when they're trying to relearn how to

walk after a stroke or something like this, about how the brain paths work.

And I love his analogy, so I'm gonna use this one.

So when I am in a situation and I noticed that it, I'm continuously

having, let's just take self-doubt.

I get this imposter syndrome and it's a similar situation.

It doesn't matter where I am, but similar situation and I

have this imposter syndrome.

I have these thoughts of self doubt.

So the more that I have those and I feel the feels, these certain negative emotions

come in or unproductive thoughts come in.

What is happening is, in my head, it's like there's two paths.

One is a clear paved road.

And every time I have those emotions and allow those thoughts to come together,

I am taking that clear, paved road.

But I need to, in those moments, do something more productive.

Right?

So I need to rewire that pathway.

I need to choose a different path.

And sometimes that other path is overgrown.

It's hard because I haven't tended to it.

I haven't taken that path.

And so I have, that's why it's a struggle, and I have to make that

choice to challenge the thought so I can go down this path that is overgrown

and could start clearing that path.

to me that's the most clear example I've ever heard about.

Of like neural pathways and habits and triggers.

I just, to me that makes so much sense because it's just saying that is the,

there's a reason why we do what we do, even if it's bad mental habits.

It's that it's a well worn path and the more we travel it, the more worn and the

more we tend to be in the ruts in the

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

and it's just because we just constantly in it.

But it takes that choosing to challenge your thoughts to take a

right hand turn and say, here's the.

Road less traveled.

I gotta clear some debris and some brush out.

It's gonna be a little bit harder, more intentional.

It's gonna take more

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, I'm gonna wanna the pave.

Yes, I got, I'm gonna want to go back to Easy Street, but

I'm gonna, I'm gonna clear a new path.

But again, I think that's encouraging.

It should encourage everyone.

And I think that's, again, that is the path of change because now the second

time we come to it, that path is just a little bit easier than the first time.

'cause we've just started clearing that and then we get third

time it's a little bit more.

So it, it's, to me, it's really encouraging because it says if

we take that right hand turn.

And we go down the road less traveled.

It's only, it's more traveled every time I travel

Dr. Megan Buning: Exactly.

more easy every time I go down it.

So I love that.

I love that example.

is there a time that you remember in your career, whether it's an athlete

or a coach or even as a professor, that, that has become real to you?

Like that when you look back on that, was that like, oh my gosh,

that, That makes all the sense in the world because you kind of feel

what you went through, through

that lens.

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah, I would say, when I was, and let's be honest,

I think everybody faces this every day in certain, in different ways.

I don't want to put on this, false pretense that I've got it all figured

out, and I never have self-doubt.

I never have.

That's just not true.

Those are normal.

thoughts that we are going to have, so when I was in my first position

at Augusta, I was research faculty, but I was teaching also, and I was

working with students that were counselor educators, teachers.

And then, you had a few coaches, but that's mostly what it was.

So these were K 12 teachers, And I was

Wow.

Dr. Megan Buning: coach.

Coming in and I struggled and I had that first year I really had this imposter

syndrome, like how in the world, like I'm just a ball coach standing here.

Like, why is this not driving with these students?

And it took me doing exactly what I have shared with you all.

It took me saying, you know what, wait a minute.

I've always been told and I had to connect back to my receipts.

That I was very good at explaining, pitching.

I could coach, I knew how to coach that.

I knew how to teach a skill, so how could I transfer what I was doing

as a coach into the classroom?

So that's where that started.

I had to go back and review how much work have I already put into how I teach.

And then when the moments of self-doubt would come up when I'm standing in

front of these students and getting my teaching evaluations back or teaching

a new concept, there was this moment of, you don't deserve to be here.

You don't belong here.

And it took me saying, okay, I'm not trying to be star professor.

I'm trying to be Megan and here's what I know, so I'm

going to choose to go this path.

I'm gonna start trying to break that away and eventually what happened is

the paved path of my negative self-doubt and all that started to overgrow and

the path of, no, I can do this and I can be my own person, my own professor.

Do it in a different way and think outside the box a little bit.

That path started to get more clear.

and so that is probably the most clear, example I could give you.

I love that.

That's a great example.

That's a fantastic example.

All right, so I gotta ask you this, because when you're leading a team,

you sometimes, you're coaching, we call them leader coaches, mainly

because I haven't come up with a better way to say that because there's

you're coaching technical expertise, but you're also leading them to.

Some where they haven't been.

And then there's obviously some coaching, individual

coaching that goes through that.

so if you're leading a company, an organization, or a team, one of the

things and challenges that you have is keeping that team to choose that.

Maybe a little bit overgrown path, right?

and, or make some better decisions that you can as the leader see

that slightly overgrown path will take you to a place that's much

better for both you and this team.

But.

It's like sometimes feels like pushing a string.

that.

As a performance coach, how do we, what's really good ways that we

can motivate people to choose to maybe, hopefully take that right

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

So here's the thing with motivation is, and you may have heard this before, but

part of the problem is we did so much work in the research field on motivation.

Like how do I, and I see with coaches, our coaching students, how do I

get my athletes to get motivated?

the first thing that you learn is if you're gonna sit around

and wait to get motivated to do something, you may never do it.

So you have to train yourself and create a culture of.

Acknowledging.

So I use the power of, and so in technical terms, I guess you could

call this, it's such a silly name, but Botness, B-O-T-H-N-E-S-S.

Okay.

Both this, I've never

Dr. Megan Buning: Yes.

And so when we, and you'll hear it in the counseling field and

Uhhuh.

Dr. Megan Buning: field, but it's thinking about the power of the word a ND and.

So a lot of times what happens is we use the word, but or we, use

this kind of dichotomy of thought where I feel this way, and so that

means I can't have this over here.

So I don't feel, I don't like what my boss said to me or my supervisor said to me.

And so then what happens is, I don't like what this person said.

So then I connect that to me, getting my job done.

I don't like what the coach said.

I don't like what my supervisor said.

So that means that I'm not going to get my job done.

I'm not going to perform well.

Okay.

So there's this sense in our head of I have to have one or the other.

I can't have both.

But if we replace that thought, we connect it with and we recognize I

don't like what my supervisor said and I can still get the job done.

don't like what the coach said, and I can still perform well.

So that's part of this.

I can have both and be okay with that.

I don't have to like, what's going on.

I can be tired and I can not agree with and right.

Yes,

Dr. Megan Buning: that part of it.

that's

Dr. Megan Buning: second part of it is teach yourself to do hard things.

So I wake up and I work out allergies, workouts.

I work out almost every day, probably six days a week.

Let me tell you something, I work out, not because I want to all the time, especially

the, I'm not training for anything.

I'm training for life, right?

so there's that piece of it, and I feel good.

And there's, and the motivation, if we talk about motivation,

yes, I feel good, I feel better.

I, all the things like that.

But if I wait to feel motivated to get my workout in, I'm gonna drag it out and I'm

gonna make excuses to not get it done.

So here's what I do.

I acknowledge how I feel about working out.

I don't wanna work out today, and I'm gonna do it anyway.

Okay.

So I'm acknowledging I don't like it.

I'm not motivated to do it, and I can still go do it.

Yes, yes.

Dr. Megan Buning: hard things.

Push yourself to do the hard thing.

It's okay.

You don't have to wanna do it.

You don't have to agree.

You can be hungry, you can be tired.

All the things, and guess what?

You can still go do it.

You can still do

man, that I'm motivated.

I'm ready.

I'm ready.

Let's go.

I'm gonna go pump some iron right now.

This is awesome.

Oh, man, I think that is so true because you're not dismissing the idea.

and it's almost like you're playing mental, gymnastics a little bit

because if you dismiss the idea and you try to put it away, it's the truth.

if you don't wanna work out, you don't wanna work out.

That's the truth.

And if you try to get around that somehow and you dismiss it, then it's gonna win.

'cause it eventually it's gonna push through and you're just like, I'm not

gonna work out because I don't like it.

But if you acknowledge it then you're just like, no, yeah, I accept that as true.

And there's another truth and I'm gonna choose to pursue this truth.

And that is, man, that is awesome.

I love that.

Both myths, the power of, and I love that.

Really good.

That's good technique.

Dr. Megan Buning: Good.

And I think that's true.

'cause we're leading through some change right now and, I think that

it's that power of and can be in organizations, if you're leading

through change, then it's so good as leaders to communicate that power of

and because as we go into this change.

We are all doing hard things.

this organization that we're leading right now, this new team that's coming

together in new ways and they're having to learn new technology and all

these things, and it's like it gets worse before it gets better, right?

And so it's, as a leader, if you're leading your team through change,

I love that Power Van because I can say it's getting worse.

You feel frustrated because of it.

If you push through, it will

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

Like it will get better and you can keep on moving.

We're gonna do it anyway.

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

You are frustrated, but you can continue to push because

when we push through, it gets better.

And so you can do both.

And I think as leaders, it's great to communicate that because I

think as a team member, I'd find that very encouraging as well.

that I, that we're acknowledging the pain, right?

Okay.

I just threw this CRM system on you.

It is brand new and you hate it and you don't know it, and it's like hard.

But, and

Dr. Megan Buning: And

we can do better.

And we can do better, and we can push through it and we, and when you

push through it, you'll be better

Dr. Megan Buning: yeah.

so yeah, I love that.

I think that's a great tool for leaders Now.

We were talking before the show and you were telling me about this,

thing that you're involved in, and we actually live in horse country in the

up upper upstate of South Carolina.

And, and so you were saying how that you actually.

Own a horse, but you don't just own a horse to go ride a horse.

Your horse has a specific purpose as a therapy horse.

So how does one, I mean your performance, per, I mean, you're a pitcher, you're

FSU professor, and then all of a sudden there's this therapy horse.

How does this happen?

what, tell me about the therapy

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

So for those that have known me forever, since I was a kid, I

actually am a horse girl and have always loved horses, but I just, when

I got into softball, it's danger.

So you gotta protect the arm, right?

So we gotta

Yes.

Dr. Megan Buning: not ride as much.

There's the cost involved.

So everything became focused on softball.

And throughout the years I just didn't go back to horse riding 'cause

I honestly, just to be very blunt, never thought I could afford it.

And it was about two years ago, my husband said, you need to do something for you.

And I told him, I said, well, I want to get back into horse riding and.

He said, okay, so let's do it.

And he pushed me a little bit 'cause I kept fighting him.

So there's a performance lesson in here too, but he pushed me a little bit.

So what he did is he went ahead and booked a family vacation in Colorado

and he booked my daughter and I a four hour cattle drive on horseback.

So it.

this isn't just okay, I'm on a trail behind a guide.

My horse is known the way, and it just TROs along.

No, you're doing a cattle drive for four hours.

Oh my

Dr. Megan Buning: Yes.

And you're like

awesome.

Dr. Megan Buning: helping to keep, there was like eight bulls in this

herd, and so the bulls are staring at you and you're like, what?

Well, obviously I realized, okay, I need to get back into lessons like quick.

so the only western riding barn around was this barn that we are now affiliated with.

And so we went out there with lessons and there was this horse

in one of the pastures where we would pull our lesson horses up.

My daughter and I, and my daughter was 14 or 15 at the time, and

she fell in love with this one horse that was in the pasture.

He was just kind of skinny.

He was real tall, skinny.

And I never understood.

I was like, what is your deal with this horse?

Like he's not even a lesson horse, but she just loved him.

Well, kind of fast forward a few months and my daughter

had been harassed at school.

She wore her, she's in civil air patrol and wore her a BU

uniform to school and just got totally trashed by the other kids.

Yeah.

So I called the barn manager and I said, can we, can she just

pull this horse up and brush him?

She loves this horse.

I don't understand it, but can she do it?

And we had never asked that before, and he said yes.

So I sat there and I watched my daughter in her a, we went straight from school.

I watched her in her abus, talk to this horse, groom him.

I mean, he's three years old.

He is really young.

He was so calm, she was talking to him like a baby, and at that moment I

said, there's something special here.

So I started asking more questions about this horse, and he had not been, just

the previous owner had too much on her plate and was trying to sell the horse,

but the horse had not been really trained and we were not expert horse people.

Right.

Right.

Dr. Megan Buning: So throughout more conversations, we engaged with the horse

a little bit and I thought there's just some, he's so calm and he's just a baby.

He's really calm.

And so we ended up buying the horse.

Wow.

Wow.

Dr. Megan Buning: and

a big

Dr. Megan Buning: it was, and I had, well I had talked to my husband

when my daughter graduated, maybe us looking at leasing a horse or,

right?

Dr. Megan Buning: that was five years down the road.

Well fast forward back that up.

And we bought a horse within a year and it was one of those

situations where, the dreams started to become more of a reality.

So at first it was making, wow, you get to own a horse.

you can do this.

You've worked really hard.

Here's enjoy it.

Right?

Then the more I started training this horse and working

with him, it's a commitment.

It's a, you know, four or five times a week I go up there and I work him.

He has to learn to trust me, all the things.

I have to learn how to communicate with an animal that can't

talk A lot of lessons there.

I just, there was just something special and I kept getting this

sense of, there's more here.

So I wanted other people to be able to enjoy him.

Like we were fortunate enough to be able to enjoy him.

So I thought, how can I do that?

so I started just getting him out into the community, walking him up

through the Publix parking lot, tractor supply, all the places, just getting

him used to see how he would do.

He never flinched.

And so I took him out over Christmas to a senior living facility and

we dressed him up as Santa Horse.

My daughters dressed up as elves.

wow.

Dr. Megan Buning: just visited with the residents there and it was amazing just

the communication, how the residents lit up and the stories they told.

And a woman came up to me and she said, I'm a therapist at the hospital here,

and they have an animal therapy program.

Have you thought about applying for that?

And I didn't know they took courses.

I thought it was dogs.

Yeah.

Dr. Megan Buning: I did, we applied for it.

We did, pretty extensive training.

And my daughter and I became certified as an animal therapy team with this

horse over, I think it was back in April.

And yeah, so we take him to, some of the hospital settings and then we

can be requested for special events and we visit with the patients, the

therapist can use him as part of their therapy to get patients to stand up and

balance, brush the main, all the things.

and it has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.

so that's what we do.

that's what you do.

That's so amazing.

And it's a cool spin because you wanted to do something for yourself,

which was get back on a horse and have a horse and, and then yet the

way that comes full circle is by doing something that you enjoy for yourself.

you're really helping the community and the people around you.

So, man, it doesn't really get any better than that.

Like that's with the cherry on top.

That's the sundae with the cherry on top right there.

and if you ever are in Florida and you see a horse walking through a Publix parking

lot, you'll be like, oh, I, that's Megan.

I know her.

Oh, that is so great.

Oh, that's so great.

That is really great.

and, thank you for the work you're doing with that because that, I know, is so

meaningful to the people that get to experience the horse and whether it's

part of therapy or just in the community.

So that's really, really well done.

well done, Megan.

This has just been an absolute.

Ben.

just wonderful to talk to you and thank you so much for sharing your experience.

all the wisdom.

Oh man, I've just got notes everywhere.

this is really great.

I think mine is choosing to challenge your thought like that.

Just that, man, I love that.

I love that.

And then the path, the road less traveled, the path less traveled mentally.

I think that's really great.

So, listeners if they want to find out more information about, your program

at FSU or speaking, or, therapy, horse therapy, then how do people get in contact

Dr. Megan Buning: Sure.

So I think the easiest way is you can email me at m bunning

m dot B-U-N-I-N-G, at fsu.edu.

I'm also on social media.

I have an X account at Dr. Bunning.

And then on Instagram, at mental Megan, PhD and

Okay.

Dr. Megan Buning: Yeah.

So you can message me, follow the horse also has an Instagram account.

A pal and bow.

Yeah.

But yeah, and I do travel around, to do workshops with

mental performance training.

so I'm absolutely open to do that kind of work too.

That's great.

All right.

We'll put all that in the show notes.

So if you're driving, don't worry.

It'll be there for you when you get where you're going.

And we always end the show, Megan, by asking guests on the show who they would

like to hear as a guest on the last 10%.

Dr. Megan Buning: I think for your listeners, I would highly recommend

Jefferson Fisher, and I don't know if you know about him, but he's a

trial attorney in Texas and he has become viral with communication.

And how to communicate, like a logger, he says.

But to be honest with you, there's some mental performance threaded in with his

style and it's just applicable and real, and he has some really good techniques.

I think that would be good for your audience.

Okay.

Wow.

we'll have to reach out to, to Mr. Fisher and see if we can get him on the show.

That would be great.

Yeah, we'll definitely talk after the show and see if we can get him on the show.

Megan, thank you again for being on the show and, just wish you

Dr. Megan Buning: Thank you.