March 31, 2026

Focus or Fail: The One Habit That Protects Your Mental Edge

What separates success from failure when the pressure is at its peak? NFL placekicker Nick Lowery opens up about the mental side of performance and why true toughness comes from controlling your mind under pressure. From mentorship and humility to gratitude and earned wisdom, Nick shares how character and resilience shape clutch performance. 🧠 What you will learn: How a “do your job” mindset keeps you focused on controllablesWhy mentorship and humility accelerate growthHow gratitude interrupt...

What separates success from failure when the pressure is at its peak?

NFL placekicker Nick Lowery opens up about the mental side of performance and why true toughness comes from controlling your mind under pressure. From mentorship and humility to gratitude and earned wisdom, Nick shares how character and resilience shape clutch performance.

🧠 What you will learn:

How a “do your job” mindset keeps you focused on controllables
Why mentorship and humility accelerate growth
How gratitude interrupts self-doubt and ego spirals
Practical mental tools for training cues, rehearsal, and conditioned responses

🔑 Key takeaways:

Clutch performance is built, not born, through thousands of intentional choices
Perspective from elders and mentors can transform mindset and decision-making
Mental skills apply beyond sports, into work, life, and high-pressure moments

Listen now to Nick Lowert’s story about focus, resilience, and performing when it counts.

Watch on YouTube or subscribe to YoggNation’s Spirit of Gratitude podcast for more conversations on mindset, performance, and growth in sport and life.

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Nick Lowery’s upcoming book, Naked and Alone with 80,000 People, goes beyond the game of football. It explores the pressure, rejection, and challenges that come when everyone is watching.

Through his story, Lowery reflects on resilience, identity, and purpose, offering insight into what it takes to face fear and keep showing up, no matter the stakes.

00:00 - Beating Self Doubt Under Pressure

00:08 - Why Mentors Matter Most

00:31 - The Elder As A Guide

01:03 - A Coach Teaches Gratitude

02:45 - The Mental Game Of Kicking

03:33 - A Blueprint For Key Moments

04:02 - Olympic Proof Of Conditioned Courage

05:10 - Focus On What You Control

WEBVTT

00:00:00.080 --> 00:00:07.759
And how did you vanquish those inner demons or those voices of self-doubt before kicking game-winning field goals for the Chiefs and the Jets?

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You know, um mentors are really important.

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And um, if you don't have a mentor, find one.

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Teachers, parents, siblings, friends.

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Because that that requires some level of humility to say I can learn more, I can always get better.

00:00:27.199 --> 00:00:31.359
And the mentor figure throughout all cultures is so crucial.

00:00:31.519 --> 00:00:33.840
The elder, I've done a lot of work with American Indians.

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I was actually chairman of the National Fund for American Indian Education back in 2003, four, five.

00:00:38.640 --> 00:00:39.039
Right.

00:00:39.359 --> 00:00:58.079
And uh Native American culture reveres the elder because the elder's been there and has been proven only through thousands and hundreds of thousands of decisions, uh their words aligned with their actions, their humility, their ability to see the connection of all things.

00:00:58.560 --> 00:01:03.439
Uh and so that to me has really helped me because I had unbelievable mentors.

00:01:03.600 --> 00:01:10.000
Dick Johnson was the one who coached me in kicking from 1973 till 1989.

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And uh from the very first day, first thing he said to me is I'm walking from my mother's station wagon after she dropped me off at St.

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Albans School under the shadow of the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.

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on the playing field at St.

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Albans.

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He first thing he said, he didn't say hello, he said, Did you thank her?

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I'm like, Really?

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Thank her.

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He said, Yeah, she just gave you a ride.

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And he interrupted my pattern, and from that point on, it was that really a sense of humility, right?

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Gratitude, humility to remember what your parents do for you.

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If you're lucky to have parents that do that for you, and I certainly really did.

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And the second thing he told me was, I almost died two months ago.

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I was on my deathbed, and uh literally I was gonna die.

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And this kid appeared to me that I hadn't thought of in 60 years, since I was ten years old, he said, and uh he stood at the edge of my bed and he said, Dick, you were always there for me when I was being beaten up and bullied.

00:02:12.240 --> 00:02:15.360
You were the only one that stood up for me, and now it's my time to stand up for you.

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You're not gonna die.

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This vision appeared to him, and I think when we um sow those seeds a thousand fold, um we are um inoculating ourselves.

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I I didn't want to say vaccinating, but we are we are giving ourselves the kind of soulful medicine um where uh what really matters always matters.

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And so that mentor taught me that.

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And then this third thing he taught me was never, never give up, and how important the mental side of the game was, how to control my focus.

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And so I've been so blessed with a school of how to focus, no better, encapsulated in being a place kicker in the NFL with a tiny target that looks like a pair of tweezers when you're in front of 80,000 people and 15 million on television, who only are going to remember whether you made it and will never forget when you missed, no matter what.

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And so that forces you to either quit or to keep going and keep learning to manage your state.

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So all of those things came from Dick Johnson and from mentors, great coaches, great teachers.

00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:32.960
What does that look like though?

00:03:33.120 --> 00:03:40.800
I mean, again, kind of a blueprint of how we can take what you've said today and have a person reflect on your messaging.

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Well, not all of us are going to be placickers, in fact, very few are, but all of us will need to be able to be at our best in key moments of life.

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They are essentially the sculptors of our state and our identity, how we look at ourselves.

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How did I do it?

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You watch the Olympics, which are going on right now as we do this interview, um, and we watch some people that are rising.

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The the uh the man that came from behind uh the American to win the 1500 meters.

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That was incredible.

00:04:11.439 --> 00:04:16.720
Um, you know, an American tradition of middle distance running is not that great in the Olympics, not at all.

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And yet he did.

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And uh, and then the the third place finisher, um, you know, but what did come into their being to in the last hundred yards and even the last 30, 40 yards, grind out and be better than the other best runners in the world?

00:04:39.439 --> 00:05:11.360
And those are the conditioned responses to um, you know, a million different choices one has made to sacrifice and train and get tougher than whenever thought possible to focus on what one can do and to develop that sort of discipline of for me as the kicker, keep my head down, left foot at the target, explode, attack the ball, as opposed to there are 11 really, really large, very ugly people with bad breath, body odor.

00:05:11.519 --> 00:05:12.399
I'm having a little fun here.

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Passing gas.

00:05:13.680 --> 00:05:25.920
Uh maybe passing gas, uh, but certainly 11 guys paid millions of dollars who have 40-inch vertical leaps, they're six foot five, they weigh 300 pounds, and all they want to do is block my kick.

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Well, if I focus on that, I'm probably not gonna be very effective.

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But if I focus on what I can do, that's it in life, too.

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We always get in trouble when we focus on what we can't control, which is other people, other things.

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Sure.

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Just us, that's it.

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And that is the lesson that applies every day, every moment, every breath of our lives.