Dr. Robert Heller

“Striving for “perfection” is the greatest stopper there is…. It’s your excuse to yourself for not doing anything. Instead, strive for excellence, doing your best.”

This quote is not by a famous “psychologist” but the Oscar winning actor, Laurence Olivier.

Perfectionism is an illusion. Both achieving it and maintaining it even if you think you have it, just leads to anxiety, stress, depression and low self-worth. Perfectionists feel they are never good enough. It is like pouring water into a funnel. No matter how much you put in, it never stays full.

When you strive to do your best, you are focusing in on what you can control, appreciate your efforts and have goals you can work towards achieving. Your opportunities for improving and getting better increase and you feel good about your efforts and your progress towards your goals.

These are some of the ideas I explore with my clients in my Boca Raton office and through the many counseling clients I work with by phone and SKYPE.

As a cognitive therapist, I help people recognize and improve the way they think in order to feel and behave better. While understanding the past is useful in knowing how you learned to develop your thoughts and beliefs, changing them is often the key to both feeling and getting better and achieving success and excellence.

For articles, books and other “self-help” information visit, www.cognitivetherapy.cc

Former tennis great Andre Agassi’s new autobiography, “Open” should more appropriately have been titled, “Closed”. Closed is how Andre was for most of his life. Although depressed, confused and conflicted for long periods of time, he apparently suffered silently. (more…)

I have been using hypnosis with my clients for many years. More recently, I have used it with some of the elite junior tennis clients I work with and have been very pleased with how well they have responded and how quickly the suggestions have transferred to their match play. (more…)

Andre Agassi’s recent confession that he used illegal drugs while on the professional tennis tour and then lied about it when questioned about it was a real bombshell as was his statement that he hated tennis for most of his life.This, from one of the greatest champions the sport of tennis has even known. (more…)

A study reported in a British Medical Journal looked at males over 50 and found that the most active men, those who did at least 3 hours of sports or workouts per week were estimated to  increase their average life expectancy by 2.3 years. (more…)

One day after catapulting from obscurity to international fame as the giant killer of the top women tennis players in the world at the US Open, young 17 year old Melodie Oudin has a bombshell dropped on her: her father is divorcing her mother for sleeping with Melody’s long time coach! (more…)

As I listened to the commentators extolling the “mental toughness” of the latest young superstar at the US OPEN tennis championships, the 17 year old from Georgia, Oudin, I asked myself what does it really mean? I think it boils down to the idea that if you don’t have “expectations” that you “have to or are supposed to win”, you can concentrate more fully on the task at hand and play your best. (more…)

With States looking to save money, a number of schools are looking to save money by cutting sports that don’t bring in big bucks. Tennis, wrestling, volleyball, swimming etc. are all example of sports that are “at risk”. (more…)

As a consultant to tennis coaches and players, I often hear that a big concern surrounds women’s teams and league play. Whining, complaining, bickering, pettiness and backstabbing seems to be rampant among this group. (more…)