Theoretical Orientation
My Stance
Performance is not just about outcomes; it’s about becoming. My approach is intentionally eclectic, weaving together diverse yet complementary theories, perspectives, and practices. I believe that excellence emerges when we support the whole human being—body, mind, story, and system.
My Theoretical Orientation to Performance Excellence (TOPE) draws from six foundational approaches: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Systems Thinking, Interpersonal Neurobiology, Embodied Cognition, Reflective and Meaning-Making Frameworks, and Liminality. These are not separate lanes, but interconnected pathways. Each offers a distinct lens; together, they form a living, relational, and dynamic map for sustainable performance.
TOPE integrates scientific insight, lived experience, and ethical practice into a model that honors complexity, respects individuality, and promotes lasting growth—from the inside out.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), developed by Steven Hayes and colleagues, is grounded in the idea that psychological flexibility is essential for well-being and performance. ACT teaches performers to notice and unhook from unhelpful thoughts, make space for discomfort, and take values-aligned action. In my work, I use ACT to help clients move beyond perfectionism, fear, and avoidance, so they can show fully, even when it's hard.
Key interventions like defusion, acceptance, present-moment focus, and committed action allow performers to relate differently to stress and self-doubt. Rather than trying to "fix" internal experiences, ACT encourages a shift in posture: one of willingness, clarity, and action. This model resonates deeply with high-pressure environments where control is often elusive, yet choice remains possible.
ACT also underpins much of TOPE’s language around values, meaning, and growth through discomfort. It provides practical tools and a flexible mindset for navigating the mental and emotional demands of performance.
Systems theory views human beings as dynamic, interdependent, and contextually embedded. Individuals operate as open systems influenced by relational, cultural, physiological, and ecological contexts (von Bertalanffy, 1968; Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Bowen, 1978; Payne et al., 2015). In my TOPE, systems thinking provides the philosophical foundation for wholeness. Performance emerges from the full ecology of the performer: their body, history, relationships, values, and culture.
This lens reframes growth as cyclical, recursive, and adaptive, shaped by feedback loops and co-regulation (Côté & Gilbert, 2009; Wong et al., 2021). Growth spirals and reintegrates. From this perspective, excellence isn’t compartmentalized; it is an emergent expression of a coherent, integrated human system.
Interpersonal Neurobiology (IPNB), developed by Dan Siegel, integrates neuroscience, systems theory, and contemplative practices to define the mind as an embodied, relational flow of energy and information. This aligns with how I view performance as a co-created process shaped by context, connection, and presence.
Central to IPNB is the concept of integration: the linking of differentiated parts to create coherence. When neural, emotional, and interpersonal elements are acknowledged and connected, flexibility and adaptability emerge. This mirrors what I see in high performers—those who thrive not through rigidity, but through connected differentiation.
In my TOPE, integration is foundational. It allows for dynamic tensions, such as structure and spontaneity, effort and surrender, to coexist without being diluted. I utilize IPNB to help performers access regulation, coherence, and creativity, particularly through tools such as the River of Integration and Wheel of Awareness practices, which support sustained presence in high-demand settings.
Embodied cognition challenges the idea that the mind operates independently from the body. Drawing on thinkers such as Shaun Gallagher and the work of Kimiecik and Newburg on Feel and Resonance, this approach views perception, thought, and emotion as grounded in physical experience. In my TOPE, embodiment is foundational. I help performers cultivate somatic awareness, utilize their bodies as a resource for regulation, and develop movement-based strategies for clarity, grounding, and resilience.
Whether we’re mapping emotional states through posture, working with breath as a performance anchor, or exploring flow through rhythm and repetition, the body is treated as a site of wisdom and integration. Embodied cognition reminds us that high performance is not just executed—it’s felt.
Reflection in performance is not just introspection—it is transformation. The stories we tell ourselves shape how we show up under pressure. But real narrative change happens in the spaces between performances: during preparation, recovery, and integration.
My TOPE draws from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (Beck, 1976) and Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (Ellis, 1994) to support cognitive reframing and belief restructuring. These models, rooted in cognitive constructivism, offer tools to challenge unhelpful thought patterns and build more empowering interpretations of experience. Lazarus’ (2000) relational meaning theory and Jones’ (1995) appraisal model of anxiety reinforce that emotional impact depends not just on events, but on how they are perceived.
I also integrate Narrative Therapy (White & Epston, 1990), which invites performers to reexamine dominant identity stories and author new ones. Paired with ACT, which teaches cognitive defusion and acceptance, this framework promotes a rhythm: unhook in the moment, reauthor in reflection. This rhythm supports performers in holding space for what is while shaping what could be.
In my TOPE, reflective work becomes a site of agency. Performers learn to interpret their experiences with nuance, reclaim authorship of their narratives, and cultivate clarity and growth through intentional meaning-making.
Liminality refers to threshold moments and spaces of in-between where certainty dissolves and transformation becomes possible. In performance, this might manifest before stepping onstage, between roles or projects, or when old identities no longer serve. These moments are often uncomfortable, but they hold generative power. They are where growth takes root.
Drawing from Victor Turner’s (1969) framing, liminal phases invite performers to release the familiar, confront uncertainty, and emerge with renewed clarity. In my TOPE, liminality is both a theoretical lens and an applied focus. I help performers identify and navigate these transitional states with compassion, curiosity, and courage.
Liminality appears throughout the Spiral of Performance Excellence during feedback, recovery, reinvention, or creative risk-taking. It’s the heart of “the stretch,” where performers build the capacity to tolerate uncertainty, stay present, and choose transformation. Supporting liminality isn’t about fixing what’s unclear—it’s about honoring the unknown as a fertile ground for becoming.
Bringing It Together
Each of these six frameworks contributes something essential, whether it’s helping performers unhook from unhelpful thoughts, attune to their bodies, navigate complexity, or find meaning in the stretch. TOPE is not a rigid system. It’s a flexible, evolving orientation that meets performers where they are and grows with them over time. What unites these foundations is a shared commitment to wholeness: not reducing performance to outcomes, but honoring it as a deeply human act of expression, connection, and becoming.