Grounded for Life

🏃‍♂️🏉 Athletes Wanted for a Performance Case Study 🏊‍♀️⚽

Are you an athlete who trains hard, knows you can perform better — but finds that pressure, anxiety, overthinking, or past injuries get in the way when it matters most?

I’m currently looking for 2 athletes to take part in a confidential case study using a neuroscience-based performance and nervous-system regulation approach (Multi-Level Neuro-Processing™).

This is ideal for athletes who:
✔ Experience performance anxiety or self-doubt
✔ Struggle with tension, overthinking, or loss of confidence
✔ Feel “blocked” despite solid training and ability
✔ Are returning after injury or a difficult performance period

What’s involved:
• Ten focused 1-on-1 sessions
• A safe, non-invasive, non-talk-heavy process
• Support that works with the body and nervous system — not against it

Why participate?
Participants receive significantly reduced-fee sessions and contribute to a real-world case study.

📩 Interested?
Send me a DM or comment “CASE STUDY” and I’ll message you with the details.

Limited to 2 athletes only.

Anger Isn’t a Character Flaw

If anger shows up when you’re stressed, overloaded, or under pressure — you’re not broken.

You’re likely operating from a chronically activated nervous system.

I’m recruiting a small number of case-study participants for a new anger management coaching program designed for people who:
• Carry responsibility
• Keep pushing through stress
• Don’t want therapy — but do want control
• Are tired of reacting instead of responding

This work is:
✔️ Practical, not emotional dumping
✔️ Confidential and structured
✔️ Designed to work alongside therapy if needed

Limited spots available.

📩 Send a private message with the word “CALM” to apply.

Anger isn’t the problem.
A dysregulated nervous system is.
I’m Gerda Hayes, an Integrative Neurocoach, and I work with men who feel:
• Easily triggered or constantly on edge
• Emotionally reactive—or completely shut down
• Drained by their own anger responses
• Frustrated by saying or doing things they later regret
• “Fine on the outside” while carrying relentless internal pressure
For many men, anger isn’t about aggression—it’s a stress response to overload, burnout, or operating in survival mode.
Using neuroscience-informed, trauma-aware coaching, I help men:
✔️ Regulate their nervous system
✔️ Increase stress tolerance under pressure
✔️ Build emotional self-leadership without losing control
✔️ Respond with intention instead of reacting
✔️ Restore focus, stability, and day-to-day functioning
This is non-clinical, ethical coaching, designed to work alongside therapy or healthcare when needed.
If anger is starting to cost you—at work, at home, or internally—there is a practical way forward.
📩 [email protected]
🌍 Remote & in-person coaching
🔗 Grounded for Life

I picked up a little booklet over the weekend while rearranging one of my bookcases: The 1988 Annual yearbook of Athletics South Africa. I delighted myself in familiar faces and familiar races. Johan Fourie who won the mile in 3:50,82. Matthews Tsemane who established a world best time of 60 minutes 11 seconds for the half marathon. Tshakile Nzimandi, Zelda Botes, Desiree du Plessis, Marjorie van der Merwe, Tanya Peckam, Elana Meyer, Zola Budd, Jacques van Rensburg.

I was thrilled to discover that at the time of print, my personal best for the 800m (2:02,93) was ranked in 6th place of all-time junior 800m athletes in South Africa. A few split-seconds after the 5th position and with Zola Budd ranking in first place.

I was 19 years old then and still had a lot to work towards – Springbok Colours in Athletics being my ultimate dream. (The highest accolade for an athlete in South Africa at the time).
My sports coach, Oom Hennie Botha acquired a sponsor for my very first pair of Nike spikes. I travelled by plane for the first time, I stayed in hotels for the first time in my life. Oom Hennie’s last words before a race were always: “Remember: stick, and kick”. Which meant, stick with the bunch and sprint with all the reserves you have left from the 150-meter mark until the finish-line. Advice that I still find useful in various life situations today.

Oom Hennie not only trained me as an athlete, he supported my whole person (body, soul and spirit). He encouraged me to see a doctor when he suspected that my iron levels were low. He opened my eyes to wolves in sheep’s clothing. He encouraged healthy friendships. In my first year of training with him, I qualified for junior Springbok colours.

Despite Oom Hennie’s plea for me to remain in Potchefstroom for the upcoming season, my romantic inclinations towards Stellenbosch (the place and a person in it) prevailed. I managed to convince my academic sponsor that studying at the Stellenbosch University would make much more sense for someone aspiring to become an elite athlete.

My Maties coach was good, and I trained with the best, but I did not improve on my personal best time in the 800m. Now, 36 years later, having raised three kids and successfully transitioned from a career in software development to life coaching, I’ve come to realize that success isn’t solely determined by raw talent and unwavering dedication. In any domain - be it academics, career, sports, or relationships - personal mastery is the key to exceptional results.

As a Neuro-Coach, I rewire my clients’ subconscious minds, nurturing growth and well-being. This empowers them to achieve their goals and dreams, even amidst external pressures. In a competitive landscape where split-second decisions define winners, engaging a Coach becomes a strategic advantage that benefits not only you but also everyone within your community.

Have you ever been held back by your fear of failure?
I certainly have.
For example, I did not want to engage on Instagram before I have put together the perfect, sequenced, curated posts like my graphic designer recommended.
I am starting to overcome that fear. To prove my point. Yesterday I created a post which I shared on Facebook and did not even add the pictures to match my story. Here they are.
Wild flowers and wild horses shared with old friends and new.

Have you ever been held back down by your fear of failure? I certainly have. I did not want to engage on Instagram before I have put together the perfect sequenced, curated posts like my graphic designer recommended.
I am starting to overcome that fear. To prove my point. Yesterday I created a post and did not even add the pictures to match my story. Here they are.

Wild horses and wild flowers shared with old friends and new.

Hoekom wil mens alles so perfek hê? Gras sonder onkruid byvoorbeeld. Wie het besluit onkruid is nie gras nie. En is gras nie maar onkruid nie?
Surings en klawer en dandelion is vir my mooier as gras.
Net nie duwweltjies nie.
Ek sal die duwweltjies uitroei en die klawer laat groei op MY grasperk.

Have you ever tried to stop speaking for more than an hour? This weekend I spent in complete silence for 30 hours in community with 30 other fellow pilgrims.

To silence my voice was not nearly as challenging as silencing the voices in my head.

Masterfully guided by the organiser of the Silent Retreat Johan Horn and Godfrey Magawo, I came back refreshed, with razor sharp senses, and a deeper friendship with God than ever before.

A dear friend sent me this wisdom today (Not sure who the author is:

"Two universal paths of transformation have been available to every human being God has created: great love and great suffering. These are offered to all; they level the playing fields of all the world religions. Only love and suffering are strong enough to break down our usual ego defenses, crush our dualistic thinking, and open us to Mystery. In my experience, they like nothing else exert the mysterious chemistry that can transmute us from a fear-based life into a love-based life. None of us are exactly sure why. We do know that words, even good words or fine theology, cannot achieve that on their own. No surprise that the Christian icon of redemption is a man offering love from a crucified position!
Love and suffering are part of most human lives. Without any doubt, they are the primary spiritual teachers more than any Bible, church, minister, sacrament, or theologian. Wouldn’t it make sense for God to make divine truth so readily available? If the love of God is perfect and victorious, wouldn’t God offer every human being equal and universal access to the Divine as love and suffering do? This is what Paul seems to be saying to the Athenians in his brilliant sermon at the Areopagus: “All can seek the Deity, feeling their way toward God and succeeding in finding God. For God is not far from any of us, since it is in God that we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:27–28). What a brilliant and needed piece of theology to this day!
Love is what we long for and were created for—in fact, love is what we are as an outpouring from God—but suffering often seems to be our opening to that need, that desire, and that identity. Love and suffering are the main portals that open the mind space and the heart space (either can come first), breaking us into breadth and depth and communion. Almost without exception, great spiritual teachers will have strong and direct guidance about love and suffering. If we never go there, we will not know these essentials. We’ll try to work it all out in our heads, but our minds alone can’t get us there. We must love “with our whole heart, our whole soul, our whole mind, and our whole strength” (Mark 12:30).
Finally, there is a straight line between love and suffering. If we love greatly, it is fairly certain we will soon suffer, because we have somehow given up control to another. That is my simple definition of suffering: whenever we are not in control."

This resonates with me. Today, I will be creative.
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