I recently joined James Weisbecker on the Meet Your Mental Helper podcast—and we didn’t just scratch the surface.

This conversation went deep into how martial arts and mental health aren’t separate tracks—they’re overlapping disciplines that build something far more powerful: leadership, resilience, and clarity in the moments that matter most.

We broke down:

• The mindset behind real discipline (and how it translates into life and business)

• Why confidence has to be earned—not given

• The psychology behind showing up strong, even under pressure

James did a phenomenal job guiding the discussion into areas most people miss—like how martial arts doesn’t just help kids “burn off energy” but actually wires in long-term mental strength.

It was an honor to be part of this, and I think you’ll walk away with a new perspective on how physical and mental training connect—and why both are essential.

➡️ Listen now and sharpen your mindset: Click Here

I think you’ll like the discussion!

Chief Master Greg Moody, Ph.D.

P.S. Here is the transcript!

“We need to know the difference between, I’m teaching this at a mental health conference next month, but bullying, conflict, and violence. Bullying or abuse, conflict, and violence are three separate things, and they need to be handled differently. And for the most part, we don’t know how to tell the difference first, and then what to do about it.

This podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only, and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Consult a qualified professional for your needs. These are those of the hosts and guests, and not necessarily those of Meet Your Mental Helper podcast LLC, or its affiliates.

We are not responsible for actions taken based on this content. Welcome to the Meet Your Mental Helper podcast. I’m Jim Weisbecker, the host.

I’m also a licensed professional counselor in Arizona, who loves to talk shop with colleagues. And when I do, I’m always amazed at how much knowledge they have. And I think to myself, they should have a podcast, or they should be on a podcast.

But they’re not celebrities. They’re counselors, therapists, psychologists, life coaches of all types, who grind it out every day

“in our community to help us grow and to help us heal. Without further ado, let’s meet today’s mental helper.

And welcome to this episode of Meet Your Mental Helper. Today, we have a special guest, Chief Master Greg Moody, PhD. He’s based in Arizona, consulting and teaching nationwide.

Dr. Greg Moody began as an aerospace engineer before earning a master’s in counseling and a PhD in education, focused on special needs and gifted learners. His pioneering research proved martial arts reduces bullying and boosts self-esteem, marking the first controlled study of its kind. He’s a successful entrepreneur, therapist, and author of 15 books, including three Amazon number one bestsellers.

He built eight multimillion dollar businesses and consults in education, business, growth, and mental health. With 30 plus years in martial arts, Dr. Moody is an eighth degree black belt and chief master instructor, training everyone from three-year-olds with special needs to adult champions. His expertise blends education, psychology, and leadership to empower students and professionals alike.

Welcome, Dr. Moody, or as I know you, Chief Master Moody.

Well, we’ve met each other more than a decade ago, so I guess we must have been 10 years old then or something, I think.

I think I was three, possibly.

Well, yeah, thanks for the great introduction. I mean, my work career and what I do is kind of eclectic and strange. There’s not a whole lot of engineers that go into counseling, and there’s not a lot of people in that space going to martial arts.

So I guess I get bored easily or something. There’s some mental health problem I get to deal with with all those things, but appreciate the really nice introduction.

Well, you must have a lot of energy. That’s what hit me as I went through your stuff. I said, how does he have that much energy?

Yeah, I don’t know if it’s energy or insecurity that I’m not doing enough there if we’re going to talk about mental health issues for the mental health providers. But what’s been really neat lately is I get to work with business owners and help them with the things that I’ve learned when I’ve built businesses and help them be successful. And then I’ve been doing therapy as well.

I don’t do that. That’s not my full-time gig. I mean, I don’t know if I…

I guess I got a bunch of full-time gigs. But both of these things, it seems strange, the engineering, psychotherapy, and this martial arts work and business work, but they all kind of intertwined for me and my world because the engineering work helped me learn to build systems better. And that’s something that when I help small businesses with, that’s a big struggle for them.

So, you know, that was very valuable. The therapy work helps me in my work with kids and in martial arts because we really deal with, in martial arts, kids at a higher percentage and adults too, at a higher percentage of developmental issues like autism, ADHD, and other things. And so there’s kind of a wide variety.

If you look at the general population or bell curve, we’re getting people with some other challenges. We’re not really an activity that people do because they’re trying to be like a, you know, pro football player or a pro at something. It’s not a, it’s more of for everybody, but people tend to come with us more when they have other challenges.

One of those is bullying. And so the autism and bullying are two main research subjects that I spent a lot of time with. And it turns out there’s a lot higher percentage in the general population that come to martial arts.

So all the therapy works help me with the martial arts work, and the martial arts work massively helps me with my therapy work. Most of my therapy works with couples and with adult men, kind of our age. And, you know, but they’re dealing with, you know, some of the same issues that I’ve been working with martial arts people for many years.

So when you mention autism, autistic children are targets. Definitely targets because of their response. Their response is different maybe than what other kids are used to.

And they, you know, I know the autistic clients I’ve had more as adults, but their foundation was being bullying. You know, their years of school was, had a lot of trauma in it, a lot of bullying and that type of thing.

Well, and especially if you’re working with the R age population, 30 and up, because it’s one of the controversies in the autism field, and I just talked to somebody about this the other day

“why the prevalence has gone up. You know, autism speaks to groups that works with kids with autism. When I started working with them about a decade ago, it was one in about 100 kids were diagnosed with autism.

Now it’s one in 44. And the, yeah, this argument in the world, and you know, I’m not a fan of, hopefully, I don’t know if any of your listeners are thinking that vaccines have a relationship with autism, but all the research and all my, you know, research work, you know, confirms that that’s not really the case. At least that’s my assessment of all the research and data.

But yet, people think that it’s some environmental cause that’s increasing the prevalence of autism. I think, to your point that you were making before, why were kids or adults now that had autism bullied or, you know, not good relationships or have challenged with their parents even when they were young, is because it wasn’t diagnosed very well earlier. So I believe the change in the prevalence is really about awareness and diagnosis.

To support that, you know, I don’t know if you had heard of the Korean study that they did. It was a very big study, and they didn’t, they were trying to determine autism prevalence. And instead of them just counting up how many people were diagnosed with autism, well, they realize not everybody’s getting diagnosed.

So the Korean study, about 10,000 samples, so large sample, took kids that were exhibiting any kind of various challenge developmentally. And then they did autism screenings for all of them. And what they determined was it was about 3.8%.

I think I’ve got that number right. About 3.8% of kids, which is right in line with the one in 44, and maybe even a little bit, you know, a little bit more. So we have a lot of people that, historically the ability for us to diagnose and recognize autism, particularly primary care physicians, often they don’t know anything about this stuff.

So, back to circle around to what you said, when we get adults, adults with autism, they had, you know, unless it was super severe and they weren’t functional, for high-functioning adults now, but were high-functioning autistic kids when they were young, they wouldn’t get diagnosed. So they’re not getting any help, not getting any special

…see the remaining transcript by Clicking Here!

Dr. Moody is also a licensed psychotherapist and maintains a practice at Integrated Mental Health Associates (IntegratedMHA.com) where he specializes in couples therapy and men’s issues.