October 19, 2008
Mental Training - How Negative Thinking Can Really Destructive
I started working with my team officially this weekend with our first practice yesterday.
We have a good hitting team. And yesterday, I was introducing a few simple hittin concepts mostly about stance, rythm and loading/trigger/negative movements.
I have one player who said "I can't do it".
What?
"I can't do it. My body won't do it."
Are you kidding me?
Wow - we got also as much, if not more coaching on the thinking and mental side than we do on the technical side.
But you know what? It is certainly not usual.
In this case, this young lady was actually arguing with me to convince me that she couldn't do it.
I'm only talking about a slight trigger here. What else can't she do? I'm looking forward to see.
This is actually very typical.
And this is a big block to getter better.
Kids are used to instant success, instant fixes, to getting what they want NOW!
They aren't used anymore to working hard and facing obstacles to get what they want.
This kind of thinking is really a big road block to getting better.
You really can't afford to think like that if you want to get better.
Learning works this way..
1) you have to be willing to try something else and have an open mind
2) Willingly integrate the new stuff
3) Understand that it will NOT work right away
4) Understand that you actually will probably be even worse than it was because you learning a new thing
5) Understand it will take time to master it and before you feel comfortable.
Learning takes time.
Learning is like taking 3 steps back to take 5 forward after.
You have to move back before you can move forward a few steps.
And pleazzzzzzzze… get rid of that I can't do attitude.
So useless, so destructive.
Train hard, play hard.
Marc
"Your Peak Performance Coach"
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
About the Author
Marc Dagenais, MHK, CSCS,
is a softball peak performance coach that helps players be more confident, mentally tougher, hit with more power, run faster,
throw harder, and be more dominant on the field. He also helps coaches win more
games and get more out of their team.
To quickly and easily boost your performance, check out Marc's powerful softball resources.
To get tons of performance-boosting softball tips, tricks, and advice by
email, sign-up for his FREE
softball
newsletter.
Comments on Mental Training - How Negative Thinking Can Really Destructive »
Hi Mark,
I find this more in girls than boys too. Girls seem to immediately say they can't while boys do it wrong and boast about how they are doing it right.
On all of my teams the word "can't" is strictly forbidden. If it slips out you should see the other players and hear the oohhs and ahhhss. Pretty funny.
Instead of "can't" we use "not able to yet" or "Struggling with", these are terms that insinuate success in the future along the lines of your "if you work at it you will be better in the long run" attitude you are professing here.
Being in FL, the other word not allowed on our teams is "hot", but that's for another time.
Eliminate "can't" from the vocabulary and it eliminates failure as an option. The only option is future success.
Marc,
You hit the nail on the head with this one.
Having coached youth sports for almost 20 seasons now, the "can't" word still gets my hot button. I have outlawed the word, and made kids (or the whole team) run when I heard it. Even now, it still gets me mad.
About 5 years ago, I realized that the "can't" word usually comes out of a player when they are having a self-confidence problem. It's a defense mechanism. The particular player may be the most confident young athlete on the team, except for this one area or something happened during the day to shake their confidence.
Five years ago, I tried a different approach. Instead of using "punishment" for the "can't" word, I made the player say 3 things that they did well during that practice, the last game, or during the day at school. I forced the player into postive mental talk. I would also tell the player I had high expectations of them and that they hadn't let me down so far and I believed they wouldn't let me down again. Finally, I would whisper in the team captain's ear to give the player an "attaboy" before practice ended.
While this didn't stop players from saying "I can't" and I still boil over when I hear those words, it significantly reduced the negative impact of those words on the player and the team. It took these types of situations out of the negative spiral and turned them into can do opportunties to overcome.
Good luck with the team.