I recently reread two essays by William James, "The Will to Believe" and "Is Life Worth Living?" and they only get better with age. I recommend both, they can be read online for free through Google Books. I think so highly of William James that there is little I can add to his words, so I will just do some choice quoting.
From "The Will to Believe":
"I began by a reference to Fitz James Stephen; let me end by a quotation from him. 'What do you think of yourself? What do you think of the world? . . . These are questions with which all must deal as it seems good to them. They are riddles of the Sphinx, and in some way or other we must deal with them . . . In all important transactions of life we have to take a leap in the dark . . . If we decide to leave the riddles unanswered, that is a choice; if we waver in our answer, that, too, is a choice: but whatever choice we make, we make it at our peril. If a man chooses to turn his back altogether on God and the future, no one can prevent him; no one can show beyond reasonable doubt that he is mistaken. If a man thinks otherwise and acts as he thinks, I do not see that any one can prove that he is mistaken. Each must act as he thinks best; and if he is wrong, so much the worse for him. We stand on a mountain pass in the midst of whirling snow and blinding mist, through which we get glimpses now and then of paths which may be deceptive. If we stand still we shall be frozen to death. If we take the wrong road we shall be dashed to pieces. We do not certainly know whether there is any right one. What must we do? 'Be strong and of a good courage.' Act for the best, hope for the best, and take what comes . . . If death ends all, we cannot meet death better."
"Is Life Worth Living?" is addressed to those in despair, which at some times is all of us. As James says, "In the deepest heart of all of us there is a corner in which the ultimate mystery of things works sadly." He quotes James Thomson from "The City of Dreadful Night" to illustrate the point: "My Brother, my poor Brothers, it is thus:/This life holds nothing good for us,/But it ends soon and nevermore can be;/And we knew nothing of it ere our birth,/And shall know nothing when consigned to earth:/I ponder these thoughts, and they comfort me."
James makes two main arguments that life is worth living. The first is to fight, to continue on bravely in the battle of living. He quotes here from Carlyle: "Wherefore, like a coward, dost thou forever pip and whimper, and go cowering and trembling? Despicable biped! Hast thou not a heart; canst thou not suffer whatsoever it be; and, as a Child of Freedom, though outcast, trample Tophet {Hell} itself under thy feet, while it consumes thee? Let it come, then; I will meet it and defy it!" Now that's rousing!
The second argument is the stronger. It's two pronged. First is the counter to scientific or skeptical doubt, that since there is no proof life is meaningful, that there is any significance to us beyond our complexity, that there is divinity or an afterlife, we cannot believe. The second prong is that belief itself, despite a lack of proof, helps to create the fact. I'll leave you with this long quote. And does not the final sentence sound like quantum physics?:
"But 'may be! may be!' one now hears the positivist contemptuously exclaim; 'what use can a scientific life have for maybes?' Well, I reply, the scientific life itself has much to do with maybes, and human life at large has everything to do with them. So far as man stands for anything, and is productive or originative at all, his entire vital function may be said to have to deal with maybes. Not a victory is gained, not a deed of faithfulness or courage is done, except upon a maybe; not a service, not a sally of generosity, not a scientific exploration or experiment or textbook, that may not be a mistake. It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all. And often enough our faith beforehand in an uncertified result is the only thing that makes the result come true.
Suppose, for instance, that you are climbing a mountain, and have worked yourself into a position from which the only escape is by a terrible leap. Have faith that you can successfully make it, and your feet are nerved to its accomplishment. But mistrust yourself, and think of all the sweet things you have heard the scientists say of maybes, and you will hesitate so long that, at last, all unstrung and trembling, and launching yourself in a moment of despair, you roll into the abyss. In such a case (and it belongs to an enormous class), the part of wisdom as well as of courage is to believe what is in the line of your needs, for only by such belief is the need fulfilled. Refuse to believe, and you shall indeed be right, for you shall irretrievably perish. But believe, and again you shall be right, for you shall save yourself. You make one or the other of two possible universes true by your trust or mistrust, -- both universes having only been maybes, in particular, before you contributed your act."
Monday, June 13, 2011
Thursday, June 2, 2011
The Hard Volume High
I've started running. It has been a long time since I did any serious endurance training and I had forgotten the feeling of being crushed at the end of an hour of continuous exercise. In a full sweat, exhausted, stunned, heart beat pounding and psychologically in an altered state. You are impressed with what you've accomplished, you climbed the mountain you weren't sure you could get up. It's a powerfully positive state. I had forgotten how good it feels to just grind one out.
But I know that if I want to get better at running, I need to do other types of training. I need to do some repeat work, short distances run as fast as I can. I need to do some hills. But I'd rather not, and that's interesting. I'd rather not for two reasons. First is I know how slow I am and would feel disappointed at the end of the training session. Second, that type of work doesn't give me the "hard volume high." I'll be tired, whipped, but it won't feel as good.
It's also far more results driven, hitting a pace, the rest is timed, I either fail or succeed. Who wants that when I could rather just gut out some long distance and feel charged up after? If I really want to get better, I need to do a variety of work.
Coaches, don't forget what that hard volume high feels like and how your athletes (and you even) can get hooked on it.
But I know that if I want to get better at running, I need to do other types of training. I need to do some repeat work, short distances run as fast as I can. I need to do some hills. But I'd rather not, and that's interesting. I'd rather not for two reasons. First is I know how slow I am and would feel disappointed at the end of the training session. Second, that type of work doesn't give me the "hard volume high." I'll be tired, whipped, but it won't feel as good.
It's also far more results driven, hitting a pace, the rest is timed, I either fail or succeed. Who wants that when I could rather just gut out some long distance and feel charged up after? If I really want to get better, I need to do a variety of work.
Coaches, don't forget what that hard volume high feels like and how your athletes (and you even) can get hooked on it.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
An Irishman's Philosophy
In life, there are only two things to worry about—
Either you are well or you are sick.
If you are well, there is nothing to worry about,
But if you are sick, there are only two things to worry about—
Either you will get well or you will die.
If you get well, there is nothing to worry about,
But if you die, there are only two things to worry about—
Either you will go to heaven or hell.
If you go to heaven, there is nothing to worry about.
And if you go to hell, you’ll be so busy shaking hands with all your friends
You won’t have time to worry!
Either you are well or you are sick.
If you are well, there is nothing to worry about,
But if you are sick, there are only two things to worry about—
Either you will get well or you will die.
If you get well, there is nothing to worry about,
But if you die, there are only two things to worry about—
Either you will go to heaven or hell.
If you go to heaven, there is nothing to worry about.
And if you go to hell, you’ll be so busy shaking hands with all your friends
You won’t have time to worry!
Friday, May 20, 2011
The Emotions of Coaching: Part 1
This piece will appear in a future ASCA Publication. Enjoy
“Emotion runs the show in sports” – James Loehr “The New Toughness Training for Sports”
The more years I coach, the more I take this to heart. As a coach I am no less “run” by my emotions than the athletes. And my coaching effectiveness is determined as much by my emotions as it is by my knowledge. Many coaches are overdeveloped in one area and underdeveloped in the other. Some are amazing people who get kids to respond to them in almost magical ways. Others are the big brains in the sport, meticulous planners, technicians, relentless task masters who nail down the physical progression. But I think the greatest coaches have both, perhaps not in equal parts, but neither part is greatly deficient.
My goal is in this article is get each of you to reflect on your emotional state at practice, at meets, or any time you are working with the athletes. If you are like I am, you already spend a considerable amount of time reviewing your workouts, learning about training, technique and everything swimming related. I challenge you to put some of that energy and time into emotional evaluation. How do I act around the athletes? What puts me in a good mood? What puts me in a bad mood? What makes me tense? What makes me angry? If I were looking at me each day, as the swimmers do, what would I see? And is that what I want them to see? I think for most of us changing a workout, or teaching a stroke technique differently, is far easier than facing up to your emotional states and then working to overcome them. It’s time to do the hard-work of coaching . . . improving ourselves.
I have used the Eight-Fold Path from Buddhism to illustrate the process of making changes for athletes, but I think it applies equally well to evaluating ourselves emotionally as coaches. Each step on the path can apply to many different things (which is its beauty), so my interpretation is not meant to be complete, but rather illustrative of the emotional side of coaching:
1. Right views (understanding): Become aware of how you feel on deck, dig deep into the real feelings
2. Right purpose (aspiration): Decide what you aspire toward – what needs changing?
3. Right speech: Mind your speech, make sure it is in line with what message you want to send
4. Right conduct: Act in a way that helps you reach your goals
5. Right vocation: Live and work in such a way as to grow emotionally
6. Right effort: Your effort must be sustainable and effective
7. Right awareness (mind control): Learn to be less reactive and more thoughtful during the hard times
8. Right concentration (meditation): Learn how to think and feel deeply.
Ever read parenting books? Or even watch some of the parenting shows like “Supernanny?” I find watching Supernanny fascinating because it always appears that the most out of control kids can be subdued by simple, straightforward rule setting and enforcement. Nothing draconian, nothing severe, but clear and consistent expectations and consequences. But enforcing the rules is very hard for these parents, that’s why they are on the show in the first place – don’t mistake “simple” for “easy.” These parents are unable to do the right thing because of their own emotional shortcomings. The rule enforcement, the consequences, the patience, the self-examination, that is more difficult emotionally than letting them be bad, or just yelling at them when you get fed up. Good parenting is a lot about becoming a better person. I submit that good coaching is the same.
I quote here from a well-known article by Anson Dorrance, soccer coach at the University of North Carolina, titled “Coaching Women: Going Against the Instincts of My Gender”: “And while we, as coaches, never want to cease learning about our sport, ultimately, coaching development ceases to be about finding newer ways to organize practice. In other words, you soon stop collecting drills. Your coaching development shifts to observing how to support and motivate your players, and how to lead them to perform at higher and higher levels.” Technical learning needs to be ongoing, but it’s only a piece of the coaching puzzle. I’m at a place where I need to dig into myself to become a better coach.
So how did your season go? Great? Poor? Or, as usual, a mixed bag? How will you do better next season? Instead of chasing the next thing, or the magic set, or the newest piece of equipment, look at how you connected (or failed to connect) emotionally with your athletes. Are the ones doing well the ones you get along with best? Are they the ones you like being around the most? Or the ones that react most positively to your personality? The answer is likely yes to those questions and that’s natural. But which is the cart and which is the horse here? Are they getting the extra positive attention because they are doing the right things, or are they doing the right things because they are getting extra positive attention?
The challenge of coaching is investing the time and energy into the kids who you don’t connect with as well. Sometimes they are just the more quiet ones, or those who don’t seem to want to be there, or are difficult, or annoying. This next quote is from a recent article on espn.com by Bill Simmons about the Lakers coach Phil Jackson after his retirement. Phil is known for his 11 championship rings, and having coached Jordan and Kobe, but I think this is a majorly overlooked part of why he is one of the great coaches of all time: "Steve Kerr told me once that what made Jackson special -- and Popovich too -- was that he cared about his twelfth guy as much as his best guy. He spent time with his players, bought them gifts, thought about what made them tick. He connected with them, sold them on the concept of a team, stuck up for them when they needed him. His actual coaching -- calling plays, working refs, figuring out lineups and everything else that we see -- was a smaller piece of a much bigger picture. His players competed for him for many reasons, but mainly because they truly believed Jackson cared about them. Which he definitely did." Are you prepared to care about all of your athletes like that? What stops you from doing so now? What can you do to change that?
At the club level we have the unique problem of coaching boys and girls together in the same group. Not many sports coach boys and girls together. Some run practices congruently, or practice together up a point, but not many do the same workout day in and day out for both boys and girls outside of a recreation level. I think of diving, gymnastics, track, not a long list for sure. Why do we train together in swimming? Out of necessity in one respect (what other sport dares to put 90+ kids in 25y by 50m area?), but also because in swimming girls can keep up with boys, or at least close enough to do the same workouts. But having them together has created some unusual social dynamics that do not occur in sports where the genders train separately.
We sometimes talk about the girls being more comfortable competing against the boys than each other in practice. Would women basketball players do better competing against men? Or in soccer? Doubtful, but maybe if they had grown up practicing with the boys they would. Do the women swimmers have better or worse leadership skills, competitiveness, practice habits, or confidence than women in other sports who practice same gendered? Sounds like a good sports-psych study to me. Or how about the men. Do male swimmers have better or worse abilities in all those areas for having trained with women? We often view the boys as immune to some degree, that they would “do fine” in any environment, but that is hard to believe. Compare the male culture at a military academy sports team to that of your mixed gendered club team, it’s hard to say those differences amount to nothing. And getting your butt kicked by another guy is one thing, but by younger girls is quite another.
I don’t know the answer to these questions, but from a coaching perspective I don’t think we would coach a same gendered group in exactly the way we currently coach a mixed gendered group. And because of that fact, a higher demand is placed on us as coaches because we have to be aware of whether our style works better for one gender or another. And if you intend on switching styles i.e. working with female athletes fundamentally different then male athletes (which most of us do either by design or instinct) that is yet another challenge. Yes, my claim is we have it harder than if we were coaching a single gendered group (sorry college coaches).
Ok, so, what emotional challenges does that reality present? I don’t want to get into the literature about the differences between men and women too deeply, as others have done a fine job of this before me. Here is a straight-forward illustration of how men and women often have different goals in conversation. Deborah Tannen in “You Just Don’t Understand” asserts that women have “rapport-talk” and men have “report-talk.” The idea is that women tend to use language to establish an emotional relation with the other person, a connection, being in-sync, demonstrating a sameness, an understanding. She also calls this “affiliative talk.” While men tend to convey information about impersonal topics, report about a situation. For women the act of talking itself, even if it is sharing information that seems inconsequential or irrelevant, matters a great deal, while with men not-so. Some arm-chair evolutionary sociology will claim that historically women needed rapport talk to establish connections and safety back at home, while men needed report talk to do the hunting and fighting. Ever try to have a “report” conversation with a female athlete that from your end is about changes she needs to make to her swimming, and she walks away thinking “Why does he always yell at me and hate me?”
Figure out where you sit on the spectrum of report v. rapport talk yourself. And that’s not as simple as being male makes you a report talker, as I venture to guess many of the great male women’s coaches have a sense of rapport talk. Go further though and notice how you respond when women have a successful performance in practice or a meet and how you respond when men do. Then do the reverse, how you respond to poor meet or practice performance in a male swimmer and female swimmer. Do you get more excited for one over the other? More disappointed or angry? Not sure? Ask a coach you work with, someone you trust, to assess you in this way.
It’s such a delicate balance, coaching both genders well at the same time, and that’s why so few teams are consistently equal in boy and girl performance. One of my pet peeves is how coaches unintentionally emasculate the boys. As if wearing a Speedo in front of girls (especially if you are skinny and small for your age) isn’t enough, you sometimes get beat by girls (and sometimes younger girls!). So given that, why do coaches often put down the boys for getting beat by the girls? You don’t have to say so directly to create that effect, just get more excited about the girls’ performance and act disappointed in your guys and you’ve done it. Another way to emasculate is taking the girls attention. If all the girls spend their time talking to the male coach and each other (and not the boys) that will make them feel less than. If you are a boy in that situation you’ve got to be thinking, “Screw swimming. How about I go play baseball or lacrosse with all guys and feel like a man instead of getting my butt kicked here and feeling like a wimp.”
Sometimes you hear coaches complaining about how their boys aren’t tough, or they aren’t staying on the team, or they are small and weak, as if they just happened to be in a town that has a genetically poor crop of boys. Try letting your guys be guys a little, let them stand around a bit and talk about how fast they are, trying to look tough, crack some jokes with them and help make them into men. If you don’t do that, and you are in a girl-dominated culture, with all their attention going to you and all your attention going to them, the only boys who last on the team are ones that are frankly like the girls. You want big, tough, aggressive, fast boys? Then make them! Let them race, talk a little trash, act tough, lift a few dumbbells, now and then even goof-off a bit (heaven forbid!) and you’ll find they start doing better.
In the 2nd part of this series, I intend on exploring the challenges new coaches face building trust with the athletes, and what it takes emotionally to work effectively with teenagers.
“Emotion runs the show in sports” – James Loehr “The New Toughness Training for Sports”
The more years I coach, the more I take this to heart. As a coach I am no less “run” by my emotions than the athletes. And my coaching effectiveness is determined as much by my emotions as it is by my knowledge. Many coaches are overdeveloped in one area and underdeveloped in the other. Some are amazing people who get kids to respond to them in almost magical ways. Others are the big brains in the sport, meticulous planners, technicians, relentless task masters who nail down the physical progression. But I think the greatest coaches have both, perhaps not in equal parts, but neither part is greatly deficient.
My goal is in this article is get each of you to reflect on your emotional state at practice, at meets, or any time you are working with the athletes. If you are like I am, you already spend a considerable amount of time reviewing your workouts, learning about training, technique and everything swimming related. I challenge you to put some of that energy and time into emotional evaluation. How do I act around the athletes? What puts me in a good mood? What puts me in a bad mood? What makes me tense? What makes me angry? If I were looking at me each day, as the swimmers do, what would I see? And is that what I want them to see? I think for most of us changing a workout, or teaching a stroke technique differently, is far easier than facing up to your emotional states and then working to overcome them. It’s time to do the hard-work of coaching . . . improving ourselves.
I have used the Eight-Fold Path from Buddhism to illustrate the process of making changes for athletes, but I think it applies equally well to evaluating ourselves emotionally as coaches. Each step on the path can apply to many different things (which is its beauty), so my interpretation is not meant to be complete, but rather illustrative of the emotional side of coaching:
1. Right views (understanding): Become aware of how you feel on deck, dig deep into the real feelings
2. Right purpose (aspiration): Decide what you aspire toward – what needs changing?
3. Right speech: Mind your speech, make sure it is in line with what message you want to send
4. Right conduct: Act in a way that helps you reach your goals
5. Right vocation: Live and work in such a way as to grow emotionally
6. Right effort: Your effort must be sustainable and effective
7. Right awareness (mind control): Learn to be less reactive and more thoughtful during the hard times
8. Right concentration (meditation): Learn how to think and feel deeply.
Ever read parenting books? Or even watch some of the parenting shows like “Supernanny?” I find watching Supernanny fascinating because it always appears that the most out of control kids can be subdued by simple, straightforward rule setting and enforcement. Nothing draconian, nothing severe, but clear and consistent expectations and consequences. But enforcing the rules is very hard for these parents, that’s why they are on the show in the first place – don’t mistake “simple” for “easy.” These parents are unable to do the right thing because of their own emotional shortcomings. The rule enforcement, the consequences, the patience, the self-examination, that is more difficult emotionally than letting them be bad, or just yelling at them when you get fed up. Good parenting is a lot about becoming a better person. I submit that good coaching is the same.
I quote here from a well-known article by Anson Dorrance, soccer coach at the University of North Carolina, titled “Coaching Women: Going Against the Instincts of My Gender”: “And while we, as coaches, never want to cease learning about our sport, ultimately, coaching development ceases to be about finding newer ways to organize practice. In other words, you soon stop collecting drills. Your coaching development shifts to observing how to support and motivate your players, and how to lead them to perform at higher and higher levels.” Technical learning needs to be ongoing, but it’s only a piece of the coaching puzzle. I’m at a place where I need to dig into myself to become a better coach.
So how did your season go? Great? Poor? Or, as usual, a mixed bag? How will you do better next season? Instead of chasing the next thing, or the magic set, or the newest piece of equipment, look at how you connected (or failed to connect) emotionally with your athletes. Are the ones doing well the ones you get along with best? Are they the ones you like being around the most? Or the ones that react most positively to your personality? The answer is likely yes to those questions and that’s natural. But which is the cart and which is the horse here? Are they getting the extra positive attention because they are doing the right things, or are they doing the right things because they are getting extra positive attention?
The challenge of coaching is investing the time and energy into the kids who you don’t connect with as well. Sometimes they are just the more quiet ones, or those who don’t seem to want to be there, or are difficult, or annoying. This next quote is from a recent article on espn.com by Bill Simmons about the Lakers coach Phil Jackson after his retirement. Phil is known for his 11 championship rings, and having coached Jordan and Kobe, but I think this is a majorly overlooked part of why he is one of the great coaches of all time: "Steve Kerr told me once that what made Jackson special -- and Popovich too -- was that he cared about his twelfth guy as much as his best guy. He spent time with his players, bought them gifts, thought about what made them tick. He connected with them, sold them on the concept of a team, stuck up for them when they needed him. His actual coaching -- calling plays, working refs, figuring out lineups and everything else that we see -- was a smaller piece of a much bigger picture. His players competed for him for many reasons, but mainly because they truly believed Jackson cared about them. Which he definitely did." Are you prepared to care about all of your athletes like that? What stops you from doing so now? What can you do to change that?
At the club level we have the unique problem of coaching boys and girls together in the same group. Not many sports coach boys and girls together. Some run practices congruently, or practice together up a point, but not many do the same workout day in and day out for both boys and girls outside of a recreation level. I think of diving, gymnastics, track, not a long list for sure. Why do we train together in swimming? Out of necessity in one respect (what other sport dares to put 90+ kids in 25y by 50m area?), but also because in swimming girls can keep up with boys, or at least close enough to do the same workouts. But having them together has created some unusual social dynamics that do not occur in sports where the genders train separately.
We sometimes talk about the girls being more comfortable competing against the boys than each other in practice. Would women basketball players do better competing against men? Or in soccer? Doubtful, but maybe if they had grown up practicing with the boys they would. Do the women swimmers have better or worse leadership skills, competitiveness, practice habits, or confidence than women in other sports who practice same gendered? Sounds like a good sports-psych study to me. Or how about the men. Do male swimmers have better or worse abilities in all those areas for having trained with women? We often view the boys as immune to some degree, that they would “do fine” in any environment, but that is hard to believe. Compare the male culture at a military academy sports team to that of your mixed gendered club team, it’s hard to say those differences amount to nothing. And getting your butt kicked by another guy is one thing, but by younger girls is quite another.
I don’t know the answer to these questions, but from a coaching perspective I don’t think we would coach a same gendered group in exactly the way we currently coach a mixed gendered group. And because of that fact, a higher demand is placed on us as coaches because we have to be aware of whether our style works better for one gender or another. And if you intend on switching styles i.e. working with female athletes fundamentally different then male athletes (which most of us do either by design or instinct) that is yet another challenge. Yes, my claim is we have it harder than if we were coaching a single gendered group (sorry college coaches).
Ok, so, what emotional challenges does that reality present? I don’t want to get into the literature about the differences between men and women too deeply, as others have done a fine job of this before me. Here is a straight-forward illustration of how men and women often have different goals in conversation. Deborah Tannen in “You Just Don’t Understand” asserts that women have “rapport-talk” and men have “report-talk.” The idea is that women tend to use language to establish an emotional relation with the other person, a connection, being in-sync, demonstrating a sameness, an understanding. She also calls this “affiliative talk.” While men tend to convey information about impersonal topics, report about a situation. For women the act of talking itself, even if it is sharing information that seems inconsequential or irrelevant, matters a great deal, while with men not-so. Some arm-chair evolutionary sociology will claim that historically women needed rapport talk to establish connections and safety back at home, while men needed report talk to do the hunting and fighting. Ever try to have a “report” conversation with a female athlete that from your end is about changes she needs to make to her swimming, and she walks away thinking “Why does he always yell at me and hate me?”
Figure out where you sit on the spectrum of report v. rapport talk yourself. And that’s not as simple as being male makes you a report talker, as I venture to guess many of the great male women’s coaches have a sense of rapport talk. Go further though and notice how you respond when women have a successful performance in practice or a meet and how you respond when men do. Then do the reverse, how you respond to poor meet or practice performance in a male swimmer and female swimmer. Do you get more excited for one over the other? More disappointed or angry? Not sure? Ask a coach you work with, someone you trust, to assess you in this way.
It’s such a delicate balance, coaching both genders well at the same time, and that’s why so few teams are consistently equal in boy and girl performance. One of my pet peeves is how coaches unintentionally emasculate the boys. As if wearing a Speedo in front of girls (especially if you are skinny and small for your age) isn’t enough, you sometimes get beat by girls (and sometimes younger girls!). So given that, why do coaches often put down the boys for getting beat by the girls? You don’t have to say so directly to create that effect, just get more excited about the girls’ performance and act disappointed in your guys and you’ve done it. Another way to emasculate is taking the girls attention. If all the girls spend their time talking to the male coach and each other (and not the boys) that will make them feel less than. If you are a boy in that situation you’ve got to be thinking, “Screw swimming. How about I go play baseball or lacrosse with all guys and feel like a man instead of getting my butt kicked here and feeling like a wimp.”
Sometimes you hear coaches complaining about how their boys aren’t tough, or they aren’t staying on the team, or they are small and weak, as if they just happened to be in a town that has a genetically poor crop of boys. Try letting your guys be guys a little, let them stand around a bit and talk about how fast they are, trying to look tough, crack some jokes with them and help make them into men. If you don’t do that, and you are in a girl-dominated culture, with all their attention going to you and all your attention going to them, the only boys who last on the team are ones that are frankly like the girls. You want big, tough, aggressive, fast boys? Then make them! Let them race, talk a little trash, act tough, lift a few dumbbells, now and then even goof-off a bit (heaven forbid!) and you’ll find they start doing better.
In the 2nd part of this series, I intend on exploring the challenges new coaches face building trust with the athletes, and what it takes emotionally to work effectively with teenagers.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Be Like Phil
Phil Jackson retired after the Lakers lost to the Mavericks. He is one of the coaches I look up to. Not just because of his success (11 titles) but how he went about getting them. People talk about why Phil was so successful in terms of his triangle offense, his calm demeanor, his intense preparation, his Buddhism, but this quote may be the most correct, and it's one of the many reasons why I try to be like Phil:
"Steve Kerr told me once that what made Jackson special -- and Popovich too -- was that he cared about his twelfth guy as much as his best guy. He spent time with his players, bought them gifts, thought about what made them tick. He connected with them, sold them on the concept of a team, stuck up for them when they needed him. His actual coaching -- calling plays, working refs, figuring out lineups and everything else that we see -- was a smaller piece of a much bigger picture. His players competed for him for many reasons, but mainly because they truly believed Jackson cared about them. Which he definitely did."
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons%2F110513&sportCat=nba
"Steve Kerr told me once that what made Jackson special -- and Popovich too -- was that he cared about his twelfth guy as much as his best guy. He spent time with his players, bought them gifts, thought about what made them tick. He connected with them, sold them on the concept of a team, stuck up for them when they needed him. His actual coaching -- calling plays, working refs, figuring out lineups and everything else that we see -- was a smaller piece of a much bigger picture. His players competed for him for many reasons, but mainly because they truly believed Jackson cared about them. Which he definitely did."
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons%2F110513&sportCat=nba
Sunday, May 8, 2011
"Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain"
I've just finished a great book titled "Train Your Mind, Change Your Brain" by Sharon Begley about neuroplasticity (the brain's ability to change physically) and its intersection with Buddhist meditation. The major message fits with recent research into talent, that practice and training can improve things previously thought to be unchangeable. There is less and less that is determined at birth. In particular, these passages deal with changing one's ability to focus, feel compassion, calmness and base-line happiness:
"Virtually all of biomedical science focuses on getting people up to the zeroth level and nothing more. As long as someone can attain nonsickness, that is deemed sufficient. As Buddhist scholar Alan Wallace put it, 'Western scientists have an underlying assumption that normal is absolutely as good as it gets and that the exceptional is only for saints, that it is something that cannot be cultivated. We in the modern West have grown accustomed to the assumption that the 'normal' mind, in the sense of one free from clinical mental illness, is a healthy one. But a 'normal mind' is still subject to many types of mental distress, including anxiety, frustration, restlessness, boredom, and resentment.'"
"There is a tremendous lacuna in our worldview, where training is seen as important for strength, for physical agility, for athletic ability, for musical ability -- for everything except emotions. The Buddhists say these are skills, too, and are trainable like any others."
Psychology in just the past 20 years is now developing what's generally referred to as "Positive Psychology" or the study of people who are above average in mental health. The best analogy to what we are talking about here is the difference between a person who is of average body weight, blood pressure, and overall physical fitness to a top Olympic level athlete. Psychology was previously occupied only with getting the unhealthy person to the normal level, and now there is a reality that through mental training we can get go up from normal, perhaps even to the Olympic level of emotions!
"As researchers probe the power of meditation and other techniques to alter the brain and allow it to function at the highest levels, we are therefore poised at the brink of "above-the-line" science -- of studying people whose powers of attention are far above the norm, whose wellsprings of compassion dwarf those of most people, who have successfully set their happiness baseline at a point that most mortals achieve only transiently before tumbling down to something comfortably above depression but far from what may be possible. What we learn from them may provide the key to raising everyone -- or at least everyone who chooses to engage in necessary mental training -- to that level. Neuroplasticity will provide the key to realizing positive mental and emotional functioning. The effects of mental training, as shown in the brains of accomplished Buddhist meditators, suggest what humans can achieve."
I started writing those little handouts on Mental Training (see below for an example) and giving them to my swimmers years ago. My focus then was on thought habits that directly connect to physical performance. Now I feel I need to broaden my approach to include training which improves overall emotional strength. Neuroscience has shown that even cognition is closely intertwined with neurons that deal with emotion, so nothing is truly "unemotional," and nothing is untrainable!
"Virtually all of biomedical science focuses on getting people up to the zeroth level and nothing more. As long as someone can attain nonsickness, that is deemed sufficient. As Buddhist scholar Alan Wallace put it, 'Western scientists have an underlying assumption that normal is absolutely as good as it gets and that the exceptional is only for saints, that it is something that cannot be cultivated. We in the modern West have grown accustomed to the assumption that the 'normal' mind, in the sense of one free from clinical mental illness, is a healthy one. But a 'normal mind' is still subject to many types of mental distress, including anxiety, frustration, restlessness, boredom, and resentment.'"
"There is a tremendous lacuna in our worldview, where training is seen as important for strength, for physical agility, for athletic ability, for musical ability -- for everything except emotions. The Buddhists say these are skills, too, and are trainable like any others."
Psychology in just the past 20 years is now developing what's generally referred to as "Positive Psychology" or the study of people who are above average in mental health. The best analogy to what we are talking about here is the difference between a person who is of average body weight, blood pressure, and overall physical fitness to a top Olympic level athlete. Psychology was previously occupied only with getting the unhealthy person to the normal level, and now there is a reality that through mental training we can get go up from normal, perhaps even to the Olympic level of emotions!
"As researchers probe the power of meditation and other techniques to alter the brain and allow it to function at the highest levels, we are therefore poised at the brink of "above-the-line" science -- of studying people whose powers of attention are far above the norm, whose wellsprings of compassion dwarf those of most people, who have successfully set their happiness baseline at a point that most mortals achieve only transiently before tumbling down to something comfortably above depression but far from what may be possible. What we learn from them may provide the key to raising everyone -- or at least everyone who chooses to engage in necessary mental training -- to that level. Neuroplasticity will provide the key to realizing positive mental and emotional functioning. The effects of mental training, as shown in the brains of accomplished Buddhist meditators, suggest what humans can achieve."
I started writing those little handouts on Mental Training (see below for an example) and giving them to my swimmers years ago. My focus then was on thought habits that directly connect to physical performance. Now I feel I need to broaden my approach to include training which improves overall emotional strength. Neuroscience has shown that even cognition is closely intertwined with neurons that deal with emotion, so nothing is truly "unemotional," and nothing is untrainable!
Satisfied Mind
The lyrics to a great song by Johnny Cash. Reassuring in tough times:
How many times have
You heard someone say
If I had his money
I could do things my way
But little they know
That it's so hard to find
One rich man in ten
With a satisfied mind
Once I was waitin'
In fortune and fame
Everything that I dreamed for
To get a start in life's game
Then suddenly it happened
I lost every dime
But I'm richer by far
With a satisfied mind
Money can't buy back
Your youth when you're old
Or a friend when you're lonely
Or a love that's grown cold
The wealthiest person
Is a pauper at times
Compared to the man
With a satisfied mind
When my life has ended
And my time has run out
My friends and my loved ones
I'll leave there's no doubt
But one thing's for certain
When it comes my time
I'll leave this old world
With a satisfied mind
How many times have
You heard someone say
If I had his money
I could do things my way
But little they know
That it's so hard to find
One rich man in ten
With a satisfied mind
How many times have
You heard someone say
If I had his money
I could do things my way
But little they know
That it's so hard to find
One rich man in ten
With a satisfied mind
Once I was waitin'
In fortune and fame
Everything that I dreamed for
To get a start in life's game
Then suddenly it happened
I lost every dime
But I'm richer by far
With a satisfied mind
Money can't buy back
Your youth when you're old
Or a friend when you're lonely
Or a love that's grown cold
The wealthiest person
Is a pauper at times
Compared to the man
With a satisfied mind
When my life has ended
And my time has run out
My friends and my loved ones
I'll leave there's no doubt
But one thing's for certain
When it comes my time
I'll leave this old world
With a satisfied mind
How many times have
You heard someone say
If I had his money
I could do things my way
But little they know
That it's so hard to find
One rich man in ten
With a satisfied mind
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)