Competitive Wellness Series - Pride

Pride…hubris…self-esteem…easily something that is present in all of us, easily something to blame or credit. In ANY world of ANYTHING compared, valued, competed, judged, evaluated…in other words ANY situation that involves external feedback on performance, or simply action, Pride has an open invitation. One’s relationship with Pride becomes the determining factor of processing, response, and likely future action.

This post is inspired by the fallout of the UFC 229 McGregor-Nurmagomedov brawl. I am a Conor McGregor fan. (I am also a Chael Sonnen fan, if that paints an accurate picture of the MMA athletes that I support.) I enjoy the pre-fight banter, the gamesmanship, the taunting WHEN it is followed with clean competition and respect regardless of outcome. This is the heart of competition. Khabib made me a fan in that fight. I have followed him loosely prior, but the domination and mastery of his craft was on full display. As fighters, these men are very similar; as men, they could not be further from one another on the spectrum.

As much as I don’t condone the actions of “other participants” in what happened after McGregor tapped, (here forward not receiving any of our attention in this post), I can understand the actions of Nurmagomedov. As a man he is proud, he is loyal, he is intense. Not being cut from the same cloth of theatrics as McGregor was on full display. There was video of mid-fight trash talk where McGregor responded, while clearly losing on the scorecards, that “It’s just business”. Not a message that was going to be received during the culmination of frustration and, finally, opportunity for Nurmagomedov to speak in the language he is most fluent in. He was able to let his actions do the talking, and boy did they. But in the emotional high of physical victory, Khabib’s anger, frustration, and pride spilled out into unprofessional, yet completely human, action. Whereas the consuming toll on the human existence that preparing for that type of competition sometimes manifests in tears, what had been boiling up inside of Khabib for months showed itself in animalistic instinct.

Honestly, the fact that he was able to control himself until after the fight is nothing short of commendable. For someone who is not practiced or seasoned in the “talking game” of sports, and who undoubtedly had moments of sheer frustration throughout the process, he was able to focus everything, every thought, every emotion, into doing his job and defending his belt. But where does the anger come from? Where did his inability to control his actions for mere moments more come from? Herein lies our analysis of Pride.

I am a self-aware “sticks and stones” practitioner. Sure, words have hurt me in the past, they will presently, and I’m sure they will in the future, but the goal is to decrease that pain. A lot of this pain-management comes in the form of introspection - looking at myself to evaluate the Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How of the effect of the “offense”. (Yes, that offense should be in parenthesis and that will be addressed later). This intellectual analysis immediately takes attention away from the “sting”, protecting the heart with the brain.

Philosophically, there is no shortage of resources on the subject of Pride. Mythology from the beginning of oral history of mankind warns of and celebrates Pride and its different manifestations. There are camps in full support of Pride and there are camps that criticize its every action. There is individual Pride and group Pride. There is Pride stemming from self-love and Pride stemming from self-contempt. This is an individual experience, and a journey, that seems to never end. This is one of those situations that as soon as you think you’ve figured it out, the Universe says, “Here, try this one”.

This is another one of those posts where I am not going to give an answer because, clearly, I don’t have one. But in all endeavors here, I hope to more direct this conversation to raising children and young adults. When is the right time to begin the Pride discussion. Is there a right answer? Is this one of those subjects where the culturally acceptable norm is the leading candidate for what is “Right”?

“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Simple, poetic, empowering. Now we live in a society where seemingly EVERY word hurts someone, offends someone, puts someone at a disadvantage or knocks them from equality. Instead of teaching children to build their confidence through an internal locust of control, we give them an opportunity to give someone else influence in their life.

Now, even as I type this, delete and retype, and repeat that process over and over, I am fully aware of the sensitivity of the topic. There are boundaries, there are expectations as a member of society, and there is “too much”. I am not saying that we should teach our children to become hardened into Stoicism and that it is alright for others to verbally and emotionally abuse them. As parents and teachers, it is our job to help them navigate their own lines of tolerance, comfort, and power. I am not victim-blaming. I am encouraging a mind that is open to rising above mean words. This rise comes as a result of positive self-image, confidence, and compassion/sympathy/empathy that is severely lacking in our world.

As we read this as adults, we are discouraged and turned off to the idea. Who wants to sit and be told what we are, why we do things, and what we are thinking? I personally am supremely sensitive to being told what I mean, or am meaning. I still have moments where someone else’s stupidity is offensive to me. I am a looooooong way from Self-actualization. But I also know that other people’s words are often more about them than me, just as my mean words to someone else are just as much about me.

What we should be teaching our children is tolerance, acceptance, and most of the -pathies. We should be reinforcing their defenses of “belief in self”. I’m not a “turn the other cheek” proponent, per say, but when jousting, or attacking, is verbal, I think there is a greater opportunity to invest in the development of one’s Self before immediate counteraction is required.

Idealistic: yes. Practical: maybe. Popular: probably not. However if I can teach a child to brush off “mean words” and/or realize that not everything that they don’t want to hear is necessarily “mean” or “offensive”, and something they need to be protected from, I will do it. There will be times that even the most controlled, registered human beings will reach their breaking points. Conor continued to verbally pepper a very proud Khabib until there was no turning back. Khabib acted how he personally felt necessary. (Even better, his father’s response to that, look that up too). Our children don’t have to deal with the professionalism of their responses right now, so they should be testing out their options, including one where they simply ignore our perception that they should be hurt or offended by them.

It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels - Saint Augustine

Suggested searches: Pride, Saint Augustine philosophy, hubris, Terry Cooper Pride, group pride, pride, shame, and group identification salice and sanchez

Competitive Wellness Series - Raising Athletes from Day One

Youth Sports have become big business. The fact that I exist in the form of a training business specializing in training children and young adults is a testament to that. Parents are “recognizing” the potential benefit that comes with raising a young superstar, often without a firm grasp on the reality of the world of competitive sports. (Let’s be serious, if you want to raise a top-tier athlete, find an obscure sport for him/her to specialize in from an early age. But better keep your fingers crossed that it actual aligns with his/her passion or you’re going to spend a lot of money on a neat childhood hobby). The reality, however, is that the push toward early specialization and over-training leads to burnout and over-use injuries later in life.

There is a way to progressively prepare your child for the demands of a childhood athletic “profession” while simultaneously teaching him/her how to live well, and it starts at birth.

I will always be a proponent of youth sports. Yes I have some reservation about the “trophy for everyone” trend, but that really starts to exist a little bit later in childhood. If a plastic, mass-produced trophy inspires, motivates, and captures a child’s interest to continue to play a sport, stay healthy, and make life-long friends, then by all means lets keep filling parents’ attics and basements with them. But even before this “don’t you want to try soccer?!” pitch to your five or six year old, you could have already prepared your child to maximize the experience.

From birth to about 6 years old, your child is navigating the world learning how to survive. The early years, obviously, are reliant upon the parents until - roughly - ideally - the age of 3 or so. (Now before you think I’m saying that a 3 year-old is an independent human, I’m simply saying that by this point in his/her life, there is a capability to begin a continuous practice of independence). Within these years, you will always find (hopefully) numerous suggested resources about the benefit of allowing your child to explore, struggle, fall, etc. in order to gain a better feel for the world and build a healthy relationship with life’s obstacles and create the foundation of Confidence. The child is finding his/her strengths, weaknesses, powers, and powerlessnesses. All of this weaves a netting upon which to fall back on once the child hits 6 and starts exploring his/her place in the bigger world.

Failure is a part of sports. It is the nature of the beast. I’m not sure of any study that actually investigates all of the different forms of failure, but I’m sure it would be an area of study unto itself. (Consider me a candidate for my Master’s in Failure). The relationship that is formed between a child and “failure” (and its many different forms) is one of the true pillars of success in life. This is letting your child make a mistake and not over-reacting to a skinned knee. This is supporting your child’s teacher when the child is reprimanded instead of looking for an excuse and a reason it is someone else’s fault. This is, “Man, that must be frustrating, I wonder if there are ways you can avoid that happening next time?”.

The young athletes with poor attitudes often show a lack of resilience in their everyday lives. The young athletes that quit mid-season are often the ones who have been allowed to quit at things throughout their lives. The young athletes that give an excuse for performance are often the ones whose excuses have been accepted by their major influencers previously.

Building an athlete out of a child takes, first, the passion and commitment of the child - the true love of the game and understanding of competition. He/she should be the primary voice in what activities he/she does or does not participate in (after a certain age; again, making the decision for a young child to “try” a sport, even if for the experience of sticking out a full season of something, is still ok. They are children, after all, what do they know.).

But after that, it isn’t x-hours per week with a specialist trainer. It isn’t house league, plus traveling team, plus AAU. It isn’t “choose which sport you want to focus on or you won’t make it” or “Honey I know you love that but you don’t have time for that in your schedule”.

It IS the simple, wonderful, continuously-challenging act of raising a child, a person, who understands hard work, disappointment, success and celebration, camaraderie, selflessness, and grit, that is learned through (passively supervised for the sake of safety and being a parent) independence and own-life experience.

Remember early-humans didn’t become great hunters because matriarch said to stay home because it’s dangerous and you might get hurt…or took an already-dead prey and puppeteered it so the new-hunter thought he had been successful.

(I know that’s a stretch, but for real, “raising athletes” is simply “raising good people”, so start there).

Competitive Wellness Series - Introduction

When we consider top-tier athletes, at any tier, there is always something that separates them from the rest of the field. To varying degrees at different levels of competition, there is some combination of physical prowess, skill and abilities, strategy, mental toughness, and competitive edge that create advantages. Some of these are naturally occurring, some are external gifts, and some are internal specialties. I’m sure at some point there will be developed an algorithm that calculates the potential achievement of an individual athlete within a variety of situations that may be used to help them decide where to “take their talents” in order to maximize them, or how to spend their time training. 

Though the science of sport is already being applied at greater detail and with increasing frequency to even younger athletes, the most obscure and evasive weapon to train will always remain the same: the mind. 

(Luckily for all of us, training the mind, and its connection to our bodies, will benefit us well beyond sport and our days of athletic competition, but we’ll just stick to that application of it in this post). 

There’s a lot of frustration in sport and competition, and learning to embrace that will create some of the best athletes. But one of the most frustrating entities in sport, both in the present and retrospectively, is the skilled athlete without the competitive mind. I would know, I was one of those cases. A plague then and a blessing now it has led to training, research, and application to help others avoid this feeling - not only in sport, but in life as well. 

This series of posts will discuss common mental obstacles, address physical manifestations, and suggest self-guided exercises to help develop the weapon of the mind for your competitive arsenal.