So your sports were cancelled?
So your sport was cancelled? The thing you likely spent all off-season preparing for is now not going to happen. For the seniors this means no senior season. Something you have no control over is dramatically affecting your life. Yes it sucks, but what can you do about it? Nothing we do will change the fact that people with power made a decision for the safety of the public. However we can change how we react to it. Will you be stuck with the “poor me’s”, or will you focus your attention on the positives?
With sports being cancelled we have the opportunity to become better athletes. First we have more free time to dedicate to training. Now that we’re not practicing 6-12 hours per week, plus game time, we can dedicate much more time to our physical development.
Secondly, we are seeing a reduction in the number of aches and pains we see in our athletes. This is due to 1) obviously the reduction of injury due to contact sports. And 2) the reduction of overuse injuries, primarily in overhead sports (baseball/softball, lacrosse, tennis, volleyball, etc.). Now we’re able to train with less restrictions as chronic overuse injuries are healing. It is important that we view this situation in a positive light at least from an injury reduction standpoint.
But sometimes our perception is so clouded with having a negative attitude that we completely miss the positives. Being optimistic is so difficult when all we think about are the bad things that happen, and the “why me’s?”. What to you think would happen if you changed your mindset from looking for the bad things to looking for the good things?
The law of attraction is the belief that positive thoughts lead to positive experiences, and negative thoughts lead to negative experiences. By having a positive mindset and seeking the best from every situation we attract positive people and experiences to us. When we start complaining we start to attract complainers and people who are not as likely to take matters in their own hands. So let’s examine this further…
Our sport gets cancelled. We could mope around the house, play video games, watch Netflix or Disney+, and feel sorry that we lost our season…feeling bad about the missed opportunities. This kind of attitude will negatively reinforce our ability to get better. We start to lose the motivation to eat well, train, and follow a consistent sleep schedule. Our body gets used to the lack of activity, and we find it hard to start back up again. We play games online with our friends who are in a similar situation and who, like us, are in this negative spiral. This further makes us feel down and the cycle continues until something drastic breaks it. Under different circumstances those people we spend time with would help us break that cycle either by physically helping us through, or passively when we see them overcoming obstacles; but this doesn’t happen when we find ourselves in the company of negativity. Now compare that against this…
Our sport gets cancelled. We make the decision to get better, regardless of our situation. We wake up early, eat a great breakfast, and go train. Doesn’t matter if we are in the gym or at home. We go do something that makes us better. We don’t make excuses and get better every day. We talk with our friends and teammates who are also seizing the opportunity to get better. We start to compete (physically or virtually) and that competition makes us even better. Even if we slip up and sleep in some days, our teammate still holds us accountable so that mistake doesn’t become a negative habit. Getting 1% better, 4 days per week, for 3 months is almost 50% (48 sessions) better than when you started. That’s pretty incredible. Compare that versus the person getting 50% worse…you see where this is going.
We see in our programs at Full Plate that the most physical athletes are the consistent ones, who train even when they don’t feel like it. In season and out of season they put in work. Yes we don’t expect to build in season…but we definitely don’t take steps backwards.
Don’t waste this opportunity to get better. Rise above the negative emotions and do something to make yourself better. there are so many opportunities for you to develop and get better for your next season. Even if you are done with sports, do this for your health. Your competitive hunger will never go away. You need to feed it.
Be better than your competition.