Brain in the Game | Sport Mind Coaching Podcast
Dave Diggle
Episode Seventy-Two – Sustainable Performance – 4 Key Frames to Optimise Our Own Unique Characteristics
Hello and welcome back to Brain in the Game. Brain in the Game is a podcast that's been specifically designed for athletes, coaches and parents who are out there looking to do their sport just that little bit smarter. Brain in the Game is a balance between being a human and being an athlete. And I'm your host, Dave Diggle.
In this episode 72, we're going to look at objectives and goal-setting frames. The four rules. In episode 71 we looked at the five key strategies to ensure that you stayed on track with your objectives and your goals. In this episode, we're going to make sure we look at how we do that. The frames we can embed into our day-to-day training that allows us to stay on track without tripping us up with too much to do or too many things to think about.
Humans are teleological which means we do not do anything unless we see a reason to do it. We want to make sure that everything that we do has a purpose, has a buy-in, has a return on our investment. If it doesn't, then we tend not to follow on or follow through, with that understanding that humans will need a purpose.
We've got to make sure that the purpose of our objective and our goals are front of thought for us as often as possible, making sure that we remind ourselves on a day-to-day basis that everything has a purpose. Humans are also emotional gauges and we react to the moment. If something doesn't work, we try and come up with some rational explanation and then change what we're doing rather than really understanding what worked or what didn't work. What do we need to do to replicate or we need to do to replace? We tend to forget in the moment when something doesn't work, the bigger picture, the end step that we're trying to get to. Very rarely does our trajectory go in a straight line. It's often side-steps here, side-steps there adjusting to the moment, analysing what we're doing, and then changing our trajectory a little bit. If we get caught up in the moment, then we get caught up in reactions. We want to make sure that we respond to what's going on around us rather than react. So we need to create a system that's not in our head because we know everything inside our head is emotional, but something that's external of us we can look at.
So we need to write it down or create a picture that reminds us every single day of why we do what we do. That's why the vision board process actually works. It's not because it's magic. It's just front of thought. It's in our face day-to-day. So what I get athletes to do is to create a very similar process, either to write a mission statement of who they are, their purpose, or to create an image that they can put up on the back of a door somewhere. Both of these become front of thought for them every single day. I've had athletes who laminate them and put them in their shower, put them behind their toilet doors, have them as screensavers on their phones or on their computers. They're even in their training bags. So when they get their gear on, when they go training, they know why they're doing what they're doing. This front of thought process allows everything to be connected to that end step objective. And even when you're having a really bad day, when you see why you're doing what you're doing, it puts things back into perspective for you and you get context.
"Okay, I've had a bad day today. But you know what? Yesterday and the day before that, really good training sessions. I need to get back on my track to make sure tomorrow's training session is just as productive." So having this constant reminder by doing something, something that works for you – something external of, not being inside your head, but being external so you can see it – allows you to put it into context. It reminds you of why we do what we do. So that's number one, make sure that you see your objective. It gives you context about why you do what you do on a day-to-day basis. Every single training session, every single decision, every single response should feed the end step objective. We increase its value. So if you're running around the pitch or you're doing laps in a pool, if you recognise that it doesn't matter that it hurt, it doesn't matter that you're tired or you're fatigued. It feeds the end step objective. It increases the value of what you've just done. And we tend to push through things a little bit more diligently when we do that.
Number two is to have a plan, a detailed plan. Something that you look at and you don't have to think about too often. You've put the hard work into crafting it and creating it. Now it's all about applying it. Now I use a decision matrix. It's what we've created here at Smart Mind, and it works really well. Every single one of my clients goes through this process multiple times, depending on where they are in their process. The whole idea of this is to create something that's logical. One step leads into the next step, it leads into the next step, it leads into the next step, and there's action steps in between those. What do I need to do to go from here, to go to there? So not only does it lay out a path for you to follow, it lays out all the steps that you need to take, the actions that you need to make to make sure that that occurs, and it's also got inbuilt reward systems. So when you do hit one of these goals towards your objective, you've already stipulated in the cold light of day what that value is to you. You know what? That's a night out at the movies or I'm going to spoil myself and have pizza this week or I'm going to go on holiday this week.
Whatever it is, whatever the comparable value is to the goal that you've just achieved will allow you to be able to recognise that, to reward that and to feed that momentum. So the decision matrix and it's also one of our Building Champion Minds training modules, which is number two I think, it takes you through that whole process, and it's quite an indepth process. It's something that should be done at the start of your trajectory. So if you're building towards a national championships or towards an Olympic games, or whether it's just a state competition, by creating a Decision Matrix, something that you can hold yourself account to, those in the moment emotional reactions don't take you off your track. They don't change your trajectory. In actual fact allows you to get more detailed about what you're doing. So, number two, have a really detailed, structured plan. One that you've crafted, not one that your coach has done or one that somebody else has used. One that's tailored to you, that reaches your objective, that holds you on track and rewards you along the way.
Number three is to understand and implement a team around you that feeds your internal versus external referencing process. Now, when we talk about internal versus external referencing, what we're talking about is are you trusting what you need to know and backing what you're doing? Or are you asking everybody else, what do I do here? How does this work?
Now, we all know somebody who is externally referenced. If somebody goes, you tell me what to do and I'll do it. Hey, coach, I don't know what I need to do. You just tell me and I'll go and do that. That puts all the onus on the coach, to dictate what you as an athlete needs to be doing. Of course, that's part of a coach's role. They're there to guide you not there to do it for you. They're there to guide it. The downside to that is if somebody else has crafted it, somebody else has created it for you. When it gets difficult in the back of your mind, you always think to yourself, Right, that's not mine, that's theirs. That's what's important to them. It's not what's important to me. So it's important that you do craft it. You do own it.
So if we have an internally referenced person now, we all know somebody like this. They're the ones that say to you, "I know what I'm doing. You don't need to tell me. I've got this. I don't want to listen to you. There's nothing you can tell me that I don't already know." Both of those aspects, whether it be external or internal, have positives and they have negatives. The positive to an internally referenced person is they are tenacious. They will stay on track. They will do whatever they need to do because they 100% believe in what they're doing is right. The negative side of that is often they'll crash long before they realise they've got wobbly wheels. What I mean by that is when things start to go a little bit wrong, or maybe it's not the optimal path that they're following because they are so focused on doing what they believe is right and they stick into their plan, often they need to crash before they realise something is wrong. When we've got the externally reference person, the great thing about that is you do have balance. You do have perspective because you've got so many bits of information coming in from different people who have different perspectives on what you're doing that you tend not to crash.
However, the downside to that is it tends to take forever because before you make any kind of progress, you got to check in with so many different people. So we know that the optimal place for an athlete to be is internally referenced with external ratification. So what that means is, "I know what I need to know. I trust what I'm doing is right. This is my plan. Now let me check in with some key people around me who I trust for their input because their input either confirms or challenges my thought process." But it's your thought process. It's your plan. So if it confirms what you're doing, you're already bought in. It's already owned by you, crafted by you. If they challenge you and you start to change your perspective, you know what what they said is right. I didn't think about that. I didn't take that into consideration. Let me adjust my plan. You're not throwing the baby out with the bathwater and starting again. What you're doing is adjusting something that you already believed in. So when we talk about creating a team around you, your entourage around you that feeds your internal versus external referencing, what we're looking for is making sure you've got your decision makers that you've built, you have key people, one or two people around you that you can go to who are not necessarily going to tell you what you want to hear, but their input and their value you trust. You might know they are going to challenge you. You might know they're the kind of people that are going to go, "But have you thought about this. What about this aspect? Did you take this into consideration?" That's exactly what you want. You want somebody to be able to challenge you so you can say, "Yeah, you know what? I did take that into consideration and that's why I'm doing this or I hadn't thought about that. Good point. Let me make some adjustments."
So we've already got three key things that are going to allow you to implement this process of setting the objective and setting goals along the way. They're going to allow you to stay on track no matter what comes your way, no matter what kind of rough track you go through. Whether it's injury, whether it's competition strategies, or whether it's somebody else who's been selected over you – whatever's going on – allows you to keep focused on what you're doing.
Making sure you understand the purpose, making sure that everything that you've created is visually in front of you, whether it be written down or in a picture format. When you get up and you go in the shower every morning, you see it. When you're sitting on the toilet, you can see it.
The second one was making sure you have a detailed plan, a step-by-step process, something that's got gaugeables on it, something you can not only follow, but you can action and reward.
Number three was making sure you put the right team around you to ensure that they not only support you, but challenge you when you've created this path, you want those kind of people to challenge the decisions that you've made so that you know what? I've been challenged. I can believe in this. I know this is going to work. Doesn't matter what kind of rough track is ahead of me. I know we're going to get through this.
The fourth aspect to making sure that the frames fit is by having the right kind of mindset.
Now we talk about archetypes and all archetypes are realistically is certain characteristics that we can display that gives us a different kind of outcome. There's four core kinds of archetypes that we tend to reference.
Number one is the Hedonists. They're the people who are really bought into the moment. They're the ones that go, "Right, whatever I do now, I'm going to reward this, I'm going to enjoy life. I'm going to make sure every single training session is the best day of my life." Now that's great. That's great to enjoy what you do. However, often we get a little bit lost because there's no trajectory, there's no path to follow. It's living in the moment now. I know lots of coaches and athletes talk about you've got to be in the moment, and there is a time for that. When you're building your plan, when you're talking about objectives and goals along the way, being in the moment doesn't necessarily allow you to see purpose.
The second one is the Rat Racer, which is a complete opposite. They're the ones that turn around and say, "You know what? I don't care about them now. I don't really enjoy training. I don't really enjoy what I'm doing now. But one day it's going to pay off. One day it's all going to come good." Now they're the people who've got an excellent trajectory yet they've got no fuel to get there because it's only a matter of time before you go, "I've had enough of this. I don't want to do this every day." So you're no longer focused on progress. You're focused on how long it's going to take. We've all been in the car thinking, Are we there yet? Are we there yet? That kind of process. You're no longer enjoying the journey. You just want to get to the end. That's not a place to grow from. It's not somewhere that you want to be the best version of you who wants to constantly and consistently improve.
The third archetype is those that are the Nihilists. They're the ones that, "You know what? I don't care about the now. I don't care about the future." They want to give up. There's no motivation, and of course, there's no real gain as an athlete to be in that kind of mindset. So that kind of archetype is really counterproductive. So the reason I raise it in this podcast is because you're going to find people who have already given up. They may be your training partners, they may be in your team, they may be part of your peer group, whoever they are. If they're that negative, that kind of people, they're just hanging around going, "Man, I don't see any kind of benefit in doing that. I don't want to do that. Leave me alone." Then you want to distance yourself from those kind of people. They're only going to drag you emotively down. They're only going to inhibit your trajectory or slow your momentum down. So you want to make sure that you're aware of those people. You want to make sure that for whatever reason, they are where they are. You don't get involved in that. You don't get sucked in. Humans are pack animals and if there's a lot of people in that mindset, then you will gravitate towards that and start to assimilate. So distance yourself from those that are no longer productive.
The fourth kind of archetype is a mixture between the Rat Racer and the Hedonist. If we know the Hedonist is all about the now and the Rat Racer is all about the future, then we want to meet somewhere in the middle. We want to make sure we enjoy what we do, but it's for a bigger purpose.
So that's the Rat Racer versus the Hedonist and it's called the Happy Archetype. They're the ones that have got all of this going on. They enjoy their training and they recognise what they're doing day-to-day feeds a bigger purpose. So they see value in the moment. Based on what it's going to give them long term. They reward the now by enjoying it in the hope and the process of getting to something that they really want.
So having the right kind of mindset starts with deciding, what kind of athlete am I? And you hear me often reference being the best version of you. If you're an athlete (as long as you're not driving right now), if you closed your eyes and you pictured the best version of you, how clear is that in your mind? How clear can you describe the best version of you? And is it the optimal athlete to give you exactly what you want? There's no point in creating this optimal athlete inside your head and it not being capable of delivering the objectives that you want.
If we think about our brain being like a bartender, and there's no responsible service of alcohol here so whatever you create inside your head you get. So this cocktail you're creating inside your head as an athlete, if you want a fluffy duck, you get that fluffy duck. If you want Manhattan, that's what you create, that's what you get inside your head. Understanding that kind of concept, if we visualise inside our head the best version of you, the optimal athlete, what that looks like, what that sounds like, what that feels like, when you step into that, your brain will start to make that cocktail. It will start to flood your body full of all the chemistry that you need in order to step up and be that athlete. Try it. Create that athlete inside your head. Create that image and imagine in the top right hand corner of your mind is a dial or switch. That when you dial it up, when you turn it up, the colours become way more vibrant. The sounds become a lot more crystal clear. And those feelings become so much stronger. And then you turn it up again. So the vibrant colours become even more vibrant, the sounds become even more crystal clear.
And those emotions, those feelings become so strong and they are overwhelming. And then step in there. As you step into that moment, you'll notice that you will feel a physical shift. You'll feel more like the athlete that you've just created inside your head. And your brain does that on purpose because you tell it what you want and it will create.
The same thing happens if you focus on the negatives too. If you think, I'm not good enough, I'm not capable of doing this, I'm not strong enough, I'm not fast enough, your brain says, "Okay, that's what you're after. Let me make that cocktail for you."
So having the right kind of mindset, having a productive growth mindset is so critical in order for you to perform. That's why we blush. It's a physical reaction to an emotion. Once we create that, we want a physical reaction to positivity. Understanding those four key frames will allow you to embed everything into your day-to-day world without inhibiting you, without feeling overwhelmed. It's going to allow you to be the best version of yourself.
Now, I know I said to you, we're going to use four key rules. I'm going to add a little bonus one in here for you. And that's the increased collection of data we talk about: journaling. Those of you listen to my podcast before, you know I bang on about making sure that you collect the data at the end of every single training session.
Because the better data you collect, the better decisions you can make.
The better decisions you make, the better frames you can create.
The better frames you can create, the better performance you can deliver.
You can download them from our website, the journaling template that will allow you to be able to collect consistent, relevant data every single time that you train. And you'll be able to look at that and go, "I can see patterns, so I can see when I do a great session, this is what I did or what I didn't do to create that. Or if I had a terrible training session today, this is what I did or didn't do to create that."
So let me just quickly run through this again. We want to make sure that because we're teleologic, we're really clear on our purpose. Make sure this is written down or it's in picture format so it's external of your brain. Everything inside your brain will always be emotionally driven. We want something we can look at and go and connect with.
Number two is to have a really detailed plan, making sure that it's not only got direction, it's got action steps to create the outcome, and it's got rewards built in. Every step that you take should be recognised and rewarded.
Number three was understanding that you need a team around you, not only to support you, but challenge you so that when you're internally referenced, you get this external gratification. It's either supported or challenged by key people who you select around you to help you grow.
Number four was looking at those different archetypes. We had the Hedonist, the Rat Racer, the Nihilist and the Happy you want to be. The Happy you want to be is a mixture of the Hedonist and the Rat Racer. Enjoy the moment and for a bigger picture purpose.
And the bonus one at the end was making sure that you collect relevant data. Make sure that everything that you do feeds back into the system. The better the quality of the data you collect, the better quality information that goes into your brain, the more productive your performance will be.
I hope you got a lot from this podcast. There's more detail on our website smartmind.com. And also I've been talking a lot about the Building Champion Minds online training program that I've created. This is ten modules on video content, roughly about 13 hours worth of online training. We deal with all of these kind of subjects and being video gives us an opportunity to show you how you can walk through them. Like I said, the Building Champion Minds module number two looks at how you create the Decision Matrix. It shows you step by step how to fill it in the questions to ask yourself so you can hop over there. There'll be a link at the bottom of this podcast but you can go there and download that exercise and start following through all the other programs too.
And so until the next episode of Brain in the Game, train smart and enjoy the ride. My name's Dave Diggle and I'm the mind coach.
Copyright 2012-2022 Dave Diggle
https://www.smartmind.com/
