Brain in the Game | Sport Mind Coaching Podcast
Dave Diggle
Episode Forty-Eight – Sporting Success - Six Steps to Your Best Season Ever
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 an alternative universe where mental coaching is a must. And I’m your host, Dave Diggle.
In this, the first episode of 2015, episode 48, we’re going to look at how we can set up our season to be our best season ever. So we’re going to get into looking at what we’ve done last year and how we can learn from that and then also look at how we plot, plan and strategise to make sure that this season is your best season ever.
Before we get into today’s session, I want to first of all apologise. You may hear some very strange noises going on during this podcast. No, it’s not me. I live on the beach in New South Wales in Australia and right out in front of my office is the ocean and we’ve got some huge surf going on at the moment. So every now and then you might hear “woohoo” it’s a surfer going by. They have an absolute ball out there. So I apologise first off, if you do hear some strange sounds, it’s going to be those surfers having an absolute excellent time out there in the ocean.
So let’s get into setting up our season and making sure that what we do this year, 2015, is the best season we could possibly ever have. In previous episodes of Brain in The Game, we’ve looked at very specific strategies, strategies that helped us deal with disappointments, that helped us deal with communication, that helped us deal with very specific learning outcomes. What we’re going to do today is try and set up our season and this is something I do with every single one of my clients. I look at their whole season before we start the season. Obviously, if I get the opportunity to, sometimes I get called in when things are broken halfway through a season. But idealistically, what we’d like to do is set up our season the way we want it. Rather than fix things when they’re broken, we want to make sure that we set them up the right way from the start. So that’s all we’re going to look at today. We’re going to look at what’s going on in the past so we can learn from that and then we’re going to look at how we then plot plan and strategise for our going forwards. And we’re going to break it down into six different categories.
The first category is to make sure we know what our season is going to be like, what we want it to be like, what’s our big end objective for our season this season. So that might be something like: I want to win a national title; or I want to be selected for a national or international team; or I want to learn a very specific skill; or I want to compete somewhere; I want to get selected for a team overseas. Everybody has a different objective when I look at their season because it is so unique to each individual athlete. What I want to do, what I want to achieve in my world would be different with what you want to do and what you want to achieve in your world. There will be commonalities and similarities but on the whole, what makes me tick will be different to what makes you tick, and that’s what we want to buy into.
So step one is to be really, really precise and concise with what your end-step objective is. We need to know exactly what it looks like, what it feels like and when you step over that line to achieve it, how do we know exactly that’s the point. That’s when we’ve achieved that end step. Because if we don’t know the specifics about when we get there, then we won’t know when we’re exactly there, when we reach that objective and we can reward it. So I want to make sure we’re really clear and concise about what we want to achieve this season.
Then we want to know exactly what value that is to us, our internal why – why do we want that. If we want to be selective for a national team, why do I want to be selected? If it’s to represent your country, great, then that’s your driving force. That’s your emotional buy-in. If it’s because you’ve been trying for few seasons and this is your season, this is when you’re going to make it happen, then that’s your buy-in. If you want to learn a specific skill, why? Well if it’s to increase your base score of your routine, fantastic. If it’s something that’s been on the wish list for a long time, then again that’s your driver. As I said before, everybody’s driving force is different. That’s our emotional buy-in, why we do what we do? So we need to be, one, very very clear and concise about what it is. And then we need to recognise its true value, what this emotional buy-in is for us as individuals.
When we look at these two different aspects, we want to make sure not only is it big enough to make us strive, it wants to be just that slightly out of reach for us so we’re striving forward to get it. We’re having to grow, we’re having to extend ourselves to reach that objective. But we’ve also got to make sure that it’s realistic. There’s no point in saying “I want to be an Olympic champion this year” when it’s not an Olympic year. So I want to make sure that what we can achieve is achievable. Otherwise, we’re setting ourselves up to fail. And if we set ourselves up to fail, then we’re just setting ourselves up to not believe in the process, not to believe in our self and not to believe in the strategies and the structure that we’re going to build to achieve that. So we want to make sure, one, we’re clear and concise and precise; two, we’ve built a value to that; and three, it’s a realistically achievable objective.
So step number one, know exactly what you want to achieve in this year or this season.
Step number two is we need to collate the data that we collected at the end of last season. If I remember right, in one of our previous podcasts, we looked at what we do to collect all that data – how my season went, did I win what I wanted to win, did I achieve the skills I wanted to achieve, what worked, what didn’t work, and then what will I do different. That data, this is where it comes into play – where we want to use all of that data to help us strategy-build for going forwards.
So the first thing we want to look at is what worked. When you look back over last season and you take the time to recognise all the things that worked for you, whether that be training, whether that be communication, whether that be your team environment, whether that be your outcomes, your results, look at what you did that worked specifically well for you. Create a list. Understand exactly why it worked for you – because that’s our replicability. We want to replicate what’s working for us. We’ve already got a buy-in to that. We’ve already got a strategy in our brain that’s working. What we want to do is maximise on that and keep that so that we know in our heart, their hearts, yep, I’m bought in to that because I know that it works. I’ve used it and I’m confident with it. So that’s our replicability process.
We want to know what didn’t work. So we need to, again, look at all those different skills, environment, communication, team dynamic, and say, what parts of that didn’t work, and why? Why didn’t they work? Is it something that I didn’t do or is it something I didn’t do that I should have done, or is it just something that wasn’t in the right place at the right time? Is it the wrong skillset for that specific need? And if it is, that’s our elimination. Let’s take away what’s not working, that’s not fixable.
When we talk about our sport and we think about things that we can control and things that we can’t control, every sport has a certain percentage of things that they can’t control, whether that be the rain, whether that be the selection dates, whether that be the requirements for the competition. Whatever it is, there will be certain things we have no influence over, and it’s pointless us putting time, effort, thought, and emotion into something we can’t control. We’re throwing away what we could be using somewhere else that we can have an input on. So, we need to eliminate what we don’t have control over that we no longer need.
And the third part, that is, what do we do different? If we know that certain things last year didn’t work and we then need to build something in there to take care of that aspect. What do we need to do different? Do I need to change my team dynamic? Do I need to change my training schedule or the way that I approach my schedule? Do I need to change the way that I compete? Do I need to change the way that I communicate? And if I do, how do I do that?
So this is that evolution process. So we start off with what worked, being our replicability, our replication. Then we look at what didn’t work, which is our elimination, eliminate what we don’t need. And then we look at what would we do different, which is our evolution. We need to grow. We need to have that open mindset, that growth mindset. So we’re always learning and we’re always growing. We want to be better tomorrow than we were today because we know today we’re better than we were yesterday. We want to make sure that we’re always moving. When we talk about motivation and momentum, once we get something moving, it’s much easier to manage or maneuver than it is to initially get it moved in the first place. So we want to keep our growth growing.
So the first one was know exactly what my season or my year objective was.
Number two was collect the data from 2014 or even previous years to that. So we’ve got some data that we can use and we can look at what worked, what didn’t work, what would we do different.
So step number three is knowing exactly what you want. We want to make sure that we’re bought into that emotional want – I want to be on this team, I want to train every day, I want to use this team dynamic that I’ve got, I want to work with that coach. When we think about those wants, it’s the same as our objective. We want to buy in to that emotion because that’s going to sustain us during the tough times. Our wants, our emotions are pivotal to us maintaining momentum.
Then, we need to look at the needs. If that’s what I want, what do I need to do to get what I want, what are the action steps I have to take to work with that coach. Do I need to pick up the phone and say, “Right, I want to work with you because this is what I want to achieve this year and I know that we would work together.” Or “I want to be in that team, so right, I need to make sure that I’ve got the skillsets to be selected for that team.”
So the needs are the action step to things that we need to do that we can do, the things that we can control and go out and take action on to get that want, that emotional buy-in. Because what we want to be able to do is have a balance between needs and wants. The wants are going to give us momentum and give us that drag, that pull, towards what we want to be, and our needs will give us the skills and the momentum to stay there, our traction.
So, when we look at that from a bigger perspective, we can create a strategy of needs to get what we want, our stepping stones, which leads us into step number four, which is our decision matrix. So if you go to our website, which is www.smartmind.com/podcast, you can go there and you can download the different templates that I use and one of those being the decision matrix. The decision matrix is a strategy that we use, and if you’ve listened to my previous podcasts, you’ll know that I talk about the decision matrix frequently. It’s something that I use with every client but also I use to build my business. It’s something I believe in and I use myself. So the decision matrix is a strategy designed specifically to give a step-by-step instructions, to compartmentalise the big picture down to usable chunks. So how do you eat an elephant? Little chunk at a time. So the decision matrix is making sure we can cut up the elephant and eat it in a very easy and achievable manner.
So the decision matrix is broken up into three sections also. The first part is to work backwards from the end objective. We know what our end objective is now. You’ve already decided that. That was step number one – what’s my year’s objective. And we put that in the last box and then we work backwards from there. So if my last step was my big end objective is to be selected on national team, what has to happen right before that selection? Well, I have to have enough points or I have to have won a specific competition. Of course, because that goes into the step before getting selected. What has to happen before that, before I win that championship or I get enough points? I have to have had a consistent year and won X, Y, Z. You see, you get the idea. So work all the way back to the now. So now when we look at it, we have a step-by-step stepping stone to get from where we are right now to our end objective. Not only is it then, again, compartmentalised into achievable chunks. It’s also broken down into little goals. And every time we hit a goal, we get a reward. We feel that we’ve achieved something. That’s going to internally feed us to go into the next goal. So we look at that in achievable drive and traction and momentum.
We want to be clear about each step, the same way that in step one we looked at the need to be clear, concise, and precise about our end objective, so that we know when we achieve it, when we step into it, we’ll know that’s it, we’re there. The same needs to be bought into working on our goals. We want to make sure that we’re rewarding when we achieve. The second we achieve it, we want to make sure, yes, we’re there, that means this emotionally.
We also want to make sure that we understand our reasons why – why each goal is important to us. So when we achieve that goal, we know why we did it in the first place. We know we’re there. Or if we’re struggling to achieve that goal, we can pull on that, we can call on that emotional buy-in to get to that end step. We want to make sure that we create sustainability – because between now and the end of the season is a long time. Especially when you’re training every day, you’re traveling to competitions, you’re putting yourself through the ringer to get to your end objective. You want to make sure that when things maybe aren’t going as planned, that you know why you need to step it up or change your strategy or do what you need to do to get around that and back on track.
And then we have to build in our action steps. So in between each goal, the same thing applies. How do I go from this goal to the next goal. What have I got to do to action that. If I’ve got to increase my training from four days a week to five days a week or if I’ve got to go from running 10K to 15K or I’ve got to contact this coach or I’ve got to increase by going to chiropractors or physiotherapists to manage my body. Whatever it is to get from one to the next, what do you need to do to make that happen?
And then step number five is accountability. We want to make sure that once we’ve built that strategy, once we’ve got that decision matrix built, ready to go, we want to make sure that we are on track and we stay on track – because it’s the same as when people have New Year’s resolutions. For maybe the first week, even maybe the first month, they’re bought into that – “yeah, I’ll do that. Not a problem. I’ll stop this or I’ll do that or I’ll go to the gym every day.” And then they start to tail off, “Yeah, yeah maybe every second day. Maybe once a week,” And then by the end of February or start of March, 9 times out of 10 people have stopped whatever their New Year’s resolution was, and the reason they do is, one, they’re not bought into it, there’s no emotional buy-in; but two, there’s no accountability. You don’t have to turn to someone and say, “Right, if I don’t achieve this every day, I want you to hold me account.” Because if you had someone standing next to you and if you go, “Uh, I’m not going to get up and go train. I’m going to roll over and go sleep and then go, no, no, no, you have to get up and do this because...” You probably would, you go, “Yeah, yeah, okay.” And then once you’ve done it, you’d feel good about it and you’d get into that habitual behaviour of doing it.
So, accountability either to your coach, to somebody around you, to your partner or your best friend is something that we need to build into our strategy, so that when things are tough, it’s not only us we’ve got to answer to. We’ve got to answer that person we’re accountable to. So building that accountability process into your strategy is your insurance ticket to keep you on track. It’s much easier to lie to yourself and say, “Okay, I’ll run twice tomorrow,” than it is to turn over and say it to the partner next to you, “It’s okay. I’ll run twice tomorrow,” and they go, “No, you won’t. You know, you won’t.” If you really want that end objective, then you’ll get up, put those shoes on and you’d run those K’s. “Okay. Alright. I’ll do that. I’ll get up and do that right now. You’re right. You’re right.” So the accountability process is, again, having an insurance policy to keep us on track.
The final step is calibration – because it doesn’t matter how good we are, we can stand here in January and think about our objective in December and we won’t always get it perfect. There may be something that comes up, maybe an injury, maybe another avenue, maybe another selection, or the rules in the game may change. So things are going to happen somewhere between month 1 and month 12. So we need to be able to consistently calibrate and that means every single I try to get them to do it every week, my clients, if not, at least once month, to look at what’s working with you, am I on track? Is this working? Is this still heading towards my end objective? Are my parameters still the same as when I started? Are the game rules still the same? If they are, fantastic. Keep doing what I’m doing. If they’re not, then we’ve got to have that behavioural flexibility to go, “Right, I need to go around this and get back on track.” We calibrate. And I say let’s assess, adjust, and apply. So we assess what we’re doing, we adjust what we need to adjust, and then we apply that.
And then we get into triple R, which is: Reassess, Readjust, and Reapply. And we consistently do that as frequently as we possibly can. The more often we assess, adjust and reapply, the more often we are confident we’re on track. If we don’t calibrate to every three months or wait until a competition comes along, often that’s too late. We’ve had the wobbly wheels that we could have adjusted and actually now what we’ve done is re-route and we’re on our way down the embankment, waiting for ourselves to crash. And that’s a much harder place to correct ourselves from. People often correct themselves when they’ve crashed, when things have gone really, had a really bad competition, or they’ve gone out to perform and they’ve really underperformed and they’ve tried to correct it there and then. Well in reality all you’re trying to do is rebuild your broken parts. It’s very, very difficult to get an efficient system from a crash site. What we want to be able to do is get back on track and adjust from somewhere that’s stable and consistent and we do that by calibration.
So there are the six parts to setting up a really efficient, effective, and outstanding season. We start off by looking at knowing exactly what it is you want to achieve, what is your big end step objective, knowing exactly what it looked like by being precise. Know what you’re going to get. Know what the value of that is, why is that important to you. Make sure it’s big enough to drive you forward and drag you forward but realistic enough to make sure that you can achieve it if you put it all in the gear. Then we look at collecting and collating the data from last year and previous years so we know what worked, what didn’t work, what we’d do different. We can replicate what worked, we can eliminate what didn’t and we can use the evolution of, okay, how do I do this differently.
We then look at making sure we had the emotional buy-in and making sure that we knew what we need to do in order to get what we want. Our wants are our emotional buy-in, our needs are our action steps to get them. If you want something big enough, you’ll do what you need to do to get it. If you don’t, then you didn’t want it big enough in the first place. And that’s something, when you look at previous seasons, you might go, “You know what, I wanted to be on that team but I wasn’t prepared to get up out of bed in the morning at 5 and run that extra few Ks. So you know what, maybe I didn’t want it as much as I thought I did. However, this year, I know I want it. So I’m prepared to do that. I’m prepared to take those action steps to get there.”
Then we look at the decision matrix, the stepping stone, the template we use to build our action plan. We look at the end step being our big driver and working backwards from there. We look at the rewards process, so that we know that every time we hit a goal along the way, it drives us forward. It gives that chemical compound in our brain that goes “Ppffooo, that was fantastic, I want that again.” And again, we look at the action steps, what do I need to do to go from step one to step two. And then how do I go from step two to step three. What’s my action steps.
We then look at accountability. Now, accountability is who do I tell what I’m supposed to be doing – is it my coach, is it my partner, is it my best friend, is it the association I compete for? Who’s going to hold you best account, making sure that you stick to your plan and stay on track. And the last step was the triple A – Assess, Adjust, Apply. Then the triple R – Reassess, Readjust, Reapply.
If we stick to that strategy, that format, we’re going to have the best season we’ve ever had. Everything is in there for you to know exactly what you need to do to get what you want at the end. By following this strategy, compartmentalising it right down to chewable chunks, you can account for every step. You can make sure that you feel good about it. Every step that you go along, you get rewarded. Every step you go along, you get acknowledgment either internally or externally. And you break that big elephant right the way down into chewable chunks.
So I hope you’ve got a lot from this and look at the way your season is at in front of you and what you can do to make your dreams come true, to get your end objective, the things that you’ve been wanting to achieve – selection, championships, be on the right team, learn certain skills, whatever it is for you.
Until the next episode of Brain in The Game. Train hard and enjoy the ride. My name is Dave Diggle and I’m the mind coach.
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