There is a false assumption that “only losers fail” and “winners always win”. When you look at high achievers in athletics (and throughout other industries for that matter), they have all failed at some point. The difference between them and others, is that they learned from their mistakes, made adjustments, and went on to be successful.
Examples can be taken frkm Michael Jordan not making his Varsity High School basketball team, Bill Gates’ and Paul Allen’s first business venture that failed, Steve Jobs’ failure with Next computers, Pete Carroll’s failed attempts at his first NFL head coaching jobs, and so on.
In each of these cases, they gained new insight as to what did not work, and applied it appropriately to their work. Ahletes must do the same. We may not be able to always avoid making mistakes, lest we risk ending up over thinking. In athletics, that often means you will not play as fast as you possibly can.
Instead, our method must be to attack. When you fail, learn what to adjust, and then attack. When you perform, you must be aggressive, you allow your body to operate at its highest level by eliminating the thinking process and trusting your instincts. You process, when you evaluate and learn something new. You only have the opportunity to play sports competitively, for such a small portion of your life–so do not waste time second guessing yourself and trying to get everything right…just play!
The root of over thinking, is fear. Fear of failing, and letting people down. We must look at failure as a positive step towards achieving our goals. In this way, we can be positive when we fail and learn rather than allow it to affect us negatively.
“Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill
Sincerely,
Donny Mateaki& the DM Athletics Team
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