Belief

One of the biggest things that I have learnt over the past year, all throughout my life but particularly sport is that you have to be able to believe in yourself. You can achieve amazing things when you actually have faith in yourself. I know it sounds so clichéd, but my biggest learning curve was when I actually accepted that it is true!

The most important belief you can have is self belief! How is anyone else supposed to believe in you if you cannot even believe in yourself? It is a battle but once you get past it, you will be so amazed! One of the hardest things about self belief is getting it. You may always say you can do what you want to, but you actually have to feel it too. And once you feel it, you will begin the struggle to keep belief in yourself. People will come along and try knock it away from you, and try to quash your self belief because they don’t have any, but you can’t let them have it! 

You will also gain more confidence if you are able to gain the belief of those around you, your teammates, coaches and support staff. When they trust you to take on anything, you know that if you are not up to the challenge, they will be there to have your back. However, this is not always necessary. Sometimes when people don’t believe in you it can become easier to achieve what you want to. I find that if I am told I won’t be able to do something it makes me want it that much more!

Another key thing to self belief is goal setting. As I have already mentioned in one of my other blogs, it is important that you are able to set realistic measureable goals in order to gain your self confidence. If you set goals that are too high you will continue to fail and become down on yourself, and if you set goals that you can’t measure then you will never feel like you get anywhere. The biggest thing that taught me self belief was hard work! Although not the most talented, I always knew I could do what I wanted, but when I started putting in the hard yards I began to gain what I had always wanted.

 

I want to end by saying I have had a wonderful semester, and creating these blogs has helped me to express who I am and what I believe in. I will leave with a quote that Keith said to me that I will never forget:

“Give yourself permission to succeed! “

Superstitions

I have a large number of pre-game superstitions, and I know in my head that it doesn’t matter what colour apple I eat for breakfast the morning before a game, but I just can’t help but have to stick to it each week. People I know think I am completely crazy for the things I do before a game, but all of these small things help to relax me and help me to prepare myself for the game. The role that superstitions play is up to the individual. Some people have none at all, and just do whatever they need to do before a game, others have a few to help them prepare, and then there are people like me that have all the stupid ones under the sun. As I spoke about in a previous week, some athletes require a routine to help them and relax into a game. I am one of those people. The first of my annoying pre-game rituals is that I need to have a red powerade the night before a game, and a blue powerade and a long black before the game. I feel as though I have to eat my cereal out of a Tupperware container, I can only eat a green apple the day of a game, and I like to have a fresh coat of paint on my nails the night before. If that wasn’t enough, I need to strap my own ankle, but get the trainer to strap my thumb, and I cannot put my socks and boots on before my strapping is completely finished. Oh, and I always put my left sock and boot on first. Crazy I know, but having routines like these help me to be able to mentally prepare myself long before I start preparing my body.

When you are coaching athletes that have habits like these, you do not need to encourage or discourage them. The athletes can decide this for themselves whether it is worthwhile continuing or not. The only time you should step in is if it becomes far too hard to manage. If the person cannot go to the same newsagency for their morning paper for example, and they begin to freak out, that is when you know it has gotten out of hand.

But hey, there’s nothing wrong with a red apple the night before a game ;)