The Stage of Mental Development in Sports-Part 3(Development Coaches)

When we were born, we came along with the passion to learn. Just observe beautiful babies. They don't worry about making mistakes or humiliating themselves. With enthusiasm to learn after seeing adults walking, they crawl, they walk, they fall, and they get up and jostle forward. They were never discouraged by failures nor do they think they were failing. These beautiful babies only thought they were learning.

What babies have shown us is the hallmark of successful people in all fields i.e sports, business, academics, etc. That is constantly learning, learning and learning. For these successful people, failure is an opportunity to learn.

Basically what I'm trying to tell to all development coaches is that children are born with a growth mindset. A mindset that finds success in learning and improving, not just winning. To be a successful child is every child's dream.

New research had shown that the brain is more like muscle-it changes and gets stronger when you learn. These tiny connections in the brain actually multiply when you challenge your mind to learn. The more you learn, the more your brain cells grow.

For development coaches, it's a challenge as you are in an environment that worships success more than anything else. Success or failure of these children is played in front of crowds, published in the newspapers and written into the record books. On top of this, your job rest on producing winners.

Never let such an environment to shape you. As a coach, you are entrusted to guide these children. Be a coach that is always a concern and care about these children's progress in sports and academic. Guide them in learning techniques and skills, and practice them regularly. Learning and improving is your main focus.

The metaphor of two sides of a coin can also be applied to coaching i.e a growth mindset coach and a fixed mindset coach. Put simply, a fixed mindset coach is more concerned about his reputation and pride, and as for the growth mindset coach, he is selfless. He has the passion and patience to develop a child's mindset; a mindset that will thrive in facing challenges in life.
(will cover more extensive this topic after completing these articles)

There is a common adage in sports, that is, "Sports is Life and Life is Sport" which I believe means whatever you learn in sports will be an asset in your life. And two values from sports that will keep you going in life when the going gets tough are perseverance and resilience, as the popular saying in sport, " When the going gets tough, the tough gets going." 

Children are our future. Be a good development coach who continues to learn along with the children. Remember, when your development program embodies excellence, the child's learning capacity is infinite and when your development program embodies mediocrity, the child's learning capacity is finite.




Thank You.

Note: some of the above facts were sourced from the book written by Carol S. Dweck Ph.D.: Mindset-The New Psychology Of Success.