‘Stop Crying Or I Will Give You Something To Cry About” - Generation X Dads.
Recently my daughter was born, this has been a catalyst for some growth in areas of my life that weren’t possible before and I thought I would share a story of challenge.
Every baby has fussy days, not fussy days and plain old grumpy days, days of endless crying usually from being tired or from an upset stomach, this story is from one of those days.
We had decided to stay in for the day, it had been a long week of work for me and I was tired, the kind of tired a Netflix and couch day will often fix, today was not that day. Olive was not having the kind of day where she was all smiles, she was grumpy, refusing to go to sleep and not even the boob could settle her down. We decided to go for a drive, she always sleeps in the car, in this case long enough to get the energy to cry again.
We had been driving for about 1.5hrs and she woke up, not impressed with life and the crying began. Over the course of the next hour I felt myself get more and more worked up, like anxiety, frustration, and anger all building, welling up inside me. I began to feel hot, like the car was stifling me and I just wanted to yell.
So let’s look at the facts.
She was warm and dry
She was in a comfortable seat
She was fed
She has parents that love her.
She had nothing to be crying about. and this is where the narrative start.
“You have nothing to cry about, If you’re going to keep crying I will give you something to cry about”.
For me, when i’m struggle with something Im trying to process information I internalise, I shut down, stop talking, this is what was happening, its not good for relationships to do this but I know if I get a few minutes to myself I can work it out then discussion with Mur really helps..
In this case, I was deeply internally frustrated, the conditioning of my past had been triggered.
The thing with conditioning is it inter generational, it or parts of it are passed from one family member down to their children, onto their children’s children and on until someone identifies it, accepts responsibility for it and works through it. So you can either get angry at your parents or you can realise that they were probably conditioned to the same stimulus from their parents, we can’t always point to where it started but we can choose where it ends.
After making this connection to my past, I felt relieved, the pressure that had built up inside me to the point of wanting to explode was draining away, I knew why the pressure was there and I was able to let it go, that button that was there to be pushed had been removed and I felt calm.
But the athlete, how does this story relate to the athletic endeavour?
How you see the world, how you are conditioned is how you will perform, it is both the limits of your performance ability and the driver which compels you to perform. There will be aspects of your life you are acutely aware of and there will be things going on that you cannot see and others you are not willing to see.
Your conditioning are your glass ceilings.
There are 2 parts to coaching, 1 is to improve technical and performance ability and the second is to sometimes bring these conditionings to light if they are holding someone back, to create an awareness around them if the athlete is willing too and to help the athlete through them, it is the athletes responsibility to choose whether to work through them or not.
You cannot perform in a way that is incongruent with the way you see yourself. - maybe this was Zig Ziglar or Jim Rohn I cannot remember, if you know please tell me! google won’t haha.
The greatest athletes over time have conditioned themselves to see themselves as great athletes, we always hear of gratitude journals or how they use self talk to create the conditions within themselves to be able to perform in a way that they want to but I think this needs a 2 pronged approach.
To get to a place of understanding with your conditioning, it is neither positive or negative it just is. Its how you either respond or react to it that determines the outcome.
To start to create your own conditioning for yourself, how you want to see yourself, how you want too perform. Who do you want to be? Maybe you can’t answer this question but everyone can answer the opposite, who do you not want to be? this will give you the foundation for change, it identify your areas for growth you choose growth in.
I love to talk about these topics so if you have comments or want to talk in person please shoot me a message!
