Positive Thinking vs. Effective Thinking

Up to this point in your athletic career you have excelled at your respective sports. You would not be playing at this level if you didn’t figure out a way to adapt to whatever the game throws at you, overcome the challenge in front of you and improvise to find a way to succeed. This week I want to speak specifically about how thinking effectively will increase your ability to ADAPT, IMPROVISE & OVERCOME!

Your ability to adapt is strongly related to your ability to think effectively. As Dan explained last week, our thoughts can be the difference between success and failure. We all know that thinking positively can have a major effect on how we perform. There are countless research articles documenting the benefits of a positive mindset. But let’s be real, things aren’t always positive. Things aren’t always great. You WILL be challenged and WILL face defeat. This is why we play our sports, to be challenged and to see what we are made of.

As an athlete, the last thing I want to hear after facing defeat is, “Everything is going to be okay”, while I am thinking to myself, “We just got our asses kicked!”. During the moment when we are challenged is when we need to transition from positive thinking to effective thinking. When we are thinking effectively our default mindset is ABSOLUTE CONFIDENCE. An unshakeable belief that no matter what happens we will keep fighting to achieve what we set out to achieve. This mindset will keep you working and keep you and your team motivated. You have adapted the ability to deal with stress. It has come through the countless hours of training and competitions that you have undergone.

This type of resiliency will translate to all areas of your life. In sport and in life effective thinking involves a proactive approach to embracing reality - embracing what IS. Not simply searching for another “better” reality, one in which you don’t have to adapt to and overcome the challenges before us. WE should know that the more time that we spend disconnected from the challenges the more time we face not working towards our goal. This is particularly important in sport when success is a matter of inches and seconds. As your season progresses look the challenge right in the eye and adapt, improvise and overcome.

Until the next time, stay believing!