NORWOOD'S BLOG

That feeling of satisfaction after a win (especially when you really need one) is really nice. It’s such a release. The tensions that build and the anticipation of the contest are over. The troops fought well and victory is yours. Sounds pretty awesome huh? The let down here is that it only last but for a short time. Losing on the other hand tends to stick with you a little bit longer. It’s like a Chuck Norris round house to the gut and the pain just takes too long to go away.

So here we have two very different feelings, the high of victory and the low of defeat. Some teams experience a little bit of each. Elite teams experience mostly the high, and poor teams experience mostly the low. So what does it take to have more of that good feeling that we are after and stay away from that Chuck Norris round house? Persistence, determination, and self discipline: These are the ingredients to reaching our goals. Do we have goals? Of course, our goal is to win a Conference Championship this season.  To be the best, one must have the persistence, determination, and self discipline to stay on the path we have created or to purposefully change it. Why would you change the path you ask?  To purposefully change your direction is perfectly ok, if you determine that your original direction or actions need to be adjusted in order to attain your goal. Change for a purpose is okay. What is not okay is to drift off from your direction because of lack of persistence, determination and self discipline. Drifting is synonymous with failure.

Now that we know the ingredients to success, how do we use them? The following points can help us on our journey.

·         Be as mentally tough as possible. Have a vision in your head of yourself achieving your goal. Play that vision over and over to yourself in your head every chance you get. Visualize your obstacles and how you will overcome them. Having a strong mental vision of achieving your goal will build a strong foundation for having persistence and self discipline.

·         Make progress every day. This can come in a variety of ways.  First in the classroom, at practice and at home. In the classroom, making good grades and staying eligible is progress.  This is vital, without this you cannot work toward the other goals. If you practice as hard as you can every time you step on the mat, that’s progress. If you do extra training at home and in the off season, that’s progress. Progress must become habit.

·         If you begin to drift on the path, find out why. Assess the situation, perhaps it’s time to change your path, or tweak what you’re doing in order to get the desired results.

·         Place the team first and be a team guy. Your teammates are your most important ally. Work to build this goal with your teammates.  Only with them can we achieve it.

·         When you fail, (and at some point you will) Get up, get back on the path, and stay the course!

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 23rd, 2010 at 10:21 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.