What To Do When A Person Won't Let Go Of Their Pain

Do you know someone, maybe a performer, golfer (or someone else) in emotional pain? Maybe it's coming out as being in a slump, choking under pressure, withdrawing from performance, competition, friends, or even quitting their career. It's a problem with their mental game, it's holding them back and you'd think they want relief. But, they rebuff efforts to help them, perhaps even sabotaging suggestions or solutions.

They may say (or show) how bad they feel and how much they want to overcome it, or they may just suffer in silence. It's especially difficult to deal with if it is a friend or loved one.

What can help is to understand that what they are doing doesn't make sense analytically (they may even understand that). What I often hear from the people I work with is that it's like part of them wants relief and another part is holding them back. That is absolutely true. What's holding them back are beliefs, which are driven by powerful emotions such as anger, fear, sadness or guilt.

How can that hold them back? An example is a fear of change. If someone is free of what's been holding them back (or can finally control it) then their life will be different. Maybe they can rise to the next level or get back to where they used to be. Their identity will change, both in their own eyes and the eyes of those around them. People won't be as solicitous or helpful (especially the competition or media). Make no mistake, that can scare the heck out of people and many times they will do anything to maintain their status quo, as painful as it may be.

If you live, work with, or represent them, then what you can do to help them is understand, first, you can't force another person to change. Telling them how to solve their problem won't work, they probably already know what to do. Platitudes or motivational quotes (such as just do it, suck it up, things will get better, keep your chin up, everything happens for a reason, every dark cloud has a silver lining, etc.) won't work either (they usually just aggravate the person you are talking to). Remember, it's a problem with their belief system and trying to solve it analytically won't work.

They may feel better if allowed to vent, but it's your choice whether to listen (and it can be frustrating to listen to the same thing over and over when they aren't doing anything about it).

The bottom line, though (and I run into this with my clients) is that it's up to them. You can be supportive and encouraging but, ultimately, it is their choice. The best thing you can do to help them (and yourself) is to let them be who they are and avoid taking responsibility for what they do and how they think and feel.

David Kenward - The Mental Coach
(916) 802-5897

Three ways to get past grief that's holding you back

The reason people can't get past grief is that they have unfinished business stored deep in their belief system. For some reason, that belief system - driven by a powerful emotion or feeling such as anger, fear, sadness, pain or guilt - is stopping them from letting go.

Justin Rose shows power of golf mental game self talk

Justin Rose (and his ailing shoulder) was featured in an article written by Rex Hoggard on golfchannel.com. In that article was a CRUCIAL aspect of the mental game - what we say to ourselves (AKA self talk) and whether we take ownership of what's negative in our lives.

Here's what I mean. How many times have you heard a golfer (or anyone) talk about "their" slump or yips, "their" problem with their swing, etc. Or they say something like, "I always bogey on the XX hole at XX golf course"

What that self talk does is reinforce to their belief system that they have a problem - that they own it - and we are taught as a society NOT to give up what belongs to us. That kind of self talk makes it really hard to let the problem go, even if we want to.

The article referred to Justin Rose's "ailing shoulder" but Rose was quoted as referring to it as "a little something."

That reinforces, to him, that it is just a bump in the road he'll get past, not a roadblock.

You can do this, too. Be aware of your language, and even one simple change: "my" to "the" can send a powerful message to yourself, because our mind is always listening. That's an important part of the mental game and it's easy to do.
--------------
Here's the link to the golfchannel.com article

Please comment to tell me what you think or contact me with any questions.

Did Peyton Manning Lose His Mental Game?

Peyton Manning and the Bronco's were ready to play an awesome Super Bowl against the Seattle Seahawks, but then something happened. Manning missed the first snap of the game.

As Lindsay H. Jones of USA Today Sports noted, "...the bad snap was the moment that seemed to change so much for Manning, who on Saturday night received his fifth NFL MVP award."

From a mental game perspective, I totally agree. A player can build themselves up, can psych themselves up, and their confidence can spread like a wave, affecting the other players on the team, as well.

But, when something unexpected happens (like a bad snap that costs the team), unless the player is able to dump that negative experience, it can derail them.

I believe that's what happened. It's kind of like a stack of cans, you pull out the right one, they all fall down. And the quarterback's attitude drives the team. If he starts second-guessing himself, or makes mistake after mistake, the team expects that it will all roll downhill and they will suffer, also.

Since it's impossible to anticipate every negative event, what *can* be done is to build a mechanism to let go of the emotional effect of mistakes, bad luck and anything else that's not directly related to moving the ball forward and scoring.

Then the player is in charge of their mental game and is not subject to being controlled by it.