Ben Crowe is a mindset coach who has worked with Ash Barty, Steph Gilmore, Dylan Alcott and the Richmond Football Club. He is a former sports marketing director for Nike and after observing high level sports and business people he recognised a pattern in the athletes/people he worked with - many were struggling under the pressure of external validation, be it from winning, making money, achieving social or corporate status.
He challenges you to answer the following questions honestly. Write them down. They do not have to be sport related at all.
1. What kind of human do you want to be? Think about who you are at your absolute best. 2. What do you want to do / achieve? 3. Now ‘join the dots’ between the way you want to be and the things you love to do.
He defines success as the ability to focus on those words, not necessarily the ‘achievement’. It’s easy to get distracted by the result and not enjoy the process along the way. “Instead, by focusing our attention on what we can control, like who we want to be, we remove external “distractions” and can focus without fear.”
As athletes, employers, employees, family people, I challenge you to answer the three questions above. Write them down, share them with your coach, with another athlete or with someone you trust. It may be useful to talk this process through and have a level of accountability with another person.
