What's better than perfect? Open to find out.
May 20, 2021 3:31 pm
Hi
Late in the season I am seeing more athletes recovering from injury. The video below details your essential first step to a successful recovery.
The #1 issue I help athletes and other high performers overcome is performance anxiety. Perfectionism often plays a role. Check out the post below if perfectionism is getting in your way, keeping you from excellence.
As always, I'd love to help with individual consulting and inside Success Stories Membership.
Be great today,
Dr Eddie
Overcoming Pain & Injury
Obstacle: Pain & Injury
Unfortunately, EVERY athlete will have this obstacle at some point. How you respond to it is a critical part of your training. The first challenge is doubt in healed body part. Too often I see athletes with medical clearance who still have lingering fears about their health status. They misinterpret safe rehabilitation pain as harmful injury pain. Others worry their body is not ready to be stressed again by exercise or sport drills. This leads to caution and actually increases the risk of re-injury.
How to Overcome:
Before rehabilitation begins, you must be confident in your medical healing and safety in movement. Talk to your surgeon, doctor, or athletic trainer and ask ALL the questions you have about the status of your injury. Let them explain if something doesn’t feel right: which pains are benign and expected to feel as you return to activity and which are signs of over-doing it. There is a difference between hurt and harm. And it is up to you to be confident in knowing that difference so you can fully engage your rehabilitation and maximize your healing.
Check out “The Psychology of Performance: How to Be Your Best in Life” at www.thegreatcourses.com/dreddieoconnor for the 18th lesson, “Pain Tolerance & Injury Rehabilitation” and 23 other sport psychology topics that will enhance your performance!
Want to be Perfect?
You want to be perfect. You obsess about the details. Mistakes drive you crazy. You know “no one is perfect” but that won’t stop you from trying.
Your performance is important to you. You have high standards, and you don’t want to let anyone down.
And let’s be honest… your perfectionism is getting you results. At least it used to.
But now your performance is starting to suffer. Your anxiety has you more focused on avoiding mistakes than making plays. Worry keeps you up at night interfering with sleep. Your sport/activity just isn’t fun anymore.
This is the dark side of perfectionism. While it can drive you up to a point, without embracing failures it becomes the enemy of excellence.
Failure is a necessary part of growth. There is no learning without mistakes.
I’m going to say it again for the people in the back … there is no growth without mistakes.
As a perfectionist, you don’t have to like it. But you do have to get used to it and use failure to your advantage. Otherwise, you will fall further and further from your perfectionistic ideal.
Strange, isn’t it?
The more you accept mistakes and failure as part of the process, the closer to perfection you will actually become.
🥇If you’d like help overcoming perfectionism, individual consulting is available at https://dreddieoconnor.com/telehealth-services
🥈 Learn how to best handle mistakes in Success Stories Membership, moving from perfectionism to consistent excellence and growth at https://dreddieoconnor.com/membership
Dr. Eddie O’Connor
