Speaker 1: Pushkin, Pushkin. This summer, Pushkin is going to the Olympics.
Speaker 1: Shows across the network have got all sorts of stories
Speaker 1: to share, including the latest on sports Science and What's
Speaker 1: Your Problem, a suite of swimmers on slight change of plans,
Speaker 1: a cautionary tales tale of how women had to literally
Speaker 1: fight to be allowed to run the marathon, and an
Speaker 1: epic season of revisionist history about why in nineteen thirty six,
Speaker 1: America participated in Hitler's Olympics. Here on the Happiness Lab,
Speaker 1: we've already spoken to an athlete who fell back in
Speaker 1: love with the sport she'd grown to hate, just in
Speaker 1: time to head off to the Paris Olympics. But we're
Speaker 1: not just interested in sporting stars. To get to the games,
Speaker 1: every athlete needs the help and advice of someone who
Speaker 1: shares their passion and commitment a coach.
Speaker 2: Oh man, this is such a special occasion for me.
Speaker 2: I've been a big span.
Speaker 1: It's always humbling to hear that someone is a fan.
Speaker 1: But I was absolutely over the moon when I found
Speaker 1: out how much this guest liked the show.
Speaker 2: I found your podcast and it resonated so much with
Speaker 2: me that we were sharing episodes of the Happiness Lab
Speaker 2: with the coaches we were working.
Speaker 1: With, because this expert doesn't just work with any old coaches.
Speaker 1: We put these episodes out there, but we don't really
Speaker 1: know who is listening to them. And to find out
Speaker 1: that someone who is actually working in behavioral science with
Speaker 1: Team USA, who would be like our affecting our Olympias
Speaker 1: at our paralympiads like this is amazing.
Speaker 2: You've got many more listeners now from Team USA because
Speaker 2: of the work that you've been doing.
Speaker 1: Christine Bulger is the Associate Director for Coaching at the
Speaker 1: United States Olympic and Para Olympic Committee, helping to train
Speaker 1: some of the finest athletic trainers on the planet.
Speaker 2: We certainly do have some of the best coaches in
Speaker 2: the world who are at the top of their game,
Speaker 2: who have been there for decades in some cases and
Speaker 2: crank out either fantastically gifted performing athletes or teams or both. Sometimes.
Speaker 1: Christine works with trainers across so many sports, archerie badmint
Speaker 1: and baseball, boxing, bob sled, cricket, curling, diving, fencing, golf, gymnastics, judosurfing, swimming, weightlifting,
Speaker 1: wheelchair basketball, wrestling, and even yachting.
Speaker 2: Coaching's coaching regardless of if you're coaching cycling or swimming
Speaker 2: or some snowsport. But what we try to do is
Speaker 2: cultivate the skills and information that cut across as many
Speaker 2: sports as possible. Leadership, communication, care planning, just the things
Speaker 2: that will resonate with every coach. And it can look
Speaker 2: different in different contexts in different sports, but those are
Speaker 2: the pieces that we as USOBC grab onto.
Speaker 1: I was shocked at how new this kind of coaching
Speaker 1: education is. The US Olympic Committee was founded way back
Speaker 1: in eighteen ninety four, but the group only got around
Speaker 1: to publishing its Quality Coaching Framework in twenty seventeen. Unlike
Speaker 1: say school team, most US coaches, even at the Olympic level,
Speaker 1: don't receive special instruction on how to coach.
Speaker 2: There's no requirements for coaches to go through any specific
Speaker 2: type of training. For the most part, we now do
Speaker 2: safe Sport to ensure that they do background checks and
Speaker 2: things like that, and I think first DAID and CPR
Speaker 2: tend to be pretty standard now. But really anybody can
Speaker 2: go out there and coach, so I think that there
Speaker 2: is a big risk without the proper education and training
Speaker 2: and we say that so often that coaching isn't about
Speaker 2: sport necessarily as much as it is about working with people.
Speaker 2: And I think that that is part of what we're
Speaker 2: trying to help the coaches understand. If they're overtraining, if
Speaker 2: they're not listening to the athlete saying hey, I feel awe,
Speaker 2: they really have to have all their senses up so
Speaker 2: that they're able to know when to push no, when
Speaker 2: to pull back, no, when to change things, no, when
Speaker 2: to take a day off, no, when to get out
Speaker 2: of the training facility and just try to learn and
Speaker 2: get better in a different context. Yeah, it's just it's
Speaker 2: so much self awareness and being totally in tune with
Speaker 2: the people you're working with and listening to feedback from
Speaker 2: the athletes from your coaching staff.
Speaker 1: But Christian's goal isn't just to improve the experience of
Speaker 1: the athletes. She's also concerned about the well being of
Speaker 1: the coaches themselves, which thus far has been pretty neglected.
Speaker 1: It's far from being an easy or a secure job.
Speaker 2: We have some coaches that rely on athletes to secure
Speaker 2: an income, where if they don't have the athletes, they
Speaker 2: don't put food on the table. There could be some
Speaker 2: that don't have that proper health care individually, and if
Speaker 2: their spouse doesn't have what they need, then you know,
Speaker 2: they're kind of just like growing day to day hoping
Speaker 2: that I don't get sick.
Speaker 1: What are the kind of mental health challenges that coaches
Speaker 1: go through all the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, certainly the pressure to win at the elite level.
Speaker 2: If you're not winning across pro sports, across TMOSA, then
Speaker 2: you're probably not going to keep your job for very long.
Speaker 2: So that in itself is enough of a stressor to
Speaker 2: put just so much pressure on yourself that all you're
Speaker 2: focused on is working, doing more, staying up watching tapes,
Speaker 2: you know, skipping meals because that gives you another opportunity
Speaker 2: fifteen to sixty minutes to do more work and put
Speaker 2: it in there. So after a while, that takes a toll.
Speaker 1: And what are some of the strains that coaches face
Speaker 1: when it comes to their own personal relationships and their
Speaker 1: family ties.
Speaker 2: Oh boy, we worked with a coach who was on
Speaker 2: tour for a winter sport that you know, was gone
Speaker 2: for two hundred days a year, that had young kids,
Speaker 2: you know, and that leaves their spouse home to take
Speaker 2: care of everything on their own. So there's the guilt
Speaker 2: factor too. You're missing your spouse, you're missing your kids,
Speaker 2: you're missing your pets. They're so selfless most of the
Speaker 2: time that all they're thinking about are the athletes in
Speaker 2: front of them, and how can I help my athletes
Speaker 2: get better.
Speaker 1: It seems like another challenge that coaches face is that
Speaker 1: they're kind of the ones that are in some ways
Speaker 1: in charge of the performance, but they don't get to
Speaker 1: do it themselves. I know, as a faculty member, I've
Speaker 1: felt this that, like when I have to give my
Speaker 1: own talks, you know, that's nerve wracking and I get
Speaker 1: a little bit anxious about it. But when my student
Speaker 1: is giving a talk, I'm so much more anxious. And
Speaker 1: I feel like my students who are giving talks are
Speaker 1: just like giving a talk at some random conference. They're
Speaker 1: not like competing for a gold medal in front of
Speaker 1: millions of people. And so, you know, is this a
Speaker 1: particular challenge that coaches face.
Speaker 2: Oh, they're no different than you and your students. They
Speaker 2: lose control, especially those that competed as athletes themselves. They're like,
Speaker 2: I can't do anything. I'm just on the sidelines. I
Speaker 2: hope that all the preparation works and they do what
Speaker 2: they need to do, and if it doesn't, I'm gonna,
Speaker 2: you know, just tear my hair out. But you can
Speaker 2: only do so much and then it's out of your control.
Speaker 2: Like prepare them as well as you can, as best
Speaker 2: you can, and hope for the best. And I think
Speaker 2: that with social media, of course, that's going to come
Speaker 2: up in anything. You know, you lose a game or
Speaker 2: you do something wrong, even if it's one player, like
Speaker 2: that person should be fired because that was just a
Speaker 2: horrible situation, Like how can they possibly be considered a
Speaker 2: good coach? So I think the pressures are compounded, certainly
Speaker 2: by social media. I think that that takes a pretty
Speaker 2: special person to try to manage that and keep the
Speaker 2: level head when people are just at you all the time.
Speaker 1: It seems self evident that sports coaching, particularly at the
Speaker 1: elite level, is a stressful business. But as a teacher myself,
Speaker 1: I know that those of us went stry or others
Speaker 1: often think that we should be the ones with all
Speaker 1: the answers. One of the saddest ironies, says Team usa
Speaker 1: is New Guidelines, is that although coaches strive to provide
Speaker 1: an enjoyable and healthy experience for their athletes. Too often
Speaker 1: they approach their job in a manner that has the
Speaker 1: opposite effect on their own well being. Christine says that
Speaker 1: for that to change, coaches need to be okay with
Speaker 1: asking for help.
Speaker 2: So what we want them to do is be able
Speaker 2: to take better care of themselves ahead of time. That
Speaker 2: takes some vulnerability. We're trying to encourage coaches to make
Speaker 2: sure that they have somebody they're talking to that can
Speaker 2: relate to them. Might not be their same sport, might
Speaker 2: not be even in sport, but somebody that they can
Speaker 2: seek and trust and get some input into anything that
Speaker 2: they might be going through. And coaches, they aren't typically
Speaker 2: used to receiving feedback. They're used to giving feedback. So
Speaker 2: it takes a level of vulnerability for sure. We have
Speaker 2: to kind of help them understand that it's okay to
Speaker 2: ask for help, that it's okay to take a break
Speaker 2: every once in a while.
Speaker 3: I was talking to the GIRs for weightlifting coaches actually
Speaker 3: last night. Emily Lasanby also coaches the Hard Pressed Team
Speaker 3: USA coaches. There is a single mom of two young kids,
Speaker 3: and she's got one hundred athletes and she starts at
Speaker 3: four in the morning, and she goes until six pm
Speaker 3: at night, and at night she's got some time with
Speaker 3: her kids, and then she starts all over again because
Speaker 3: I don't have time for myself. I mean, that's a
Speaker 3: luxury and a privilege to me that I don't think
Speaker 3: I'm going to have in this phase of life for
Speaker 3: quite some time.
Speaker 1: Emily's work involves taking the kind of well being lessons
Speaker 1: you hear on the show and tailoring them to the
Speaker 1: needs of people just like that time starved weightlifting coach,
Speaker 1: so that they don't burn out or just quit the
Speaker 1: profession completely.
Speaker 3: Coaching is a field in an industry that has no net.
Speaker 3: There's no union, there's no government agency or anything there
Speaker 3: to support a coach when a performance doesn't happen from
Speaker 3: their athlete or from their team. It's very black and white.
Speaker 3: If they perform, then there's a high likelihood that the
Speaker 3: coach continues on in their role. And if the athlete
Speaker 3: isn't performing, then there's also the likelihood of not continuing.
Speaker 3: And so I think that there is a lot of
Speaker 3: pressure around not having that support net available to them,
Speaker 3: and it just adds to the entire pressure of having
Speaker 3: to stay optimized in a field.
Speaker 1: It's a tough industry to commit to and be part
Speaker 1: of long term. As a happiness scientist, I was really
Speaker 1: impressed reading the well being guidance Emily helped design. It
Speaker 1: specifically addresses the exact kind of stressors that coaches endure
Speaker 1: in their high performance job.
Speaker 3: You're spending your days basically filling everybody else's bucket, right,
Speaker 3: Everyone's needing you all the time. So to find the
Speaker 3: space to actually recover and experience deep breast is a
Speaker 3: very rare thing. So most of our coaches are operating
Speaker 3: either at an acute or chronic stress stage for as
Speaker 3: long as they possibly can. What are some strategies that
Speaker 3: coaches can use to kind of handle stress better. One
Speaker 3: of the first things that we haven't look at is
Speaker 3: is it enhancing?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 3: Many of us look at stress in terms of like,
Speaker 3: it's so bad, right, But if we're able to see
Speaker 3: stress as enhancing, I actually may be able to utilize
Speaker 3: this in a way and help me adapt and persist
Speaker 3: through what it is that I am facing right now,
Speaker 3: this particular challenge, and actually grow from it and maybe
Speaker 3: come out stronger from that adaptation. So I think it's
Speaker 3: sort of looking at what is this stress actually looking
Speaker 3: like in my life, and how do I need to
Speaker 3: approach it differently.
Speaker 1: Another strategy I know you've talked about in a lot
Speaker 1: of your materials is the importance of social connection. In
Speaker 1: one of the articles I read from your group, you
Speaker 1: had talked about filling your network with energy givers. You
Speaker 1: know what are energy givers and why can that be
Speaker 1: so important for helping you to manage stress?
Speaker 3: It's looking at who are the people that bring me
Speaker 3: the most joy? That may not be like completely filling
Speaker 3: up this battery that's depleted right now, but you know,
Speaker 3: who are the ones that I can count on that
Speaker 3: I know when I speak with and spend time with
Speaker 3: that they're there for me and show up for me
Speaker 3: in a way to where I walk away feeling energized.
Speaker 3: So it's surrounding yourself with the people that I think
Speaker 3: create the most energy, particularly during the harder phases of life,
Speaker 3: and maybe setting boundaries around those that tend to take away.
Speaker 3: We know that we're going to have to give a
Speaker 3: certain amount each day, so how is it that we
Speaker 3: can plan to offset that with those people that really
Speaker 3: boost us.
Speaker 1: When we need it. I think this is such a
Speaker 1: fabulous suggestion, because it's not just the idea that we
Speaker 1: talk about a lot in the podcast of kind of
Speaker 1: making sure you're getting social connection, but really kind of
Speaker 1: paying attention to the particular people you seek out and
Speaker 1: making sure those people are kind of the ones that
Speaker 1: are feeding you rather than depleting you over time. Another
Speaker 1: thing you talk a lot about is the importance of
Speaker 1: coaches getting daily physical activity, which felt a little bit
Speaker 1: ironic for me because in my brain, you know, these
Speaker 1: elite coaches are so focused on like exercise and weight
Speaker 1: training and so on, but it kind of sounds like
Speaker 1: that in their own lives these things may fall by
Speaker 1: the wayside in ways that I didn't expect, And so
Speaker 1: what are some of the important benefits of exercise and
Speaker 1: how do you get these busy coaches to get more
Speaker 1: of that kind of movement in their lives. So it's funny.
Speaker 3: So on my call last night with the weightlifting coaches,
Speaker 3: the majority of them their biggest struggle is movement. Some
Speaker 3: are like the stuff that I'm teaching every day, it's
Speaker 3: actually not unsurprising. That's like, just adding more of that
Speaker 3: to their day feels like more, and we want it
Speaker 3: to feel like less right, So it's figuring out I
Speaker 3: think utilizing movement as a way to help set a
Speaker 3: rhythm and a tone for the day. So it's less
Speaker 3: about being as fit as you possibly could be.
Speaker 1: If that's your goal, great, but it's more about.
Speaker 3: Utilizing movement as an asset to help you feel good,
Speaker 3: to help fuel your body and your brain to meet
Speaker 3: the challenges of the day, but then also feel good
Speaker 3: doing it right. And a lot of what we are
Speaker 3: exploring with coaches right now is looking at how they move,
Speaker 3: how they like to incorporate that into their day, when
Speaker 3: they like to do it, and how they utilize it
Speaker 3: as an asset for themselves rather than something that they
Speaker 3: feel like they have to do in order to reach
Speaker 3: some type of fitness goal.
Speaker 1: Another physical activity you talk about with coaches is the
Speaker 1: power of sleep. Why is sleep so essential and what
Speaker 1: are some of the strategies that you've suggested coaches engage
Speaker 1: with to make sure they're kind of protecting their shut eye.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's the number one for us, I'd say out
Speaker 3: of everything, nutrition, movement, stress, resilience. I mean, all of
Speaker 3: them are significant in their own ways, but as we know,
Speaker 3: the other stuff doesn't really go as well if we're
Speaker 3: not getting sleep. The interesting thing when it comes to
Speaker 3: the Olympic and Paralympic environment is that their sleep is
Speaker 3: a regular all the time. So do you have routines
Speaker 3: set in place that can help you reset after a
Speaker 3: bad night of sleep when sleep pressure has build to
Speaker 3: the point where you are not falling asleep when.
Speaker 1: You want to, or there's jet lag, or you're waking
Speaker 1: up in the night.
Speaker 3: So we teach that skill of all right, here's where
Speaker 3: I'm at today, here's what I can do, and all
Speaker 3: of that is okay, and it's still going to be
Speaker 3: the best I can give. And here's how I'm going
Speaker 3: to reset tonight. And so it's creating that ability to reset.
Speaker 1: Rather than set, Like, what are some of the things
Speaker 1: you suggest for coaches who need to figure out a
Speaker 1: way to reset better? I love Matt Walker's approach to sleep,
Speaker 1: like approaching sleep as if you were landing a plane.
Speaker 1: So we often approach it as if it's like a
Speaker 1: light switch, where it's just all right, I'm going to
Speaker 1: lay down and I got to sleep with in thirty seconds,
Speaker 1: whereas our body and our brain needs that time to
Speaker 1: take the sleep pressure that we've built that day to
Speaker 1: then get it into a place where we're falling into sleep,
Speaker 1: and that can take some time.
Speaker 3: And I love that approach in terms of figuring out
Speaker 3: what that time looks like for you, whether it's thirty
Speaker 3: minutes or sixty minutes or two hours, you know, whatever
Speaker 3: it is that you tend to do, you know, warm
Speaker 3: showers at night, dark room, cool room, no screens, that
Speaker 3: kind of thing, or putting the screen on the opposite
Speaker 3: side of the bedroom so that you don't reach and
Speaker 3: grab it in the middle of the night and you
Speaker 3: look up and there.
Speaker 1: Everything is waiting for you.
Speaker 3: I think all of those have been really wonderful critical
Speaker 3: experiments for us all to play around with to see,
Speaker 3: all right, what is it that really works for me.
Speaker 3: One of the challenges for coaches in terms of protecting
Speaker 3: their well being and sort of maintaining self care is
Speaker 3: that they're kind of in this mode of wanting to
Speaker 3: do it perfectly. They want to, like, you know, have
Speaker 3: the perfect sleep and the perfect nutrition and the perfect exercise.
Speaker 3: But you're talking about these tiny tips that allow you
Speaker 3: to do these sort of things a little bit imperfectly
Speaker 3: but continuously, and so explain why these small additions of
Speaker 3: self care can add up over time in these important ways,
Speaker 3: like why is that so essential to remember that even
Speaker 3: the kind of imperfect attempts at getting some more self
Speaker 3: care can be really critical because I think that's life, right,
Speaker 3: and I think it's a really wonderful way to look
Speaker 3: at it in terms of, all, right, I have some
Speaker 3: agency here to really experiment with.
Speaker 2: Here's what I know.
Speaker 3: What works with me when stuff's hit the fan, right,
Speaker 3: And you know, here's I know what works for me
Speaker 3: when I have a little bit more time to myself
Speaker 3: to recover. It's adapting between you know, your resource pool
Speaker 3: and the challenges that you face every single day. And
Speaker 3: it's the seesaw back and forth of I'm facing this challenge,
Speaker 3: so what do I need to do to offset that.
Speaker 1: I think one of the problems with self care is
Speaker 1: you feel like it has to be one hundred percent.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know, I go through this in my
Speaker 1: own way. You know, I'll be like, you know, this
Speaker 1: is the week that I'm going to get to the gym,
Speaker 1: and you know, Monday, I'll get to the gym, and
Speaker 1: then Tuesday miss out. I was like, well, I've already
Speaker 1: messed up, right, But It's like, no, just one day
Speaker 1: at the gym is better than zero days at the gym.
Speaker 1: Twenty minutes of extra good sleep is better than zero
Speaker 1: minutes of extra good sleep. We sometimes think this has
Speaker 1: to be all or none, and I imagine that in
Speaker 1: high performance individuals like coaches, that's even worse.
Speaker 3: I think it comes down to the ability to look
Speaker 3: at what you're leveraging that day as optimal. Right, So,
Speaker 3: all right, I got four hours of sleep last night.
Speaker 3: I've got ten athletes that I need to coach today,
Speaker 3: or I have a ten hour day that I need
Speaker 3: to get through. I'm at about thirty percent. But here's
Speaker 3: how I'm going to, you know, maximize this twenty five
Speaker 3: thirty percent to get through this day the best way
Speaker 3: that I can. To me, that's high performance. It may
Speaker 3: not be perfect, but it's excellence. And I think that's
Speaker 3: the difference, right, is we're not striving for perfection, we're
Speaker 3: striving for excellence and using the thirty percent that you
Speaker 3: have that day. To me, that's excellence and kind of
Speaker 3: recognizing that you're at thirty percent. And it strikes me
Speaker 3: this is another strategy that you work with coaches on
Speaker 3: a lot, which is just overcoming the stigma of not
Speaker 3: being perfect, like overcoming the stigma of recognizing that you're
Speaker 3: at thirty percent and you might need to ask for
Speaker 3: help or you might need to take a break. Why
Speaker 3: is calling a spade a spait and really recognizing where
Speaker 3: you're at so important? And what are some strategies we
Speaker 3: can use to kind of combat that sense that it
Speaker 3: can be sometimes hard to admit when you're struggling. I
Speaker 3: think the instinct is to avoid, right to just grind
Speaker 3: it out, get it done. So I think right now,
Speaker 3: well being can be tied to unrealistic optimism in a
Speaker 3: lot of ways, where we feel like perfection is part
Speaker 3: of that, but the realistic part of that is that
Speaker 3: you know, this is actually what I can do today,
Speaker 3: This is all I can do, and that's still a lot,
Speaker 3: and it's.
Speaker 1: Okay, and that's great.
Speaker 3: I really like the strategy because I think it's something
Speaker 3: that all of us can use right now. You know,
Speaker 3: we might not be Olympic coaches heading off to Paris,
Speaker 3: but I think all of us have times at work
Speaker 3: when things are a little bit busier, maybe times in
Speaker 3: the school year where you know, as a parent things
Speaker 3: feel more hectic. It sounds like the strategy is really
Speaker 3: like radical acceptance, kind of look at what things really
Speaker 3: are like and to ask the question, Okay, what am
Speaker 3: I going to be capable of? How can I build
Speaker 3: in self care?
Speaker 1: But maybe in a way that's more compassionate, maybe not
Speaker 1: beating myself up for not, I don't know, making the
Speaker 1: healthiest meals during the busiest time or keeping the house
Speaker 1: perfectly clean during the busiest time. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, here's the extent of what I can do here,
Speaker 3: and I'm okay with that right and accepting it for
Speaker 3: what it is and maybe labeling that as great performance.
Speaker 1: Of course, all these lessons aren't just vital for coaches.
Speaker 1: They apply equally well to ordinary folks like you and me.
Speaker 1: None of us can expect to turn in our personal
Speaker 1: best each and every day. Sometimes eighty percent might be
Speaker 1: the best week in muster under the circumstances, and that's okay.
Speaker 1: So what else can we all learn from the high
Speaker 1: pressure world of Olympic sports? The Happiness Lab will be
Speaker 1: back in a moment. You might not think you have
Speaker 1: that much in common with a Team USA coach. They
Speaker 1: can put their own lives on hold for years, endlessly traveling,
Speaker 1: missing family events, clogging long hours, all to help an
Speaker 1: athlete who might pull a muscle, drop a relay baton,
Speaker 1: or get a cold come race day. It's hard to
Speaker 1: think of a more stressful and unforgiving job, but their
Speaker 1: lives can be really instructive for the rest of us. Oh.
Speaker 2: I think that coaches just kind of like a microcosm
Speaker 2: of society for sure.
Speaker 1: Christine Bulger is part of the team that teaches well
Speaker 1: being fundamentals to America's Olympic and Para Olympic coaches. One
Speaker 1: core principle, a principle that applies just as much as
Speaker 1: it does to a high dive instructor or a volleyball
Speaker 1: team manager, is that you need to find your purpose.
Speaker 2: We talk a lot about finding your true north, like
Speaker 2: why do you coach? What's my why? And is it
Speaker 2: to be the best in the world. That's okay, you
Speaker 2: can be the best in the world while also be
Speaker 2: a good person. You want to know why you're out there,
Speaker 2: and it's not just to win all the time. It
Speaker 2: goes back to self awareness. Are you in this for yourself?
Speaker 2: For the athletes? And if the athlete needs a break
Speaker 2: or other support, then I think we need to find
Speaker 2: a way to do that. That's part of quality too, right,
Speaker 2: Like they're not machines, they're people, and I think we
Speaker 2: need to realize that even in the passion of competition,
Speaker 2: sometimes you just need to take a break, and that's
Speaker 2: got to be okay.
Speaker 1: Another strategy that lay people can learn from coaches is
Speaker 1: this important of delegating and asking for help, which, as
Speaker 1: I know something that your organization has tried to work
Speaker 1: with coaches on a lot more, you know, what's the
Speaker 1: importance of delegation and what can kind of lay people
Speaker 1: learn from what coaches have learned from doing this a
Speaker 1: little bit more often.
Speaker 2: I'm still learning how to delegate myself. I think you
Speaker 2: can bring people in in a way that makes them
Speaker 2: feel more valued if you give them a responsibility, and
Speaker 2: that means a lot because we're developing people, not just
Speaker 2: the athlete, but the team around you. So if I'm
Speaker 2: a head coach keeping everything close to my vest and
Speaker 2: not asking people to help me, that doesn't help anybody else,
Speaker 2: and eventually the system's going to break down because you
Speaker 2: just need that support system around you. So give people
Speaker 2: an opportunity to show them what they can do. Give
Speaker 2: them an opportunity to learn and maybe do it even
Speaker 2: better than you would have done it yourself.
Speaker 1: In the last episode, we Harn't for a British long
Speaker 1: distance runner, Georgia Bell. She was a great runner in
Speaker 1: her teens, but later on in college she found that
Speaker 1: the training regimen didn't really suit her. She was unhappy
Speaker 1: and picked up injuries and her times got worse and worse.
Speaker 4: I was perpetually injured in and out of boots because
Speaker 4: I had stress fractures, and so that just translated to
Speaker 4: not running as well on the track and not running
Speaker 4: as fast.
Speaker 1: I really wasn't enjoying it anymore.
Speaker 4: As the bottom line, it had gone from being something
Speaker 4: that I really loved and looked forward to racing and
Speaker 4: training to.
Speaker 1: I just kind of wait to be done with this.
Speaker 1: Georgia left the sport and only got back into running
Speaker 1: by accident when the COVID lockdown prompted her to dig
Speaker 1: out her old track shoes again. She's now competing at
Speaker 1: the Olympics thanks to a training program from a coach
Speaker 1: who listens far more to her individual needs.
Speaker 4: He's just been a fantastic coach, emotional support and guidance
Speaker 4: and yeah, I have full trust in him, and I
Speaker 4: think that's one of the things that has led to
Speaker 4: a lot of the success as well, and making a
Speaker 4: lot more decisions over my body and racing and training
Speaker 4: that I just felt like it didn't really have before,
Speaker 4: And that means that I just feel a lot more
Speaker 4: in control and enjoying it.
Speaker 1: A team USA, Christine Bulger teaches the kind of sensitive
Speaker 1: coaching that has helped Georgia so much. Christine thinks coaches,
Speaker 1: like the rest of us, need to put themselves in
Speaker 1: the shoes of the people around them so that we
Speaker 1: can try to see their perspective.
Speaker 2: Oh man, that goes back to having some self awareness,
Speaker 2: because if your athlete is just off, or you go
Speaker 2: in there and you're just in a bad mood, as
Speaker 2: the coach and the athletes kind of feel it like
Speaker 2: there's obviously something going on. You want to be able
Speaker 2: to be there for your athlete to the best of
Speaker 2: your ability. So if you're not connecting with them, if
Speaker 2: you don't understand what each other is feeling or doing
Speaker 2: or going through, you're not going to have as deep
Speaker 2: an understanding of how to get the best out of
Speaker 2: the athlete. They say, treat others as you would like
Speaker 2: to be treated. The one lesson that I've learned is
Speaker 2: that's not accurate treat others the way they'd like to
Speaker 2: be treated, because we're all individuals, and I think that
Speaker 2: that makes such a difference. You know, if I have
Speaker 2: to tell somebody seven different times how to do something,
Speaker 2: I'm clearly not articulating how I want them to do it.
Speaker 2: And that's a me thing, it's not a them thing.
Speaker 1: If you watch the games this summer, you'll probably see
Speaker 1: the metal ceremonies where elated sometimes tiary athletes have gold, silver,
Speaker 1: and bronze hung around their necks. You'll also see the
Speaker 1: leaderboards and medals tables, who's winning, who's ahead, and who's
Speaker 1: falling behind. In elite sports, coming first seems to be
Speaker 1: the only prize worth pursuing, but Christine is trying to
Speaker 1: widen what's perceived as success. She encourages coaches and athletes
Speaker 1: to feel a sense of accomplishment and gratitude for the
Speaker 1: entire journey and not.
Speaker 2: Justify the lap. For the athletes who participate in the
Speaker 2: Olympic and Paralympic Games, this might be a once in
Speaker 2: a lifetime. Usually it is a once in a lifetime opportunity,
Speaker 2: and it could last thirty seconds or three hours. Right,
Speaker 2: you might not have won that gold medal, you might
Speaker 2: not have pit the podium, but looked at everything that
Speaker 2: you accomplished, and even if it was a bunch of
Speaker 2: hard work just to make the team, not everybody gets
Speaker 2: to do that. I hope that the athletes realize what
Speaker 2: a fantastic accomplishment it is for them to achieve, even
Speaker 2: making the team and then going over to experience the games.
Speaker 2: And I think we have to think about that in
Speaker 2: our own lives. It's like, if you're the business person
Speaker 2: and you're selected to go to a business meeting, that's
Speaker 2: you reserved for the top one percent, Like that's an achievement.
Speaker 2: And I think that we have to remember, you know,
Speaker 2: give ourselves some credit for the work that we're doing,
Speaker 2: because if you accomplish your goal or you don't, you're
Speaker 2: working towards something with a team. You're probably making lifelong friends,
Speaker 2: people who work in the trenches with you.
Speaker 1: I love this idea, both celebrating your wins and also
Speaker 1: celebrating the journey that led to those wins. That sounds
Speaker 1: super important for everyday people to engage in it's.
Speaker 2: Hard to do though, have to remember to do it right,
Speaker 2: so so hard to do so so hard to do right.
Speaker 1: Another kind of strategy that you talk about, which comes
Speaker 1: up in coaching a lot, is this kind of give
Speaker 1: and take between practice and playing. In some of your materials,
Speaker 1: you've mentioned this idea of kind of going back and
Speaker 1: forth between deliberate practice, which is what we often think
Speaker 1: of as important for performance, but also play, which we
Speaker 1: might not think of as that necessary. So talk about
Speaker 1: the importance of play and what lay people might learn
Speaker 1: from that from how coaches think about play and performance.
Speaker 2: You know, I used to teach swimming, and you know,
Speaker 2: the most learning occurred after the lesson when they were
Speaker 2: able to just play around with their friends. You know,
Speaker 2: they take those chances, and I think that you can
Speaker 2: see that at the Olympic and Paralympic level as well.
Speaker 2: It has to be fun. You know, you're going to
Speaker 2: do a skill or you know, an exercise thousands, if
Speaker 2: not millions of times if you're an Olympic or Paralympic athlete,
Speaker 2: and that can get really mundane. You know, you need
Speaker 2: to put in the work to do it, and you
Speaker 2: have to do other stuff so that you don't burn
Speaker 2: out or like hurt yourself. But I think every time
Speaker 2: you can give some control back to the athlete, just
Speaker 2: so that they can say, hey, we're just going to
Speaker 2: try this other thing. Just see what happens, and you
Speaker 2: could discover some great things if you just give them
Speaker 2: some freedom to play well.
Speaker 1: I mean, I have whole episodes talking about, you know,
Speaker 1: the fact that I needed to build more fun into
Speaker 1: my life. But I think it's also something that we
Speaker 1: can miss out on. Like in the work context. We
Speaker 1: often think that fun happens in the context of leisure,
Speaker 1: but I think we forget that, like our jobs should
Speaker 1: be fun. We should be kind of messing around and
Speaker 1: thinking creatively and kind of getting flow from the enjoyment
Speaker 1: the intrinsic rewards that we get out of the jobs
Speaker 1: that we have. But this is something that we forget
Speaker 1: a lot. So any tips that come from coaching about
Speaker 1: how to remember the fun and sort of get back
Speaker 1: to it even when the pressures on.
Speaker 2: Oh man, just the inspiration you hear the stories of
Speaker 2: the athletes and the coaches you know at this level
Speaker 2: of sport. And I'm a little biased because I grew
Speaker 2: up in sport just loving it my entire life. So
Speaker 2: I get a lot of inspiration from the people that
Speaker 2: I work with the knowledge that's just around to try
Speaker 2: to push human performance in a safe way, safe, respectable way,
Speaker 2: and then just see what they can do. We had
Speaker 2: an interview with a Bob Slid coach and athlete a
Speaker 2: couple weeks ago, and you know, I swim on the side.
Speaker 2: I'm old lady swimmer. I was joking, but I was like, man,
Speaker 2: if I had the passion that you had, you know,
Speaker 2: to do so well in the drive, I would have
Speaker 2: had a much better swim.
Speaker 1: This morning, Christina and Emily are doing some really inspiring
Speaker 1: work with the team USA coaches, and I'm humbled that
Speaker 1: they're using the happiness science that they heard on this
Speaker 1: show to push my nation's Olympic efforts to the next level.
Speaker 1: I can't wait to see how all their advice winds
Speaker 1: up playing out on the courts, pools, fields, tracks and
Speaker 1: trampolines this summer in Paris.
Speaker 2: We've started the conversation the vulnerability it takes to admit
Speaker 2: that you need some help. For many people, it's a lot,
Speaker 2: but the ones that really are interested in improving are
Speaker 2: going to seek the input so that they can be
Speaker 2: their best for their athletes.
Speaker 1: The Happiness Lab will be taking a short summer break,
Speaker 1: but we'll be back with a season exploring how we
Speaker 1: can navigate a world in which argument, division, and anger
Speaker 1: seems to be bubbling up everywhere. We'll look at evidence
Speaker 1: showing that we aren't as polarized as we fear, and
Speaker 1: we'll look at ways that we can come together and
Speaker 1: act cooperatively and civilly. All that next time on the
Speaker 1: Happiness Lab with me Doctor Laurie Santos