Safety concerns

While there is certainly room to discuss and debate the grey areas of sport performance drugs and substances and what sport leagues will tolerate, to create sport competition where anything goes is a dangerous slippery slope, and a terrible precedent to set.  When competitive athletes have no rules, parameters, or consequences, many will fall prey to the emotions associated with being the best, and some will make irrational and unhealthy decisions as a result.  In fact, an argument can be made that legitimate sport leagues who do enforce drug policies actually save some athletes from themselves.  The competitive spirit for high performance athletes can leave them vulnerable to experimenting with their training (including drug usage), but those temptations are mitigated when leagues hold athletes accountable with strict guidelines, and serious consequences for cheating.  The Enhanced Games don’t seem to care about any of this, leaving their athletes in potentially dangerous spots (even if they don’t realize it).

Integrity?

Aside from the obvious safety concerns, how important are sports records that occurred because of steroids?  If you look at some of America’s biggest steroid cheaters (i.e. Barry Bonds, Lance Armstrong), their records are tainted, and most fans write them off as unscrupulous people.  If you win an event at the Enhanced Games, or break a record, should anyone actually care?  Does it matter at all?  And what message does this send to kids?  That if you only get so far with natural abilities, cheat!!!  While there is no doubt that some athletes do cheat and look for ways to work around drug policies, governing bodies need to remain vigilant and preserve integrity, not go the other way and incentivize drug usage.  After all, how impressed are you by artificially fueled performances?

Final thoughts

Admittedly, I never thought there would be a sport competition where using illegal, dangerous drugs would be not only tolerated, but encouraged.  In fact, as a lifelong SNL fan, I thought there would be a better chance of me seeing John Belushi eating little chocolate donuts in the Olympics long before the Enhanced Games — if you haven’t seen this skit before, enjoy!

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It’s not what’s expected of you, but what’s in you….

For athletes today to succeed, they must accept that pressure and expectations not only loom, but must be dealt with as issues arise.  Athletes can’t control the narrative by silencing the expectations and pressures of others, but they can successfully respond to the challenges by digging deep from what’s inside — relying on focus, perseverance, heartiness, and resiliency.  In other words, rather than focusing on all the noise, turn your attention toward all the skills and abilities you have to overcome the hurdles you face.  In life, it’s not what’s on you in terms of expectations, but instead what’s in you with respect to your will and fortitude.

Scott Peck, author of The Road Less Traveled, began his book with a simple 3-word sentence: Life is difficult.  For athletes these days, young and old, sports are difficult — and often include intense pressure and great expectations.  Every athlete, therefore, has a choice to either falter to challenging conditions, or look inside and find the courage, confidence, and conviction to overcome adversity and play at a high level.  The choice to look outward at the noise, or inward at your personal courage and resiliency, is an important choice that only you can make — so choose wisely!

Sports today, including youth and interscholastic sports, are more serious and intense than ever before.  When kids learn important life skills relating to how they perceive situations (challenges or threats?), where they direct their focus, and how they execute skills and strategies to succeed, the outcomes they experience are far different compared to if they simply quit the moment things got tough.  When kids learn these skills in sports, they can then apply them to other life situations, including academic and social challenges.  From there, as confidence increases, new goals are taken on and hurdles overcome — all because of first relying on what’s inside, not the noise and static on the outside.

Final thoughts

Sports can be a tough life experience, especially when expectations are super high and seemingly everyone around you pressures you to be your best.  For kids, this can be especially challenging since they have yet to learn the importance of life skills, and how to cull mental toughness from within to overcome the hurdles in front of them.  Yes, it truly is “what’s in you,” not what’s “on you” in terms of pressure.  Re-frame the outside noise into healthy life challenges, identify life skills to overcome, and learn how to apply focus, motivation, and coping strategies to overcome whatever stress you face in life.

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Magic vs. Mentalism

A relatively new video was uploaded to YouTube that breaks down the validity of mentalism, and while it’s a whopping 5 hours long, if you have an interest in this stuff the time will pass quicker than you could ever imagine.  But before you check out that video, it is important to note that we have already seen stunts similar to what current mentalist Oz Pearlman is doing as far back as the 1970’s when Uri Geller captured audiences worldwide with his purported spoon-bending powers.  People were just as amazed by Gellar as they are today by Pearlman, that is, until it all fell apart for Geller on this now famous Johnny Carson appearance:

The potential dangers of “mentalists”

Unlike traditional magicians, mentalists lead you to believe that they really do possess superpowers and can read people, understand their thoughts, and make predictions based on these abilities that other mere mortals could never do.  Comparatively, magicians like Penn and Teller are upfront about their tricks, and sometimes even show the audience how their tricks are performed.  In fact, mentalists rely on something called metadeception, a framework where mentalists extend deception beyond the stage, framing traditional magic tricks as genuine psychic abilities, body language reading, or psychological manipulation.  Metadeception creates a dual-reality where audiences believe they are witnessing supernatural abilities, when in fact it is the exact same sleight-of-hand that magicians commonly use.

If you think about it, “mentalists” are incentivized to work in this manner, as people are far more interested in seeing someone with special powers rather than a silly magician who pulls rabbits out of a hat.  Oz Pearlman is the most famous mentalist in this moment, and he has appeared on just about every major tv program and podcast you can think of — and made tons of money working as a mentalist than he would have as a magician doing the same exact trick.  But, as we can now see in the video below, Pearlman’s mentalism is no different than Uri Geller’s from the 1970’s — that is, it’s bunk.

But does it really matter?

So what does it matter if a mentalist leads you to believe he has supernatural powers, and why should we care if mentalists are really just using the same tricks magicians use?  Critics argue that claiming “mentalism” steers onlookers away from entertainment and toward unethical, “guru-like” deception that fosters inaccurate, superstitious worldviews.  Drilling deeper, when people truly believe that mortal human beings possess special powers, critical thinking is often replaced by short-sighted, emotional decisions.  When science and medicine are replaced by mentalism and psychic power, you may be vulnerable to examples like:

• If you have cancer and decide to follow the advice of a mentalist by drinking an unproven potion or wearing a copper bracelet instead of being under the care of a licensed oncologist, you could be making a fatal mistake.
• If you think listening to a mentalist talk about your troubled marriage is more effective than working with a licensed mental health professional in couples therapy, you could actually experience even more stress within your marriage.
• If you think having your child mesmerized by a mentalist’s routine rather than working with an educational specialist will help your child improve upon his sub-par grades, you could actually be making things worse when your son is even more upset that nothing seems to be helping him in school!

Mentalists lead us to believe they have powers over things like what I described above, whereas magicians are quite candid about where their “powers” are limited (in other words, they are clear that they do not have any supernatural powers).  James Randi was so concerned about the serious dangers of mentalism that he not only revealed Uri Geller, but he also had a standing offer of 1 million dollars to any person who could prove under controllable conditions that they had super natural powers.  James Randi died in 2020, and that money remained in a bank account until he passed.

Final thoughts

Oz Pearlman is a big deal right now, and he seems to be just about everywhere doing his mentalist tricks and gags.  If Pearlman advertised himself as just another magician, it’s doubtful you would have ever heard of him….but a mentalist??  It is precisely here where things get dicey, and potentially dangerous, when we begin assuming that the magic trick we just witnessed was actually something far beyond magic, and actually some kid of authentic psychic power.  When we believe we are in the company of a psychic, we become vulnerable to suggestion and bad decision-making, and this is why it is important to appreciate good magic when we see it, and dismiss those who claim that what they are doing is beyond magic and more akin to the supernatural.

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So simple, yet so powerful

Often when I give lectures on human performance I offer simple ideas and concepts, and then work hard to impress upon people that gaining new information is one thing, but applying what you learn is often what makes the difference between success and failure.  Just Do It is direct, final, and action-oriented, and can be used by everyone.  Rather than thinking about going for a jog, Just Do It.  Instead of postponing that term paper coming up, Just Do It.  As opposed to thinking your new idea will fail, why not Just Do It and find out?  In lieu of talking yourself out of applying for that job, Just Do It and see if today is your day.

In theory, knowledge is power, but is it really?  How many times do we have the knowledge, but not have the will to use what we have learned?  Knowledge, therefore, is potential power, and only becomes powerful when we put the knowledge into action.  Many people mistakenly believe confidence comes before action, but in reality confidence is often the byproduct of action.  We act, survive the experience, learn from it, and gradually build belief in ourselves over time.  Waiting to feel completely ready before taking a chance is one of the most common psychological traps people fall into, because complete certainty rarely exists in life.  This is where Just Do It becomes psychologically powerful.  It interrupts hesitation.  It stops overthinking.  It shifts people from passive thinking into active engagement.  Rather than allowing fear, doubt, and uncertainty to dominate our thinking, Just Do It encourages movement, action, and initiative.

Ironically, the more we avoid difficult tasks and uncomfortable situations, the bigger and more intimidating they become in our minds.  Anxiety feeds on avoidance.  The longer we delay taking action, the more time the brain has to catastrophize outcomes, magnify risks, and imagine failure.  Action, however, disrupts this process.  Taking the first step often reveals that the situation was not nearly as overwhelming as we first thought.  This is why some of the most successful people in sports, business, and life are not always the most talented or intelligent — but instead the people most willing to act despite uncertainty.

Final thoughts

At its core, Just Do It is not really about sports, shoes, or advertising, but instead it is about human courage.  Are you ready to begin even if you are not fully ready?  Are you ready to act despite uncertainty?  Are you tired of fear and hesitation making decisions for you?   Just Do It does not mean to act haphazardly or without thought, but instead a positive reminder that often in life there never is a perfect time to start….so why not Just Do It?

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The need to go viral…

The craving to have content go viral is rooted in several inter-related psychological pieces, including ego, belonging, status, and reward.  Most people who post content are motivated by these factors, and that’s actually quite normal when it comes to mental health.  It feels good to have something liked, and there are studies showing dopamine increases similar to playing a slot machine when our posts are recognized.  But what about people so dependent on accumulating likes, favorable comments, shares, and other digital signs of acceptance that they will post almost anything — regardless whether it’s true, or of good taste?  What starts out as people who want to be seen for who they are through genuine posts, often changes to gain more attention and end up shaping their content solely for what gets seen (and liked).  In essence, a shift occurs from sharing things about yourself, to morphing into a communication vessel designed solely for attention.

When the drive for attention becomes the #1 motivator in posting online content, authentic messaging gets replaced by sensationalism.  The crazier the post, the more likely to gain attention — and go viral.  At this point truth and authenticity take a backseat to shock, hyperbole, and often downright lies.  Many people get caught in this cycle — post something bland and not much occurs, but post something deeply controversial and/or offensive, and here come the clicks!  This type of interaction provides positive reinforcement (especially if the account is monetized), but it also comes with a mental health cost.  The chase for virality isn’t about being heard—it’s about being validated.  And the more we rely on metrics to define that validation, the more we lose control over what we create, and why we create it.

Being active online is one thing, but when we hang all of our self-worth on how much virality a post receives, then maybe it’s time to re-think the online game.  Online activity gets even concerning when posts are purposely created with lies, poor taste and offensive/dangerous elements.  While it seems like online posts and the goal to “go viral” is harmless, the success (or lack thereof) of a post can have a direct, positive or negative effect on one’s mental health.  Contrast the “go viral” approach to simply positing for the sake of sharing your life with others, and you can see two very different approaches with two very different outcomes.

Final thoughts

“Going viral” is the name of the game today, but why?  And why do so many people push the envelope with their potentially viral posts by means of lying, or posting things solely based on shock value?  Is this always monetarily driven, or do we have a human need to be recognized and appreciated — regardless of how we receive the attention?  For those who regularly post online with the hopes of going viral, it is important to regularly self-audit to ensure you aren’t pushing content into dark, controversial places simply because of shock value.  It’s also important to evaluate how much of your mental health depends on viral activity of your posts, and whether that helps (or hurts) your overall mental health.

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“Elite” youth sports today

There are more “elite” and premier youth sport teams across sports than there has ever been before.  The problem, however, is when the label “elite” expands faster than the standard required to earn it, the meaning of the label erodes.  Over the last 15-20 years, club and elite programs have shifted from being very selective, development-focused teams to a large, tiered ecosystem (A/B/C teams, multiple age groups, year-round seasons).  At the center of that shift is a simple reality: more teams = more revenue.

This new “elite” sports business model rewards expansion, not restriction, and increasingly more parents are wondering if their kid really is the next potential sports star, or simply on the team because mom and dad paid for him to be there?  And to be clear, we are not talking a mere couple hundred bucks — associated fees with elite sports programs these days can quickly get into the thousands of dollars range due to:

• Tryout fees
• Seasonal dues
• Uniform/gear
• Tournament fees and travel costs, including gas, food, lodging, and other incidental fees
• Private training add-ons, including skill/position coaches, dieticians and nutritionists, strength coaches, and sport psychologists

I regularly talk to parents who are astonished by how quickly the fees add up, with increasingly more asking if it is all worth it?  Things become especially difficult when families pay a lot of money, yet see that their child is a reserve player who doesn’t play much.  Or, their child plays, but the competition doesn’t appear to be much greater than what she played against in recreation leagues.  Still, huge time and financial investments are made with hopes that the experience is worth it and will help the child maximize sport abilities, and maybe have a chance to one day play at college.

With all that said, it is important for parents to do their homework and ask important questions, including the following:

• What does it actually take to make this team?  What are the skills expected to have been mastered before joining, and what expectations should we have moving forward?
• Are kids being evaluated — or accommodated?
• Is this club developing important sport skills, or simply sustaining participation numbers for increased revenues?
• Would this roster look the same if money was not involved, or would a number of kids be cut if their parents did not have the financial means?

Final thoughts

While it is true that there are still some elite sport organizations that cater to very talented kids, we are seeing many clubs today expand to meet an increasing appetite for “elite” youth sport development programs.  This shift occurs when families who can pay big club fees, even if their child does not have the athletic skill or potential to be on the team.  As the clubs continue to grow and flourish from the influx of revenue, the on-field product continues to be watered down and more resemble a recreational sports model than it does a premier sports model.  None of this is good or bad, right or wrong, but it does add new challenges for sports parents when vetting youth sport programs, and trying to discern what program is legitimate, and what program is there just for the money.

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The post The Illusion of Elite Sports: Are We Watering Down Youth Competition? appeared first on The Sports Doc Chalk Talk with Dr. Chris Stankovich.

Understanding team chemistry

To begin, it is important to note that team chemistry isn’t simply about liking each other — it’s about trusting each other enough to perform without hesitation.  Good coaches, regardless of sport or skill level, know that what is most important is that team members know and embrace their unique individual role on the team, unconditionally support one another, hustle and promote a positive attitude.  Breaking this down even more and you realize not every team member can be the star, or have the ball in their hands the most.  Team chemistry is at its highest when all team members, including reserves, understand what is asked of them and fully embrace their assignment.

While team chemistry may seem simple to develop, the reality is it takes work.  Players naturally want to play in important roles, and athletes have egos, too.  It’s also easy for team members to blame others when things aren’t going well, or allow their enthusiasm and support to waver depending on the level of team success experienced.  And how do you keep reserve players feeling that they are an important part of the team, especially when they rarely play?  Savvy coaches prepare for all of these issues and work hard to create a locker room of equality, opportunity, and relationships that develop not out of talent, but out of recognition that every player’s efforts count.

The components that enhance team chemistry, coming from a role perspective, include many different pieces with value toward team success.  There are your star players, of course, but a balanced team also has players who excel in game knowledge and wisdom, defense specialization, and enthusiasm.  When these pieces come together, and support and trust established, a balanced and equipped team is developed.  Veteran coaches know that it’s not always easy to get certain players to buy in to their role (i.e. a reserve on the team to help with depth), so they create a team environment that allows every player — regardless of role or talent — to feel as though their place on the team is every bit as important as the next player’s role.  This is achieved by first accepting that team chemistry is vital, and then working hard to empower, listen, support, and trust every player with the same degree of effort and sincerity.

Final thoughts

Jerry West, in addition to being one of the greatest basketball players ever, is also widely accepted as being one of the best sports general managers of all time (basketball and beyond).  If Jerry West thinks team chemistry is the most important variable contributing toward team success. coaches should look at their own current teams and see how they score on this scale?  Do all players feel important and respected?  Is there a high level of trust on the team?  And do players know and fully embrace their individual role?  If you checked those boxes, you’re probably doing a pretty good job at coaching!

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Labels don’t just describe behavior — they start directing it

Labeling theory is a sociological theory that explains how being labeled can shape a person’s identity and behavior — and this is certainly true with ADHD.  Labeling theory posits that people don’t just get labeled — the label starts shaping how they are seen, treated, and how they see themselves.  Using ADHD as a mental health example, it is important that parents not use ADHD as the defining reason for every unsuccessful challenge, problem, or issue their child experiences in life — and even more important that the child not immediately glom onto ADHD as the reason why he wasn’t successful.  Once a child is regularly labeled ADHD by mom and dad, the following behaviors and outcomes often occur next:

• Adults (parents, teachers, and coaches) interpret behavior through the label, almost as though viewing the child through an ADHD prism.  “He’s not off-task, he’s ADHD.”
• Expectations shift toward the child not quite having what it takes to be successful, bringing along lower expectations for focus, discipline, and effort.
• The child sees all of this and internalizes the messaging as “This is just how I am, and my ADHD is preventing me from experiencing success.”

Over time, a label can create the very behavior it was meant to explain, and often this is where kids struggle with self-fulfilling prophecies that limit their chances for success even further.  An additional problem when using a label improperly is that it prevents an accurate appraisal, and subsequent helping strategy, from ever getting off the drawing board!  In fact, there are many important things that get missed when immediately assuming ADHD is causing all the problems, including:

• Skill deficits.  The kid has yet to learn and master the skills relating to how to multi-task, field a ground ball, tune an instrument, or take apart a small engine.
• Motivation issues.  Perhaps the kid knows how to do something, but simply isn’t motivated to do what you are asking.
• Emotional factors.  Dealing with anxiety and frustration are common obstacles for kids and adults, and not to be confused with ADHD.
• Environmental mismatch.  Sometimes kids simply get bored, be it due to a long day, nice weather outside, or poor instruction from the teacher, parent, or coach.
• Behavioral patterns.  These are learned habits that become tough to break sometimes, and can get in the way of completing a task successfully (i.e. regularly sitting in a big, comfy chair to do homework but falling asleep instead).

Final thoughts

Labels, while often helpful, can actually lead to unwanted and potentially dangerous outcomes — as in the case of labeling every shortcoming experienced by a kid as a product of his ADHD.  Mental health clinicians make diagnoses that produce labels, but they caution parents that not every behavior (or lack thereof) is directly related to the mental health label, and that not every observation should be routed through one, single explanation.  Once a label is applied, it becomes easy to explain every behavior through that one lens.  Instead of asking why is this happening, we settle for it’s because of the diagnosis.  That shortcut might feel helpful — but it often prevents us from actually understanding what the child needs.

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Examining online content kids regularly consume

Watch closely at the kids in your company (or adults) as they interface with their phones and you will see them entering a kind of low-effort, high stimulation “trance-like” mental state.  The content is high stimulation in the sense that it is usually fast paced and visually exciting, and with no depth, meaning, or natural stopping point, minimal cognitive effort is required — leading to trance-like mental states.  Simply put, high stimulation, low meaning content is designed to keep attention without requiring thought.

Some early research examining “brain rot” has found this video content diminishes attention and focus over time, and I expect future studies to validate these claims.  When kids mindlessly scroll, they drift into automatic behavior with reduced cognitive control, not exactly the best way to actively experience life, learn how to problem-solve, communicate more effectively with others, or improve mental health.  The “brain on scroll mode” leads to kids constantly glued to their screens because of something new, something unpredictable, or something potentially entertaining, and it is this unpredictability (similar to slot machines) that creates an unhealthy addiction to wanting more.  High dopamine, low cognitive demand, hence the very appropriate term of “brain rot.”

Furthering examination of the dangers of brain rot and we learn that kids who consume mindless content day-after-day show a reduced attention span, weakened working memory, increased impulsivity, and higher levels of anxiety.  Through these daily scrolls of nothing kids become conditioned to expect constant novelty, instant gratification, and minimal effort for maximum stimulation.  Recent studies have found heavy short video use is linked to decreased attention control, promotes instant gratification and weaker focus, and is associated with impaired attention and working memory.

It’s important to note that none of this is by accident, as social media platforms regularly use infinite scroll, autoplay, and algorithm-driven feeds to keep kids tuned in to their content.  In fact, critics call this “addictive design,” and we are even beginning to see lawsuits pertaining to these specific concerns.  In essence, kids aren’t just lacking discipline — they’re interacting with systems engineered to override it.  Parents, therefore, have a lot of work to do, beginning with the following:

• Accept that there is growing evidence that allowing your child endlessly scroll on a phone/tablet can, and likely will, lead to mental health issues and concerns.
• Ongoing psychology research is finding specific issues with how kids are impacted with their attention, focus, and cognitive processing.
• Social media platforms understand the science behind keeping people tethered to their page, and develop content specifically designed to increase user adherence.
• Since these are newer issues and concerns, researchers do not know for certain what long-term consequences occur from chronic screen scrolling (though early studies are already raising big flags).  Furthermore, assuming psychological damage occurs from high usage, even bigger questions arise as to whether kids can ever eventually recover and regain attention, focus, and cognitive abilities.

Final thoughts

With each day that passes kids spend increasingly more time with their phones, often locked in to mindless, “brain rot” content.  Researchers are examining the impact of this behavior, especially with respect to human development and mental health.  Early studies are revealing that many social media platforms design their content not to help kids develop in positive ways, but to instead keep them on their page and scrolling away for hours on end.  Parents, therefore, must be vigilant, and monitor both the content being consumed, as well as the sheer number of hours their kids spend each day mindlessly scrolling as opposed to actively living in the world around them.

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Common characteristics of bad losers

To begin this analysis, it is important to accept that it is not because somebody “cheated” every time you lose in sports (or life).  Rarely are games “rigged,” and in 99% of competition the outcome came about because one team or competitor simply outplayed the opponent.  While losing never feels good, future positive growth can only occur when results are accepted, and the losing individual/team can review the game in order to improve.  Below are examples of poor sportsmanship that compromises healthy competition, and sets forth poor examples for kids with respect to handling adversity:

• Blaming everyone but themselves.  Poor sports tend to blame the officials, weather, field conditions, and everything else instead of simply taking responsibility for a loss.
• Emotional outbursts and poor self-control.  Yelling at officials (and possibly getting ejected as a result), dressing down players by means of humiliation, and engaging in other disrespectful behaviors while competing.
• Disrespect toward opponents.  Playing with disregard to safety, intentionally making disparaging comments toward the other team, and purposely doing things on the field to make the other team feel unworthy.
• Win at all cost mentality.  Bending rules, overlooking cheating, and pushing kids well past what would be acceptable expectations (mentally and physically).
• Inconsistent standards.  What’s good for our team isn’t good for yours, over-playing star players at expense of playing reserves, and calling out other teams/coaches for doing the same things that their team does.

While it is understandable why it’s easy to engage in poor sportsmanship since sports are an incredibly emotional experience, the behaviors listed above prevent kids from experiencing a healthy, competitive, and enriching life experience.  In fact, kids that witness consistent poor sportsmanship from their coaches and teammates are more likely to look for another team — or quit the sport altogether.  It is for these reasons that it behooves coaches to take responsibility, own losses, and model for kids that through adversity there is opportunity for growth.  The reality is that in most competitions the outcome is fair, and rarely are games “rigged” or that the opponent has cheated.

Final thoughts

Pointing your finger toward anything other than your own efforts may be comforting in the moment, but it does not reflect reality, nor does it allow for introspection to examine what needs improvement.  For kids to witness poor sportsmanship it also models to them that when you lose it’s not your fault, and that officials are anything but fair.  When kids learn that it’s never their fault, they are more likely to carry that thinking over to the classroom (i.e. blaming bad teachers), and even their future careers (i.e. they were cheated out of a promotion).

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Comparing coaches

Great youth sport coaches can have an amazing, positive impact on the kids they coach.  Conversely, unprepared coaches can negatively impact the youth sport experience, and even drive kids to quitting if the experience isn’t fun.  In order to size up your child’s coach compare the different approaches below:

Great coaches

• Bring a positive attitude every day, are prepared, and always look for ways to make the experience fun.
• Make it a point to find ways for all kids to participate, and provide ongoing feedback to kids who do not play a lot so that they can continue to improve.
• Talk to kids about the life lessons they are learning while competing, and show them ways to apply the skills they use in sports to become a better student, friend, and future employee one day.
• Place value on the overall team experience, friendships and off-field experiences, and not solely wins and losses.

Unprepared coaches

• More or less wing it when running practices, often with no practice plan to follow.
• Plays only the best kids, and believes that youth sports should always separate kids by talent regardless of age/maturity.
• Hyper-focused on winning, with little focus on growth and learning life skills through sport participation.
• Takes on a very authoritarian approach with kids, and will not hesitate to embarrass or humiliate kids who fail or appear to not be trying their best.

People often ask me if it’s really a big deal the type of coach makes a difference, and the answer is a resounding yes!  Since only a very small percentage of kids will ever play college sports (and an even smaller number go professional), it is important that we use youth sports in the best developmental ways possible.  Great youth sport coaches place an emphasis on keeping it fun, educational, and an experience that kids will cull from the rest of their lives when faced with stress and life challenges.  Additionally, these coaches fully understand that it’s not the wins and losses, but the day-to-day moments when kids reach personal goals, cheer for one another, display integrity and sportsmanship, and learn how to handle adversity and losing.  Coaches who disregard these ideas and approaches not only miss golden opportunities to help kids grow and mature, they also usually drive kids to quitting well before they might have with a better, more tuned in coach.

Final thoughts

Great youth sport coaches take the job seriously, and they work hard to help kids grow as people, not just athletes.  These coaches have a great impact and influence on the kids they coach, and often help kids develop the self-confidence needed to excel in life far beyond the sports field.  Less prepared coaches, comparatively, tend to overly focus on winning at the expense of a more holistic experience for kids, leaving a lot of the value of youth sports behind when the games eventually end.  While you may not always be in control regarding who coaches your kid, when you do have influence, it is important to look at the big picture and seek out coaches who appreciate the importance of helping kids develop by using sports as an important, holistic life experience.

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Athlete training today

Objectively speaking, athletes today — including young athletes — regularly outperform previous generations.  Modern day athletes run faster, jump higher, and swim at record speeds, just to offer a few easy examples.  In fact, previous athletic records once held by adults are now regularly challenged by athletes much younger, and in just about every sport that keeps records we see those records fall.  While there may be outlier athletes of the past who would likely still perform at a high level today, those are exceptions, not the norm.  So if we can agree that athletes today are generally better than athletes of the past, why is this the case, and what new problems have developed as athletes have improved?

• Better athletes, but narrower athletes.  Many kids today specialize (only play one sport) in sports early and become quite good — at that one sport.  This approach to sport participation leaves kids vulnerable to sport burnout, and overuse physical injuries.
• The professionalization of childhood.  Year-round seasons, professional coaches, rankings, social media exposure, and recruiting pressure.  This new paradigm for kids creates adult-level pressure for them, an identity exclusively tied to sport performance, and a lot less room for failure.
• Injuries are no longer just “bad luck.”  Sport injuries today are more systemic than they are random.  Overuse injuries like ACL tears and stress fractures occur largely due to the growing number of games played each year coupled by the lack of rest, downtime, and no off-season.
• Sport burnout is a feature, not a bug.  Sport burnout is no longer an anomaly, but is expected at some point in your child’s youth sport career.  Constant pressure and emotional fatigue leads to loss of intrinsic motivation and eventual premature quitting.
• The illusion that more = better.  Does more games, more reps, and more travel always lead to positive outcomes?  The science doesn’t support this approach, as development does not scale linearly but instead in conjunction with rest, variation, and unstructured play.
• Economic and social costs.  Youth sports have essentially become “pay-to-play.”  Travel leagues, private coaching, club fees, and ongoing equipment replacement have created have/have not scenarios that impact what kids get to compete.
• Identity foreclosure.  Kids who only see themselves as athletes and their only future path as college and pro sports set themselves up for future stress, depression, and anxiety constantly battling to be one of the top 2% who ever make it that far.
• Short-term gains vs. long-term development.  Winning now, making the top team, and getting exposure can negatively effect a kid’s long-term development and love of the game.
• Less unstructured play.  Less pickup games in exchange for more structure impacts kids and how they freely interact with others, experience sports with less pressure, and improve social relations by playing for the love of playing, not just to eventually earn a college scholarship.

To be clear, not everything is doom-and-gloom and problematic in sports, but there is also little argument that kids today experience a very different, intense, and less forgiving sport environment than their parents.  In an ideal situation, kids vary their routines, play for the love of playing, embrace life skills learned through sports, and create friendships and experiences for a lifetime.  If a child has athletic talent, then he or she will almost inevitably be noticed and likely have some college opportunities presented.  Unfortunately, what I just described is a fading memory of previous generations being exchanged for a hyper-competitive, pro sport focus for increasingly more kids.

Final thoughts

There is little argument that, generally speaking, athletes today are better than athletes of the past.  The question, however, is whether the means and approaches used to develop better athletes today offsets the growing number of serious issues and concerning trends witnessed as a result?  Is it worth it to see better athletes, when at the same time far more young athletes today are suffering serious physical injuries and experiencing an increase in sport burnout?  Like with most things in life there are trade-offs, and this is certainly the case when it comes to youth sports and how young athletes maximize their sports training.

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Today might be the best day of your life (you just don’t know it)

If you have spent time in my company, you may have heard me say that today might be the best day of your life, but you just don’t know it.  In fact, I often say this around kids playing youth sports as I watch them having fun, sharing laughs, and making memories for a lifetime.  Of course, kids don’t know how today is any more important than any other day as they haven’t lived a long enough life to allow for perspective, but we as adults know what it can mean contributing to a team, and being accepted by teammates.  In fact, for many adults, it is only years later that we look back on moments that, at the time, we took for granted.

The best days of our lives are the moments that are tough — if not impossible — to relive.  It’s the first soccer goal, the base hit that won the game, and the moment someone inspired you to push harder, do more, or contribute to something truly special.  It’s someone showing a special interest in you, it’s being recognized for a big accomplishment, and it’s the feeling of connection we experience when we reach out to help someone.  These moments make our lives what they are, and contribute directly to our level of happiness and life satisfaction.  Sadly, too often we take these moments for granted until someone or some thing reminds us, and then we put it all together how special that trip to Dairy Queen was after winning the league championship that year.

Maybe it’s that warm summer day, or brief rain that came out of nowhere, where you just sat with your kid, or a friend, or maybe someone you simply met by chance, that led to a remarkable discussion that literally redirected the trajectory of your life.  A career you just learned about, or a networking opportunity that resulted in the job you always wanted.  Maybe that brief chat over a cup of coffee with a friend turned out to be the most influential 10 minutes of your life, even if you didn’t know know it then.

Sometimes in life we find ourselves sad, upset, or dealing with great adversity, and we need someone or something to turn to for support.  It is in these moments that we can benefit through the product of time and history the importance of our most fond moments and days of life, and those memories can be used again in a variety of healing ways.  Every self-discovery, new idea, and different way of looking at things likely began with a conversation, or a moment someone special empowered you to keep going.  These are the times that help define our happiness, health, and life satisfaction.

Final thoughts

There are countless moments in life that truly shape who we are, how we think, and what we do.  Sadly, many of these moments are not recognized at the time, and usually are not appreciated until years later when we have proper perspective to understand the value.  The next time you feel something special happening, sit back and enjoy the moment, and take in everything special that you are experiencing.  You don’t need to make sense of what is happening, but instead simply appreciate that you could be having one of the best days that you will ever have in your life.

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You are not vulnerable to “chemical imbalances”

Due largely to the work of professors Joanna Moncrieff and Mark Horowitz we now know there is no clear evidence that serotonin levels or serotonin activity are responsible for depression.  Think about that for a moment, it’s not that your brain suddenly went haywire and serotonin acted unpredictably to the point of being medicated to get back to “balance,” but instead far more likely that any depression you have ever experienced was likely brought on by life events and situations, coupled by the ways in which you coped with the accompanying stress.  While it may feel better to think that depression is this thing that occurs randomly and that we have no control over (and therefore no personal responsibility for experiencing), the reality is that depression is a product of how we perceive situations, our coping skills, and our resilience.  When we frame depression that way (accurately), it puts more of the depression on us and how we deal with life, rather than how the drug companies had us thinking that basically “you’re doomed, and only we can help.”

Depersonalizing mental health issues might help us cope in the short run, but introducing potentially dangerous psychotropic drugs can — and often does — create an entirely new and even more serious set of problems.  Don’t believe me?  Tune in closely to the next drug ad you see on tv and take note of the potential side effects that go on and on and on…..it’s actually hard to believe any of these drugs get approved when you take a close look at all the things that can go wrong.  Rather than search for a theory without legs (i.e. the chemical imbalance theory), a much better way to go is to learn better coping, and using professional assistance when needed.

Turning attention toward yourself and how you may have gotten to a depressed mental status can be scary, but buying into theories with no credibility is even worse.  In fact, by knowing that your brain is not damaged, nor that you are the unfortunate recipient of flawed genetics, allows you to quickly move from an “I’m doomed” mindset to a more empowered approach to self-improvement.  No pills needed, but instead a recognition that a mood change has occurred, and that you have the ability to correct the situation through your own personal efforts and not an ongoing prescription of SSRI drugs.

It is important to note that improving mood state is not easy, regardless of what caused the depression.  Working everyday to feel better is challenging work, and there are plenty of moments of hopelessness that often occur along the way.  Depression is very serious, but it is also very important to get it right when assessing why depression occurs, and the best methods to improve mood state.  When we erroneously accept that depression is created by uncontrollable, genetic “chemical imbalances” of serotonin, the first thing we do is immediately stop trying to improve our condition.  After all, why would you try to get better if you are convinced depression is completely out of your control?  We compound matters when we then use potentially dangerous SSRI drugs in exchange for other more authentic and efficacious approaches, including therapy, support groups, and exercise.

Final thoughts

While assuming depression is caused by uncontrollable, genetic chemical imbalances takes the onus of responsibility away from individuals, it’s also not backed up by science.  What this means is that we are responsible for our well-being, and that we have a lot more control than some would think when it comes to our mental health.  While the drug companies would like for you to think improved mental health is beyond your personal control and can only be experienced through their drugs, scientific research says the exact opposite, and shows that our human perception and means for coping with stress are what actually mediates our wellness.  Marketing is one thing, science is another, and with drug companies sometimes blurring the lines it is more important than ever that we become vigilant, critical consumers when it comes to our mental health.

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AI versus human therapy

If you have ever played around with AI, then you know how easy it is to forget you are actually communicating with a computer, and not a real human.  AI can be very polite, conversational, and knowledgeable — but can AI help with real mental health challenges?  While millions of people worldwide receive mental health assistance from trained, licensed clinicians, we are witnessing some people replace human therapy with AI mental health assistance.  Is this a good thing, or does AI actually compound mental health issues that might have been resolved by using a trained human instead?

One problem with AI is that it lacks clinical judgement.  AI does not understand language, but instead predicts language patterns — a very different approach compared to human therapy.  AI is also problematic when assessing and managing risk — including self-harm and suicidal ideation — by missing important, yet subtle, warning signs.  While a real clinician is trained to watch for important signs of distress, AI overlooks those indicators, resulting in potentially dangerous situations.

Another problem with AI is that no therapeutic relationship forms between computer and client, as compared to the dynamic that develops in a human therapeutic relationship.  A therapeutic alliance allows for trust and empathy to develop, factors closely associated with positive therapeutic outcomes.  Additional concerns relating to AI therapy include misdiagnosis, as well as oversimplification of complex mental health conditions, factors that can lead to improper, unhealthy, or dangerous treatments.

A final consideration when comparing AI to human therapy has to do with the uniqueness of the support provided.  With AI, advice is general, relies on patterns, and misses individual nuance.  Human therapy, by contrast, is personalized, adaptive, and evolves over time.  Human therapists also track progress over time, adjust treatment, and coordinate care, whereas AI does none of those things.

Final thoughts

AI can simulate conversation, but it cannot replace clinical judgement, human connection, or responsibility for care.  Human therapy is about facilitating change, not just giving advice, as is often the case with AI.  Yes, AI can be useful with some things relating to mental health support, including psycho-education, journaling prompts, and providing a sense of low-level support, but using AI exclusively to assist with mental health issues is not advised, and can even lead to new and more serious concerns.

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Is this an ideal summer?  Truthfully, that question is impossible to answer before fully understanding the role of athletics in your child’s life.  For a very select few kids, the summer I just described could lead to eventual positive outcomes by means of a future college athletic scholarship, and even a pro sport opportunity.  In these examples the kids have exceptional athletic talent, clear goals, family support, and strong motivation.  But what about all the other kids playing sports (the vast majority)?  Does the hyper-committed schedule work the same for them?  This group includes kids who simply play sports for fun, with talent that ranges from a little below to a little above average.  Is this the best way to spend a summer, or would a more balanced approach that includes non-sport experiences and activities be a better choice?

Selecting summer sport schedules

Should all kids today play on professional sport schedules?  Absolutely not!  But this is trend we are seeing today, where increasingly more kids are signing up for “elite” sport organizations (often in name only) and playing a ton of games.  Breaking this schedule down, however, shows that kids who follow this pattern often deal with the following concerns:

• A super-busy schedule that leaves little time for anything else.
• Increased chances for sport-related injuries, including serious injuries like concussions and ACL tears.
• Varying playing time, as club/elite teams are supposed to have many other talented kids, leaving only so many opportunities to play (compared to recreation leagues where kids get a ton of playing time).
• Mental health concerns, including anxiety and undeveloped stress coping to deal with new stressors.
• Sport burnout, almost guaranteed to occur at some point as kids simply aren’t wired to play a adult professional sport schedule.

Sure, flexing on the fact that your child plays on an elite team may be cool, but is that experience truly delivering on the needs of your child?  Yeah, the uniforms are flashy, but how is that adding to your child’s sport skill set?  When you talk to experts, including former players and coaches, they will almost always tell you that the best thing you can do for your child and sports is to keep it fun, and find as many opportunities as possible to get reps and develop fundamentals.  As your child enjoys the sport and gets better, then look for advanced opportunities to improve — but really work on those fundamentals first!

Another way you might look at it using an academic example — your child would not go from Introduction to Math right into Advanced Calculus, as there are many incremental steps between basic and advanced math.  Similarly, sport skill advancement is scaled the same way, with the ideal approach being to master the basics, then move up a step at a time to allow for skill mastery and greater self-confidence.  When families chase swag, travel, and prestige, they may be missing out on the real experiences needed to reach maximum athletic potential.

Final thoughts

At the end of the day when it comes to youth sports, kids need reps, not frequent flier miles.  While it is exciting to feel the hype of a so-called big name program, if your kid doesn’t get to play a lot you may actually be setting your kid back, not forward.  Additionally, playing a ton of games over a summer can leave your child at much greater risk for serious injuries, sport burnout, and even premature quitting — things that will quickly curtail your child’s fun and investment into sports.  Finally, fun keeps kids playing sports, and confidence is what motivates them to play harder — putting too much on kids too early can zap the fun, and leave them on the bench watching better skilled kids play instead of them.

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Imprinting and critical periods of development

Have you ever watched ducklings walk in sequence behind their mother?  Aside from it being quite cute to observe, it also serves as evidence of the importance of ducklings learning early in their lives the value of following mom.  Even more interesting, scientists have learned that this process, called imprinting, is a time-sensitive experience for ducks to attach — and once passed, can never be recovered in quite the same way.  When ducklings fail to properly imprint, many adverse things can happen, including:

• failing to develop normal social and mating behaviors,
• attaching to inappropriate objects (including people and other animals that are not ducks), and
• struggling to function normally as adults since they never developed in the same, normative ways as other ducklings.

For humans, psychologists have learned that we experience a similar sensitive period where we are prime to learn invaluable life skills.  Just like ducklings, there are windows in development where the human brain is especially receptive to certain experiences, including language development, attachment, social skills, and emotional development.

We know that when kids fail to fully develop during these sensitive periods, unwanted consequences often follow.  For example, if language is not developed during a sensitive period, some kids never fully develop grammar, and often struggle with communication long-term.  When attachment fails to develop during a sensitive period, kids can be later challenged with trust issues, emotional regulation, and social functioning.  Lastly, when kids miss out on social interactions (i.e. playing video games alone for chunks of their teen years) there is evidence that kids lag behind on reading facial expressions, tone of voice, body language, conflict resolution, and empathy.

While there is little debate on the significance of human sensitive periods and the impact on life skills development, there are still questions whether humans can later make up for these periods when they are missed?  Social skills are not simply downloaded form the internet, but they develop during important life periods where kids can trial-and-error things, make mistakes, and learn from others.  If, however, kids glom on to their phones and play hours and hours of video games through their formative years, serious concerns arise that they may never be able to recapture what was missed in terms of life skill development.

Early research on sensitive periods and human development show that when early experiences are limited, social skills may eventually develop later, but less efficiently.  Individuals may also show social awkwardness, difficulty reading cues, emotional dysregulation, and weaker communication skills.  While it appears as though the brain can still learn social skills, it is no longer operating in its most optimal learning window, leaving individuals less developed than they would be had they maximized sensitive periods during development.

Final thoughts

There is definitely a developmental cost to missing invaluable life experiences during sensitive periods, and increasingly more kids today are becoming vulnerable to developmental issues due to high-volume usage of technology (i.e. smart phones and gaming).  In essence, many young people are currently growing into adulthood with limited experience reading body language, verbal communication, and self-regulation largely due to choosing technology over real life human interactions.  As we continue to interface with technology (including artificial intelligence), it is important for parents and teachers to realize the potential psychological damage that can occur when kids replace real-life interactions with stationary phone and video screens.

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Robots over humans?

Should Major League umpires be worried about their future?  If I were an ump, I sure would be, as it is clear that the ABS system offers distinct advantages over the human eye, leaving umpires at a huge disadvantage.  In fact, as MLB rolls out the new challenge system, umpires are being regularly humbled each game when their calls are overturned on the in-stadium scoreboard for everyone to see.  Keep in mind umpires are very proud of their job, as all MLB umpires go through rigorous umpire school, and are required to log years of minor league games before ever getting to call a big league game.  Now, for the first time, that credibility and respect are being cast aside — not exactly the best way to empower your employees.

The ABS system, depending on how it is received this year, could soon take the place of human umpires entirely and dramatically alter the game.  New technologies currently allow for absolute precision with balls and strikes, and could soon be responsible for foul ball accuracy, and bang-bang calls on close calls on the bases.  Do we want a future game where there are no human umpires on the field, but instead cameras, sensors, and other technology tools officiating the game?  A game where animated umpire calls that add spirit to the game are replaced by monotone, mechanical output decisions delivered with no feeling?

All of this brings me to my final big question — is it perfection we are after, or does the subjective nature of human decision-making add the most to the game?  The truth is MLB umpires get about 99% of the calls correct (an amazing feat in itself), and the times they do miss often adds flavor to the game by means of crowd involvement, on the fly coaching decisions, and even manager-umpire on-field disputes that bring energy to the game.  Replacing all of that with a boring graphic on the big screen showing a baseball hitting a corner of the strike target might get the call right, but lose a lot of the human component that makes baseball a great American game that has endured for over 150 years.

Final thoughts

Often when new technologies emerge, we quickly forget what we just had, and the value of what is being replaced.  There is no doubt that the efficacy of ABS calls are better than human umpires, but does adding this kind of element to the game add, or take away from, the subjective nature of baseball?  While some fans are adamant that getting it right is always better than a human umpire missing a call, critics worry about adding too much technology, minimizing the value of human umpires, and the overall effect of replacing the energy that real umpires bring in exchange for bland, non-feeling computer evidence.

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Jeffrey “The Dude” Lebowski

These days, we hear expressions like “fake news” and “alternative facts,” but what do people really mean when they say these things?  It seems that a lot of what people call “fake” news is really just news they don’t like, and “alternative” facts are not necessarily facts, but alternative opinions of what the person wished were the case.  As people argue what is and isn’t fake about the news we receive, it seems as though the bigger point that needs attention is helping people understand the difference between objective facts and subjective opinions.  For example, something isn’t fake simply because you don’t like it, and just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean you should dream up some alternative that you call a “fact.”

Understanding objective and subjective information

It is important to first define terms before providing examples of objective and subjective perspectives.  When we make an  objective comment, the claim can be confirmed or assumed independently of any minds, and means evaluating situations, data, or information based on facts and verifiable evidence rather than personal feelings, biases, or opinions.  Examples of objective statements include:

• It is 56 degrees outside.
• The Tigers beat the Bears 35-14.
• A student received an 85% on the math exam.
• The new car just parked in the dealership showroom is painted navy blue with an off-white color leather interior.

As you can see from the examples above, it’s “just the facts” when it comes to objective reporting.  Now, let’s take the same 4 examples and offer a subjective opinion based on or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions:

The next time you hear objective news that you don’t like (i.e. someone you know lost a school board election), you are welcome to offer a subjective opinion about the news, but try to refrain from calling what you don’t like as “fake.”  Instead, first recognize the objective news (someone you know lost the election), and then, if you want, offer a subjective opinion about the news (“I know him, and he would have been a real asset to the board.  Unfortunately, he lost.”).  These kinds of exchanges allow for a common denominator to be established (the results), leaving plenty of room for subjective discussion to follow (he would have been the best board member had he won!).  This type of communication is healthy and allows room for varying opinions, but is based on objective reality that people can verify without bias.

Final thoughts

It is important that we not blur the lines when it comes to objective and subjective views of information — and the good news is there is room for both!  You can accept that your team lost a game, and still have an opinion as to why they lost.  You can accept a grade on a test, and freely offer your thoughts on the quality of the instructor.  When we fail to acknowledge facts (objective evidence), we lose the opportunity to begin discussion around a central, agreed upon piece of evidence that allows for differences of opinion.  Bypassing truth, however, immediately sends us to subjective arguments without a place of consensus, making it near-impossible for fruitful discussion and future growth.

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A heuristic worth exploring

In psychology, a heuristic is known as a rule or piece of information used in or enabling problem-solving or decision-making, also known as a mental shortcut.  We use heuristics all the time, and often — but not always — they help us with decisions.  Take the following heuristics as examples:

• If something is expensive, it is of good quality.  While this is often the case, it is not always the case.  For example, generally speaking, more expensive cars and computers provide more by means of ease of computing ability and driver perks (equating to better quality).  We also know that not all expensive things are better, as many clothing brands are expensive, but they do not use better materials.  Instead, these companies rely on branding that has been established as high-end, creating an illusion of being better than the competition.
• If something is rare (or scarce), it must be expensive.  Again, some things that are scarce are of greater value, including items that are no longer produced and hard to find.  But not everything that is rare is valuable — if I gave you the only purple paperclip in the world today, it would not have any greater value than other non-purple paperclips even though it is rare.

For psychologists, a contemporary heuristic may be developing in real time, and that is the following:

If someone is a popular influencer online, they must also be of great knowledge and expertise.

Similar to previously established heuristics, the statement above does have some truth to it, as there are some online personalities known as influencers who really are experts in their respective fields.  For example, if there is an emergency room doctor hosting a podcast on how to immediately treat an injury while waiting on an ambulance, we should all pay attention.  But what about the majority of podcasters who are simply, well, popular?  I’ll steer clear of naming names, but I’m sure you can guess a few of them pretty quickly, people who have become influencers online, but have no credible expertise on many of the subjects they opine about daily.

I mean no disrespect by this, but the fella online telling you how to do your hair and makeup — unless he’s also trained in medicine — should not be telling you what you should do about vaccines.

When it comes to medicine, science, engineering, and other important fields that require education and experience before one can claim “expertise,” it is important that we not grant equivalent expertise to online personalities simply because they have a big following.  Perhaps the new heuristic should be much simpler and straightforward: If your favorite online personality has a lot of followers, it simply means he or she has a big following.  HARD STOP!  Having a big online presence means exactly and only that…it does not mean the person is a legitimate expert in anything at all other than drumming up a following.

Final thoughts

As we increasingly live more of our lives online, popular influencers are being seen as experts — and often for things they know little about.  Engaging, polarizing, confident figures tend to command a lot of attention, but is the advice they are spewing of any value?  Or, worse yet, is it dangerous?  Good for influencers who have learned how to make a great living capitalizing off the internet, but use great caution when assuming if they have a big audience, they must know a lot about a lot of stuff.

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