The Tale of a not-so Resilient Olympian
I'm a Performance Coach and Olympian. The pursuit of success and all the mindset stuff that goes with it, is kind of my thing - including resilience. I know what it means to lose, face adversity and come back - been there and done that, several times over. But why has it been so hard to tap into resilience as a working adult?
A few months ago I began down the road of starting my own coaching business, Monarch Leadership Group. The very beginning was great - all brand new and shiny, kind of like a new car with the new car smell before your kids get in and start eating Doritos in the back seats. I had a lot of encouragement - probably more than the average person needs. Between coaches, colleagues, friends and family. Everyone cheered me on.
Then, I hit a wall. Actually, several large and impenetrable walls. I had a succession of things happen - rejection for a contract coaching job, a website that wasn't up to my perfectionist standards and critical feedback on said website, and clients that I had counted on falling through. I don't think it helped that it all happened in one week, but those were all dings on the road to my ideal state of progress.
When we think of Olympians, we think ‘Wow, those are a bunch of really athletic and resilient beings.’ I mean, some of these people are "break legs and keep going" kind of resilient. The truth is, it's so much easier to be resilient when you feel that you have some autonomy and control. In fencing, I would lose a competition, know what to work on and try it out in the next competition. A plus B equals C - not that simple, but you get the point. There are just so many more factors that are within your control as an athlete.
In real working life, you get rejected without explanation, your website has glitches, or your clients have life events and cancel at the last minute. There is so much that isn't in your control. Layer on top of that impatience and perfectionism and it's a powder keg.
How can we feel resilient when so much is out of our control? Here are a few thoughts from an Olympian and Performance Coach as she works through her own discomfort:
Do not deny yourself the process of tripping and falling
To go from being the best at something and being just "meh" (as my kids say) at something is a really, really humbling thing. We believe, ‘I'm an adult and I'm accomplished, I SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO THIS!’ Wrong.
This is the first time I have ever been a solopreneur. I am starting from scratch with a scratch budget. There is no way that I know how to do all the things. As the founder of MLG, I am the CEO, the COO, the CFO, the CRO, and everything in between. I am not an Excel sheet guru, a marketing genius, or any of the above. I am me, working in my office and doing my best. I will trip, fall and fail and sometimes I'm going to need a minute. Or in my case, lots of minutes.
2. A Crazed Attitude
In a Master Class author Neil Gaiman (one of my favorites!), he spoke of coping with rejection.
"Only two ways to do it. One of which is you go down. You get sad. You put the thing away and stop writing. Go get a real job and do something else. And the other is a kind of crazed attitude that the most important thing now is to write something so brilliant and so powerful so that no one can reject it."
There is a crossroads that appears at the first point of friction when you are starting off on something new, going after your dreams or investing in habit changes.
I picture standing at the fork in the road with a wooden sign - "More of the same" this way and "The Unknown" that way. For the record, my crossroads looks like a sunny paved road for "More of the same", and "The Unknown" looks like forest and treachery. It's easier to go about things the same way and it takes an entirely new sense of faith in oneself to pursue the Unknown. In the same class, Gaiman explains the attitude you need to stick with writing,
"On the one hand you need enough humility to know that you don't know yet and on the other, you need an arrogance that is normally only seen in seven year old boys. You need that conviction that you are brilliant and this is brilliant. And my writing it, you will set the world on fire."
If I am to take the Unknown pathway, I simultaneously live with fear of this is going to go all sorts of wrong AND the hope that I could set the world on fire. It's a feeling I feel intensely. Every. Single. Moment. However, if I want to live the world out loud and at all corners of the page, I accept that fear and hope will battle on top of my shoulders every day.
3. Pace Appropriately
My mother, a very perceptive woman, always told me that the one thing I lacked is a sense of patience. I have had several coaches also tell me that I have a lot of "shpilkes" - the Yiddish word of impatience and agitation.
It is difficult to stay the course when you see others at their finish lines. It is difficult to stay the course when you feel you are not anywhere close to where you want to be. It is difficult to stay humble to the process without validation. It is difficult to be the ONLY driver of a process where you are unsure of where this may go.
The pace is slower, the pathway is more difficult, there are more twists and turns, but we have hope (see above) and set smaller goals. I have taken time to set monthly, weekly and quarterly goals for myself to begin to validate my steps and to ensure I am not veering off into the deeper parts of the Unknown.
4. Give Yourself Props
When I check my list at the end of the week, I have taken to telling myself "job well done" - even for the little things (like finishing this article). When you are working on your own business, there is no one that will do this for you. Even if you are working with others, it is important to recognize that YOU can and must become your biggest cheerleader.
I think this is my biggest challenge. I have been an externally motivated person from the day I set foot on this planet. Claps, cheers, stars and kudos are like air. I pursued sport because I always had a coach to tell me right from wrong, good job, bad job and I have followed that model for a very long time.
If you are doing the hard things as an adult and pursuing what you really want, you must become the loudest cheerleader for yourself. Period, end of story. Give yourself props routinely because no one else is going to do it for you. If you need some inspiration, here is a video of Snoop Dogg thanking himself after getting a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Resilience is a learned skill, and it takes work. If there are goals you want to reach, you will need to:
Give yourself permission to mess up.
Believe and trust in yourself.
Set smaller and attainable goals and take the time to be clear about the checkpoints on the journey.
Give yourself Snoop Dogg level props because self-validation is crucial to success.