The space between

How to respond to uncertainty in sport

By Jeff Lancaster

Victor Frankl, the author of "Man's Search for Meaning" and survivor of Auschwitz concentration camp, famously wrote, "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."

With the recent postponements and cancellations of national championships and the Big Hockey Hit Out, many athletes may be feeling uncertain, anxious and powerless.

How you choose to respond to these moments determines what you will feel and do.

Each of us decides how adversity, trauma or loss is defined. 

When you work hard for a goal, and that goal is then taken away, you may feel a sense of loss.

It's okay to feel that. In fact, it's recommended that you feel and experience these moments with honesty and self-awareness.

These are natural and normal responses to loss.

But it's important to not meet tension with tension.

In much the same way that a person's natural response to being caught in a rip in the ocean is to swim against it, most people try to fight or resist tension. This often results in fatigue, frustration and outcome avoidance or even self-sabotage.

The best response is often counterintuitive to most athletes. Don't fight the tension. Accept it. But learn how to swim around it by minimising the depth and duration of the experience.

Importantly, you need to reframe the loss as opportunity and refocus on preparation, process, purpose and improvement. Focus on gain, not on loss.

Consider some famous examples from our own backyard:

Savannah Fitzpatrick - dropped from the Hockeyroos 12 months out from the Olympics, Sav chose to recommit to her goals and her purpose. As we now know, she forced her way back into the squad and then into the Tokyo Olympics.

Mark Knowles - in response to recovering from what many athletes would consider serious adversity: “I’ve used getting injured as an opportunity to improve something else. When I broke my ankle and did my foot, I used it as an opportunity to do more upper body work, get stronger on the ball with my core.”

Daniel Beale - in response to the rescheduling of the Tokyo Olympics: "The postponement of the Olympics ... provided a rare opportunity to get a few things right and get my body right and make sure I’m in a better place physically ..."

###

Jeff Lancaster is the mental performance coach for Hockey Queensland and the University of Connecticut Huskies in the USA. He is the author of 'Get Your Head in the Game" and the developer of the sports mindset program Changefully and the team culture program Teamfully. He currently works with athletes, coaches and teams around the world and across sports, including hockey, cricket, swimming, golf, tennis, lacrosse, softball, netball, AFL, soccer and rowing.