So much negativity…

Is the glass is half empty or half full? In a game where mental toughness, consistency and having the ability to move on from both adversity and success as quick as possible are absolutes for success, understanding what a negative mindset is and what a positive mindset is are absolutes in relation to the skills listed above.

This habit in young people is formed by those around and in front of them. The voices they hear. The body language they see and the way they are treated.

When we as adults give more attention to the negative, even when it may outweigh the positive, we are 1000% instilling a negative mindset and creating an atmosphere where being afraid to fail will lead to more failure than success.

Let me give you an example…

I once had a player tell me about his weekend. His team played 4 games. They lost the first one and won the next three. His facial expression, the tone in his voice and body language expressed disappointment and failure. I stopped him right there. Something was wrong with this picture. Isn’t that a .750 winning percentage?? What is this young man being taught? What message is being sent to him to make him feel this way?

I had to give this young man a lesson in failure because he obviously had a distorted, adult driven, opinion on it.
“It is unrealistic to think you will win 100% of your games. It doesn’t matter how good you are and how good your team is, that’s not reality. I know you play on an exceptional team that rarely comes out on bottom, but one day you may be on a team that rarely comes out on top and you will need to be able to stay confident, be prepared and come to the field everyday focused and mentally ready to produce for your team no matter how good the talent around you is. That’s not a bad weekend Dude. In fact, that’s a great weekend!”

Come to find out, in this trophy driven generation, this is often the mindset. A mindset created by the pressures of the adults, parents and coaches, who have this distorted view on wins and losses and treat these tournaments like they are playing in the MLB World Series!

In professional baseball, we are taught this mentality…In a four game series at home, our goal is to take three of those games and on the road we strive to at least split the series. Anything more than that is gold. We do this and by the end of the season we will be where we want to be in the standings.

Professionals MUST learn how to fail to succeed. You will strike out. You will make an error. You will give up a grand slam. You will walk the bases loaded. You will hit into a double play. You will fall into a slump. YOU WILL FAIL and you must know how to DEAL WITH IT. If you can never come to terms with it, and you beat yourself up constantly, you will NEVER make it. That’s just simple fact.

Will these youth players become professionals, odds tell us no. Will they be a parent, teacher, coach, spouse or someone others look up to at some point in their lives, YES SIR.

With that said, my question to all the parents, teachers and coaches out there is, how are you helping those in front of you to learn how to deal with failure? Do you bombard them with a negative attitude relentlessly? Do you always make it a point to point out the positive? Does one or the other tend to outweigh the other? Sure there are parts of life that are tougher than others and raising and working with teenagers often proves to be a heavy task but I encourage you to find some way to shed a positive light on life. Take a deep breath. That less than an A grade is not the end. That loss is not the end. That poor choice is not the end. That rough day at the ball park is not the end. Turn that negative into a positive and see what we/they can learn from it.

For our youth to GET THEIR MINDS RIGHT, we adults must GET OUR MINDS RIGHT!! Stop being a downer and start being a leader.

Chris Gissell (168 Posts)

Founder of Baseball Dudes. Blessed with three beautiful children and an amazing wife. Baseball is my life, after my family, and I love sharing what I have learned from it. Thanks for taking the time to view what we offer here at Baseball Dudes.

No one wants to fail. Failure is a negative, it’s embarrassing, it’s disappointing, it’s shameful, it’s downright unforgivable…Right??

Umm, I don’t think so! Remember that time when you failed a test because you didn’t study enough but put in extra study time for your re-take and passed it the second time? Or how about the mistakes we made as a parent with our first baby that we learned from to better raise our second and third. Or getting our butts spanked in a doubleheader because of fundamental mistakes that we hadn’t given much attention to but made some adjustments to our practice plans to ensure reps and proceeded to execute much better the rest of the season.

Life is a constant game of adjustments and learning. When we are young, we see failure as a bad thing. We would get visibly emotional when we lose or made a mistake. We would carry a bad day over into the next. We would allow a rough patch to turn into a prolonged slump because we hadn’t yet learned how to see the negatives as positives and that they were secretly moments that would make us stronger.

I spend a lot of time talking with my students on how to handle failure. How to deal with negativity, be it in their own mind or from others around them. How we need to view it and use it to help us become a better athlete and a better person.

It’s important as leaders to help them get a feel for failure to talk to them about our own failures. Give them some understanding of what led us to stand before them. I’ve often shared with students that in my career I lost nearly 100 games, gave up nearly 120 home runs, walked over 500 batters and twice never made it out of the first inning while giving up 5 and 6 runs with most of that happening before I ever got a shot in the big leagues.

We MUST fail in order to become great. We must learn to acknowledge it in order to properly process it. If we as parents, coaches, teachers and leaders treat failure as only a negative, we are instilling that fear of failure. Then that fear festers into long term and prolonged mental weakness when adversity presents itself which makes the ultimate goal of success that much harder to repeat.

Help them learn to work through it. Learn to use it. Let them experience it WITHOUT your own negativity making it even worse. Be the voice of reason. Be the positive attitude needed and let it go the way they need to. You be the example and teach them how to use failures as moments that lead to greatness.

The most important lessons are hidden in each of our failures.

Chris Gissell (168 Posts)

Founder of Baseball Dudes. Blessed with three beautiful children and an amazing wife. Baseball is my life, after my family, and I love sharing what I have learned from it. Thanks for taking the time to view what we offer here at Baseball Dudes.

“Thank You Coach”

For helping me see the world a little clearer. For trying to use my talent to make a name for yourself. For giving me a chance when no one else would. For helping me see everyday why we need to continue to be a voice for todays youth. For treating me the same as the older more talented players even though I hadn’t yet proved my talent. For helping me become the parent, teacher and coach I am today.

We have all had coaches at some point in our lives. Those that made a positive impact and those that made a negative impact. But in the end, they all made an impact. It’s up to us how we decide to see and use those experiences. For example…

The coach who was my biggest fan and always friendly when I was having success but as a season full of adversity proved to be tough to overcome, he treated me as if I was the enemy.

The coach who welcomed me into the clubhouse, a new face with little experience. Gave me time to get comfortable, provided opportunity and treated us all as one, no matter our age, draft level, signing bonus or who we knew.

The coach who whispered in my ear, before doing a televised interview, asking for me to mention his name. The same coach who earlier in the season refused to have my back when it should have been so easy to.

The coach who would take time during our precious off days to meet us at the field if we needed to get in our throwing and bullpen sessions. Play long toss everyday with us and strap on the catchers gear whenever needed.

The coach who decided to join me, a 19 year old boy, on a run and proceed to let me know that I was letting HIM down with my performance.

The coach who would let me corner him in the coaches room and pick his brain whenever I had a chance. The same guy who who has pretty much held every position you can in this game.

The coaches who are in front of our youth everyday and decide to abuse arms, abuse bodies, belittle young minds, bench them for mistakes, yell at them out of anger, make the game about them, obsess over the early developers and turn away the late developers and fail daily at teaching the kids fundamentals that they will need at the next level because winning that nothing youth game/tournament is all that matters to THEM.

The coaches who relentlessly put the kids first, character first, development first and carry themselves with professionalism no matter what the situation is.

There are good coaches out there and there are some who have no business being in front of who they are. We MUST learn from all of them. Learn how we want to behave and how we don’t want to behave. We choose to either complain about it, or learn from it and turn a negative into a positive.

I encourage you to find the good in whatever situation you are in. Yes, in the moment it may seem as if there is nothing good to focus on but if you look close enough, I bet there is.

“Thank You Coach”

Chris Gissell (168 Posts)

Founder of Baseball Dudes. Blessed with three beautiful children and an amazing wife. Baseball is my life, after my family, and I love sharing what I have learned from it. Thanks for taking the time to view what we offer here at Baseball Dudes.

In a game that started as a kids game. A game that is so fun to play and teach. A game which can lead to great things and a game which can teach us so much about ourselves and life, why is it so hard to find positive stories? Uplifting and motivating stories. They are out there but they seem to be buried by stories of neglect, abuse, greed and negativity. So frustrating!

Unfortunately, I feel we are in a cycle which will take YEARS for perspective to change. And truth is that the only way this will happen is if there are some serious changes made to the way major organizations like Little League, Cal Ripken, Babe Ruth, NFHS and everywhere in between go about selecting leadership. Who they choose to lead, how they train these leaders, the standards they demand, the principles and values they live and die by and their own moral courage to discipline in moments of failure.

Just as we speak often on how to handle poor attitudes from our youth, I fear we fail at holding our youth/amatuer leaders to the same standards. Most of the messages we receive do not relate to the game on the field but relate to seeking advice on how to handle situations pertaining to coaches and parents. From poor communicators, to coaches abusing players by catching them countless innings in one game and then pitching them in the next, to coaches verbally abusing and embarrassing children, to parents coaching from the stands and so on.

We need for leadership up top to make some changes if we desire to see this culture change. Just because someone is a volunteer doesn’t mean we can’t hold them accountable. It doesn’t mean they should be able to lead by their own rules. This would take a major effort but if we truly care about all these kids, why would we not give that effort??
The game has turned into a battle of peacocks. Egos in the dugout and egos in the stands. Leadership needs to make changes. Rules and guidelines need to be established. Adults need to be held accountable. Standards need to be set. Messages need to be made loud and clear…

THIS IS THEIR GAME. THIS IS ABOUT THEIR LIFE. SUPPORT THEM. TEACH THEM THE GAME. TEACH THEM ABOUT LIFE. ENCOURAGE THEM. NEVER ALLOW POOR ATTITUDES WITHOUT ACCOUNTABILITY. BE A MENTOR. BE AN EXAMPLE. TEACH RESPECT. TEACH HUMILITY. TEACH COMPASSION. TEACH WORK ETHIC. TEACH RESPONSIBILITY. TEACH THEM TO THINK FOR THEMSELVES. TEACH THEM TO TAKE CHANCES. TEACH THEM WHAT IT MEANS TO GO ALL OUT AND TO NEVER FEAR FAILURE AND TEACH THEM HOW TO WIN WITH GRACE AND LOSE WITH DIGNITY.

For the current culture to change, leadership needs to re-evaluate and make some changes.

Chris Gissell (168 Posts)

Founder of Baseball Dudes. Blessed with three beautiful children and an amazing wife. Baseball is my life, after my family, and I love sharing what I have learned from it. Thanks for taking the time to view what we offer here at Baseball Dudes.

Do we really forget that these are kids? That they are clumsy. That their hand eye coordination is so far from being mature. That they are playing a tough game. That their normal focus level is nowhere near what ours is as adults, BY NATURE.

What is yelling going to solve? You feeling better about yourself. You getting your aggression out. You getting your point across. You showing that you’re the boss.

It is…Making you look like a fool. Causing those before you to loose some trust in you. Making them afraid of you. Embarrassing them. Very harmful to that relationship.

As I was reminiscing with my father the other day about my youth years on the field, we quickly realized that there was very little I remembered from those years. In fact, the stuff I did remember didn’t even have to do with my performance on the field. I remembered things like playing pickle for hours with my buddies at the fields. I remember vaguely what the fields looked like. I remember the first time I threw from 60’6″ as a 13 year old. A few other things, but that’s about it.

For the past 15ish years I have been working with ball players from the tee ball age to players in their 30’s. Getting to know them. Getting to help them learn this game, how to use their bodies and how to use their minds. Too often I have to help players work through confidence issues. One, because the game is tough and they simply need to learn what they need to do with their bodies and how to prepare and two, because their confidence has been broken by how they have been treated as a player and person from those they are SUPPOSE to trust.

Psychology…The mental side of life. Of coaching. Of parenting. Of playing. The toughest part. The physical side, that’s the easy part. The mental side, now that’s getting real. That’s the part that will make or brake a child, an athlete, a coach, a parent, a leader.

When you raise your voice out of anger (raising your voice in a motivating and encouraging way is very different) and it comes out as hatred, we have a problem. That’s a relationship you are breaking. That’s a moment that child WILL remember. That’s a moment others WILL lose faith in you. That’s a moment that your true character is being reveled.

If you have a habit of behaving like this, to be blunt, you have no place leading (coaching). It’s time to walk away. If you are a parent and this is the norm, I beg you to make some changes NOW before your relationship with your child becomes broken to the point of no return. I have worked with older ball players who have broken relationships with a parent for this exact reason, please don’t make this YOUR reality.

Build them up, never break them down. Remember their age and the reality of that phase in life. Stop thinking that their performance is a reflection on you and your abilities and understand that everyone is different, even our own kids. Lead by example. Motivate, encourage and support them, no matter their journey in life.

Chris Gissell (168 Posts)

Founder of Baseball Dudes. Blessed with three beautiful children and an amazing wife. Baseball is my life, after my family, and I love sharing what I have learned from it. Thanks for taking the time to view what we offer here at Baseball Dudes.

1. Provide players with playing time at multiple positions throughout the season to enhance baseball IQ. DON’T play them at just 1 or 2 positions all season.

2. Dedicate practice time each week to continuously work on the little things. DON’T only play games once the games start.

3. Take away playing time for poor sportsmanship, disrespect, selfishness and poor choices. DON’T turn a blind eye because it’s your more talented players but follow through only when it’s a player with lesser talent.

4. Allow and encourage pitchers and catchers to call their own pitches while teaching them to observe and evaluate each situation to make better, more thought out choices. DON’T call each pitch from the dugout and even worse, with a message that they are not allowed to shake you off.

5. Promote thought and encourage aggressiveness. DON’T dictate as to say it’s your way or no way.

6. Constantly promote self evaluation, ask them questions and force them to think. DON’T solely speak at them without ever looking for feedback.

7. Have pitchers on a rotation for consistent time on the mound in games and between games to continually refine and develop consistent feel for their delivery and pitches. DON’T let it go more than three or four days without them getting on a mound or only pitch them in games without ever providing time for them to work on their weaknesses and maintain their strengths.

8. When a player makes a mistake, coach them up, rebuild their confidence and let them go back out there. DON’T take away playing time immediately or even worse, yank them off the field in the middle of an inning simply because you, the adult, have seen enough.

9. Create a team atmosphere and camaraderie through sportsmanship, respect, compassion, leadership and positivity where everyone supports and believes in each other because they all see each other as equal. DON’T create a division amongst players, parents and coaches because one group of players is treated differently than another group of players because of talent, skill and who their parents are.

10. Create a team full of leaders by leading by example and motivating, inspiring and encouraging them to act as leaders amongst themselves, towards their opponents, towards the umpires, towards their fans AND away from the field. DON’T be a poor example of how to carry yourself in moments of adversity, play favorites based on ability and talk down to them in a belittling manner because things aren’t going the way you think they should.

Development is such an important word when it comes to our youth and their leadership. As adults, at home and on the field, we must keep refining our leadership, evaluating our ways and understanding the big picture. This is all so much bigger than Baseball. This game, when viewed correctly, can be one of the most amazing life coaches there is.

Let’s stop being blinded by the “WIN” and start adjusting our thought process to focus on DEVELOPING PEOPLE through Baseball.

Chris Gissell (168 Posts)

Founder of Baseball Dudes. Blessed with three beautiful children and an amazing wife. Baseball is my life, after my family, and I love sharing what I have learned from it. Thanks for taking the time to view what we offer here at Baseball Dudes.