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From the Texas Glory. One of the top, if not the top, organization in Texas.
Mental Skills Tip of the Month: Routines: LEARNING ‐ Make Learning Most Important. If your top goal is to be the best you can be in
softball, you will maximize your chances to achieve all your other softball goals. What does it take to approach potential? This lofty goal
doesn't require that you perform perfectly today; it requires that you learn as much as possible today about how to give your best effort
in all the performances in your future. Three questions: 1. Do you perform better with a positive attitude than a negative one? 2. Isn't
adversity inevitable? 3. If yes to both, then isn't staying positive through adversity going to be a critical skill for you to develop into the
best athlete you can be? Here's how to do it: make learning most important! Adversity is good because it usually provides information
about something that isn't working. Seek out that information and when it isn't immediately apparent, have patience and faith! Even
when we aren?t able to learn from adversity, which is rare, it provides us with an opportunity to practice dealing with adversity. We do
this successfully by controlling our attitudes and emotions with the positive self‐talk that comes from an optimistic explanatory style.
When you make learning more important than achievement today, you are able to adopt the scientist's mindset that there is no such
thing as "failure,? only outcomes that can be avoided in the future by making effective adjustments. Learn what to repeat from your
"successes" and what to change from your "failures." But remember, learning doesn't happen automatically. You have to pay attention,
looking for patterns and details that have eluded you in the past. Realistically, this is too much trouble for most people, but since you are
committed to being the best you can be at your sport, it's certainly not too much for you. You know that to get what most people won't
ever get, you'll have to do things that most people won't do. This includes having the thought, ?adversity is good!? Constantly ask
questions, including: ? What was I trying to do? ? What happened? ? Why? ? What do I want to try to do the next time that I'm in a
similar situation? ? How can I do that? We are not born with the information needed to formulate the best plan of attack for any
situation. We must seek it out if we are going to have a chance to approach our potential. We must be open to the possibility that our old
map of life that tells us how to get to where we want to go probably has a few mistakes on it. Also, this map is certainly lacking in some of
the details and distinctions needed to traverse challenging obstacles, and there is no more challenging path than trying to be the best you
can be at something. Here are two big 'ifs:' If you know what you want, and if you have both the motivation and courage to go and get it,
then you are well on your way getting what you want. That "way" equals learning and applying what you learn. Our ability to get what we
want in life is no different from our rate of learning and applying what we learned. Know your job and do your job!
Mental Skills Tip of the Month: Routines: LEARNING ‐ Make Learning Most Important. If your top goal is to be the best you can be in
softball, you will maximize your chances to achieve all your other softball goals. What does it take to approach potential? This lofty goal
doesn't require that you perform perfectly today; it requires that you learn as much as possible today about how to give your best effort
in all the performances in your future. Three questions: 1. Do you perform better with a positive attitude than a negative one? 2. Isn't
adversity inevitable? 3. If yes to both, then isn't staying positive through adversity going to be a critical skill for you to develop into the
best athlete you can be? Here's how to do it: make learning most important! Adversity is good because it usually provides information
about something that isn't working. Seek out that information and when it isn't immediately apparent, have patience and faith! Even
when we aren?t able to learn from adversity, which is rare, it provides us with an opportunity to practice dealing with adversity. We do
this successfully by controlling our attitudes and emotions with the positive self‐talk that comes from an optimistic explanatory style.
When you make learning more important than achievement today, you are able to adopt the scientist's mindset that there is no such
thing as "failure,? only outcomes that can be avoided in the future by making effective adjustments. Learn what to repeat from your
"successes" and what to change from your "failures." But remember, learning doesn't happen automatically. You have to pay attention,
looking for patterns and details that have eluded you in the past. Realistically, this is too much trouble for most people, but since you are
committed to being the best you can be at your sport, it's certainly not too much for you. You know that to get what most people won't
ever get, you'll have to do things that most people won't do. This includes having the thought, ?adversity is good!? Constantly ask
questions, including: ? What was I trying to do? ? What happened? ? Why? ? What do I want to try to do the next time that I'm in a
similar situation? ? How can I do that? We are not born with the information needed to formulate the best plan of attack for any
situation. We must seek it out if we are going to have a chance to approach our potential. We must be open to the possibility that our old
map of life that tells us how to get to where we want to go probably has a few mistakes on it. Also, this map is certainly lacking in some of
the details and distinctions needed to traverse challenging obstacles, and there is no more challenging path than trying to be the best you
can be at something. Here are two big 'ifs:' If you know what you want, and if you have both the motivation and courage to go and get it,
then you are well on your way getting what you want. That "way" equals learning and applying what you learn. Our ability to get what we
want in life is no different from our rate of learning and applying what we learned. Know your job and do your job!
