Are You Playing Not To Lose?
My youngest daughter was a collegiate tennis player 🎾and when she was growing up, I spent countless hours watching and listening to coach after coach impart their wisdom and experience to help make her the best player she could be.
It was always fascinating to observe the different approaches.
Right before beginning college, she was going through a particularly rough time, losing matches that she should be winning. She was getting stressed and worried about her results as she approached her first semester. Even though she had been recruited, she knew she still would have to earn her spot in the line-up. The more she worried about this the worse she played.
Finally, after about 6 weeks of this, we found a new (and favorite) coach. He summed it up this way: “You’re playing not to lose instead of playing to win.” This was not only an AHA moment for her, but it stuck with me as well. 💡
It was the truest thing that any coach had ever said to her and it changed everything.
Olivia was engaging in self-sabotage. The realization of her dream of playing college tennis was about to come true and her limiting beliefs about her worthiness, if she was good enough, and the fear that she would fail resulted in her playing small instead of going for it.
She had always been the hardest working most committed kid on the court. But that wasn’t enough. She needed to align the physical AND mental to reach her goals. Being in the gym and drilling for hours was her comfort zone. In a way, unknowingly, she was hiding behind all that busyness and activity while avoiding what was going to make the real difference – changing her thinking and beliefs and confronting her fear.
Her fears were holding her back from taking the risks she needed to on the court and so she couldn’t produce the results she was looking for. To start winning again a few things had to happen…
✅She needed to figure out where her fear was coming from = what was the belief producing the fear
✅She had to remove the beliefs that were holding her back and to then create and install new beliefs.
✅She had to embrace being uncomfortable throughout a match and learn to play through it while staying focused on the physical parts of her game and her strategy.
Once she made these shifts she started playing up to her potential, loving tennis again, feeling confident, and winning. The more she won, the more she won. 🏆
The thing about sports is that they're a great metaphor for life.
Watching this unfold for her I started to recognize how much I too was playing not to lose in my own life, especially in my business. In many ways I had been playing safe and small instead of going for it.
The risk of being vulnerable, the possibility of failing, and the dread I felt when thinking I might not be good enough kept me sabotaging myself.
Instead of doing the one or two critical activities that would make the true difference in my business and income, I filled my to-do list with busywork, which made it appear that I was productive but I was just procrastinating.
To finally breakthrough I needed to take the same steps as my daughter...
👉confront my fears,
👉shift my limiting beliefs,
👉force myself out of my comfort zone.
And I couldn't just do it once and expect things to change. It took daily intentional action to get there.
The result was personal and professional growth to the next level. ⬆ My income started to increase consistently and the right clients and opportunities started to show up with less stress. Not only that but my relationships got better as I allowed myself to let go of what wasn't serving me.
Things became so much easier as I let go of the internal struggle.
But this is hard to do without guidance and support.
If you're thinking you can just wing it, that a few days of affirmations is going to change your self-sabotage, that won't work. I know. It would be great if it did, but it doesn't.
What does work is to strategically and consistently do the deeper mindset work to change your thinking so you start taking different action. This is what works. This is what I teach my clients and I'd like to share that with you.
If you’re ready to release your struggle, stop playing small, and step into your highest and best level of success then join me for this new MasterClass Stop Sabotaging Your Success
Learn to Get Out of Your Own Way and Start Growing Your Impact, Income, and Happiness
Thursday, September 24 at 4 PM EST, 1PM PST
Space is limited!
I created this FREE MASTERCLASS to help you tap into the beliefs, feelings and actions that will propel you forward toward success, so you increase your income and feel good doing it.
See you there.
💛
