“The judges totally ripped me off.”

“The conditions sucked.”

“He totally got overscored on that wave, I'm so much better than him.”

Do any of these statements sound familiar?

Maybe you have uttered them before, or you have heard your child say them after not doing so well in a contest.

Could there be some truth to them in the moment? Maybe.

But here is the thing, either we can choose to blame external forces for our less than stellar results or we can choose to learn from them and use them as a motivator to improve our skillsets and performance.

The mindset you choose to adopt as an athlete will either hinder your ability to succeed or fast-track it, the choice is yours. 

The statements above are representative of a Fixed Mindset versus a Growth Mindset, as described by American Psychologist, Stanford Professor, and Author Carol Dweck, a pioneer in the field of human motivation.

When faced with difficulties or challenges, an athlete with a fixed mindset tends to make excuses, dwell on the problem, and allow their ego to take center stage, and quite frankly hold them back from improving.

They see the success of others as a threat, igniting feelings of insecurity and envy. This can lead to avoiding certain challenges such as not wanting to try new tricks just so that they can stay in their comfort zone and not risk failure.

And any feedback or criticism is perceived as a personal attack and that their innate talent is enough, and any further effort, training, or coaching is seen as unnecessary.  

Versus if we approached the same situations with a growth mindset, as exemplified by sports legends Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan. 

An athlete with a growth mindset is hungry for feedback and criticism, they seek it out because they see it as a path towards improvement. 

When an athlete with a growth mindset sees a competitor or peer succeeding rather than feeling insecure or envious, they study their performance and training for clues and seek out the lessons they can learn from and implement to improve their own performance. They embrace the challenge to learn and level up their own performance. 

And as they face difficulties and obstacles they know that with effective effort, they will achieve eventual mastery.  Athletes who encompass a growth mindset believe that their skills can be developed and fine-tuned by putting in hard work. 

Athletes with a growth mindset want to poke holes in their own performance to find their weaknesses in order to turn them into strengths.  They remove their ego from failure and defeat because to them it is an opportunity to learn. 

So before you want to go and blame the judges,  complain about the conditions, or say your fellow competitor got "popularity points," do these 5 things to cultivate your growth mindset as an athlete:

• Train in unfavorable conditions to be prepared for anything on competition day, whether that is flat light or small waves, do the work ahead of time to know how to handle these sorts of challenging conditions when it matters most
• Talk to the judges before the competition to find out what they are looking for that day or after the competition to learn about how you could improve your performance and scoring
• Study the tape: what are your competitors doing that you can learn from, whether that is training, their tricks, or preparation
• Failure is simply feedback to learn from so you not only welcome it but embrace it because you know with hard work you will eventually master your goal
• Ask for help and feedback from coaches, trainers, and even other athletes

Building a long-term successful and healthy career as an athlete, to become one of the greats starts with implementing a growth mindset and believing that by combining effort, seeking input, and using every setback as an opportunity to learn you too will eventually master the skills you need to achieve your goals. 

Author: Sue Izzo

Reference: Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck Ph.