As kids, we are taught very young how to think like an athlete. This means something different in every sport. If you try to play football like a baseball player you may not have the most success. Each sport has different immediate and long-term goals with a variety of physical and mental obstacles standing in the way.
Although each sport is different, many of my coaches growing up liked to tell us that their sport, be it football, basketball, soccer, baseball, you name it, was a metaphor for life, particularly in the working world. This may be an overstatement, but there are certainly things to be learned about life from each sport you play.
My Story
I started playing baseball at the age of six so how to think like a player was ingrained early on. The main tenants of a baseball mindset are the focus, control, and leaving the past behind you. Because baseball is a game of waiting; waiting for the ball to be thrown, waiting for your at-bat, you need to be present in your mind, so you’re not distracted when the ball is hit to you, or you need to swing the bat.
Control is important in every sport but especially in baseball. Everything happens quickly: a pitch, a hit, a ground ball. Your actions and reactions need to be under control to throw a strike or make contact with a pitch. Control comes from training your instincts and from muscle memory and also from focus.
To remain focused and therefore in control, you have to leave your mistakes in the past. The error you just committed or your last strikeout has to be pushed aside for you field the next grounder or get a hit.
These three parts of the baseball mindset all have applications in the real world. Most professions require you to be focused and in control and not to get hung up on past failures. Whether you’re a writer meeting a deadline or salesman persuading a client you have to be prepared and focused on doing a good job.
Different Sport But Same Mindset
The football mindset, although completely different from the baseball one, was also supposed to be a metaphor for life. Whereas baseball requires concentration and control, football is more about exertion and intensity. Of course, there is a great amount of technique involved in making a block or running a route, but there is a fury present as well.
As kids in Pop Warner, we were taught to summon up all our anger to put on every hit. Everything that made us mad was supposed to be channeled through our shoulder pads and helmet into the player poised across the line of scrimmage.
Football is not a sport you can half-ass. Anyone who has tried to go half speed during a game knows they will end up on the ground. Because your opponent will presumably be coming at you with everything he has, you have to bring your all as well. Not sometimes, or every other play, but every single time the ball is snapped. Without this intensity, you risk being pummeled if not injured.
Control Your Mind and Your Energy
Few things in life require this much intensity, and very few require this level of physical violence. But any kid who has learned and mastered the art of corralling all of his energy into a single hit knows something about himself that’s hard to learn through other endeavors: there’s nothing more rewarding than giving all of yourself to the task at hand.
While there are not too many jobs out there that are looking for yelling and physical violence, there are plenty of employers who will appreciate someone bringing intensity and one hundred percent of their effort to work.
There is a lot to be learned from sports, but before you go preaching to your little league team that life is just a game of baseball with slightly different rules, you may want to reflect on the ways that life is not a game. Winning and losing in the real world is hardly ever cut and dry. While it may be easy to know what to focus on to improve your batting average, it is not always easy to figure out how to improve yourself. We can get trapped if we are too focused and closed off from our creativity. Athletic competition can train us to concentrate, but it can hinder us in thinking outside the box. It’s great to give a project all you’ve got but not at the expense of your personal life or mental health.
Kids can learn a lot about themselves and the world from playing sports. But it’s good to remember that at the end of the day, baseball is just a game and not a roadmap for success.
