Keys to Success with 2008 Olympian Caroline Burckle

Five Keys to Success with 2008 Olympian Caroline Burckle

BELIEVE: I know this sounds cliché, but if you do not believe in yourself and what your mind and body are capable of, then there is no chance you will be successful. You have to buy into what you are doing and believe that the instruments you are given to work with – in this case, your body and mind – are exceptional and will be trained in a positive way, to believe. Believing in myself really and truly turned my swimming around a few years ago, and ever since, I don't doubt my capabilities, or think that I am not good enough.

DON'T OVERTHINK IT: So often, swimmers think their races through so much that they do more thinking than they do swimming. What will the outcome be? Will it hurt? What if I let myself and others down, or if I don’t do well? You can play the "what if" game forever, but it is not going to get you anywhere. Before I race, the last thing I do is think. Thinking is for practice. The best swims come when you have nothing going on in your head at all. You are in autopilot mode. It should come naturally at this point, and over-thinking shouldn't even be an option.

LOVE WHAT YOU DO: It is easy to get into a rut with swimming, especially when you train a lot for a long period of time and get broken down. But you have to remember why you are doing it in the first place – because you love it. You love the competition, the feeling you get when you win that race, or make that time. You will be successful in anything you do in life if you love it. Passion is a huge aspect of my swimming, and I make sure that I don't let swimming define who I am as a person. Rather, I define swimming by how much passion I have for it and how much I give back to it.

FAILURE: You are probably asking me why I chose failure as a key to success. Without failure, you cannot succeed. I have failed more times than I can count, and after each and every time, I have picked myself up and realized how much better I want to do and how I cannot take failure as an answer. Some times are going to be harder than others to pick yourself back up, but it is all a learning experience. Once you get the hang of it, it becomes easier to fix your mistakes and move on in a positive manner.

SET GOALS, quietly: Obviously, setting goals is a key to success. But how often have you heard everyone's goals over and over again, and verbalized so much and then maybe the outcome isn't as planned? I strongly believe in setting goals, but knowing them for you, not telling everyone else about them. I do not think I have told a single soul any of my goals. Maybe my coach once or twice. But I set them for me, and I do them for me, not for anyone else. It helps keep me motivated to do what I want for myself, and not worry about everyone else’s expectations because that can be stressful.

Garrett's Blog: You Can't Always Be At Your Best

By Garrett Weber-Gale // Swimnetwork Olympian Blogger
“Experiencing some hardship in life along the way is good so that when we really achieve success it will be that much sweeter.” - My Grandpa

I try to keep this quote in mind when I’m not swimming as well as I may like. We all are aware that life is full of ups and downs, success and some struggle. What I think is most important during these times is that we maintain our composure and poise. Look at the big picture. Realize what the facts are and analyze the situation with them.

This past weekend I competed at the Short Course Nationals in Seattle. I’d say 'swam' might be a better word than 'compete'... I hardly competed. My swimming was not anywhere near what I would consider competitive. Simply put, I swam slow. I failed to qualify for the finals of either the 100 or 200 freestyle - I watched from the deck. As I observed the heats I was so accustomed to racing in, I made sure to keep the smile on my face and the positive air in my lungs. I knew going into this meet where I was in my training: I was tired. I had lifted like a mad-man for two hours only five days earlier and lifted twice the previous week, not to mention hard swim workouts.

So maybe I was in a bit of a different place than I was used to. For a change I actually got to watch people race in the big heats. It was exciting and I fully enjoyed it. Some time in there I realized: 'Maybe this is just a little fuel to fire me up. Maybe this is the opportunity to have a first person look at my main competition.' In the end, I was ok with it all. This is a very important thing to remember: Realize where you are in your training and think if you really need to be at your best in right now. The answer for me was a resounding no. I understand what y’all are going through when you don’t swim well at times. We’ve all been there. The exciting part is that we will all be better. This is the worst of it (well, hopefully) and it is only uphill from now on.

Right now I’m getting ready for Duel in the Pool in a couple weeks. My excitement level for this competition is on the rise. There is no question in my mind I’ll be better in Manchester.

ABCs of Mental Training: J is for Juggling Everything

BY AIMEE KIMBALL, PhD//Sport Psychologist
Athletes are dedicated. They are committed. They are willing to make sacrifices in their lives to help their sport performance. However, when you take this commitment to their sport and add a similar level of commitment to their academics, social lives, work and family, it can lead to a very difficult juggling act.

Take “Christina” for example. She is an athlete whom I work with that did not play well partly because she had done poorly on a paper and was stressed about it and partly because she didn’t get a chance to eat before her game and instead had taken a nap.

She was so tired because she was up until 1 a.m. finishing a paper. She was up so late because she had procrastinated and did not manage her time well. She had known about the paper for a week, but said that it wasn’t really that long or difficult of an assignment. She even admitted she could have done a better job managing her time because she probably didn’t have to watch “Grey’s Anatomy” (which took longer for her to watch than it did to actually complete the paper).

She also said her friend had a bad day, so she spent almost an hour on the phone talking to her. Because she waited until the last minute, waited until she was totally exhausted, and did not prioritize well, she not only did poorly on her paper she also did poorly in her game. Juggling her fun time, with her friend time, with her sport and academics proved to be too overwhelming. However, if she had thought it through and worked to manage her time and energy better, she could have been more successful in both her academic and athletic performance.

Unfortunately, I’m sure many of you can relate to Christina and are wondering how committed athletes who look for success in all areas of their lives juggle everything. Here are some suggestions to help you juggle your many demands successfully:

Recognize it’s hard to give 100% to everything all the time

You’re not a superhero. At some point something has to give, and that’s OKAY. It’s fantastic to strive to be perfect, but it’s unrealistic to expect it all the time in everything you do. Do what you can, the best you can, with what you have at that moment.

Know your true priorities and think long term

Make sure if you choose to sacrifice one area of your life for the benefit of another that you are not just focused on the here-and-now, that you are thinking about how prioritizing one area of your life will affect you 1, 5 and 10 years from now. For example, if you choose to put your social life first and go out with friends all night rather than working on a project or getting a good night sleep before your 6 a.m. practice, recognize that one year from now your grades might not be good enough to get you the job or get you into college, or, five years from now when your swimming career has ended you may regret not doing the little things necessary to help you to reach your fullest potential. However, when choosing your priorities, keep in mind that the odds of competing at the collegiate or Olympic level are against you. So, before you prioritize swimming over all else, make sure you don’t totally neglect the areas of your life that you have to rely on if/when competitive swimming ends. Again, think about the long-term effects of your decisions.

Know who else your decisions affect

As you are juggling the various aspects of your life, make sure you know what relationships might suffer. Whether it’s your relationship with teammates, coaches, friends, or family, when you are spending a good deal of time with one group your connection to others may begin to fade. It’s just something to consider as you try to balance your life.

Decisions don’t have to be totally wrong or totally right, they just have to be the best you can make at that time

Many people stress out because they don’t want to make the wrong decision. When several things are important to you, you are likely to feel that you are doing something wrong if you have to make a choice between two things you enjoy. When you struggle with such a decision, weigh the pros and cons, the long term effects, the people involved (including yourself), and make the best choice you can with the options available.

Balance the time and energy required for tasks

When you have lots of demands for your time, it is hard to get everything done. You can feel overwhelmed, stressed, and think that it is impossible to be you and be everywhere at once. When you have stress because of significant time demands, the best way to get control of it is to plan it out and learn to manage your time and your energy. First, get out a piece of paper and divide it into five sections. This is going to be your “to do” list. In the first column write down everything you have coming up. In the second column estimate how much time the task will take. In the third column, decide on a scale of 1-5 (1 being a little bit, 5 being a lot) how much energy the task is going to take. Then look at your list and prioritize-your fourth column is the order in which you are going to complete each task. The final column is the date or time you want to complete the task by.

To Do	Time Required	Energy Required (1-5)	Priority	Completion Date/Time

I suggest doing the tasks that require the most energy first, the ones that require the most time next, then, with the remaining tasks, decide which are most important. The reason you want to do the tasks that use your energy first is because you want to do them while you still have energy and you don’t want to have them hanging over your head all day. You might have to call a coach and tell him that you are going to miss practice, something you dread and know it takes a lot of your energy to do but not necessarily a lot of time. If you wait until the end of the day, you’ll have been stressing over this “energy-draining” task all day, which can distract you from all of your other tasks (causing them to take longer than needed and possibly decreasing their quality). Also, once the “energy-drainers” are completed, that sense of relief of having it done can actually bring you an energy boost.

Juggling the various aspects of your life is a skill. If you can create good time management habits, set goals to help you choose your priorities, and learn how to deal with the stress of it all, you will develop the ability to be successful in multiple areas without having to sacrifice too much in others. Sometimes, there is a lot going on and a lot being demanded of you, but the more you work at it, the more things you can juggle at once.

Make it great!

Dr. Aimee

About Aimee C. Kimball, PhD:

Dr. Kimball is the Director of Mental Training for the UPMC Center for Sports Medicine. She is an Association of Applied Sport Psychology Certified Consultant, and is a member of the American Psychological Association, the United States Olympic Committee’s Sport Psychology Registry, the USA Swimming Sports Medicine Network, and the NCAA Speakers Bureau. She works with athletes, coaches, and parents to help them achieve success in sport and life.

For more information contact: kimballac@upmc.edu, 412-432-3777, http://sportsmedicine.upmc.com/MentalTrainingProgram.htm