{"id":299758,"date":"2018-03-09T04:00:44","date_gmt":"2018-03-09T11:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/?p=299758"},"modified":"2018-03-09T08:34:49","modified_gmt":"2018-03-09T15:34:49","slug":"stop-setting-long-term-goals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/stop-setting-long-term-goals\/","title":{"rendered":"STOP Setting Long-Term Goals"},"content":{"rendered":"

Leadership Lanes by Toni Armstrong<\/strong><\/a> (A Multi-Part Series Sponsored by Swimming World)<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThe best thing about the future<\/span><\/h2>\n

is that it comes only one day at a time\u201d<\/span><\/h2>\n

\u2013 Abraham Lincoln\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The 2010 Maryland State Short Course Championship Meet had an outbreak of stomach virus affecting so many swimmers that the CDC became involved.\u00a0 Kids were puking on the deck left and right creating a hopeless and apocalyptic atmosphere.\u00a0 Everyone felt that participation in the meet would likely end in a less desirable evening in the bathroom, and this left a vast majority of swimmers and coaches concluding their 2010 season feeling like failures. \u00a0The 2010 Men\u2019s D1 NCAA\u2019s suffered the same fate.<\/p>\n

What if I were to tell you that goals were to blame for this feeling of failure and not the virus?\u00a0 That setting goals fosters a fixed mindset where goals are your sole motivation and accomplishing them defines your talent and self-worth; that goals are psychologically damaging to your motivation, confidence, and definition of self-worth.\u00a0 What if I were to tell you to burn your goal sheets?<\/p>\n

Dr. Carol Dweck<\/strong>, Professor of Psychology at Stanford University, has spent her career researching motivation, personality, and social development as well as teaching courses in these fields.\u00a0 One of her main research projects charted the reactions of 10-year-old students who failed an exam loaded with questions well above their intellect.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Few students responded by saying, \u201cI love challenges.\u201d\u00a0 Most responded by either hunting out students that performed worse\u2014to justify their intellect\u2014or acknowledging that they \u201cwould probably cheat on the next exam.\u201d<\/p>\n

In an interview in 2012 with James Morehead,<\/strong> Dweck states, \u201cI was fascinated by how people cope with failure or obstacles.\u00a0 I was curious about why some students love challenge, and other who may be equally talented, shy away from challenges\u2014play it safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dweck theorizes that the 10-year-olds in her study highlight the two main developmental mindsets, which she defines as a fixed mindset and a growth mindset.\u00a0 In a fixed mindset, a student believes that their basic abilities (intellect and talent) are fixed traits that have a glass ceiling.\u00a0 An exam is a measuring stick of their intelligence and defines their self-worth. \u00a0In a growth mindset, a student recognizes that knowledge and intellect can be developed, a test is only a challenge, and effort and difficulty are a means to learning.\u00a0 Failure is not traumatic, but simply a learning experience because their self-worth is defined by their process (effort, hard work, persistence) and not their performance.<\/p>\n

Using long-term goals as the motivation and purpose for participation, teaches an athlete to value performance over process and fosters a fixed mindset.\u00a0 It creates a test for athletes to define their experience, intellect, talent, and self-worth. \u00a0The standard procedure of setting long-term goals leaves athletes of all abilities with an unhealthy sense of self and is to blame for their struggles with retirement and transition into life after athletics.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

An awareness of post-Olympic depression is developing around the world with athletes like Michael Phelps<\/strong> and Sasha Cohen<\/strong> sharing their stories, but this isn\u2019t just a problem at the Olympic level, this is an issue for all athletes.<\/p>\n

In an article published by USA Swimming in January 2018, recently retired swimmer Felicia Lee discusses her career and the challenging nature of retirement.\u00a0 She admits to being disappointed with the way her career ended saying, \u201cSure those (results), of course, were nice, but I left the sport with a lot more than I realized: a strong sense of self, work ethic, and go-get it attitude, priceless memories in a countless number of states and countries around the world, and above all, friendships that are unlike anything else.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was only through time and reflection that Lee was able to redefine her self-worth, find value in the process, and establish her identity outside of athletics.<\/p>\n

Our psychological bias is to blame for why we continue to use the damaging procedure of setting goals in athletics.\u00a0 We hear about a handful of Olympians setting and achieving their goals and we start to believe that there is a direct correlation between the goal setting process and the results. \u00a0Just this year, Michael Phelps\u2019 goal sheet from the age of 10 made major headlines when it was leaked.\u00a0 We start to believe that if we do what the Olympians did, we will also reach success, and that we will only reach success if we do what the Olympians did. \u00a0There is an entire market that uses this psychological bias for financial gain.\u00a0 Who do we want to speak at our coaching conferences, and whom do we want to learn from?\u00a0 The outliers of course, because we think that this will increase our odds of becoming one too.<\/p>\n

In reality, there is no correlation between practice times and meet times, procedures and performance.\u00a0 This is because there are an infinite number of variables in play\u2014psychology, personality, genetics and circumstances being a huge portion of them.\u00a0 Even Olympic siblings like Kleet<\/strong> and Kalyn Keller<\/strong>, or Morgan<\/strong> and Paul Hamm<\/strong>, didn\u2019t reach success the same way.\u00a0 If Michael Phelps never met Bob Bowman<\/strong>, would he still have been the greatest Olympian of all time?\u00a0 Ultimately, nothing is achievable until it is achieved, and nothing was achieved because you wished for it to happen on a piece of paper.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There is even a double standard in regards to goal setting:\u00a0 99% success is considered a failure, and 100% success is selling yourself short. \u00a0The rare athletes who retire on top, like USA Swimmer Maya Dirado<\/strong> (who won 3 relay medals and a gold in the 200 backstroke during her first and last Olympic team in Rio), are criticized because \u201cthey failed to recognize their true potential and could have achieved so much more.\u201d<\/p>\n

The double standard of goal setting is paralyzing: you either set your sights too high or too low.\u00a0 It puts the athlete in a consistent state of failure where success is short lived and anticlimactic.\u00a0\u00a0 It defines your limitations, keeps you focused on the uncontrollable performance instead of the controllable process and ultimately defines your experience instead of allowing the experience to define itself.\u00a0 Long-term goals are psychologically damaging and an unsustainable form of motivation.<\/p>\n

Setting a long-term goal of reaching the Olympic level will end in failure for 99.9866% of club swimmers (USA Swimming had 336,026 registered swimmers in 2016 with only 45 making the Olympic Team).\u00a0\u00a0 We need to stop developing standard procedures that follow the example of outliers, and stop preparing all athletes for the professional level.\u00a0 Long term goals need to be eliminated and instead we need to teach athletes to value the process and develop a growth mindset.\u00a0 We need to change the culture of our programs to find motivation through growth, hard work, perseverance and developing adversity instead of seeking medals and specific performance.\u00a0 As Dr. Dweck suggests, we can start by praising our athletes for process skills\u2014effort, strategy, perseverance, improvement, focus, etc.\u2014and encouraging our struggling athletes with words like \u201cnot yet.\u201d This isn\u2019t to say that all athletes deserve a participation ribbon, but rather that taking care of the controllable today will take care of the mental health of our athletes and the uncontrollable performances of tomorrow.<\/p>\n

Another suggestion is to switch from long term goals to long term intentions.\u00a0 Goals are rigid, unforgiving, and uncontrollable, but a broad and generic intention is a plan that can easily change based on the variables\u2014IE my intention is to attend and race my best at the championship meet.\u00a0 Having a flexible intention will help athletes develop a mindset to thrive in the face of adversity.<\/p>\n

Medium and short-term goals should instead become daily process-oriented intentions\u2014ie I\u2019m going to streamline past the flags on every wall today, I am going to be the first person in the water today, I\u2019m going to compliment my team mates today.\u00a0 This will not only create happier and more successful athletes (who retire at an appropriate time with a sense of fulfillment), but teaches mindfulness and the value of being present.\u00a0 Ultimately, developing a growth mindset through these practices instills a better sense of self and self-worth for all people.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As you approach your next season, consider getting rid of your goal sheets, and instead focus on actionable tasks that can be executed on a daily basis and will correlate to success.\u00a0\u00a0 Teach your athletes to value a growth mindset and find value in daily achievements.\u00a0\u00a0 And finally, check back here and read more articles in our miniseries \u201cLeadership Lanes\u201d as we will be continuing to challenge your standard way of thinking and coaching.<\/p>\n

To learn more about Toni Armstrong please visit\u00a0www.baltimoreleadership.com<\/a>\u00a0– Leadership mentor and owner of a leadership development company centered out of Baltimore, MD<\/p>\n

All commentaries are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views\u00a0of Swimming World Magazine nor its staff.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Leadership Lanes by Toni Armstrong (A Multi-Part Series Sponsored by Swimming World) \u201cThe best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time\u201d \u2013 Abraham<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6322,"featured_media":235486,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3,18,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-299758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-coaches-education","category-commentary"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\r\nSTOP Setting Long-Term Goals - 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