You win or you learn - you never lose

Bonjour à tous,

Bon début de saison à ceux qui viennent à peine de reprendre l'entraînement en vue des championnats en 2011.

Voici un petit article (en anglais... désolé) de Lanny Bassham (double médaillé olympique en tir: argent en 1972; or en 1976) parlant de l'aspect psychologique entourant la peur, plus particulièrement la peur de perdre. Bref, il propose une philosophie permettant à l'athlète de comprendre qu'il sort toujours gagnant d'une épreuve, qu'il ait gagné ou non, et ce, grâce aux apprentissages que l'on fait dans la défaite. Voici donc le texte en question.

Bonne lecture et bon entraînement!


One of the primary motivating factors in life is fear of loss. It comes in many forms.

It is fear of possible bad outcomes that keeps us from driving our car too fast, following too closely behind a car in front of us or taking a chance crossing a highway. This form of fear tends to protect us from harm. That's a good thing!

There is a fear that we will not do well in competition, that we will be disappointed and miss out on the joy of winning. No one wants to lose a game or be the one last to cross the finish line. This fear can be a motivator to work more diligently in preparation for the event. That's a good thing as well! But this form of fear can also be destructive if we are fearful in the competition. To fear that we are going to perform poorly creates an imprint in our self-image that it is like us to do poorly. We tend to become what we imprint. That is a bad thing!

So what are we to do about this potentially destructive form of motivation? I offer this suggestion. Go into competition with the attitude that everything that happens in the event is for your benefit. Only two things can happen to you; you win or you learn. There is no lose. We tend to learn more when we struggle and make mistakes than when everything goes well. I am not against having a flawless performance but I am suggesting that we learn more from our errors and poor performances than we do from our good ones. There is great value in learning from error. I have never met a winner that has not failed many times and learned from the failures. The key is to learn not to fear. Life is full of fearful times, turn these into opportunities to grow. The most important thing about competing is who you become not where you finish. Do not let fear become an obstacle to the opportunity you have to learn something valuable about yourself. You can become fearless! -Lanny Bassham