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    Athletic Identity Transition To Transformation: You are more than an athlete
    Athletic Identity Transition To Transformation: You are more than an athlete
    Athletic Identity Transition To Transformation: You are more than an athlete
    Ebook196 pages1 hour

    Athletic Identity Transition To Transformation: You are more than an athlete

    By Dr. Mark D Robinson

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    About this ebook

    Through decades of global research and observation of athletes at all levels, I have analyzed their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. This book delivers an examination of the athlete’s personal development process. Specifically, I explore the multi-level platform of the transition to transformation dynamics and detail how athletes

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPersonal Player Development
    Release dateAug 11, 2017
    ISBN9780692936474
    Athletic Identity Transition To Transformation: You are more than an athlete

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      Book preview

      Athletic Identity Transition To Transformation - Dr. Mark D Robinson

      Section

      1

      How Do Athletes Prepare?

      As athletes, we experience a multilevel platform of transitions before we reach the final game of our sporting careers. Transition is not solely based on leaving sport; it is also based on movement through the athletic system. Many of us do not realize the importance of each transition. As seen in Figure 1, at each stage of athletic development a transition will occur for athletes. We spend most of our time focusing on athletic-related transitions and neglect the personal developmental components needed to achieve success. This leaves us in a state of confusion and disappointment when the final buzzer of our athletic career sounds.

      The transition is defined as entering or exiting athletic identity. It can happen at any moment during our athletic careers. After all, we are one circumstance away from ending our professional participation in sport. Focus on this idea for a moment: athletes prepare to win games, not lose them. How are you preparing, or have you prepared, to be a winner in life—with or without sports? Obtaining a degree is a small part of such success.

      Athlete Misconceptions and Misunderstandings

      The difference between misconception and misunderstanding can account for success or failure in sports. Misconception is an incorrect conception, idea, or thought. It is also described as a fallacy or false belief. For instance, someone who has always been told by loved ones that he or she is destined to play professionally may have an inflated sense of his or her own athleticism. A misunderstanding is a failure to understand or interpret correctly. An athlete might wrongly think, for example, that if he or she just works hard enough, he or she can one day play professionally; despite, say, being too small. Athletes at all levels experience misconceptions and misunderstandings daily. As a result, they venture through their athletic career without a realistic view of their future in sport.

      Take a minute to think about what your life will be like after you have finished playing sports. What will you do? Who will you become? For years, coaches have told us, It’s about the team. There is no ‘I’ in team. They are right; however, this is a misconception because without the individual players, there would be no team. One day you will not be on the team and may find that you have neglected yourself as a person in the collective interest of the team. What will you do without the team? What will the team do for you during this transition?

      How about this piece of advice: Get your education to have something to fall back on. As an athlete, I heard this constantly. What does it mean? This is a classic misunderstanding. Telling me I will need an education to fall back on gives me the illusion that I have a chance of playing professional sports. A degree that will make me marketable in some other profession than sports should not be treated as plan B. I know hundreds of athletes who have degrees and can’t use them because they are in areas that are not marketable. For many athletes, a degree is nothing more than proof of four years of participation in sports. In preparation for that moment when you stop playing sports, you need to develop a mindset to make sure you win in the end. It’s time to think of yourself as an individual, rather than as a team member.

      Managing sports-related transitions requires core elements of personal development that athletes often ignore or do not know. This book is designed to help you prepare for transitions, giving you a better opportunity to achieve maximum success within, and outside of, athletics. Athletic identity, for this generation of athletes, is defined as the level of maturity and understanding an athlete has in his or her efforts to maximize opportunities.

      Personal Player Development

      A key component to successful sports transitions is something I call Personal Player Development which entails helping student athletes to become more than just an athlete and gain the coping skills required to enter a life after sports. While studying for my doctorate degree, I realized personal development in athletics is referred to by many names. On the collegiate level, we recognize it as life skills or student athlete development. On the professional level, we use the terms player development (NBA), player engagement (NFL), and welfare officer on the international level (English Premier Football league). All of these entities are essentially trying to complete a similar task: take a personal approach to a player and develop that player. This is why I introduced the term Personal Player Development, which I discuss in detail in my first book titled Athletic Identity: Invincible and Invisible the Personal Development of the Athlete.

      I believe all athletes, much like non-athletes, require personal development. However, when assisting the athlete in particular, one must have a unique appreciation for his or her unique stressors. The athlete’s journey through sports participation never results in complete success without the assistance of others. Think about it: no athlete has ever won anything, graduated from college, or had the privilege of being selected to play on the professional level without assistance. Therefore, through the process of athletics and the possibilities of rewards in sports, you need to understand how transitions in athletics impact your overall development and success. More importantly, you need to understand the system of circumstance you as an athlete are currently in as well as the elements that can affect athlete behavior.

      A System of Circumstance

      He who would accomplish little must sacrifice little; he who would achieve much must sacrifice much; he who would attain highly must sacrifice greatly

      James Allen, from the essay As A Man Thinketh1

      As athletes, we are in a system of circumstance, which leads to establishing a brand. All athletes are injected with the Athletic Identity brand, long before they sign a contract with a team or endorse a product. Athletic identity can be considered the original brand before the athletic success. Think about athletes such as Michael Jordan, David Beckham, Serena Williams, and Maria Sharapova: they all have strong brands, but the start of these strong brands is deep rooted in athletic identity. As an example, before Nike and Air Jordan, he was just Michael Jordan. Athletes spend years creating a brand. A successful brand ultimately depends on athletic success and out-of-sport behavior. This athletic success requires individual athletes to spend a large amount of time in the athletic environment.

      For a short time, athletes appear happy and content with their progress and athletic development. Each year we strive to become a better athlete, becoming more entwined in our athletic identity through athletic participation as we do so. We become accustomed to the stressful lifestyle of an athlete, we focus mainly on our sport performance outcomes, and our athletic identity becomes all we know or want to know. Many of us refuse to acknowledge our doubts and fears about our future in the sport we love. We also refuse to fully acknowledge our doubts and fears regarding a future without sports. We have to address these issues in both areas, but it’s difficult because of the environment associated with athletics and the athlete.

      When we examine the athletic environment of an athlete as seen in figure 2, it is clear that athletics and the athletic community is where we spend most of our time. If we compare and contrast the environment of incarcerated criminals to the environment of the college athlete, we can see stark similarities. Athletes’ lives revolve around sports to such an extent that it is as if they are incarcerated—imprisoned by sports. According to the NCAA, a student athlete can expect to spend hours in practice, film session, engaging in community service, as well as sport psychology sessions. However, the student athlete’s time is not spent with a personal development coach or specialist—which can explain why the transition to transformation process is difficult for many athletes.

      A man is not rightly conditioned until he is a happy, healthy, and prosperous being; and happiness, health, and prosperity are the result of a harmonious adjustment of the inner with the outer, of the man with his surroundings.

      James Allen, from the essay As A Man Thinketh²

      Sports alone cannot make an athlete happy, healthy, or prosperous because they are just one element or aspect of life. If our only experience is in sports, or we spend most of our time in the athletic environment, are we being prepped for long-term happiness? If simply playing a sport was intended to bring athletes long-term happiness, why are athlete transfer rates higher than 10 or 20 years ago among college athletes? If we look at table 1, we can see transferring schools is a process many student athletes experience. A transfer is a transition, and personal development is required before, during, and after the transfer is complete. It is important to note that not all transfers are bad and some are beneficial to the student athlete.

      Professional athletes may be happy with the money they earn, but how many go broke or end up divorced after their careers are over? Post-career divorce rates among professional athletes in all sports stand at between 60% and 80%, according to Forbes magazine, which also reports that 60% of NBA players and 80% of NFL players are broke between two and five years after their careers end. All of this negativity due in part to a lack of preparation for the transition from sports participation, which is an overall lack of personal development.

      Are athletes being provided the personal development required for long-term

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