In my last post I wrote about the negative impact of multitasking on your brain. Knowing how hard it is to change behavior, I realize that some of you will choose to ignore my suggestion that you focus on only one thing at a time (what a concept!).  

Okay, if that is the case, at least try to take a few minutes out of your day to try to reverse the damage to your brain.  How? Read on… 

If you can spare 5 minutes a day (come on, anyone can do that!), find a quiet place and close your eyes.  Now focus only on your breathing, noting the rhythmic rise and fall of your breath.  As other thoughts arise (and they will!), simply notice them and let them go. Then return to focusing on your breathing. 

The above exercise will help to train your brain to focus and to let go of irrelevant thoughts – essential to good cheerleading!  If you can stretch this out to 10, 15, or even 20 minutes, so much the better. 

Here’s another one… 

Periodically, take a mental break by gazing at the sky or even an expanse of a blank wall.  Don’t try to focus on any one thing, allow your eyes to simply take in the bigness of what you are seeing.  Alternatively, you can close your eyes and imagine you are gazing at the sky or the sea.  

This will give your brain a nice little rest to refresh you.  A refreshed brain is a healthy one!

Cheerleaders are busy people.  There’s all that school work to get done on top of hours of cheerleading practice plus maintaining a social life.  Many cheerleaders tend to listen to music while they study and in addition to that, they are busy responding to emails and text messages. 

Of course, if you ask them how they can stay focused and get anything done, they will tell you they can manage just fine, thank you.  But can they? 

There is, at this point, a significant body of research on the impact of multitasking and the studies suggest that cheerleaders, like many of us, are fooling themselves into believing that they can get more done by multitasking. 

Actually, pushing yourself to perform two or more tasks is extremely inefficient says David Meyer, a cognitive neuroscientist at the University of Michigan.  Dr. Meyer and his colleagues found that people who toggle between tasks lose valuable time in the transitions. 

You see, the brain has to refocus each time it switches activities and that time can add up over the course of a day.  There is also something called “working memory” which is like “mental counter space,” says Dr. Laura Vanderberg, a biology researcher at Tufts University. There is only so much “mental counter space” and everything we do takes mental energy which takes up room on that mental counter. 

Multitasking adds to the drain on the brain’s limited supply of resources. 

So, what does this have to do with cheerleading?  Well, researchers at Stanford University found that people who try to juggle things such as checking text messages while writing an email or studying, are unable to block unimportant information as well as those who consume one media stream at a time. 

In other words, these people are distracted – all the time!  They cannot stop thinking about tasks they are not doing. They have trained their brains to be unfocused. 

The reason this is important for cheerleaders is because cheerleading – especially tumbling and stunting – require laser focus, meaning focusing on one thing only.  A distracted cheerleader is vulnerable to being injured or causing injury. 

So the next time you are tempted to do 3 things at once, remember that you are actively training your brain to be inefficient and distracted.

Remember the news reports exclaiming that cheerleading is the most dangerous sport?  Well, it turns out that is not true.  Just goes to show you can’t believe everything you hear or read. 

A new report submitted by the American Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Administrators (AACCA) challenges the assertion that cheerleading is more dangerous than sports such as football and hockey. 

It seems that information derived from two sources – The National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injuries at the University of North Carolina (NCCSI) and the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s Emergency Room visit study (NEISS) was misrepresented.  When it comes to statistical analysis, such misrepresentation is not unusual but in the case of cheerleading, it led to sensationalized news reports and media coverage. 

What is the real story?  Well, the AACCA wanted to know this too and so they conducted their own study by analyzing the data from the NCCSI study and comparing it to the “injuries per 100,000 participants” for cheerleading to the other sports discussed in the study.  

You see, to determine the “danger” of an activity compared to other activities (cheerleading to football, for example), it is important to measure the actual “risk” of injury from performing the activity.  This is determined by calculating the number of injuries per athletic exposure, designated as “injuries per AE.”  So for each time someone engages in cheerleading or football, how often will an injury occur. 

The AACCA analyzed data from the CPSC study for other traditional female sports and used participation figures provided by American Sports Data to produce a measurable risk assessment. 

What did they find?  Because a typical cheerleading season is longer than that for other sports (ice hockey or soccer, for example), that needed to be factored into the analysis.  AACCA discovered that there are ten high school sports – including girl’s ice hockey, gymnastics, and soccer – with a higher risk of catastrophic injury than for cheerleading.  There are 17 high school sports with a lower risk of catastrophic injury. 

And what about football?  Contrary to earlier reports, it turns out that football is the leading cause of catastrophic injury in high school and college sports, with 63.5% of all catastrophic injuries. 

So why have there been an increase in emergency room visits by cheerleading?  Well, for one thing, there are more and more girls and boys who are participating in the sport.  Don’t forget that school-based cheerleaders only account for a portion of all cheerleaders. So when these emergency room figures were looked at again, it turns out that the incidence of cheerleading emergency room visits were lower than that of girls’ soccer, basketball and softball. 

What’s the bottom line?  Cheerleading is certainly not risk-free but the risks associated with it are in line with other male and female school sports and are much lower than the risks associated with football. 

Of course the ideal would be for there to be no injuries in cheerleading and while that may not be possible, it certainly is possible to reduce the number of injuries that do occur.

How?  All cheerleading coaches should be safety certified and should follow established safety rules.  All cheerleading programs should establish and practice an emergency action plan. 

As a mental game coach, I would add that a psychological readiness training program would benefit coaches and cheerleaders alike.  Training in ways to enhance focus and manage distractions (which can lead to making mistakes and causing injuries) would help a great deal.

The Burlington Patriots, a Massachusetts Pop Warner Cheerleading Team (Junior Midgets), has won 11 national titles and want to win another one. Will they do it? Watch the movie and find out! 

Film makers Laura Molta and Al Ward follow the Patriots Cheerleading team over the months of preparing for their national cheerleading competitions. From the first practice of the season in August through the many long hours of grueling preparation to the final test of their skill and expertise at Nationals, this film will attract and hold your attention as you root for the home team. 

I highly recommend this riveting movie to anyone who is involved in cheerleading.  This means all cheerleaders, all cheer coaches, all cheer parents, and everyone in the cheer industry.  If you’re new to the spirit world, this is a perfect introduction to the reality of this exciting sport.  If you’re a veteran, you will appreciate the story of this team and its leaders as it moves towards its exciting finish. 

There is so much to like about this film that it is hard to know where to begin!  The cheerleaders themselves are superb athletes who dedicate countless hours perfecting their skills.  The coaches pull out all the stops to devote their time, energy and love to the girls in their quest for a title. 

If you think winning a title is just a matter of practice, then this film will be a revelation to you.  Sure, the physical and technical preparation and practice are important, but the mental preparation is what makes the difference between a championship team and a runner-up.  Co-directors Darlene Tierney and Carolyn Shannon and Coach Jennifer Currie know this well and their passion, wisdom and psychological astuteness help the team overcome setbacks and forge ahead.  Perhaps without their knowing it, these ladies are teaching valuable mental toughness skills to these girls. 

At one point, Carolyn says, “It’s a lesson in life…you don’t have power or control…” True!  One of the key principles in sport psychology is to recognize the things you can and cannot control and to devote your energy to those things you can control.  These women know this instinctively. 

Right before the National competition, one of the girls has to have an appendectomy and cannot perform. Then, the night before the big event, the team is told they have to change one of their moves.  One girl has the flu and another has a painful ovarian cyst.  What do they do?  They work fast and hard to change the routine and the girls pull it all together in a remarkable fashion. 

I found myself rooting for the Patriots, feeling the excitement and the tension as they competed.  (I even had tears in my eyes.) You can’t help but get involved in this story! 

In addition to the main story, there are special features that are like a mini-course in cheerleading.  These features include behind the scenes interviews with 10 of the top ranked Pop Warner Cheerleading teams in the country; more than 10 full length competition performances and live critiques of cheer routines by judges.  Surely the last feature alone makes this video worth buying.  Where else can you hear a judge assess a cheer team’s performance – in the moment?  

Do yourself a favor and go to www.Cheerleadingfilm.com to purchase your DVD of Blood, Sweat & Cheers!

In my never ending quest to educate myself about cheerleading, I discovered a site that is definitely worth visiting.  It’s called the Cheerleading Info Center (http://www.cheerleadinginfocenter.com ) and is loaded with helpful articles on topics such as nutrition, body image, fitness, peer pressure, education and more. 

Cheerleading Info Center is truly a comprehensive site where you’ll be content to spend a good bit of time!  For example, it offers a blog with new articles, info, and tips offered daily.  I especially like CIC TV which offers videos galore!  You can watch and learn everything from how to execute a jump to how to strengthen your core using Pilates exercises. 

There is also a Forum which you can join where you can interact with other cheerleaders or coaches.  And check out Cheer County – a wonderful on-line cheer community where you can post photos of yourself or your team and share ideas and tips and information. 

And by the way, if there is a website you like, let me know and I’ll write about it!

I’m pleased to announce that my brand new column – called Mind Games – appears in the latest issue of Inside Cheerleading Magazine!   This is the October “back to school” issue and my column addresses how to make the transition from summer fun to school and practice. 

Inside Cheerleading Magazine won the 2009 award for the Best Spirit Industry Periodical Issue from SITA (Spirit Industry Trade Organization).   This award, which Inside Cheerleading has won 3 years in a row, recognizes “comprehensive, balanced, and creative coverage of the spirit industry with sound journalistic principles and emphasis on both editorial excellence and visual appeal.”  

I am proud to contribute to such a fine periodical.  Not a subscriber?  Check it out!

All cheerleading teams know that fundraising can be a big challenge.  My friend, fund-rasing expert Kristy Hall, and I are developing a new system that is designed to be fun and profitable.  Kristy has appeared in this blog before.  She specializes in helping small non-profits raise cash fast. In this video, Kristy offers a first in a series of tips on raising funds for your cheerleading organization.

We welcome your comments and questions so please go to the “Contact” page to write to me or contact Kristy directly at kristy@universal-synergy.com.

Part of any mental game approach is the ability to reframe obstacles into opportunities.  Instead of dwelling on what’s wrong, a mentally tough person will determine what the solution is to the problem and then take action to resolve it. 

This was true for Lawrence “Herkie” Herkimer, known as the father of modern cheerleading.  Herkie had a stuttering problem when he was young.  Now some kids who stutter hide in embarrassment.  Not Herkie!  Instead of focusing on a weakness, he discovered and nurtured his strengths.  

Herkie decided to master acrobatic skills which led him to his high school’s cheerleading squad where he discovered that he didn’t stutter when he spoke in rhymes. 

Of course, Herkie didn’t stop there!  He went on to cheer at Southern Methodist University (SMU) and eventually founded the National Cheerleading Association (NCA). 

It’s interesting to think what might have happened (or – what might not have happened!) if Lawrence Herkimer had allowed his stuttering to silence him. 

How about you?  What kinds of challenges might you be allowing to stop you?  Take your inspiration from Herkie – find your strengths and talents and build on them!