Of course there are the other times when the cause and the fix are not clear. As I mentioned yesterday, high stress families, especially families where feelings are not expressed or allowed or where conflict is not addressed in a healthy way, can be breeding grounds for all sorts of medical and psychological symptoms including mental blocks. (And by the way – high stress is a significant factor associated with sport injuries.)  

You will have your own way of working with blocks and it’s good to follow through with what you usually do – especially if you have had success with other cheerleaders.  But if you find the problem is not resolving or if the athlete is especially emotional, then you might want to consider assessing for family stress. So how do you do this?  

 This may not be as hard as you think.  After all, you probably already know something about your cheerleader and you’ve probably met one or both parents. Use what you know already to review the following checklist: 

1. Has the athlete alluded to tension at home?
2. A recent separation or divorce? 
3. A loss of a loved one – including a beloved pet?
4. A parent losing a job?
5. A parent who travels extensively?
6. A recent move?
7. Illness in the family?
8. Illness in the athlete?
9. Problems in school?
10. Relationships problems?
11. Missed practices (more than usual)?
12. Does athlete seem unusually tired and listless?
13. Does athlete seem to have trouble concentrating?
14. Does athlete seem preoccupied?
15. Does athlete seem more emotionally volatile lately?
16. Have you seen any changes in the athlete’s behavior lately?
17. Have you noticed any bruises that may indicate abuse? 

If you answer “yes” to any one of these, it’s worth investigating further with the cheerleader to see if the problem is something he or she is willing to talk about. Sometimes the athlete will feel so relieved to have the opportunity to express pent up feelings that the block will melt away.  

Usually though, your conversation will be a first step in a process that may include some problem-solving with the cheerleader or bringing the parent(s) in for a meeting. It could also result in helping the athlete and/or the family find a good therapist.

It can be helpful to appreciate the psychological complexity of a block and so this article is devoted to exploring the impact of family stress on a cheerleader and how this might result in a block.  When I was in graduate school I had the opportunity to study family therapy.  Unlike individual therapy, working with a family is – just as you might imagine – working with the whole family together in one room at the same time!  And yes, sometimes it could get crowded! 

Well since I’ve been thinking a lot about mental blocks lately, I’ve come to realize that, in some cases, the solution to a block might be family therapy.  Why – you may wonder? 

It is not unusual for a child to develop psychological or medical symptoms when that child lives in a high-stress family.  Now I realize that stress is part of life and that there is no such thing as a stress-less family but it is the way the family deals with the stress that can make all the difference. 

One way to think about it is this: we all have a need to communicate and we are always communicating even if we don’t say a word.  We communicate verbally, that’s true, but we also communicate with our facial expressions, our gestures, our behavior, our attitude and mood, and with our medical and psychological symptoms.  What we cannot express verbally, we do so in other ways. 

If we are lucky, we live in a family where the lines of communication are open and where everyone feels free to verbally express his or her feelings and thoughts in direct and respectful ways.  This includes especially the ability to identify and resolve conflict. 

In families where there are things left unsaid, the feelings get put away but they do not disappear.  Nope – they get expressed in other ways – through acting out (examples include alcohol abuse, taking drugs, misbehaving, failing at school, sexual behavior, and so forth) or through the development of symptoms such as medical problems (tummy aches, constipation, irritable bowel syndrome, insomnia, etc.) or psychological problems such as anxiety, depression or mental blocks! 

You see, these behaviors and symptoms can be (not always) a way of expressing feelings and thoughts that cannot be expressed verbally.  

So what might a child be trying to communicate?  

• I want and need attention or comfort
• I am scared about…my family’s economic situation; marital conflict; pending divorce; recent loss; trouble at school; conflict with friends; and so forth.
• I am angry about…not spending enough time with me; the strict limits you put on me; your not really understanding me; the way you treat me or mom or dad; and so forth. 

Sometimes a child’s symptoms serve to draw attention away from other family problems such as marital conflict, economic worries, or grief.  The child believes, unconsciously, that his/her symptoms will bring mom and together again or will be a distraction from other problems.  

Typically a family will get quite involved with a mental block problem.  A parent may pay for extra coaching or special equipment. There will be extra meetings. The child may become the center of attention in the family. For a while it may seem as if everything revolves around the child with the block. 

Now I am not saying that all of this is bad. Not at all!  It can be complicated to resolve a block and it may require extra time and money and attention. What I am trying to get at is, in some cases, it is the extra time and attention that the athlete is looking for. 

Stay tuned for my next post where I will write about how to determine if a mental block is a symptom of family stress.

P.S. I’ve added a Page on Mental Blocks on this blog…check it out!

You might recall that a while back I wrote about how to manage conflicts that can arise in cheerleading.  I introduced a format called Transactional Analysis or TA which shows how different parts of your personality, also known as ego states (see diagram below), can get “hooked” in certain situations. 

Well, not only is this true when you interact with others, it is also true when you interact with yourself!  If you have ever caught yourself saying to yourself, “Well, that was a stupid thing to do,” then you have engaged your own Critical or Controlling Parent which is berating your own Child.

The point here is that any conversation you have with yourself involves your ego states – your Parent, Adult, and/or Child.  As you might recall, the Parent can be divided into the Critical or Controlling Parent and the Nurturing Parent and the Child can be either the Adapted Child and/or the Free Child.

The Critical Parent  (CP) is that part of you that tries to control or discipline another part of you – usually the child.  The CP is not all bad.  For example, we all need a gentle kick in the pants (figuratively speaking only!) now and then.  So, if you think, “Come on…get going…you gotta get this done – now!” this is your Controlling/Critical Parent reminding you to get on track. It may be a motivating self-talk that indeed gets you moving in the right direction.

If however, you think, “You are so lazy and good-for-nothing…you’ll never get it done!” well, that is likely to get you feeling berated and defeated and not inspired and energized. This is the Negative CP in action.

If you make a mistake, what is your response?  From a TA perspective there are various options.  Here are some examples:

·        “I am so stupid…I’ll never get it right!”  This is coming from your Negative CP. How is this going to make you feel?  Yep – not so good and certainly not eager to try again!

·        “I’m still not getting it right!  It’s frustrating but if I calm down and try again I’ll eventually get it.” This response is from your Nurturant Parent; it’s a comment that you might expect to hear from your own loving mom or dad.  This comment is more likely to encourage you to try again.

·        “I am doing something wrong and I need to figure out what that is so I can correct it.”  This is from your Adult.  There are no feelings, just facts.  This objective stance is what most championship athletes embrace.

·        “I give up!”  This is from your Adapted Child, that compliant and dependent part of yourself.  This response may be designed to get someone else’s Parent to bail you out or to provide solace.

·        “Wow! That was a doozy! Let’s see if I can do it again!”  This response is from your Free Child, that part of you that is playful and creative and spontaneous.  In moderate doses this is good and fun but if excessive, real work may be replaced by goofing off!

So there are some examples of some ways you might respond to making a mistake.  It may be helpful to consider this as you move into 2011.  Certain internal responses will energize you and others will de-motivate you.  The nice thing is that you have much more control over this than you may realize!

Please feel free to ask me any questions you may have about the mental game of cheerleading.  I am happy to respond either in writing or via a telephone chat!

And please “like” my Facebook Page – Confident Cheerleading Center! http://www.facebook.com/confidentcheerleadingcenter

To refresh your memory, the series of interactions (or transactions as they are called in TA) were as follows:

 1. Coach says to Cheerleader, “Remember, cheer practice is at 3 pm tomorrow.” Cheerleader responds, “OK coach.”  This is an Adult to Adult interaction. 

2. Coach says to Cheerleader, “Remember, cheer practice is at 3 pm tomorrow.”  Cheerleader says, “Ok, ok…I know. Do you think I’m stupid or something?” Here, Cheerleader responds from her Child and tries to “hook” Coach’s Parent. 

3. In response to the above, Coach says, “I don’t need attitude from you. Show up and shut up.” Coach is responding form his Critical Parent, directing the message to Cheerleader’s Child. 

4. Another way Coach could have responded, which would have diffused the tension, is:  “Hey – of course I don’t think you’re stupid.  I just want to make sure you’re there ‘cuz practice isn’t the same without you!  I’d miss your smiling face.”  Here, Coach is still coming from his Parent but it’s his Nurturant Parent, not his Critical Parent. 

Well, there is another way Coach might handle this and it is by trying to reestablish the Adult to Adult transaction.  As you can see below, Coach says, “No, I don’t think you’re stupid. I just want to make sure you know because there was a time change.”

This should be said in a calm, friendly tone of voice, devoid of any sarcasm.  What you hope for is that Coach will have succeeded in engaging Cheerleader’s Adult.  This is an exchange of information and it belongs in the Adult realm. 

This is not to say that Adult – Adult transactions are superior to any others; they are not but this transaction started out as a simple exchange of information which is always an Adult to Adult interaction. It took a turn somewhere else when Cheerleader tried to hook Coach’s Parent. 

Different situations require different kinds of transactions; if we only had Adult to Adult transactions, life would get pretty boring.  It would be like conversing with Dr. Spock all the time! 

Generally speaking, when conflict arises, a good way to reduce the tension is to try to establish an Adult to Adult transaction.

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According to Transactional Analysis (TA), the way your Parent, Adult, and Child ego states or personality parts are constructed depends on your own history – the way you were treated by parents, siblings, and other people in your life plus your own life experiences.

 Therefore, it is not unlikely that your Parent may sound and feel like your parents or other authority figures in your life.  Similarly, your Child contains left-over feelings, needs, fears, triumphs and resentments from your own childhood. 

All of these feelings and experiences can be “hooked” or triggered by current transactions with people.  When this happens, you are likely to re-enact dramas from your past.  It feels like “now” but it’s fueled by the past. 

A clue is this: whenever there is an intensification of feelings about a situation, it’s a good bet you are being “hooked” or triggered by something from your past.  This is a good time to count to ten (really – it works!) to give yourself the time and space to step back and THINK about what your best next move should be. 

To go back to yesterday’s example, you saw Coach’s Critical Parent being hooked by the Child of the Cheerleader.  What could Coach have done differently?  

Solution #1: Coach could have recognized that this was a kid who was hypersensitive to criticism (anyone have an athlete like that?) and so, he could have responded from his Parent but from his Nurturant Parent as you can see in the diagram below.

In this instance he would have said, “Hey – of course I don’t think you’re stupid.  I just want to make sure you’re there ‘cuz practice isn’t the same without you!  I’d miss your smiling face.” Now it’s important to have the right tone when this is said.  It must be said with a warm smile and perhaps a gentle touch on the shoulder. 

What do you think this kind of response would have done?  If done with the right tone of voice and a smile, I think it would have reduced the tension and neutralized the negativity.  I bet Cheerleader would have smiled, too.  You can diffuse a lot of tension with a little gentle humor. 

There is another solution to this negative transaction so come back for more soon! 

Please “like” my Facebook Page – Confident Cheerleading Center – http://www.facebook.com/confidentcheerleadingcenter

Today, as promised, I will show how a simple interaction can result in conflict.

 In the diagram below, Coach again offers the reminder.  Note this is coming from the Coach’s Adult and is directed to the Cheerleader’s Adult.  But this time, the Cheerleader responds differently.  This time, the Cheerleader says, “Ok, ok…I know. Do you think I’m stupid or something?” 

What happened here?  Well, the Coach’s reminder was innocent enough and if it was delivered in a neutral way, meaning no non-verbal attitude, why should Cheerleader respond in such a way?

We can’t know for sure why Cheerleader responded in this way.  We do know that she responded from her Child and directed it at the Coach’s Parent.  Whether the Coach’s Parent will get hooked or not depends on the Coach’s psychological awareness and general wisdom. 

It may be the Cheerleader perceives any communication from any adult as a remonstration; maybe the Cheerleader’s parents are highly critical people; or maybe the Cheerleader is just in a bad mood (teenager anyone?). 

What should Coach do in this instance?  There are several options, each with its own consequence. 

If Coach’s Critical Parent gets hooked, he might say (in a loud voice), “I don’t need attitude from you. Show up and shut up.” 

The Adult to Adult transaction has disappeared and in its stead is a Critical Parent to a Child transaction.  The conversation has changed from a simple reminder about practice to a heated and unpleasant exchange.   

Coach might now see Cheerleader as a trouble-maker and Cheerleader sees Coach as another adult who doesn’t understand her. 

What would you have done in this situation?  To learn how to get out of this kind of scenario, come back tomorrow for more!

If you look at the illustration below, you will see the typical 3-circle diagram of the Parent, Adult and Child personality parts.  (Everyone has all 3parts no matter how old you are.) 

In this diagram, you see how you draw a transaction. 

In this case, Person A is on the left and Person B on the right.  Let’s say that Person A is a Coach and Person B is a cheerleader. 

What is illustrated is a simple transaction.  Coach says to cheerleader, “Remember, practice is at 3 pm tomorrow.” 

This is an Adult to Adult transaction.  Coach is merely giving information and is engaging the Adult in the cheerleader. 

The Cheerleader says, “Thanks Coach,” indicating that the message has been received. 

Now you may wonder why I am talking about this. After all, what’s the big deal?  You have these kinds of interactions all the time.  Exactly!  You are constantly giving information and providing advice – after all, that’s what coaching is all about, right? 

But how about those times when an innocent comment on your part results in a sullen response? What happens then?  Stay tuned.  Tomorrow I’ll show you what’s really happening in those situations and how to resolve theme.

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Yesterday I began to address a problem that exists in any group or organization (including cheerleading teams) – conflict. Let’s face it – discord is going to be present from time to time whenever two or more people get together.  Personalities, needs and egos can clash, differences of opinions emerge, and there might be a scramble for power and control. 

Lest I sound too pessimistic, let me reassure you that I also have infinite confidence in the ability of humans to work through discord and forge loving supportive relationships.

 There is a theory in psychology called Transactional Analysis (TA) which was developed in the late 1950’s.  It was still popular when I went to graduate school several decades later.  It’s not as popular now but I think TA offers a useful model to help us understand and resolve conflict. 

Actually, a popular book emerged from the TA world called “I’m Ok, You’re OK” and although it’s a bit dated, it is still a good read. 

The basic premise is outlined in the matrix above. 

As you can see, in any interaction, you either feel ok or not.  Furthermore, the person you are engaging with also feels ok or not based on what happens in the “transaction.”  The healthiest position is “I’m ok, you’re ok.” 

I invite you to think about your transactions. Do you work to create situations where you and your transaction partner both feel ok?  Do you find with some people you always end up feeling not ok?  Do you go out of your way to help others feel okay at your own expense?  Do you sometimes unwittingly drag others down so no one feels ok? 

If you are a coach you might want to consider posting this diagram in your gym.  It can serve as a useful reference point when there is a conflict on your team.   

What do you think? 

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A few days ago, a cheerleader wrote to me asking for my help in dealing with a member of her team who “is a bragger and who puts people down.” Since I realize that this is not an isolated incident, I thought I would share with my readers what I told her.

 (Please note: this is advice for a cheerleader; what I would suggest to a coach would be different and something I will address in future blog postings.) 

This is a somewhat revised version of my response to the cheerleader: 

It’s awful to not get along with a team-mate – especially someone with whom you have to work so closely!  

And yet, if you are able to learn how to work with her, you will have developed a skill that is invaluable since throughout your life, you will be in situations that require you to work with people who are difficult. 

I always encourage people to take the high road.  Please avoid talking or complaining about her to others.  That only sets up a situation that is unpleasant for everyone.

If you have not yet discussed this situation with your coach, please do so.  Your coach may not be aware of the problem and will want to help. 

A good lesson for any sport (and for life!) is to focus on the things you DO have control over and let go of those you DO NOT.  You do NOT have control over your teammate nor do you have control over whether she is part of the team. 

Think about what you DO have control over.  For example, you do have control over your attitude and your response to your difficult teammate. 

Each time you react emotionally to this person’s behavior (and this includes obviously ignoring her or giving her the silent treatment), you are buying into her moods and she is “winning.”  

People who put others down are very insecure themselves.  They think they are elevating themselves by putting others down. Turn down the volume on what she says and focus on the task at hand. 

Here are some things you can say to her: “Let’s try to get this right for the sake of the team.”  Or you can say, “I know we don’t always get along but since we both want to perform well for the team, let’s try to work together, ok? Let’s start fresh today and forget about the past.” 

Be cordial to her…you don’t have to be her best friend but you owe her the respect that one human being owes another.  This is especially true if she fails to demonstrate that!  If you keep a cool head and don’t react emotionally to her, she may back off. 

Remember, people who put others down are insecure.  She is trying to get you to feel what she feels most of the time.  Imagine that you are surrounded by an invisible shield that will protect you from her words.  

This is not easy, I realize.  But if you do this, you will be demonstrating a maturity and leadership skills that are quite impressive!

Performance excellence in cheerleading requires the consistent control of body, mind, and spirit.  This means developing good habits such as attending practices on time, listening attentively to the coach, attending to the rules, practicing diligently, and being a team player. 

Each time you encourage your team to do any of the above, you are nurturing their moral development; you are enhancing their character.  Sure it’s important to offer praise for good athletic performance, but it is equally important to do so for displays of honorable, upright behavior. 

When you encourage your athletes to sacrifice individual glory for the good of the squad or when you insist that they congratulate the team that beat them out at Nationals, or you help them to control their emotions (think before you act), you are helping them become better citizens. 

Of course, the way you behave has a powerful influence on your cheerleaders, too. You are a highly visible role model.  If you want  a team you can be proud of, be proud of yourself first!