Episode #47: Demi Agaiby Webinar (Building Resilience in Student-Athletes)

Special Webinar Episode: Building Resilience in Student-Athletes

In this episode of the Significant Coaching Podcast, we dive into the crucial topic of student-athlete resilience with Demi Agaiby, Sports Performance Coach and Director at Beyond Horizons Performance in Chicago, IL. Demi shares expert advice on recovering from sports setbacks, developing a growth mindset for athletes, and turning mistakes into opportunities for success.

Key topics covered include:

• What resilience training for athletes looks like and why it’s vital.
• Practical strategies for managing stress in sports and staying motivated.
• Techniques for overcoming mistakes in sports and building mental toughness.
• Tips for parents to support their high school athlete's success both on and off the field.

This episode is packed with actionable takeaways for athletes, parents, and coaches looking to enhance performance, improve mental health, and achieve sustainable success in youth sports.

Discover more about sports performance coaching and connect with Demi Agaiby at beyondhorizonsperformance.com.

Transcript

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Welcome everybody to the Significant Coaching and Recruiting Webinar Series. I am honored to have Miss Demi Agaibi with me today and we're going to talk about resilience tonight and how athletes can overcome mistakes and setbacks. If you've been an athlete, if you've done anything in your life where it's been hard, you've failed and you've struggled and maybe you've been injured and you've had to overcome those injuries. So that's our focus tonight. And I want to welcome Demi and Demi, you want to tell a little bit before we get started about beyond horizons. Sure. So my name is Demi. I am a mental performance consultant. And I have my own practice beyond horizons performance. Basically I work with athletes and performers on elevating their mental skills and strategies so that they can approach their training, and feeling equipped and empowered to manage whatever comes their way. So I focus on the mental game through sports psychology. Which is awesome. It's something that every kid I've ever worked with needed, even the kids that have played high level college and those kids trying to make a high school team. Every kid goes through this at some level. So I'm excited to hear your thoughts and opinions on it and see if we can share some Advice and some solutions. So families and coaches can walk away from this saying, okay, we don't just have to deal with this or ignore it. We actually have some tools that we can use. Let's start Demi with how you handle situations where an athlete just feels discouraged or doubts their ability to be their best on the court, the field, wherever that may be. Self belief, can be a really tricky thing. A fancy word for self belief is called self efficacy, right? And what we want to do is build self efficacy, which is essentially believing in yourself. The idea that when you step out into the world, you believe that you have the ability to get things done. You have the ability to see things through to finish what you started. And there are a few ways that you go about that. One of them is, relying back to past success, right? So thinking back to how many different times you actually succeeded, especially amidst a challenge, a struggle, something where you saw it through And the outcome was actually in your favor, right? So what that does is remind you like, Hey, I did it before. I can do it again. Sure. Maybe there was a little differences, right? However, the fact that I did it can reignite my self belief in that moment. So that's the first thing. The second thing is that, and this is huge for coaches, huge for parents, is actually being told, hey, I believe in you, To have somebody significant, and that's I think the key word here, it has to be somebody significant, like coach, like a parent, who the athlete is trying to appease to some extent, right? To have them say, I believe in you. I believe that you are capable of managing this challenge, coming out the other side of this, can be such a powerful thing. And I'm sure you've seen it, Matt, where it's just literally they, you might say those words or something similar. And then it just it just, a fire ignites and they're like, Oh, He believes in me, right? They're just such a simple thing, but yeah, the more that you say, Hey, I believe in you, the more powerful it can be. and as a coach, I look back and I've always tried to be that person that gives those kids, That belief in themselves that I'm there for them, but you're constantly challenging them in different ways. And sometimes it doesn't come off the right way. What would you tell a parent or a coach in terms of teaching that athlete on their team or that athlete in their house, some things like if I'm a volleyball player and I get really nervous when I'm going up to serve. Especially in pressure situations. I'm a baseball or softball player and I'm coming up late in an inning and I've got to get a hit. My team needs me to get a hit. What are some of those things an athlete can have in their toolbox in those situations to get that self efficacy that I got this, I know I can do this. What are some of those tools they can use? Yeah, so I definitely think thinking back to prior successes would be one that I would, offer. Another one that might be helpful is, vicarious experience, which essentially means, hey, my teammates, are doing this thing with me. They've gone through it. That kind of reignites my ability of Oh, I can do this too. But in those moments, I think I would actually lean more towards confidence building and, managing the pressure. Because to me, As it relates to the mental skills, you almost have to prioritize okay, if this is a self belief thing for sure, that's a component, but in this instance of okay, you're coming up on a really clutch moment and you have to execute, to me that screams more, okay, how do you manage pressure? And so in those instances, I would say you have to get real comfy. You have to get real comfy in those moments and you have to have more of those moments. So the more that you can put yourself in the hot seat over time. the less it's going to feel like you are in the hot seat, right? That's called psychological adaptation. Our brain just gets accustomed to managing pressure and stress. And so it's not going to feel like a big deal, which is super powerful. So I would say you have to find small ways, even if it's in practice, to push yourself. out there to experience challenge, to experience pressure. And coaches, this is where I tell coaches, I need you to create low stake, high pressure scenarios in practice, right? I need you to mimic those high pressure scenarios. instances as much as possible because you need the athletes to be so skilled in managing the low stakes, high pressure so that when they walk out there, they're like, okay, we're good. We got this. And that can require a lot of creativity. But from what I found, it's instrumental. I think another strategy I would just throw out there is, I would identify what noise is getting in the way. Why in that moment are you doubting yourself? What is the chaos or the noise or the distraction that is taking away your focus from doing the thing at hand, And that's like a question where it's like, Oh I don't believe in myself because I'm afraid that if I mess up, then my teammates will judge me. Coach might put me on the bench or mom, dad might be upset. That would be a reflection point of okay why is this a point of tension for you? And then also okay, from there, how can we reframe that to be not destructive? Like, how can we help you manage that noise or that chaos that's happening? Yeah, it's almost like I'm excited about that chaos. I'm excited about the potential. I don't know about you, but as a former high school coach and a longtime college coach, one of the things I build into my practices is whatever routine it is, free throw, batting practice, pitching, tackling, whatever sport you play, I make the kids Really learn how to breathe and use breathing as a huge part of it. So one of the things I'm working on with my daughter, we've been doing this for years. She's a volleyball player and a golfer, very similar mindset, serving the ball, and then taking that swing to hit the ball is we talk about, okay, even when you're practicing on the range, swinging a golf club, or you're practicing in volleyball practice, serving. Everything we do that with breathing and taking that deep breath, exhaling, getting that bad air out, relaxing the shoulders. You and I have talked a ton about visualizing then. And if you're not making that a part of your habit and practice and a part of your routine outside of games and competition, now it's not there when you want it, right? Exactly. Yeah, I think the more that you practice that skill, the more that it can come in those clutch moments, right? Something just a super simple kind of rule about breathing is you inhale on the prep and then you exhale on the effort, right? So if I'm serving, I'm going to as I'm bringing my arm up, I'm going to exhale when I'm hitting the ball. And my follow through. Yeah. And that's just a super easy rule of thumb that if you just get your body used to that, it'll do it automatically. And you're regulating your system to manage those high intense moments, which is exactly what we want. you and I have talked about this on podcasts that we've done. I think it comes back to the kids understanding that they have control over their bodies. It's not the situation that's controlling them. They have the ability to control who they are. The breathing, relaxing my shoulders. I'll take clips from NBA games for my basketball teams and I'll show them these guys making 40 million a year. You've got a pressure free throw. They step back. They put the ball under their hip. They close their eyes. They take a huge deep breath and exhale. if that guy is in that situation, Can't you do that? Why can't you practice that same way? So I just love those things. I love getting kids to understand that it's not the situation. It's you've got this, right? On that same note of building self belief there is this ability to get so caught up in everything that's going on around you and what you can't control. And I think the self belief comes into, okay what am I capable of in this moment? What is in my control so that I can put my mental energy into that and then reap the fruit or reap the benefits that comes from that, right? So instead of thinking like outcome or talent, it's okay, where can I channel my effort? Because that streamlined and then from there you get outcomes. But focusing on the controllables, essentially. I love that. Let's talk about those kids that are maybe dealing with a nagging injury or maybe even a long term injury. How do you work with them? And I know you've had injuries. I've had injuries as an athlete. How do you help athletes set realistic goals during their recovery process? How do we get them to understand the reality of what they're going through and not putting added pressure on themselves when they're out? Yeah, injury is a really loaded topic. When I work with injured athletes, I really like to have a communication with a physical therapist, whether just a quick email back and forth or something, obviously it has to be, through consent of the athlete. But that helps me understand the injury in a more like neutral way of Okay, this is actually, logistically what this injury is going to look like. This is the protocol. This is the return to play, estimated return to play, right? So that's the first step. And that's more for me to help me out and determine. But truly, I don't. necessarily focus on return to play as much as I talk about your day to day small wins. And I think that is where having the athlete graduate from this like black and white thinking of I'm either all better or not better at all is where they can get really down on themselves. So I say, I want you to acknowledge a small win and introduce the spectrum of the experience, as opposed to being like, Hey, I'm all better now, or I'm still in the place that I was, right? Because the reality is the progress is there. It's just about acknowledging it. And taking it as significant, even though it might be as simple as, wow, I straightened my leg today after surgery. And that's the reality of the situation, but that's still a huge win, because what are the implications of that? Now that I can straighten my leg, I might be able to put weight on it. Whoa. Like everything scaffolds and builds on top of each other. So there's no win that's too small to celebrate, in my opinion, especially when you're injured or coming back from surgery, like you are building. A new athlete in so many different ways. And so I helped them become aware of those small wins in that process, because There is a lot of pressure elsewhere and they are already getting that messaging. So when it's me and the athlete, we don't focus on that at all. we talk about that 1%, Can we get 1% better today? We don't need to get 50%. We don't need to get a hundred percent better, right? Can we get a hundred percent or 1% better? Can we make Those little incremental improvements, whether we're hurt or we're just trying to be a better hitter, a better server, a better defensive player, whatever that may be. Yeah, and I think athletes don't always hear. The reality from a physical therapist, an athletic trainer, a sports performance coach, whatever that may be. And I think the more we can get them to understand this is your reality, but here's what we can do to change that reality. We're not going to change it all today. We're not, maybe we're not going to change it all in a week, but here's what we can do today. Am I on the right path there? Yeah. I think something I want them to embrace the reality. Like I want them to be extremely aware of the circumstances that they're in. And I actually think if there's resistance towards that's probably where I would start of no way. Coach says this, or my physical therapist said this about there's no trans, I'm probably going to come back way sooner. I would wrestle with that. I'd be like tell me more, right? That's where I dig in. And I would be like, what makes you think that, better, right? Obviously, I'm gonna do this from loving, nurturing place. But tell me more about that. That's really interesting to me that you are insistent that you're going to come back sooner. So I want them to understand the reality and embrace. every outcome that could happen. They could bounce back and they could be great, cool, but it also could take longer than anticipated. You're so focused on coming back quicker, coming back at all, then you're going to be disappointed in the instance that, doctor is like, Nope, Got to wait a little bit more. So I want them to embrace the reality of all of the potential outcomes and then along the way, still acknowledge the small wins. I love that. I really love that. Let's talk about the parent role in this. Oh, yes. I think, I'm a dad and I struggle with this stuff too. there's so much empathy when you're a parent, because whatever your kid's feeling, you're feeling, if they're hurt, you're hurting. It's almost they've got a tear in their knee. You can almost feel the pain in your knee, when they're disappointed, cause they didn't get to play enough or their coach benched him. It hurts my heart. So what's the parent's role in all of these obstacles? How do we keep our kid from going backwards and being a part of the problem instead of part of the solution? Oh, so many things. I think the first thing is that help them become aware of their small wins. bring awareness, state observations of I love seeing you fill in the blank. I love seeing you push past this. I love seeing you unlock different things in your journey, right? Like state observations, which I think we talked about on the, one of our podcasts, right? But like state observations, and really just continually help them become aware of their personal process in those small wins. The second thing is that when you do have, because injury is not void of extreme emotional responses, When you do see your athlete upset or distressed, try to understand that they're going through an iteration of a grieving process and try your best to validate and nurture that. emotional process and help them not stay there too long, meaning give them a bounce board to go off of. they need something to direct to. And so that's where the controllables comes in. I'm like, okay, what are we going to do that's in your control? What can we do right now to give you, again, 1 percent better or one step forward? Yes, I acknowledge that this is a really hard time for you and you can still take a step forward. It might not feel so great. I get that. But let's not have you stayed down for too long, then what happens is like a helplessness, a hopelessness, in avoidance, and then they that actually, which has been proven, that actually delays the healing process even more. So the psychological state and, approach that they have could actually push them back. And then the last thing is a little bit more in traditional, but help your athlete understand that they are more than just an athlete. And these are the times that you do that. The times that maybe they were at practice and they're not, maybe you take them to, I don't know, an outing that they would never go to because they would usually be at practice, right? Or maybe you're hanging out with family more or you're going out And spending quality time with whoever, right? But encourage them to find other hobbies or interests and invest in those hobbies and interests. Fill their life with other things that fulfill them and try to encourage them to do that. Because yes, they're an athlete, but it's not all that they are. And these are moments that the sport is taken away momentarily or temporarily for sure. this is your time to just sneak that identity portion in there. I find it really important for me as a coach to do the same thing with injured athletes when they're in the practices they can't play. I try and keep them really involved, whether that's keeping stats, whether that's taking on a bigger leadership role, whether it's coaching and mentoring the younger athletes on the team, whatever they can do, I want to keep them as involved. And as engaged as I possibly can. So I think we're thinking very similar things, for me, the more I'm talking to that injured kid about our strategy and getting their advice on, Hey, would you take a look at this play? I'm thinking about doing this rotation change. What do you think about this? How are these? How are the girls or the guys going to handle this? So I almost want to take that injured kid and make them an assistant coach and make them feel that value. How do you feel about that? No, I think them being in the space is really healthy to continue to nurture the athletic identity. I also think that there's a newfound appreciation that can come from being in those spaces, right? Like I don't want them to be completely separated where they're never there. I want them to watch practice. I want them to go to games. I want them to be there and they're going to come back with probably this reinvigorated passion and appreciation and gratitude for their sport, which is amazing. And the other side to that, so parents watch out for this. Is that is a loaded situation to be in. It is a very emotionally charging situation to be on that bench, watching everybody else advance, get better, grow, and you feel like you're stuck, right? And again, two things can exist at the same time. While this is an amazing opportunity for them to grow, their appreciation and take on different roles, and gain a different insight. It also is really emotionally challenging. And so that's where having those coping skills, having those mental strategies to help them when they are experiencing, that internal dialogue that might not be so helpful. is really key because otherwise they could just sit there again and stay in that emotional distress. And then they develop an avoidance of I don't want to go watch practice today. It made me feel awful. Exactly. And then they start pulling away slowly, but shortly. And that's where his parents. When we see that pain and we want to remove them from that painful situation. We want to say, you have to go, And we need to do the opposite. Go talk to coach, what can you do? What role can you take? On this is your team. You committed to this team, whether you're hurt or healthy, it doesn't matter. Go talk to coach. What role can you take on? Is there something different? Can you help with strategy? Can you help with player development? Can you help with mentoring? Can you be that big brother, that big sister for the team? What can you do? So I love all that. And it's getting my brain really moving in a lot of Yeah, I think you bring up a good point of like parents, when you hear that it is really important that you don't necessarily jump to that conclusion of okay, let's just take you out of it. Obviously it's not serving you. Because to some extent it is, it's just about, again, giving them the tools to manage. To manage that situation because there is a beautiful benefit to them being in that space that surpasses maybe what they could even imagine in that moment. And I'm sure we're speaking from experience and I've seen it in my own clients as well. I have one of my clients is a sophomore volleyball player and she's been down. She's hasn't been contacting me. I had to reach out to her and we finally had a little come to Jesus about what she's been dealing with. she was taken out of her role. The coach removed her from her role and she felt worthless. She felt useless. Like she, I don't have this responsibility anymore. Now I'm no longer a member of the team. And I said, At what point did you go to the coach and ask them if you could play a different role? If there was a, could you play back row instead of front row? I know you love front row, but you're such a good passer. You're such a good defense player. Did you go to coach and say, Hey, coach, I'm willing to play back row. Can I get some reps back there to earn more playing time in a different role? She goes, no, I didn't even think about that. And she's five foot four playing front row. And I said, what are you going to play in college? She goes back row. I go, wouldn't this have been a great opportunity to have a conversation with your coach about having a versatile role and being able to play different positions. And she goes, yes. I go, don't you wish we would have had this conversation four weeks ago? She goes, yes. It is true. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. Let's talk about the other side of the mountain we've overcome that injury, or we're back in that starting role. How do we help athletes manage the anxiety and the fear of, Oh, I don't want to get hurt again. I don't want to lose my job again. We've gotten them healthy. We've gotten them back to that role. How do we get them to stop thinking about the negative of going backwards? So this is actually a process that start when they're injured. And I always make it a point to talk about what, basically, I ask the question, what did your body tell you this week? What did you learn about your body this week? Because, Every single time they go to PT, every single time, they are learning something. They're learning something about the way their body communicates. They're learning about how they can better take care of their body. They're just learning different things. And like any relationship, the more that you know about somebody, and the more that you can put the pieces together about how things work, the more that you trust them, right? The same thing goes with an athlete's body because the reality is after injury. An athlete is probably going to have a really weird relationship with their body. They're going to be like, what the heck? You failed me when I needed you the most, right? So what you have to do is rebuild that trust. And that happens through the course of physical therapy. And so when they do have to take steps towards re entering sport, whatever it may be, I'll say, Okay, look, we've already established this relationship with your body. You've already established a relationship with trust. So this is when you do it with courage, right? It's going to be scary, right? You got to trust yourself, but it's not without the prior work being done. It's about the work that goes in between the backend. But really having them rely on okay I was able to do all of this in PT. And so I'm cleared for a reason. Yeah. I, I always like giving kids the scenario of, okay, who do you want to be? Do you want to be that half of a person that, because you're worried that you're going to get hurt again? Or do you want to be that kid that says, you know what, if I get hurt again, I get hurt again. I'm going to, I want to be the best version of myself, but whatever happens. But I got to go out there and be me. Yeah, I would rather be, hurt again knowing that I gave everything to be here And then being half of myself and not seeing the results that I used to see You know what? Some people, you know when they're entering those spaces they want to protect themselves, right? So that's a It's a way for them to feel safe of I'm not going to take this risk or I'm not going to put 100 percent effort when we do this drill or this skill because, that's where I'm scared. That's where my fear goes in. And so they do that to protect themselves, but in a way, like you mentioned, They're holding themselves back as an athlete altogether. Yeah. And it's such an easy thing to do. And that's why, you and I both do this a lot. We preach communication. Don't not use your team. You have a coaching staff, you have teammates lean on them. Tell them what's going on. It's not a coward. You're being honest. Hey coach, I'm a little worried about, Playing eight straight minutes. I'm a little worried about playing three sets. I'm a little worried about playing nine innings. Can we start out where I give my all for three, four minutes at a time, and then, I know I'm going to, you're going to rotate me out. How do you feel about that? Having that conversation and really working to build that relationship with the people on your team is such a big deal. It's a very complex thing. And I think coaches, that's where I would point to you and I would be like, okay, what are you doing to facilitate an environment where your athletes feel comfortable, stepping up to the plate and being like, Hey, this is what it is. This is what's going on. Because a lot of times I hear this, every day of like how they're feeling, like really, truly how they're feeling and did you express that? And it's no coach would never, like I would never, but then we reflect on the environments and perhaps they're not suitable for that. And so it puts them in a corner. It's so important for me when a kid loses minutes or gets hurt, it's always important for me to just have that conversation in that moment and say, remember early on in the season before your injury, who was playing a lot, who was starting, who was a major contributor. Yeah. And they go, me? And I go, why do you think that was? Because I was earning, I was out playing everybody. I go, are you healthy now? Yeah. I go, so why would I feel any different? About you than I did back then. Why do you think that's changed? And I want them to understand that, yeah, you've been out, yeah. You've been, you haven't been your best, but you're there. We have never stopped believing in you. We just knew we had a little bump in the road we had to get by and we had to get you healthy, whether that's physically or mentally. So I think as a coach. Constantly reminding kids, Hey, I haven't left your corner. I still have your back, but we got to get you healthy. We've got to make sure that you can contribute the best of your ability before we put you back out there. Nothing's changed as far as how we feel about you. I also think you bring up A lot of times athletes will say I just want to go back to how I was, which is what you alluded to of oh I'm going to go back to the start of the season. And I think something again, the reality is that you are not going to go back to the player that you were after injury. hopefully if it's truly a transformational experience, you're actually going to come back a different athlete, but not a bad different athlete, a good different athlete. And I think that's like the concept that like different can be good in this case, like you transforming into a different athlete is actually, what's going to set you apart from the rest. And you've overcome this now, you can do it. That's what makes you different. Yeah, that's what's really changed. You now is that You know how to pick yourself back up, you know how to get yourself mentally back prepared And overcome that huge thing that huge trauma, whatever it may have been Yeah, you're stronger than you think you're you're you're not worse than you were at the start of the season. You're better Yeah, you're stronger. I think that's a great way to put it of like you're not gonna go back You To who you were, you're going to come back stronger. We talk to kids with ACL injuries, they're out for eight to 12 months, sometimes longer, Tommy John surgery with pitchers. They're out, a full year at least and getting them to understand that if you do your therapy. Your body's going to be stronger than it was before the injury. If you listen to that PT and you listen to your performance coach, cause there's so many things that you didn't understand about your body back then that now you do, so I love all that. This has been great. For those of you that would like to just do a discovery meeting with Demi you can always go to beyondhorizonsperformance. com. And Demi, you live in Chicago, but I would imagine you do a ton of work over Zoom. Oh, yes. I see clients every which way in the nation. So reach out. So you've got her whenever you need her. And we thank you for spending some time with us. Have a great night, everybody. Thank you. Well, that's a wrap for this episode of the Significant Coaching Podcast Webinar Edition. I'd like to thank superstar performance coach Demi Agaibi for tackling those hard questions about the stresses athletes face when mistakes, failures, and setbacks happen. We hope you walked away with some great advice and solutions for your athletes. For additional help from Demi, you can go to beyondhorizonsperformance. com. She's very much worth the call. If you're enjoying these conversations, please click that subscribe button and share it with a friend. If you're a parent of a student athlete looking to play in college or a school administrator looking for help with your family's college recruiting, you can schedule a free strategy session with me at CoachMattRogers. com. Thanks again for listening. Have a significant week. Goodbye until next time.