Ask Cael: Hey Cael, I have a question..How do you stay consistant, this season I lost about 12 times, I feel I should\’ve only lost maybe 4 tops. I have a really hard time focusing, In Practise I feel like I can out wrestle the best, but when I get on the mat, I freeze, bad position, Bad Technique, and intiminated…

Story Published Sunday, June 14th, 2009

Question: Hey Cael, I have a question..How do you stay consistant, this season I lost about 12 times, I feel I should\’ve only lost maybe 4 tops. I have a really hard time focusing, In Practise I feel like I can out wrestle the best, but when I get on the mat, I freeze, bad position, Bad Technique, and intiminated. This Year at nationals, I couldn\’t focus my first match. I threw a beautiful over under, but didnt rotate my hips well enough. At fila trails, I had to wrestle a who won his weight in Cadet and won Pam-ams and so on. I wrestled horribly. And then at Canada Games trails, I bet this guy before, I couldn\’t focus. First Round, I was up 3-1, 8 seconds left, He finished a double, next round I was up 2-1, 9 seconds left, I was very dissapointed in myself, I practised defence for doubles, I dont know what it is..

If you just read your question you will see that it is just a matter of you overthinking and putting pressure on yourself to win. When you put pressure on yourself to win instead of simply focusing on your best effort it changes everything. You tighten up, you worry about making mistakes, you don’t react, you worry about things that you can’t control, and it’s no fun. Everyone wants to win. But is really winning? Winning isn’t necessarily who has their arm raised at the end of the match. At least not in the big picture. We really have a talent of complicating things. The deep down truth is that winning is doing everything in your power to succeed, not having your hand raised. When you go to heaven, God isn’t going to ask you how many wrestling matches you won. Life is only a test. Wrestling is only a question on the test and the question isn’t whether you won or lost. The question with eternal implications is how you play the game not whether you won or lost. Are you a good sport? Did you play within the rules? Etc. did you give your best effort in training and in competition? Those are the important questions. The world we live in judges us by wins and losses but that doesn’t mean anything. That just makes it more special to think like God wants us to think. It is not a good thing to be of “this world.” So the point is, step out on the mat and fight with your best effort. Don’t waste your time and energy focusing on the wrong things. Putting pressure on yourself to win instead of fighting makes it more difficult to reach your goals and it doesn’t work anyways. Keep it simple, know that the real goal is to fight and go see what you can do. If you don’t win, it’s not the end of the world. It’s an opportunity to learn from your loss and move forward. my recent blog talks a little about this same topic.

Latest Questions in the Ask Cael Archive

- question: Do you think starting wrestling at a young age is helpful/important?
- I have been a head coach for only 2 years, so I cannot expect overnight success but This school has so much potential. Please help me with pointers on this problem.
- A kid that I wrestle in practice won’t let me tie up with him. I beat him but how do i get a hold on him when he always circles out when I try to tie up with him.
- Everyone around here almost automatically defers when they win the choice to start the second period. I believe that is counter-productive and want my boys to take bottom every time.
- I have two boys who love to wrestle, what do you think is the best way to bring them up the ranks, without “burning them out?” And what would be some good motivational ideas?
- I have watched videos of you in college where you put your head to the mat. Are you gaining an advantage by using your head on the mat?
- Can you explain why college wrestlers defense is so different?
- What is your philosophy regarding Team v. Individual in the sport of wrestling and how do you communicate this philosophy?
- What causes passivity? How can we overcome it?
- I graduated 2 years ago and recently got a coaching job coaching my old middle school team. What is some advice you could give me to help me get moves across to my team without skipping important details?

View Complete Ask Cael Archive by Date