Confidence is Overrated: Chapter 16 "Validate and Encourage"

Hello, welcome everyone to Confidence Is Overrated, an informal reading by the author, me, Travis Thomas. Chapter 16, Validate and Encourage. Quote, too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word. A listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. End quote. Leo Buscaglia. I was talking to a friend recently. He's one of the best mental performance coaches in the world. We've known each other for a while now, and we highly respect each other's work. When we first met, we connected immediately because we both saw the value of story in explaining the concept. We both used games and activities to have people feel and experience what we were teaching. We both focused on building trust, connection, and connecting the head to the heart, and addressing the person instead of the problem. He had gone to school and had gotten his sports psychology degree and all the certifications— and all the certifications respected in the field. I, on the other hand, Had none of them. While talking, he asked if anyone in the field of sports psychology had given me a hard time for not having all the letters after my name. I laughed because I really haven't. I told him that I have flown under the radar, but once this book is a bestseller and I become more known, I'm sure the hate will come. Thanks for helping me make this a bestseller eventually. I told him that I teach— excuse me— I told him that I teach and help athletes and people with mental skills, but I do not pretend to be a psychologist. I'm a leadership team dynamics and culture coach who also teaches mental skills. I am a coach, not a therapist or psychologist. Maybe that ruffles some feathers. I hope not. I feel I'm pretty good at what I do because mainly what I do doesn't require a fancy degree. It's simpler than that. This is what I do. I listen, I validate, I encourage. That's it. Do I have activities, concepts, habits, mechanisms, and processes for helping with high performance? Yes. But none of them mean anything unless I do the above. Here's the equation: V plus E equals P. V, validation, plus E, encouragement, equals P, progress. I have essentially been talking about this equation the whole book. That is why I don't need a degree. I just need to be able to do these really well. Parents don't need degrees, and they do this all the time. Teachers and coaches get degrees, but this equation isn't formally taught. Yet when it comes to being effective, understanding this equation is crucial. If you are not able to validate someone else's experience, they will never trust you. My wife and I get in trouble all the time because our daughter will bring us her passionate ideas. And as her parents, we try to get her to look at the situation from another perspective. In response, she blurts out, you always take the other person's side. We're not trying to. As her parents, our intent is good. We want her to see that everything is not black and white. It's complex, and that often there's more than one solution. Our intent is good, but our execution is poor. Why? Because we haven't validated her feelings or perspective first. Since our immediate response is to challenge, she gets defensive, and then the conversation escalates into an argument. It only takes moments for a discussion to turn into hurt feelings. Time and time again, I mess this up when it comes to my daughter. And wife. When it comes to working with athletes, leaders, or anyone who reaches out professionally, I crush it. It's so easy and natural for me to do it with them, yet I drop the ball when it comes to my family. The reason is simple. As their parent, I want to protect and fix them. My ego gets involved because they are my child. I feel responsible. As coaches, leaders, and parents, we can do the same thing. Once we feel responsible for the people we lead, it becomes personal. We see them as an extension of us, our identity and ego. And so we want to control what they think and how they behave. They become a representation of us. But when someone comes to me professionally, I am simply a neutral outside perspective. I care about them, but none of their experience is a reflection of me. It allows me to stay unattached and free from protecting my own ego. I get to just be there for them and listen. Validate. Whatever someone else is feeling is valid. Why? Because they're feeling it. It doesn't mean we agree with it or like it, but their feelings are 100% valid. Like my daughter, if we don't acknowledge and accept how they are feeling, they will not feel heard. If we drive to move that— move them off of their perspective, they will hold on tighter. If we try to minimize their feelings or emotions, they'll feel ignored and diminished. And worse, when we try to tell someone who is feeling bad, nervous, afraid, threatened, etc., that they should not feel that way, not only do they feel unheard, but now we have reinforced that there is something wrong with them for feeling the way that they do. We have helped them take the poison twice. But when you validate, it's like you're holding a balloon and slowly allowing all the air to be released. There is no resistance. There is no pushback, judgment, or fixing. There is just them and their feelings, thoughts, and emotions, all real, all valid, and there's nothing wrong with them. You're just listening. Validating does not mean you agree with them. It does mean that you try to understand why they feel the way they do. Recently, I was working with a young player who was told he would be on the B team for an upcoming tournament instead of the A team where he felt he belonged. He explained to me how well he had been playing and all the great feedback he got from the coach. Yet the same coach decided to put him on the B team. He felt hurt, confused, angry, and thought the decision was unfair. I listened and asked a few follow-up questions to understand his situation even more. From my perspective, he made a good case. But also from my perspective, I have no idea what the full story is. I don't know what the coach thinks, his philosophy, and the reasons for the decision. I don't even know if everything this player is telling me is true. And guess what? It doesn't matter. My job is to listen and validate. I say that I'm sorry. I, I never agree, but I share that I can totally understand why he feels the way he feels. I reiterate that it's totally acceptable to feel how he feels, and there's nothing wrong with him. All the negative emotions are normal and expected. I mentioned that I would probably feel the same way in his shoes. Isn't that what we all want? I know my daughter does. We want to feel loved, heard, and understood. We want our feelings and emotions to be validated. If we have done that well, there will be time in the conversation for us to ask, what are you going to do now? We are helping them move from the past to the present. Now, I might ask them, In this situation, what can you control? This is what I asked the young player. It was easy to see why he was so upset. The B team made him feel inadequate. It made him think his coach didn't believe in him. It made him doubt himself. I think most of us might feel similarly in his shoes. We don't know what his coach is thinking. He didn't want to ask, so he might be right. And he might be wrong. After I asked him about control, I said to him, let's switch places and you tell me what I should do if I came to you for help. He paused and then he said, I should just keep working hard. I asked, what else? He said, have a good attitude, be a good teammate. To which I responded, you mean control what I can control? My attitude, effort, and response. And he said, yes. We switched back and I said, is there anything else you need to control? And he said, no. Encourage. We were now at a point of focusing on actions and solutions. Now we can move forward. The emotions, feelings, and thoughts were still valid, were still valid. But by getting neutral with them, we could now focus on collaborating with our new reality. Instead of staying in the victim mindset and arguing with our reality, we are going to work with it and choose how to respond to it. We focus on what we can control regardless of how we feel. It's okay to be frustrated, but shifting to behaviors and actions will allow us to collaborate with our new reality. With this younger player, he set the intention and goal of being the best player on the field for the B team. He thought about what it would take— excuse me, he thought about what it would look like if he were a leader out there and how to play the best he can to have a good tournament. He was now focusing on what is instead of being stuck with what he wanted it to be. There is courage again. Then, excuse me, there is courage again, right there embedded in encourage. We encourage someone to move forward when they are stuck. We encourage someone when they are hurt, scared, frustrated, sad, confused, and unsure. We encourage them by helping them focus on the right behaviors, and most importantly, Reminding them that we believe in them. We make them feel safe by letting them know that we value them and have their backs. Win or lose, succeed or fail, we are going to support them and help them. They are ready to take the next right step, whatever that step looks like for them. They feel heard, validated, supported, and encouraged. Progress. The progress is theirs, not ours. Our goal is not to control what they do, and we definitely can't control the outcome. Our only goal is to help them keep moving forward to make progress. As they move forward with encouragement, they are, they are being courageous. That is progress. With every step in the right direction, they keep Progressing. They have the courage to do so because you reinforce the belief and support they needed. Are they confident? Maybe, maybe not, but they are making progress. Validation plus encouragement equals progress. Regardless of the result or the outcome, progress is made. And then we move on to the next right step. No judging, no fixing, no convincing, just support. V plus E equals P. Now your Chapter 16 reflection questions. There's 3 of them. One, think of a person in your life who doesn't feel validated for feeling the way they feel. Are you willing to listen to them? 2. Now that you are willing to listen to them, what does encouragement look like? 3. Think of someone you are unwilling to listen to and validate. What is holding you back? All right, that concludes chapter 16. Coming up soon, chapter 17.