030: Understanding Emotions and Creating Common Language with Gen Z with Coach K

Our guest on the podcast today is Kristyna Bertolone, also known as Coach K, who is the owner/founder and head coach at Game Changers, a mental performance coaching group. Coach K is a former college athlete, PE teacher and high school coach who loves to  provide the resources, tools and knowledge to athletes and coaches so they can feel empowered to get out of their heads and into "the game". In our conversation, Coach K shares some of her advice for parents and coaches and how they can better connect with athletes of a different generation.

Episode Highlights:

• How to foster emotional intelligence 
• How to navigate gender-specific emotional processing
• Advice for navigating communication barriers between generations
• How to engage with Gen Z  athletes

Connect with Coach K
Instagram: @gamechangers___
https://www.thementalgameisthegame.com/

More ways to work with Fearless Fastpitch

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlessfastpitchmentaltraining
• Instagram @fearlessfastpitch
• Twitter @CoachAB_

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to the Fearless Warrior podcast, a place for athletes, coaches and parents who know the value of a strong mindset. I'm your host, coach AB, a mental performance coach on a mission, former softball coach, wife and mom of three. Each episode we will dive deep into all things mental performance, mindset tools and how to rewire the brain for success. So if your goal is to gain the mental edge and learn the secrets of mental performance, you're in the right place. Let's tune in to today's episode.

Speaker 1: 0:38

Today I have Christina, or Coach K as most call her, the owner and founder of Game Changers, a great friend of mine. I've gotten to know her and learn about how she works with teams. It has been so fun to connect and see her travel the country and we'll get into this later in the episode of how she came to Nebraska and we got to meet in person. She hails from Long Island, new York. As a native. She played softball and field hockey growing up and then she decided to become a teacher and eventually a mental performance coach. She has her certification from John Gordon and she has her master's in curriculum writing. So all in all, I love her perspective as a mental performance coach and how she works with teams, so I thought it would be really fun to bring her and she's on here live with. Welcome to the Pod, Coach K.

Speaker 2: 1:30

Coach ID Thanks for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

Speaker 1: 1:33

Okay. So the question I always start with is where are you at? What are you doing? I love where you're at right now. I know where you're at, but tell our listeners where are you at? What are you up to?

Speaker 2: 1:42

So I'm currently in South Carolina where I'm working with some college and high school teams. Here I travel up and down, I would say, the East Coast, but lately sometimes my travels are taking me out West, which I'm all for. So basically I just travel state to state working with teams. So before South Carolina I was up in Massachusetts, long Island, in New Jersey. Then I come down South for about three weeks and then I'll head back up north to service those North teams towards the beginning of March and then literally I'm right back here again at the end of March. So right now it's just a lot of traveling and a lot of just state hopping. Yes, yeah.

Speaker 1: 2:23

And we have to talk about this, and maybe we'll get into this later of how the heck did you end up in Nebraska? And I have to give you a little bit of crap, because you didn't necessarily know until you looked at a map how far you had to travel. And I'm like you're three hours from me. You have to come see me.

Speaker 2: 2:40

I'm sorry, as an East Coast girl, I don't know anything about the out. What like? I don't know anything like. Even it's so funny.

Speaker 2: 2:49

I was, like you said, I was a an elementary physical education teacher and every year my kids would sing the 50 nifty United States song, like my fourth graders would put on a play about it. And to this day, like there's so many states in that song where I'm like, where are they? Like, what are those states? So yeah, so I threw a friend of a friend, got connected to do a keynote for some schools in Kansas who they were putting on like a leadership workshop or a leadership seminar for the kids of their school districts. And I got out there and yeah, literally you text, you DM to me and we're like, do you know how close you are to me right now? And I was like where are you from? Again, like I know you're out West. I was like where? And you're like, look on a map. And it was like, oh my God.

Speaker 2: 3:32

And then, honestly, that trip I could have easily flown to Kansas and like just did a good one and done. But something in my head was like Christina, you've never been out there, like you don't even know what's out there. So the fact that like I drove through I mean I drove through Kansas, nebraska, iowa, indiana like places I've only seen on a map and it was like so cool to be a part of like that lifestyle. Also, like I've never left the East Coast, like it's always been like beaches and water and like out there there's a whole lot of flat, that's just. I remember there was like one road from Kansas to you was like one road for 300 miles and I was like, are we serious?

Speaker 1: 4:14

A lot of voice memos. Yeah, it was okay. Are you having an existential crisis? What thoughts, what downloads are you having?

Speaker 2: 4:23

So fun, so fun to get out that way and like, honestly, like I feel like that was such a big like universe moment bringing us together Because, yeah, like you said, the only talked via text voice memo zooms so like to be able to like hug you in real life. It was like one of those moments where it's like, oh my God, this is why I came out this way, not for the leadership workshop, it was literally so that me and Amanda's past could physically cross.

Speaker 1: 4:47

Physically cross Yep and you crashed on my couch in I did. Welcome to the family fashion and my five year old comes downstairs to wake you up. It's like no, no boundaries, we're good.

Speaker 2: 4:57

I feel like your husband was like your husband was like, um, who you know her? How like? Who is this woman coming into our home? And I was just like, oh, hi, from the internet. We met on the internet.

Speaker 1: 5:09

That's what we did. We're professionals, I promise. Well, let's, let's get into it. So, as we go through this conversation, the reason that I wanted to bring you on is obviously because you know I do very similar things, but the way that you do it, we kind of started talking about it and we said let's just hit record. Tell me some of the clients that you're working with. And I am so fascinated. I know you played softball and you work with softball teams, but on the other side, talk about some of the main teams that you're working with field hockey and lacrosse. Right, those are two separate things. Yeah, she's a non non-institutional service yes.

Speaker 2: 5:50

Okay, so I am someone who works with all ages, all genders and all sports. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that I grew up the daughter of a football and wrestling coach, so my whole life I was surrounded by, you know, male athletes. And then I became, you know, then I played my own sports. I played field hockey and softball. I went off to play softball in college and then, becoming a physical education teacher, I realized that, like my, I have influence and impact over both genders, not just like, yes, I want to empower young women and females, for sure, but like I also, you know, was responsible for shaping the minds of, like five to 12 year old boys, you know, and confidence, things like confidence, your mental space, your emotional well-being, like that's not gender specific. And I feel like the conversation is so much more easily had with females than it is with males. And I will say that now being in this light, recently I was just with a baseball team, men's lacrosse team and women's lacrosse team all in the same day, and I was like back to back to back sessions at this one university and the conversations I was having with the men were blowing my mind because it was like they wanted it. They want to talk about their mental space. They may be immature and they may not want, like not know how, to have those conversations, but the fact that there's somebody giving them information and then they can go off and kind of do what they want to do with it. Something about my business, too, is that I work with athletes one on one. So whether it's a console, like it's a one and done kind of thing, my calendar is always open for those athletes that want to take it a little bit more personal or a little bit more the next step and it's always interesting to me to see how many athletes do jump on my calendar after I'm done with a in-person team session, because then I know that, like the impact is like they're thinking about it long after I'm gone, and I think that that's probably the coolest part about what I get to do is that, yes, I want them to excel in sport, and a lot of you know a lot of what we're doing is the here and now. So for them, the here and now is their sports, but it's also taking this into their life right, their relationships, their jobs, their careers, and I think we need to be more open to having like those kind of conversations. So yeah, so I love that I get to work with Listen.

Speaker 2: 8:18

Anytime I get to work with a softball team, I like I'm giddy on the inside because I think that's I played that my entire life. Like that really was like my bread and butter. Field hockey I love it because I coached it for so long. But when I get to you know when I, when I get any team jumps on my calendar any like a bat, you know. Men's basketball like I have no idea about basketball. Sometimes, like the fouls get to me. Lacrosse I have no idea about lacrosse and like I'm immersed in lacrosse but at the end of the day, it's not lacrosse and basketball and baseball, it's your headspace and your heart space is what I like to call it.

Speaker 2: 8:54

So the game changer is the game changer is understanding your head and understanding your heart and having a place to kind of like mesh those two together with what you're doing. So, yeah, take it to the field, but also take it in the classroom, take it to your romantic relationships, take it to your platonic friendships, take it to your family. Something that I do preach to a lot of my athletes is, like you know and we can get into this a little bit later or you know a little bit more in depth but like something that I always come back to is like, why do we do anything that we do in life Right? Like, so, like, why am I a mental performance coach? Why do you have a podcast? You know it's always having that answer to the why, and I always encourage athletes to take that why beyond their sport.

Speaker 2: 9:37

You know, why am I in a relationship with this person? Why am I studying this career? Like, why do I want this for my life? And it's like sometimes it's too much for them, sometimes it's like a too big of a question, but as long as you plant those seeds, like you don't know when that flower is going to sprout, but it'll sprout if you plant it and water it. So it's. I feel like I'm out here just planting some seeds and hoping that, you know, they pop up in due time.

Speaker 1: 10:03

I think your impact is incredible.

Speaker 1: 10:05

I want to go back because I think you said something really interesting. We make this assumption about our emotions and confidence let's just talk about this because it hasn't been talked about on the podcast yet and I know that there's a lot of parents who have, obviously, male and female sons and daughters and I think one of the things that, as females, we assume our male counterparts have it all figured out because they act confident. But on the inside, yeah, there's this idea of masculinity and femininity, and we talk about this in realm of not as in gender, but as in effort levels, in confidence, the feminine, the flow, the ease, and I think females get a bad rap, for it's all about we have to look good, to feel good, to play good, and our male counterparts get the bad rap that will. They already feel good, they're already showing up as confident even before the results there quote unquote cocky and so just kind of recognizing those differences. But if we look at it from a perspective of masculine and feminine I would love your opinion on this Both males and females have both the masculine and feminine sides to them, where sometimes you are going to be confident and sometimes you're not going to feel confident.

Speaker 1: 11:28

I just posted about this on Instagram today, at the time of recording of feelings right there fleeting. Yes, let's riff.

Speaker 2: 11:37

So I think the biggest thing for our athletes is that, like yes, there's lots of assumption, right, like we're assuming all day long and what is assuming it's being judgmental.

Speaker 2: 11:48

Like let's just put like a black and white word on it, right? So I like to function from the place of be curious, not judgmental. So that comes from you know me being curious. Like when I walk in with a team, I have two hours with them, right? So it's like I can't judge, I can't be there in the moment and like say what I think they need me to say, it's I have to ask questions and I have to draw it out. So sometimes it's like a session, you know, a team session is a lot more of me asking questions of like, okay, where are we at? Okay, what's happening? Versus me just standing in front of a room and preaching, you know, and sometimes, like the questions is is where you get, like, the bread and butter, right, it's like that's where the bulk is, and sometimes coaches will make assumptions of what they think their team needs. But at the end of the day, I truly believe that we just need to talk about it, we just need to get it off our chest, and I feel like girls, females do a way better job of talking about their feelings and getting things off their chest. And then their male counterparts. It is a lot more reserved. I will say, when I walk into a male team, 90 percent of the time they just want the information. Just give me the information and I'll go and implement it. Where girls want to know, they want to have conversations, they want to talk, they want to like, turn and talk to their buddy and and I think that it you know whether or not it's a level of maturity, I'm not sure. I truly believe it's a societal thing is that we've put this on them and like, for you who have little, you're raising little boys, right, like I am such a big component where it's like, let's just teach them how to like, separate, you know, emotion versus like from like the facts, right, so that's that's where that be curious, not judgmental, comes in. So like when I have a thought or when I have an emotion or when I have a feeling, instead of judging it and then assuming the role that I have to play, right, so it's like if I'm a, if I'm a, you know a male or a female, and I feel sad, instead of judging myself, saying like why am I feeling sad? I'm so embarrassed. Or like I can't feel sad, puma, people are watching me, it's.

Speaker 2: 13:56

Can I get curious in that moment of what's making me feel this way? What just happened? And then you know there's two different avenues that you could, you could go down when it comes to athletics. Right, are you on the field and feeling this? Because in that moment you can't be curious, you just have to have a way to work through it. So, like I give a lot of like coping skills or a lot of like tips and tricks of how to just move through that, but once you move through it, it's not gone, it stays in your subconscious mind, right? So it's like, after the game, after practice, how are you reflecting and how are we actually moving through it? But if, if I'm feeling sad and I'm sitting at my you know my kitchen table and I'm just able to journal or able to like sit down, that's where like the be curious really steps in, is like let's be curious as to why this is coming up, and then I'm very much a solution minded person, right, I don't want you just thinking about like be cute. There comes a time where you have to stop the curiosity and be like, OK, I need to do something about this because this is affecting me. So it's like making that plan to move forwards and like I feel like that's what you know.

Speaker 2: 15:04

Game changers the reason that game changers is fault game changers is because I want athletes to find the thing that's going to change the game for them. So for some it could be a mistake ritual, for some it could be Diving deeper into like your personal habits, for some it could be mindset shifts. But for many athletes it's learning the difference between you know feeling the feeling and understanding the thought. But it's like moving between this be curious, not judgemental mindset, because the world teaches us to judge and teaches us to like assume these roles. Being curious kind of goes against that and it's often scary for a young athlete to adopt that mindset. But that mindset is where they're going to find growth and they're going to find, like, the answers that they're probably seeking.

Speaker 1: 15:53

I think I just telling them to do something about it.

Speaker 1: 15:55

Yeah, but I think you're absolutely right in that this isn't this didn't used to be the norm. This is a new paradigm shift in parenting, in coaching and you know I have young ones too, that you mentioned raising them I think about, if we're coaching these athletes right now, our roles as mental performance coaches. We can't go back and change parenting. We can't go back and change environments, but what we can do is we can provide tools and new perspectives so that if your whole life and I'm thinking of your male dominated rooms and teams if coach K is coming in and you're coming in and giving them tools and saying your emotions are valid, you don't have to squash them down, you don't even have to eliminate them. You are allowed to feel frustrated, and I'll use a softball example. But if you strike out and you're frustrated, yes, that's valid.

Speaker 1: 16:58

If you missed a goal, or you missed the goal or you missed the play or you got benched, I would be more worried if you weren't frustrated, and I think this is the first time that somebody's athletes might be hearing it. Not that we want to unravel years and years of parenting, but some of our parents were raised and choosing to raise their kids the way that they were raised and things are changing, and so I want to kind of speak to you, listening If you're hearing this going oh dang like I'm going to have to reevaluate my parenting and I don't know if I'm doing the right things the mere fact that you're listening and having this conversation with coach K and I means that you care enough to try new things. And so what would your advice be for maybe the parents and the coaches who are thinking man, I don't know how to talk to my athlete about their emotions. I just try to pad it and make them happy as possible, or we avoid the tough conversations. What's your advice?

Speaker 2: 18:03

So something that I have been suggesting a lot lately to the coaches that I work with, because, like, not only am I working with athletes, but I am working with the adults in these athletes' lives. And I will tell you right now, 100% of the time these conversations aren't being had because, as adults, we are uncomfortable with these conversations because we didn't have them growing up. So it's identifying the fact that I'm uncomfortable and my biggest piece I guess there's gonna be two pieces of advice. My biggest piece of advice is to bring in a third party person. That is the buffer between what you're uncomfortable with and how to start the conversation, because that's all we need sometimes is a conversation starter. We just need somebody to be in that like a facilitator, a mediator, a mentor, whatever you wanna call it. So when I get into a room and there's a coach and kids, it's how do I use as friendly language as possible so that I can encourage this coach to take the risk to start talking to the athletes? So it's all about creating common language and so, like that's why I come in and I have things like you know, I dissect the phrase controlling the controllables, I dissect the phase. The phrase is, you know, be curious, not judgmental. Like there's a big piece of like how, how do I go about doing that? And like that's where, like the coping skills and that's where the resources. Like I create a lot of resources for the teams. I work with a lot of digital and physical things that they could use, but it's just creating that language that's friendly enough so that the athlete, no matter the age, understands what we're talking about. But then it also creates the connection to their coach, who often is an older generation, right? So, like recently, I'll just I'm working with a team.

Speaker 2: 19:47

They are a very young collegiate program. They had way more underclassmen than underclassmen, and then they have a. Their coach is, I guess, what you would call a boomer, right? So you got boomer and Gen Z and they were just hitting heads, like there's a lot of miscommunication. And when I walked in, that's literally what I experienced. It was miscommunication. It was we don't know how to communicate, because the kids of this generation communicate way differently than even you know, you and I do, right? So it's like you and I had to learn how to communicate with this generation below us so that they listened to us. But like, think about, like two generations above. It's that that is really hard. So like, for example, boomers like to talk, gen Z will do anything to avoid the conversation. They'll type in text. So it's like how do we get these two worlds to talk? And that is common language? Bring in that third party person and then I will say, for any parent out there that's starting to have like wanting to have these conversations but not sure how, because let's face it face to face. Conversations often become emotional and it's like sometimes a knockout, drag out, fight right, like if we don't want it to be.

Speaker 2: 20:58

Something my mom did with me and this is what I suggest to every parent that I work with, like if I work with your child. Something my mom did with me is that she started a notebook that was just mine, like me and her notebook, and she would stick it in the backseat of the car and every game, after every tournament, I would get into the car and honestly, a little backstory real quick. My father was my coach my whole life, love him. He's an amazing man. But we had to take separate cars to every single tournament. Like I made my mom and my dad drive separately. Like that was ridiculous. Looking back on it, I can't believe little Christina did that, but I did because I could not be in the car with my dad after a game because all it was was coaching. It was like we'd never turned it off. So my mom created this notebook for a space for us to talk, and nothing that was in the notebook ever came out of the notebook. We never talked about it in face to face, but it was a place for me to write down my frustrations, heard her respond to me and it created like this sense of okay, she gets it Right. So I encouraged parents out there.

Speaker 2: 21:59

If you're a physical notebook person, I would start how can I implement like this notebook with my kid? If you're more of a digital family, I will say that I have people that use the Notes app. If you are an iPhone person, you can have a shared note and it's this way. It's not a text, because you don't want your kid's phone going off during the school day, right, and like they might have thoughts during the school day. So it's like if they have the shared note, they just jot it down. Google Docs a lot of schools are Google schools nowadays, so the kids have their Google classroom, their Google Docs, opened up and I will say that a lot of my college athletes choose to communicate with me via Google Doc, like so, not a text, not a DM, it's like a running kind of like. I call it like a running diary, right, like, so, like they'll write, I'll respond. Sometimes, I'll write, they'll respond. So it's just again.

Speaker 2: 22:53

I think it all comes back down to like that common language. I also think, as adults, it's our job to start to get these athletes to understand the difference between doing something that's difficult and doing something that's detrimental, right? So a lot of these athletes think that, like their bad things are, you know, the minute I have a negative thought or the minute I have a negative emotion or a negative reaction, like my mental health is being, like, it's taking a toll, right, because that's all they know right now. Everything's like you know about mental health and I'm a big I'm a big, you know, preacher of mental health, but I think we've gotten far away from like what mindset really is, and it's identifying that things are difficult, but I could do it.

Speaker 2: 23:39

Mental health is, like this is detrimental to me. This is physically, emotionally, like mentally, bringing me down and I need to stop or I need to seek out help. So, as a parent, I'm a product of the mental tough generation, as, are you right, we were mentally tough. This generation below us is very much the mental health generation. They are very aware of their mental health. So I think it's our job to, like, identify and mesh the two right, and I really think the difference is it's not mental health versus mental toughness, it's doing it's difficult versus detrimental, and giving them the tools to get through that.

Speaker 1: 24:15

That's incredible, the way that you describe that. Thank you. Well, because I think sometimes the detrimental side my job and yours is that if there is an athlete that we're working with and we see those detrimental things, it's our responsibility to refer at that point and get them the help that they need. On the mental health side, and I think sometimes if you're afraid to have that conversation as a parent, if you don't have a mental performance coach in your daughter or son's corner, then who's pointing that out to them? Who's having those conversations?

Speaker 1: 24:48

How do we know that they don't need interventional measures? Or that they may you know how do they have that sounding board to know? Is this detrimental or is it just difficult? I love the way that you phrase that and you, I'm assuming, are educating them on. No, the static actually isn't detrimental. This is just really hard. Let's talk through it. Or, yeah, this really is something that I can help with. Let's get you connected with XYZ.

Speaker 2: 25:17

It's interesting because, like you know, it comes down to the how do I know it's difficult versus detrimental, right, so it's having, like you said, like somebody who's a sounding board, right, like sometimes I'm just listening and it's, like you know, it might be not just like one session, it might be like a repeated thing. I'm hearing session after session or conversation after conversation when eventually I'm like, hey, listen, like this is going far past the scope of what I'm comfortable talking to you about, but like here's the next steps, right, and honestly it comes down to sometimes things are detrimental, right, like sometimes this generation knows the difference, right, they know that. Like this is not great for me. I need to go and I feel, like you know the trans report will get so much flack and like I have mixed feelings about like the trans report or like, if you're younger, jumping from team you know travel team to travel team, like I've got my own thoughts on that stuff.

Speaker 2: 26:12

But sometimes it is necessary to like remove yourself from an environment that you don't feel like you're growing in and go find an environment that's going to be better it's not the grass, you know, I'm not saying the grass is greener on the other side like you're going to have different problems in this new space, but it's being aware that these kids know they have choices, like they know they don't have to stay in a place that they are miserable in, and I feel like that is honestly. I feel like that's triggering for a lot of our generation and above, because we weren't given options. We were told to suck it up. We had that choice, but that's Gen Z, we didn't have it.

Speaker 1: 26:51

But that's Gen Z. Is that they really are of the main thing that when I started doing research good, really amazing mentor of mine that was her advice to me was, if you're going to continue to coach, you need to do your research on Gen Z. And the thing that shocked me and keep in mind this was as a head high school coach. The thing that shocked me the most is Gen Z's have no filter, for they want to contribute to the decision making. They want to call the shots Down to something as simple as wristbands. We were deciding whether or not we were going to do those stupid. I hate them right Like signal wristbands of, instead of calling face signs and things like that.

Speaker 1: 27:34

You know our generation. You would never even dream about. It then became a debate about well, this is why I think we should have wristbands. And then I laughed so hard because my athletes to this day I can hear them saying well, coach AB, we'll miss less signals. This is what's in it for you if you side with us on this decision.

Speaker 2: 27:56

So fun, you're so right, you're so right and so, like something that I do I put on a lot of coaches workshops and I work with a lot of like coaching staffs and like a big topic is how to communicate with Gen Z, or like just understanding Gen Z. So, like some of the things that like I kind of like roll off or some of these you know coaches, is like, hey, gen Z is literally the only generation of their kind. They grew up only knowing technology. So when we start talking about you know, back in our day, they tune us out. They have such a great job like they can do such a good job of like filtering, because think about like they're on social media all day and they're just scrolling all day. They're filtering out the things that are of zero interest to them. So if we start to talk about things that are, you know, something that they can't even like comprehend, they're like oh, this has something to do with me. They also struggle with face-to-face skills due to their dependence on digital communication, right? So it's like a sport. You know where we need. You know all sports. You need to communicate in some way If we're not stopping practice, and I you know that is such a scary word for some coaches because they're like we can't stop practice, but it's like are you factoring in at least one day where you're in the classroom or one day when you're off the field or off the court and engaging them in like conversations, like I just posted the other day, culture conversation starters, right, like just use these conversations, like use these to start some conversations and coaches, you know, sometimes it's scary to start conversations, right, because they don't know where they're gonna go.

Speaker 2: 29:32

But like the fear, just like you can't go into a game being afraid to lose, like nobody wins, being afraid to lose, right. So it's like you have to be afraid to fail and you have to be afraid to. The conversations might get a little serious, but like that's where growth happens, right, that's where we start to understand each other. And I feel like Gen Z just they want to be a part of the conversation. They just don't know how, right, they want autonomy, but like they don't know how.

Speaker 1: 30:01

So it's like as a they're not gonna change their coaches' practice plan. But I will say in the softball world we call them chalk talks, and so I love the idea of having one day a week in the classroom. But if you only have practice, we'll all speak to the travel coaches that maybe you only have one to two practices during the week. Can you set aside a length space?

Speaker 2: 30:25

Yes.

Speaker 1: 30:26

For your reference for you.

Speaker 2: 30:27

I love it. You know like five to 10 minutes when it's okay.

Speaker 1: 30:31

Can you do five to 10 minutes before practice? Can you do the five minutes where they're getting their water break? And maybe your conversation starters would be a great opportunity for them to have one conversation piece and just leave space, and you would be so surprised at how much they want to talk.

Speaker 2: 30:50

Yeah, and if we provide them the opportunity for them to talk, then, like when we're in practice, like we are also teaching them, okay, now it's time for this. So it's like the side chatter will go down. You know the side conversations kids not paying attention because we've given it to them. And like, to be honest, like what happens when you all show up to practice Most of the times kids are still on their phones, right, so they're not like back in the day, like we used to talk before practice, right, Like catch up with everybody, but now people are still on their phones like they come to practice. So you know, youth and club athletes and travel ball like I do implement, okay, when is the phone in the bag time. Like yes, for us that's common knowledge, but for Gen Z it's not common knowledge. Like we have to provide the parameters. You know, just like listen when COVID lifted it's. You know when everything got lifted and we went back to normal life. Us as adults were really easily able to go back to normal life, but our kids were like what is normal life? What? This isn't normal life? Like what do you mean? Like this is all I know, because their brains were just at such a young. You know, they were at such a young age when all this happened. So I feel like, if we want to set aside a time or if, like you, want your practice to go a certain way or you want your program to flow a certain way, it's putting in these parameters. It's almost as if, like you know, back using that the quote, you can only lead a horse to water. I believe Gen Z is. You know, we are leading them to water, but we also have to provide them with the cup. We have to show them how to scoop it. We have to hold it out in front of them. They have to grab the cup and drink it. I 100% believe that. But we are no longer in a place where we can just lead a kid and they'll figure it out.

Speaker 2: 32:37

I will tell you right now, I was just with the team and we were talking about the things that trigger us, and this was a male team, a men's team. I was talking about the things that trigger us, the things that make us upset, things that make us emotional, and they all, unanimously, were like we hate when coach says to figure it out, and I was like, right, but we're not going to change coach. He's not changing and unless one of you are brave enough to have the conversation with him about it, it's always going to happen. So it becomes coach saying figure it out. It should be the positive trigger that we need to change what figure it out means to us and, honestly, they don't know how to figure it out.

Speaker 2: 33:19

So when someone says figure it out, they're like I don't know how. So it's like OK. When coach says figure it out, this is what we're going to do instead. And then when I brought it to the coach's attention, of course coach had no idea and I was like listen, you don't have to change. This is on them, this is not you, but it might be beneficial to engage in a conversation about OK. Well, what can I say instead? And I will say that that was a huge turning point for him in his career, where he was like wow.

Speaker 2: 33:46

I didn't realize. He had no idea that it was triggering them even more than they were already being triggered. So it's like, yeah, it's a simple conversation.

Speaker 1: 33:55

It's the same thing as control the controllables and trust the process. If you don't know what the process is, how do you know to trust it? If you don't know what it is, how can you figure it out? This is amazing. I'm loving this conversation. I do want to be mindful of your time because you're amazing and you're working with a lot of teams, but this question and it is time. I would love for you to answer this question. It is the question I ask of all of the podcast guests.

Speaker 2: 34:24

You are a time traveler.

Speaker 1: 34:26

It's the time traveler question. You could go back in time and give your past self one message. What are you telling her?

Speaker 2: 34:36

College. I had a career and an injury and your life will go on. You'll have purpose. After this, I thought my whole identity was in that I was a softball pitcher and when that injury came, man, there was a lot of just really sad stuff. I think that was really the jumping off point for me for taking on such a leader type role. I was already a leader, I was already a captain. But really stepping into, if I can't physically do something, what am I going to do? So I wish I could just go back in time and just let her know. First of all, give her a hug, because I feel like that girl also needed a hug. She was a little too brave, although she put on a little bit too much of a front crying not in front of people but off on her own. But I would definitely tell her that it's OK and this is going to open up a door that you had no idea was even a door that could be opened.

Speaker 1: 35:35

Even today. Look at the impact.

Speaker 2: 35:38

I know.

Speaker 1: 35:39

Look at the impact you get to have.

Speaker 2: 35:41

I know it's mind blowing to me sometimes that I get to do this.

Speaker 1: 35:45

Same. I'm glad we're doing it together. This has been awesome. Where can we follow you? I know you're super active in certain places, mostly Because we connected on Instagram, but where is the best place to follow your journey?

Speaker 2: 36:00

I would say it's funny. I would say Instagram. I will be completely transparent. I am having such a love-hate relationship with social media right now where I am overwhelmed. Somebody said this to me the other day and it really changed the game for me in my own life. Someone says you're frustrated with social media because you're consuming more than you're creating and I was like, oh, that was it. I'm doing way too much scrolling, I'm following too many other content creators, so automatically I'm thinking my stuff has less value or my stuff isn't as great because I'm comparing. So I will say that I just did a social media detox. I unfollowed a whole bunch of people. But Instagram at Game Changers, with three underscores at the end of it, is probably the best place to follow me right now. I do have visions of getting back on TikTok. I was really active on TikTok for a while and then I took a break and again, when you take a break, sometimes it's really hard to get back into it.

Speaker 1: 37:00

And I feel like I, but I love that you preach. You practice what you preach. You practice what you preach as a coach. So keep posting. I love it. Post when you can. Thanks, I appreciate it. Ironically, I'm in the same boat for busy making an impact in the world, we don't always have time to post, and that's OK, right, right.

Speaker 2: 37:19

But you are not less than if your stories go to zero Like that, you need to anyone out there listening Like it's OK, let the story go to zero. The world will still turn, and when you decide to post again, people will be there to see it. But it's not to be a lend all and that's a little PSA for me too. I need to remind myself of that.

Speaker 1: 37:39

Amen. Well, thank you so much for this. This has been an amazing video. We'll keep chatting and keep saying in touch, but for now that's podcast. Sounds good, thank you.