Let’s be honest. Practice can be boring or repetitive sometimes. Or you may just really lack the motivation to give it your all on some days. If this happens to you, instead of avoiding practice or just getting through it, try immersing yourself even more.
A few days ago we discussed the importance of balancing the challenge you are facing with your skill set in order to enjoy it. Try this with your athletic practices. Are there places you can add even more challenge to the session in order to not only improve your game, but have more fun too?
Instead of just getting through practice create self challenges like the ones below. My football coach used to say “Competition heightens the play and competition heightens the joy of the play.” This is exactly what happens when you create mini challenges for yourself. Not only will you get better, but you will have more fun doing it. These mini games you create against yourself or others will push your abilities to new levels.
Some Ideas
If you’re a cross country runner and are winning each repeat during practice how can you challenge yourself further? Can you try to recover faster between, or see if you can keep your HR lower ?
If you play golf can you remember each of your courses and their distances?
Play basketball or football? Can you remember what your teammates’ responsibilities are on each play?
In each sport there are infinite aspects to improve. If you truly want to succeed you can’t just correct the things your coach sees or forces you to work on. You must push yourself to improve at a host of other aspects of the game. The best part is that in doing so you will inevitably find more fun in your sport as well.
