Dedicated to two of my closest friends and teammates: Chris “Flash” Burner who passed away on Tuesday, and Billy Canavan, who left us on the same day, 2 years ago.

That’s me in the middle, flanked by Billy Canavan #11 and Mike Morris #13

There is something happening in my body right now that happens every year around this time. Maybe it's the angle of the sun, or its warmth. Maybe it's the particular hopefulness that comes with early March. After so many years playing and coaching lacrosse in the spring, my body has learned to recognize this as the beginning of something I love. It stirs before my mind catches up. It always has.

Forty years ago, I played my last competitive season. I didn't think much about it then. You never do. What I knew was that it was a remarkable season, though seasons rarely announce themselves that way in real time. We were conference champions. We were playing our best lacrosse at the end — a team in full flow, the way athletes dream about and rarely find. In the championship game, I had the game of my life, 6 goals and 3 assists, and a referee pulled me aside afterward and told me it would be a crime if we didn't make the NCAA tournament. We didn't make it. The selection committee chose otherwise, opting to pair two other teams for travel budget reasons, we were told — and just like that, it was over. Two weeks later, we graduated.

But none of that — not the championship, not the snub, not my best game personally — is what I keep coming back to now.

It started in England.

Instead of two-a-days over spring break in Lancaster — eating meatball subs in sweats and watching our friends head to Fort Lauderdale — Coach Sachs put us on a plane. For most of us, it was our first time overseas. We brought analog cameras and carried ourselves like schoolchildren on a field trip to the city. We played four games and traveled together in a foreign country long before cell phones or social media — with nothing but the people immediately around us. That's all we needed.

After one game in Manchester, our opponents invited us to their local pub, Blossoms. Coach Sachs — our sixty-something Christian coach with coke-bottle glasses — smiled and said, “If we need to drink a few beers, well, we’ll drink a few beers.” Thirty-three of us grinned in unison.

Then both teams crowded into the back room. Pitchers appeared en masse. We sang. We drank. They loved asking us: “so, are you Franklin, or . . . are you Marshall?” We exchanged garb and hugs with men who had been trying their best to beat us a little while before. We invited them to visit us back in the States — half-meaning it, fully believing it, the way you do after a few pints when the world feels wide open and everything seems possible.

What stayed with me wasn't just the feeling of being twenty-one and invincible. It was what happened after every game on that trip. Both teams gathered — food, beers, exchanging sweatshirts — fellowship with the very people you had just competed against. Somewhere in that, I began to understand something about competition: that you could get after each other fully and still come together afterward in genuine warmth. That the game didn’t have to divide you. It was actually the thing that connected you. I carried that theme into my coaching years later, and it still shapes how I think about what sports can teach us. Some of the guys I competed hardest against became friends over time. Edges soften that way.

Looking back, that trip wasn't a warm-up for the season. It was the season — distilled into a week. We were nowhere else and with no one else. Playing the game we loved.

March 1986 - somewhere in England.

Back stateside, we opened with solid wins over Swarthmore, Trinity, Dickinson and Lafayette. But we grew through the losses. Bucknell in overtime 9-8. Lehigh by one. St. Lawrence — that one stung. Then Washington College — loaded with All-Americans, a team that lost to Johns Hopkins by a few goals that season. They had players like John Nostrand, a three-time All-American lefty midfielder who always seemed able to get his shot, and Steve Beville, a World Team player — 6'4", 220 pounds, relentless and fast, the toughest defender I ever faced. We lost that game too, but something happened in it that doesn't show up in a scorebook. Playing a great team reveals you to yourself. It shows you what remains when the margin for error disappears. We found something in that loss — an edge, a clarity — and carried it forward. We earned their respect, and perhaps more importantly, our own.

After every game, win or loss, we would gather over cold beer and music — Dire Straits, Marley, Creedence — and sit with what had just happened, bonds tightening in the din. The shot that hit the crossbar. The missed ground ball. The goal allowed. But also the improbable save, the perfect feed, the moment that broke it open. We'd feel it all, then let it go. We didn't wallow in the sting, or in the sweetness either. We'd acknowledge it and move on together. Lacrosse was important to us, but it was still just part of us. Looking back, that may have been one of our greatest strengths — and one of the most useful lessons sport ever taught me. I've spent much of my life since trying to help others find that balance — and honestly, still working on it myself.

After Washington, we rolled. Big wins. Clear roles. Deep trust. Mt. St. Mary's by 10. Western Maryland by 7. Haverford by 21. Our arch rival Gettysburg by 9, avenging a bitter loss year before. Then the conference title, 20–5 over FDU-Madison, a team that had put together an excellent season. There is a particular joy in operating at that level — when the game slows down, when you're in it completely, and even the hardest moments become navigable. Deep practice, and faith in each other. No team I've ever been part of gelled the way we did at the end of that season.

Coach Sachs did something else that mattered during that season. He would give our offensive unit ten or fifteen minutes alone at one end of the field while he and Coach Bailey, his youthful and equally kind assistant, worked with the defense at the other. It might be unheard of today, but we owned that time. We felt our way into what we needed. We did it ourselves; “figured it out,” and he trusted us with it. Those minutes are somewhere in those last five games. I’m sure of it.

Some postseason honors came my way — All-American, Conference MVP, and a spot on the North-South All-Star game roster. They came with no small amount of wonder.

Because I remembered the kid who had shown up at F&M four years earlier, arriving quietly, invited in by a handwritten note from Coach — fresh out of Tabor Academy, hopeful but unsure, not at all certain he belonged. That kid could not have imagined any of this. Or that he'd leave as the program's all-time leading scorer — a record that's been eclipsed a number of times since, as it should be. It was older players — Chris Burner, Doug Overby, Gerry Canavan, Rippy Philipps, Chris Boyce and others — who welcomed me in those early days and made me feel like I belonged. And it was Coach Sachs, whose quiet, steady encouragement had a way of bringing out in me what I couldn't know was there. And teammates who believed in me before I fully believed in myself. What closed the distance between that kid and the senior standing there wasn't talent alone. It was all of them. Any recognition I received belonged to all of them as much as to me.

Coach Sachs, the man who believed in me

Leadership on that team was not concentrated in a few captains. It was everywhere.

Mikey Morris #13 — recruited to F&M as a wrestler (F&M had Division I wrestling), which tells you everything — won 80% of his faceoffs, forgoing arm and shoulder pads. He didn’t need them. Danny Garrett played the game, fittingly, like an action hero — fearlessly, with one of the best shots I've ever seen. He scored 50 goals the following season. Matt Carberry could run you into the ground, and if you weren't aware of where he was, he’d level you — legally and unapologetically. He played with an edge that never dulled. Johnny Hartzell did the quiet, unglamorous work — midfield defense, setting picks, clearing. Andre Demian, a natural righty, played the lefty attack position because that’s what the team needed. Jeb Barrows was one of the smoothest shooters I ever saw. Paul Varsames quietly erased the opponent's best attackman. CK Haynsworth and Brian Silcott — who went on the become a decorated professional in the years that followed — anchored a second midfield line every bit as athletic as the first. Steve Ehrlich and Andy Alpert quietly held things together on the defensive end, game after game.

And Billy Canavan, #11 in goal.

Of course, Billy was a goalie. The kind of person willing to stand in front of hard rubber traveling ninety miles an hour for his teammates — unafraid, or more likely, simply oriented toward others more than toward himself. That was Billy on the field and off. He could walk into a deli and leave everyone in it feeling seen, feeling a little happier. He circled closer when you needed someone to circle closer. He did that for me when I needed it most. I miss him every day.

And then there were the people just outside the frame of that team photo — the ones a year or two ahead who shaped the culture we inherited and never really left our orbit. People you simply assumed would always be there. This week reminded me otherwise. There’s no one coming off the bench to replace Billy or Chris. These friendships don't have a season. They just continue. The bonds haven't faded — if anything, they've deepened, the way a river deepens its own bed over time, quietly, steadily, year after year.

We've lost some guys. Kenny Gramas, taken far too young by an avalanche. C.K. Haynsworth, my roommate, as good a teammate as there was. Kevin Zinn, gentle and offbeat, with a heart of gold. Billy, two years ago this week. And Flash, on Tuesday.

The void is palpable. The bonds haven’t faded.

A word about the underclassmen on that team — Kenny, Steve Muto, Eric Schlanger, Jeb, Rob Verratti, Scott Cozzens, and others — who would go on to become the foundation of some of the finest teams F&M ever produced, under Coach GW Mix. I had the privilege of coaching alongside GW two seasons later. But that is a whole other post that I will get to in time.

We had our locker room, which was its own world — the true home of the team, where the culture lived. And we had the walk to our practice field and back, a mile each way through tree-lined streets, sweaty and tired, helmets off, gear slung over our shoulders. On the way back, our roles dissolved. We weren't attackmen, defensemen, midfielders or goalies. We were just young men, walking ourselves home, finding our way, together. You build friendships one step at a time. Literally.

Somewhere in the back half of that season, something shifted. The warm spring days of late May had arrived. Graduation was on the horizon. We felt it without saying it. Crowded apartments, music floating across the quad on warm spring nights. And so much laughter. The closeness of people who were, without fully realizing it, becoming friends for life. There was a bittersweet quality to all of it — not heavy, not sad, just present. The way beauty is sometimes most vivid when you sense, somewhere below thought, that it’s fleeting.

When I look now at the plaque on my wall — the 1985-1986 Franklin & Marshall Diplomats, Middle Atlantic Conference Champions — I see it differently than I once did. The record matters less. The names matter more.

Sport can shape you. At its best, it teaches you to trust, to lead, to fail, and to persevere. But more than that, much more than that, it forges friendships under pressure — the kind that endure across decades, the kind you rely on when life gets hard. Because life gets hard. It's been hard this week.

I didn't know at twenty-one how seminal that spring would be. You rarely know the significance of things while you’re living them. It reveals itself slowly, in what endures.

And what endures has nothing to do with the score.

It has everything to do with the people.

—  #22
March 5, 2026

The 1986 Franklin & Marshall Diplomats: Jeb Barrows, Brian Silcott, Tom Van Camp, Bill Canavan, Peter Bidstrup, Mike Morris, Andre Demian, Andy Alpert, John Hartzell, Chris Divecchio, Eric Schlanger, Mike Berman, Pat Keating, Kevin Zinn, Charles Dixson, Scott Cozzens, Paul Varsames, Steve Ehrlich, John Morriseau, Bill Schaller, Matthew Carberry, Josh Chervokas, Rob Donohue, Rob Verratti, Simon Demian, Daniel Garrett, Kevin Green, Ken Gramas, Dave Maischoss, C.K. Haynsworth, Steve Muto, Lee Larson, Coach Ross Sachs, Assistant Coach Doug Bailey.

If you liked this, Practice Notes is where I publish shorter reflections — field notes from the practice of being human. → here 

About me, and The Practice → here 
About Integrative Coaching → here 
About my book, The Why of Sports → here

"The flower is made of non-flower elements." — Thich Nhat Hanh

Outside, the first real blizzard in a few years is settling over southeastern Massachusetts. The wind has been howling since dawn. The lights are flickering. The yard's buried beneath drifting snow. I'm not going anywhere.

I've been thinking about harmony today — about what happens not just within things, but between them — as my old house stands solid against the wind, while I stand in the kitchen, granola in the oven, trying to get a recipe right.

This especially harsh winter has forced me to slow things down to what's essential — and I've found, not for the first time, that there's something good in that. For me, it's meant puttering around the house, picking up old hobbies, writing more, and spending time in the kitchen.

Lately I've been tinkering with these bars. Granola, almond butter, miso, dark chocolate, a few other things. The recipe isn't finished yet. Too sweet. Not enough depth. Something missing. Balance a little off. The miso was the surprise. On its own, it has no business being anywhere near a granola bar. But add it to the right combination of things, and something lifts. The whole becomes more than the sum of its parts. I keep coming back to that word — combination — and what it actually asks of us. Not just the quality of the parts, but the harmony between them.

We're good at evaluating ingredients. Resumes. Rankings. Stats. We've built entire systems to assess the parts. What we're less practiced at is sensing what happens between them — the relationship, the fit, the way one element somehow transforms all the others. A great ingredient and a great combination are not the same thing, and we constantly confuse them.

I notice this especially when people talk about sports teams. The conversation almost always turns to talent — who's on the roster, who the star is — the best recruiting class. Fans and analysts understand talent. What they don't always see is combination. The coaches understand it. They have to. Because they know that assembling the right mix of people — complementary skills, temperaments, roles — is a different art than simply collecting the best available players. Sometimes the team with less talent wins, and it isn't luck.

There's an alchemy that happens when the right combination comes together. In sports. In music. In a kitchen. In a room full of people who somehow, improbably, bring out the best in each other. You can't always predict or engineer it — but you can feel it when it's there. Both Olympic hockey teams felt it this week, and so did everyone watching.

I coached lacrosse for many years. One season, I had a talented first offensive unit — three attackmen and three midfielders — that felt almost complete. Almost. Something about the movement wasn't right, though. We had shooters and feeders. We had dodgers. Players who wanted the ball in their hands and thrived when the game ran through them. What we didn't have was someone comfortable in the spaces where the ball wasn't.

In lacrosse, off-ball movement is largely invisible. It doesn't show up in the highlight reels. But the player who reads the defense, drifts into an opening, stays patient without the ball — and then, in one quiet moment, finds a seam, catches a pass, and finishes — can change everything. Most players don't want or know how to do this. It asks you to be peripheral for long stretches and to trust that your moment will come.

I started looking. I ran drills designed to surface that quality. I watched practice differently — not just where the ball was going, but what was happening away from it. It was detective work more than anything else.

Then I found Matt.

Matt was quiet. Humble, almost shy — and his personality was actually the first clue. The players who thrive off-ball tend to be the ones who notice what others miss, because they're not busy announcing themselves. He fit. Not just tactically. He fit — the way the miso fits — by making everything around him better, by completing something the group didn't know it was missing. That season, Matt led the team in goals. We won the league title.

The missing piece isn't always the most obviously talented one. It's the one that creates the alchemy. We hear this in music — the band that's more than its players, the song that shouldn't work on paper and yet does. We taste it in food. We feel it in teams, in friendships, in families. The right combination does something the individual parts simply can't do alone. The question isn't only how good are the parts? The question is what happens between them?

What I've come to understand — through coaching, through a long cooped-up winter of tinkering with granola bars — is that harmony isn't manufactured. You can't force it into existence by adding more or trying harder. It requires a different kind of attention. Slower. More receptive. You have to feel for it. Adjust. Stay curious without grasping. The recipe isn't finished until something in you says, “There it is.” The lineup isn't right until the movement on the field has a quality you can sense but not quite name. That's a presence practice.

And it doesn't only live in kitchens or on athletic fields. It lives anywhere you're willing to ask not just what's missing — but whether you might be the ingredient that completes it.

The snow’s going to fall for a while. Maybe I’ll make another batch.

— Pete

If this resonated, you're welcome to share it with someone who might appreciate it. And if you feel like it, you can always reply — I read every note.

Author's note: This reflection draws on themes explored more fully in my book, The Why of Sports, where presence — not pressure — is the doorway to performance, growth, and connection.

Thanks for Reading.

Last night, Ilia Malinin stepped onto the ice as the heavy favorite. The most technically gifted skater in the field. The “Quad God.” The expectations were enormous.

And then the moment didn’t go his way. It always amazes me how surprised we seem to be when someone falters under enormous pressure — as if being human were unexpected.

When pressure rises, the nervous system responds. What once kept us alive shows up as urgency — tightening muscles, narrowing vision, speeding thought. The margin between fluidity and force gets smaller. The mind wants to control what normally unfolds.

In a recent reflection I called Wondering Where the Lions Are? I wrote about how most of the time there is no lion — just a system trying to protect us. But when the stakes rise and the story grows loud, the lion can feel very real.

This isn’t weakness. It’s human.

What struck many observers was how differently the night unfolded for his teammate, Maxim Naumov. He stumbled early but recovered with remarkable composure. The same ice, the same lights — but different histories. Different expectations. Different internal stakes. One skater carried the enormous weight of gold-medal expectation. The other turned transformed profound grief into something beautiful. The nervous system responds not just to the present moment but to what that moment represents.

Moments feel “big” because of meaning. Identity. Memory. Loss. Hope. The body does not cleanly separate those threads. It reacts to the story as much as to the circumstance.

For any athlete — especially a young one — nights like this can linger. But they can also teach. Not about talent, but about how to meet pressure. How to notice when urgency masquerades as truth. How to widen the view instead of shrinking into protection.

Compassion matters here. For the athlete who faltered. For the one who recovered. For all of us who have stepped into a moment that felt larger than we were ready for.

It’s easy to celebrate perfection. It’s harder — and more important — to make room for imperfection.

Sport, at its best, reminds us that being human means being unfinished. Fallible. Learning in public. Sometimes brilliant. Sometimes not.

And that’s okay.

In fact, it may be the point.

— Pete

Author’s note: This reflection draws on themes explored more fully in my book, The Why of Sports, where presence — not pressure — is the doorway to performance, growth, and connection.

Thanks for Reading.

“Lion at Rest”

Your mind’s primary objective is to keep you from being eaten by a lion. Consider the implications of this for your life.

That wiring made perfect sense once. But in modern life — and especially in sport — the “lion” rarely looks like a predator. It looks like a crowd, a scoreboard, a mistake, a coach’s comment, a moment that suddenly feels bigger than it is. The nervous system doesn’t ask whether the threat is physical or psychological; it just reacts. Heart rate spikes. Vision narrows. Muscles tighten. What once kept us alive now shows up as urgency — rushing the moment, forcing the outcome. It doesn’t ask whether the threat is physical or psychological; it just reacts.

In sport, the lion lurks right before the snap, the face off, or the free throw — times when the moment feels big. Not because it is inherently dangerous, but because it activates conditioning laid down over time: past failures, expectations, identity, the fear of letting someone down. The nervous system responds less to the moment itself than to what the moment has come to represent. Suddenly, the athlete is no longer playing the game, but protecting themselves from what it might mean.

The turning point comes with awareness. Not trying to get rid of the nerves, not forcing calm, but recognizing what’s actually happening. This is my nervous system doing its job. When athletes learn to notice that moment — to feel their feet, soften their breath, widen their vision — they regain choice. The game slows just enough. Effort becomes directed again. They’re no longer defending against a threat; they’re playing the game.

And this doesn’t end at the sideline. Sport mirrors life. The same pattern shows up in life when moments feel big — not because they’re dangerous, but because they activate old conditioning. Before a hard conversation or a job interview. When feedback feels critical. The body tightens, the story speeds up, and urgency masquerades as truth. “What if I’m not good enough?” Recognition changes everything. What we’re feeling is not a threat but protection — and in that realization, in that space it creates, real freedom returns.

Over time, it helps to have something you return to regularly that quietly reconnects you to yourself — something embodied and absorbing. For me, that can be time on the water, fishing. The rhythm, the patience, the beauty, the way the mind settles when there’s nothing to force. In winter, (especially this winter) when the harbor freezes, I’ve been dabbling in watercolor painting and discovering it offers the same gift. A quiet creative practice that steadies the body, softens the mind, and trains the nervous system — through direct experience — in what it feels like to be at ease with ourselves.

My mind resisted at first. It wanted competence, certainty, and results. But learning to begin anyway — to stay with the process rather than the outcome — turned out to be the practice, quietly reinforcing something I already knew.

Most of the time, there is no lion. There is only a mind doing what it has always done —scanning, predicting, protecting. When we learn to recognize that impulse without obeying it, we recover something essential: our ability to stay present. In sport, that’s where the game opens back up. In life, it’s where conversations soften, decisions clarify, and we remember that we are not under threat — we are simply just here.

A simple practice:

Notice the reaction.
Feel your body. Feel your breath.
Widen your view.

That’s often all it takes to move from protection back to participation.

— Pete

ps - “Wondering Where the Lions Are” is a favorite Bruce Cockburn song, as is the “why” he wrote it. Check out the lyrics and some comments by Cockburn here.

Afterword

Part of what prompted this reflection is my work with a high school athlete who plays two sports. In one, he moves freely and confidently. In the other, he plays tight. The difference isn’t talent. It’s history.

During a club season, he tried to play through an injury. His performance suffered. He was benched. Criticized. The experience left a mark. Now, in a different setting, with a different coach, his nervous system still remembers. The lion shows up early.

It’s a sobering reminder of how much power coaches hold — not just over performance, but over how young athletes come to experience themselves. The moments we create, especially under pressure, don’t disappear when the season ends. They live on in bodies and beliefs. And they shape whether a game feels like something to engage with — or something to survive.

Author’s note: This reflection draws on themes explored more fully in my book, The Why of Sports, where presence — not pressure — is the doorway to performance, growth, and connection.

Thanks for Reading.

Yesterday, my book The Why of Sports: Finding Meaning, Presence, and Purpose in the Game and Beyond was published.

The ideas come from my life as the son of a coach, then as an athlete, coach, parent, and mindfulness teacher. The book consists of 61 short chapters, each 1-2 pages long, written in an informal, lyrical style, and divided into 4 parts:

Part 1 – The Why: Finding Your Motivation, Values, and Mindset for the Journey.

Part 2 – The Inner Game: Mastering Attention, Thoughts, Emotions, and Presence.

Part 3 – The Craft: Practice, Process, and Mastery.

Part 4 – Connection, Collaboration, and Leadership: Expanding Mastery Beyond the Self. 

These parts may also represent four ways to live an “examined life.” The book is about more than just sports. Sports are about more than just sports.

Available on Amazon

This project began with a simple question that kept tugging at me: Why do sports matter so much? Writing the book ended up being my way of answering that question for myself.

Over the years, I’ve seen sports shape character, deepen awareness, and create moments of real growth. I’ve also observed how pressure, anxiety, comparison, expectation — and indeed, the influence of big money — can be harmful. 

The book is my attempt to get back to the heart of it all. To remember that, at its best, sport is a way to practice becoming a better person. It invites us to slow down, pay attention, and reconnect with why we show up: to learn, to compete with intensity and humility, to trust our teammates, and to become more selfless, grounded, and resilient along the way. As my dad would have said, it’s about “the integrity of the game.”

My outlook may lean idealistic, but in a time when burnout, anxiety, and depression are far too common in sports, I feel called to offer a more mindful and grounded way forward.

I didn’t write this as an expert with all the answers - I’m not a psychologist or a researcher. It’s more “how to be” than “how to.” I wrote it simply as someone who has lived in this world of sports for a long time and cares deeply about the people inside it.

If these reflections bring even a little more calm, clarity, or confidence to a few athletes, coaches, or parents, then the book will have done what I hoped.

Thank you to everyone who has supported and pushed me along on this effort. I’m truly grateful.

Credit: David Cannon Allsport via Getty Images

I happened to be writing a short section “Competition” as part of a book I’m working on, when I started reading about the horrible fan behavior at the Ryder Cup. As a lifelong participant, coach and fan, sports has given me so much. In many ways, it has shaped who I am today. My dad, a lifelong teacher and coach used to talk about “the integrity of the game” . . .

I’m not naive enough to think that hatred and vulgarity won’t find their way in to sports, but also know that anyone who’s ever worn the uniform and competed hard and fairly against a good opponent would never behave like the fans at Bethpage. Our opponents drive our improvement.

Tommy Fleetwood was honored with the Nicklaus - Jacklin Sportsmanship Award. Here’s what he had to say:

Here’s the book segment:

Competition

In this day and age, it's become popular to denigrate or even to "hate" your opponent. While this approach towards your opponent can seem motivating, it's flawed, since it comes from a place of negativity. This has always seemed ironic to me, since oftentimes our opponents are quite like us - they play and love the same sport, they're around the same age, they love their teammates and want to win just like you do. 

You should respect and even honor your opponent. After all, without a worthy opponent there can be no competition. You grow and improve through regular healthy competition. It's possible to want to beat your opponent and to respect her at the same time - you can hold these two views at the same time. You and your opponent are bringing out the best in each other. At the end of the day, your opponent is providing the challenge, but the person you're really competing against is yourself. Am I growing? Am I improving? What more can I work on or do to play better? Competing against a worthy opponent helps to clarify this. Don't let yourself get caught up in negative emotions about your opponent. This will only detract from your mental bandwidth, and can put you into a negative, contracted frame of mind and body. Instead, respect, if not honor your opponent. Keep things positive, and know that a good opponent is what you want. That's what makes you get better. That's the value of competition. There's a spaciousness there.

Being a good competitor takes practice. Not giving up takes practice. Competing right through to the end of the game takes practice. Too many athletes train year round for their sport - but don't compete enough. The good news here is that you can practice competing in other sports or activities that may not be your "main" sport. So if you want to get good at competing, practice competing. Embrace the benefits of competing, as it sharpens your edge. Learn to love competing as a way to learn what you are capable of. Value your opponent as someone who brings out the best in you.

Thanks for Reading.

I recently re-watched episode 1 of Ken Burns’ epic documentary: The National Parks. This episode prominently features John Muir, whose commitment to the natural world is beyond extraordinary. Time and again in the midst of documenting the beginnings of Yosemite and Yellowstone Parks, the episode reverts back to Muir, who essentially makes nature his religion. As the son of a minister who literally beat him into memorizing the entire Bible as a boy, the obstacle became the way.

Photo by Bailey Zindel on Unsplash

For anyone who’s taken a walk in the woods and been captivated by a falling leaf, or sat at the beach watching the sun set, or heard the rush of a great blue heron’s wings, you know first hand that nature has a way of interrupting our incessantly busy mind, and bringing us back to a natural place of stillness. When that happens, it’s like we tamed the wild horse.

Pema Chodron encourages us to learn to take a break from our normal discursive thought patterns as a way to reconnect - even momentarily - to our native stillness. Our natural state of open awareness - the state that we often find ourselves in while in nature - can in fact be accessed during our busy ordinary day. Connecting to the present moment, and disconnected from thought - for a few moments at a time serves as a reminder to us that it is there all the time. All we have to do is allow ourselves to be there with it. No doubt some people find it easier to access this state than others. Thankfully, it can be trained.

In a world that is systematically working to manipulate our attention through technology, perhaps we can learn to push back, to train ourselves to find a moment or two at a time to connect to our direct experience, to open the gaps wider and wider between the random thoughts or the same old stories (often untrue) that we tend to tell ourselves over and over again. To recognize that thoughts, like sounds, sights, tastes and everything else, simply come and go. There’s no need to grip them so tightly. We can avoid that rope burn.

If walking in the woods or watching a sunset aren’t readily available on any given day, perhaps you can take Chodron’s advice and simply reconnect to your breath for a few moments at a time. In this way, you’re connecting to your most basic natural condition - who you are before thought comes. If this seems a little scary for you, consider that you may be clinging to negative thought patterns as a way of shielding yourself from the truth of the moment. In any event, clinging to thought is clinging to “I.” There is something deeper, freer, more stable, to discover. Something without ego. You already know what that feels like.

One way to practice this is to recognize moments of transition in your day - opening the door to go out to the car, getting up from your desk, taking a lunch break etc. and intentionally paying attention to the feeling of taking a few deep breaths. Consider it a brief practice of “breaking the spell” of being lost in thought. Just reset, and then do it again.

Another way is to practice meditation. This can be as simple as sitting quietly in the morning with eyes closed, paying attention to the sensations of breathing, noticing when you become caught up in thought, then returning to the breath. (If you try this, don’t judge whether you are “good” or “bad” at it as that judgment will make it harder to get started.)

“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” - John Muir

Find your place.

Yours in practice,

Pete

Thanks for Reading!

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My friend, and one the most inspirational people I’ve ever known, Kenny Gramas. He died in a skiing accident in 1992 while working at an orphanage in Europe.

I recently told a group of football captains: “Your job is to inspire your teammates.” Later, when talking to their coach, I said: “Your job is to inspire your players and fellow coaches.” Call it positivity, call it whatever you want, but when we’re around someone inspirational, we know it - we feel it. Which is why it’s so powerful. They move us.

Your job is also to inspire yourself.

So I got curious, (admission - I’m a bit of a word nerd) this definition is from Oxford Languages via Google:

in·spire. /inˈspī(ə)r/

Middle English enspire, from Old French inspirer, from Latin inspirare ‘breathe or blow into’ from in- ‘into’ + spirare ‘breathe’. The word was originally used of a divine or supernatural being, in the sense ‘impart a truth or idea to someone’.

So there you have it. I guess that’s why churches have “spires.”

So often when I’m talking to coaches, business leaders, teachers, parents and my fellow humans (after all, you could make a case that we are ALL in positions of potential leadership if we see it that way), I notice we can get caught up in the technicalities of leadership. Coaches get caught up in X’s and O’s, business leaders get caught up in metrics, numbers, data . . . parents get caught up in bedtime, curfews, school supply lists, and club sports teams. And all of that is completely necessary and understandable. Yet none if it matters without inspiration.

I’ve had the good fortune in life to spend a lot of time around some highly inspirational people. Like Mr. Santos, my little league baseball coach, whos trips to the mound and words to this young pitcher inspired. Like Kenny Gramas, who at 5’8” and 150 lbs put a college lacrosse team on his back senior year and led them to a Final 4. And he did it with a broken wrist. Kenny died at 25 heli-skiing in Europe near to where he was volunteering at an orphanage.) Like Coach Sachs, who often stopped practice so we could take in a sunset. Like Dick Duffy, my JV football coach, who once ran 50 yards down the sideline screaming at me to keep running till I reached the end zone against Exeter. Like Mr. DiNocenza, my English teacher at Tabor, who’s dedication to his craft inspired me to want to write well. Like a rising college senior, a Division 1 lacrosse player, who despite hardly ever stepping on the field, despite being subject to a coach who can only say “just keep trying,” keeps her head up, and returned to college determined to stay positive. Like so many friends and colleagues who have turned adversity into positivity.

Kenny’s love of the game and fearlessness inspired his teammates and coaches

A bit here about those un-inspirational people. Those people tend to express their fears and insecurities in their dealings with others. They tend to see the faults, rather than the gifts. They see the clouds, not the sunset. At best, their self-awareness is not developed. At worst, they suffer from mental illness which needs professional treatment.

So how do you do it? How do you cultivate a personality trait of being inspirational?

My advice might seem pretty simplistic. To become a more inspirational person, practice being inspirational. Nothing changes without practice. It begins with self awareness. Are you aware of your opportunities to inspire? Perhaps the next conversation with one of your children? Or a colleague? Or a bus driver? Maybe the next time you’re talking to an old friend you could remind them of what makes them special to you, what makes them great even. It’s always best to build on strengths, not point out deficits. That puts us in a positive emotional state and things just build from there. Can you catch yourself when you’re feeling down? Can you let go of self pity, reset to gratitude, and cultivate that resilient, winning mindset?

Of course, it’s about action, not talk. What can you do - how can you be - in the world that serves as an example for others to follow? That’s leadership.

I watched some college football this weekend. Before the games, ESPN had the coaches mic’d up, which was very cool. Before the Notre Dame - Texas A&M game, sure enough, both Marcus Freeman and Mike Elko walked around during warm ups, spewing positivity to their players. It was heartwarming to see these two guys going player to player and wishing them well. No surprise that they are great coaches.

Who can you inspire today? Start with yourself. Why not start now?

If you found this post to be helpful in any way, please forward it!

Yours in practice.

Pete

ps - Hope you catch a great sunset tonight!

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Photo by Cristina Glebova on Unsplash

I recently asked a client to list the names of people who really helped and impacted him during certain life stages: 5-12 yrs old, 13-21, 22-30, 31-50, 50+ My client took a few minutes and jotted down some names. We then discussed those people, how they helped him, and why they quickly came to mind. 

His list included 6 people ranging from a high school coach to his wife to a business mentor. When we drilled down into really why he recalled these people, a common thread emerged. 

Each person he described showed a genuine interest in understanding my client and in helping him to reach his potential and succeed. His high school coach (a legendary and highly successful one, no coincidence), saw his potential and recognized a need for guidance and care. His mentor in business, a well known public figure with an extremely busy schedule, regularly took time to check in and always was there when my client needed guidance. His wife inspired him to become the best version of himself and they have been happily married for 34 years and continue to create a future together. 

When we attune ourselves to our natural inclination towards compassion; when we not only understand and expect that others may need our support, but go on to offer that support as well - then we are leveraging the best of our humanity for the greater good.

You are around people who can benefit from help and support all the time. All you need to do is offer it.

“We” are our best and most important resource. “Life” is a “team” sport. With humility and compassion, we can connect with, inspire and help not only those who report to us or whom we coach or mentor, but everyone we happen to come into contact with. Helping others is the basis for healthy workplaces, families, teams, communities and even nations. 

Who needs your help today?

Yours in practice,

Pete

ps - Can I help you? Just reply and lemme know.

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The Practice is a labor of love - literally. It is free of ads and paywalls, and always will be. I write for you.

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The most frequent question I get asked when working on performance with athletes is: “How can I stop the negative self-talk in my head?” This question cuts right to the core of one of humanity’s most perplexing afflictions.

There’s no denying the power of a great story. It’s what draws us into movies, TV shows, and playoff sports. We all love a good drama - real or imagined. Or that special person who could spin the story yarn endlessly, capturing our attention and transporting us into their world. I can vividly recall my grandfather telling story after story of his youth while my sisters and I sat captivated at the Thanksgiving dinner table.

Storytelling sets humans apart from the animal world. No doubt it was central to our survival. The evolution of language enabled our species to thrive. Stories influence us and shape us whether they are told by a friend or family member, watched on TV, or listened to through the lyrics in song. Personally, I find the stories in song particularly interesting.

We also have a way of telling stories to ourselves, and these ones shape us too. We’re all playing a dialogue in our heads; a running commentary with ourselves as we go about our day. It’s as if there’s some little gnome on our shoulder whispering (sometimes shouting) in our ear all day long. And for some, that voice gets really loud in the quiet of night. So often (and due to the “negativity bias”) that little gnome is a pessimist, more often offering up critiques rather than praise. So often that voice is “you’re not good enough.”

You can see why this can be debilitating to athletes individually and teams collectively. What’s more, the way our brains work, the more often we think a certain way - the more often we tell ourselves a certain story - the more ingrained that story becomes. Behaviors follow thoughts and sure enough, we can find ourselves in a rut that’s hard to escape from. When I speak to athletes about this, I tell them to imagine a path in the woods. This path is worn from their thoughts, and it becomes routine to just follow it along.

Yet it’s important - critically important, to stop sometimes and question - is this the right path? Are these thoughts accurate? Do I need to believe them? Should I start treading a new path?

As a mindfulness teacher/mindset coach, I’m trained to help people objectify their thoughts, to see them in the same realm as sounds, sights, physical sensations, smell, and taste. Thoughts are just something our brain secretes. But they don’t have to be taken as the truth, and the stories they create can simply be random. We can choose to believe them or not.

Successful athletes know that they can’t linger on mistakes. When athletes are going all out, they at times drop passes, miss shots, get penalties etc. Their success and their team’s success is in direct relation to how quickly they can let go of mistakes - how quickly they can shut off the voice of criticism - and simply keep playing the game.

Sport mirrors life. Have you ever beaten yourself up for a mistake you made? Has that voice ever persisted for a few hours or days? Weeks or months? Years? Moreover, can you consider for a moment that a negative or self-defeating story you tell yourself - about yourself - may have little or no basis in fact? Can you consider that in your mind’s need for certainty, it can simply concoct stories in order to make sense of the world?

Given that our brains are always changing (neuroplasticity), I use this very simple technique to help my clients change the inner dialogue: I tell them to imagine making a costly mistake in a game. Then I ask them to write down in 7 words or less, what would be most helpful for them to hear in that moment coming from a coach or teammate. I tell them to memorize those words, write them down and put them next to the mirror or door. And to say those words to themselves often and especially in the aftermath of a mistake, however big or small.

In a recent conversation with an old friend who’s struggling with his inner dialogue, I told him this over text after we’d ended the call:

“It’s helpful to challenge your identity frequently. We don’t have to be the story we tell ourselves, often written by someone else during our childhood.”

Jim Carrey, in his famous graduation speech says: ”Our eyes are not viewers, they are also projectors, that are running a second story over the picture. And the working title is: 'I’ll never be enough.’”

He also says in that speech, which I think is worth noting here: “You can spend your whole life imagining ghosts, worrying about the pathway to the future, but all there will ever be - is what’s happening here, and the decisions we make in this moment. So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect so we never dared ask the universe for it. I’m saying - I’m the proof - that you can ask the universe for it.”

So I encourage you to step back and become aware of that voice. If you need to, change that voice. Change it from negative to positive, with clear intention. Make that voice your best friend, your cheerleader, your Coach. See what happens.

You’ll always be enough.

Yours in practice,

Pete

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The Practice is a labor of love - literally. It is free of ads and paywalls, and always will be. I write for you.

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A few weeks ago I was invited speak at Eaglebrook School in Deerfield Massachusetts as part of their “Hillie-Chase” speaker series. My former player and assistant coach, Tim Winslow - an Eaglebrook and Governor’s alum - had asked me. It was my honor to speak to the school community about lessons I’ve learned along my journey. To me, giving back like this is and inspiring young people to be their best selves is what it’s all about.

It also happens that my son Larsen went to Eaglebrook for a year before embarking on his high school experience at Governors Academy.

After my talk and a question and answer session, I sat down with some students, and did a podcast. It’s about 20 minutes.

“In this episode of A View From the Hill, Peter Bidstrup P11 discusses his experience in coaching lacrosse, overcoming challenges, and the impact mindfulness and meditation have had on his life.”

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

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Four weeks ago, on Sunday morning, March 3rd, I had just left my house for a walk with my dog Coach, when old friend Rippy Philipps called. “Biddy, I have terrible news. Billy had a heart attack this morning. He didn’t make it.”

He was a very close friend whom I saw frequently and spoke to every few days. He was 59. A college teammate, fittingly, Billy was our goalie. If you know anything about lacrosse, you can understand why it is the rare person who would even consider standing before a 6’ x 6’ goal, with light protection on, attempting to get in the way of a hard rubber ball being shot toward him at 90 miles an hour. But that was Billy. Of course he was a goalie. The consummate team player.

We connected over lots of things, sports, fishing, cooking, and music to name a few. After I lost my wife, Billy circled closer to me. He knew I needed care, and he was there for me. When it was his turn to endure a couple hurricanes in his life more recently, it was my turn to circle closer to him. We cared about each other. And we took care of each other. This is what humans do for one another.

Margaret Mead, the renown cultural anthropologist, author and speaker, spent her career understanding how humans treat one another. As the story goes, a student asked her what she considered to be the first evidence of civilization.

Her answer didn’t mention tools, earthen huts, or the vestiges of language. Instead, she said it was evidence of a broken femur that had healed 15,000 years ago. You see, when an animal breaks a femur, it can no longer forage for food, nor can it escape predators. So it surely dies, before it can heal.

In the case Mead referred to, another human had to help and care for this person. Another human had to have had compassion, had to have spent several months with that person, feeding them and protecting them until they were healed. While that scene played out, no doubt, mostly outside in the elements - in a completely different world than we live in today - I have to think the feeling in the heart of the cared for, and the care giving, were exactly the same as the feeling one would have today in a similar scenario.

I go here, because among Bill’s many wonderful qualities, was his utterly genuine interest - his care - for other people. I can still remember the expression on his face when I saw him at my wife’s service. It was the face of care.

Me (22) and Billy (11) in 1986. Billy was the best goalie in the league and we won the title that year.

When we all gathered 3 weeks ago to celebrate Billy’s life, we talked a lot about his intrinsic orientation toward “care.” He had that rare gift of seeing another person free of titles, class, race or social status. He saw them for their humanity, and his first inclination was always to offer his help and company. I’ll never forget going into Olga’s Deli near his house to provision for an all day fishing trip, watching Billy work his magic with other patrons while we waited in line. He might start a conversation about the Giants quarterback problem, or ask a contractor about the merits of different decking materials. Invariably he’d chat up the sandwich makers and clerks, offering gratitude for the good food they made for us. That we paid for it wasn’t part of the equation to him. They made food for us. Everyone Billy talked to realized that a “stranger” just took an interest in them. And their day was somehow a bit better.

At his celebration of life, I was moved to say some words, encouraging the crowd to practice seeing their fellow humans in this way. How then, might that make a difference in our world? How can we become a little less guarded, less centered on our own self, and more interested in the self of another? Maybe developing an attitudinal orientation that frequently resets to the question: “How can I help you?” is a start.

Before I conclude this post, I want to mention another dimension to care, that’s quite literally the root of it all. A dimension you need to have in place before you can properly offer care to another. This is care for one’s own self.

Sometimes we can find ourselves bent on caring for others, but not doing such a good job at caring for ourselves. Billy suffered some health problems - for one, a few years ago after a surgery he contracted sepsis, a life threatening condition where the body attacks its own organs in response to untreated infection. This nearly killed him, and created serious complications that required surgeries etc.

In Mindfulness, there are 4 “Foundations.” Mindfulness of Body is the first foundation. Our body is our first and in a sense, only true home. It is our gift, and our physical means to experience the world. It houses our brain, thus our mind is a physical thing. Our first obligation as a caring person, is to care for ourselves, starting with our body.

The body needs nutritious food, and not too much. It needs good sleep, and not too little. It needs clean water (which ironically and fittingly is what Billy worked his whole adult life to provide, as a hydrogeologist), and a peaceful place to inhabit. It needs exercise. All of these things are available to you.

Tara Brach, in a recent module of the Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification Program I am enrolled in, said “the tissues hold the issues.” SO we need to be kind to this body of ours, to give it the care it needs.

Time to take Coach for a long walk.

Happy Easter!

Yours in Practice,

Pete

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The Practice is a labor of love - literally. It is free of ads and paywalls, and always will be. I write for you.

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Last week, I led a college team I work with in a gratitude exercise. This is something I typically do early in the season when the group is forming and is part of how I approach mindfulness/mindset training for athletic teams.

When you’re working with 50 male college athletes, the idea of expressing gratitude can seem like a shaky proposition. After all, many of us guys are brought up to be “strong,” as in being physically tough and emotionally closed off. For these young men, it wasn’t lost on me that the idea of expressing gratitude could be seen as being “soft.”

Yet there is strength in the “softness.” And exploring uncharted territory leads to new discoveries. It’s a good way to get them to consider something more than the playbook, or the next opponent. It’s part of a much bigger picture that I can help them see.

The exercise is simple. I break the team into 4 groups of 12 or so. Each group member has a piece of paper that says:

Player Name:

Sending Gratitude To:

A few words about why you are grateful you have this person as a team mate/what you admire about them:

The first things I notice is that they focus in and begin to think deeply. They often gaze upward for inspiration (and courage). This is different. It’s as if they’ve been asked to grab their shovel, dig for some gold, and give it to someone else. They always seem happy to do this - as if they have finally been asked. When I move around between groups, it’s quiet and contemplative. It’s the opposite atmosphere of an action packed contact sport environment these guys are used to.

After a few minutes, I instruct them to slide their papers face down, to the player they wrote about. They seem 10 years old now. As they go around the circle, each reads what was written about him. Eyes water, voices crack, and emotion wells as each player shares publicly a heartfelt expression written just to him. It’s a courageous exercise. Thankfully, these guys understand that insight is on the other side of discomfort.

I’ll never forget what happened next. After the groups had finished, and as we were exhaling before the next part of the training session, someone started a slow clap. Immediately others joined in, and as I looked around the room, I witnessed 50 smiling young men clapping enthusiastically as if they were gathered up postgame after a big win. To call the feeling palpable is an understatement.

We then debriefed. I simply asked them what they felt, and if they wanted to share anything. Again, sharing like this in the presence of 50 team mates doesn’t come naturally. One player mentioned how nice it felt to be appreciated by a team mate and that he didn’t usually think that kindly about himself. Another player nailed it when he said there was a “warm feeling” that he felt welling up inside him as he gave, received, and witnessed what went on. Van Morrison wrote a song about this transcendent feeling, though in a different context. Same feeling though.

It is the cultivation of this “warm feeling” that I am after when I lead this exercise. It is the feeling of “I appreciate you, and I am appreciated.” It’s a feeling that certainly bonds a team. I asked the players to try to stay in that feeling for a while, to allow the residue to become a part of them, to become a little more of their regular state of being. I explained to them that if they can linger in that state of the warm feeling, then they will become just a little more like that. And if they can develop a practice; a way of being that includes expressing gratitude and producing that warm feeling, well then they’re really on to something.

If being grateful feels so good, and if it’s not so hard to do, then why do we struggle with it at times? In our human existence - as teammates, friends, work colleagues, neighbors, partners/spouses, parents, why is it so difficult sometimes? And why, if we know it can be so beneficial - why wouldn’t we do it more?

And by the way like the best things in life, it’s free.

These are questions worth considering. Sometimes I think the “small sense of self” overpowers the deeper feeling of being interconnected, of understanding the vastness of our experience, and of knowing that our success and happiness is always the result of our relationships with others. If you doubt this, notice how much easier it is to recall the people in your life who have gone out of their way to care about you, vs. people who are famous, noteworthy, extremely wealthy etc. Who do you remember?

Expressing gratitude is evidence that you care. It’s how we feel truly “seen.” And it sure feels good to be seen. When someone tells us what they appreciate about us, we know they are paying attention to us.

Every great team is built on a foundation of selflessness. So is every great person. Gratitude is a way of putting selflessness into action in the same way that compassion is the activation of empathy.

If you can’t say it, can you write a note, email or text? How about a letter? (It’s still possible to write letters.) These modern times allow us any number of ways to be less than personal in our expressions of love and gratitude. Or maybe you can just say it.

In my work with coaches, I try to help them broaden their scope of coaching to go beyond the drills, skills and conditioning work. I ask them to bring in the practice of gratitude and compassion and to teach these things to their players. In that way we can shape young people who are physically tough and resilient but also emotionally flexible and responsive to the needs of others. This to me is the essence of coaching.

I have a challenge for you as a way of pushing you into your own practice. Because if you just read this and feel a little better for a few seconds, it’s a waste. It would be just another piece of fleeting inspiration and I’m more into helping you make this a personal practice than in making you feel good for a minute.

So I ask you to share gratitude with someone - or a few people. Use my template if you want: In a few words tell this person why you are grateful you have them as a team mate in this life, and what you admire about them. It will make their day. It will make yours too.

My daughter called me on Valentine’s Day to wish me well. When I asked her what she was up to she said she’d been writing Valentine’s Day cards to her friends.

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The Practice is a labor of love - literally. It is free of ads and paywalls, and always will be. I write for you.

If you enjoy reading it, consider making a one time or recurring donation via my secure business PayPal here to support my work.

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Most coaches and competitive athletes follow a similar pattern: Plan, Execute, Adapt. They do this over and over again as each new opponent shows up on the schedule. The planning phase can differ in its complexity, depending on whether it’s a team or individual sport, the level of play (Youth, High School, College, Pro) and so on. If you’re a fan, as I am, of the NFL playoffs, you know that the coaching staff and players are spending vast amounts of time right now planning for their upcoming game on Sunday. They’re watching hours and hours of film, trying to anticipate what the other team will try to do, then creating schemes and plays to exploit any weaknesses they can find while they leverage their strength. When I coached high school lacrosse, I used to tell our offensive players that their job was to solve the riddle that the defense represented every time they gained possession of the ball. How well they solved the riddle had a lot to do with their training. It also had everything to do with how they executed and adapted. I always felt like if I did my job well, I was simply training them to adapt.

Executing the plan is simply competing - playing the game - in real time. The whistle blows, and off you go. All the training, all the practice, all the strategy, it all plays out now in the rush of adrenaline, speed, contact and whatever else is happening in the here and now. The plan is being realized in this stage. Those who execute best let their body intuitively do the work, as too much thinking can get in the way. The flow state is what we’re after here. 

in the execution stage, coaches and athletes realize what’s working and what isn’t. As the game unfolds, the need to adapt emerges. Perhaps the plan isn’t working or the opponent rolls out a new wrinkle that is completely unexpected. Again if you watch the NFL this Sunday, you’ll see the quarterback approach the line of scrimmage, survey the defense, then often change a called play depending on the defensive alignment (which is often a disguise). These little subplots create drama that makes it fun to watch. As games unfold, adjustments are made moment by moment but also during times when play is stopped. Some games have no stop - think of track, or a crew race, or sailing race. Tennis stops between sets for a short break. Soccer is more or less continuous. Hockey has long breaks between periods. Football has a long halftime. Surfing is continuous adaptation. Maybe that’s why it’s so enthralling. These all represent opportunities to adapt - to change the plan - to correct course. To reset.

Sport mirrors life. We all make plans to some extent. Few adults living a reasonably productive and happy life can afford to simply live aimlessly from one moment to another (I tried that with mixed success in college). We need to plan to ensure things get done - bills get paid, cars are maintained, children are clothed, pets are fed, work is done. We execute our plans as best we can. Sometimes we screw up dinner, run late to a meeting, or forget to brush our teeth. We have to be mindful not to let plans become expectations. We can plan for things to play out a certain way, but we need to be flexible in knowing things don’t always go according to plan.

So much is out of our control. Maybe it snows on your commute, or the power goes out. The washing machine kicks. You get stuck behind a school bus on your way to a meeting. You twist an ankle and tear a ligament. Or you lose your job or your kid gets hurt or struggles in school. Or your spouse gets cancer.

In the game of life, we can plan all we want, we execute every day from when we wake up until we finally fall asleep. In between, in the game, shit happens. Life happens. Hard stuff happens. Unexpectedly hard and brutally difficult things happen. Wishing it didn’t doesn’t help. It actually makes it worse.

So you adapt. You change the plan on the fly. Maybe a little. Maybe a lot. You get a new job, you drop everything and help your kid or your friend. You grieve. You learn to let go. You keep moving forward, hopefully a little wiser. You try to stay in that flow state of life where your training kicks in and you live - and adapt - intuitively. When the waves of joy and sorrow come, you surf them without getting sucked under.

Your happiness in this life, your success at playing this game - the only game that really matters - has everything to do with your ability to adapt. Your resilience is about your flexibility, not your physical strength. You have to be like water sometimes. Adaptation isn’t about trying harder - though effort and the desire to improve are important. You have to want it. Adaptation is most often about discovering new ways to deal with the problem. It all starts with your mind.

How are you training your mind to be better able to adapt to the constantly changing flow of life? It’s easy when the plan is working. But your happiness depends on how you manage the hard stuff, how or if you are able to hit that curveball when life’s pitcher throws it. And what you do after you strike out. How do you respond in that moment?

As you consider your own ability to adapt to ever changing circumstances, consider that your mind and body are one. Train one, and you’re training the other. Physical and mental fitness works in concert. In stereo even. You know the building blocks - eat good food, limit alcohol, exercise, connection socially, meditate, be positive, be compassionate - these are the qualities and practices - obvious and subtle - that need cultivation and daily tending. These are the practices that enable you to grow, evolve and ultimately to execute and adapt in ways that bring you - and others around you - into greater states of well being. That’s worth practicing. So keep practicing. Every day.

You’re in the game. The clock is ticking. Plan. Execute. Adapt. Until the final whistle sounds.

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The Practice is a labor of love - literally. It is free of ads and paywalls, and always will be.

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Last Friday, I spent an evening Christmas caroling with my 2 children, extended family and about 150 other folks in the packed “Orchard Chapel” in Hampton Falls, New Hampshire. Leading us in song was Rev. “Bobby” Thompson, who’s baritone voice set the bass tone amidst the bucolic stillness. His Oh Holy Night solo moved the chapel timbers, and the hearts of the listeners. I had a lovely evening being together with my grown kids, their aunt, uncle and their children, sharing our group connection with other folks I’d never met before and may never see again. It was a poignant moment in time.

What struck me most though, was Rev. Thompson, before our final carol, encouraging us to go out into the world and to be a little kinder, a little more compassionate, to help a stranger or even just hold a door for someone. Maybe pay it forward in the coffee line . . . In short, to let ourselves be a bit more kind of our fellow humans. He reminded us of our responsibility to one another.

Reverend Bobby is a good teammate.

The best teams are made up of individuals who support each other unconditionally. There are teams chock full of talent that seem to always fall short. And there are teams seemingly lacking in talent yet full of “togetherness” that succeed against all odds. That’s where support and connection come in. Teams can’t win without it, and oddsmakers can’t quantify it. Indeed, no one can succeed without it. In this sense, we are only as good - as whole - as the support of the groups we belong to - team, family, work group, town, country etc.

Sometimes it’s just a pat on the back, a quick hug, a random compliment, a look in the eye or a smile in tacit connection. I have been reminded of this recently, as my 2 children, Brett and Larsen have been with me for a couple weeks before heading west again and re-embarking on their respective careers. Their consistent and often unexpected acts of kindness toward me, (including simply asking me how my day is going) ensures that my “well is full” as the New Year begins.

And while many people at this time of year will no doubt resolve to become more fit, to accumulate more wealth or to find romance or to clean out the attic - all worthy endeavors - perhaps we should also resolve to cultivate compassion, kindness, - friendship - towards our fellow humans while we’re on this very earthly - and finite - journey together.

Last night during the after-dinner conversation around the table, someone shared a story of a difficult experience they’d had as a kid. This led us to each tell a story along those lines. Next, we each shared a joyful highlight from 2023. Eyes got misty as stories of feeling lost on a bus as a child, peeing their pants on the way to camp (several!), unable to recite a passage in English class, finding love, success as a leader or bringing a baby into the world. In our personal triumphs and challenges we re-affirmed our common humanity.

It reminded me of a short essay Brett wrote for her college application 11 years ago. When asked to describe a resonant image through a window, she chose to depict looking in to the dining room from outside . . . a summer evening, the big oak table, people all around it chatting by candlelight, the heartfelt hum of connection in a place where she experienced the gift of belonging.

Thanks Bobby, for your inspiration, and for being such a good teammate. 

Oh Holy Night.

Yours in Practice,

Pete

Photo by Laurenz Kleinheider on Unsplash

I surveyed a college team I work with, and asked them what they could use some help with. The majority of the responses centered around dealing with negative self-talk. As college athletes pushing themselves to their limits, making mistakes is simply part of the game right? What’s also part of the process is being overly critical of one’s self especially in the direct aftermath of a mistake. And when athletes (and coaches) can’t quickly move past a mistake and get back in the game, performance suffers. Sport mirrors life.

Have you ever been unkind to yourself? If you’re like most humans, you have - maybe daily. Even little things can get us mad at ourselves, like yesterday when I called myself an idiot for burning a bagel. There are big things too, and these can get pretty destructive. Repetitive negative thoughts about performance, body image, grades, effort, relationships can lead us into bad mental states. We can think, “am I good enough?”

The good news: You can do something about it. 

There’s this thing that psychologists call the “negativity bias.” It explains why, if the average human has 50,000 thoughts per day, 75% are negative. It’s a survival mechanism wired deep into our DNA. See, when our ancestors were living in makeshift shelters on the edge of the forest, the guy who up and left when he thought he heard the lion rustling in the bushes survived and had kids, while the guy who thought it’d be cool to check it out didn’t. It also explains why so many people are drawn to negative news. 

So we have this thing inside us that helps us survive, essentially by keeping us worried. In modern times, this worry and fear doesn’t serve us well. In sports, worrying makes players freeze up and coaches impulsive. Teams and players crumble when they start thinking the worst. 

The more time we spend in a particular state of mind - say, worry in this case, then the more that state becomes who we are. Your mind works like your social media feed - you get more of what you click on. You become what you choose to pay attention to. 

Back to the good news . . . you can choose to change the channel on that negative voice. Here are some things you can do:

• Imagine seeing your best friend make a big mistake in front of a lot of people that ends up costing her team (work or sports) a victory. She is visibly distraught. What would you say to her to comfort her in that moment? In 7 words or less, write that down, and say it to yourself whenever you make a mistake. (Learn from the mistake too!)

• If you catch yourself thinking poorly of someone else, try thinking of something positive you can see in them. If that isn’t working for you, try to imagine what they might be going through.

• If you’re feeling overwhelmed, try focusing on just enjoying the next 30 minutes, whether that’s your commute, a meeting you’re in, class you need to get to, work, or practice. If you look for the positive, I bet you can find it.

• If you’re feeling sorry for yourself, remind yourself that if you’re reading this, there are billions of people on the planet who would happily trade places with you. 

There have been times in my life where I’ve blamed myself for things that were out of my control. I’ve learned that, in being my own “coach,” it’s far better to encourage myself, to see the best in myself, to forgive myself, and to, as a student friend of mine says, “see the light in the little things.”

And yes, you’re good enough. Damn good enough.

Yours in practice,

Pete

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Team Photo

I recently attended a 4 day conference, The Nantucket Project.

The theme of the 11th TNP was “pluralism.” Among the dozens of speakers - including Michelle Obama, Ken Burns, Rainn Wilson, Kelly Corrigan, Jennifer Lawrence, Arthur Brooks, Laura Ingram, and Brad Raffensperger (list goes on and on) - was Eboo Patel, whose organization, the New Pluralists “Will invest in strengthening the growing field that is addressing our nation’s crisis of division, distrust, dehumanization, and disconnection.”

I need to note here that alongside the well known, aforementioned quasi-famous/famous people, there were a number of folks, like Caprice Jones (Fountain of Youth), and Layla Zaidane (Millennial Action Project) who may be less well known but are doing really meaningful work that helps our society.

As I meandered through a highly thought provoking (soulful, gut wrenching, joyful, rocking) weekend, a couple words kept coming to the surface - "love," and "humanity." At the end of his riveting opening night discussion with documentary film maker Ken Burns, Founder Tom Scott offered 3 sacred words: “We the People” to which Ken responded confidently: “Yes, and I have 3 better: I Love You.”

It strikes me that perhaps we need to “love humanity” - in our neighbors and ourselves - a lot more than we do.

This theme was reinforced on my ride to work this morning as I spoke to a dear friend who is recovering in the hospital after surgery. He commented to me on how very nice it feels to be taken care of - to be loved, really - by the doctors and nurses caring for him, if even for a short hospital stay. We discussed how that benefits both the receiver and the giver, and that as a doctor himself, it’s the very thing that keeps him coming back to work each day.

Partway through the conference, I found these words from the old Don Henley song “Heart of the Matter” running through my head:

“Ah, these times are so uncertain . . . There's a yearning undefined . . . And people filled with rage . . . We all need a little tenderness . . . How can love survive . . . In such a graceless age?

I've been tryin' to get down . . . To the heart of the matter . . .”

Let’s keep tryin’.

Yours in practice,

Pete

Heart of the Matter (1990) Written by Don Henley, J.D Souther and Mike Campbell