The Reason Why Some Athletes Don’t Learn from Losing
One of the most overused clichés to tell young athletes after they lose is that there’s no such thing as losing, only learning. Unfortunately, this statement doesn’t apply to all athletes. For some athletes a loss is just a loss because they don’t learn anything from it. However, there is a reason for this that makes complete sense once you understand the mindset of a learner.
To learn one must be willing to change. In other words, if you aren’t willing to change you can’t learn. Indeed, doing things how they’ve always been done is a major roadblock to learning. Moreover, it’s an innate human trait to avoid change unless there is a strong belief that the benefit of change is far more than the cost of staying the same.
Adding this all up explains why some athletes don’t learn from losing and continue to make the same mistakes that caused them to lose. Simply stated, these athletes don’t believe that changing is worth it. Therefore, the only way to get athletes in this situation to learn from losing is to change this belief.