When trying to improve your performance, you can maximize your strengths to increase your highs or improve your weaknesses to reduce your lows. How do you know which to do? Figure out which is easier to improve or which will more significantly improve your average.
An idea I heard recently is to get so good that you make your misses makes – you are successful even when you make a mistake. The idea came from an NFL kicker; his goal is to get so good that when he kicks the ball poorly, he still makes the field goal.
I like this idea – widen your groove so that the range of acceptable performance is bigger. If I apply this to my handstand practice, it means that I strive to hit a balanced handstand every time I kick up instead of missing sometimes.
What I need to figure out is what will make the biggest difference for me – is it increasing my wrist strength which is good or improving my shoulder flexibility which is my biggest weakness? I can either work on both or choose one as a focus and see how much of a difference I can make over 2 to 3 weeks, then reassess.
How can you widen your groove to make your misses hits?
Today we had coaching supervision… our group is still new to coaching so we used it more as an opportunity to coach each other on deepening our own skills are a coach. During my session as the coachee (client) I found myself exploring what I love about coaching and where I am uncomfortable. It all came down to the lead in and lead out of the session which was to be backed up by the contract that would be written between myself and my clients. This would allow me plenty of bandwidth to be in the authentic moment and flow of coaching in my own style knowing that if a session that if things moved sideways we were clear on our rolls and it should be easier to course correct.
Widened the groove for me is being clear on my roll and the expectations of coaching relationship so that my version of being a coach is free flowing and holding the space clearly.
I could also see widening the groove as getting so good at all of the aspects of coaching that you can maintain your flow through a wide range of client abilities and needs, as well as challenges such as equipment restrictions and environmental distractions.