Parents and Coaches - We hear you asking for help!
You didn’t sign your kids up for sports to become more stressed out. You don’t want to spend your valuable free time in a negative environment. And you don’t want to hear parents or coaches yell at kids or anyone else for that matter.
What Happened? Sports is supposed to be fun for you and your athletes!
Our research tells us that; “when you combine the cost of sports, the commitment and dedication of parents, along with dual income earners and stress levels peaking in adults of aged 35 to 54 (prime sports parent age), one can conclude that enjoying the game has become significantly harder than perhaps any other time in history.”
- Two parents working outside of the home has put significant time pressures on families.
- Sports has the highest rate of volunteers (12%) compared to other organizations, and overall stats indicate that 53% of volunteer work is done by about 10% of the volunteers…that’s a lot of work!
- Scheduling various children in various sports, factoring in both practice and playing times, has strained the schedule of working parents to the max.
- The distance parents have to travel to and from work, commuting traffic nightmares and “away” games that are ever farther and farther away mean arriving at games nerves already frayed and frazzled.
- Increasing pressures on employees at an organizational level to always be “representing the company.” In other words, in our social media savvy world – parents even run the risk of losing employment based on behaviours displayed outside of their place of business.
Combine the parental strains with what we now know about the fact that stress in youth is also on the rise and you have a recipe for disaster.
Children today are facing increasing peer pressure, bullying, the onslaught of extensive social media exposure causing anxiety and increasing pressure to think about their future goals. Children, even in middle school, are thinking they must perform at peak levels, all the time, or not perform at all. Kids who originally enrolled in sport “for the love of the game” are leaving in droves because of the “pressure to perform” to increasingly exacting standards and under a verbal barrage of “advice” (read abuse) at the hands of parents, coaches and other players.
At What Not To Yell Inc. we focus on playing with “H.E.A.R.T.” and work together with parents to bring the joy back into sport for everyone. A Spectator Intelligent Culture includes you playing with HEART. It’s a chance to return to the original reasons you signed up your child to play.
- We use science-based technology and programs that are proven to reduce stress and anxiety, build resilience, and move conflicts to conversations.
- We help you identify your “player parent style” and the gaps between the intent and the impacts of each;
- We teach you how to prevent, prepare for, manage and recover from the S#!@T experience that happened. (we are human after all, so they will happen!).
- We work with parent groups and bench staff to help them build their own Spectator Culture that will enhance the teams performance….all the way to the finals!
Take a conscious deep breath. Inhale for 5 seconds, now exhale for 5 seconds. This alone can start to decrease the cortisol levels (stress hormone) in your system. Do this 3 times, multiple times during the day (or perhaps multiple times during a game) and see what you notice.
Need to give some feedback to on your team? Check out our resource page to see how.
We are conducting research and looking for a group of parents and bench staff who would like to help to take their team to the next level of performance, by managing their energy systems in stands. Give us a call and we’ll explain what is involved….it is as simple as taking a breath!