Overcoming The Fear Of What We Don’t Know

From our experience, we've seen that a lot of young players get intimidated by what they don’t know. It can seem like there are players that are so much better than you so after some feedback from our listeners, we thought it was important to share a few things that we think any aspiring cricketer, athlete, coach or anyone for that matter, can do to increase their knowledge in their craft, as many of the things we discussed aren’t limited to just the cricket field.

This is by no means a comprehensive list of everything and you don’t have to do it all. It’s just some ideas from 3 mates who chat regularly about topics like this and want to share some of our ideas that we’ve developed over our lives in sport with whoever is interested and wants to learn.

A few key messages and points from this episode...

• Young players get intimidated with what they don’t know. It can seem like there are players that are so much better than you but if you’re prepared to chip away and keep working hard and constantly be looking at ways to get better then who knows where you can get to. And as Buck said, even if you’re learning some bad stuff at times, you’ll find that out as well and you’ll realise that’s not helpful and you’ll steer clear of it in the future
• If you want to be the best, you have to be prepared to seek avenues where you’re learning more. Try not to just be a fan of the game but try to be a student or an analyst and use every opportunity to learn and develop yourself
• Be resourceful and use the resources you have available to you. You might not have access to footage of every innings you play like the pros do but you can find ways to learn and improve
• We share a number of stories including how one of the players that Buck mentors, sent him the video of the Ponting, Gilchrist and KP doing a masterclass and said “I just want to talk about it. I just want to try and understand it”.
• It’s up to the young players to seek out information and mentoring from the older players. You have to get out of your comfort zone and not be scared to ask questions or ask for help.
• Buck shares a brilliant story he heard of NBA star Tim Duncan about how he goes in to practice and to do his daily vitamins on his days off and then speaks to the team's analyst about how he can get better. An inspiring mindset & work ethic.
• Plus a whole lot more!

We want this podcast to gives as much value as it can, so we’d love to hear your feedback - what did you find interesting or learn from this show? We also want to hear what topics you’d like us to discuss in future episodes so send me a message via the Cricket Mentoring social media channels and we’ll start shouting out the people who suggested the topics we’re discussing.