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094 - Quiet Reminders & Lighthouse Leadership w/ Ashley Kowalewski
132 Plays26 days ago
Coach Ashley Kowalewski [@ashleykowalewski], LSU Volleyball's Strength & Conditioning Coach, joins us in the depths of Death Valley. AK's coaching philosophy centers on two powerful concepts. Quiet reminders, those moments she echos the gentle but powerful guidance. Then Lighthouse leadership, providing awareness and direction without controlling the journey, offering bumpers to guide athletes toward their goals while giving them the autonomy to navigate their own path.
In this conversation, we explore:
- Why AK hasn't put a barbell on her athletes' backs all semester—and why they're jumping higher than ever
- How quiet reminders help athletes see themselves accurately when past coaching has distorted their self-image
- The lighthouse model: guiding athletes away from danger while letting them choose their course
- Why relationship-building creates buy-in that no program design ever could
- The difference between standards and expectations in high-performance environments
- The power of autonomy in driving athlete intent and ownership
If you're a coach who believes connection comes before correction, this conversation will resonate. Sports don't teach lessons. Coaches do. And AK is proof that when you lead with people first, performance follows.
*NEW* Education - Captains & Coaches course, "Why They're Not Listening - Coaching Today's Athlete": http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com
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Transcript
Empowering Athletes Through Choice
00:00:00
Speaker
with elite level athletes, the athletes that I coach, you can see that in them. And there's some times that I might have to come up to you and remind you who you are.
00:00:10
Speaker
You remember who you are right now? You're the leading scorer in the SEC. You are that bitch. and Bleep it out if you need to, but you are that bitch. Go, be that, i like be that girl, go on.
00:00:24
Speaker
And that's the quiet reminders that I got from our coach and the people that we had in our circle is you are, you are that, go be it. What if the secret to elite athletic performance isn't found in the perfect program, but in giving athletes the power to choose their own path?
Interview with Ashley Kowalewski
00:00:41
Speaker
Welcome to the Captains and Coaches podcast. We explore the art and science of leadership through the lens of athletics and beyond. I'm your host, Texel Koukoukou, and today I travel to Baton Rouge to sit down with Coach Ashley Kowalewski, LSU's straightly conditioning coach for volleyball.
00:00:58
Speaker
From pole vaulter to javelin thrower to strength coach in Death Valley, AK has learned that presence matters more than perfection.
Lighthouse Leadership Concept
00:01:07
Speaker
In this conversation, we dive into Lighthouse Leadership, why she's never put a barbell in her athletes back this season, and how building relationships before anything else has led to zero in-season injuries.
00:01:21
Speaker
If you've ever wondered how autonomy, communication, and compassion create dominant athletes, this one's for you. With that, let's throw it out to AK to help us raise your game. Ready, ready, and ready.
00:01:34
Speaker
I do a power relaxation. yeah Which I can't. Those two words don't go together for me. Power relaxation. Well, I feel that's a great name for this podcast episode. Power.
00:01:46
Speaker
Power relaxation. Welcome,
Ashley's Journey to Coaching
00:01:48
Speaker
AK. We are in the Death Valley, the depths of depth Death Valley here at the Louisiana State University.
00:01:59
Speaker
right, this is my second time here. First time here, you gave us a grand tour of all the weight rooms, a beautiful tour, and we got to walk out on the field and just check it out. So thank you for joining me. Thank you for opening up the doors. I'm excited to return, and now we get to know you a little bit.
00:02:16
Speaker
Happy to be here. Always happy to have you. Yes. Well, I know your journey didn't start here. You were the Division one athlete. And then is that where you fell in love with performance? Most people, it was an injury that then led them to this. What was your hero origin story here? Oh, hero origin story. Well, my hero, if you really want to hear who did it, it was Adam Kuehl. So he worked, um he was a GA at the time.
00:02:42
Speaker
Came in, former thrower. I was a pole vaulter at my we'll call it my origin, right, at Oklahoma. and this big guy comes in the weight room and he's, you know, telling me he's going to teach me how to train. And I was like, dude, I've been training my whole life. You're not gonna teach me not one thing.
00:02:58
Speaker
Taught me everything. Like I had never Olympic lifted before. i had trained in a very unconventional way. And i had just been allowed to be an athlete my whole life. And it was just really, really eye-opening, not only to get to know him, but then to really have a foundation of,
00:03:16
Speaker
proper lifting. Um, so he came in and kind of overhauled me. i put on 15 pounds of muscle within my first year, which didn't thrill my coach because as a vaulter, you need to stay at a decent weight for all these other things, but that's neither here nor there, but fell in love with the weight room.
00:03:32
Speaker
Truly, and just training in general, concepts. I didn't understand what certain things were called, so I was starting to get like you know picky with the names. Hey, what is this? Did you lift weights in high school? I i did, but not... i had a very...
Transition and Transformation in Athletics
00:03:46
Speaker
um Like I said, an unconventional guy that worked with me. He was very much like open to movements and very fluid. And he would teach me a lot of calisthenic type things and body weight movements. And um we did a lot more sprinting and jumping and things that kept me, i mean, moving well, but I had never truly moved weight.
00:04:06
Speaker
And it showed by the time I got there and was able to move my body around well. But teaching me the clean was much easier because I had no misconceptions of what it was. I had no preconception of of what these movements were. So truly, no But Adam made it look, I think i I would give him credit for making it look like I had. he looked like it It looked like I had trained within that first year. yeah So he was the one originally who made me fall in love with it. And then coming back full circle, he's also the one that told me I should be a strength coach at first.
00:04:38
Speaker
And I was like, nah, guy, going to go to PT school. Is that where you were studying? Oh, yeah. i I was getting ready to go to PT school. i had applied. I got waitlisted. So I was like, man, going to work in a PT clinic and it's going to be great.
00:04:50
Speaker
No. You know that stuff's boring? um Yeah. o I was so bored and- Was this hours or internship? This was originally hours because like I actually got, I was employed by a PT studio. So I started doing my tech stuff so that I could get all my stuff compounded. that big By the time I got accepted into school, I was already in with the clinic and it was great and I was gonna have this big plan.
00:05:15
Speaker
No, blow it up. I did, I blew, I completely blew it up. I left, I went home and decided I needed to go get a master's. How many hours in? ah Four or 40? Yeah, about 60, truly. I almost worked there for, i was working 20, 25, 30 hours a week, not full time, but almost full time. Yeah. And for- Not on paper.
00:05:40
Speaker
Oh yeah, it was crazy. I was working, working a lot and Fortunately, I mean, I learned a lot. Don't get me wrong. During that time, I learned a lot about the human body and a lot about, I mean, ACL, return to play.
00:05:52
Speaker
That was my first real exposure to the PT side of return to play processes. And i think that helped me a lot. And i I really value the time that I had in that setting.
00:06:04
Speaker
But I can personally say it just was not for me. was so bored. was so bored. I get it. And then so now back back to Oklahoma for from my perspective for pole vaulting. That's if you're a gymnast and you just grow out of the sport.
00:06:20
Speaker
Is this the same story for you or how did you get into pole vaulting? No, I trained it. I was, I vaulted in high school. I won the state championship in Oklahoma, right? Uh, only in Texas. So we yeah at Liberty Christian school in Argyle.
00:06:35
Speaker
Um, I vaulted there. I, I vaulted there. I played softball. I played basketball. I, there
Building Trust and Autonomy
00:06:39
Speaker
was nothing you could probably keep me off of when I was in school. Um, and then my, before I actually went, right yeah it's about, Oh, well it's Denton. So the triangle, Denton, Fort Worth Dallas.
00:06:53
Speaker
But it's, a yeah, I know. Denton, that's the first time I've- Denton's blown up. it's the It's called the triangle. Denton? Denton calls it the triangle. Nobody else includes him. You're right. You're right. Well, I grew up in that in in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Yeah, I spent time with Celina, so I got- Really enjoy that north Dallas area. Oh, yeah, but not so much Dallas proper. No, no, not Dallas proper. Not for you. Fort Worth is where I spent. So my family's in rodeo.
00:07:20
Speaker
Okay, so we spent a lot of time and my family is still about an hour and a half west of Fort Worth. So we ranch we race horses rope horses we breed we raise them and break them and that's what I ended up going back to eventually but Yeah. So from high school on, I started training the vault. There was a guy, one guy in the area that was specifically a vault coach. interesting and when my, I injured my knee my sophomore year of high school and I wasn't allowed to do cutting and all, you know, all this other stuff, but I could still run a straight line.
00:07:51
Speaker
Yeah. And I could still, yep. And i I figured out a way to do it. So I got really good at, again, the pull-ups, the the body weight movements, the kips, the boobkas, there's all these movements that you do specifically to train the vault.
00:08:04
Speaker
And I went to him and I was like, hey I can't cut, I can't play basketball right now. And that was my first love. I can't do any of this right now. And I'm going to lose my mind if I can't train in some way. I need a goal.
00:08:14
Speaker
So I started vaulting. Nine and a half feet, 10 feet, 10 and a half feet, 11 feet, 11 and a half feet. You start creeping up there and all of a sudden there's schools that are like, do you want to do this? Like, is this something you enjoy? And basketball, I got back to playing, but it was never the same.
00:08:32
Speaker
And in my mind, I i got had gotten offers to play softball. I had gotten offers to play basketball and nothing was that crazy to me. I got an offer to walk on for track at Texas A&M.
00:08:46
Speaker
And I was like, uh, okay, like neat. What else we got? What are our options? Well, you could walk on at Baylor. And i was like, that's cool. What else we got? Like, what are we doing?
00:08:59
Speaker
Going up to the University of Oklahoma? Not much, but we'll give you scholarship. Here's what, so the guy the guy at the time, and i was like, ah, yeah, like I'm going. You can earn more. Great, of course I can. Let's go, like, let's go. Do you believe in me enough to give me something? Literally, books.
00:09:14
Speaker
Who cares? So I'm like, I'm going. So go in. Within three weeks, this guy gets fired. Oh God. There was a big old blow up. And I'm thinking, ooh, do I stay here?
00:09:26
Speaker
What do I do? This was before the portal and all that, you know, this is before everything is easy to transfer. you have to wait a year to participate? I would have had to have waited, it didn't matter. There was no exemption, there was no nothing.
00:09:37
Speaker
So I thought, man, I'll just stay. Well, me, myself and I, after Adam got a hold of me and I started loving the weight room and loving to train, I was training with Olympic throwers. So Brian Blutrich is my coach and was my, is my throws coach. But anyway, was the coach still at Oklahoma at the time, not yet my coach.
00:09:54
Speaker
And I start training with the throwers and he's got Brittany Borman and Karen Shump and Tia Brooks at the time. These are, ah these are all future Olympians, but current NCAA champions. And I love these guys.
00:10:06
Speaker
They were a riot, an absolute riot. And I vibe with that. They trained hard, partied hard also, but that's, you know, we won't talk about that. But I mean, these these people, it doesn't didn't matter. We'd be out, go out, go have a great time, enjoy each other's company on a Friday night, Saturday morning at 6 a.m. They're like, hop up, let's go train.
00:10:30
Speaker
Yes, like i found I found my people, let's go. So I start training with them, I start hanging out with them, even just going and doing extra things with them that I wasn't supposed to do, but who cares? And the throws coach starts noticing me and he was like, hmm, she's kind of a little Energizer bunny.
00:10:50
Speaker
Sure, been called that before, why not? So Amy Bakel was the assistant at the time, his assistant. And she was like, I kind of want to teach you how to throw the javelin, is that okay? Yeah, yeah.
00:11:03
Speaker
So I'm up top one day just playing catch with one of the other throwers. We would just we had team meetings once a week, and so we would have to play. Javelin catch? no No, no, no, no, no. Just thank God. No, just catch. Regular, regular, shmegular catch with, I think we had found a lacrosse ball. And we're launching that thing back and forth across the top field of the track.
00:11:20
Speaker
And we're on opposite corners, and we're launching this thing, just having a great time. And my coach walks up, my coach now, he walks up and he... Looked at his assistant. He's like, are you teaching her how to throw?
00:11:31
Speaker
And she said, yeah. Are you just throwing throwing the ball right now? Yeah. He said, get her on a jab. Let's go. And so he comes up to me. and He told me, he says, you have two weeks. You have two weeks to impress me.
00:11:43
Speaker
You have two weeks to get this done. Do it. And I'll take you. I'll take you on. you're not and You will not be vaulting anymore. Like you'll be throwing.
00:11:55
Speaker
Let's try. So i start training and I'm training both for a while. I'm training, I'm throwing, and I'm still jumping for a new coach that does not recruit me. was what it was, start throwing, start getting good, start getting better.
00:12:08
Speaker
It starts becoming something that I just love and felt like got obsessed with. yeah And he, one day, wasn't even a weekend to this official training period.
00:12:19
Speaker
He walked over to
The Role of Presence and Relationships
00:12:20
Speaker
the coach, the vault coach during the, after one of my practices where I was just getting broken down and beaten into. And he walked over to him and he said, Hey, she's mine now. um I'll take her on. She's a thrower.
00:12:32
Speaker
And just we, my friends, all my friends who just lost it. Like everybody's like, yeah like yes, like this is the best day. we had, i mean, just I start training with them and we train seven days a week. Like this was before, i'm sure we were not, if any compliance officers are listening, we never did that. Statue of limitations. We never did that.
00:12:51
Speaker
but you had we just We enjoyed it. We enjoyed each other. We enjoyed throwing. We enjoyed training hard. we enjoyed I just would just go sit at practice with the shot putters and discus and hammer and you just soak it in because this man is, to this day, is the best throws coach in the nation.
00:13:05
Speaker
He's at University of Oregon now. He has more national champions than I have fingers and toes. and I mean, he's just an incredible human being. Silent, quiet, not like his coach. his He was coached by Art Venegas.
00:13:18
Speaker
Loud man, very loud man. Brian Blutrich is the exact opposite. And I learned what quiet power looks like. I like that. And i have never been so intrigued because I am a talker and he and I could not have been more different, but I couldn't love another human being more.
00:13:37
Speaker
Like as a coach, as a mentor, as of to this day, as ah as somebody I truly have a deep respect for, never, I've yeah raised his voice never.
00:13:47
Speaker
I don't know what he sounds like above about this conversational tone. wow And i just am, again, the quiet power aspect, that is what I think of when I think of Brian Bluchick.
00:13:58
Speaker
what What was that experience like outside the whistles? So imagine us in the weight room where we're directing our high expectations for our athletes and we're leading them within this arena, but then there's lots of downtime, some between sets, some between sessions, or if you're seeing them on campus, what was your experience as the athlete with the mentor when he was just trying to get to know you?
00:14:22
Speaker
It was family. And I don't even... That is what the word is, is family, because his wife and his two daughters are very active. His wife was an Olympian. He coached her through the Olympics in the javelin. And so one day we were just, we would come up on the weekends and mess around at the facility. We would play. We would we would do, I mean, I never lost play.
00:14:46
Speaker
in my whole career, never lost that word. We would come and play kickball. We would come up and play, like we would play ultimate, the throwers. we We were just the most active group that I could really, that I can remember. And so one day, I will never forget this day either, because it's one of my favorite days. He called me on a Sunday and he said, what are you doing?
00:15:07
Speaker
And I was like, my God, am I missing practice? Oh, Coach, no, nothing. Coach, I'm not and doing anything. He goes, cool, do you want to come up to the facility and and come hit balls with us? I pulled the the pitching machine out and, you know, I got Brooke. I'm pitching to Brooke and you want to come hit?
00:15:24
Speaker
I'll be there in five minutes. Yeah. This man never let anything out. And he knew I loved that. I loved coming up and playing with Logan and Brooke and, or it would just be us. And he'd be like, hey, do you know, you want to go hit? I'll i'll throw some balls you, whatever it is.
00:15:40
Speaker
It kept us young, it kept us alive. It was never just me. It was like, there would be other, you know, Karen, there was a lot of, a lot of other throwers that really enjoyed just, we just were kids. yeah That's all we were. And so whether it was playing with his daughters or just enjoying time with them, if he didn't go home for Christmas or some kind of holiday, he, they're hosting. Yeah. And I lived two hours south, so I was almost always home or taking people home with me. But yeah he made it so much more because he was a high-level coach.
00:16:10
Speaker
And when we were serious, we were serious. When we were throwing, we were throwing. But when you're in line waiting to take a throw, you're kiki and ha-ha, yeah, and you feel comfortable and you get up. And we all took ourselves so seriously that he didn't ever have to push us.
00:16:24
Speaker
yeah i And i I think that's true to this day with elite-level athletes. The athletes that I coach, you can see that in them. And there's some times that I might have to come up to you and remind you who you are.
00:16:37
Speaker
I've got one that I think of specifically a volleyball player. You remember who you are right now? You're the leading scorer in the SEC. You are bitch.
00:16:48
Speaker
You can bleep it out if you need to, but you are that bitch. Go, be that, i like be that girl, go on. And that's the quiet reminders that I got from our coach and the people that we had in our circle is you are, you are that, go be it.
00:17:04
Speaker
And so it was just something that I loved that that we never really departed from. Time
Emotional Intelligence in Coaching
00:17:09
Speaker
out. Coach, have you ever felt like your athletes shut down, tune out, or just too cool for coaching?
00:17:15
Speaker
You want them to listen. You shake them. You know this attitude and approach that they're taking with their training or their practice in front of you is not going to lead to success on the field or off the field later in life, and you have to change it.
00:17:30
Speaker
Athletes today are operating on a different internal system and we need to course correct on how our approach is going to land with them. And that's why I wrote the new course, Why They Won't Listen, Coaching Today's Athletes.
00:17:46
Speaker
If you want to learn more, head to listen.captainsandcoaches.com for this online course. If you want the first lesson free, see how I break down and combine whiteboard lecture and practical demos, movement-based lessons,
00:18:02
Speaker
that you can bring them to your practice and your training environments again head to listen.captainsandcoaches.com to learn more and get that free lesson and now back to the show ready ready and break when it's your time to throw you're focused when it's not okay we're we're still still here with the person there's there's a lot of opportunity for you to practice then getting in the zone and then coming out of it which if you're an athlete and you get caught in the zone now everything becomes just you become a perfectionist and it's this downward spiral and sometimes people lose the ability to get back into the zone focused so then they're off to the side playing grab ass and they fall out of love yeah with with the game if you will so that um Were there any tricks that you recall or cues that he helped you get back in into the zone or maybe you had a bad miss or something didn't go as far as you wanted it to go What was his coaching feedback loop to help get you back in the saddle using our experience from earlier for the next throw I think the thing that really
00:19:16
Speaker
does it for me personally, is just pulling you back into presence. Like just literally, where are you right now? What are you doing? Can we pull back to something so simple that you can't miss?
00:19:27
Speaker
And for me in throwing, that was a regression of steps, right? Removing the the approach. So a lot of the times you get jacked up somewhere getting to the line.
00:19:38
Speaker
It's not your throw is not bad. Very rarely do you see a thrower whose actual throw is poor. in my world, because you get to the approach, all that's left is for me to release. You might miss the point. You might, there there may be areas where you could probably have been better, but when it's something that you've done thousands and thousands and thousands of times, that's probably not the miss. It was probably something else, right?
00:20:02
Speaker
And so it's a regression. How can I pull you back into the simplest form of what it is that you do to give you success and let you, allow you to be successful in that?
00:20:13
Speaker
then you feel good, right? or Or I think one of my favorite things too that he and other coaches have done for me is repaint the goal. What is the goal? Hey, remember the goal of this session wasn't to throw far.
00:20:26
Speaker
The goal of this session was to hit through the point on every throw, right? I don't want you to miss. I don't want you to pull on the javelin. I don't want you, you know, I don't want you pushing. I want you to focus on hitting through the tip every single throw. What does that look like?
00:20:40
Speaker
Oh, Well, it looks like a really sexy throw, to be honest with you, whether it goes far or not, you know. And I think that's the same thing for me in a lot of areas of of life, of coaching, of relationships, like recenter yourself. What is the goal?
00:20:55
Speaker
Repaint it, right? and or Or just simply restate in a different way. Because sometimes that's it's it's the whole presence over perfection thing is that if...
00:21:08
Speaker
My presence matters much more for me for me personally and for the athletes that I coach. I would rather you be here and fully here. I never asked you for perfection. I never asked you to be perfect on every rep.
00:21:19
Speaker
I asked you to stay here and remember what it is that we're doing. And that's that's something that, again, in in my own athletic career and in my coaching career, that's been a foundation for me.
00:21:31
Speaker
Yeah, I like that. it's I like the repainting of the goal. In my mind, that's missing the forest for the trees. They're focused on this one tree and this one particular thing, but then, hey, big picture, where are we? We're in practice versus a competition. So then repainting the goal and regressing to the where they need to correct.
00:21:52
Speaker
um While we're on it, you said presence. So in in my in my mind, I was limiting myself to presence as my aura, my control of the weight room.
00:22:04
Speaker
This is me not able to control the volume of my voice. um
Autonomy and Athlete Growth
00:22:11
Speaker
But you referring to it as present. I like it.
00:22:16
Speaker
um So how are you articulating that to 18 to 24-year-olds who are often not present because they're on their phones or minoring in the minors or majoring in the minors or focused on the trees versus the big picture that we just painted for them?
00:22:35
Speaker
Well, we start personally every session we start and we we chat. we have a We have a moment. It's not, we try not to have a speech. Not goingnna throw a lot of things at you. But when they come in originally, they come into the room, they don't just sit and talk. There are no phones.
00:22:51
Speaker
There's none of that. we don't We don't sit and and try to bog things down. They have a routine that they'll go through. They check the board. Ooh, board says I have hip mobility, shoulder mobility. These are my choices. What do I roll through? They have some, ah they have, I would say they have some autonomy. They have a lot of autonomy.
00:23:07
Speaker
The athletes that I coach have an immense amount of autonomy. um And then they have things where I limit them. Don't come in and sit on a foam roller. That's gonna drive me insane. And what happens when you do that?
00:23:19
Speaker
You start chatting and then you're not here. And then you're, we we go on that that road, right? we we're not We're no longer present. And, Our breakdown, we have, and I ask them this every single time and they know, we have a quote at the bottom of our sheet and that seems very, that that sometimes can seem like a lot.
00:23:38
Speaker
Like, what okay, great. It's short, right? This last one, this last quote that we had on the bottom was, there's more, period. There's more. We're digging for more. There is more. There's more in our play. There's more of our season because we had a long we had a run there where we were losing just a little bit.
00:23:54
Speaker
That was it. So all that did in that moment was pull them back into, right? We got more to do. So don't give up on this session. And then same deal, going through the session, right? What are the goals of this session?
00:24:05
Speaker
Hey, the goals here today are to move this weight really, really well. I'm not concerned about how much. I'm not concerned about how fast. I want you to move well. I want you to feel good. I want you to feel fast. I want you to feel like an athlete today.
00:24:18
Speaker
And they get choices, right? They get choices on what movements they choose. They get choices on how much weight They get choices on velocity bands. What is it that we're using today and how fast do I want that to move?
00:24:30
Speaker
um But more often than not, giving them that autonomy back helps them stay locked in because it and it drives the intent behind whatever movement it is that we're doing. Hey, I need some kind of a single leg movement out of you today.
00:24:42
Speaker
Choose and let me know. I need no less than 10 reps on each leg and I need no more than 30. then Let's move some stuff today. And it has driven the intent through the roof and it keeps them locked in because they get to choose and then they get the whatever result, the result of that session very much, most of them know their bodies at this point.
00:25:02
Speaker
We've done a lot of education. This wasn't a day one thing where I came in and was like, good luck. explore the weight room, choose whatever you want, whatever feels good for you. Yeah, right right. And so we've explored, we come in on day one and we we choose. we we get This year it was the Zurcher.
00:25:20
Speaker
Yeah. This year it was introducing Zurcher and i have I have athletes who are in love with it. Love it. I have some that said never again. I had some that looked at me and said, that was awful. I hated it. It made my elbows feel weird.
00:25:34
Speaker
Yeah. And never again. And so they'll never touch that movement again. I don't care. The ones that have chosen it have locked in and gotten better because of it. The ones that didn't, we found another way.
00:25:45
Speaker
And the team that I've got now is physical. They're dominant. They're looking at their numbers. We wanna over jump numbers. That keeps them locked in too.
00:25:57
Speaker
yeah Giving them that. Feedback. Giving them the moments to be successful and then doing something, filming it. putting up, letting them see, like our look at me, look at me, I'm a freaking athlete. Hey, I was only jumping 10.4 a year ago, now I'm jumping 10.9.
00:26:15
Speaker
What does that look like? You're literally half a foot higher than you used to be. And giving giving them that opportunity, to not only see this their success, but to actually quantify it and put it out there for them, it's great. And it keeps them locked in and it keeps them present and it keeps the goal in mind.
00:26:34
Speaker
Yeah, and they're proud of it. They are so proud of it. And they repost it. And it's, that well, it's them. Yeah. it's not And that's what I tell them is, hey, you chose that. Remember all those exercises that I was getting, you know, all these things that I'm guiding you, but this is very much a partnership.
00:26:51
Speaker
This is not me telling you, you know how many times, actually, we'll use this. You know how many times we've put a barbell on our backs? How many practice, how many training sessions? 15, zero?
00:27:03
Speaker
Thus far, this semester, zero barbells on back, unless they chose it. There was never a point in time where I said, oh, we're loading the bar up. Let's go put it on. Like, let's go back squat. Some of them really enjoy back squat.
00:27:17
Speaker
We haven't put a bar on anybody's back one time. We've had athletes go from touching 10-1, one in specific, freshman that was touching 10-1 that's now touching 10-6.
00:27:28
Speaker
No barbell on back. We've used the isofits. We've used different isometric movements. We've used different squat variations. We've used different step-ups, step-downs, lunges, whatever.
00:27:39
Speaker
We've used a lot of things, a lot of different methodologies. The result has not been because I chose the right path. It's been because she has. And her intent has driven her.
00:27:51
Speaker
I've used that to guide her, right? I wouldn't even say like train tracks. It's not even like that. It's kind of like I'm using bumpers. like I'm guiding her towards the end goal. And it's like, hey, if you communicate well with me and you give me good feedback, I can help you get exactly where you want to be.
00:28:08
Speaker
And they do. They buy it they're They're for it, man. And I mean, in a sense that responsibility and decision making that they're you're gifting them is teaching them how to navigate life.
00:28:22
Speaker
So there they have bumpers in place. They have mentors, they have bosses, they have family members, they got coaches. So they're helping them stay on the right path. And so they're directing themselves to where their goal is versus you're telling them exactly what to do. And as soon as they take off on their own,
00:28:41
Speaker
And they could step over those bumpers at any point in time. I think about it that way. If you don't want to do what I'm asking you to do or what I'm suggesting that you do and you don't come to me, I've had athletes come to me and say, that doesn't work for me.
00:28:53
Speaker
That hurts. I have one with a back problem that boggles the mind. Boggles the mind. And you know what? She's available and playing. That's my goal at the end of the day. If you are pain-free to an extent, you can't back problems.
00:29:09
Speaker
If you are in less pain than you've been in your whole career and you're still able to play, goal, let's go. You're available. Our availability rate is insane. The only athletes we have unavailable are unavailable because of a surgery from an ankle injury that was non-negotiable, one lateral release of a shoulder.
00:29:29
Speaker
I'm sorry, lateral release, tendon release of a shoulder. And I, that's it. We have no injuries that have happened on court that have taken somebody out for whatever reason. Let's just real quick.
00:29:40
Speaker
But I think that the more autonomy that we give them and the more feedback they feel comfortable giving, because what if I tell, like, they come up to me and tell tell me this doesn't work for them and I tell them, so what, you're doing it anyway?
00:29:55
Speaker
Cool. No thanks. Don't like this. Like, I hate it here. oceans Yeah, I hate it here. The intent drops. Yeah, nothing works. The jumps drop. And now...
00:30:06
Speaker
the program is worthless. Well, the fun part is too, is I can tell them what's gonna happen to their jumps based on what phase of training we're in. And inevitably when it happens, we still get discouraged no matter what.
00:30:19
Speaker
yeah And that's, I get it. yeah And because I mean, if that was my whole, if my career was based around jumping, And this person came in and told me, this is going to wreck your jumping. I'd be like, it's not. I've been doing this my whole life.
00:30:31
Speaker
But knowing what we're doing to them when asking them to go under tempo or when we're going when we're going into these breakdown phases where I need to get you to a point where we're just working about getting stronger right now. We're working on our landing mechanics, whatever it is. Takeoff is not the goal right now.
00:30:46
Speaker
But here we are in season where i almost promise them. I try not to make promises, but I tell them, if what we're doing has been effective, you'll be jumping your highest right now. And our whole team right now is jumping an average of two inches higher than they were jumping in August. We're heading towards playoffs, right?
00:31:03
Speaker
We are. SEC tournament next week. So it's it's it's building to this this tournament and the next tournament, this crescendo. And that that is a difficult thing to communicate to athletes because they're used to, ah and as a high schooler, everything's a linear progression. You're always getting better every day and you're like, this is amazing.
00:31:22
Speaker
I know what I'm doing. right So now at the college level, okay, we are planning, we are periodizing, we're anticipating because sport coach has their expectations. and Now we can help use the weight room to be a force multiplier out in the court.
Timing and Peak Performance
00:31:40
Speaker
I think that's the best part about it though is that i can you can give realistic expectation. to coaches, to athletes. I track everything that we do for the most part. I don't, I'm not crazy about write down every single weight. So I, fine.
00:31:53
Speaker
If we're going to do that, it's so that we can make adjustments week to week, right? I need to see where we're at. I wanna make the best possible suggestion for what it is that we're doing. But when it comes to keeping the data digestible for the coaches, simple.
00:32:09
Speaker
I'm not trying to give you every metric we look at. You don't need that. I don't need that. I don't. There's a lot of stuff we could look at. If it's not gonna impact us immediately and it won't change what we're doing, yeah I don't want it.
00:32:21
Speaker
And all they care about is touch heights, jumps. We jump right over there and that's, the coaches will not miss a day that we jump.
00:32:31
Speaker
When I tell them that we're jumping, they're not missing it. They're proud of it, they're excited about it. The girls are excited for each other, for themselves. Even if they're not having a great day, they stay process oriented.
00:32:45
Speaker
And that's the reminder ah is that, hey, like, and I'll all'll straight up tell them when I'm looking at it, hey, your your timing is just funky. Your timing's off. We're done for the day. I'm not going to let you keep trying. I'm not going to let you keep beating yourself up and put yourself in a hole. We're not doing that.
00:33:01
Speaker
You're done for the day. Congratulations. I'll see you at practice. And then they go to practice and they're ripping at practice because they're just like, i can still do this. I'm ready. Yeah, of course you can. Of course you can. So it's it's been really cool to be able to give them realistic expectation about when they should be jumping their highest, because that's my goal.
00:33:18
Speaker
I don't care if you're jumping your highest in August. who Nobody does. Nobody wants to be jumping their highest in August if it means that you're gonna suffer some kind of injury in season because for whatever reason, I don't know, I can't imagine overuse. i can't I can go on and on. A million things happen. Yeah, a kajillion things could happen.
00:33:34
Speaker
But for you to physically be at your best, at the end of the season for me do it for for you to stay healthy for the entire three, four months leading into this post season, let's go.
00:33:45
Speaker
That's what I want. That's what coaches want. To my knowledge, it's what the athletes want. So. Yeah, and helping them understand that. I ah do want to go to where you talked about your coach was a constant reminder of ah you're this bad B. I'm going beat myself. hey um Just to, so that reminder, and I've used this reference before where great coaches, you help hold up an accurate mirror.
00:34:15
Speaker
Because the analogy that I use is like ah going into one of those circus like mirror And kids, based off previous coaching experiences, they have a distorted view of themselves. So whether it's you know the short, fat mirror or the tall, skinny mirror, they start to see themselves as a label that an authority figure, a coach, has given them in the past.
00:34:39
Speaker
And now we get to this ah new level with a coach that you say a freshman comes in here, you've never met them before, you will see them as you see them.
00:34:50
Speaker
And that's the best representation of who they are, because you want the best for them, you see the potential in them, you've worked with thousands of athletes and taken them where they can't take themselves.
00:35:01
Speaker
So now it's just a matter of helping them see themselves as accurate, because now they're open to receive the coaching versus the distorted views where you're trying to be positive and they don't believe you.
00:35:13
Speaker
So now in in your career, and were there athletes at times that you had to learn to navigate that false mirror that then there there are successful stories based off that that now helps you lead to, okay, I see this athlete, I see there's a ah misperception of their current potential in their own eyes. Okay, here's how I'm gonna navigate this one person versus these these other athletes that are, they truly believe they are bad believers. God's gift. Yeah, sure. God's gift.
00:35:47
Speaker
and Yes, I think there are much way more stories of success than there are, you know, of failure in that aspect because my my biggest thing is people matter and i want to make you feel seen as an athlete. If you're an athlete and I mean a person in my life, goodness gracious, I hope i hope it's not just the athletes. I want to make everybody in my life feel seen and feel connected in a way.
00:36:15
Speaker
and no we're not going to have everything in common. Ever, ever. And the generational gap is showing. I didn't feel at the beginning of my career and now I'm like, we could not be much more different and that's okay.
00:36:27
Speaker
How do I relate to you? What does that look like? And when those new freshmen come in and they're they've heard stories, there's if there's one thing I've never had an athlete come in here and not heard about me from the others.
00:36:43
Speaker
And to me, that's the biggest honor. If the athletes that I have are confident enough to talk about me to them and to tell them, we love this, go in and buy in and you will get what you need.
00:36:55
Speaker
That's the biggest honor for me. If the coaches all day long, coaches can sing my praises, great. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. you're I hope you are. I'm giving you what you want. But if the athletes can one, buy into what we're doing,
00:37:06
Speaker
and then turn around and tell somebody, no, you want to go in there. No, this is our favorite part. No, go on. We love to train. We want to train. We open up. I do open hours on days that we're off and they come in.
00:37:20
Speaker
And so that's where it starts is just seeing them and creating the relationship first because if I don't actually know you, then I'm being fake. If I don't actually invest in your life, if I don't ask you questions personally during the day, yes, I care about how your body feels, but how's your mom doing?
00:37:38
Speaker
Is your mom all right? Is she okay? I know there's other stuff going on in their lives. They're not just machines. And even that awareness, if you read the body language correctly and they're down, you're not yelling at them to get in line.
00:37:50
Speaker
yeah You are now asking, hey, what's up? Yeah. And it's it's that simple. And I've had i've had moments. We're here at 6 a.m. m Everybody's ready to roll. And there's one that just looks at me and breaks down and just tears.
00:38:04
Speaker
Oh, let's step into my office. What's going on? Cool, cool, cool. All right, cool. I would like for you to go get some coffee and some breakfast and sit with your thoughts for a while. Call our sports psych, whatever it is, right? Whoever we need to talk to in that moment. Sometimes I'll grab a teammate and send them with them.
00:38:17
Speaker
Hey, go take care of for a little bit. Y'all come back and lift this afternoon. Great, see you then. Because this is not this is not it. You are not going to suffer because you missed practice with your team, weights with your team, whatever.
00:38:33
Speaker
But let's say that same athlete is not here, not present, not able to lock in. They're upset, they're crying, they're whatever. And something happens in here oh and there's an injury or there's a, God forbid, there's an accident of some kind. Whoop, nope, I'm out.
00:38:47
Speaker
That's it. So to circle back to the original point. That's where it starts for me is making them feel seen and that they matter to me as people. And as the person, I would like to guide you in a way that again, keeps you autonomous, keeps you, i want your goals to be in sight for you.
00:39:07
Speaker
Yes, I would like it if you jump higher, but this girl wants to get stronger. She wants to put some weight on. She would like to lose a little bit of weight. She would like to recomposition her body, right? Whatever. Cool. How can I work with nutrition? How can I work with your daily habits? How can I work with your training to help you get there?
00:39:23
Speaker
Right? What does that look like? And so speaking to them and finding out what they want first from their training is great. And then you learn more about their history. I have a freshman who came in this year and she was yeah, was a power lifter.
00:39:37
Speaker
Nice. Like, cool. I had one that came in. I've never touched a weight in my whole life. We had to learn everything from zero. yeah And that kid now, you wouldn't know. You'd walk in this room and be like, nice. They've been they all been training forever like this because they're bought in. They're supporting each other. There's no judgment. There's nobody saying, oh, you picked this and not this.
00:39:57
Speaker
So it's just really cool to watch them come together, to connect with them first as people, to find out about what they enjoy about training, what they don't. I've got some that I know hate running.
00:40:08
Speaker
And you know what? Every now and then we run. There's some stuff that we do. It's not all the time. And it's not, but yeah, when not frequently at all. But there are days where I'll tell her, hey, you're not going to like me very much for the first 30 minutes today.
00:40:20
Speaker
I'll get you on the back end with something you enjoy. Or i'll you know we'll hit you up. I'll let you do this and this later in the week. I deal. whatever Whatever. Hey guys, we got the assault bike today. We're all going to be in the suck for the next 15 minutes. Just get ready for it. Get your minds right and go. You can do hard things.
00:40:38
Speaker
There you go. Like there are times in which you prepare them for things that they're not going to enjoy. and we can all, and I tell them, it is okay to not like something. And it's okay to tell me you don't like it. I don't mind.
00:40:49
Speaker
You can tell me that. You're not gonna hurt my feelings. But there are certain things that we're gonna do and we're gonna do them together. And then it'll be done. And you can walk away and tell me you hate it and boom, we're done. Had some that couldn't do pull-ups, chin-ups that hated them forever. Now can go rep out five or six.
00:41:05
Speaker
And they're like, AK, it's so weird. I feel so light.
00:41:10
Speaker
I said, sweet girl, you're just stronger. yeah this a Sweet girl, you're just getting stronger. And that's so great. Oh, I am stronger. Great. Amazing. Amazing. But all that to be said, it's the relationship building that makes everything.
00:41:23
Speaker
Everything. Because for me, connecting with 18, 22-year-olds, how do I keep them present? I remind them that I am also present with them. I'm here. And we work a lot about putting things down at the doors. I know the camera can't see the doors. The doors are over here.
00:41:38
Speaker
When they come in those doors, I tell them, when you walk through the first set of doors, if you've got something that's weighing on you heavily, if you can put it down i right there. Literally. Actually, like actually bottle it up, take it from your brain.
00:41:52
Speaker
put it down at the door and walk away, you can pick it up on your way out. And please don't forget to pick it up. I'm not asking you to suppress something in here, but I'm asking you to compartmentalize enough to take it, put it down, come in here and train if it's possible.
00:42:07
Speaker
And then on your way out, pick it back up, pick it up. And if you need to tell me about it for me to remind you or to help you or to pay more attention to you today, because there are 20 of them in here.
00:42:19
Speaker
But my other the other thing that I do is I try to say everybody's name at least once within the first 15 minutes that they're in here. Whether I'm cueing them, whether I'm reminding them, whether I'm telling them something, whatever.
00:42:30
Speaker
Everybody's name, your name matters. You should hear your name at some point during the session to remind you that I'm here with you. I'm present in this room with you. There are days they've come in that I'm tired or I'm sad. I'm a human being.
00:42:43
Speaker
They know I'm a human being, but they also know that when the clock hits, We're trying, it's trying to go and we're gonna do something. I'm here to do a job too. And that helps. It helps to remind them that I'm, there tight there are days, it was not too long ago, i was having a really bad day.
00:42:58
Speaker
I was sad. My brain was somewhere else. ah they and And they came in and I had been just, um i had been a mess that day. And I struggled and they came in and the few of them that came in at first, they know me.
00:43:11
Speaker
They looked at me and just walk up and give me a hug. And then I'm like, try not to cry. Like, you know, I'm sitting there like I'm just having a really hard day. And so I told him, I said, give me, give me five minutes. I'm usually out there when they get here talking to him, doing whatever. I said, give me five minutes.
00:43:23
Speaker
Went in, did my thing, came back out. Let's roll. Let's roll, girls. I put it down at my desk. I'll pick it up when we get done. and they're hugging on me. Okay, well, we love you. We're ready to go. what do you need from us today?
00:43:34
Speaker
Can I do something? more can what What can we do? Okay, can we can we start setting up? Can we get rolling? What do you want us to do? I love it. I love it here. And that started with the relationship building. And again, reminding them that I'm a person, that I'm gonna practice the same things I tell you.
00:43:51
Speaker
I'm not gonna tell you to do something I wouldn't do. No, and it creates the the leadership up. which is a beautiful relationship between team leaders and coaches where they can lead up as well.
00:44:02
Speaker
The seasons are long. So even coaches need those moments where Hey, I'm struggling. Yeah, I'm struggling. I'm a person. I'm sad. I'm upset. I'm tired. I'm overwhelmed.
00:44:15
Speaker
And or I'm having days where I'm like, I'm I don't know what's going on. And they come in and they remind me ah you're that girl. Do you want do you want do you want us to do like do you know who you are? I'll find
Coaching Tools and Philosophies
00:44:27
Speaker
notes on my desk. Notes are a love language. Coffee is a love language. Notes are a love language. I'll come in. and they're like, hey, like there'll be a note on my desk. Thank you for everything that you do. We love you. We appreciate you. And you're like, that made my day. I didn't even need my day made, and that made my day.
00:44:39
Speaker
If you're AK athlete, write a note on a coffee and leave it on her desk. Ooh. Ooh. Force multiplier. Time out. Tex here at trainheroic headquarters meeting with the team to talk about the coaching experience that I'm able to provide for my athletes. So if you're a coach and want to put your program out there on an app that athletes actually enjoy using, trainheroics for you. I've been using it since 2014. delivering literally over tens of thousands of workouts to athletes, and Train Heroic allows me to provide the unique coaching experience that I want to. Uploading video, providing coaching feedback, directions, and building a community, that's why I love Train Heroic. And if you want to take your athletes where they can't take themselves, that they want to go, head to trainheroic.com slash captains and check out how you can deliver programming to them.
00:45:33
Speaker
And now, back to the show. Ready, ready, and we're in.
00:45:39
Speaker
Speaking of coffee. Let's go. You recommended Lighthouse. So I made a little drive over there and they were all out of drip. So they had to make an Americano.
00:45:52
Speaker
So usually I'm a cold brew, just grab and go. And I'm taking my sweet time. just waiting for them to take their sweet time and and pour their love into a cup. And I'm just taking it in. I'm standing because I don't want to sit down.
00:46:05
Speaker
There's enough space. It's a beautiful place to work. If you're a college student, I just, I've been on an airplane. I was sitting down on a previous podcast and I'm just standing up and just taking in all the live, love, laugh shenanigans on the walls. Coffee paraphernalia, the slots. Did you see the slots hanging from the ceiling? no because something drew my attention and it was when the uh the chef the cook in the back they were leaving and then the door swung open and i noticed a sign on the wall i know what it was and it jumped out and i'm like huh and so i was just soaking this up waiting uh a moderate amount of time for this americano to pop up
00:46:47
Speaker
And there are four rules that light so Lighthouse Coffee employees are constantly reminded of when they walk in and out that door. So I wanna read you these rules and then get your perspective on how they apply to coaching in a weight room environment.
00:47:03
Speaker
I love this. Number one, be nice. I love this because it's Roadhouse rule number one for Patrick Swayze, but be nice.
00:47:15
Speaker
I mean, what does that mean to you? And I'll share couple of nuggets. Well, I'm gonna take the negative first. Nice to me is fake. Okay. So, and that's just my semantics on the word itself.
00:47:30
Speaker
To me, i don't wanna be nice. I wanna be kind. All right. I wanna come from a place of i I don't like everything that goes on and I don't always feel like being nice.
00:47:42
Speaker
Nice is very, oh, she's a nice person, right? Whatever. Nice to me, if I'm being nice, I'm probably being fake. And the intentions of my heart are probably, i would rather rock and like gut punch you, but I'm going to say something and be fake about it.
00:47:56
Speaker
If I'm kind, truly, and I mean that, it's tattooed on my arm, If I'm going to be kind, it is going to come from a place of compassion for the most part. Even if it's something I don't enjoy, something I don't like, somebody is rude to me, the last thing I want to do is be kind to them.
00:48:16
Speaker
But I'm going to choose that. Niceness turns it into a fake, let me put on a show for you. Nice is very much like, well, like i and i care what you think about me.
00:48:27
Speaker
So I want to be nice to you. No, I wanna be kind to you because I care about you as a human being and you're a person and you have things going on in your life also. And I'm not saying that lighthouse means this at all by any means. This is just what the word nice means to me personally.
00:48:41
Speaker
But I think that that's where it comes from for me is kindness is considering the other person's life and What about that reaction or that situation has nothing to do with me and brings me back to kindness every single time. Now, it doesn't happen. I've snapped off. I've been rude. I've been nice, I'm sure, and fake and walked away and been like, I hate it here, whatever.
00:49:03
Speaker
But I think that centers us back to consider other people and that understanding that other people have things that are going on that are outside of their control too. And people experience stress, athletes experience stress.
00:49:14
Speaker
There are things that are going on outside of their control and our control and coaches control. And when head coach snaps at me, it's not always about me. Nope. When athlete snaps at me, it's not always about me.
00:49:27
Speaker
Does that mean I stand my don't stand my ground? No, that's not what it means. It means that I approach them with compassion and kindness and consideration. I like that adjustment. so Lighthouse, make that fix.
00:49:39
Speaker
be in In my mind, this this is a an opportunity for impulse control. So hopefully not putting on a mask, but realizing, okay, somebody is trying to tear me down. Somebody is barking on at me on the field or the court.
00:49:56
Speaker
I have the opportunity to choose my response to that. So in my mind, it's it's choosing your response. You used the word choose. I like that. um So just some impulse control and emotional regulation.
00:50:10
Speaker
Two and athel. So probably not, we're going way deeper than White House coffee. This is deep, but I like it. I really, this is what I live for, these moments. Number two, are you ready? I'm ready.
00:50:22
Speaker
Love people. anything Love. So be nice first. That's probably to the jerks. But now it's like, love my regulars. Love the people I don't know.
00:50:35
Speaker
How do you do that? If you don't know somebody, how do you love them? that question Right? Yeah. That's good to know. Yeah. yeah And again, it people first, right? People matter.
00:50:46
Speaker
Not just people that look like me, not just people that share my political beliefs, not just people who have the same experiences I have, not just the people who enjoy the same things I enjoy. People matter.
00:50:59
Speaker
And approaching somebody with kindness and love, I don't think are, or I don't think those things swing very far apart because again, it comes from, um a desire to actually make people feel seen and heard like they matter. And I don't think it always means understanding because I can't possibly understand everything that you've been through.
00:51:21
Speaker
I can't possibly understand your situation. I can't. But I think that love truly, when you love somebody, you accept them where they're at. And that's big. That's hard because we want to change people all the time.
00:51:34
Speaker
In personal life, right? Athletes, a lot of the times we're looking to change things. and coach them up or coach them out of certain things. But can i can i take you where you're at? Can I accept you where you are and be patient enough to see growth in you and love you all along the way to do that?
00:51:53
Speaker
And I think that means again, to to me, love and it's in some of its realist forms is just simply meeting somebody where they are and and being consistent. Yeah, I like that. the This is where I would apply compassion and where you said, can't understand. And some sometimes people say that.
00:52:11
Speaker
I have a friend that's an FBI agent and he's taking these negotiator courses. And they're like, rule number one, don't tell them you understand because that's going to set them off. Yeah.
00:52:24
Speaker
So then where I'm viewing this is is social awareness. Can I read the room? And then feel that one or two athletes that now need closer attention. And so my direction there is just to bring self-awareness to that individual, to help hold that mirror up and remind them.
Communication and Boundaries in Coaching
00:52:42
Speaker
hey, this is how I see you, which is a superstar, massive potential, versus maybe what you're feeling. And it could be self-doubt or could be there's something else going on that they need, a more adult perspective, which I can present to them. So it's I'm looking at this as social awareness. I'm aiming to read the room to find the people that then need some internal coaching or external coaching.
00:53:09
Speaker
I think that's true, but I think it also comes back to us loving ourselves too. Which, I mean, self-awareness comes before social awareness. I agree. And that, to me, being self-aware is something I chase. I i chase this stuff every day. as you should. I mean, i I struggle. There are a lot of areas where I struggle where I'm not patient with myself, but I'm patient with other people.
00:53:29
Speaker
I don't accept things about myself that other people love about me. And i'm like, God, that's annoying. And other people are going, no, we love that. we're You're quirky or you're whatever it is. So I think loving other people shines brighter and means more when we love ourselves.
00:53:44
Speaker
Well, it's it's it is harder than it seems. I'm probably speaking to a lot of servant leaders. We give, give, give for a reason. What are you giving for yourself? Can you have compassion, self-compassion?
00:53:57
Speaker
It's hard. So hard. I'm a gift giver. It's the coffee. You're the best. If I only wrote a note on it. yeah ah next but it it But it's so beautiful to see, to, to, ah again, i go back to this over and over again, just seeing people to see you to me. That's, that is love to see you and to understand what, what makes you, what makes you smile? What makes you tick?
00:54:20
Speaker
What, what makes you light up? It may not be the same things that make me light up taking a run. I don't wanna go run. i don't want That doesn't bring me joy. That doesn't that doesn't make me happy.
00:54:32
Speaker
I know people that it does. And when i add those people that have been like, hey, do you wanna go on a run with me i'm like, I don't ever wanna do that, no. I'm not gonna say that to you. Like 400 meters? Yeah, I'll be like, yeah. Like, do you wanna run to the coffee shop?
00:54:44
Speaker
But that's it's a beautiful thing to be included in somebody's life and to show them love in those ways, like you're saying, but then in the same sense,
00:54:55
Speaker
Hey, I struggle being honest with somebody enough to tell them when you struggle with something and that you don't want to do that or you, hey, that would be detrimental to my rest of my day whatever it is and setting those boundaries and learning how to do those things for yourself. Yeah, boundaries a big one.
00:55:10
Speaker
Which. Let's continue on. Like we planned it. We went to our next one. Be on the same page, which the segue is I feel boundaries is representing we're we're on the same page here.
00:55:24
Speaker
We know where each other's lines are. would What does being on the same page mean to you? It's clear communication. That's the ABCs of coaching, right? And i I detest that. I had a rough experience with that that phrase, but always be communicating.
00:55:42
Speaker
That was one of the big things. Always be communicating. Always be coaching. Always be, there's all these things that I had a former employer say to me. But I think that it holds true. Great communication, great communication. I'm not talking good. I'm not talking, I'm telling you what we're doing.
00:55:58
Speaker
Great communication includes coaching intent, coaching, I mean, not only methods, right? But how, how do I want you to get there?
00:56:10
Speaker
yeah Am I giving them room to have autonomy? And that's a big thing for me is, am I giving them the room that they need to be successful? in whatever it is that we're doing.
00:56:20
Speaker
um But then making that communication both ways. Do you feel comfortable communicating to me? And if you don't, why? Did I scare you? Did I did i make you nervous? Did I snap at you? did i Did I harm your feelings in some way? And I'm not that person that's touchy feely with emotions when it comes to that. I don't need to be all lovey and make you feel like a princess every time you're in this room.
00:56:45
Speaker
but I am gonna consider your emotions because you're a human being. And like we talked about a while ago, something might have gone on in your life today that makes you incredibly sensitive. So how do we do that?
00:56:56
Speaker
How do we navigate that? And so clarity and communication is a big one for me. And then the expectations and the standards, to me, those are similar to boundaries. The expectation and the standard, the expectation is that this happens. Now, do we always meet expectations?
00:57:13
Speaker
No. Will you always meet a standard? You better. That standard's in play for a reason. That's different to me. So the standards and expectations are different. And the standards, I think, are the things that you clearly communicate up front. Those are the things we go over at the beginning of the season and every day in the preseason.
00:57:31
Speaker
They know when they walk in this room. That I know when I walk into a room. If I walk into a meeting with my boss or anything, there are standards of communication that have to be upheld. Same deal with the coaches meeting, with the head coaches meeting, whatever. There are standards.
00:57:44
Speaker
And then there are expectations that I might not meet, right? The expectation is that everybody's jumping their highest right now. What if there's an athlete that isn't? I didn't meet expectation. Can we fall back and find where, what happened? Absolutely we can.
00:57:58
Speaker
There are probably things that happened. Yeah. Also, there's a whole world out there. Oh, the world. Yes, exactly. And again, it's not always one thing, right? And we know that it's multifaceted. there There's so many, so many things.
00:58:09
Speaker
But That's a big, big part too of the the boundaries we'll call it, right? We need to, ah sometimes I don't like that word, right? Because we have to be flexible. We have to be fluid. We can't just set walls up.
00:58:20
Speaker
Well, I don't want to do this. So I'm going to put my boundary. This was my boundary. No, no, let's calm down. let's Let's set a standard. Let's set an expectation and let's communicate clearly. And when you don't meet those things or you, if you're going to be late, if you're going to be, if there's something going on in your life and you communicate it with me, that is way easier for me to to be understanding and to meet you where you're at instead of making an assumption or just not hearing from you. Oh goodness. or you lying to me. You lie to me, we're in a bad place.
00:58:54
Speaker
I do not tolerate that. I've got head coaches that don't tolerate that. And so that's a very clear cut standard. Be honest. Do not lie to me. Because if you lie to me, then you break down that trust that we worked so hard to build and it does not come back easily.
00:59:10
Speaker
yeah this be on the same page i like that standards versus expectations i'm going to try think on that and explore more and then i i feel respect just popping into my mind because we can treat our athletes with respect and help them understand what that truly means when their behaviors from past life's experience, maybe survival skills that they had in the past, which could be in the form of covering things up and not telling the truth that allowed you to survive through your high school experience, but it's going to get you cut here.
00:59:48
Speaker
And helping them understand that is disrespectful. so And I think to piece in with that really quickly, giving respect when it's not given back.
00:59:58
Speaker
That's life. That's tough. That's life. When you are disrespected, right. But when you are disrespected, what are your values? What do I, I value respect.
01:00:12
Speaker
So I'm going to be a respectful human being, but the self-respect aspect comes in. I respect myself enough to put not put myself in the same situation twice. No.
01:00:23
Speaker
So there are there are lines that we draw in the sand with that of, hey, can you be respectful in that situation and then not get back in that situation?
01:00:35
Speaker
And that's that's very real. You're not always going to, the head coach is not always going to respect your feelings or show you respect or do they owe you, whatever, do they owe you respect? Who knows? But that's a big That's a big challenge for me. That's something that I challenged a few of the athletes with early on is can you be respectful when there's no respect reciprocated to you?
01:00:54
Speaker
No, I mean, they're gonna learn that in the workforce. Yeah, big time. I could go on for stories, but we'll leave it there. Yeah, another Last one.
01:01:07
Speaker
Don't settle for less than excellent.
01:01:12
Speaker
Is that a standard an expectation?
01:01:16
Speaker
I feel weird about that word because what is what is excellence? Is excellence, right? Right? And I agree with those things, right? But do we reward?
01:01:31
Speaker
i saw, i i don't know what I was doing the other day, but I saw something that was, do we reward effort or do we reward excellence? Right? And then I get into the weeds I'm like, well, what is excellence? What are we considering to be excellence? are you Is that because you meet the standards or is it because you meet the expectations?
01:01:48
Speaker
Or is it a combination of the things, right? Is it personal? is it What does that look like? And I think that showing up and being, again, showing up and being authentic and being genuine, I think can also be very different, but I'm not gonna go into the weeds on that either.
01:02:06
Speaker
But bringing bringing what is
01:02:11
Speaker
almost what is expected of you. I mean, to it to an extent, I'm kind of losing my words on that one, but I think that delivering excellence is again, tied up in that clear communication of what can I give and can I give you all of it?
01:02:25
Speaker
And that's, that's it for me is what do I have to give today? And can I give the best of what I've got?
01:02:35
Speaker
So I like that. We're going to tackle this from two perspectives. One, I hate the word don't. Don't think of an elephant. got item and el cool Don't make a mistake. Don't do this. out if In timeouts, when I hear coaches say that, hey, don't do this, what is the kid thinking about?
01:02:53
Speaker
That's all we're thinking about now. Thanks, coach. So if we're able to reframe this, so what I first wrote here was aim for excellence. Will I meet it? No, but hey, yeah I'm trying every single day.
01:03:05
Speaker
yes So we're putting forth our best effort. We're aiming for excellence. Even if we don't make make the mark, we did it. We made the world's best cup of coffee. Congratulations, you did it.
01:03:19
Speaker
We could also reframe this as give it your all today.
01:03:24
Speaker
I mean, the the the workers, they are college students. They have whole lives going on, and they still got to show up for eight-hour shift with bunch of other cranky college students and just some guy who's, hey, can you take a picture of that sign for me over there?
01:03:37
Speaker
Weird. I told him, hey, weird question. Can you take a picture of that sign for me? um And the kid was like, yeah. yeah He was yeah, sure. Okay, is this an android freak?
01:03:49
Speaker
So, ah yeah, we can reframe that, Lighthouse, I hope you're listening, to give it your all today. Yeah. Because then that's it's it's open to change every single day. Yeah.
01:04:01
Speaker
And I think the beautiful thing, wellll we'll put it to coffee and I'll give it to Lighthouse. It's pretty consistent. Very rarely, if I reset the machine, if I reset the espresso machine effectively and I have the same grind size, I have everything right, I'm going to get a pretty consistent cup of coffee.
Adaptability and Feedback
01:04:16
Speaker
I can't relate that to an athlete. You didn't get the same amount of sleep last night. You didn't eat the same meal yesterday. You had two tests. you had There are a lot of factors that that come into your life that affect your athletic performance and your performance in general, your mental clarity, whatever. We can go on and on and on.
01:04:35
Speaker
But what should not change is your ability to communicate those things effectively. And we have to give them the skills to do that. They don't know what they don't know. They have no, if if they've never been encouraged to communicate those things, why would they know that they're supposed to tell you?
01:04:53
Speaker
And that that's something to me that is very, that I've learned truly is I have had i have had some crazy expectations. I have had some high level, unattainable expectations of some athletes and people, human beings, interns, right? In general.
01:05:12
Speaker
And what I've learned is that my communication really helps make those things available and attainable to everybody is that if I can communicate a little bit more and they feel comfortable finishing that loop, communicating back to me, and we're constantly going back and forth, it makes things so much easier. And same deal with the athletes.
01:05:32
Speaker
I've got kids that'll tell them they'll text me in in the morning. Hey, I have this and this going on today. So when you see me, if I look like a zombie, I'm i'm all there. I'm still, I'm still here.
01:05:43
Speaker
Like we have like nine hours before lift. What? Like, are you serious? That's amazing. I've never had that. And it came from me It started with me. Hey, I want you to feel safe enough to communicate these things to me.
01:05:55
Speaker
I want you to know I will make an adjustment. I will adapt my program to fit you. You will not adapt to fit my program. That's goofy. That's goofy. That's goofy. So you tell me, I'll make an adjustment.
01:06:07
Speaker
I will move things around. i will move your days around if I need to, if it's possible, if we need to make some kind of adjustment, timing, whatever, or otherwise, or if you need something different on the day. i have never had a group that is so comfortable coming to me and telling me exactly what they need because I have told them that they know what they need.
01:06:25
Speaker
I've not told them they don't know and I know and i only I have the secrets. That's crazy. No, you don't. I don't know what's going on in their lives or their bodies. I mean, I do because I ask, but... That's that's where it where it really hits for me is understanding that this is just a small piece of the day. And I want this hour, 45 minutes, 30 minutes, whatever I get, i want it to have the most impact possible.
01:06:50
Speaker
And if we're all communicating about it, it's going to be better. It's going to be good. At the very least, it's going to be good. Yeah. but giving them the opportunity for it to be great and for it to be impactful and for it not to be a waste of anybody's time. No.
01:07:04
Speaker
And you're helping them understand what is excellence. And it's 30 people working on the same page towards the same goal where player one is high today, player two is low, and then it's going to ebb and flow, but they're there together working towards the the same mission, the same focus, the same goal.
01:07:23
Speaker
and that that's a powerful thing. So that encourages then future communication in a workforce that they now have the tools and the confidence to to call stuff out, hey, that's not how we do things.
01:07:35
Speaker
And i mean, that that takes a lot of gusto. But the more reps and opportunities they get in here and the more value they see and when they took initiative to communicate to their their boss, their coach, hey, this is how i'm feeling, what's going on, and then was encouraged and reinforced Now we developed a sharp tool for the future.
01:07:56
Speaker
And I think also communicating to them that it's not always gonna go your way when you do, and not not giving that unrealistic expectation of, you tell me, poor baby, go sit on the, no, no. Let's make an adjustment that matters.
01:08:08
Speaker
And sometimes that's what it looks like for us. Well, what can you give me? Can we work to a common ground? Can we have a compromise? right what do these what does What does all of this look like? And teaching them about that, the feedback and the compromise and,
01:08:21
Speaker
there are consequences. Every decision that you make has a consequence, positive, negative. And it's it's really cool to watch sometimes the wheels turn and then then you have an aha moment of, oh, okay, well, I chose this, so this.
01:08:37
Speaker
great it was a Great, it was a great turnout, great consequence, great whatever. Or I chose this, this happened, didn't like that at all, won't do that again. And they learn and you make an adjustment because you're an adult, believe it or not, whether they feel like it or not, they're adults.
Conclusion and Future Plans
01:08:50
Speaker
Have you heard of ah a lighthouse leader before? No, but tell me. I mean, a lighthouse, you're on the the coast, the pier, the cape, and you're just making peel people aware, hey, this is land here, there are hazards.
01:09:04
Speaker
Rocks. So you help them steer to the appropriate direction and keep them away from the the danger. So it's awareness. It's guiding in a sense, but you're not telling them exactly where to go. They're still going to navigate the...
01:09:19
Speaker
choppy waters themselves. I love that. So, Lighthouse Coffee, Lighthouse Leaders, that's our show. Where can people continue to to learn from you, your experience, and everything you got going on? Because there is some coffee in your future. There's coffee in my future. i love it. that's It's the best. um Really, I'm on Instagram, Ashley Kowalewski. That's the only social media I'm really on.
01:09:45
Speaker
And I can't even say I'm on that very consistently, but I'll try. Um, email ash, A-S-H-K, at lsu.edu. Shoot me an email. Generally, I'll get back to you within a certain amount, you know, a month. But I do my best on there, too.
01:10:03
Speaker
Um, that's pretty much it. Other than that, I'm not a very active social media follower. Yeah. The Coaches Coffee Collective will come in, I don't know, time when volleyball slows down.
01:10:14
Speaker
There you go. Roasting coffee. Yeah, roasting coffee, taking orders here in the next year time. Here we go. Setting an expectation.
01:10:25
Speaker
Then now you've got to hold that standard. Oh, I'm here. I'm roasting coffee already. Let's roll. Cool. And that does it for the show. Thank for tuning Scene. Scene. Thank you for tuning in to another episode the Captains and Coaches podcast. And thank you, AK, for opening up your doors.
01:10:40
Speaker
If anyone listening finds themselves in Death Valley, be sure to reach out to Ashley. Amazing coach, amazing person. be sure to grab a coffee with her. If you like what you heard here today, be sure to like, subscribe, rate, and review the show. If you want weekly coaching insights delivered right to your inbox, head to newsletter.captainsandcoaches.com to sign up for our weekly huddle.
01:11:05
Speaker
With that, we'll let you go. Thank you for tuning in to another episode and helping us raise the game.