Return to Rugby – “Staying on the Field”

This year I decided to lace up the boots again and return to the fold for another season of rugby. I had contemplated doing so for the last couple of years... But after four years absence, the itch became significant enough to scratch and I decided to return. It's a return to dingy club dressing sheds, the smell of freshly cut grass, the sound of studs on cement, chilly weeknight trainings and a strangely satisfying battered and bruised Sunday morning body…

Rugby was a big part of my life for a long time.

I gave it away at age 22, largely out of frustration with consistent injury problems – and also, because I felt my commitment had waned… And, I suppose I reached a point where I wanted to try some new things free of playing serious rugby.

I had been on the brink of turning a childhood passion for the game into a career and the disappointment of the timing of a major injury was immense. In my lay-off, I suppose I saw the game as having changed, and not necessarily for the better. I questioned whether it was really something I wanted to do “full time”. Also, I had played so much as a junior and as a kid I as well as in the schoolyard and the backyard that in a way, it felt like I’d already had a “life” of experiences in the sport..

I will save that struggle of dealing with injury for another time, save for the fact to add that virtually anyone who is involved with sport, or indeed any physical performance discipline or art, experiences injury and has their commitment tested, in this regard, at some point.

The people that do ultimately make it to the highest level have invariably persevered through some significant challenges. Perseverance is one of the critical life lessons taught, in the theatre of sport. Not always do we measure up – I probably didn’t, ultimately, in respect of my run of injuries.

Not that I am bitter about my decision because it was the right one - for me - at the time.

The mental commitment and discipline required to continue to work extremely hard at a pursuit, coupled with the mentality to contextualise set-backs and persevere are the critical ingredients.

This was well articulated in a recent interview I watched on ABC’s “Lateline” program, with a guy called Matthew Syed (who has written a book called “Bounce”). In addition to the things mentioned above he argues, somewhat radically, that innate talent plays an almost negligible role in the evidence and documented science of becoming a “champion”.

Syed was himself a table tennis champion and interestingly, the street he grew up on nurtured the careers of the majority of Britain’s premier table tennis players of the 1980’s. I have cut and pasted various comments from the interview below:

“...patterns of success and failure… it's about how long you're prepared to work. It's an ability to stick at it, even though there are gonna be difficult periods along that road. And what the evidence seems to suggest is that those who make it are those who believe that excellence pivots on practice….if on the other hand you believe that excellence pivots specifically on talent, any time you fail, you're gonna interpret that as you not having sufficient talent. So you're likely to give up. If you believe that excellence does hinge on effort, then any time you fail, you're gonna see it as an opportunity to adapt and grow. And so that mindset, what a psychologist at Stanford University calls the "growth mindset" - the idea that you can transform yourself over time, it's a deeply liberating mindset and it is that belief that tends to propel people along the road to excellence...

I give innate talent almost no weight at all, and that’s a controversial view… The process of ingraining excellence is long-term, but what the evidence suggests is that almost all of us who are healthy have the potential to get there, provided we're willing to stick at it for all those many hours.

…there are certain hardware issues that are significant in certain activities. So, for example, if you're very short you're unlikely to become a top basketball player ... However, in virtually all the tasks characterised by what I describe as complexity, the limiting factor is not hardware, it is software… What they have is acquired mental representations that enable them to play in the most efficient way.

One of the reasons that initial talent doesn't really matter very much is that your innate structure is very much the starting point. Over time… with practice, you change dramatically, not just the body, but the anatomy of the brain.

…there was a time when scientists thought that the plasticity, the adaptability of the brain, was limited to childhood. We now know that the brain can adapt, the anatomy can change dramatically even at late middle age.

…When you learn a skill for the first time, you exercise conscious control over it, like when you drive a car… as you build up the neural frameworks supporting the skill, you have to concentrate very, very hard… When you become brilliant at something, proficient at something, you can do it subconsciously.”

Syed also spoke of the need to “care about the destination” – and that this “care” needed to be internally motivated not externally influenced. To this end, he said that great coaches play an enormous part in this process and that the genius of coaching was in encouraging not coercing. Creating external conditions in which a person resented what they were doing, are deeply destructive, argues Syed, but on the other hand:

“the sociological skill of encouraging… and trying to ensure that that motivation is internalised, that is the liberation that the performer needs to get there…the skill of top coaches… is not technical, it's not tactical, it is almost a branch of social psychology to get the performer to really care about where they're going and to entrench the growth mindset.”

I certainly feel I have seen examples of what Syed talks about. Example - several players in the current Wallabies squad are guys I played with and against. All the guys I know that are there have surmounted their own significant challenges and persevered where others chose not to. There are others of great ability that I played with and against that are not there of course. The mental and physical resilience, and the sacrifice in the face of other opportunities, to arrive in that position is great and I don’t discount or trivialise it for a second. Luck plays a role as it does in everything in life but hindsight has taught me that the "growth mindset" Syed talks about is the determining factor.

I digress, but it is an interesting interview and many fine wisdoms expressed that are clearly relevant not just to sport but many pursuits in life. You can read the transcript of the full interview here: http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2010/s2951668.htm

The way that sport can magnify universal human experiences and teachings is unique. Having gone back, I realise I have missed competitive sport.

Whilst the prestigious Brisbane third grade isn't exactly the most "competitive" and intense pressure cooker in the sporting world, that's where I find myself and I have been really enjoying it. I never thought I would enjoy this kind of less intensive rugby much – but I am. The standard is decent though and I’ve played the equivalent of about 8 full games now. I'm back with my old club Souths and one of the best things about it is that I am playing with old friends – guys I played junior, school, colts, A Grade and rep footy with. It’s a talented bunch of players even if it is the oldest team at the club – we go through more strapping tape than any other - but everyone is playing for the love of the game, with their mates in a relaxed frame of mind. We train a couple of times a week, go out on a Saturday and throw it around and strive to perform well. We’re sitting on the top of our table comfortably and while winning is always the goal, it’s not the sole driving force for being there.

Having been out of the game for over four years, my aspirations have been very modest – simply to get on the field, try to rediscover some fitness and form, enjoy it and stay on the field… if I come through this season and am feeling good, maybe that will change to trying to play as well as I can – but for now, it’s just good to be back.