Even the Greats experience pressure
Pressure: it does funny things to people. Just ask Alastair Cook. For several years now he has carried the burden of scoring runs for England, of ensuring that the English team’s innings gets off to a good start and being the man upon whose shoulders the chances of victory rest because, if he doesn’t, the team will probably not do well. And on many occasions, Cook, who is undoubtedly one of England’s finest ever batsmen with more Test runs to his name than any other English player, has delivered. But even the greats experience pressure.
Compared to his usual standards, Alastair Cook has recently not been doing so well. It has not helped that England have failed to find him a stable batting partner but Cook himself will not blame others for failing to lay the platform of the English innings; that is his job. And that is pressure. Pressure, most often, is a product of our imagination and an imposition we place on ourselves because we are aware of the expectations around us. The fans, the media, his team-mates – all of these people looked at Cook the talisman to lead the way and as this wasn’t happening, the pressure built.
All of us experience pressure when we begin to imagine what may occur if the desired outcome is not achieved. We feel we are going to let others down. Sometimes it can fuel us to great success; at other times it can consume us with fear. Fear is the brain’s way of protecting us from the burden of change which is what is required if we want to achieve our goals. The trouble with fear is that it demotivates us so that we return to what we know and we stop developing our thought patterns. In assembly on Thursday I spoke to the children about aiming high with their ambitions for this year and being SMART (specific-measurable-achievable-realistic-time-bound) with their targets. Thorough planning in our goals enables us to imagine positive outcomes because we can find small successes along the way and negate the build-up of pressure.
Having a clear target with a pathway towards it creates structure and purpose. By announcing his decision to retire, Alastair Cook simultaneously created a new target in his life beyond international cricket and unburdened himself from the pressure of scoring runs. And the irony is, in his final match, without the pressure, the runs flowed. His televised 147 may have been hours slower than a Ronnie O’Sullivan express, but it was more captivating, thoroughly deserved and the perfect example for why educators must not heap pressure on young children.