Looking After Yourself

April 23, 2020

In a paddling situation, you wouldn’t try to effect a rescue before ensuring that you were safe and it’s the same with coaching during this difficult time. As coaches tend to look after our paddlers first, particularly if we work with young people but we need to recognise that we’re no good to anyone if we’re not taking care of ourselves first. We’ve been following the government guidance on physical health and the following is based on their guidance for mental health which we hope will be helpful to you.

Connect with others

As we said in a previous post, it’s physical distancing but socially connected so don’t let yourself get isolated. If you would normally meet somebody for a coffee, why not have the same coffee chat online.

Talk about difficult feelings and listen to others

It’s a pretty scary time, right? Humans are generally not good with uncertainty and a perceived lack of control, so it’s completely ok to feel a bit overwhelmed, anxious or stressed at the moment. If you’re feeling it then you can guarantee that others will feel the same way. As the wonderful Brene Brown puts it “we are hard-wired for connection” so keep reaching out to others and share how you’re feeling. If you don’t feel able to do that, there are people you can speak to via NHS recommended helplines (Mental Health Helplines, Every Mind Matters, Moodzone Mental Wellbeing Audioguides) or other support groups like Samaritans.

Equally, if somebody comes to you looking for a listening ear, use your coaching skills to create a connection and let them know that you get them. I highly recommend this video on empathy and how it’s very different from sympathy.

Look after your physical wellbeing and get outside

This is an obvious one for coaches but never underestimate the power of being outside and getting active for your mental as well as your physical health. Make it a priority for you and obviously observe good physical distancing :-) There are also lots of great exercise activities and programmes to follow indoors.

NHS Home Workout Videos

NHS Fitness Studio

Manage your media intake and information sources

The trouble with having the internet at our fingertips is that we can get obsessed, read it all the time and become more worried. So while knowing what’s going on and being informed is really helpful, it’s also important to check the validity of the information source (good examples include the Government & NHS advice) as well as limiting how much time you spend on it. Why not limit yourself to checking at certain times of the day? Or even using apps to lock you out of certain apps if that helps?

Routine

In a previous article we spoke about how important routines are, particularly to young paddlers. Well if they’re important to them they’re important to you too and they’ve just been decimated so it might be time to set some new ones. Routines help us to predict the world around us which can make us feel less anxious so as you create structure for your paddlers, why not create some for you too. I have recently learnt the hard way though that too much structure for a toddler ends badly (!) so don’t get too upset if they need to be adapted...

Relax and focus on the present

This can help with difficult emotions, worries about the future, and can improve wellbeing. Relaxation techniques can also help some people to deal with feelings of anxiety. For useful resources see NHS Every Mind Matters and NHS Mindfulness which are from the NHS.

Take care of yourselves and please get in touch if we can help at all.

Doug MacDonald, SCA Coach and Pathway Developer

This is part of a 3-piece series written by Doug to provide support and guidance for coaches during the COVID-19 lockdown. To view them all, please click here. We have also released hints and tips for how clubs can stay together whilst staying at home, how clubs can help their members, and how clubs can use this extra time at home!