Today, I think I experienced one of the most interesting and engaging lectures I have ever encountered. Interestingly, it was and was not because of the person delivering it. Dr. Gary Hermanson has had a very captivating career as a sport psychologist but is not the liveliest presenter I have ever listened to. Still, I felt enamored by his stories, theories, and models surrounding the psychology of sport. I mean the man is an illustrious figure in the field and especially within that field in the country of New Zealand. The people and teams he worked with communicated to us just how important he was to New Zealand sports. He showed us pictures of him at the Olympics, standing with Kobe Bryant, and hilariously a picture that featured a photo-bomb from Prince Harry of England himself. Dr. Hermanson dropped some serious knowledge on us as well and was consistent with having us answer and ask questions throughout the lecture. Below is a picture of one of his models regarding “Performance Alignment Patterns” which related to how sport induced anxiety causes strife between the mind and body while performing.
I really internalized a lot of what Dr. Hermanson spoke about. It was like everything he was saying just made so much sense looking at it from the perspective of a former athlete. I soon realized this was simply because I experienced a lot of performance induced anxiety as I matured through sports. I always felt I had to perform up to or above the standard to make my father or family proud. I had to prove to my peers that I was one of the better athletes in our class. I can remember pretending to be sick or thinking I was sick during a championship basketball game when I was probably in the 3rd grade because I was just really anxious. After hearing him speak I was almost angry that I had not identified what might be going on with my anxiety levels when I played sports. I felt like to have experienced that at such a young age and seeing retrospectively just how arbitrary a 3rd grade championship basketball game was that it was most definitely a predictor of what was to come. In high school, I was an undersized guard who had to fight every practice just for a shot at getting anytime on the court in a game. My coaches loved how I worked every day in practice, but I would more than often get on the court, freeze up, overthink things, and make mistakes that would just earn me my spot on the bench. I talked to Dr. Hermanson after his lecture just to ask about what it would take to become a sports psychologist and well I am definitely a bit past the point of no return with my nearly completed major. I would essentially have to gain a psychology degree, then likely be put through more schooling, attain 2,000 hours of supervised observation or practice of a psychologist, and pass a test just to become a practicing psychologist myself. I was just so drawn to the idea of it as soon as I realized my own personal experience with anxiety in sport. I guess we will see what happens, but chasing that career down might be currently out of sight.
Personal Post_5: Blog Entry 13
Foreign Adventures-New Zealand 