Coach Cadoux's Reflections - Team Retreat

“Equity feeds mental toughness feeds equity feeds mental toughness” - Judy Jarvis (NYGL ‘19)

This past weekend I had the immense privilege of facilitating the NYGL 2020 team retreat. Together with Director of Operations & Community Engagement Khunsa Amin, team psychologist Annie Chanler, and the rest of the coaching staff, we brought the team together to set the foundations of our offensive systems on the field and the foundation of our team mental toughness & equity work off the field. Over the course of the weekend, we did team workshops on intersectionality & equity fundamentals, individual mental toughness & mindfulness, team mental toughness and uncontrollables (credit to Tiina Booth), building a systems of oppression analysis, and feedback. 

As a coach & facilitator, I’m constantly asking myself: what does it look like to build a team where everyone, regardless of identity, can thrive? What does it look like to build a foundation of trust that honors our equity mission and creates the conditions for every individual player and the team collectively to achieve peak performance? 

Peak performance, unconscious & in the zone play, happens when individual players trust themselves and teammates trust each other. This is why culture, mental toughness, and equity work cannot be separated. Building team capacity for uncomfortable conversations that name power dynamics is critical not only to create equitable culture & processes, but to deepen team mental toughness. Mental toughness is the individual ability of players and the collective ability of teams to withstand challenges & setbacks. Challenging moments are overcome through collective buy in to team mental toughness programs and reps that have built trust on and off the field. Setting aside dedicated time for relationship building and working through challenging conversations about systems of oppression goes hand in hand with creating a stronger team. 

It was such a thrill to watch the team dig into this content throughout the weekend. I left on Sunday feeling so much anticipation for the rest of the season and deeply proud to be part of a program that values this off-field work and creates space for it. The more we prioritize our relationships, the deeper the trust. The deeper the trust, the deeper the mental toughness. The deeper the mental toughness, the more we stay in the zone and achieve peak performance together.

Locked in.