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The Secret Weapon of the “Pregame Talk”

Jeff:
We got a fun topic today and that is mastering the pregame talk. I think I know where this is going, and I got some thoughts here, but I love that concept. I love that idea, Jeremy, what’s going on here?

Jeremy:
Yeah, so we had a really awesome conversation on our front porch with a bunch of parents of littles. We have a group that we meet with occasionally and talk through like, “What are some of the biggest wins?” And so one of the couples mentioned this and I thought, “Oh, this was such a big deal for us, especially when you have a bunch of littles.”

Jeff:
Yes.

Jeremy:
And that is when you know that in certain environments, things tend to not go well, at the table, in the car, at the grocery store, on the way to church, whatever the thing is that like, “Aw, this breaks down all the time. Why does this break down?”

Jeff:
Yeah.

Jeremy:
I really think it’s important to begin to master the pregame talk. And that is right before or right before you enter the grocery store, you sit down with your kids and you give them extremely explicit instructions about what success looks like, “Hey guys, I know that oftentimes we go in here and it’s like, mommy, I want this. So this is what I want you guys to do. I want you to be really big helpers. Johnny, I want you to really help Sally while we’re in there. We’re going to pick out something …” You tell them exactly what you want from them.

Jeff:
Totally.

Jeremy:
What is this about? What do you want them to be doing during the whole time you’re in the car or in the grocery store or whatever you’re doing. The more clear you can be with your kids, those times tend to go really, really well. And so, I like to call this the pregame talk because every single coach knows how this goes. And that is that if you sit down with your team and really talk about, “Hey guys, this is what we’re going to focus on during this game.” Your game is going to go way better if the entire team knows what success looks likes, knows what exactly they’re going to try to do to improve in that particular area. And so I cannot emphasize enough how valuable this is, especially in those repeated, annoying areas where your kids, your whole family’s together, things don’t tend to go well, but it’s an opportunity for you to experience the teamness of your family. So, yeah. Jeff, how have you guys worked on this?

Jeff:
Yeah, I absolutely love that. And I think one thing I would say is I was thinking back to my high school years of baseball, I think it was high school or college year. One of my coaches, he was really big on visualization. So he would always have us, it’s funny and hippie-like, it sounds like. But we would literally, he would have us sit in the baseball field, close our eyes, and then he would walk us through visualization exercises, just like, “Visualize getting up to the plate, visualize, hitting, visualize, throwing a strike. What does that feel like? What does that look like?” And I think that’s a cousin of this, right? Where when you actually can picture what your future is going to look like and then you don’t feel off base when you’re in that scenario, you don’t feel like your imposter syndrome or that I haven’t been here. I don’t know what I’m doing.

You might, but you feel comfortable because you feel like you’ve visualized it. And that’s what we’re trying to give to our kids. Visualize what we’re about to do and how it should go. And so, yeah, this is exactly what we do. And we’re huge on this, where I have a cue. I would say to the parents listening or the dads listening have a cue phrase that’s just for this. So ours would be, we say, “Stop, look and listen.” And we trained them with that for a couple months where it’s, I don’t say that anytime I need them to look or anytime I need them to listen, I only save it when I really need their attention, eye to eye. And when I’m about to say, “This is what we’re about to do. This is what I need from you, and this we’re about to do.”

I do it in the home. A really big place we do it is right when we get in the car and we get all buckled and I turn the car on, then we just pause. And then I turn around and we have a little talk before we go somewhere. So for us that stop look and listen, the kids know like, “Oh, dad’s about to give us some serious information. I need to listen. I need to pay attention.” And I think something like that is really helpful. Have that cue where you can get their full attention to really unpack something of this is what it’s going to be like. And I don’t even use that for other situations. I just say like, “Hey, look at me.” Or whatever.

There’s different ways, but specifically when I’m about to unpack a lot of information. I usually say, “Stop, look and listen.” And they’ll freeze, they’ll stop. And they’ll just look at my, whatever they’re doing, and they’ll just look. And so I would say that’d be a helpful thing too. And then yeah, just walk them through what you’re about to do. And then don’t be afraid to actually reward them. I think sometimes we have a weird conscience about rewarding our kids, like we’ve talked about before, of oh, are we only training them to do it when they’re rewarded? Well, at some level maybe sure, but it’s we’re as adults, do we not do things because we want to be rewarded or because we want to be blessed. No one does everything.

Jeremy:
Right.

Jeff:
That’s the ideal, maybe when you’re 90, but no one does everything because we want, no one, none of us do anything because we’re non-reward motivated.

Jeremy:
Yeah.

Jeff:
So yeah, that’s what I would say is, master that pregame talk. What does that look like? And like Jeremy said, look for those places where the game doesn’t go well and then say, “Hey, let’s have a specific talk. Let’s get out the whiteboard, let’s draw the X and Os before that game and then see how it goes.”

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