Former Glasgow Warriors rugby player Grayson Hart shares his inside to out mindset to help on and off the park
Psychological advice and support can be a vitally important component for any athlete who is trying to achieve their goals.
Most sports organisations and athletes are opening up to its benefits with many sports psychologists working alongside individuals and groups.
While the practice has become more popular it isn’t for every athlete with many finding their own paths to being mentally prepared.
One of those who followed their own path is former Glasgow Warriors and Edinburgh professional rugby player Grayson Hart.
Having witnessed the death of his father at the age of 21 through cancer, a highly promising player in New Zealand turned to alcohol, gambling and prescription drugs for a short time.
Shortly after this, he and his brother found his cousin hanging from a tree after struggling from a meth addiction - thankfully he was still alive.
Despite all of these struggles, Grayson has now been able to look back, take on board the devastating experiences and turn them into life lessons on and off the field.
From creating his own website The Good Life Movement, to making podcasts discussing his inside to out approach on life, the current Ealing Trailfinders scrum-half has been on a journey to help others in his changing room and out-with.
And while his view on life is a tool for any, Hart admits that it also helps his performances on the rugby field.
He said: “You can learn so much from death. The way the mind works the ego wants us to believe that we have an unlimited amount of time and we spend so much time not doing meaningful work.
“So one of the greatest blessings for me was when my dad passed away as I went on an even worse path until I got to a point of rock bottom.
“Then when I hit rock bottom my perception changed and I realised your feeling isn’t created by a circumstance - whether that be your job or your past. That never creates how you feel, it is created by your perception towards it and what you allow your thoughts to create.
“Everything you feel is never created from a circumstance it comes from within and I also realise that things like alcohol and drugs they actually stop us from understanding that perception. They get in the way of what your true human state is which is to be present.
“I got onto my own individual path around the age of 22 when I was so amazed by this new perception while reading as many books as I could and living it up and learning.
“This mindset definitely helps my performance. I look back on my time when I was 21-years-old when I was at the Auckland Blues that was one of the times with some of the most turmoil in my life but I wouldn't change anything because it has set me on a path to where I am just now.
“When I look back what I think of is if I had guys around me I could look up to in a rugby environment that I could have learnt from to help change my perception It would have been hugely beneficial to me.
“Sometimes when you're young when advice comes from a figure of authority like a teacher or a sports physiologist you can almost be a bit more closed off to the concept.
“I interviewed an author called Garrett Kramer in one of my podcasts and he spoke about video analysis for ice hockey as he works with the NHL. He says in sports if you tell your team you have to learn this it just creates another layer of thought and when people have too many layers they don't function out of clarity and intuition.
“When a sportsperson performs at their best it’s when it’s instinct and they are flowing. Too many layers get in the way of that. He will put the video tape up but only if they want to watch it and that seems a more natural way of doing it.
“I wish more people had this understanding that you function at your best in a natural state in the inside.
“None of this would have came about if I did not have to learn from the stumbling blocks. One of my favourite sayings is ‘use your stumbling blocks as stepping stones’.
“There were times in the moment where I thought ‘why is this happening to me I had so much promise and now I have nothing’ and that was again basing things on an outward instead of inwards.
“There might be people who are like ‘what happened to Grayson Hart the dude that played for the Blues when he was 19 and won the Junior World Cup’ but my success is not about what I achieved on that material thing, it is about who I have become and the meaningful work I can do from it.
“If you have faith in what you are doing and follow your heart things have a way of working out.”