yawning before the start of a race.
This week I was part of a terrific group looking at how fear can hold entrepreneurs back from innovation. One person asked, around getting us to take action, to innovate: “can fear be helpful?”
My mind leapt back to my younger days, and to a particular moment when I was getting ready to go on court for a squash match that would decide whether or not my team, the Cayman Islands, would win the international competition. The pressure was high, it was all on my shoulders for the team. I knew that I was nervous, but I also had a secret, a pre-match routine that would transform that nervousness to extremely relaxed alertness, often called Flow (an article on flow and another sporting moment here).
I went on court and was in such a “flow state” that I could barely remember any of the match even right after I had won 3-0. One of the spectators came up to me and said: “I was really worried about that match, especially when I saw you yawing so much while you were getting ready to play.” Ah, but you see, yawning was part of my routine, it was a secret weapon. Why? Back to the question: “can fear be helpful?”. I told that story to make the point that my answer is “yes, and only so far. If it spurs you to action, great, but in taking the action itself, being in a state of fear is the opposite of useful for performance, one must be in a state of relaxed alertness.”
The photo above is of Apolo Anton Ohno, eight-time Olympic medallist in one of the most combustible sports, short track speed skating. He was famous for yawning before races, plus there is science behind this:
“A yawn often signals a change from one condition to another. You can facilitate the change from a more alert state to a more sedate one or vice versa. Paratroopers yawn before jumping.”
Robert Provine, psychologist
A closing thought around how fear can be hugely counter-productive to performance, a quote from Dune, the seminal novel that fans (like me!) are hugely excited at seeing as a movie in 2021. My full post on this is here, the litany follows:
“I must not fear.
The Litany of Fear, originated by the Bene Gesserit order, from Dune by Frank Herbert
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”