The other day I went to visit a healthcare professional (HP). Nothing serious, just basically checking a box for the insurance company.

Anyway, we were talking about some lifestyle changes I’ve made to try to stay healthier longer. Yet it seemed like every time I told the HP about some improvement I’d made she countered with I should be doing this or that too.

It was kind of frustrating, because rather than feeling encouraged to continue doing better I was made to feel like no matter what I did it would never be good enough. The focus would always be on what more I could do or should be doing.

That experience got me to thinking about how we coach our fastpitch softball players. (Take that Google algorithms.)

Often times we coaches are so focused on trying to get our players ready for “the next level” (whatever that is) or trying to make them look just like the players we see on TV that we fail to acknowledge all the great work they’ve done to get themselves to this point. And that can be just as discouraging as my experience with the HP.

That’s why it’s important every now and then along the journey to stop and take a look backward even as you’re trying to look ahead to the next goal. Showing a player how far she has come can give her a real boost to continue putting in the work to keep moving forward.

Let’s take a hitter who has been working on her swing. Honestly, I get a fair amount of students whose only goal (or their parents’ only goal for them) is to not strike out every time they come to bat.

Mom and/or Dad aren’t looking for little Amelia to hit home runs or have the highest batting average on the team. They’re simply hoping she doesn’t get totally discouraged from playing because she wouldn’t hit water if she fell out of a boat.

They don’t want to have to cringe every time she comes to the plate, but that’s another story.

So Amelia gets help from a coach or instructor, fixes whatever was causing her to just randomly swing the bat and hope she hit something, and now she’s making contact with greater regularity and getting on base now and then. At which point the goal becomes to start hitting the ball to or over the fence.

That’s great that everyone wants Amelia to keep growing and improving. But maybe in the midst of all that take a step back to appreciate the fact that the original goal has been met and let Amelia feel good about what she has accomplished so far – at least for a few minutes.

Video is great for that, by the way. Even if Amelia isn’t quite getting on base often enough, showing her a video of how she used to swing the bat versus how she is swinging it now will probably help her build confidence and continue to focus on the process instead of the outcomes.

Then let the law of averages take care of the rest.

It’s the same for pitching. Maybe you have a goal of having a pitcher throw faster, or throw more strikes. Or both.

Regardless of the goal, the path to achieving it starts with improving her mechanics.

So perhaps when she started out she looked less like she was trying to pitch and more like she was trying to fold a fitted sheet.

Showing her a video of how she used to look versus how she looks now might give her some encouragement that she’s on the right track, even if the radar isn’t reflecting it or she’s still throwing a few too many in the dirt. That doesn’t mean you still don’t want to hold her to a higher standard.

But you can acknowledge the fact that she is improving so she has something to feel good about while she works toward the bigger payoff.

All of this doesn’t mean you should provide false praise just to spare the player’s feelings. If she’s not putting in the work and showing improvement that needs to be called out. Otherwise, what’s the point?

Often, however, we are in such a hurry to get to the ultimate goal (being names an MVP, making a particular team, winning a scholarship, etc.) that we don’t take the time to appreciate the progress that’s already been made.

So think about that today. If you’re a coach, what can you do to recognize how much better your players are today than they were a month ago, or three months ago, or a year ago, etc.?

If you’re a parent, what can you point to that lets your daughter know you are proud of how far she has come so far? Even if she still has a ways to go.

That little bit of encouragement may be just the thing your player needs to keep grinding – and build a level of confidence that will carry through not just her softball career but her whole life.