Tony: Our stars are ‘grieving’
LEADING performance psychologist Tony Og
Regan says the shutdown has plunged some GAA players into ‘grief’.
Ex-galway star Regan played a key role in Tipperary’s 2016 All-ireland win and worked with defending champions Limerick last year.
The two-time All-ireland finalist said the current lack of action and uncertainty of whether play will resume in 2020 has hit many players hard.
Speaking to the LGFA’S Ladies Football TV, Regan said: “There’s a bit of grief to this cycle that we’re in at the moment.
“We as sports people are very inclined to attach ourselves to our sports identity.
“For sports people, we’re running into this cycle where there’s a bit of denial at the start about what’s happening and the confusion that’s coming every three or four weeks for people because it (returning to play) is being pushed out to September or October so you’re going to go through that at different points.
“Then we move into a place where it’s a bit of anger and frustration over this. It’s ‘Why can’t they tell us more? Why are certain sports going back and we’re not going back? Why can’t they just give us a date?’.”
Regan said players need to realise that ‘we are not our sport, we just play and experience sport’.
The 2005 and 2012 All-ireland finalist added: “Not all our players are going to be in that emotional state of depression but if we’re finding ourselves very irritable or anxious or in a low mood at the moment, first off meditation would help us to anchor ourselves in the present moment.
“It also helps us to detach from those thoughts and become more aware of the thinking, the feeling that we’re having around the situations we’re in, or the people or the situations that trigger those emotions.”