How do you learn a new trick if you're too scared to try it?
Today we're going to talk about what you can do to get over the fear and finally start
landing the tricks that you've been too afraid to try.
So, we've all been there before.
You're ready to start trying to learn a new trick and you've learned all of the prerequisites,
but when you roll up and start to pop the trick, something in the back of your head
tells you to abort the mission, and you end either up running off of the board, kicking
the board out from underneath you when you're in the air, or when you go to land, one of
your feet just refuses to stay on the board and you land with one foot on the ground,
and for whatever reason, you can't get past the fear of keeping both feet on your board
long enough to land the trick.
Alright, so let me go ahead and start this whole conversation off by telling you something
that you might not be all that excited to hear: If you want to learn how to do new tricks,
you first have to learn how to fall while trying them.
So, hopefully you're already doing this, but if you're not, go ahead and make it a habit
to only try tricks that you're already comfortable falling on.
It's okay to go a little bit outside of your comfort zone, but you really shouldn't be
risking breaking a bone or getting a concussion every time you try a new trick.
Something that you won't see in a lot of skate videos that's actually a hugely important
part of learning more advanced tricks, is that the individuals who learned those tricks
first had to learn how to fall while trying them.
It's really step one to the whole process.
Once you can do that, you can really focus on putting the rest of the trick together
so that you can land on the board and roll away.
Alright, so let's say you are, like I was a couple of years ago, trying to learn how
to do a blunt stall to fakie.
Now, for the blunt to fakie, the scariest part is when you ollie off the coping and
try to land back inside the ramp, and when you do that, it's very easy to just take your
back foot off while you're in the air and safely put it on the ramp, so that you can
avoid having to face any real danger of the board hanging up or shooting out from underneath
you.
So, as you can see in this clip, that's exactly what I started out doing, and to help get
myself psyched up enough to really commit to the trick, I went ahead and strapped on
a helmet.
Alright so how do you go from just being able to just pop the trick to being able to actually
land on top of the board?
You've probably already guessed it, but sometimes you just have to grit your teeth and get that
inevitable first slam out of the way.
Now I realize that it kind of sounds like I'm telling you to just go outside and risk
getting yourself injured, but keep in mind that what I'm really saying is to first, make
sure that the trick that you're trying is reasonably within the limits of what you can
safely fall from, and then go ahead and give the trick an honest attempt, landing with
both of your feet on top of the board, accepting the fact that you're probably going to take a
hit on that attempt.
Once you do that, assuming that the fall you just took wasn't a day ender, everything about
the situation changes dramatically.
It's like a switch flips inside your head that goes from "Oh, I don't know if I'll ever
be able to do this trick" to "I know exactly what I need to do to land this trick and it's
about to happen here in the next couple of tries."
So first off, now you don't even have to really be afraid of falling any more.
You just did it, and it turns out it wasn't quite as bad as you were making it out to
be in your head.
For most people, the fear of falling is less about being scared of having to deal with
the pain of falling down than it is not knowing exactly what will happen when they do fall.
Getting that uncertainty out of the way can play a huge role in allowing you to continue
learning the trick.
Second, falling gives big rush of adrenaline that you can use to focus in and really go
for your next few attempts with a big wave of confidence.
And third, actually stomping the board down, even if you fall, teaches your body what it's
going to feel like the next time you try, and now you'll know exactly what you need
to do in order to roll away on your next attempt.
In my case, even though I knew in my head that I was supposed to lean back more in the
transition, I wasn't really used to doing it from that high up and I'd never done it
from a blunt stall before, so I ended not leaning back far enough and having the board
shoot out from underneath me.
But right after I took that first hit, I knew exactly what it was going to feel like to
put my weight on the board in that spot on the ramp with that particular amount of momentum,
and a few tries later, I was able to commit to landing on the board again and this time,
I was appropriately leaned back enough to prevent myself from falling that same way
again.
Then two tries later, I landed it for the first time for real.
Now at this point, I do want to reiterate that skateboarding does carry along with it
the inherent risk of serious injury, so even if you take every precaution that you can,
you always run the risk that something can go wrong.
If you're not ready to accept that fact, you should probably hold off on skateboarding
until you are.
However, if you use your head and skate smart, you can minimize that risk and the amount
of fun that you're going to have from skateboarding will easily warrant getting banged up every
once in a while.
Alright so now let me show you one more example.
So when I first started trying this one, I would pop the trick and flick the board with
my back foot just fine, but as I was on the way back down to the ground, I would take
my front foot off at the last second so I wouldn't have to risk what might happen if
I landed with it over top of the board.
But then, here's where the switch flipped.
Now, every time I pop the trick, I just think to myself, falling really wasn't that bad.
I can just fall over and over again until my body adjusts to landing properly and then
I'll get a make.
And five tries later, that's exactly what happened.
Now, keep in mind that anything that you can do to make falling less dangerous will make
this whole process even easier.
So, that means, if you have a helmet and pads, wear them.
If you can have your friend stand next to you and catch you when you start to fall,
have them do that as well.
The more that you're able to experience what landing the trick actually feels like, the easier
it will be to commit to it and the less scary it'll become.
Now one thing I have to mention before I go is that you should take a second and see if
you can apply this advice to any other areas of your life.
For example, it was this exact approach that eventually lead to me starting this Youtube
channel.
A lot of you guys probably don't know this, but before I started this one, I started another
Youtube channel that I worked on for two years and I made over 40 videos, some of them that
I worked really hard on, and I never even managed to get over 200 subscribers.
So if you really want to do something new, sometimes it's best to stop debating the risks
and just give it a shot.
You might fail at it the first few times, but it's almost always through failure that
you'll learn how to succeed.
Alright guys so remember to stay safe, and never stop improving.