On Athletics: Sport and the problem with putting mind over what matters

The best part about waking up on these frozen stiff mornings is that first flying leap onto the frosty grass, down Boranaraltry Lane and across the side of Glencullen Mountain, where no man or dog is about at that hour and even the birds haven’t the heart to whistle, seeing my smoky breath disappear into the air and knowing that in half an hour my hands and heart will feel as hot as burning coals.

This may not be everyone’s idea of a positive start to the day, that sense of aloneness – not loneliness – which comes with the long distance run. Especially when there is no stopwatch, no goal, and definitely no ambition, other than seeking out the sheer pleasure of it all. And there is no reason to recommend it except to say that it works for me.

It wasn’t always this way.

Those long distance runs used to be all about goals and ambitions, and yes the stopwatch, which is not a bad thing, as long as there is a healthy balance between the purpose and the pursuit, between the passion and the obsession.

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It’s easy to say that now when the physical pursuit has been totally eclipsed by the mental one, knowing the starter’s gun was last fired a long time ago, and when running has nothing to do with testing mental strength anymore but simply reinforcing it.

It’s not so easy to say that when you’re operating at the so-called elite end, not just of running but of any sport. Or indeed any walk of life. And especially at this time of the year.

It’s one of the main motivations behind the First Fortnight festival, the charity organisation aimed at challenging mental health prejudice through the creative arts and spoken word, and where sport naturally plays an important part, often for the better but sometimes for worse.

Despite all the increase in awareness and dismantling of taboos, admitting to any sort of mental health issue is still one of the hardest things for any athlete to do. And not just when it comes to the now familiar tale of the conflicting pressures and anxieties that often make up elite sport, but particularly the deeper, darker depression, and the addictions that sometimes come with it.

Mental wellbeing

Part of the problem is that so much about elite sport is still about building physical and mental strength, putting mind over matter, when actually a lot other things matter too.

It's the subject of the First Fortnight discussion at the Sugar Club in Dublin, and it often doesn't matter if the athlete is sitting on top of the world or is down at the bottom of a whirlpool of lies; if anything, when athletes feel they are ahead of their game is often when they are at their most vulnerable.

“Corinthian: Sports and Mental Health” will feature three elite athletes who know all about that: Alan O’Mara, the Cavan footballer who six months after playing in an All-Ireland under-21 final in Croke Park in 2011, had spiralled downwards into such a similarly desperate low that he was also intent on killing himself; Diarmuid Lyng, the Wexford hurler who was also at the top of his game when his physical wellbeing completely collapsed, partly because of large cracks in his mental wellbeing; and Darren O’Neill, the Irish boxing captain at the 2012 London Olympics who has witnessed first hand some of the devastating consequences of allowing mental health issues to go unchallenged.

O'Mara has aired his story already, and eloquently captured it in his book, The Best Is Yet To Come. Yet he admits he's still coming to terms with it: he's trying to decide whether or not to commit to another season with Cavan, having been first reserve goalkeeper last year, but is now acutely aware of the importance of maintaining the healthy balance in his life.

He also recognises the fact that athletes can often struggle most at or around a high in their career, a suitably apt observation given many Irish athletes are still coming down off the high of the Rio Olympics.

There were lots of takes of Irish athletes struggling in the aftermath of London 2012, mentally more than physically, as they tried to find something else that mattered as much, and O’Mara can certainly identifying with that.

“I’d say that under-21 final in 2011 was a bit like my Olympic moment, if that makes sense,” he says. “A lot of other things were going on that I chose to ignore, in the interest of chasing one goal, that dream.

A skyscraper

"Then when that goal and dream is over, all the other stuff is still there. It hasn't gone away. Only the distraction is gone. Sometimes that distraction is a good thing, a healthy thing, but I kept kicking the can down the road, and eventually you reach the end of the road.

"And football had become a skyscraper in my life, that just overshadowed everything. I know I don't want that anymore, so it's about trying readdress that balance, finding a more sustainable long-term strategy and maybe chase different highs. Football is still an important part of my life, but it's not who I am. The most important thing in my life is wellbeing, and if football can add to that, great."

For Lyng, who also aired his tale in a recent Tedx Talk event in Wexford (watch it here), sport had become increasingly motivated by the "me" instead of the "we", and he too is still exploring ways of rebalancing that.

And for O’Neill, who can recount the tragic suicide of fellow Olympic boxer Darren Sutherland in the aftermath of Beijing 2008 and also the alcoholic tearaway of Kenny Egan, the question of his own motivation remains, and having missed out on Rio, what exactly is inspiring him to get back in the ring one more time. Their words may not always make for easy listening but are nonetheless essential, especially at this time of the year.

* Corinthian: Sports and Mental Health takes place on Saturday at 3pm in The Sugar Club, Dublin: For more information see www.firstfortnight.ie