Chipper Jones, Chip Gaines, and the Habits of Discipline
The gifts of future baseball Hall of Fame inductee Chipper Jones and current contractor and reality TV star Chip Gaines are best demonstrated in motion as either baseballs or sawdust flies. Both chafe under the enforced stillness of introspection. In a recent episode of Fixer Upper in which Chip Gaines had to sit still and review clips of the show with his wife, he seemed to twitch visibly like a schoolboy kept in detention. Chipper was used to the hitter's discipline of keeping his head still, but his discomfort in the introspection chair that came with a book tour he launched this week in Winston-Salem was clear in other ways. His laugh was uneasy. His delivery was, at times, too low and too fast for the audio catchers mitt of poor acoustics to capture.
Both were there, however unnatural there was. Both Chipper and Chip built in time to purposefully reflect. For Chipper, although this week's format may have been different and more daunting, a regimen that forced him to consider was not new. As a baseball player, he said, he woke up thinking about the day's starting pitcher he would face. Whether that pitcher was a daunting presentation of gangly arms and legs like the hard-throwing Randy Johnson or was a "rookie off the farm" Jones said he instilled the inviolate routine of reviewing the pitcher's last three starts on video in order to help him visualize his own performance. He used this time, he said, in order to develop a plan with which he would approach the plate. Although last week he was sitting with an author near home plate rather than approaching it from the left or the right batter's box, the discipline of insisting on time to think and reflect rather than rely on reaction was still intact.
How to Win Friends and Influence People predates Chipper, but it validates the discipline he was demonstrating. Author Dale Carnegie, without a reality show or a book contract, at least at the time, developed a Saturday night habit of charting out the week ahead in order to establish his priorities. Mark Twain, already a world-famous humorist, tirelessly and nervously perfected the contents of an upcoming world tour before a small audience of intimates, as told in Richard Zacks's Chasing the Last Laugh. If Carnegie as salesman and Twain has proven wordsmith could discipline themselves to formulate a plan with which to go to the "plate" of their respective professions, who would not benefit from such a habit?
Between Chip and Chipper's outings this week, they not only demonstrated the importance of establishing a "when" to reflect on performance, but they showed a keen awareness of "who" can sharpen the acuity of self–reflection. Chip Gaines had his wife Joanna by his side as in the show he reviewed his performance in previous outings. In Theodore Rex, author Edmund Morris says that even as forceful a personality as Theodore Roosevelt could be disciplined in his expression simply by a particular kind of silence from his wife at his side, sense when he had said enough, and conclude his remarks. Chipper, knowing he was in a new setting where his skills and experience as a baseball player drew an audience but did not necessarily hone the ability to communicate with them, brought the co-author of his book in order to help him focus and refine his reflections. The co-author, for instance, prompted Chipper with a question about his "personal life" which allowed him to bring up his marital challenges candidly. In the earliest hours of his presidency brought on by the chaos of assassination, Theodore Rex reports that TR, whose wife was not yet by his side, could distinguish the voice of longtime mentor Elihu Root in the chatter around him and that Root's low-key guidance, familiar over time, steadied him as he faced new responsibilities.
The "when" can be blocked off on the calendar with the crucial and respected "who" in place, but reflection hasn't happened if the "what" is not received in honest humility. As husband and wife on Fixer Upper reviewed the show's highlights, Joanna pointed out to Chip that he often showed arrogance, and the format allowed her to present specific evidence of this habit. Lest he retreat to a false, murmuring version of counterfeit humility, she also pointed out instances where he could be equally unreasonable in rendering an unduly harsh verdict against himself. Counsel like this strengthens the sinews of established relationships because only people who know each other over time have the trust and perspective to point out opposite extremes. Without these, denial or reaction provide a shallow recourse that doesn't promote productive change.
Even the length of one baseball season can allow time for candid conversations, such as one Chipper Jones divulged with a long-time adversary against whom he hit particularly well. When by the caprices of baseball this guy became his teammate, Chipper explaned to him that he was delivering the same pitches with the same delivery, letting batterers know by the way he wound up what pitch to expect. This pitcher, Chipper says, took the information and made a big difference with small changes. Another teammate with more talent was not open to corrective counsel and went on to under-perform for most of his career before really considering that Chipper as a potential mentor might have been right.
Both were there, however unnatural there was. Both Chipper and Chip built in time to purposefully reflect. For Chipper, although this week's format may have been different and more daunting, a regimen that forced him to consider was not new. As a baseball player, he said, he woke up thinking about the day's starting pitcher he would face. Whether that pitcher was a daunting presentation of gangly arms and legs like the hard-throwing Randy Johnson or was a "rookie off the farm" Jones said he instilled the inviolate routine of reviewing the pitcher's last three starts on video in order to help him visualize his own performance. He used this time, he said, in order to develop a plan with which he would approach the plate. Although last week he was sitting with an author near home plate rather than approaching it from the left or the right batter's box, the discipline of insisting on time to think and reflect rather than rely on reaction was still intact.
How to Win Friends and Influence People predates Chipper, but it validates the discipline he was demonstrating. Author Dale Carnegie, without a reality show or a book contract, at least at the time, developed a Saturday night habit of charting out the week ahead in order to establish his priorities. Mark Twain, already a world-famous humorist, tirelessly and nervously perfected the contents of an upcoming world tour before a small audience of intimates, as told in Richard Zacks's Chasing the Last Laugh. If Carnegie as salesman and Twain has proven wordsmith could discipline themselves to formulate a plan with which to go to the "plate" of their respective professions, who would not benefit from such a habit?
Between Chip and Chipper's outings this week, they not only demonstrated the importance of establishing a "when" to reflect on performance, but they showed a keen awareness of "who" can sharpen the acuity of self–reflection. Chip Gaines had his wife Joanna by his side as in the show he reviewed his performance in previous outings. In Theodore Rex, author Edmund Morris says that even as forceful a personality as Theodore Roosevelt could be disciplined in his expression simply by a particular kind of silence from his wife at his side, sense when he had said enough, and conclude his remarks. Chipper, knowing he was in a new setting where his skills and experience as a baseball player drew an audience but did not necessarily hone the ability to communicate with them, brought the co-author of his book in order to help him focus and refine his reflections. The co-author, for instance, prompted Chipper with a question about his "personal life" which allowed him to bring up his marital challenges candidly. In the earliest hours of his presidency brought on by the chaos of assassination, Theodore Rex reports that TR, whose wife was not yet by his side, could distinguish the voice of longtime mentor Elihu Root in the chatter around him and that Root's low-key guidance, familiar over time, steadied him as he faced new responsibilities.
The "when" can be blocked off on the calendar with the crucial and respected "who" in place, but reflection hasn't happened if the "what" is not received in honest humility. As husband and wife on Fixer Upper reviewed the show's highlights, Joanna pointed out to Chip that he often showed arrogance, and the format allowed her to present specific evidence of this habit. Lest he retreat to a false, murmuring version of counterfeit humility, she also pointed out instances where he could be equally unreasonable in rendering an unduly harsh verdict against himself. Counsel like this strengthens the sinews of established relationships because only people who know each other over time have the trust and perspective to point out opposite extremes. Without these, denial or reaction provide a shallow recourse that doesn't promote productive change.
Even the length of one baseball season can allow time for candid conversations, such as one Chipper Jones divulged with a long-time adversary against whom he hit particularly well. When by the caprices of baseball this guy became his teammate, Chipper explaned to him that he was delivering the same pitches with the same delivery, letting batterers know by the way he wound up what pitch to expect. This pitcher, Chipper says, took the information and made a big difference with small changes. Another teammate with more talent was not open to corrective counsel and went on to under-perform for most of his career before really considering that Chipper as a potential mentor might have been right.
Somehow gratifying to see Carnegie's masterpiece cited here
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