Coaching – to be insane

Recently, students asked me why I became a Sport Performance coach and what I am doing the whole day. That’s a very powerful question, it’s the question how I define my job and how I see myself. It’s not about the daily tasks I have to do, it’s more about a deeper meaning, the higher purpose of my job. Here comes my answer:

The daily job of a coach is not to tell young athletes everything they should know or do, but to excite them in their personal development and process of understanding, to help them develop an appetite for movements, knowing their own body, interact with others and to feel the beauty of sport.
I think we coaches have the possibility to create a wonderful world for young athletes to express themselves, to help them to find their own identity and their personal meaning or purpose.
Sometimes outsiders (non coaches) don’t understand the passion of a coach, can’t understand why coaches spend so much time in training.
I can only answer this with a quote of Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, the German philosopher:

And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.