“Find out what it means to me”
Aretha Franklin
One of the great privileges of doing this work is having the opportunity to meet and learn from others doing incredible work with young people. Recently, I had the pleasure of an online meeting with Dr Deborah Jump, a Criminologist at Manchester Metropolitan University and Deputy Director of Manchester for Youth Studies, to discuss young people and boxing.
GRIT uses boxing in a very specific way – it is non contact (meaning no sparring or fighting) and it is designed to embody the challenges young people face in their lives. They get to know what it physically feels like to put a boundary in place, to understand how to regulate their body and emotions, to use the support of people in their corner and to focus their mindset on facing adversity. This works very well for young people with anxiety and low mood. Often such young people struggle with esteem and confidence, taking too much responsibility for the wellbeing of others and people pleasing to avoid upsetting anyone.
To be able to stand in a boxing stance and physically feel your own power when you land a back hand punch on a pad or bag can be quite transformative to that young person.
Yet, more often than not, boxing is associated with those who may be expressing their distress through their behaviour or on the verge of criminal activity. It is cited as ‘teaching respect and discipline' and there are many examples of boxers who claim they were saved from a self-destructive path by boxing.
Unsurprisingly, GRIT gets a fair few referrals for young people who are being destructive in class or have been labelled as having "anger issues" as it would seem on the surface a good fit. However, this group of young people have particular areas of unmet needs and offering boxing may not necessarily be the best option. Often this group have been exposed to one of more Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), which can lead to trauma and hyper-vigilance.
Their brain and body physiology adapts to cope with increased threats in life, meaning they are more likely to see a seemingly innocent event as a threat and are then more likely to respond in a highly reactive manner. From her experience, Dr Jump recognises how much respect influences behaviour. When she has asked why the young person reacted as they did they often respond with “because they disrespected me” yet are unable to explain what respect really means. Often their experience of respect is that of another obeying the orders of someone else gained by intimidation and the threat of violence. Without getting underneath this more complex reason, boxing could simply be upskilling the young person in violent behaviour.
Respect often comes up as a core value when we explore values with young people and more often that not it is also a core value of schools. Yet so many of us fail to practice respect in its true form. If we don’t respect ourselves we run the risk of people pleasing and ignoring our owns needs. When we don’t respect others we run the risk of coming across as aggressive or intimidating. Either way it has a negative effect on communication and relationships and therefore limits our potential. Coaching is a fantastic base to explore this as the whole coaching relationship is non-judgemental and based on equality within that relationship. Boxing can also teach this when it is used in the right way and combining the two together is especially powerful as the young person can get to experience what it physically feels like to put in a healthy boundary and for those boundaries to be respected.
Respect is a value definitely worth exploring, for yourself, as a family, in your work life and also for society as a whole. Too often we can find ourselves feeling irritated or angry, knowing we have been disrespected but not truly understanding why. This can then shape our interactions in a negative way which could then stand in the way of reaching our goals. Back in 1967 when Aretha Franklin sang 'Respect', she said at the time, “It reflected the need of a nation, the need of the average man and woman in the street, the businessman, the mother, the fireman, the teacher - everyone wanted respect”.
Over half a century later the same sentence still reverberates today - perhaps it’s time to give ourselves and others the gift of respect.
