Total Recall: Arnold Schwarzeneggers Biography Critique - Essay Example

? Book Review Total Recall by Arnold Schwarzenegger Introduction This review paper aimsat discussing Arnold Schwarzenegger’s biography “Total Recall” and the concepts of sports psychology presented by the author in the book. For this reason, this paper would consist of a brief introduction to the book and the author, summary of the book, sports psychology concepts discussed in the book and personal reflection of perceptions that I associate with the book after reading it. 1.1. Book Total Recall: My Unbelievable True Life Story is an autobiography written by Arnold Schwarzenegger. In this book, the famous Terminator Saga’s lead actor turned politician and champion athlete from the past explains his life long story about his travel from an average Austrian citizen to becoming the Governor of California (Schwarzenegger, 1999). 1.2. Author Famous as Arnie amongst his social circle, Arnold Schwarzenegger was born on 30th July, 1947 in Thal, Austria. Arnold is a professional athlete associated with bodybuilding, artists, investor and a key political figure in United States of America. Up to date, Schwarzenegger has a number of awards on his name in the above mentioned fields and is now serving the residents of California as the elected governor of the state (Dave, 2008). Arnold started his bodybuilding career when he was just 15 years of age. When he reached to the age of 20 years, he achieved his first milestone, i.e. the award of Mr. Universe. Soon after winning Mr. Universe, Arnold achieved another milestone by winning Mr. Olympia contest, not once but seven times. He spent the golden years of his life his all his energies in achieving what he want from life and followed his dream by travelling to United States of America. The sporting physique he had, soon caught the eyes of producers in Hollywood and he was seen as perfect for in action movies. Terminator Saga became Arnold’s true identity throughout his career as an actor. In 2003, Arnold achieved another milestone in his life, by winning the state election of California by beating Gray Davis, the powerful democratic candidate from the state. The hard work, determination and courage that Schwarzenegger endured from his father and mother finally paid off well (Dave, 2008). 1.3. Book Summary The book starts with author explaining his childhood and career as a professional body builder. The first two hundred pages of the book contain the family life, academic life and initial years of Arnold’s professional life. Rest of the books contains Arnold’s perception of self-achievements and how he aimed at the success, that he enjoys in present days, only when he was a teenager in Austria. Total Recall: My Unbelievable True Life Story explains Arnold’s experiences in life in such a manner, that it inspires people that how one should struggle to follow his or her dreams and never lose hope on the course (Schwarzenegger, 1999). 2. Analysis This section of the review paper would discuss the key sports and exercise psychology concepts that are being discussed in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s biography “Total Recall: My Unbelievable True Life Story”. 2.1. Sports and Exercise Psychology Concepts 2.1.1. Burnout The concept of burnout implies a situation where an athlete feels physical and mental exhaustion from overtraining or one after another sporting events. But this is not essential that an athlete may exhaustion due to burnout, because there are other reasons such as athlete’s own perception of life and his behavior which is influenced by his personality traits. In this manner, burnout is a concept of sports psychology which extends way ahead of overtraining or increasing number of sporting events. Previously, scientists and researchers in the field of sports psychology has seen burnout as a resultant of stress, or failing to fulfill the commitment or even absence of motivation. Smith (1986) stated that cognitive-affective model is the best model to explain causes of burnout due to stress. Athletes may experience stress due to burnout in a situation where they lack in resources to properly train and may fall victim to burnout due to repeatedly perceiving that he or she may lack in required resources. Such a stress would highly de-motivate the athlete and result in partial burnout. Also, the physical and emotional exhaustion will also be noticed in the way athlete behaves towards certain events. But Raedeke (1997) believes that this is not necessary that the athlete may experience burnout due to stress, but the physical fatigue he is going through in training and sporting events may be the only cause of burnout (Moran, Walker, & Craig, 2011). Schmidt and Stein (1991) provide another viewpoint to burnout. These researchers view burnout as lack of commitment shown by the athlete towards t he preparations that are necessary before a sporting event and keep athletes warmed-up for sporting seasons. The model implies that the amount of time and money invested in the sports profession by an athlete, defines the level of commitment he or she possess towards sports. If the investments are high and return is low, the athlete may feel stuck in the profession and his motivation level will drop. These situations result in dropout as a result of physical and emotional exhaustion that they athlete may feel. In this sense, it can be inferred that the burnout is the resultant of extrinsic factors of motivation which deprives him to show higher level of commitment towards sports profession (Raedeke, Lunney, & Venables, 2002). 2.1.2. Personality Another area of interest in sports psychology that Arnold has emphasized on is the relationship between the personality traits of a person and his or her performance. The study of personality traits and its relationship with performance of the athletes helps in understanding the psychological variables of an athlete’s personality that hamper or boost the performance (Jones, Hanton, & Swain, 1994). Mental toughness of the athlete refers to the ability to push the lines in order to deliver high calibers of performance consistently. Athletes with mental toughness reflects inner confidence, i.e. strong belief in self while delivering on the sports field and becomes an unlimited source of motivation to achieve success. Additionally, athletes with mental toughness also possess sharp focus on their goals and objectives in life which reduce the disturbance caused by distraction from the external factors and composure under stressful and pressure situations on the sports field (Jones, Hanton, & Connaughton, 2002). Self-efficacy is another trait of sportsmen’s psychology which refers to the utter believes of the athlete in the fact, which he or she can perform well necessarily to achieve certain milestones in their lives (Weinberg & Gould, 2010). For example, if an athlete believes that he is able to break the records of Usain Bolt in sprint racing; such a confidence is referred to as self-efficacy. Arousal is another concept in the relationship between personality and performance of athletes which refers to the physiological and cognitive activation of athlete’s personality. Despite of the fact that there are very little known theories defining arousal, it is evident that there is a positive relationship between arousal and performance. Arousal, in true context, reflects gauge of athlete’s capability to perform, which can positively influence the performance of an athlete by motivating him or cause burnout or boredom if negatively perceived by the athlete (Anderson, 2000; Broadhurst, 1957). 2.1.3. Coaching Coaching is another dimension of sports psychology which revolves around a coach’s hard work in improving the technique of athletes which consequently results in improved performance. Moreover, coach’s also works on enabling the athletes to absorb pressure and keep themselves fit in tough sporting conditions. Coach’s also works on developing an environment in the surrounding which is known as motivational climate. This refers to the execution of exercise plan and create task-oriented and ego-oriented environment. Task orientation exercises aim at improving the techniques, skill sets, helping the athlete to determine and commit towards the goals and mastering the art of winning. On the other hand, ego-oriented exercises help the athlete to show superior ability to achieve milestones and ability to compete (Smith, Positive reinforcement, performance feedback, and performance enhancement, 2006). Then there is an effective coaching practice which provides the best possible tools for coaches to enable their athletes to deliver superior performance. By using effective coaching plans, coach or a trainer may improve the communication and reinforcement techniques of the athlete with the help of certain rewards on achieving milestones (Ames, 1992). 2.1.4. Goal Setting Goal setting is t he most important and foremost concept of sport psychology which refers to a planned process to achieve goals and objectives in a given time frame. Athletes uses goal setting to focus on the end result and prepare them to compete in order eliminate hindrance on the course of achieving end result. It should be kept in mind that the goals set by an athlete should be practical, achievable measureable, time-bounded and contains both long and short term goals on the way. It is evident in researches carried out in the past that goal setting reflects the best results attained by athletes and help them. It help sin improving the performance as it psychological keeps an athlete, conscious of the worst end results and good end results, which obviously compels the athlete to put his or her best efforts towards avoiding defeat or in competitiveness. Psychologists and scientists carrying out research in sports psychology believes that the short-term goals set by the athletes are actually the stimulators or motivators which compel the athlete to achieve the long term goal, thus working as a bridge between the athlete and success (Horn, 2008). Goal setting has also relationship with the personality traits of the athlete. From the research, it has been found that athletes with negative perception or fear of competing would have an m extrovert personality trait as they are more dependent on the extrinsic motivational factors. Similarly, confident and good performer would always believe on intrinsic factors of motivation as it provides him or her ever enduring self-confidence and ability to assess and rectify mistakes (Andersen, 2000). Goal setting helps athletes to prepare an action plan or road map which guides them through their career to achieve certain milestones like breaking records, establishing records or coach athletes in future that will achieve the milestones that highlight the hard work of the coach. Last but not the least, by having a roadmap in hand towards success, athletes also become aware of how and where to invest resources (Jarvis, 2006). 3. Personal Reflection This section of the review contains my personal perception of Arnold’s biography and the concepts presented within. Moreover, this section would contain my personal reflection on Sports Psychology course that I studied in the semester. 3.1. Personal Perception to the Book Total Recall: My Unbelievable True Life Story is story based on courage, determination and hard work towards achieving what you want in life. This story teaches that one should never give up on their dreams and keep on putting their best efforts towards fulfilling their desires and dreams. Instead of being a book containing personal biography, this book reflects the real incidents that Arnold saw as opportunities in life to count on and manipulate them into a success story. Though I m a fan of Arnold’s movie but I never knew much about Arnold’s personal lives and what he has been through to achieve what he have today. The best part of the book was the chapter containing Arnold’s story about his relationship with Maria Shriver. These two personal were completely opposite to each other and grew in the families completely distinct to each other. Where Arnold’s childhood was not as lavish as his counterparts, Maria had a wonderful and stable childhood. But Maria’s strength became Arnold’s strength and she helped her husband to become one of the most successful athlete, actor and politician in United States of America. From their relations, I learned that a perfect love bond can only be successful if both man and woman are ready to compromise and give their best efforts to be of help to each other. After all, a family can never survive without the key figures in the home and the relation between these two key figures, i.e. the husband and wife. Though, this book is a classic celebrity biography which keeps it readers interested till the last line of the book, there are certain sections of the book which I think were completely unnecessary to be discussed. Such as, the section in which Arnold discusses the purchase of First ever Humvee by him and he praises the act with psychological inadequacy, which seems to me a little vague to be discussed with special focus in an autobiography of a living legend. My personal opinion about the book is that it is a great book to be read by teenagers. This is because the lifelong experience of Arnold is a classic example of successful struggle in the history of mankind and motivates teenagers to organize their life in such a manner, that it provides them the means to put efforts to achieve success in their lives. 3.2. Relationship between the Book and Sports Psychology Total Recall: My Unbelievable True Life Story provides a complete insight into Arnold’s bodybuilding career and highlights the key factors of motivation that he endured to achieve the success he has today. From bodybuilding to gymnastic, from field games to fitness competition, Arnold’s biography is a tutorial for athletes all around the world. It teaches them how sense of urgency and internal motivation derives human towards achieving impossible milestones in their lives and gives them utter satisfaction what they achieve with their efforts. 3.3. Personal Perception to the Course After studying sports psychology, I have experienced that the course helped me to strengthen my ideas about how human behavior and perception of events affects his or her performance in professional life. The best thing about studying psychology and performance is that it equipped me with the knowledge of rehabilitation techniques from the injuries and mental fatigues that athletes face in their professional career. This course also helped me to understand that every individual in the sports profession needs a particular set of psychological stimulators according to their attitude and perception of events in life time. Last but not the least, the course also taught us how to help athletes to recover from the moral and emotional set-backs that athletes faces during the course of their professional life and what are the important factors that help coaches and trainers to define a tailored training and development program for sportsmen. Reference List Ames, C. (1992). Achievement goals, motivational climatAchievement goals, motivational climates and motivational processes. In C. G. Roberts, Motivation in sports excercise (pp. 161-176). IL: Human Kinetics. Andersen, M. B. (2000). Doing Sport Psychology. IL: Human Kinetics. Anderson, J. R. (2000). Cognitive psychology and its implications. NY: Worth. Broadhurst, P. L. (1957). Emotinally and the Yerkes-Dodson Law. Journal of Experimental Psychology , 54, 345-352. Dave, S. (2008). Arnie: Schwarzenegger and the Movies. London: I.B. Tauris. Horn, T. S. (2008). Advances in Sport Psychology. IL: Human Kinetics. Jarvis, M. (2006). Sport Psychology: A Student's Handbook. London: Routledge. Jones, G., Hanton, S., & Connaughton, D. (2002). What is this thing called mental toughness? An investigation with elite performers. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology , 14, 211-224. Jones, G., Hanton, S., & Swain, A. (1994). Intensity and interpretation of anxiety symptoms in elite and non-elite sports performers. Personality and Individual Differences , 17 (5), 657-663. Moran, A., Walker, G., & Craig, C. (2011). Sports and Excercise Psychology. NY: Sage. Raedeke, T. D. (1997). Is athelte burnout more than stress? 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