Why don't people listen: the art of coaching.

You’ve seen it happen. A doctor tells a patient to exercise more. The patient nods. Nothing changes. A coach pushes an athlete harder. The athlete quits. A manager demands more output. The team burns out.

What is going on?

I see this everyday with the people I meet. The instinct is always to push. But push too hard and something breaks. Not enough and nothing moves.

Psychologists call it reactance.

When people sense their autonomy is threatened, they don’t just resist. They rebel. The harder you push, the harder they push back.

But here’s the paradox.

Without pressure, there is no growth. No challenge means no change. The athlete who is never pushed stays exactly where they are.

The answer lies in what sports psychologists call the challenge-support matrix. Too much challenge without support creates anxiety.

Too much support without challenge creates complacency. The sweet spot sits precisely where both meet.

Therefore, the best coaches don’t motivate through force. They create conditions where people motivate themselves.

In psychology, this is Self-Determination Theory. Humans need three things to sustain effort. The feeling of autonomy (feeling in control), the feeling of competence (feeling capable), and the feeling of connection (feeling understood).

Push in a way that threatens autonomy and you trigger reactance. Push in a way that builds competence, and you build momentum.

The same principle governs preventive healthcare.

Tell someone to change their diet, and they feel judged. Help them understand why their bodies respond the way it does, and they feel empowered.

One approach demands compliance. The other invites ownership.

The greatest skill in managing people isn’t knowing how hard to push. It’s knowing when to step back and let them pull themselves forward.

Sometimes the most powerful intervention is silence. A pause. A question instead of an instruction.

Your nervous system knows this instinctively. Pressure that feels like support creates activation. Pressure that feels like control creates shutdown.

The art isn’t in the force you apply.

It’s in the space you leave.

Reach out to me on twitter @rbawri Instagram @riteshbawriofficial and YouTube at www.youtube.com/breatheagain