What kept Royce White outside the basketball court started with an anxiety disorder and, in my opinion, ended up with learned helplessness. This last illness happens when someone becomes conditioned to believe that a situation is unchangeable or inescapable. The fact of knowing that he has anxiety is scaring and collapsing Royce more than the actual mental disorder. I noticed that instead of pushing himself to succeed, the player is stuck and can’t move forward. He thinks that his illness is unchangeable and has stopped trying to recover from it. He is asking the team to work for him instead of him working for the team. I know it’s hard to have a disorder like that, and I’m not saying that it is easy to deal with it. But I think Royce should take it as an obstacle in his life which he has to overcome if he wants to achieve his dream of being a basketball player. If we pay attention to the documentary, in most cases he is using his disorder as an excuse. It’s not only affecting his career, it’s also affecting his environment. Nowadays there’s a lot of ways to deal with this type of disorder. The anxiety took control of Royce and made him feel scared and paranoid of what could happen to him. If the player tried hard, he could get over his anxiety problem. The feeling of overcoming a disease would make him feel prouder than the feeling of being responsible for not fighting against it. Do you agree or do you think that Royce is being mature by giving up from his dream because of his anxiety disorder?
Personally, I think that Royce is being immature by refusing to play in the NBA. It feels like he is using it as an excuse, and making the disorder his "crutch." I agree that this may be an example of learned helplessness, and that there are many things he could try to make his situation work- he needs to be less stubborn and be willing to make change on his end, rather than relying on the organization to agree to his terms.
ReplyDeleteI think after he handled working for the Rockets and unsuccessfully demanding the personal doctor, he did the right thing for himself. If he is unable to overcome his anxiety one way or another, I think he did the right thing by quitting for the sake of his health. If Royce had handled things differently in the past, this may not have been the right thing to do. But given what he did, I think he made a good choice by leaving the NBA.
ReplyDeleteI believe Royce White is being immature. I agree that he is using his disorder as an excuse. He is giving up on something he worked his entire life for, instead of trying to overcome the obstacles in his path.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with what is being said in this post, because while he does have a legitimate reason for his behaviors, he does not appear to be making an effort to improve his lifestyle, as you had mentioned. However, I don't think this is something he can completely overcome, so his dream of playing in the NBA may be slightly out of reach.
ReplyDeleteI think that if he really wanted to overcome his anxiety he would have sat down with the head coach and talked it out. Instead what he did was hide and just gave the coach a list of requirements to follow. To me this seems immature.
ReplyDeleteI do not think that White is being mature about this issue because he is giving up his dream for a problem that he can solve. I understand that he wants to stay true to his values, but to me, it seems like if he really loves basketball, then he would work harder to overcome his anxiety and play in the NBA.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your point. While anxiety is something that is difficult to overcome, there are ways to do so, even in the case of Royce White's generalized anxiety. But instead, he doesn't seem to do anything about it to improve and try to play in the NBA. Rather, it appears that he is using it as an excuse.
ReplyDeleteI don't necessarily think that he was immature about this because I feel that his choice of not playing was because he didn't feel supported enough to be able to play. His anxiety is something that affects him daily and I think that the whole situation gave him even more. I doubt he wanted to stop playing but I think that he may have lacked skills to be able to cope with his anxiety, which could be why it was so hard for him. I think that it was wise of him to quit because of his struggle with mental health, which was probably hard for him.
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