Different Seasons, Different Learning: Why Continuing to Train the Mind Matters for Life
Different seasons of life change how we learn, and we can learn from these changes to increase our success.
As children, learning is fast, exploratory, and often unconscious. We learned through trial and error and play. As adolescents and young adults, learning becomes more goal-directed and identity-shaping, think sports and life-skills. Later in life, learning requires greater intention, structure, and self-awareness. What once felt automatic may now demand deliberate effort.
This shift is not a flaw, it’s feedback, and feedback is useful for growth when we combine it with awareness.
Athletes who understand that learning changes across the lifespan gain a powerful advantage: they stop comparing themselves to who they used to be and start optimizing who they are now. More importantly, this awareness doesn’t stop at sport. It becomes a framework for growth in career, relationships, leadership, and health.
Learning as an Athlete Is Training for Life
Sport is one of the most effective classrooms for learning how to learn. Every time an athlete adapts to a new coach, system, rule set, or role, they are practicing:
Cognitive flexibility
Emotional regulation
Problem-solving under pressure
Identity adjustment
Interpersonal skill development
These skills do not disappear when sport ends. In fact, the athletes who continue to intentionally challenge themselves after competition, through movement, learning, and skill acquisition, often thrive in their post-sport lives. The skill development continues, it might look different, but it continues.
The key is continuing development, not clinging to past performance standards. Adaptation to developing needs should continue throughout life to maintain peak efficiency and productivity while developing new skills or strengthening old ones.
The Neuroscience of Lifelong Learning
Modern neuroscience strongly supports continued learning as a cornerstone of long-term brain health. As we get older, it is important to be aware about how learning new skills and continually developing old ones is a major key to long-term cognitive health.
Neuroplasticity: The Brain’s Ability to Adapt
Neuroplasticity, a rather major buzz word in the news in recent years, refers to the brain’s ability to reorganize itself by forming new neural connections. Contrary to old beliefs, plasticity does not end in childhood. It remains active throughout life, but it must be used through challenging yourself with novel ideas, tasks, or activities.
Complex, novel activities such as learning a new sport or physical skill, practicing or learning a musical instrument, learning (and using) a new language, and learning new ways to solve old problems force the brain to integrate motor control, attention, memory, timing, and emotional regulation. This multi-system engagement strengthens neural networks far more effectively than passive activities. This can pay dividends later in life when it comes to prolonging independence.
Neurogenesis: Creating New Brain Cells
Research shows that neurogenesis, which is the creation of new neurons, can also continue later into adulthood than previously assumed, particularly in the hippocampus, a region critical for learning and memory. Physical activity, skill acquisition, and cognitive challenge all play a role in supporting this process.
Sports that involve coordination, decision-making, and adaptability (rather than repetitive movement alone) appear especially beneficial. When physical training is paired with mental challenge, the brain is given a reason to keep growing. I am not one to quote movies in a blog post, but, “if you don’t use it, you lose it.”
Why Learning Feels Harder as an Adult and Why That’s a Good Sign
As responsibilities increase and recovery time changes, learning may feel slower or more frustrating. But effortful learning is often better learning.
Struggle signals engagement. Engagement drives adaptation. Adaptation leads to growth.
Athletes and adults who avoid discomfort in learning often stagnate. Those who embrace discomfort with structure and intention continue to build cognitive resilience. This same mindset applies to leadership roles, career transitions, parenting, and personal growth.
The question shifts from “Why isn’t this easy anymore?” to “How do I train effectively in this season?” This takes self-awareness, and if you have been reading these posts for awhile, you know that Self-Awareness is a big focus of mine.
Using Self-Awareness as a Competitive Advantage
Self-awareness is the key to fruitful and purposeful change, it allows you to:
Adjust your expectations without lowering your standards
Design smarter training and recovery strategies
Recognize when your identity needs to evolve or shift
Apply lessons from sport to life challenges, and from life to sport
This is where mental performance training becomes essential, not just for competition, but for sustainable growth. Learning to work through self-awareness and developing new tools and perspectives to continue growing is a key ingredient for continual success.
Beyond Sport: Training for the Long Game
Eventually, competition ends. Learning should not. Even after you hand up your cleates or skates, you still have a lifetime of learning, growth, and development. Every day brings new challenges and opportunities to grow.
Athletes who continue to move, learn, and challenge themselves maintain sharper cognition, stronger emotional regulation, and a deeper sense of purpose. The same habits that build consistency in sport, such as reflection, adaptability, discipline, and curiosity, build longevity in life. Their benefits translate directly to work, parenting, and maintaining friendships as adults.
Performance is not just about winning. It’s about staying capable, engaged, and growing, no matter the season.
Ready to Train for What Comes Next?
Mental performance training helps athletes and high performers adapt their mindset to new seasons in sport, career, and life. If you want to build self-awareness, maintain consistency, and continue developing long after the scoreboard stops keeping track, Peregrine Rising Mental Performance offers individualized coaching designed to help you train the mind for lifelong performance.
Growth doesn’t end when the season does. Let’s work together to build the skills that carry forward.
~ Dr. Tyler
References
Draganski, B., Gaser, C., Busch, V., Schuierer, G., Bogdahn, U., & May, A. (2004). Neuroplasticity: Changes in grey matter induced by training. Nature, 427(6972), 311–312. https://doi.org/10.1038/427311a
Erickson, K. I., Hillman, C. H., & Kramer, A. F. (2015). Physical activity, brain, and cognition. Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences, 4, 27–32. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cobeha.2015.01.005
Kempermann, G., Gage, F. H., Aigner, L., Song, H., Curtis, M. A., Thuret, S., … Frisén, J. (2018). Human adult neurogenesis: Evidence and remaining questions. Cell Stem Cell, 23(1), 25–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.stem.2018.04.004
Park, D. C., & Bischof, G. N. (2013). The aging mind: Neuroplasticity in response to cognitive training. Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, 15(1), 109–119.
Seidler, R. D., Bernard, J. A., Burutolu, T. B., Fling, B. W., Gordon, M. T., Gwin, J. T., & Lipps, D. B. (2010). Motor control and aging: Links to age-related brain structural, functional, and biochemical effects. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 34(5), 721–733. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2009.10.005
Voss, M. W., Nagamatsu, L. S., Liu-Ambrose, T., & Kramer, A. F. (2011). Exercise, brain, and cognition across the lifespan. Journal of Applied Physiology, 111(5), 1505–1513. https://doi.org/10.1152/japplphysiol.00210.2011