Now, before I get started here, I want to preface by saying, we all have some level of egomania within us obviously some more than others.
With that said, I'd like to address the "yes men" issue that runs rampant, I've been a victim of this myself, and it can be great for your ego yet terrible for your training, competing, and especially your total. When people are pumping your head up like a hot air balloon, it's up to you to sift through the bullshit and hold yourself accountable.
Self Accountability
We've all been there, take a rep and think to ourselves "that didn't feel right" only to have a person or even several people hit you with the barrage of typical yes man comments. That's a lengthy list, but we all know them, "smoked it bro" "smooth as fuck" "oh yea depth was all right." Now if you feel right off the bat that it wasn't good, chances are it wasn't, and we all need to learn to go off of that feeling and that feeling alone.
Family and Social Media
This is where it get's bad, you mix family, friends, coworkers, and even for some "fans," and that is when the ego takes over. Your family and friends who've never step in a squat rack or even un-racked a bench in their lives are going to tell you you're awesome and amazing.
These people are supposed to support you and say nice thing's, let's be honest you're ma's not going to get on your Facebook and say you cut that squat a little high Johnny, although that would be funny as fuck, it's not happening. I know seeing your ma proud of you sets fireworks off in your heart at the moment, but again does nothing to help you on the platform.
If you're "lucky" enough to have "fans" they to will blow smoke up your ass. Hell, I've seen fans entrenched in battle online defending their favorite lifters contested lift for hours on end.
This leaves the lifter getting caught up on the positive side of the argument, his/her lift was good, and that's one of the issues with a yes man, it'll change your thinking process of YOUR lifts negatively affecting your training.
Teammates and Training Partners
This one is the worst case scenario if shit is going bad with your training, and your "camp" is in your ear telling you your shitty lift is golden, that's just pouring salt in the wound, and that shit hurts.
Unfortunately, I've been on the receiving end of this and was too nieve to believe any different; I'd be a liar if I said I wasn't gassed up believing every positive word.
I was feeling like King fucking Kong for a couple of years until I started accepting the fact that some of these people in my ears weren't necessarily "haters" they may have in fact just have been addressing the problem in a voice that detoured me from even considering that it held some truth.
When in reality it was all on me at the end of the day I should have had more self-accountability. I learned a valuable lesson via the road of setbacks and false bravado, knowing now that I have to be responsible for me is one of the greatest lessons I've taken away from the "yes men" phenomenon.
The Asshole (The good guy)
Now, I'm no coach by any means but somehow some way I ended watching over a small crew of lifters. Most days I hate it, but as of late I hate to admit, but it's become something I enjoy. I've made a promise to myself that if someone else trusts me to "help" them, I'd never bullshit them, I rarely tell them they did a good job, I just don't see the good in it.
What does saying "good job you got your reps" achieve? Well, good fucking job you did what you're supposed to, what I have been doing is finding ANYTHING wrong and drilling them with that. I feel you learn more by hearing what you did wrong then receiving a pat on the back.
We need more assholes around telling people the truth, and mostly the people around you that you consider friends, family, training partners should be the first telling you that your shit sucks when it does. So when these little twirps come around kissing your ass so they can ride your coat tails remember how the song goes "no new friends" (Drake).
The Money Shot
You should build your crew to improve each other at all cost because when it's three judges six lights nine attempts the truth WILL come out, and all the attaboys in the world won't matter if you shit the bed on meet day.