We, at the Mental Toughness Academy, want to support girls in sports and those girls owning their power! Today, we have a guest post from Dr. Andrea Corn, a sports psychologist and Ethan Skolnick, a sports columnist to give us some insights into the minds of female athletes they have worked with.

As a child growing up outside of Pittsburgh in the 1980s and 1990s, Swin Cash wasn’t that different from the boys of that time:

She idolized Michael Jordan. Not only did she idolized him, she imitated him.

“I remember him having these fierce, competitive eyes,” she said recently. “I was like, man, he’s crazy on the court. That’s one of the things that I wanted to grab for myself, the intensity that you had to have.”

She has displayed that intensity in whatever she did, whether in school plays or as a cheerleader or as a rising star on the court, and her basketball prowess became more pronounced with every passing year — from youth leagues to high school to the University of Connecticut to the pros.

She’s an Olympic gold medalist with the U.S. Olympic team, two NCAA championships for UConn and a WNBA title with the Detroit Shock.

At no point has she felt the need to apologize for her competitive nature, and yet she realizes that, sometimes, girls feel uncomfortable showing they care about succeeding in sports.

“For boys, it’s expected,” Cash said. “But if you look at it, intensity isn’t based on your gender. If we can get girls to realize that if they want to be cute and have a ponytail and wear a little bit of makeup, I do those things when I play as well. What is about the outcome? But it’s about the outcome, and how you play the game.”

That sort of attitude inspired the 1972 legislation called Title IX, which leveled the playing field for male and female athletes, giving the latter more of an opportunity to enjoy, and enrich themselves, through sports.

That landmark law is certain to receive increased attention this summer, due to the “Nine for IX” documentary series airing on ESPN and its sister networks.

sports for girls

When collaborating on our book, “Raising Your Game: Over 100 Accomplished Athletes Help You Guide Your Girls and Boys Through Sports” we recognized the increased interest that girls now have in sports, and the unique challenges that come with it.

That is why we included prominent current and former female athletes on our interview list, to share their childhood anecdotes and adult insights with Moms – as well as Dads, Grandmas, Grandpas, Aunts, Uncles and coaches – everywhere.

A couple of universal lessons stood above the rest:

1. Make sure it’s fun first, without making the child feel cornered into playing sports. Make sure the child believes you are in his or her corner, showing your support by showing up and showing interest but also showing restraint.

Related to girls specifically, another message came through clearly, especially through interviews with the elite likes of Karrie Webb (golf), Mary Joe Fernandez (tennis), Sanya Richards-Ross (track), Julie Foudy and Brandi Chastain (soccer) and others.

That message?

It’s the one that Cash earlier expressed: that girls should know that it’s just as normal and healthy for them to participate and compete, as it has always been for boys. Some girls may be reluctant to enter sports, because they have heard it’s not “girly,” or because they’re shy or awkward or even a bit overweight.

2. Adults need to help them shed the stigma, and their fears.

“We are building you as a young person, like young boys have been able to build themselves as a long time,” Chastain said of the role of sports. “And the byproduct of that is a girl is going to feel good about the things they do, and that is going to carry over into other things in their life.”

Webb accompanied her grandparents to the golf course when only four years old, whacking the ball with her plastic clubs. Fernandez slammed tennis balls against her refrigerator and bedroom wall. Richards-Ross ran for fun, until she realized she was good at it: “Then I wanted to train and get better.”

Foudy was already driven in school when, in recess, she found this fun thing called soccer. “I liked being active, I think,” Foudy said. “I was really hyper and social. So it brought those two elements together. It was physically demanding and you were surrounded by teammates. I loved being competitive, and it was kind of an outlet for me where I wasn’t being looked upon as a freak.”

Still, Foudy — the former World Cup captain — fully recognizes that some girls find themselves in a challenging spot, “to come to grips with being competitive” in a society that typically reserves those expectations for boys.

Through the Julie Foudy Leadership Academy, she de-emphasizes the more destructive elements of youth sports (notably, parents living vicariously through children), while trying to teach the girls how sports participation can assist in them “finding their voices and becoming stronger women.

To be OK with who you are, to understand that we don’t all have to look the same or be the same – that is OK.

You can be different and that is good.” That is true whether in comparison to the girls who play sports, or to the girls who don’t.

Authors

sports for girlsEthan J. Skolnick is a longtime sports columnist who covers the Miami Heat at home and on the road for the Palm Beach Post. He appears regularly from 1 to 3 p.m. onThe Ticket Miami radio show (790AM, 104.3 FM).

sports for girlsDr. Andrea Corn is a licensed psychologist and has published articles and presented on various youth sport and parenting topics.

Tap here to purchase their book, Raising Your Game: Over 100 Accomplished Athletes Help Guide Your Girls and Boys Through Sports.