Are you self-critical of your performance after losing or not performing to your potential? If so, believe me, you are not alone! It is a natural tendency to criticize your performance after a loss and dwell on every mistake, beware it is a big confidence buster.

You can overcome performance anxiety with these few tips. But first, ask yourself…

When thinking about your game do you:

• Focus on the mistakes you made?

• Can’t remember the good plays or shots

• Don’t feel satisfied even when you do well because you never perform up to your high standards

• Expect to perform perfectly and view less than perfect as a failure

Often times parents can play a role in that negative thinking or self talk. They usually are well meaning and want to help their kids to improve, but they can also contribute to a loss of confidence in sports in their efforts. Saying things like, ” How did you miss those easy passes?” can cause kids to develop a critical mindset

What can you do to avoid these confidence busters? Our goal is to help you build confidence with each performance, NOT tear it down.

Here are a few mental game strategies that can help:

  • Being Objective vs Subjective. Evaluate your performance based on objective true facts instead of subjective feelings. When athletes are subjective, their emotions take over, such as frustration and anger, and that’s when they can be the most self-critical.

By understanding the difference between objective and subjective you can manage your feelings and focus on improving your performance.

  • Cheelead yourself. Ask yourself, “How would you view your performance if you pretended to be the most positive coach in the world? What are some of the positive things a coach might tell you that would help make you feel satisfied or more confident?
  • Find the positives instead of mistakes. Don’t just focus on the plays, shots, or passes that got away from you. Ask yourself, “What are the things I did well in today’s competition?” Get some “height” from a teammate, parent, or coach to give you a positive perspective.

  • Focus on what you can improve on, not your shortcomings. Instead of thinking about all the reasons you failed or messed up in this past big match, think about what you can improve for the next game.

As an example, you could take “pretend” that the last 15 minutes of practice is a real game to practice being in pressure or stay an extra 15 minutes after practice to focus on your weakest area.

Talk to your coach and see if you can add some of your ideas into your next practice or do it on your own. Confidence will come from knowing you are working to improve your sports performance on the areas that will help you to be better in the next competition.

So if you’re tired of letting those feelings of stress and anxiety in sports performance hold you back…

performance anxietyOur Mental Toughness Training program is based on Craig Sigl, the Mental Toughness Trainer’s extensive one-on-one work with athletes across all sports and at every level over the last decade!

He has developed a program that will help you to more consistently compete at your best under pressure and help you overcome fears and blocks and perform to your potential!