Confidence is a player’s belief in their ability to perform well in any situation, practice or game. Confidence is derived from a baseline assessment of past performances, training, and preparation. As competency or skill mastery grows, your confidence becomes proportionately stronger. In order for players to develop high levels of confidence, they must have a clear understanding of the factors that boost and undermine their confidence, such as high expectations. Confidence is a core mental game skill because of its importance and relationship to other mental skills. Harvey Dorfman (2005) describes confidence as a mindset based on tangible sources […]
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27
Nov
2012
Enhancing Self Confidence
08
Nov
2012
Sports Psychology and Mental Training
Most athletes are highly committed to excellence and seeing how far they can go in sports. They love competition and testing themselves against the best in their sport. They understand the importance of a positive attitude and mental toughness. These athletes want every possible advantage they can get including the mental edge over the competition. Sports Psychology is about improving your attitude and mental toughness to help you perform your best by identifying limiting beliefs and embracing a healthier philosophy about your sport. Mental training is used by elite athletes to help improve focus, confidence and deal with distractions. […]
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07
Nov
2012
The Key to Composure in Sports
The first step to improve your composure is to identify the mental breakdowns that cause you to lose emotional control in sports. For example, an athlete with very high expectations for his performance is likely to become easily frustrated, lose control emotionally, when he believes that those expectations are not being met. Below is a list of the top mental errors that can reduce your composure. 1. Perfectionism — When you don’t perform perfectly you lose composure because you become frustrated and then focus too much on your errors instead of the tasks needed to perform well. 2. Social […]
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05
Nov
2012
Common Mental Game Challenges for Athletes
One of the hallmarks of great athletes is the desire to improve themselves. Athletes at all levels use mental training and sports psychology to become better athletes, and overcome their mental game challenges. Mental training helps athletes perform more consistently, find the zone more often, keep a winning streak alive, and learn how to think well under pressure. The first step of mental training is to identify the need to improve your mental game. Often times athletes are unaware of the mental barriers the limit their performance, and how mental training can help them meet their athletic potential. The […]
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02
Nov
2012
Three Keys to Success in Sports
Three (must have) keys to success in sports are good instruction, practice and repetition, and most importantly – trust in your skills. Many people have a false assumption about learning a new technique such as throwing over the top, or staying on-top of the ball. Some coaches think that once they teach athletes a new technique the athlete should be able to apply it right away. Likewise, some athletes believe that they should be able to make adjustments in their game, and have it pay off right away. Change doesn’t happen overnight. When you expect change to happen overnight […]
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