Much of my business happens as a result of parents, agents, coaches or others calling when a player is struggling with “confidence” or “they don’t know why he/she is not playing well.”
I am happy to help these players – the stakes can be high if the player is in a contract year, the player plays a key role on the team, or the player could lose “status” if they don’t hit targets.
But, this is currently the problem in high performance sports – I get the call too late in the game
Much of the mental/emotional development/Sport Psychology business is reactive. The phone rings, there’s a problem and you are asked to help and fix it.
If parents, agents, coaches and others were to take a proactive approach to mental/emotional development, the athlete could develop complementary “fundamentals” to complement their physical skills. This would alleviate the “distress” calls made later for those that have great physical skills but lack the mental/emotional fundamentals to support it – and therefore underachieve
Similar to technical and physical development in a sport, mental/emotional development is a process – developed in the early years with mental/emotional fundamental education and developed over time until the athlete is able to establish independence and self-correct. The mental/emotional fundamentals, if built to complement the technical and physical development, help to create a consistent athlete who can sustain performance.
If you are a parent, agent, coach or another supporting athletes, be proactive in helping your athlete build mental/emotional fundamentals early in their career. Building these fundamentals will lead to a self-aware, confident and self-reliant athlete helping to create sustainable, consistent results over time – and a complementary skillset to physical ability.
Please remember that this is also an investment in the athlete, as the skillset is transferable to everything they will do in life – business, career, relationships and any other “performance” activity they will engage in. Consider it an investment in the future.