Want to bounce back from the setbacks and find it easy to reach your goals? Try these six sports psychology techniques and develop your own winning streak.
1) Visualise past successes
The theory - Thinking about past wins can help you repeat your successes in the future, while reminding yourself of tough challenges you have overcome will reinforce exactly what you are capable of. Before an important race or match, athletes are encouraged to visualise their achievements and to make them as real as possible in their mind, says Dr Marc Jones, sports psychologist at Staffordshire University in the UK. They are told to imagine performing the task successfully and recall the excitement, satisfaction and confidence they felt when they won and what it would feel like again.
The practice - If you are delivering an important presentation for work, visit the venue beforehand if you can, says Dr Jones. Many athletes do this not only to get a feel for the place but also to imagine themselves performing successfully in that environment. Go one step further and in addition to imagining delivering the first few sentences of your talk successfully, imagine how pleased you are going to feel afterwards.
2) Make anxiety work for you
The theory - Anxiety does not have to be a negative factor says Dr Jones. “It can actually be positive and have a motivational effect,” he says. When athletes feel stressed just before a race, they release adrenaline and if it is harnessed in the right way, it will make them run faster and jump higher. Not letting anxiety get the better of you can be the key failure or success. “Butterflies in the stomach are good - they indicate you’ve switched into fight or flight mode,” says Paul Douglas, a former professional basketball player and England basketball coach. The secret is to stay, fight, and make anxiety work to your advantage. The danger, however, is becoming over aroused, says Douglas. When this happens, rather than being able to control stress and use it to your advantage, it overwhelms your body, causing your eyes to start twitching and your muscles to tighten. You need to adopt a method that puts you in a state of ‘tensed relaxation’ - “Not so relaxed that you do not care, but calm enough to deliver a peak performance,” says Douglas.
The practice - “The ability to handle pressure is vital to your success,” says fitness coach Sarah Maxwell, former hurdler and athletic coach. “You need to turn destructive energy into mental energy.” Maxwell sometimes calls upon a technique called ‘progressive relaxation’. This involves tensing and relaxing each muscle from your neck down to your feet. Tense the muscles while breathing in, hold for a few seconds and then relax on exhaling, she says. The aim is gradually to relax each muscle and bring your body into a state of alerted calm. “This technique develops a high degree of mental and physical control,” says Maxwell. Alternatively, why not take a tip from Douglas? “Before a game, I tell my players to think of something that puts a smile on their face, which automatically de-angsts them,” he says. It may be thinking of a partner and how enthusiastic they are every time they see you succeed. Have one ready to tap into at any time.
3) Talk to yourself
The theory - There are times when athletes need to turn their focus inwards to tune out distractions and make them mentally stronger, says Douglas. This is where self-talk comes into play. Find a mantra that spurs you on personally and keep repeating it until you believe it.
The Practice - “Staying focused with a mantra helps you approach difficult situations more optimistically,” says Douglas. In addition, according to Dr Jones, using a mantra can give you self-belief and help screen out distracting feelings of anger and frustrations.
4) Move on from mistakes
The theory - To aim for greatness, you have to make mistakes; you then recognise them and learn from them. When athletes have had a bad game or race, they analyse their performance, ask themselves where they went wrong and then pledge to resolve it.
The practice - “The secret is not to dwell on past mistakes or compare yourself with winners because you will embark on a mental downward spiral,” says Maxwell. Do not give yourself the luxury of making an issue of an error as that just makes the problem worse. Knock backs can dent your confidence. If you have been passed over for that much-wanted promotion at work, do not keep going over the interview - you will only find fault with what you said (or didn’t say) until you begin to doubt your abilities. Instead, move on, remind yourself you did the best you could and vow to come back stronger next time.
5) Learn to take direction
The theory - Athletes are taught not to close themselves off from constructive criticism because a critic may be commenting on something the athlete cannot see herself. Elite athletes would not have a chance of succeeding if they did not surrender themselves to being coachable and were not willing to take negative criticism. “Being open can encourage you to take risks you wouldn’t have taken otherwise,” says Douglas.
The practice - If you are not open to criticism, you will not learn anything. For those who find it hard to accept negative comments, Maxwell suggests you always ask your critic if they can fully explain their reasoning to you. That way you can evaluate whether they actually have a point, and if there is a nugget of truth in what they are saying that you are not willing to face. “Learn to coach yourself too,” says Dr Jones. “Athletes are perfectionists and do not want to mess up so they can be pretty honest with themselves when it is necessary, but it is important that they are honest in a constructive way.”
6) Set yourself precise targets
The Theory - Athletes are not just told they need to run faster and further before they win gold. They also need to improve their speed and distance by such and such a date and then work with their coach on reaching that goal. Furthermore, athletes set targets for each training session, season and year. “Goal setting is important for athletes as it doesn’t allow them to drift in their thinking - it gives them a focus and structure and can change motivation in training,” says Jones. This puts them on track for the bigger picture.
The practice - Keep your targets short-term and precise and review them regularly. You want them to stretch you but not overstrain you. One of the main reasons for demotivation is that people set themselves unachievable goals with unrealistic deadlines, she says. When these goals do not come to fruition in a couple of weeks, they start losing interest.
For instance, if you want more money (who doesn’t) set yourself realistic deadlines. Rather than just asking for a pay rise, aim to make the money. Next, aim to pay off one of your credit cards in the next six months. This will spur you on to make a better money decision for life. “Setting goals is a tried and tested method to reach targets that may, at first, seem unattainable,” says Douglas, but they help lay the foundation of your life.