As an academic and applied sport and performance psychologist, I’m often asked how the individuals I work with, from many different performance backgrounds (i.e., athletes, coaches, dancers, business managers and students, to name but a few), can improve their performances on a regular basis. In response, I always emphasise that the skills, and they are skills, I work on with any individual are both mental and physical in nature. The brain-body link is important to establish from the beginning of any explanation of what sport and performance psychology is really all about. There is often a desire by some people to separate out these different skill types from each other, namely into mental skills and the physical skills, however, this is often not a great idea when it comes to trying to achieve a good performance. Why? Read on….
Despite increased interest in what I do in my role as a sport and performance psychologist, and indeed a greater demand for the work we practitioners also do, many people still consider our role to be one of just ‘motivating athletes and improving individuals’ confidence’. However, that view of our role is so narrow and misleading. The work really being carried out by well-trained, experienced and qualified individuals in our profession is much more concrete and diverse too. Logic should also tell us that ‘skills are skills’, that physical skills (running, passing, kicking, writing, playing music, painting, dancing etc.) cannot happen without mental input (in the form of concentration and coping skills), and vice versa, that such mental skills do not happen except in and using the physical body, the physical brain. However, logic does not remove stereotypes. Thankfully, education can and does now help people to really understand sport and performance psychology and what it is really all about. That is why I love my role as an educator, an academic, too.
Within society today there is also, and rightly, much focus being placed on mental and physical health. In many cases, the emphasises is again placed on either one or the other, namely mental health or physical health. However, in my applied work and in my academic settings too, I consider it very important to emphasise that ‘health is health’, and the frequent attempt to separate out the two (i.e., into physical versus / or mental), is not ideal in a practical sense. We physically do not leave our heads or brains on the side of the track/pitch/stage, or indeed outside of the office or classroom when we enter into those settings. Therefore, constantly separating out and referring to the two dimensions of health (and skills, as above) in isolation, as physical or mental, as if they are not interconnected, is not helpful in the majority of cases. Try to remember that the next time you do something that you typically do for ‘the good of your physical health’, such as going for a swim or doing some stretching exercises at the end of a long day. Consider the mental benefits of those actions too maybe the next time you do them? And vice versa, the next time you use a coping (mental) skill, such as engaging in some breathing exercises or listening (and maybe even singing-along) to your favourite song on the radio, consider how you feel physically as or after you have engaged in that activity too. That brain-body link will become very apparent to you then, I think.
Another key message I try to communicate with any individuals I work with is that perfection does not exist, mentally or physically. No person can be happy all the time, healthy all the time, flawless in performance, at any time! It is a message teachers, parents and coaches are also now communicating, to our young people especially, and that is a very good thing. A nice word to use instead of ‘perfection’, to encourage such young people I think, is excellence. Aiming for excellence allows us to strive for whatever is a ‘great’ performance on any one day (which may be just going for a walk, finishing a dance or calling a friend you have not spoken with in a long time). ‘Your excellence’ can always be self-determined – it leaves room for realistic evaluations of your actions, it enables better acceptance of the setbacks and failures that will happen on your journey toward those ‘personal best’ performance days. Setbacks and disappointing performances, or days, do and will happen. An important thing to remember is that those days are just as much a part of life as are the ‘successful’ days. They are the days we can learn a lot about ourselves too, indeed, they challenge us to be willing to learn even more about ourselves, those days! In life, there is so much we cannot control. How we respond to those setback days are inside our control. ‘Control the Controllables’, you often hear athletes, performers and coaches say in pre or post performance interviews. But what does that phrase really mean? What is inside your control? Well, the things inside your control are: your actions, your attitude, your behaviour and your effort. And what is not inside your control? …. Pretty much everything else! – with some examples being: other people’s actions, other people’s opinions, other people’s feelings and other people’s errors. So, my advice is to try to: ‘ACT’…. Accept the things you cannot control … Have the Courage to Change the things that you can ….. and ….. Train yourself to know the difference! Finally, remember too that being courageous at any time in your life is not when there is an absence of fear …. Rather, courage is often “being scared to death but saddling up anyway” (as John Wayne said). And it is sometimes that little voice in your head at the end of the day that says: “I’ll try again tomorrow”.
I hope you found these little pointers helpful 😊
#BeBrave #ExcellenceInAction
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