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A Mental Toughness Trainers’ Biggest Mistake By An Athlete

Biggest Mistake By An Athlete, losing focus

Coach training female basketball player during practice in court

Before becoming the mental toughness trainer, I played a lot of sports, especially golf.  (I still do)

In addition, as I look back at what held me back (not just in sports, but in life), most it was this:  The need to control! (The opposite of trusting yourself and your skills.)

Remember the formula from last week’s blog? 

Performance = Potential – Interference

As I’ve mentioned in my trainings and teach other trainers, FEAR is the #1 interference to performing to ones potential, in competition as well as in life. And it takes surprising forms:

  • First, Fear of failure
  • Second, Fear of success
  • Third, Fear of disappointing others
  • Lastly, Fear of emotions

There is a “sub fear set” of those main fear set listed above, which we can call:

“Fear of loss of control” 

This fear occurs regularly with athletes. It gets triggered because of a belief program instilled in the unconscious mind that says: “If I can control things, then I can prevent the bad thing from happening.”

Also, this is directly opposed to what every good coach teaches you.. that you need to, “Trust your skills.” (Way to go coach/parent if you have preached this!)

In our R.A.C.E formula, this is the “A”.

The Awareness – needed to eliminate the kind of interference from your performance… Stay tuned for more on overcoming fear and finding your true potential. 

Let’s do this,

Craig Sigl, Mental Toughness Trainer

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