The Growth Mindset
For the next three weeks the Growth Mindset will be focused on the Mental Performance skill of Self-Talk. This is the lead up to the release of our Self-talk curriculum in late May.
Part 1:
What is Self-Talk and how can it help unlock Peak Performance?
Self-talk is arguably the most important mental skill for everyone on the planet to master. Over the course of a normal day, the average human gives themselves between 40,000 and 60,000 messages and for the majority, up to 80% of these messages have a negative tone. What makes this worse is that negative messages have a more profound impact. Negative self-talk can be 40 to 70 times more impactful than the positive messages that we give ourselves. Our self-talk is probably the single most powerful factor in how we view the world. Making self-talk even more important is how humans handle stressful situations. When faced with stressful, high pressure situations, it is our nature to turn inward to solve problems. When coupled with negative self-talk this can really derail the performance of any athlete.
Negative self-talk also generates negative momentum and can lead people to fixate and focus on one aspect of their lives that is not going the way they want it to. This means that the majority of thoughts are focused on what is going wrong and it is very difficult for athletes to see anything positive. For an athlete, this can start with them making an error, they then compound the mistake by providing themselves a negative message. Perhaps then the referee makes a bad call they don’t agree with and that leads to more negative thoughts. The train to negativity is leaving the station and picking up steam. Trains are powerful and take a long time to stop. The same is true for negative self-talk. Eventually, it will begin to have a detrimental impact on the athlete’s physical performance.
Another important challenge comes from the fact that our brains and bodies take action on those messages. This is called the law of ironic errors. The human brain processes the most dominant emotion before any others. When an athlete at the free throw line tells themselves to not miss their brain will act on the fear of failure and the result is often failure and a missed free throw. Therefore, negative self-talk becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
There are four primary types of self-talk that athletes utilize:
1.) Instructional- Reminders of instructional cues to help succeed ie: drive through the ball
2.) Motivational- Attempts to motivate oneself to improve performance ie: you got this, let’s go!
3.) Focus- Talk to help the athlete focus or refocus on their task ie: one step at a time
4.) Calming- Help to regulate Arousal/ Anxiety in competition ie: This is just another race, take a deep breath.
These all can be either positive or negative and they will impact the athlete accordingly. The athlete who is primarily
When athletes can recognize and control their Self-Talk it helps them perform at a higher level. Changing negative Self-Talk to positive or even neutral can significantly improve performance. Some key benefits to improved Self-Talk include which can help them perform at their best include:
Improved Self-confidence: If negative self-talk erodes self-confidence and can create it’s own momentum then it stands to reason that positive self-talk can have the exact same impact. The more positive message athletes can give themselves the better the will feel.
Improved Self-Efficacy: Positive Self-Talk helps athletes believe that they are capable of succeeding at the task at hand. An athlete who tells themselves that they are going to fail, likely will get their wish. On the other hand, one who tells provides themselves with positive messages is more prone to succeed.
Improved Motor Skill Performance: A study conducted found that participants were 12% more likely to hit a free throw when they provided themselves with a positive message instead of a negative one. That is a huge boost and has been found consistently across other sports whether it is putting a ball in golf, or serving a ball in volleyball. Athletes who tell themselves something positive prior to executing a skill fare better.
Self-Talk is a key component of peak performance. Flow states are when athletes are able to perform at their very best and they do not tend to occur when athletes are stuck in negativity. Negative self-talk has been shown to be a serious impediment to athletes achieving flow states. Negative self-talk will impact the athlete and their ability to experience a flow state. It tends to undermine the athlete by taking away their sense of control. It can also make the athlete question whether they can be successful. Both of these are key characteristic to experience a flow state. More recent examinations of flow states has found that persevering through hardship and distraction is a key component of helping access a flow state. Negative Self-Talk is going to impact the athletes ability to be resilient and prevent them from playing through early struggles to unlock a great performance. How many times has Stephen Curry overcome a cold start to catch fire later in the game. Steph’s confidence is unshakeable in part because the messages he gives himself help him navigate the ups and downs of performance.
Self-Talk Curriculum
Our curriculum for coaches to help them teach the skill of Self-talk will be releasing soon and will include the following:
- Background information and rationale for coaches
- Teaching materials for delivery of lessons to athletes
- Resources for athletes to analysis and examine their habits around self-talk
- Techniques for athletes to utilize self-talk in practice and in competition.
- Ways for coaches to embed the awareness of self-talk across their program.
Extra Resources
There are some great resources to learn more about Self-Talk. The best and most recent one is Chatter by Ethan Kross. It is a real in depth look at how Self-Talk impacts our lives. The book is available here: https://amzn.to/3u3CqoO
