The Fear of Success
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]‘When two teams are equally strong in technique, tactics and feel for the game, the team with the greater confidence is going to win.’
– (Sven-Goran Eriksson on football, 2002)[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]Ostensibly, top athletes seem to have everything they need in order to compete – two arms, two legs, fitness, ability, a brain each – so what is the difference between winning and losing. What is it that allows any athlete to produce world-class performances at certain times and to struggle at others? The answer is connected with that last item, the brain and what’s in it. What many top athletes lack is the winning attitude and they’re reluctant to listen to those who know it’s something you can manufacture and build up.
If you ask any serious athlete to what extent their mental state affects performances they all tell you a huge amount. 70%, 80% or even 90%. Nobody says less than 50%. Indeed, it’s widely accepted throughout world sport that the correct mental approach is crucial to performances. I think we all know this don’t we?
But if you then ask those same athletes what they do to prepare their minds for competition, most of them say nothing at all. Why? ‘Because nobody told me.’
Although motivated, ambitious athletes torture themselves with long hours of hard physical slog in the gym, pool, court or field in order to crank up their bodies to peak performance level they do little, if anything at all, to condition their minds for success.
This is a paradox because if athletes believe their mental attitude is responsible for at least half their performance then logic suggests they should be spending at least as much time working on their minds as their bodies. Indeed, there is no doubt they should. The world of sport is very sadly littered with the bodies of burnt-out, talented athletes who couldn’t find the mental strength to fulfil their amazing potential.
Mental training is the great broken link that must be fixed toute suite if you’re really interested in achieving great things and also, of course, if you wish to stay in contention with your more progressive rivals who know this already. It gives you the opportunity to be truly in the zone and to experience that beautiful state at will. When you’re in the zone you switch over to auto-pilot and your mind and body click into harmony. Everything feels right and everything is perfect. Everything flows easily and effortlessly and you feel a surge of purpose and strength. You feel amazing and at that fantastic moment your performance skyrockets and you go further than you have ever gone before. This is exactly what my method does for you. Not only does it improve the athlete’s performance level and help them achieve their full potential but it is absolutely certain that they cannot achieve their full potential without it.
Mental training should form an integral part of the regular, daily, training schedule of players and coaches who should understand that mental strength is built up on a regular basis in the same way as physical fitness. You don’t go to the gym once and declare yourself fit do you? In the same way, you don’t have a mental training session and say ‘That’s it! I’ve sorted my mind out.’
Also, just as athletes perform a physical warm-up routine prior to competition, they need a mental warm-up to drive out all negative thoughts and leave them feeling strong, confident and powerful with only positive thoughts flowing through their minds when they step out to perform.
Any athlete or team will instantly perform on a higher level when using the methods I have developed over the last twenty years or so. This is a fact. So why wouldn’t you do it? After all, the exercises are simple and pretty straightforward. They’re perfectly safe and highly effective. We know many athletes are affected by the scourge known as fear of failure. Maybe some are affected by a different scourge. The fear of success. If you really want success, you want to follow my mental training method. Promise. I’m not saying you’ll win every time but I am saying you’ll have a much better chance of winning every time.
Watch out for more from the UK’s top sports mental coach, Peter Gilmour, coming soon![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]