Have you caught yourself using repeating strategies in an attempt to encourage your female athlete to believe in herself, only to be unsuccessful?

Today, we’ll discuss “doing something new.”

Stop doing the same things and expecting different outcomes, especially when it comes to our daughter’s self-esteem. I’m going to share a technique with you today that will help your daughter believe in herself and recover from mistakes.

Here’s an in-depth look at the system I developed after years of training female athletes.

Doing Something Different

“You’re enough.”
“You have the abilities.”
“They chose you because you belong on this team.”

Those are the things we want our daughters to remember as female athletes. We want our daughters to believe in themselves. We want them to play confidently and enjoy themselves.

These are the pleasant things we usually say when things go wrong. It might sound right, but experiencing obstacles is an important part of your daughter’s athletic path. She is bound to make errors. She will feel pressure to be flawless. She is concerned about what other people are thinking. She will feel inadequate, and without the necessary mental skills to deal with these issues, your daughter might be stuck.

The majority of coaches are not taught how to teach the mental aspect of the game. As a result, we cannot rely on your daughter’s coach to handle this for her.

That is why I developed a method to assist athletes with the mental side of the game. I’m going to go into detail about one aspect of the process that is critical to your daughter’s self-confidence – overcoming mistakes.

The Unstoppable Athlete method

The method I’m referring to is known as the Unstoppable Athlete Method. It consists of three elements, each of which reinforces the others. As a result, when one aspect of the approach improves and expands, the others do as well.

Part #1: Overcoming Mistakes

The first part is overcoming mistakes.

It is important to understand how your athlete reacts to adversity. How does she deal with setbacks and mistakes? Does she punish herself after making a series of errors? Is she able to overcome her flaws?

One key indicator that your athlete doesn’t have a good way to navigate mistakes, is hesitation. They play it safe.

More indicators following hesitation include; being timid, being afraid, and making lots of mistakes. The anger and frustration that comes with the inability to overcome mistakes don’t just hurt the athlete, but also the parents.

And as hard as it is to watch, we also have to look at ourselves and ask, “Have I given her the skill to know how to overcome this?”

What you see on the outside is always a reflection of what’s happening inside.

When most athletes are in these situations, they are hoping that their physical preparation up to that point has been sufficient to prevent them from making mistakes. They simply believe that overcoming these barriers is beyond their power. They are at the mercy of this dismal thinking that they have no control, yet the truth is that they do.

They are completely in charge of themselves. If they have the necessary skills, they can opt to overcome their mistakes right away. They can be ready, and if they put their minds to it and have the necessary skills, they will know what to do. However, most athletes are unaware of this. So, as mothers, strive to assist her by providing a means for her to master these mental abilities.

Don’t try to fix it right away; it won’t work.

Why?

It’s because our brain’s primary function is to protect us. So, when your daughter is out there competing and making mistakes, she is suddenly thrust into this position in which she is not safe. The stress and worry will cause the brain to send out the “not safe” signal. When our brain sends that signal, the amygdala activates our sympathetic nervous system, which is the fight or flight reaction, causing our body to shake and make additional errors.

If this happens to your female athlete, that only means that her nervous system is dysregulated.

At that moment, nothing that you, her coach, or her teammates say is going to help her bounce back after a mistake. There’s nothing you can logically say at that moment to snap her out of it.

The only solution that works is training your daughter’s brain on how to deal with it. This is possible, but it has to be learned and practiced ahead of time. These skills have to be front-loaded so that when your athlete goes into these kinds of situations, she knows what to do.

Here are the five primary things your female athlete must learn to respond to these mistakes appropriately.

1. Having mistakes are necessary – She must have the skills herself to shift her mindset and view mistakes differently. Instead of treating mistakes as something bad, treat them as something that helps.
2. Have situational planning – Learning situational planning means that they’re preparing physically, but they’re also preparing mentally for those situations. They must know what situations trigger them. And they plan ahead of time.
3. Notice the signal – When our athletes start to become dysregulated in those moments, they can feel it in their bodies. So they go from being in this flow state where they’re not thinking very much, they’re feeling really good, they’re playing great. And then a shift happens. There will be patterns and triggers when this happens. The ability to be in the present and notice it will help them be more in control of their mind.
4. Breathwork – Let them practice habitual and intentional breathing to engage their parasympathetic nervous system. Athletes who know how to breathe properly can activate their parasympathetic nervous system which is the one that will calm them down and get them back into the flow state.
5. Having a snap-back routine – That’s what we call the routine that shows how your daughter should respond to mistakes. A specific practice routine to help regulate their nervous system at that moment.

When athletes compete at their best they’re in what we call a “flow state”, they’re in “the zone”.

They’ve gotten to a place where they’re not thinking too much. They’re just like in this awesome place and they’re just letting their body do what their body does. When this happens, there are a lot of neurotransmitters that are causing this to happen. Great things are happening to allow her to play in ” the zone” and in “the flow”. That’s where we want our daughters to be when they’re competing.

Part #2: Releasing The Pressure

The second part is releasing the pressure.

Many athletes put themselves under a lot of stress. They feel the strain of their sport, as well as the expectations of their coaches, teammates, and parents. However, some athletes add additional strain to the mix.

And if they don’t already know how to deal with the first layer of pressure, they’re not going to be able to deal with the strain they’re putting on themselves.

Part #3: Flipping The Negative Mindset

The third part of the method is flipping the negative mindset.

Our minds have a negative bias. Focusing on the negative is an evolutionary and biological response. But if our athletes are not aware of how their brains respond to situations and can’t adjust their thinking to be more productive, they will be locked in this negative mindset.

And a negative mind cannot produce positive results.

Bottomline:

Do things differently. Don’t keep on doing what you used to do, especially if the results are not good.

Remember the Unstoppable Athlete Method; Overcoming mistakes, releasing the pressure, and flipping the negative mindset.

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Helpful Links:

• Join our FREE training for Sports Moms – How To Strengthen Your Athlete Daughter’s Mental Game So She Believes In Herself As Much As You Do.

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