Self Confidence
When athletes feel confident, they can more readily turn sporting potential into superior performance. Conversely, when they feel unsure of themselves, the slightest setback or minor hurdle can affect their performance.
What is self-confidence?
Self-confidence is commonly defined as the sureness of feeling that you are equal to the task at hand. This sureness is characterised by absolute belief in ability. You may know someone whose self-belief has this unshakeable quality, whose ego resists even the most significant setbacks. In such people, confidence is as resilient as a squash ball: the more challenging the blow, the quicker they bounce back. Nonetheless, although confidence is a desirable characteristic, arrogance - or sureness of feeling not well-founded in one's ability - is undesirable. If self-confidence is perhaps the 'guardian angel of sports performers', then arrogance is their nemesis.
The six sources of self-confidence
The confidence an individual feels during a particular activity or situation is generally derived from one or more of the following six elements:
1. Performance accomplishments are the most substantial contributor to sports confidence. When you perform any skill successfully, you will generate confidence and be willing to attempt something slightly more complex. Skill learning should be a series of tasks that progress gradually and allow you to master each step before progressing on to the next. Personal success breeds confidence, while repeated personal failure diminishes it.
2. Being involved with the success of others can also significantly bolster your confidence, especially if you believe that the performer you are engaged with (e.g. a team-mate) closely matches your qualities or abilities. It evokes the reaction: "if they can do it, I can do it".
3. Verbal persuasion is a means of attempting to change the attitudes and behaviour of those around us, including changing their self-confidence. In sports, coaches often try to boost confidence by convincing athletes that the challenge ahead is within their capabilities: "I know you are a great player, so keep your head up and play hard". An athlete might reinforce this by repeating the message repeatedly to him or herself as a form of self-persuasion. A tip here is to avoid stating what you want in the negative; rather than " I don't want to come off second best" try "I really want to win this one". Accordingly, your mind will not need to consider what is not required to arrive at what is.
4. Imagery experiences involve athletes recreating multi-sensory images of successful performances in their minds. Through creating such mental representations, mastery of a particular task or set of circumstances is far more likely. What you see is what you get
5. Physiological states can reduce feelings of confidence through muscular tension, palpitations and butterflies in the stomach. The bodily sensations associated with competition must be perceived as facilitative to performance. This can be achieved by applying appropriate stress management interventions such as the "five breath technique" and "thought-stopping".
6. Emotional states are the ultimate source of self-confidence and relate to how you control the emotions associated with competition, such as excitement and anxiety. The importance of the occasion often creates self-doubt, which is why managing your thoughts and feelings is essential. Learning imagery and concentration skills such as those described in "the spotlight of excellence" (Exercise 2 below) will help.
Five exercises that will boost your self-confidence
Exercise 1: Confident situations and situations of doubt
To achieve a greater sense of stability in your confidence, it is necessary to know exactly what causes it to fluctuate. Divide a clean page into two columns. Label the first column 'High-confidence situations' and the second 'Low-confidence situations'.
Identifying the conditions that make you feel uneasy is the first step toward building greater self-confidence. In the first column, list all the situations or circumstances in your sport that make you feel completely confident. In the second column, list the problems or events that sometimes cause your confidence to diminish. We will return to these lists in some of the remaining exercises, but it should have just served to increase your awareness of areas that can be improved.
Exercise 2: The spotlight of excellence
This visualisation exercise recreates the mental state associated with past performance success and will help you in bridging the gap between your ability and confidence:
- Imagine a huge spotlight beaming down on the floor, one metre in front of you. The light beam is about a metre in diameter
- Think back to a time in your sporting career when you performed at the peak of your ability - perhaps using the first column from Exercise 1 to guide you. Each movement you made brought about a successful outcome, and everything just seemed to flow without much conscious effort
- Examine each of your five senses in a dissociated state (i.e. looking at yourself from the outside). See yourself inside the circle and excelling. Imagine what the 'you' inside the circle is seeing, hearing, feeling, and smelling. Notice the 'taste of success' in your mouth
- Now step into the spotlight and become entirely associated with experiencing events through your own eyes and in real-time. Again, notice what you are seeing, hearing, feeling, smelling and tasting
- Notice what this feels like so that you can reproduce it at will whenever your confidence is waning.
Exercise 3: Positive self-talk
Positive self-talk will affirm that you possess the skills, abilities, positive attitudes and beliefs that are the building blocks of success. The statements you choose need to be vivid, should roll off the tongue, and be practiced well in advance of the competition. Most of all, they must be believable. It would help if you used these, particularly in the low-confidence situations you identified in the second column of Exercise 1. Here are some examples to help you in composing your own:
- Boxer - I have fists of steel
- Basketball player (for free throws) - It is just me and the basket
- A defensive lineman in American football - No one is going to get through
- Hammer thrower - I am the king of the stingers
- Judo player - I am as strong as an ox
- Ski-jumper - My timing is always spot on
- Sprinter - Go on the B of the bang
- Striker in soccer - I will slot in every chance
Make your list of four or five positive self-statements and read them to yourself every night before you go to bed and every morning as you wake up. Through repeated use, they will become embedded in your subconscious and profoundly influence your sporting performance.
Exercise 4: Exploiting weaknesses in your opponent
Your opponent will harbour doubts and fears that they will try hard to hide from you. Like any human being, they are susceptible to anxiety, fatigue and indecision. If you spend time thinking about your opponents, focus upon which weaknesses and frailties you might most easily exploit. Here are some specific guidelines to help you:
- Study video footage of your opponents and analyse what most often causes things to go wrong for them. It may be that they cannot perform under certain conditions - such as Paula Radcliffe in the heat and humidity of the Athens Olympics - or a particular part of their game has a distinct weakness. For example, British tennis player Greg Rudeski was known to have a weak backhand that opponents would often seek to exploit
- If you play an individual sport that requires precision skills, such as snooker or golf, make a point of congratulating your opponent when they have a lucky stroke but say nothing when they are genuinely skilful
- In team sports, identify players who quickly wound up and determine what triggers them to see red. Italian defender Marco Materazzi used this technique in the final of the 2006 Football World Cup, albeit somewhat controversial. Materazzi allegedly uttered an insulting personal remark to French captain Zinedine Zidane who reacted badly. Zidane violently head-butted Materazzi and was immediately sent off as a result. Italy went on to win the match
- Some opponents will be highly perturbed by what they perceive as unfair refereeing decisions. Make a point of being friendly and respectful towards match officials and, in doing so, at a subconscious level at least, they are more likely to decide in your favour in any 50-50 calls
- When your opponent is having a good run of form, use tactics that slow the match down to break their flow. American tennis star John McEnroe was the undisputed master of this; his on-court rants even earned him the epithet 'SuperBrat'!
NB - you will notice that some of these techniques are entirely ethical and 'sportsmanlike' while others push the boundaries of fair play.
Exercise 5: Using the power of sound
Music has unique properties, including its ability to inspire, motivate and boost one's confidence. There are many tunes with inspirational lyrics or strong extra-musical associations that you can use to increase your confidence before the competition. Good examples include I Believe I Can Fly by R Kelly (62bpm), The Best by Tina Turner (104bpm) and Gold by Spandau Ballet (143bpm). You may like to try playing some tracks on your mp3 player as part of a pre-event routine. If you want to feel confident and keep your physiological arousal low, select tracks with a slow tempo (i.e. below 110bpm). Conversely, if you psych up, go for a higher rhythm (i.e. over 110bpm), and build up to a rhythm of over 150bpm just before competing.
Summary
This article should have convinced you that self-confidence is not solely in the hands of fate. Even when Lady Luck is not shining, you are the person responsible for determining how confident you feel in a sporting encounter. Ideas for promoting confidence range from the simple principles of understanding what causes confidence to wane visualisation techniques and positive self-talk. You have also learned how to adopt a 'can-do' attitude, exploit weaknesses in your opponents and use inspirational music to raise your game. The legendary American football coach Vince Lombard! once quipped.
'Confidence is contagious ... but so is a lack of confidence.'
Article Reference
The information on this page is adapted from Karageoghis (2007)[1] with Electric Word plc's kind permission.
References
- KARAGEORGHIS, C. (2007) Self Confidence in Sport - make your ego work for you. Peak Performance, 249, p. 1-4
Page Reference
If you quote information from this page in your work, then the reference for this page is:
- MACKENZIE, B. (2008) Self Confidence [WWW] Available from: https://www.brianmac.co.uk/selfcon.htm [Accessed