Mental Toughness

This article was written by Lindsey Wilson. Lindsey is the Co-Founder of Positive Performance Mental Training Zone. Lindsey played basketball at Iowa State and then played professionally overseas. She has been teaching, writing and speaking about mental training for the last 6 years.

Take Control of Your Mind

by Lindsey Wilson

There are those who are brave, and then there are those who are BRAVR™.

The BRAVR™ Goal

We developed this focusing technique to give coaches and athletes a more defined path toward achieving their goals. Through BRAVR™, athletes and coaches alike can manifest their dreams into reality through a process that “resets” the brain and prepares the mind and body for optimum performance.

The Coach’s Role

Encourage players to use all five components of the BRAVR™ Method.

• Remind them to breathe properly and deeply.
• Help them to identify negativities that are holding them back, and to blow them out when they exhale.
• Remind them to say their positive affirmation every day, out loud! If they have trouble coming up with an affirmation, come up with one together.
• Assure they visualize themselves succeeding using all their senses. Go through each sense individually to bring the whole picture together. Can they see the opponents’ uniform colors? Smell the sweat? Hear the sound of sneakers squeaking on the court?
• Come up with a reset word that both describes and inspires them. Learn your players’ reset words and use them to encourage them during practice and during games when you see they are mentally struggling.

Use the BRAVR™ Method on yourself.

Even though coaches are the most neglected members of the team, they require just as much mental training and preparation as any player. Get yourself performing at your best – get in focus with positive thinking and proper breathing – and you’ll be better able to pass that confidence along to your athletes.

Do BRAVR™ as a team.

It doesn’t take a lot of time and is so easy it can be done alongside most pre-existing routines, like pre-practice stretching, water breaks, and cool downs.

Immediate Improvement

Many of our clients report that the first 20-minutes of practice drastically improves after implementing this five-minute pre-practice routine. Giving your team an opportunity to get their minds centered, focus on practice, visualize what they want to achieve, and let go of any unproductive thoughts and emotions is the most productive use of 300 seconds that we know of.

BRAVR™ Quick Start:

After telling your team why you’re doing this pre-practice routine (there may be considerable eye-rolling, but just ignore that; your team will notice a difference almost immediately!), start the BRAVR Method by reading off these instructions to your team:

• Breathe. Close your eyes and take five deep, long belly breaths. Count six seconds in, and six seconds out.
• Release. Let go of all unproductive thoughts, emotions, and all those things that don’t serve a purpose at the moment: self-doubt, worry, fear, or even feelings of silliness. Focus strictly on breathing.
• Affirm. States your personal sports-related affirmation quietly to yourself.
• Visualize. Visualize that affirmation as if it is happening right now. (Again, it’s important to use all five senses in imagining your affirmation becoming reality.)
• Reset word. Say your one- or two-word reset word quietly to yourself at the top of every breath and at the end of your visualization. This will also serve as your tool to get back into a relaxed and focused state (For example: during a break in a competition, take a deep breath, say your Reset word, and get your mind back to where you want it.)
• Final Breath. Take one final long, deep belly breath, six seconds in, six seconds out. Open your eyes and start playing!

You can download the Positive Performance BRAVR Quick Start Guide at this link: BRAVR Quick Start Guide

Print it out. Use it at your next practice. Take it with you on the road. Put it in your gym bag. Post it in the locker room. Put this technique to work for you wherever you and your athletes might need to take a few minutes to reset and get BRAVR.

This article was written by Lindsey Wilson. Lindsey is the Co-Founder of Positive Performance Mental Training Zone. Lindsey played basketball at Iowa State and then played professionally overseas.  She has been teaching, writing and speaking about mental training for the last 6 years. As a former collegiate and professional basketball player, Lindsey now takes her passion for mental training to thousands of young athletes and to universities in the Pac12, SEC, ACC, and beyond.

The Truth About Positive Self-Talk

By Lindsey Wilson

There’s a lot out there about positivity and the importance of having a positive mindset: talking to yourself positively, talking to your kids positively, even talking to your pets positively. (Groan… Yes, it’s a thing!)

All this positivity can be a bit much.

And that’s saying a lot, especially coming from someone like me who’s a BIG believer in the power of the glass-is-half-full mentality. The complication with positivity is that it can be hard to distinguish what is actually helpful and what is just, well, fluff.

That’s why I want to talk specifically about self-talk today because, in my opinion, self-talk serves as the basis for so many things in our lives: our beliefs, our outlook, our confidence, how we interact with others, and much, much more. But, I don’t just want to talk about self-talk alone; I also want to dive into the research behind it to make sure this isn’t just another ‘positive self-talk is great’ article. Yay!

Seeing as our focus is athletics, I want to specifically analyze the research looking into the relationship between self-talk and performance. Basically, my big question is:

Is teaching athletes positive self-talk worth it?

So, here we go! This is what I found:

• Positive self-talk can improve confidence.
• Positive self-talk does positively affect performance.
• Self-talk effects motor skill performance more than cognitive performance.
• Self-talk is best scripted ahead of time and practiced.
• Research shows there are differences in what type of statements you should say at different times, but…
• What works for each person is fundamentally a matter of personal preference.
• Addressing yourself by name or ‘you’ is found to be more powerful than ‘I’ statements.
• Self-talk should focus on what you should do rather than what you should not do.

First, before we can talk about self-talk in depth, we need to establish a solid definition. More specifically, we need to be able to answer the following questions:

1. What IS self-talk?
2. What different types of self-talk are there?
3. Are there types that are more helpful in certain situations than others?

These questions get really specific, really fast, so let’s start with a basic overview of self-talk and go from there.

Defining Self-Talk

The Mayo Clinic defines self-talk as “the endless stream of unspoken thoughts that run through your head… [that] can be positive or negative.” Furthermore, “[i]f your thoughts are mostly positive, you’re likely an optimist — someone who practices positive thinking.”

Positive thinking, therefore, is the result of positive self-talk, and those can offer multiple health benefits, such as increased life span and increased immunity.

The Mayo Clinic then gives us examples of both positive and negative self-talk:

Putting Positive Thinking Into Practice

Negative self-talk	Positive Self Talk
I’ve never done it before.	It’s an opportunity to learn something new.
It’s too complicated.	I’ll tackle it from a different angle.
I don’t have the resources.	Necessity is the mother of invention.
I’m too lazy to get this done.	I wasn’t able to fit it into my schedule, but I can re-examine some priorities.
There’s no way it will work.	I can try to make it work.
It’s too radical a change.	Let’s take a chance.
No one bothers to communicate with me.	I’ll see if I can open the channels of communication.
I’m not going to get any better at this.	I’ll give it another try.

The Mayo’s cover-all rule: “Don’t say anything to yourself that you wouldn’t say to anyone else.”

Simple enough right? Not so fast. Let’s dive into this a little deeper…

TYPES Of SELF-TALK

Research shows there are 4 specific categories of performance-based self-talk:

• Calming/relaxing (“Take a deep breath.”)
• Instructional (“Bend your knees.”)
• Motivational (“Yes! Come on, let’s go!”)
• Focus (“Don’t think about anything. Just concentrate.”)

This list got me paying attention. Why? Because these categories are all so different. Even for myself, I can see one type of statement working in a certain situation and not working in another. (Leaving the research aside for a moment, this is where I encourage athletes to build up self-awareness and to practice what works with some trial and error.)

But, back to the research…

WHAT TO SAY, WHEN

In Perspectives on Psychological Science[i], a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, researchers at the University of Thessaly did a meta-analysis on 62 research studies on self-talk. Their analysis revealed that, not only did self-talk improve sports performance, but different self-talk cues work differently in certain situations.

Here is what they found:

• • Instructional self-talk (i.e. “Elbow-up”) is most helpful for tasks requiring fine skills or for improving technique.

Motivational self-talk (i.e. “Give it your all”) seems to be more effective in tasks requiring strength or endurance, boosting confidence and psyching-up athletes for competition.

It is a matter of personal preference or what works for each person; but generally, it is advised that self-talk is positively rather than negatively phrased and focuses on what you should do rather than on what you should avoid…”
Antonis Hatzigeorgiadis, researcher at the University of Thessaly

A SMALL TRICK

According to an article in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology[ii], a researcher by the name of Kross and his associates at the University of Michigan did an experiment with one small caveat: participants would either use the word ‘I’ or ‘You/[their name]’ when addressing themselves with their self-talk.

This is what the experiment looked like:

Kross asked volunteers to give a speech. Catch: they were only given five minutes of mental preparation. During the five minutes, he told some to talk to themselves and to address themselves as ‘I’. For the rest of them, their five minutes was spent using ‘you’ or by addressing themselves in the third person (using their own names).

At the close of the study, this is what Kross found:

• People who used ‘I’ said things like ‘Oh, my god, how am I going do this? I can’t prepare a speech in five minutes without notes. It takes days for me to prepare a speech!’
• People who used ‘you’ or their own names said things like, “Ethan, you can do this. You’ve given a ton of speeches before.”

Positive self-talk effects your everyday life.  Clearly, the people who used ‘you’ or their names sounded more rational and less emotional—perhaps because they were able to get some distance from themselves.

Truly, it sounds like they are coaching themselves.

SELF-TALK CAN INFLUENCE RESULTS!

Research done out of Waseda University in Japan[iii] shows again that motor skills especially are greatly affected by self-talk. The results of their research show that positive self-talk improved physical performance by 11%.

Their research was based around a simple balancing exercise. Students completed the exercise then were given 30 seconds to rest before completing it a second time. In between the sets, students were told to pay attention to their self-talk. Some students reported having negative self talk; others reported positive self-talk; still another group reported using a combination of positive and negative self-talk.

The results were shocking.

Students that reported using positive self-talk exclusively during those 30 seconds were able to hold their balance a full second longer than those who used exclusively negative or had a mix of both negative and positive self-talk.

The positive self-talk resulted in an average balance time of 9.29 seconds, while the other two groups averaged out at 8.29 seconds. This is more than an 11% increase in performance, really close to the proven 15% increase in athletic performance we see with Positive Performance’s mental training.

CONCLUSION

Based on the above findings it’s obvious that teaching athletes how and when to use positive self-talk—that is, using positive self-talk appropriately—is not only a good time investment, but a worthwhile one.

While talking about positive self-talk can seem merely warm and fuzzy, research shows that it is a powerful, actionable tool in achieving one’s peak performance. And, based on our own work with athletes, here are some simple best practices for self-talk education:

6 TIPS FOR EFFECTIVE POSITIVE SELF-TALK

• Self-talk should be practiced ahead of time (outside of competition).
• While there are best practices, the focus should be less about negative/positive, or good/bad self-talk, and more about what is PRODUCTIVE for athletes in certain situations.
• Individual preferences are okay.
• Self-talk should be focused on what should be done, rather than what should be avoided.
• Different situations might call for different types of self-talk.
• It is difficult to turn off self-talk. For most people, self-talk is going to happen, for the good or the bad, regardless of whether you work on it. Knowing that, you may as well make the monologue in your head helpful… and positive!

Here’s to athletes everywhere, using self-talk as a tool to find their peak performance every time they step onto the playing field.

P.S. Want to pump up your performance even more? Click HERE to learn about our Competition MasteryTM training and get a FREE sample training.

REFERENCES:

[i] Girodo & Wood, 1979; Goodhart, 1986; Mahoney & Avener, 1977; Van Raalte et al., 1994; Weinberg, 1985

[ii] Kross, E., Bruehlman-Senecal, E., Park, J., Burson, A., Dougherty, A., Shablack, H., Bremner, R., Moser, J., & Ayduk, O. (2014). Self-talk as a regulatory mechanism: How you do it matters. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

[iii] Belief in Self-Talk and Dynamic Balance Performance.Kaori Araki (Waseda University, Japan), Joseph K. Mintah (Azusa Pacific University), Mick G. Mack, Sharon Huddleston, Laura Larson, and Kelly Jacobs (University of Northern Iowa).

This Toughness Evaluation comes from Brett McDaniel. Brett is the Head Boys Basketball Coach at Sumner High School in Sumner, Washington. It was inspired by Jay Bilas’ Toughness in Today’s Game article.

Directions: There are 33 paragraphs below. Each paragraph discusses an element of basketball that would be defined as an act of toughness on the basketball court. After reading the paragraph ask yourself if you would agree that you consistently succeed in the element discussed. If you believe you are successful in this area, circle “yes” below. If you do not believe you are consistent in the specific element, answer “no”. It is vital you are honest with yourself.

I have a link to download the pdf version of this evaluation at the end of the post.

This evaluation will help you understand what it truly means to be a “tough” basketball player. After completing the evaluation give yourself a grade. See end of evaluation for grading scale.

1. Set a good screen: The toughest players to guard are the players who set good screens. When you set a good screen, you are improving the chances for a teammate to get open, and you are greatly improving your chances of getting open. A good screen can force the defense to make a mistake. A lazy or bad screen is a waste of everyone’s time and energy. To be a tough player, you need to be a “screener/scorer,” a player who screens hard and immediately looks for an opportunity on offense. On the 1984 U.S. Olympic Team, Bob Knight made Michael Jordan set a screen before he could get a shot. If it is good enough for Jordan, arguably the toughest player ever, it is good enough for you. Yes/No

2. Set up your cut: The toughest players make hard cuts, and set up their cuts. Basketball is about deception. Take your defender one way, and then plant the foot opposite of the direction you want to go and cut hard. A hard cut may get you a basket, but it may also get a teammate a basket. If you do not make a hard cut, you will not get anyone open. Setting up your cut, making the proper read of the defense, and making a hard cut require alertness, good conditioning and good concentration. Davidson’s is hardly a physical muscle-man, but he is a tough player because he is in constant motion, he changes speeds, he sets up his cuts, and he cuts hard. Curry is hard to guard, and he is a tough player. Yes/No

3. Talk on defense: The toughest players talk on defense, and communicate with their teammates. It is almost impossible to talk on defense and not be in a stance, down and ready, with a vision of man and ball. If you talk, you let your teammates know you are there, and make them and yourself better defenders. It also lets your opponent know that you are fully engaged. Yes/No

4. Jump to the ball: When on defense, the tough defenders move as the ball moves. The toughest players move on the flight of the ball, not when it gets to its destination. And the toughest players jump to the ball and take away the ball side of the cut. Tough players don’t let cutters cut across their face — they make the cutter change his path. Yes/No

5. Don’t get screened: No coach can give a player the proper footwork to get through every screen. Tough players have a sense of urgency not to get screened and to get through screens so that the cutter cannot catch the ball where he wants to. A tough player makes the catch difficult. Yes/No

6. Get your hands up: A pass discouraged is just as good as a pass denied. Tough players play with their hands up to take away vision, get deflections and to discourage a pass in order to allow a teammate to cover up. Cutters and post players will get open, if only for a count. If your hands are up, you can keep the passer from seeing a momentary opening. Yes/No

7. Play the ball, see your man: Most defenders see the ball and hug their man, because they are afraid to get beat. A tough defender plays the ball and sees his man. There is a difference. Yes/No

8. Get on the floor: In my first road game as a freshman, there was a loose ball that I thought I could pick up and take the other way for an easy one. While I was bending over at the waist, one of my opponents dived on the floor and got possession of the ball. My coach was livid. We lost possession of the ball because I wasn’t tough enough to get on the floor for it. I tried like hell never to get out-toughed like that again. (The man…who gets on the floor first usually gets the ball. Just watch!) Yes/No
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9. Close out under control: It is too easy to fly at a shooter and think you are a tough defender. A tough defender closes out under control, takes away a straight line drive and takes away the shot. A tough player has a sense of urgency but has the discipline to do it the right way. Yes/No

10. Post your man, not a spot: Most post players just blindly run to the low block and get into a shoving match for a spot on the floor. The toughest post players are posting their defensive man. A tough post player is always open, and working to get the ball to the proper angle to get a post feed. Tough post players seal on ball reversal and call for the ball, and they continue to post strong even if their teammates miss them. Yes/No

11. Run the floor: Tough players sprint the floor, which drags the defense and opens up things for others. Tough players run hard and get “easy” baskets, even though there is nothing easy about them. Easy baskets are hard to get. Tough players don’t take tough shots — they work hard to make them easy. Yes/No

12. Play so hard, your coach has to take you out: I was a really hard worker in high school and college. But I worked and trained exceptionally hard to make playing easier. I was wrong. I once read that Bob Knight had criticized a player of his by saying, “You just want to be comfortable out there!” Well, that was me, and when I read that, it clicked with me. I needed to work to increase my capacity for work, not to make it easier to play. I needed to work in order to be more productive in my time on the floor. Tough players play so hard that their coaches have to take them out to get rest so they can put them back in. The toughest players don’t pace themselves. Yes/No

13. Get to your teammate first: When your teammate lays his body on the line to dive on the floor or take a charge, the tough players get to him first to help him back up. If your teammate misses a free throw, tough players get to him right away. Tough players are also great teammates. Yes/No

14. Take responsibility for your teammates: Tough players expect a lot from their teammates, but they also put them first. When the bus leaves at 9 a.m., tough players not only get themselves there, but they also make sure their teammates are up and get there, too. Tough players take responsibility for others in addition to themselves. They make sure their teammates eat first, and they give credit to their teammates before taking it themselves. Yes/No

15. Take a charge: Tough players are in a stance, playing the ball, and alert in coming over from the weak side and taking a charge. Tough players understand the difference between being in the right spot and being in the right spot with the intention of stopping somebody. Some players will look puzzled and say, “But I was in the right spot.” Tough players know that they have to get to the right spot with the sense of urgency to stop someone. Yes/No

16. Get in a stance: Tough players don’t play straight up and down and put themselves in the position of having to get ready to get ready. Tough players are down in a stance on both ends of the floor, with feet staggered and ready to move. Tough players are the aggressor, and the aggressor is in a stance. Yes/No

17. Finish plays: Tough players don’t just get fouled, they get fouled and complete the play. They don’t give up on a play or assume that a teammate will do it. A tough player plays through to the end of the play and works to finish every play. Yes/No

18. Work on your pass: A tough player doesn’t have his passes deflected. A tough player gets down, pivots, pass-fakes, and works to get the proper angle to pass away from the defense and deliver the ball. Yes/No

19. Throw yourself into your team’s defense: A tough player fills his tank on the defensive end, not on offense. A tough player is not deterred by a missed shot. A tough player values his performance first by how well he defended. Yes/No

20. Take and give criticism the right way: Tough players can take criticism without feeling the need to answer back or give excuses. They are open to getting better and expect to be challenged and hear tough things. You will never again in your life have the opportunity you have now at the college level: a coaching staff that is totally and completely dedicated to making you and your team better. Tough players listen and are not afraid to say what other teammates may not want to hear, but need to hear. Yes/No

21. Show strength in your body language: Tough players project confidence and security with their body language. They do not hang their heads, do not react negatively to a mistake of a teammate, and do not whine and complain to officials. Tough players project strength, and do not cause their teammates to worry about them. Tough players do their jobs, and their body language communicates that to their teammates — and to their opponents. Yes/No

22. Catch and face: Teams that press and trap are banking on the receiver’s falling apart and making a mistake. When pressed, tough players set up their cuts, cut hard to an open area and present themselves as a receiver to the passer. Tough players catch, face the defense, and make the right read and play, and they do it with poise. Tough players do not just catch and dribble; they catch and face. Yes/No

23. Don’t get split: If you trap, a tough player gets shoulder-to-shoulder with his teammate and does not allow the handler to split the trap and gain an advantage on the back side of the trap. Yes/No

24. Be alert: Tough players are not “cool.” Tough players are alert and active, and tough players communicate with teammates so that they are alert, too. Tough players echo commands until everyone is on the same page. They understand the best teams play five as one. Tough players are alert in transition and get back to protect the basket and the 3-point line. Tough players don’t just run back to find their man, they run back to stop the ball and protect the basket. Yes/No

25. Concentrate, and encourage your teammates to concentrate: Concentration is a skill, and tough players work hard to concentrate on every play. Tough players go as hard as they can for as long as they can. Yes/No

26. It’s not your shot; it’s our shot: Tough players don’t take bad shots, and they certainly don’t worry about getting “my” shots. Tough players work for good shots and understand that it is not “my” shot, it is “our” shot. Tough players celebrate when “we” score. Yes/No

27. Box out and go to the glass every time: Tough players are disciplined enough to lay a body on someone. They make first contact and go after the ball. And tough players do it on every possession, not just when they feel like it. They understand defense is not complete until they secure the ball. Yes/No

28. Take responsibility for your actions: Tough players make no excuses. They take responsibility for their actions. Take for example. With 17 seconds to go in Wake’s game against Duke on Wednesday, missed a 3-pointer that bounced right to Johnson. But instead of aggressively pursuing the ball with a sense of urgency, Johnson stood there and waited for the ball to come to him. It never did. Scheyer grabbed it, called a timeout and the Blue Devils hit a game-tying shot on a possession they never should’ve had. Going after the loose ball is toughness — and Johnson didn’t show it on that play. But what happened next? He re-focused, slipped a screen for the winning basket, and after the game — when he could’ve been basking only in the glow of victory — manned up to the mistake that could’ve cost his team the win.”That was my responsibility — I should have had that,” Johnson said of the goof. No excuses. Shouldering the responsibility. That’s toughness. Yes/No

29. Look your coaches and teammates in the eye: Tough players never drop their heads. They always look coaches and teammates in the eye, because if they are talking, it is important to them and to you. Yes/No

30. Move on to the next play: Tough players don’t waste time celebrating a good play or lamenting a bad one. They understand that basketball is too fast a game to waste time and opportunities with celebratory gestures or angry reactions. Tough players move on to the next play. They know that the most important play in any game is the next one. Yes/No

31. Be hard to play against, and easy to play with: Tough players make their teammates’ jobs easier, and their opponents’ jobs tougher. Yes/No

32. Make every game important: Tough players don’t categorize opponents and games. They know that if they are playing, it is important. Tough players understand that if they want to play in championship games, they must treat every game as a championship game. Yes/No

33. Make getting better every day your goal: Tough players come to work every day to get better, and keep their horizons short. They meet victory and defeat the same way: They get up the next day and go to work to be better than they were the day before. Tough players hate losing but are not shaken or deterred by a loss. Tough players enjoy winning but are never satisfied. For tough players, a championship or a trophy is not a goal; it is a destination. The goal is to get better every day. When I was playing, the players I respected most were not the best or most talented players. The players I respected most were the toughest players. I don’t remember anything about the players who talked a good game or blocked a shot and acted like a fool. I remember the players who were tough to play against. Yes/No

Total Possible = 33
30 or Above = A….and you can consider yourself a “Tough” player.

26-30 = B…and you can consider yourself on the verge of being a “tough” player, lacking in only a couple areas needing improvement.

23-26 = C…and you need to work harder on being more conscious of the things a “tough” player must have. You must identify 3-5 aspects of your game that you will work to improve. Set small goals and have your teammates or coaches help you be accountable to the areas you are working on.

23 or less = F…and you must do some soul searching. It is time for you to meet with your coaches and possibly captains. You need to first begin working on skill #28 (Taking Responsibility for Actions) You must be willing to admit, reflect, learn and apply new practices. Have a teammate and coach make you accountable to the areas letting you down. You still can become tough. It is up to you however to apply change NOW!

Toughness has nothing to do with size, physical strength or athleticism. Some players may be born tough, but I believe that toughness is a skill, and it is a skill that can be developed and improved. Michigan State coach Tom Izzo always says, “Players play, but tough players win.” He is right.

Click here for to download the Mental Toughness for Basketball Evaluation

“130 Great Ideas to Make Your Basketball Team More Mentally Tough”

Click here for 12 ideas from the e-book “This is great information that will help any coach to make their team more mentally tough and focused. I found sections 6 and 7 to be helpful to me as well as to our team. “ Brandon Sorrell Assistant Girls Basketball Coach Lawrence North (Indianapolis) High School

Just like every other area of basketball, a coach must study mental toughness and have a well thought through plan to help players develop and improve their mental toughness.

There are hundreds and hundreds of definitions of mental toughness. Here is a place to start as mental toughness applies to basketball.

“Mental toughness is the ability to control thoughts and actions and maintain a focus on what is truly important in a calm and poised way under competitive pressure.”

It is important that your players know and can explain whatever you define mental toughness to be.

Here are some ideas for things you can do to improve the basketball mental toughness in the players in your program.

1. Take time every practice to rehearse different pressure situations that arise in games. Having a definite plan that players have practiced will help them focus on what to do under pressure and less on the pressure itself.
2. Make it a point of emphasis that bad body language, moping, pouting, displays of disgust with officials, and other negative behaviors are training the players for failure. Correct them any time they occur in practice, games, or in the locker room.
3. The coaching staff needs to be a role model of poise and self control. Players will feed off of you and draw confidence from your mental toughness.
4. We are always better at things we have had experience and success with. Use the fact that the mind does not differentiate between a real and an imagined experience. Work with your players on visualizing success and performing skills the correct way.
5. Do not allow anyone in your program to accept or make excuses. Excuses are permission to give up. Excuses keep us from pushing past our comfort zones which allows us to grow and accomplish new and difficult achievements. Click the following link for more on: Mental Toughness and excuses.
6. Point out times in your game films or games you record on TV when a lack of poise and mental toughness by an individual cost a team a chance to win.
7. Have some type of phrase you can use when a player makes a mistake to focus them back on mental toughness and what is happening next in the game. A simple phrase such as “Play through it!” can be your signal to them that we need to get on to the next play.
8. Teach players when they make a mistake to recognize it, admit it, learn from it so that it doesn’t happen again, and then forget it so that it doesn’t affect any more plays.
9. Write down individual and team goals and make committments to attending to the details of accomplishing the goals beyond the current comfort level. Great basketball players and teams practice beyond their comfort zones.
10. Commitment to narrow your focus is a major key. Players need to see what they need to do to reach their goals and not be distracted.
11. Stick to performance rituals before and during the game. Load your players with performance rituals. It keeps their minds from wandering.
12. Eye control. Players and keep their eyes on the court. If a player is looking into the crowd that player is losing focus. The mind follows the eyes.
13. Emotional control. Nothing blows up concentration more than losing emotional control. Just as the mind follows the eyes, the emotions follow breathing. If someone is upset, their breathing is shallow. Teach players to lose their temper to take slow deep breaths.
14. Stay in the present moment. The most important play in basketball is the one that is happening right now. Human beings tend to not be in the present. We’re either worrying about the past or worrying about the future. Those projections into the future are almost always negative. For example a player standing at the free throw line is thinking “what will happen if a miss the shot?” All these projections into the future are 90% negative in 90% untrue, but it really affects performance. Emphasize two players to keep their minds in the present because that’s where the action is.
15. Sports Psychologist Jim Loehr has described “the four emotional markers of mental toughness:”

Emotional Flexibility–The ability to handle different situations in a balanced or nondefensive manner. Emotional flexibility also speaks to the skill of drawing on a wide range of positive emotions–humor, fight spirit, pleasure.

Emotional Responsiveness–You are emotionally engaged in the competitive situation, not withdrawn.

Emotional Strength–The ability to handle great emotional force and sustain your fighting spirit no matter what the circumstances.

Emotional Resiliency–Being able to handle setbacks and recovering quickly from them.