Confidence – On and Off the Field

This month I want to talk about Confidence.  I’m a soccer mom on the side, and with my sons  Max and Alex, we have been watching a lot of Champions League and Premier League lately, as well as the series on Netflix called Playbook, specifically the episode on Jose Mourinho.  Side note- I highly recommend that series, lots of lessons on life, leadership and coaching! 

We were watching the Everton – Liverpool game and my goalkeeper son, Max, commented that their 2 respective goalies, Jordan Pickford and Allison Becker,  used to be good but not so much anymore.  I asked him what contributed to goalkeepers losing their mojo, and he said it all boiled down to CONFIDENCE.  I WAS FASCINATED that a decrease in confidence had such an explicit, observable effect and consequence!  I’m particularly interested in goalkeepers as he is one and hopes to play in college, and also because it’s a position unlike any other.  It’s a position where not just the physical side of performance comes into play, but where mindset is especially key.

The mental side of sports performance is especially relevant for goalkeepers.  Goalkeepers possess a different set of psychological skills and confidence level than their counterparts. 

“The use of psychological skills can help athletes to interpret these events in a positive manner. By using skills such as positive self-talk, imagery and goal setting to increase confidence, athletes can improve their performance. By using skills to cope with performance, athletes are able to effectively use thoughts to manage perceptions of their performance. Using psychological skills to improve confidence and performance should be considered a critical component of an athletes’ training. “ Amanda Laws

Obviously with leaders and athletes, technical skills, or self-efficacy are the starting point.  Through repetition, training, and learning, you build credibility and technical expertise.  But then, to take you to the next level, you have to build psychological skills.

What psychological skills are important for leaders and athletes alike? After watching countless soccer games and studying my favorite goalkeeper in action, I can draw these parallels between leadership and goalkeeping.

Visualization

Dr. Michael Gervais, a sports psychologist, states that the objective of visualization is, “to create such a lifelike experience that your body believes that it could be real.” Studies show that the brain is not able to differentiate between a real memory and an imagined (visualized) memory. Whenever extreme vivid images are in the mind, the brain has a hard time distinguishing between something that is imagined versus something that is real. Michael Phelps would rehearse his races hundreds of times before the day of the race so that when he would step up on the blocks, his body goes on autopilot. His body knows what to do from rehearsing so many times, and his races become second nature in a way that his brain already knows how to swim the race.  I know that when Max started a visualization practice, it took him to the next level.  As a leader, where do you see yourself, what is your philosophy, what does success look like?

Fake It ‘Till You Become It

In August I wrote an article on the somatic approach to presence.  In it I wrote that not only does projecting confidence- standing up straight, shoulders back, speaking more slowly, taking up space – exude confidence and presence, it also tricks your brain into believing you are confident.  To employ a terms used by Amy Cuddy, Harvard psychologist, in her book Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self into Your Biggest Challenges, don’t just ‘fake it ‘till you make it’, but ‘fake it until you become it’.  

Rituals

Building on the “fake it till you become it” idea, having rituals are grounding, anchoring practices and habits that help you become present and focused.  They allow you to become the person you want to become.  Maybe it’s listening to your favorite music before a performance event, or an affirmation, prayer, gesture, or breath work, it all serves to focus your mind and fuel your body.  As my performance coach Cam MacDougall says, embodying, or InBodying  and connecting with your body, feeling it, is the differentiator in performance.

Letting Go

Not seeing a goal against you as something personal, or a personal failure or mistake.  

You can be sure of your skills, techniques and fitness because that is under your control. However, you can’t control outcomes and results. You can’t always control what others do either.  Therefore, going into a game or a situation thinking that you already won, or taking it personally when things go wrong, could be extremely dangerous to your confidence or mental toughness when things are NOT going your way….Get up, get back in the game, don’t take it personally, and stay focused!

Optimism

Similarly, your ability to be resilient, get back up, and re-focus is key.  This is one of the dimensions of Emotional Intelligence. 

Goalkeepers occupy one of the loneliest positions in sports. As a goalkeeper, you constantly face two realities: 1)  You belong on a team of like-minded individuals working together to achieve various goals AND 2) You are isolated in a certain space on the field with particular rules that only apply to you. 

Isn’t that true of a leader as well?  Particularly if you are a senior leader, where it gets lonely at the top. As a result of these competing realities, goalkeepers and senior leaders are often left with nothing but their own thoughts for large stretches of time, or 90-minute matches. It is for this reason that the psychology and mindset deserve more attention. 

One’s ability to carry a positive, optimistic mindset is under appreciated when it comes to goalkeeping. Your mindset informs your thoughts, thereby influencing your behavior, which in turn informs your overall performance. Writer Jon Gordon frequently refers to his ‘No Complaining Rule.’ Simply put, you can enhance your mindset and outlook by erasing complaints from your spoken word, by watching the language that you are using. The more you voice complaints or negative ideas, the more you validate those complaints as accurate representations of a given situation, or as reality. You can change your mindset by changing your language.

Some Rules Are Meant To Be Broken

Jose Mourinho says this, as he was barred from the locker room and the field during one of the Chelsea games.  The team knew Jose was there for them. “We won the game, but it’s not about that. What I did in that dressing room, was something I’m not proud of because it was against the rules. But I’m proud of it as a leader and a player’s friend. I did it for my boys.”

Leading From Behind

In his autobiography “Long Walk to Freedom,” Nelson Mandela wrote, “It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger.” He compared this kind of leadership to shepherding, describing how a great leader “stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go out ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing all along that they are being directed from behind.” When leading from behind, you enable all members of your team to participate in moving the organization forward, reaching targets and goals, and maximizing performance and innovation.  You’re encouraging all team members to invest in the team’s success.

Perform from a place of Joy

Finally, when you PLAY the game, when you perform from a place of joy, you are likely to reach your fullest potential.  When you start to focus internally, concentrating on how you are doing, analyzing your once natural, fluid motions, you are at risk of choking.  Same thing happens off the field.  When you start to analyze your every move, every decision, your give power to your inner critic and you self-sabotage.

We live vicariously through our children, and especially learn from them!  I thank Max and Alex for the inspiration of this article, and these parallels and lessons, as well as all the soccer and performance coaches in my life.  

Confidence is a mindset, achieved through training and repetition, and most importantly active mental awareness and work.  That, is within our control.