What does it actually mean for an athlete to be confident?
In this episode of The Mentally Fit Athlete, I talk with mental performance coach Brianna “Coach Bri” Antillon about confidence, pressure, comparison, and the way athletes can sometimes tie too much of their identity to how they're performing.
Brianna works primarily with middle school and high school athletes, including club and high school athletes, and she sees a common theme: athletes often struggle with confidence when their attention shifts toward things they can't control. That might be another athlete on the team, rankings, recruiting, social media, or what other people think about their performance.
We talk about:
Why “confidence” can be a catch-all term for a lot of different problems
How comparison with teammates and other athletes can affect confidence
The role social media plays in creating unrealistic comparisons
How pressure to perform can come from coaches, parents, other athletes, and the athletes themselves
The difference between wanting an outcome and understanding the process required to get there
Why athletes don't have to be perfect to perform well
Brianna's idea that we want the game to be “playable, not perfect”
Learning how to reset when things don't go your way
Why an athlete's value isn't limited to their statistics or results
What happens when an athlete goes from being the best player at one level to being more average at the next
Finding your own role instead of trying to become somebody else
What athletes can bring to the team when their particular strengths are needed
Taking a step back when necessary in order to move forward
And, naturally, a little West Coast hip-hop discussion involving Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, and Tupac
What do you bring to the table?
Instead of asking whether one athlete is better than another, we can ask what that athlete contributes and whether they can bring it when the team needs it most.
Coach Bri let me know that no one's perfect (including me). But that doesn't mean that each athlete doesn't have something important to contribute to the team.
And apparently, sometimes and sometimes the contribution is recommending the perfect Ice Cube song for the moment.
About Brianna Antillon
Brianna “Coach Bri” Antillon is a mental performance coach who works primarily with middle school, high school, and club athletes. She discusses mental performance topics on Instagram at @BA.mentalperformance.
At the time of this recording, Brianna was not accepting new clients but was open to conversations about mental performance and the field.
