A player’s mental health is as important as his/her physical health, which is why La Roca FC has partnered with HeadStrong Consulting to help great athletes become even greater through individual and team coaching, mental toughness exercises and other services focused on player psychology.
The following Psychology Tips were posted on La Roca’s social media pages.
Proactively learning strategies to deal with sport and non-sport stressors will let you be prepared for the challenges ahead. A great way to be proactive is to watch video of your last game and then visualize your next game. Visualizing your game will help you make those critical decisions ahead of time.
Developing self-awareness of how training and other life stresses are likely to affect you is key to improving your mental performance. A couple of examples include being aware of how staying up late affects your early morning game; being aware of how you feel and perform when parents on the sideline are yelling what you should or should not be doing on the field; or being aware of how lifting weights gives you confidence but makes you tired.
Failure is inevitable… what matters most is how you view it. If you believe that failure is outside of your control, you are less likely to grow as an individual. Whereas if you take responsibility for your failure, and choose to make the necessary changes, you will grow as a soccer player and a person.
Focus is the ability to remain concentrated on what you are doing and ignoring distractions. Keeping your focus within a match will help you perform at your best and can create more opportunities for success.
7 helpful tips to improve Focus:
- Assess your mental focus
- Eliminate distractions
- Limit your focus
- Live in the moment
- Practice mindfulness
- Take a short break
- Keep practicing
