I’m going to use this post to briefly present a lesson I use with my sports clients. It is going to oversimplify the process greatly and also give too little attention to other interventions, but I want to introduce it now before expounding on it later in various ways.
In the performance world, such as that of competitive sports, or in life during difficult times, we often experience self-doubts and a lack of confidence. This shouldn’t be problematic. It is a normal thing even in the best of times. But it bothers some people greatly because it’s simply uncomfortable, and they worry further about what those doubts mean or what they indicate about them as a person: Am I weak because I have self-doubts? Will doubts affect my performance negatively?
A little knowledge will help us greatly here. Thoughts are highly tied to moods, or what is also referred to as affect. Moods ebb and flow, meaning they go up and down changing from pleasant to unpleasant and back again many times, even throughout a few hours of the day. There is nothing we can do to stop that from happening because moods are tied to everything going on inside of us as well as the things we are exposed to on the outside of us. We cannot stop mood changes anymore than we can stop changes in eating, rest, movement, daylight, hormones, or any other cycle you can think of. They necessarily change with the world and the brain’s attempts to keep us alive through budgeting our bodily resources.
A first simple way to gain influence over this process is to recognize that unpleasant thoughts tend to go with unpleasant moods, and pleasant thoughts tend to go with pleasant moods (it’s also known as mood congruent thinking). Understand that for any situation you encounter, your estimation of your ability to deal with the situation will be somewhat to largely dependent on your mood at the time. Whether you are encountering a challenging new diagnosis, an upcoming game with a worthy opponent, or dealing with a setback, your doubts and fears, or even your hopes and confidence, are very much tied to your mood and will likely change throughout the hours and days. So Step 1 is to understand that your thoughts are likely to change (your feelings will too), and the changes are tied to your mood.
Step 2 is to understand that not all thoughts are equally swayed by mood. Some thoughts are highly influenced by mood while others are quite resistant to mood. My thoughts about being able to publish a book are far more influenced by moods than are my thoughts about my love of my child or my belief that the Earth is round. I don’t care how up or down my mood gets, I love my kid and the Earth is round. So Step 2 is to start to distinguish run-of-the-mill (ROTM) thoughts from beliefs. Beliefs are thoughts that are resistant to mood changes while ROTM thoughts will change or disappear with changes in mood.
Step 3 is to discover your beliefs (and desired beliefs) and feed them with evidence. Make them grow strong with nourishment. Admire the thoughts you like as they are present. Let the other thoughts wilt and blow away.
I like to use the analogy of an oak tree for this. You can think of the leaves of the tree as ROTM thoughts. They will come and go as the weather of your mood allows. If you like these thoughts, go ahead and admire them before they are swept away by the winds of your moods. Enjoy them while they last. If you don’t like these thoughts, understand that they won’t last.
In contrast to leaves that will not weather the changing seasons and weather of your moods, the trunk of the tree is far more durable. Think of the trunk (and roots) as your beliefs. They are what survive the cold and winds of winter. They will weather storms of mood. And the stronger the trunk of the tree, the stronger the storms it will survive. How do we get a strong trunk? Feed it. Feed your beliefs with healthy evidence and you will build a strong trunk and roots that will withstand storms.
How does this work in practice? For my athletes, I like them to journal and just start noting thoughts that are particularly interesting, exciting, enjoyable, or bothersome. We can then go through and note which ones seem to change with mood and which ones tend to be resilient across moods. Usually the beliefs tend to be big ideas: My parents love me no matter win or lose (let’s hope they identify this one) or even something as vague yet powerful as I’ve got this, which to me is the ultimate confidence in any situation because it can be equally powerful under easy/tense or win/loss situations. ROTM thoughts tend to revolve around situations: I can get a hit. I can get in this serve. We will win.
After identifying some beliefs, we choose the beliefs we love the most, and we start spending time building those beliefs stronger with evidence. Then whenever a comforting thought is needed to weather a storm, we have a strong, powerful foundational belief to grab in order to keep us grounded.
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