Too much stress and anxiety can seriously affect your ability to focus on
your skills and flow in a performance. This section examines the causes of
excess stress and anxiety, explains their symptoms and then explains techniques
that you can use to manage them.
It is important that you recognise that you are responsible for your own
stress levels. Very often they are a product of the way that you think. Learn to
monitor your stress levels, and adjust them up if you need more arousal, or down
if you are feeling too stressed. Also learn that other people may seek to
manipulate your stress levels: if you are feeling stressed and uptight, the last
thing you may need is a motivational talk from a coach or manager who may not be
able to see your stress.
Stress
A certain level of stress is needed for optimum performance. If you are under
too little stress, then you will find it difficult to motivate yourself to give
a good performance. Too little stress expresses itself in feelings of boredom
and not being stretched.
At an optimum level of stress you will get the benefits of alertness and
activation that a good level of stress brings.
Excessive levels of stress damage performance and damage your enjoyment of
your sport. These excessive levels occur in the following circumstances:
When you think that what is being asked of you is beyond your perceived
abilities
When too much is asked of you in too short a space of time
When unnecessary obstacles are put in the way of achieving goals
The negative effects of stress are:
That it gets in the way of judgement and fine motor control
It causes competition to be seen as a threat, not a challenge
It damages the positive frame of mind you need for high quality
competition by:
promoting negative thinking
damaging self-confidence
narrowing attention
and disrupting flow
It consumes mental energy in, for example, worry. This is energy that you
could devote to keeping technique good.
Very often stress can be caused by negative thinking as well as being a
result of negative thinking: If you interpret a situation saying 'I'm in
trouble', then you are much less likely to do well than if you think positively,
seeing a new situation as an opportunity to exhibit your skills at a higher
level.
Stress and Adrenaline
When you are in a competitive environment or are in an environment in which you
are being evaluated, adrenaline may enter your bloodstream.
This has the following positive and negative effects on your body:
Positive Effects:
Adrenaline causes physiological arousal
It causes alertness
It prepares the body for explosive activity
Negative Effects:
It inhibits judgement
It interferes with fine motor control, and makes executing complex
skills difficult.
You will experience the preparatory flow of adrenaline into your body typically
as 'Butterflies in your stomach'.
In sports such as shooting where fine motor control is important, adrenaline
may be a negative factor. However in sports like sprinting or power lifting,
where explosive activity is required, adrenaline may be useful in generating
optimum performance.
You may currently view high levels of adrenaline in your body negatively as
stress. You may need to review this, perhaps welcoming adrenaline as an aid to
your performance. Similarly you might like to consider using 'Psych Up' routines
to raise your adrenaline levels if you are not sufficiently aroused.
Anxiety
Anxiety is different from stress. Anxiety comes from a concern over lack of
control over circumstances. In some cases being anxious and worrying over a
problem may generate a solution. Normally, however, it will just result in
negative thinking.
Albert Ellis listed the five main unrealistic desires or beliefs that cause
anxiety:
The desire always to have the love and admiration of all people important
to you. This is unrealistic because you have no control over other peoples
minds: people can have bad days, can see things in odd ways, can make
mistakes, or can be plain disagreeable and awkward.
The desire to always be thoroughly competent. This is unrealistic because
you only achieve competence at a new level by making mistakes. Everybody has
bad days and makes mistakes. One of the benefits of training with better
athletes is that you can see them making mistakes and having bad days too.
The belief that external factors cause all misfortune. Often negative
events can be caused by your own negative attitudes. Similarly your own
negative attitudes can cause you to view neutral events negatively. Another
athlete might find something positive in something you view as a problem.
The desire that events should always turn out the way that you want them
to and people should always do what you want. Other people have their own
agendas and do what they want to do.
The belief that everything that has happened in the past will inevitably
condition and control what has happened in the future. Very often things can
be improved or changed if you try hard enough, or look at things in a
different way.
Mental Energy
You need mental energy to be able to concentrate your attention and maintain
good mental attitudes. If you are concentrating effectively then you can
conserve physical energy by maintaining good technique when your muscles are
tired, can maintain focus and good execution of skills, and can push and drive
your body through pain and fatigue barriers.
You can waste mental energy on worry, stress, fretting over distractions, and
negative thinking. Over a long competition these not only damage enjoyment, but
also drain energy so that performance suffers.
It is therefore important to avoid these by good use of sports psychology,
and by resting effectively between events and by ensuring that you sleep
properly.
NB: There is some debate relating to the interaction between psychic energy
(Kerr, 1985) and stress. This review takes the view that distinguishing between
stress and psychic energy is unnecessary as it complicates the issue without
yielding many useful insights. We reserve the right to modify this position in
future uploads.
