Cognitive impact

When the threat system has been triggered an athlete’s head chatter turns negative and they might start to notice unhelpful messages trying talk them out of reaching towards their goals. This might show up as procrastinating, pre-making excuses for why they might not do well, self-sabotaging by playing on their phone, not practicing or preparing properly or signing up to lots of things so they can justify not doing well on the thing they actually care about. These all make it harder to do well.

Some common negative thoughts athletes report thinking:

I’m useless

This is embarrassing

I’ll never be able to do this

I should have quit – they are all laughing at me

I’m too slow

I’m rubbish

I’m never be good enough.