I noticed an interesting “side effect” in some of my athletes, confidence!
I am usually hired to help an athlete get faster or to help them through a string of injuries. But I noticed that some of my athletes started walking taller, looked more confident, and their body language completely changed.
My philosophy is to make the athlete feel comfortable and confident so that they can feel relaxed. I believe it helps to maximize their learning capacity! As they are trying new skills, they might feel silly or incompetent. So I give a lot of positive feedback even when they make the smallest changes in what I ask them to do.
And it becomes a snowball effect: the athlete gets positive feedback from me and starts making speed gains and endurance gains. All of a sudden, their body language completely changes. They become more relaxed, carry themselves taller, which helps their speed even more.
It’s the coolest thing!
And to be honest, the “side effect” of gained confidence is so much more rewarding than actually increasing their speed.
It was neat to discover that my philosophy closely aligns with this table’s 1st point. Adam Virgille is the author and the mastermind behind making scientific data easy to interpret through his graphics.
This table summarizes multiple studies very succinctly. If you are interested in seeing the full article. Please check out this link for more info.
Making your athlete more confident pays dividends in the short term and in the long run. If you are a coach or a parent, let’s boost them up and let the kids have some joy out of their sport.
I see clients in Southern Illinois and Missouri.
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