We are talking about loving ourselves!
As athletes, teenagers, adults, as humans, it’s easy to forget to love ourselves.
It’s easy to love on everyone else. Our moms, our dads, our friends, our brothers and sisters (maybe). It’s easy to notice everyone else’s strengths.
It’s hard to tell ourselves what we love about ourselves and what are strengths are.
In the Local Meet Up (our once a month get-together for all the local girls in The Mental Game Mentorship + out of state girls streaming in live), we wrote love letters to ourselves.
Yep… mushy gushy, beautiful love letters to OURSELVES.
This is super easy, fun, powerful activity to do to BOOST YOUR CONFIDENCE.
So, let’s do it.
It’s really easy and simple.
Think about if you wrote a nice, appreciative, supportive letter to a friend, family member, or loved one.
Now, put you in it instead.
I had the girls in our Local Meet Up all write their own love letters. Then, we all shared our...
I talk a lot about how we can tell ourselves these positive things and be positive, especially in those really hard moments when we just want to tell ourselves crappy things.
In my program, I am challenging my girls to practice their positive self talk. PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE.
Duh, practice makes perfect right?!
Okay, so positive self talk practice looks like a lot of things though…
1. Opinions Exercise: Where you write down someone else’s negative opinion of you or your own negative opinion of yourself, CROSS THAT CRAP OUT, then rewrite your own powerful, positive opinion that actually matters because remember, you opinion matters the most!
2. Affirmations: These are STRONG, CONFIDENT, POWERFUL “I am ___________” statements.
My own example:
You are what you say you are.
Kind of like you are what you eat. I tell my girls, “If you eat doughnuts for breakfast lunch, and dinner, you’ll probably look like a fluffy doughnut someday.”
So, if you tell yourself crappy, negative, horrible things, you’ll probably show up in life, perform, and compete like those things you just told yourself.
I used to tell myself...
I’d never be a great hitter.
I’d never get awards or honors.
I’d never be the starting catcher.
I suck at writing papers.
I am a bad test taker.
There was more... meaner, nastier, crappier thoughts.
I told myself these stories about how I was just a below average hitter and I only make the lineup because I can catch.
Bull! Excuse my language.
I made the lineup because I worked my off!!
It’s time to put a to these stories we make up or that other people have made up for you. WE get to create what stories we want for US!
What’s your story?!
Tell me what kind of story...
Visualize your dreams + goals and they will come to life!
This month in The Mental Game Mentorship we’ve been improving our consistency with visualizing and becoming expert visualizers!
What does it even mean to be an expert visualizer? Well, just like practicing your physical skills at practice and lessons, we have to practice our mental skills!!
Visualization tip!!!
Visualize yourself as the confident, strong, successful girl you want to become!
Visualize yourself in that college uniform playing at the next level!
Visualize yourself getting the job of your dreams!
Visualize your name with the batting average or record that you want!
Most importantly... consistently visualize and WORK HARD!!!
Failure sucks right?!
But, guess what? You are going to fail. Everyone fails. It's not all rainbows and butterflies.
It is what you do in times of challenges and failures that defines you as an athlete.
One of the girls in my program who has been working day in and day out on her mindset and confidence had an AMAZING weekend hitting. Doubles, singles, hard hits, all the feels!! So what do you work on?
Here's the straight up truth though... You have to practice these mental training tools diligently! It has to be routine for you, just like when you...
These are 3 tools you can start doing in your games right away to be the best, to feel amazing while competing, to create success, to get the game winning hits, to boost your batting average, to make those ESPN top 10 plays!!!
1. Visualization! See yourself succeeding at the skills and opportunities you have in your games and practices. Get your free download to practice visualization here!
2. Routines! Creating pre-game and pre-performance routines. When you have a routine that you've done over and over again, it makes you feel in control and confident! Get your free download to create your own sports routines here!
3. Demeanor! Act like your are the baddest, best player out there! Show up BIG! When you act and show up like this, it will translate into how you actually feel and perform.
What would happen if you forgot about your batting average, the records, everything that’s happened this season or past seasons, and just had FUN?!
My senior year of college, I decided to forget what had happened, stopped letting the past define me, and just played softball and GUESS WHAT?! I had my best year ever! Not just like rah, rah, I feel happy, but I doubled my batting average and I felt like I couldn’t be stopped.
I mentor girls on the mental side of the game because I want them to feel and play the way I did my senior year.
Fearless
Joyful
Fierce
Motivated
Playful
So how do you do that?
Let go of the batting average.
Let go of the stats.
Let go of the opinions from other people.
Let go of the pressure.
Just try it. For one weekend. What do you have to lose?! You’ve got this. Love the game you play again. Enjoy every second of it. Just play!