If you didn't know already, visualization is an incredibly powerful tool your athlete can use to create confidence before her games. 

But, today, we are going to mix things up with visualization and use another form of it through video and imagery!

Instead of just visualizing and imagining what your daughter wants to happen, seeing her success in her mind, I want you to help her create a Confidence Highlight Reel or Album!

What the heck is a Confidence Highlight Reel or Album?! 

Highlight Reel: Compiled videos and photos of your daughter playing, competing, succeeding in a video through something like TIktok, IG Reels, or other video editing apps! 

Album: Compiled videos and photos of your daughter playing, competing, succeeding saved in a specific album on her phone (or your phone or a tablet). 

How is this going to help your daughter create confidence?!

This is something she can use, look at, watch before her games (in a pre-game routine) as a form of...

Is your daughter just showing up for warm-ups with her team and expecting to feel confident? 
Is she timid playing?
Does she feel nervous? 
Worried how she might play? 

Are you wondering if she’s going to feel confident? 
Can’t stop pacing while watching her?
Worried if she makes a mistake and can’t bounce back? 

Don’t worry, I’ve got you! 

I used to think that just warming up with my team was enough, but if you truly want to feel unshakeable confidence when you play, it goes deeper than that. 

You can’t just physically prepare, you have to mentally prepare too!

If you want to be the best, you have to go the extra mile (and lucky for you, that’s not running a mile), it’s just using a pre-game routine that also prepares your brain and creates confidence. 

Help your daughter build a pre-game routine (you can even be a part of it too)! 

1 Incorporate the things she already likes to do!

Examples:...

After I finished playing college ball, I always wish that I would have asked the best athletes, the successful athletes what the heck they were thinking about! 

Like… wouldn’t that be nice to know?! 

What am I thinking or not thinking about that these athletes are?! 

So, I’m giving you and your daughter a shortcut. I’ve talked to many successful athletes and people too and there are some common themes here.

It’s not like they aren’t afraid or don’t worry or never complain, but they are really good at changing their perspective. Choosing better thoughts. Asking better questions.

Here are some of the common themes…

1 Choosing to think about OPPORTUNITY over FEAR

Example: 

Fear: I better get a hit or we lose.

  Opportunity: Yes! I’ve been waiting and preparing for this moment, I can’t wait to get a hit! 

2 Choosing GRATITUDE over COMPLAINTS 

Example: 

Complaint: Ugh, I have to...

We are talking about loving ourselves! Well, more like your daughter learning how to love herself. 

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 my programs and lessons before, we have written love letters to ourselves. I’ve done this many times!

Yep… mushy gushy, beautiful love letters to OURSELVES.

This is super easy, fun, powerful activity to BOOST YOUR CONFIDENCE.

So, let’s do it. I mean, do this with your daughter! 

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.

After the girls have written their letters in the past, I then had...

You are what you say you are.

Or… your daughter is what she says she is.

So, if she tells herself crappy, negative, horrible things, she’ll probably show up in life, perform, and compete like those things she just told herself.

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 made 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 your daughter. WE get to create what stories we want for US!

This week in Mindset Lessons, we are working on creating the story that we WANT rather than believing the story that other people are telling us or the story we...

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 and in weekly Mindset Lessons, I am challenging my girls to practice their positive self-talk. PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE. 

Duh, practice makes perfect right?! 

Here are some ways that you can help your daughter work on positive self-talk…

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, your opinion matters the most! 
2. Affirmations: These are STRONG, CONFIDENT, POWERFUL “I am ___________” statements. 

My own example: 

I am a strong, beautiful, competitive Crossfit athlete. 

I am an intellectual, smart, resilient entrepreneur that owns her OWN business...

Is your daughter having a lot of negative thoughts? Especially after mistakes?

You’re not alone. A lot of athletes are going through the same thing. As athletes, we tend to forget or just truly don’t even know how powerful our thoughts are. 

She might not know that her negative thoughts are what is giving her negative results.

I know that when I was playing growing up and in college, I thought that if I just kept pushing harder, practicing more, making adjustments, then I would have better results… except when I didn’t.

Most of the time, I was just getting in my own way with my negative thoughts.

Thoughts dictate how we feel, how we take action, and our end results and outcomes.

One way you can help her realize just how important her thoughts are to her success is by letting her hear it from someone other than you. 

I know… so annoying. But, you’re mom or dad and you’re supposed to be Positive Polly and believe in her no matter...

Is your daughter thinking about all the things that could go wrong in her next game? 

What if I fail? 

What if I play terribly?

What if I don’t make the lineup?

What if I look dumb? 

These lies she’s believing and making her not feel confident. It’s the worst. And I know you’re just as frustrated seeing her keep doing this to herself. 

Rather than telling her to stop thinking like this, let’s shift the focus to what she should and could be thinking about instead! 

First of all, remind her that these negative thoughts, doubts, worries, fears… they are NORMAL! She is a normal athlete for feeling and thinking these things. She is a normal girl, a normal human! 

Bad news… these negative thoughts, doubts, worries, and fears are going to continue, especially after failures, mistakes, bad games. It’s just our competitive nature! 

Good news… she is in control of the thoughts she chooses (it just...

When I was playing softball at Northwestern, I really struggled hitting my first 3 years there. A whopping .133ish average to be exact . 

I remember thinking when I went up to bat and runners were on base, or my teammate drew in a walk and it was up to me to get a hit and score some runs for my team…

“$&!%, now I HAVE to get a hit.”

“I better get a hit or I’m going to get pulled out of the lineup.”

“Please don’t throw me inside, just give me something easy to hit.”

“I just want to get this hit so bad…”

Just writing these down I can feel the fear, the scarcity mindset, the doubt, the worry. This is no way to be confident and get the damn hit!

It wasn’t until my senior year when honestly, I was kind of like “screw it, I’m just going to go have fun, do my best, and whatever happens, happens.” This was a total shift in mindset for me that I didn’t even know was...

When I was working on this lesson plan around getting results even when under pressure, the first thing I was thinking about was that having confidence and getting those results when your daughter is feeling the pressure comes way before that exact moment.

Creating confidence and results happens outside of the game, even outside of practices. 

Here’s how you can help your daughter work on what she thinks about herself as an athlete (aka self-talk)!

Talk about what thoughts she is having when she’s under pressure 

It’s good to just get these out into the open!

Remind her that it’s okay to have these thoughts, worries, fears, and doubts. It’s totally normal. 

  Ask her how those thoughts she is having when under pressure is making her feel

It’s also good to notice how certain thoughts are making us feel - creates some great awareness

Have her write down or share what she wants to think about herself as an athlete? What does she...