Does this sound like you? 

You tell yourself:

• “I’ll never stick that skill.”
• “I’m not going to do it.”
• “I’m just not good enough.”

 If so, read on! 

 Your negative thinking can cancel out any positive thoughts you may have. Also, because your body does what your brain thinks, a negative thought is like a directive or instruction.  If you are thinking, “I can’t do it,” you will indeed have a hard time doing it (whatever that “it” is!). 

Here is a visualization you may find helpful. 

• Find a nice quiet place to sit.
• Close your eyes and exhale slowly 3 to 5 times.
• Say to yourself, “with each out-breath I am relaxing more and more…”
• Once you are feeling nice and relaxed, envision a control panel with two large dials – volume controls.
• One dial is labeled “Negative” and one is labeled “Positive.”
• Each dial also has the numbers 0 to 10 around it.
• The number “0” corresponds to no sound and the number “10” means a very loud volume.
• You are in control of the control panel and you can adjust the volume on your internal voice.
• First listen to your internal voice…what do you hear?
• If your negative voice is too loud, turn down the volume
• You can also increase the volume on the negative voice…go ahead and do it!
• It’s good to know that you can adjust the volume on your internal voices any way you wish.
• To perform better, you can choose to turn up the positive volume and turn down the negative.
• See yourself doing that and really enjoy the results…
• See yourself performing better as you listen to your positive voice.

For other tips on how to perform better – especially at competitions, check out my training program – The Mental Game of Cheerleading: Training for Competitions!  Scroll up to “Cheer Tools” for more information.

On Facebook?  If yes, please “like” my Confident Cheerleading Center Page.  When you do you will have access to several freebies!

Today, I came across a quote from best-selling author Seth Godin and I immediately thought I should pass it on to you.

Here is what he wrote: “Anxiety is nothing…but repeatedly re-experiencing failure in advance. What a waste.”

Simple yet profound.  I like that he summarized the essence of anxiety in one sentence. Let’s look at this, ok?

If you are getting ready for tryouts, you are likely experiencing some anxiety.  But what are you anxious about? Taking a cue from Seth, you are anxious about failing and even more than that, you are anticipating failure; you are envisioning failure; you are seeing yourself fail over and over again and you haven’t even been to tryouts!

Remember – the body does what the brain thinks.  So, if you are thinking failure, what will your body do?  It will perform at a less than optimal degree.

How can you change this?  Well, first of all, review my many other blog posts on this topic.  In essence it’s a matter of awareness – noticing that you are filling your head with negative predictions and then learning how to neutralize the negativity.

Want to learn more?  My program – The Mental Game of Cheerleading: Tryouts! looks at all these issues in depth. It’s a 2-CD audio package plus a 50-page Action Guide.  If you order the digital version, your investment will be even less!  Plus I’ll throw in a complimentary coaching session.

Professional athletes learn to recognize and control their thoughts because they know that their thoughts affect their performance. 

Many of our thoughts are automatic, that is , we have them and aren’t even aware of having them. The only thing we are aware of is that we feel anxious or sad or agitated. It’s important to learn to recognize those automatic thoughts to minimize their damage! 

How? It’s as simple as A-B-C. 

A refers to the Activating event.  This can be something that has happened or something you anticipate happening.

B stands for the Belief you have about what has happened or what will happen.

C refers to the Consequences of holding onto the Belief. 

Here’s an example: 

A = I didn’t do well in practice today.

B = I definitely will not do well in the competition coming up.

C = I feel anxious and distressed.

 Do you see that the feeling follows the thought?  To change the feeling you must change the belief or thought.  You can’t change the Activating event so don’t even try but you can change your interpretation of it.

 To change your belief from something that is negative and harmful, challenge it!  In other words, use D – which stands for Debate or Dispute.  Yes, you must learn to Debate or Dispute your Beliefs. 

Here’s how: Your Belief is – “I definitely won’t do well in the competition.”

Ask yourself: How do I know for certain that this is true? Is this belief really accurate or is it a distortion based on faulty thinking?  Isn’t it possible to perform great in competition when a practice wasn’t good? How else can I explain my less-than-great practice session?  

Do you see how this works/  It takes some effort and it really is better if you write it out but if you do, you will learn how to gain control of your thinking and this will definitely enhance your performance in cheerleading and in life!

A number of years ago a fellow named Tim Gallwey wrote a book called The Inner Game of Tennis. It has become a classic – even for people who don’t play tennis!  And the reason is that Gallwey clearly outlines what interferes with performance and how to change this. 

Here is Gallwey’s famous formula:  P = p – i. 

What does this mean, you might ask?  It means that P refers to Performance or the end result.  The small p stands for potential or what you are capable of and small i refers to interference or what gets in your way from realizing your true potential. 

The key to improving your Performance is to reduce the interference and train your potential.  You must, of course, figure out what is interfering with your performance.  Some times it is a technical problem in which case a good coach will help you to correct that.  More often, the interference is mental or the conversation you are having with yourself.  You know, that internal voice that says, “You’re lousy at this,” or “You’ll never get it.”  Sound familiar? 

What kind of impact do you think this has on your performance?  Yep, you’re right…it hinders your performance significantly. 

To rectify this situation, the first step is to become aware of your thoughts (I have other posts on this) and the second step is to challenge them – are they accurate or a distortion? Often they will be a distortion of the truth but even so they wield tremendous power over you. 

More on this tomorrow…

I have been examining some common cognitive distortions cheerleaders (and all people) use which impede progress and undermine cheerleading performance.  Today I will talk about Fortune Telling.

In this form of jumping to conclusions, you “predict” what is going to happen in the future before it happens. “Oh, I know I’m not going to get on the squad.” “We’ll never make it to Nationals.”

Fortune telling can be an especially dangerous cognitive distortion because it can become a self fulfilling prophecy.  If you expect to do poorly, what do you think will happen?

Another way of explaining this is to say that fortune telling is a process of setting negative goals for yourself and living down to them!

Why set up negative goals for yourself?  Instead try saying, “I’m going to work hard in preparing for tryouts so I can feel confident and perform well.”  Or – “We’re going to do our best to make progress this year with the hope that we’ll be able to go to Nationals.”

See the difference?  Think this would make a difference in how you perform?  You betcha!

In my last cheerleading blog post  (a long time ago…sorry for the delay!) I wrote about 3 forms of jumping to conclusions including Labeling, Fortune Telling and Mind Reading.  Today I will talk about Mind Reading.

In mind reading, your automatic thoughts assume the worst about what other people think about you and your work. It is often combined with other cognitive distortions. You may use a Mental Filter to screen out positive reactions and then read a whole set of negative reactions into what’s left.

Here’s an example:  Let’s say you are trying out for a cheerleading squad.  You arrive at the appointed time and place and you find yourself thinking, “The coach won’t want me on the team.  She won’t think I’m good enough.”

Whoah!  What happened here?  Coach has said nothing to you outside of “hello!”  For some reason, you have decided you can read the mind of coach.  Because this happens so automatically, you aren’t even aware this is going on; all you are aware of is an increase in your anxiety and discomfort. 

And how do you think his will affect your try-out performance? Of course it will undermine your performance which will then confirm your negative belief!

How do you turn this around?  As I’ve said many times – it’s important that you learn how you think…keep track of your thoughts so you can become aware of such cognitive distortions.

In this case, you can do this: Say to yourself, “How do I know what coach is thinking?  I really can’t read minds.  Maybe this is my anxiety talking.  Since I don’t really know what coach is thinking, I might as well assume it is something positive or at least neutral.  My job isn’t to read minds; it’s to perform as best as I can in this moment.”

Today I will deal with Labeling.

Here’s an example – You are finishing a practice session in which you just couldn’t hit an inverted back tuck. Each time you tried, you rotated a bit too soon.

What do you tell yourself?  If you tell yourself, “I’m a lousy flyer,” you are Labeling yourself. You are now “a lousy flyer.”  Instead of saying, “I couldn’t get it right today so I better ask coach for advice,” you ended up applying a negative label to a complex event.

Labeling leaves out more than it includes and it ignores the complexity of a given situation. There could be many reasons why you are having trouble with an inverted back tuck, but if you quickly Label yourself a “lousy flyer” you are closing off the opportunity to learn what’s interfering with your progress.

Here’s a better way of handling this situation: “I seem to be having trouble with my inverted back tuck.  It’s frustrating. I wonder what I’m doing wrong.  I can ask coach or some of the other cheerleaders to watch me and tell me what they observe.  Once I know what I’m doing wrong I can get help in correcting it.”

Do you see how this way leads to a plan of action?  Once you have a plan of action, your frustration will diminish because you have hope that things will improve!

So, watch out for Labeling!

Consider this cheerleading scenario.  Your cheerleading squad is at Nationals and you have come in 3^rd in your division.  You all know that your performance was excellent; you hit everything.  What’s your reaction? 

Do you smile with pleasure, knowing that your squad performed so well?  Are you angry that you didn’t place first? Are you complaining that the judging was unfair? 

Well, All-or-Nothing Thinking occurs when you wipe out everything positive and only look at the negative. This can have a snow ball effect such that EVERYTHING becomes negative.  So, in this case, the thinking would be look like this: “We lost.  We were terrible.  I should just get out of cheerleading.  I don’t think the coaching was good either. And the judges always pick that other squad. We’ll never come in first. This is the worst experience of my life.” 

See how easily misery can happen? Such cognitive distortions can discourage you from trying new things or deter you from taking good risks. 

Tip:  In a situation like this, the squad can benefit from a debriefing in which everyone is asked what  went well, what went very well, and what, if anything can be learned from the event.

Do you immediately point out every thing that went wrong with the routine?  Do you apologize to them for your “terrible” performance?  Or do you thank them graciously and enjoy their compliments? 

Well, just like Mental Filtering (see last post), Magnifying and Minimizing is another cognitive distortion that is a favorite of perfectionists.  In this case, you either Magnify every little thing that was not perfect or you Minimize every thing that was! 

Tip:  It’s fine to recognize when something does not go well as long as you can do so in an objective way, noting it, and resolving to figure out how to adjust so the problem can be fixed.  This is different from ruminating about it. 

Tip #2:  When someone compliments you, accept it graciously.  A compliment is a gift so accept it as such.  When you point out what they didn’t see you are spoiling it for them and for you!

Ok, now what did you hear?  Did you hear it all?  Would you rate it a favorable critique?

If yes, you’re on the right track and you have no need to read further.  If you saw it as a negative critique, please read on! 

As I mentioned in a previous post, cheerleaders and cheer coaches can benefit from knowing about cognitive distortions which can adversely affect the overall performances of cheerleaders. 

Overgeneralization is the most common cognitive distortion and Mental Filtering is one type of Overgeneralization.  Using the example from above, the cheerleader who saw this as a negative critique filtered out the positive and only focused on what was wrong with the toe touch jump.  Do you see how the filtering can work to the cheerleader’s disadvantage?  The cheerleader might spend the next several hours feeling bad because he or she is convinced that the coach disapproves of the toe touch jump! 

Lesson: If you filter out all the positive and focus only on the negative, your performance will suffer. 

Coaches!  Knowing that this scenario is possible, be on the lookout for your cheerleaders using Mental Filtering and engage them in a conversation that might sound like this” “It might be useful for me to hear what you think I just told you so we can be clear we’re on the same page.”  Then, if the cheerleader has seemed to focus on what was wrong with the stunt, you can gently help them see the whole picture.