Composure Counts: Managing Emotion to Earn Trust and Time
- Julie Jones
- 7 days ago
- 4 min read
Last week, during a session with one of my college athletes, we talked about the power of emotional control, not just for performance, but for perception.
Her coach had made a tough call: she was kept out of the lineup. When she asked why, the coach said something telling: “I didn’t think you were ready,” he said. “And I needed the other players to see that we don’t act that way when things don’t go our way.” In other words, she had to be an example.
The hard part? Her emotion came from a place we can all understand… from frustration, disappointment and caring so much that it hurts. While her emotion was human, it was also visible.
And in sports, how we look — our body language, facial expressions, tone — communicates volumes about our readiness, whether we realize it or not.
In another session last week on mental rehearsal, I asked a group of athletes, “Have you ever been disrupted in your performance by emotion or mood?”
Nearly every hand went up.
Of course they did! Because emotion and performance are inseparable. We aren’t ruling out emotion. We are regulating it to ensure we are ready!
When we’re frustrated or upset, our brain’s emotional center (the amygdala) hijacks our focus and floods us with stress hormones like cortisol. The part of the brain we need for decision-making and motor control, our prefrontal cortex, goes offline. Research from cognitive neuroscience shows that emotional arousal narrows attention and reduces working memory capacity, making it harder to “stay in the moment” or execute with precision.
So, when we wear that frustration on our face or in our body language, it’s not just an inside problem; it’s an outward signal that we’ve lost control of our state. And that signal travels fast.
Think about it:
We’ve seen players cry after winning because they didn’t play well individually or didn’t get the position they wanted.
We’ve watched athletes hang their heads or slam their gloves when pulled from the game, even if it was best for the team at the time.
We’ve seen eyes roll, shoulders slump and entire dugouts or benches shift in energy because one player couldn’t manage her disappointment.
That kind of emotional leakage doesn’t build trust…and trust is the foundation of team performance.
It doesn’t strengthen relationships…and relationships are the backbone of confidence.
It doesn’t open communication… and communication is what keeps teams aligned.
When we see someone visibly frustrated, our brain makes a split-second judgment: Can I count on her?
That’s not a moral judgment; it’s a practical one. Trust, after all, is built on consistency under pressure.
The good news? We can train our emotional responses just like we train our physical ones.
Here are three research-backed ways to manage emotion and project readiness.
First, when emotion rises, label it! Unfortunately, we normally go straight to “I’m frustrated,” “I’m disappointed,” “I’m tense.”
That’s a start. Dr. Daniel Siegel found that naming emotions activates the prefrontal cortex, helping regain control and calm the amygdala. It’s a neurological “reset button.”
But using “I am” keeps you immersed in the experience and your mind and body tend to respond as though frustration, anger or whatever the emotion you are feeling is your core state of being.
Instead, saying “I’m feeling frustrated” ….FEELING being the operative word, correctly identifies the emotion as a temporary state…not your core identity! You are EXPERIENCING frustration. You are not frustration.
Simply adding the word "feeling" or "noticing" strengthens this cognitive process, helping to calm our reactive amygdala and regulate our emotional experience.
As always, the words we use can significantly impact our experience.
Although I am listing this as tool #2, this is the first thing I have this athlete working on. Rises in emotion, which are inevitable, are the perfect time to use our breath! BUT…to do so, we must practice BEFORE we are all in a tizz! A single physiological sigh — two quick inhales, one long
exhale — lowers stress and resets the nervous system.Before we react, we can take that breath. Then RESPOND!
Lastly, just as we mentally rehearse our skills, we can rehearse our emotional recovery. This is called Motivational Imagery! Picture ourselves staying composed when we strike out, get subbed or miss an assignment gives us a chance to REHEARSE our response. We can visualize our posture, face and response.
Each time we do, we strengthen the neural pathways of composure…our “mental muscle memory” for calm. We are saying to our mind and body, “Hey, when this happens, here is what we do!”
Remember: leaders and high performers don’t avoid emotion; they manage it. They recognize that what they feel is valid, but how they show it matters.
Because readiness isn’t just a skill. It’s a signal.
And when our body language, tone and eyes say, “I’m steady. I’m ready”, our teammates believe it, our coaches trust it and our performance follows suit.
Manage the moments!
Julie
P.S. Add a 3-session mental lab into your fall season. Reach out and let’s build the perfect one for you! Shoot me an email or text – juliej@ssbperformance.com or 234-206-0946
Julie Jones
Mental Performance Coach
SSB Performance
juliej@ssbperformance.com • 234-206-0946
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