When Pressure Makes Us Think!
- Julie Jones
- Jun 8
- 4 min read
Have you ever watched an athlete, coach…or anyone for that matter…after a mistake and thought: “Oh no...now they're thinking."
You can almost see it happen. The pitcher starts aiming instead of throwing. The point guard looks to pass instead of driving the hole. The golfer stands over the putt a little longer. The speaker starts searching through notes on the lectern at 100 miles an hour as if he’s lost something.
This is when you hear comments like, "Just play!” “Relax!”
Not, "Think more. "Analyze harder." Or even, "Focus on your mechanics."
JUST PLAY!!!
But the funny thing is, we often do exactly the opposite when the pressure rises. We start thinking more. And under pressure, that can be a dangerous
Because pressure doesn't just change how we feel.
Pressure changes how we perform. More specifically, pressure often changes what we pay
attention to.
While preparing for my new Psychological Aspects of Sport course at the University of Akron, I revisited a chapter from our course text by Cheryl Coker and Mark Fischman on motor learning. Their discussion of the three stages of learning and skill acquisition provides an interesting explanation…and thus, a question about something coaches and performers see all the time.
Why do talented, prepared people sometimes stop looking like themselves when the stakes get bigger?
The classic work of Fitts and Posner (1967) describes three stages of skill development:
The Cognitive Stage. The Associative Stage. The Autonomous Stage.
In the cognitive stage, we think about everything. Movements are deliberate. Attention is focused on mechanics. Learning is very effortful.
In the associative stage, movements become smoother. We make fewer errors and begin developing a feel for the skill.
Eventually, performers reach the autonomous stage.
This is where performance becomes largely automatic, as the name would suggest. Here, we no longer need to consciously think about the mechanics of movement. Instead, we can focus on reading the environment, making decisions and responding to what we see.
The chapter describes autonomous performers this way. "Performance is quite automatic; the learner seems to require very little conscious thought or attention to the details of movement."
Then comes a statement every coach (and human) should remember!
"Asking highly skilled performers to consciously focus on their movements will seriously disrupt performance."
Think about that.
The very thing we often do under pressure is the very thing that can interfere with performance.
Performers start trying to control every move…they don’t need to…the body knows what to do! The mind just gets involved at the wrong time!!!!
We’ve referenced the research of Sian Beilock, author of Choke (and president of Dartmouth), before. She found that pressure often causes performers to direct attention inward and consciously monitor skills that normally operate automatically. As working memory becomes occupied with worry, evaluation and self-monitoring, execution can suffer.
Author Tim Gallwey described something similar decades earlier in The Inner Game of Tennis when he wrote, "The player of the Inner Game comes to value the art of relaxed concentration above all other skills." Notice he says RELAXED concentration…not forced
thinking!
Not because concentration removes pressure. Because concentration helps performers stay connected to the task instead of becoming trapped inside their own thoughts.
This is where an important distinction needs to be made…in my humble opinion!
When pressure shows up, we do not want to react emotionally. We want to respond. We want to notice frustration, fear, urgency and self-doubt! It’s our RESPONSE-ABILITY!
Then use the tools we've discussed over the past two weeks to respond intentionally.
Take a breath. Find what is true. Regain perspective. Notice à Truth à Narrow. That is response.
But once we've responded to the pressure, something different needs to happen.
We need to trust.
The hitter needs to trust years of swings. The infielder needs to trust years of reads. The speaker needs to trust preparation. The musician needs to trust practice. The performer needs to trust learning.
And then?
We need to react to the ENVIRONMENT! Not to our thoughts. To the environment.
The ball. The pitch. The defender. The audience. The situation.
Pressure becomes dangerous when we stop reacting to what we see and start reacting to what we think.
READ THAT AGAIN!
We begin trying to consciously control movements that have already been learned. We move from trusting to steering, from reading to analyzing and from performing to monitoring.
The eyes are providing useful information. The mind is creating unnecessary interference.
So, this week's tool is simple: Respond to pressure. Trust your training. React to the environment.
Respond to the emotion. Trust the preparation. React to the information.
Because elite performance is not about eliminating pressure. It is about knowing which signals deserve your attention.
And when the moment gets big, the best performers do not become mindless. They become selective.
They respond to pressure. Then they trust what they have trained and react to what the moment requires.
And we need to do the same!
Manage the moments!!
Julie
Julie Jones
Mental Performance Coach
SSB Performance
juliej@ssbperformance.com • 234-206-0946
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