Your Most Important Tool For Peak Performance May Not Be What You Think! Or Maybe It Is!
- Julie Jones
- Sep 8
- 5 min read
Another week. Another trip to another beautiful campus in Pennsylvania to work with yet another great team.
One of the best parts of going to campuses to do workshops, aside from experiencing the energy, excitement and determination of these teams, is that I get a lot of time to think about our sessions on the trip – both in the anticipation of getting it started and the reflection as I relive the experience on the way home.
A few weeks ago, I shared what I learned from my trip to Elizabethtown, PA. The team was AWEOME. Their energy was palpable and since I got to watch them practice, I got to observe one of their many strengths. It was their approach to the everyday parts of the game and trusting that each move they made was just that…a move…no matter if they loved the touch, the pass or anything else, for that matter. It was one touch and on to the next…and that leads to good stuff!
And that’s a mindset!
In my most recent trip through the beautiful hills of PA, as I was driving and running through plans for my first session of the year with the IUP Softball team, Dr. Alia Crum’s research on mindset popped into my mind.
I talk about MINDSET EVERY DAY! But I remember hearing her say on a recent podcast something we often forget: our mindset doesn’t just influence our performance, it directs it, making it our MOST IMPORTANT TOOL!! And the good thing is, it can be trained…just like any other skill we acquire to keep climbing to the top!
Dr. Crum’s research shows that our mindset shapes how we explain things, what we expect and what motivates us.
And if this is the case…we need to give our mindset a lot of attention. In fact, it may be the most important tool to work on before, during and after any performance, practice, meeting…anything!
If our mindset determines how we explain things, this means we may explain things very differently from one day (or moment) to another.
If our mindset determines what we expect, this means we may miss out on very important information because we are looking for something else.
If our mindset determines our motivation, well…we may be in trouble some days!
The truth of it is, our intelligence, our physical abilities (barring injury or illness, of course), our knowledge and our emotional intelligence don’t change from day to day. Even so, we often show up and perform inconsistently…even if it’s just a little difference here or there.
These things are constants; what is it that makes us different on those days?
Our MINDSET…plain and simple!
For instance, if we believe practice (or anything else) is a punishment, we’ll find every reason to feel drained. If we see it as an opportunity, our brain starts scanning for evidence to confirm that belief.
That’s where our Reticular Activating System (RAS) comes in. The RAS is our brain’s filter; it decides what information to pay attention to and what to ignore.
And guess what? It’s wired to look for what we already believe. I am sure you never had a kid whose mindset was “Coach doesn’t like me,”! Well, if you did her RAS highlighted every correction, every substitution and every look from the bench as proof. If her mindset was “Coach is trying to make me better,” those same cues turn into motivation, guidance and growth.
Same input. Completely different output.
This is why our mindset has such a powerful ripple effect on so much of what’s important for peak performance, like how we take coaching. Feedback can feel like an attack or like a gift. Our mindset decides.
Like how we interpret others. A teammate’s short response could be a sign they’re mad at us…or just that they’re tired…or trying to tell us something we need to know on the spot to help us. Our lens determines the story.
Or how we show up. If we decide practice is “just going through the same dumb stuff every day and we don’t work on what I need to ,” we’ll practice flat. If we decide practice is where we sharpen our edge, we bring energy.
It also affects how we approach tasks we dislike. “Conditioning is torture” leads to dread. “Conditioning builds my late-game toughness” fuels effort.
Here’s another reason our MINDSET IS SO IMPORTANT!
All of this doesn’t just affect individuals! It sets the tone for team culture. One player’s negative mindset can spread like wildfire, but so can one player’s decision to look at challenges as opportunities. Culture is nothing more than the collective mindset of a group.
Research consistently shows that our expectations influence outcomes. And since we know we don’t control outcomes, we need all the help we can get in influencing what we want to happen!
What we believe shapes not only our perception but our physiology…our stress response, our motivation, even our energy. That means our mindset before we walk into the locker room, the meeting or the classroom literally changes how our body and brain perform in those spaces.
Dr. Crum’s infamous “milkshake study” even showed our mindset can lower our “hunger hormone”…something so deep inside our gut, we’d never imagine how we think can lower it threefold.
If this is the case, it seems checking our mindset before we do ANYTHING may be helpful to our performance and everyone around us!
As I have mentioned many times, this is the place I would make the BIGGEST CHANGES if I could go back and redo my career. I’d check my mindset at the door EVERY DAY. It would make me and everyone around me better.
Of course, I can’t control the mindsets of those around me, but since my influence is never neutral, maybe, just maybe, doing my work of making sure I am there to be engaged, enthusiastic and authentic (the three words that drive my work today) will make the environment more productive and influence others’ mindsets so they can do the work they were born to do!
So, maybe our first rule, above all other rules for practice, games, meetings, or how we treat our neighbors, should be…CHECK YOUR MINDSET AT THE DOOR…literally! If we want to be our best, we must consider what we expect, how we explain it, and how we feel about it (our motivation), as well as how all of this will influence our performance. To do so, let’s ask:
What belief am I carrying into this space?
Is this mindset going to help me or hurt me?
What evidence am I asking my brain to find?
Remember, our brains are looking for what we tell them to find. It is up to us to feed them something that fuels us, our teammates and our performance.
Because in the end, our mindset is our most important tool, and just like anything else, we can train it to work for us! It isn’t just about how we think…it’s about how we perform.
Julie
P.S. I’ve been traveling to campuses a lot this fall. Let’s add yours to the list! 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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