Why Building Self-Esteem Doesn’t Increase an Athlete’s Performance
Self-esteem is a product of standards and expectations. If you have low standards and low expectations, it’s easier to build your self-esteem than when you have high standards and high expectations.
This is why so many athletes have low self-esteem. Athletes have extremely high standards and expectations. Therefore, the instinctive way to increase their self-esteem is to either lower their standards or lower their expectations. Unquestionably, that would be counterproductive. Athletes motivate themselves because of their standards and expectations, as well as their drive to exceed standards and expectations. It would be crazy to fix a self-esteem problem by reducing motivation.
So, when an athlete is facing a self-esteem issue debilitating performance, the problem-solving process should not focus on self-esteem. Instead, the focus must be on shifting their mindset from being ego oriented to task oriented.
Shifting from the Ego Mindset to the Task Mindset to Increase an Athlete’s Performance
When an athlete’s ego dominates their mindset, increasing self-esteem is insatiable. The only way an athlete will learn to like themselves more and value their journey in a way that boost self-esteem is to let go of the outcomes of competition and focus on what it means to be a competitor.
Competitors have the ultimate task mindset. As a result, if you want to help an elite athlete eliminate their ego focus on helping them be a better competitor.
The most important trait of a competitor is that they don’t view tough competition as their enemy. On the contrary, competitors view tough competition as the next best thing to a best friend. Easy wins over unworthy competitors provide 1) little to no experience, 2) no opportunity to practice advanced skills, and 3) expose none of the things one must work on to get better. These three categories motivate competitors immensely.
In addition, these three categories are also what those with a task mindset use to feed their self-esteem. With this in mind, an effective way to make the shift from the ego to task mindset is to use these three categories for goal setting.
For every outcome goal an athlete has, help them create 10 to 20 process goals to go with it. Each process goal will then focus on the three aforementioned categories: 1) experience, 2) skill development, and 3) fixing mistakes. In addition, each process goal must be S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic, and Time bound) so they can be measured, tracked, and celebrated when achieved.
To conclude, low self-esteem and debilitated performance is a chicken and egg problem. One causes the other and you can’t separate the two. Therefore, shifting an athlete’s mindset away from the chicken and egg is the best solution.