Chris Mance II - Mental Skills Coach

All competitive athletes love winning and hate losing. This fact is indisputable. However, what is disputable is if it’s better to hate losing more or love winning more. Today, I will clear up that confusion. Hating to lose more than loving to win is bad.

The reason why it’s bad to hate losing more than to love winning comes down to the fundamental process of what it takes to get better. To get better, an athlete must do things they have never done before. Moreover, when you do things you’ve never done you will fail first before you succeed.

To put it differently, an athlete must risk losing before they can win on a higher level. Therefore, if an athlete hates losing more than they love winning, there’s a chance they will choose either to:

1) Find a way to avoid competing on higher levels than they are comfortable.

2) Not give their best effort when they must “punch above their weight” so they don’t damage their ego.

Both choices debilitate an athlete’s growth, as getting to the next higher level is never the goal for athletes who hate losing more than they love winning if they can remain undefeated on their current level.

On the other hand, if an athlete learns to love winning more than they hate losing, then they embrace the losses as steppingstones to help them win more. Athletes with this mindset celebrate the opportunity to compete against someone better. This gives them more motivation than when they compete against someone with less skill.

The dichotomy between these two mindsets (hating to lose vs. loving to win) feeds directly into how an athlete deals with fear. Loving to win does not mean an athlete doesn’t hate losing, it just means they have the courage not to let the fear of losing be their primary emotional driver. This. Is. A. Game. Changer.

Reframing The Mindset Around Hating to Lose

Hating to lose is not bad. However, letting that hate drive fear without reframing that fear is bad. To have fear is to be human and there is no shame in being afraid. In fact, fear is a fantastic trigger to remind athletes to put their mental skills to work to reframe their mindset.

• If an athlete hates losing because of a fear of failure, then this is an ego oriented mindset. Athletes can use this as a trigger to practice process thinking. Work on setting task goals, using intrinsic motivation, and applying progressions to short-term plans.
• If an athlete hates losing because they fear the problems losing will cause them, then this is a threat mindset. Athletes can use this as a trigger to practice mental toughness. Work on reframing the threat into a challenge, using breathing techniques to control the heart rate, and practicing positive self-talk.
• If an athlete hates losing because they fear the unknown consequences of losing, then the athlete is displaying an external locus of control mindset. Athletes can use this as a trigger to practice focus. Work on separating out the things the athlete controls from the things they don’t control. Then direct the athlete’s energy into getting the best out of those things in their control.

To conclude, every athlete who wants to be elite hates losing. But every athlete who wants to be elite doesn’t hate losing more than they love winning. Moreover, what separates these two types of athletes is how they use mental skills to manage fear.