Confidence: the main ingredient for peak performance.

One of the biggest differences between the "minors" and the "majors," between just making it and thriving comes from the ability to switch your influence of confidence from external to internal.

Athletes especially are prone to this. While they are growing up, they are getting their confidence fed by parents, teammates and coaches. Always getting stroked and being told "how great you are." If an athlete had a bad game, all they had to do was look around and someone would be there to give them the shot of confidence they needed. Without realizing it, they can become dependent on this external form of confidence. The challenge becomes when they make that jump into the top level of their sport.

At this highest level, the external confidence starts to dry up. From being fed confidence, you now have to know how to "feed yourself" confidence. Many players have challenges with this and they starve. They start to look harder at outside sources for someone to give them confidence, when actually all they may get is criticism. Other teammates are too concerned about their own certainty and they will actually put you down, to make themselves feel better. The coach doesn't have the time or desire to sit and tell you how great you are, he is too worried about performance. The team's mindset is basically, "I brought you up here to play because you are great, you should know it and play like it."

This is the time when you, as an elite athlete, have to become totally selfish with your confidence. Look inside you and understand "What makes you great." Focus on it, visualize it and feed off it. It's OK to HEAR what others say, but be very careful to what you LISTEN too. Remember, the question of "what can I do better or what am I doing wrong," is not the same as "what makes me great?". The outside influences generally ask the first question, "What are you doing wrong?" It is your responsibility to ask yourself the second question: "What makes me great?".