Sports Psychology For Dummies. Leif H. Smith

let go of mistakes and recover from poor performance.

      

There is a difference between outcome goals and process goals. Outcome goals are what you’re pursuing, and process goals are how you’re pursuing it. Outcome goals are usually not within your control, but they help guide you to greater heights in sports and are many times the fuel and motivation for you; process goals are completely in your control and help increase the probability that you’ll reach your outcome goals.

      Short-term goals

      Your short-term goals are ones that take one to six months and directly feed into your midterm goals. The accomplishment of the short-term goals is necessary for the success of the midterm goals. For example, if your midterm goal is to be the best-conditioned athlete on the field, you could set the following short-term goals:

       Run 2 miles in 12 minutes.

       Run the 40-yard dash in less than 5 seconds.

       Improve my leg strength.

       Practice my post-mistake mental-toughness routine every day in training.

      These are sometimes called “performance” goals — where you attach actual statistics to the goal, such as running the 40-yard dash in under 5 seconds.

      Immediate goals

      After you’ve set your short-term goals, your immediate goals take over. Immediate goals are actions you engage in to better the chances of your short-term goals happening. So, if you take the short-term goal of running 2 miles in 12 minutes, the following are examples of immediate goals:

       Meet with my strength and conditioning coach once a week.

       Time my 2-mile run at the end of every week.

       Perform a tempo run (set up by the trainer) four days a week.

       Do cross-training four days a week.

      Making your goals specific

      When you walk into a grocery store, whether you’ve written down a list of items to buy or you have that list in your mind, it’s specific. It says more than just “food.” You know you need milk, bread, cereal, bananas, and so on. If you do show up at the store without a list, you’ll likely get home from the store, walk in the door, and realize you forgot something you needed.

      The same is true for your goals in sports. The more specific you can be when you set your goals, the better your chances of achieving them. Clear and specific goals allow you to have laser-like focus in your pursuit of greatness. They leave little to chance or imagination, allowing you to channel your energy accordingly.

      Here are some examples of specific and nonspecific goals:

Nonspecific Goals	Specific Goals
Get fit.	Run 2 miles in 12 minutes.
Serve well.	Have a first-service percentage of 60 percent.
Play hard.	Make three tackles per game.
Let go of my mistakes.	Follow my post-mistake routine in games.

      When you say that you want to “play hard,” what exactly does that mean? How are you going to measure it? Playing hard could be turned into a specific goal, but as it stands, it’s broad, ambiguous, and lacking in clear direction.

      

Specific goals are better because they increase your motivation and focus — you know exactly what you’re going after. You know what you’re working toward, and your mind will have an easier time stayed tuned into that. It is also important to set these goals before practice, optimally a week before. Then you know what you are going to do exactly. If you do not know your goals for practice, it is easy to become unfocused and underperform.

      Setting goals that challenge you

In addition to being specific, your goals need to be challenging. They should push you beyond your comfort level and be slightly out of your reach. Setting your goals slightly out of reach, or slightly higher than you originally plan, ensures that you’ll be motivated to chase them and improve along the way.

      If you set goals that are too easy, you’ll become bored, you’ll lose motivation, and you won’t improve. You may feel good for a while — “Wow, I’m good — I’m accomplishing so many things!” — but this feeling won’t last.

      Have you ever noticed how much better you play when you play against athletes who are better than you? Yes, it’s difficult, and your ego may take a bruising, but look how much you improve.

      

At the same time, make sure you aren’t setting unrealistic goals. A goal to become a state champion or make the national team may be challenging and realistic for some, but it may not be realistic for you where you are now. If you set this goal and expect it too soon, you may end up feeling frustrated and losing motivation. You’re getting better — maybe much better — but you won’t see it because you’re focused on a goal that’s beyond your reach.

      

You want to set goals that are challenging enough to motivate you, but not so unrealistic that they discourage you. For example, we both challenge each athlete we work with to set goals slightly above what they think they can achieve. This goes back to the courage to aim high and dream big! Instead of just making the lineup, aim to be a starter. Instead of performing well, work to become all-conference. Higher goals build confidence, and they also push you to think and dream bigger in your pursuit of becoming a better athlete.

      Setting deadlines for each goal

      When you’ve set goals that are specific and challenging, you’ll want to add timelines to each goal. Doing so takes your goals from theory to actual practice — in other words, setting deadlines makes your goals more likely to become reality. Setting deadlines helps you remain focused on your goals, so that they don’t exist simply as dreams — they become real. Examples include an athlete wanting to be able to leg press a certain amount of weight in 30 days or a tennis player wanting to hit 200 first serves with at least 50 percent accuracy going in within two weeks.

      

Setting deadlines for your goals is one of the key factors that separates good athletes from elite ones. If you don’t set deadlines, you’ll likely allow other things to get in the way. Before you know it, the day, week, month, or even year has gone by and the goal is still sitting there unaccomplished.

      

Put your deadlines for accomplishing your goals on a calendar, and review that calendar regularly. You should know, every day, what you’re doing to reach your immediate, short-term, midterm, and long-term goals.

      Working with tiny goals

      Tiny goals are goals that are smaller in scale and easier to achieve. They are an important part of the