Reacting with Consistency
Everyone has had the teammate, or been this athlete:
The game is moving along, when all of a sudden, a costly mistake leads to a game-changing, and potentially game-losing, play. The one who made the error may be seen throwing their equipment, yelling at themselves and others, exhibiting negative body language, or perhaps all of the above.
There’s no question the wave of negative emotions stems from the outcome it caused (like getting scored against). Feeling frustration and regret is natural, but it’s overdone. The majority of athletes behave this way. They react to mistakes based on their impact to the results.
Elite athletes have the awareness and emotional control to treat mistakes the same, no matter the outcome.
Let’s discuss a situation where the mistake is turning the ball over to an opponent.
Example 1: the turnover leads to the opponent scoring
The mentally untrained athlete reacts to their mistake with intense negativity, hurting their future performance. The frustration may also spread to teammates.
The mentally trained athlete treats this turnover like any other - they acknowledge their frustration, analyze what went wrong, learn from it, and move on.
Example 2: the turnover only leads to an opponent’s scoring chance
The mentally untrained athlete barely acknowledges their mistake. They’re thankful the outcome remains unchanged, but don’t learn from what nearly lead to the opponent scoring.
The mentally trained athlete treats this turnover like any other - they acknowledge their frustration, analyze what went wrong, learn from it, and move on.
Key point: the mentally trained athlete reacts the same way despite different outcomes.
They focus on what they can control - not making the same mistake twice by analyzing what happened before it leads to a more costly result.
The mentally untrained athlete is more susceptible to repeating mistakes, as they only learn and adjust when the outcome is affected.
This concept, consistency in your reactions to mistakes, is in line with one of the most important concepts in sport psychology: focusing on the process.
Many people understand and discuss the importance of focusing on the process, not the outcome, but they’re not sure how to properly do it.
Here is one concrete method - reacting to mistakes with consistency.
Tool: exercise awareness of your mistakes by learning from them even when they seem irrelevant. React in the same, controlled way even when mistakes prove costly.
This practice develops:
consistency in your performance as you make less mistakes and bounce back more effectively
emotional control when mistakes do end up being costly, so you can maintain confidence where most athletes crumble
