Performance anxiety treatment for athletes and performers
What is it like to have performance anxiety as an athlete or performer?
There are times when you feel great and you perform the way you know that you can. At those times, you feel locked-in and nothing can stop you. However, those times are either few and far between or they don’t happen nearly as often as you know they should. When it’s time for you to perform, your heart starts pounding and you can barely think. The yips seem to strike at key moments when you really need to show your stuff. You used to love to compete, but now you dread it. At times, even practice seems to be too much and you can’t do simple things that you could do when you were a kid playing with your friends. You’ve tried fixing the problem on your own. You’ve watched TikTok and YouTube videos, you tried focusing on the positive and pushing through, but nothing seems to help with this mental block. You’re finally ready to talk to a sport psychology professional.
What can athletes and performers do to help performance anxiety?
I’m Dr. Jason von Stietz and I help athletes and performers with performance anxiety. Whether you call it the yips, mental blocks, choking under pressure, or stage fright, we can work together to come up with a plan to get you back to performing your best while enjoying the moment. We’ll use Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to help you challenge the heckler inside your own head. We can use CBT exercises to help build something called “distress tolerance” or mental toughness. We’ll incorporate mental skills training into our work together that will help you on and off the field.
Wondering about the next step? Contact me today to set up a free phone consultation to see how I can help.