I recently surveyed our Elite Competitor Society moms/coaches, asking: “What kills your daughter’s confidence the most when it comes to her sport/performance?”

Turns out, there are a few things that moms of female athletes agree on that cut their athlete daughter’s confidence the most. 

So, let’s face them head on! 

Note: All three of these confidence cutters deserve their own separate discussions! We are touching on them at a higher level right now to provide some quick-wins and strategies to start addressing them. 

Confidence Killer #1: Unrealistic Expectations

Let’s start with the one that I tend to see most often: athletes putting unrealistic expectations on themselves to play or perform a certain way. 

This usually stems from a level of perfectionism or perfectionistic tendencies that pop up and rob athletes of their confidence when they inevitably don’t measure up to where they think they should be. 

This is pretty common. High achieving athletes want to do well. They want to constantly be improving. They want to hit new levels of performance. 

This is all GREAT and necessary. However, there’s a fine line between healthy striving and the unrealistic expectations that come with perfectionism. We'll dig into that and also talk about three steps to take to help shift towards healthy striving.

Confidence Killer #2: Inability to Come Back From Mistakes

This is HUGE! Mistakes are a part of every athlete’s career. They are how we learn and are necessary, especially in the early phases of learning. 

However, they have the potential to be enormous confidence killers in athletes. Especially if they are happening during competition when they all eyes are on them. 

We'll discuss a few different steps to helping athletes bounce back from mistakes, including the “mistake ritual” that we teach all athletes in our Elite Competitor Program.

Confidence Killer #3: Toxic Coaches and/or Teammates

This one is multi-faceted. I’ll address what I see most in terms of “toxic” coaches and teammates. 

Note: If players are suffering emotional, verbal, or physical abuse from coaches, adult intervention is needed immediately. 

What I am going to address here is toxic coaching in terms of negativity that often brings players down and cuts their confidence. 

Coaches that create an environment where players don’t feel valued, like they can do anything right, or not making progress because of lack of feedback can be difficult. 

We'll talk about some strategies you and your player can use right now. We'll also touch again on toxic teammates.

There you have it! The three most common confidence killers in female athletes and some strategies to get you going on how to address them. 

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