Improve your sports performance through better attention
Attention and sports performance is about looking at the role attention plays in ones ability to perform. Like many things attention is a skill, one that can be developed and trained. The amount of information your brain takes in predominantly comes from your eyes. Approximately 2 billion pieces of information per second enter your brain through your eyes. That’s a lot of information! Your brain can’t meaningfully take all that information in, so it has to be selective with which information it uses.
This is one of the first things that separates elite athletes from the rest. They are really good at selectively paying attention and processing the information that is going to be the most beneficial for them in a moment. In order to do so they actually look at viewing things and take the time to take in the information more so than amateur athletes, who constantly move their eyes to try and take in more information. Elite athletes select what they think they should take in and then use that information more effectively and efficiently. This helps a lot with mental energy and not taxing themselves.
The more selective you are with what information you take in the better off you will be. Like most things it is quality not quantity that is best. Attention is everything in sports. If you are not focusing on the right thing at the right moment you will under perform. In today’s world this is even more important. Attention is an important skill set to have with all the technology we have that is negatively impacting attention and ones ability to sustain their attention over time is going down. Attention along with other cognitive skills has opened up a whole new area of mental training where we use technology to our advance to enhance cognitive abilities rather than reduce them.
No matter what you decide to use, make sure to include training your attention so you can perform how you want when you need to the most, under pressure.
To your success,
Kate
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Kate Allgood Masters Sport Psychology (with distinction) Masters General Psychology (with distinction) Sports Hypnosis Certification Mindfulness Certification
TAIS Assessment Certified
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