The Sporting Edge - For individuals and teams

No man [or woman] is an island, the poet John Donne wrote. We are all connected. A truism for sure-but if you're an athlete in an individual sport, do you need different mental skills than if you're in a team sport?

My initial answer was a qualified "yes," but the more I think about it, I suspect that the best answer may be a qualified "no."

Let me explain:

Recently, I posted a blog about a silently interactive moment: At the end of a guest lecture at James Madison University, a student asked a question. I paused before responding to him.

The blog reflected on the experience, in those few moments, of the two people (amongst a few hundred) most involved: my own and that of the questioner, who I called "Ted." Well, I made some guesses about what Ted might have been thinking and feeling.

An astute reader asked both about the question and my answer. Herewith, that information-plus some further thoughts on the subject.

The lecture focused on the practice of sport psychology and performance psychology. Ted asked: "When you're dealing with competitive anxiety, what's the difference between consulting to individuals who play on a team compared to those who play an individual sport?"

It was not a question I'd been asked before and so I paused and thought. Now, looking at a video of the lecture (if you're interested, I'll be glad to send you the link-contact me @ http://www.theperformingedge.com), I can see that I spent that thinking time with my eyes definitely up and to the left. Those of you who know anything about NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) will recognize that particular "visual eye-accessing cue" as the classic sign that you're tuning into your store of remembered imagery. (You can't trust everything you read on the web-in case you didn't know! I checked that position on the web: The first site I clicked on said that looking up and to the left is a sure-fire way of catching someone in a lie....Well, (a) that particular site has it backward and (b) sure-fire ways of catching someone lying? Lie detection is still a pretty inexact science.)

So: what is the answer? Well, I asked some sport psychologist colleagues both directly and on a couple of email lists. Here are some answers-both mine and others'. And of course the answer also depends on a lot of additional factors, such as what the person wants assistance with, who referred them and what they're interested in, what the sport is, and what the sport psychologist's role and training are.
• If I'm working with individuals who play in team sports, I'll pay particular attention to the impact of the team and coach on their sense of themselves. We'll discuss their position on the team and how well that fits for them. We'll look at competition and jockeying for a particular spot on the team. We'll look at the effect, rewards, and stresses of particular team roles. The hockey players most likely to show up at a sport psychologist's door, for example, are goalies. They're the ones with the weight of the team's fortunes resting on their shoulders.
• Because team members are directly dependent on each other for the team to play well, the relationships between team members is critically important. What are the team's dynamics? How do they change over time? Teammates change from season to season-even sometimes from game to game. And: how do these dynamics affect the athlete's performance?
• The way in which athletes experience or connect with teammates and coaches often reflects their experience with their own family's patterns and dynamics. Sometimes it's really important to recognize this "systemic" understanding of what is going on. Knowing where particular feelings or patterns of interaction come from can allow change to occur.
• Sometimes it's not just about the connection between the athlete and the sport psychologist. Where does the coach fit in? What is that particular triangle like? How does the coach view the sport psychologist? In a team sport, the coach can have a continuous role and contact with team members throughout the game, whether it's making use of time outs or time between periods. If a sport psychologist is working with an individual member of s team, the coach may experience that relationship as a threat. On the other hand, with individual sports, once the competition has begun, typically the coach can't do anything further. Individual sport coaches may therefore be much more interested in getting any assistance possible with their athletes.
• Some sport psychologists are hired for and are adamant about working essentially with the team only. If any individual work needs to be done or if the player is interested in working one-to-one, those sport psychologists will suggest they see someone else altogether.

As I reflect on the question, now, and the various answers, I come back to Donne's observation: Even if I'm working with an athlete in an individual sport, and even if we don't talk about it directly, all those people and organizations with whom he or she has been involved, past and present, may be relevant to the work that we are currently doing. It may not be at the forefront of our work, but it's there in the mix.