Pressure plays a massive part in people’s day to day lives. Very often it arises during a big moment - an important presentation, a first night performance or perhaps an incredibly tight match.
All these situations would naturally incur added pressure.
We’ve all experienced it; freezing during a key presentation or speech, missing the penalty or free throw that would have won your team the game or saying foolish things on a first date. No one is immune.
Some of the best examples of handling pressure occur in sport. Over time we have witnessed many instances of athletes coping and not coping, being successful and not successful.
There are two types of negative behaviour that can occur when under extreme pressure - Choking and Panicking. Contrary to popular belief, the two are very different albeit they exhibit similar outcomes.
In the book, ‘What the Dog Saw’, there is a chapter called ‘The Art of Failure’ in which the author Malcolm Gladwell does a brilliant job of describing the differences between Choking and Panicking. To do this he discusses behaviour, brain processes and psychological studies.
“Choking is about thinking too much. Panic is about thinking too little. Choking is about loss of instinct. Panic is reversion to instinct. They may look the same, but they are worlds apart”, says Gladwell.
First up let’s take a look at Choking.
When an athlete begins to focus on a future outcome and has negative thoughts, they become tight and do not play to their ability. At this stage, the primary physical area of the body that becomes affected is the neck and jaw (the latter holds more tension than any other muscle in our body). These muscles begin to tighten under pressure hence the name Choking.
When working with people who operate in high pressure scenarios, teaching them to be aware of the tightening of these muscles can allow them early recognition that they need to refocus. The thought of even the possibility of choking can ruin a person’s ability to enjoy their big moment. These thoughts can be very debilitating.
The answer is to understand the importance our self talk plays in shaping our behaviours. What we say to ourselves REALLY does matter.
For an athlete, using emotional control in stressful situations will help tremendously. It is a skill that can be learned and is part of understanding emotional intelligence.
Panic is slightly different.
It is the abandonment of everything an athlete has trained to do and relies on instinct. This is the limbic system (a part of the brain known in Dr Steve Peters book ‘The Chimp Paradox’ as the “Chimp”) at work. Here, an athlete seemingly just loses the plot (or control of their minds) and panic sets in. It can often become apparent that athletes simply break down and all their strategies and tactics go out of the window.
Sometimes, in short bursts due to their immense talent, they can play OK but invariably their focus is gone and they often react contrary to game plans and ultimately without success.
With regards both Choking and Panicking, the issue remains similar in that performance degrades completely. This is where experience plays a vital role and why coping behaviour is so important.
It is important to note that the often heard phrase ‘practice makes perfect’ is not exactly correct. It is in fact ‘perfect practice’ that indeed makes perfect. If one can implement this philosophy, then it is easier to understand what happens during those big pressure moments that we experience.
If when we panic the more ingrained perfect practice is, the more likely we can rely on that experience. The use of imagery rehearsal and the practice of stressful situations with positive results can help us to rely on a system that is highly practiced and trained thereby resulting in better performance. This can all be performed very unconsciously rather than the conscious act of choking.
A Game Changer Says…
Above, we’ve taken a look at the impact pressure can have on our performance via means of both Choking and Panicking.
So, how can we further prevent it? Here are our theories based around pressure and how best to handle it.
Taking Conscious Control
You become a stronger performer at anything by putting in hours of practice.
The point of practice is to outsource skills from your conscious mind to your subconscious mind so you can perform those skills automatically when they are called upon.
We take for granted many of the skills we outsource to our subconscious. Think of something you’re good at and then break it down into the individual skills involved. A good example could be say driving, which is automatic for most people.
Driving requires many skills. You need mechanical coordination to work the pedals and steering wheel, visual perception to stay in lane and avoid other traffic and symbol recognition to read road signs and instruments on your dashboard. Let’s not forget the processing power needed to make quick decisions on all that information!
Despite having to use these skills simultaneously whilst driving, we don’t pay any attention to them.
For any skill, the more your subconscious takes over, the better you’ll be (providing you've practiced the skill properly). All the best performers outsource their many skills to their subconscious, that’s why they perform so effortlessly - because it is.
So why then can these so called top performers choke?
It’s because they start to take conscious control of the skills they have already outsourced to their subconscious.
In key, high pressure situations, they want to perform so well that they try and ‘take control’ of their actions consciously thereby sabotaging their performance and ultimately their chance of success.
AGC Fix: Trust yourself and the time you’ve put into practice. You will always be better off letting your subconscious take control so long as you haven’t been practicing bad habits.
Revisiting The Past Or Projecting The Future
Think back to your best performances. What was going through your mind? You probably can’t remember thinking about anything. You were just in the moment, doing not thinking!
Throughout our lives we collect experiences and file them away for future use. Before high pressure situations, our brain searches for similar experiences. It will review the results from similar situations in the past and then project those into the future. That is why those who have choked in the past tend to choke again and again.
As bizarre as it may seem, we can even take on other people’s experiences. If your mind is filled with examples of people being nervous and freezing up during a speech, what do you think may happen when you give your first speech?
When we reflect back to past experiences for information and to predict our future, we often don’t take into account all the further training, practice and learning we have done since then. It is IMPORTANT to recognise that your past experience can be obsolete.
AGC Fix: Mentally rehearse successful outcomes. All memories are reconstructions and your brain can’t tell which really happened and which are made up. Collecting positive experiences will create a positive future. This will bring confidence as oppose to anxiety and self-doubt.
Another strategy is to stay in the present. Focus on the now and pay attention to the input from your senses. For example if you are playing tennis, notice the feel of the racket in your hand, the sounds on the court, the smell of the ball and the face of your opponent. When your mind is occupied in the now, it won’t slip into the past or the future.
Attracting Negative Results
The most common phrase people tell themselves when having to perform in a high pressure situation is:
“Don’t mess up”
Whether they are thinking this or saying it out loud, it usually leads to one result:
Messing up.
When you tell yourself not to do something, you cannot help but imagine doing it. Some people take it one step further and imagine how performing poorly in this one moment may affect their lives. When your whole life is on the line it’s pretty hard to stay relaxed and perform to your best!
AGC Fix: Focus on what you want to happen. If you are going on a big date for example, tell yourself to be charming rather than “don’t be quiet”.
Summary
Deep down we all want to win and do well. This is natural and normal. Many of us have been brought up to believe that by increasing the stakes we will try harder and thereby perform better.
We would encourage you to do exactly the opposite - don’t worry about the results.
Do what you’ve practiced doing and let it happen. The key here is that if you’ve trained hard enough and employed perfect practice well enough then you’ll succeed.
Focus on what you can do and not what you should have done. Results are in the past and cannot be changed in the present. Results are to be learned from swiftly not reflected upon constantly.
For those of you who want a basic reminder to carry around with you, here is a four step, 20 second version of how to deal with high pressure situations without choking:
Trust your skills and all of the time you spent practicing
Mentally rehearse vividly (using all your senses) the outcome you want before your performance
Focus on all of your senses to stay in the present during any performance
Let go of the results and decide what you’ll do next