Sports psychologist shares how professional athletes deal with stress

In recent years, the enormous pressure professional athletes have to endure has been scrutinized. Examples include gymnast Simone Biles withdrawing from the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and tennis star Naomi Osaka withdrawing from Roland Garros. Both cited psychological reasons.

As Biles told reporters at the time, “When you get into a stressful situation, you panic.” He added, “It’s just annoying when you’re fighting with your own head.”

Kelli Moran-Miller, a certified mental performance counselor at Stanford Sports Medicine and a member of the U.S. Olympic Committee, specializes in helping athletes navigate such challenges.

Moran-Miller, who is also a clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, shares strategies she uses to help athletes manage stress in high-stakes situations. Methods like transforming critical self-talk into positive reinforcement aren’t just for Olympians, she says, but can help the rest of us in everyday high-pressure situations.

What is the emotional journey like for athletes competing in the Olympic Games?

Through my work with elite athletes, I’ve learned that the experiences and expectations of individual athletes can vary based on many factors. For example, is this their first Olympics? Have they been there before and just missed the podium? Did they win a medal in Tokyo and now want to do it again? Because the Olympics only come around once every four years, expectations are high and there’s a lot of publicity surrounding them. All of this can add to the pressure and emotional impact of both successes and failures.

As an example, I think of Joao Felix, a Portuguese forward who narrowly missed a heartbreaking penalty that ended Portugal’s run in the EuroCup. He’s taken countless penalties throughout his career and earned the right to be in that moment, but he missed that crucial one. Disappointing moments like this happen in elite sports, but as his coach said after the game, “…only players who never take a penalty never miss.”

When you look at the Games, I think it’s important to remember that while Olympic athletes often do superhuman things, they are human beings, primarily in their 20s, and have the same range of human emotional experiences as the rest of us. It’s not so much the emotions that are unique, but the intensity of the circumstances around them that require greater emotional resilience to handle the exhilarating victories and devastating losses.

What strategies do you recommend for top athletes to deal with stress and develop emotional resilience?

I like to help athletes understand and recognize the different types of stressors that elite athletes can encounter, and how they typically respond to stressors and how they have managed them effectively in the past. Elite athletes already have many strategies in their toolbox. Reminding them that they had to compete on big stages against other elite athletes to get to this point in their careers builds confidence.

By asking questions like, “What are you focusing on, paying attention to, and thinking about when you’re at your best?” they can identify the tools they already have. Typically, athletes at their best are focused on the moment and doing their job to the best of their ability. They’re not worried about the outcome, how important a particular moment is, or what could go wrong.

To maintain this task focus, I teach strategies such as focus cues or instructional self-talk that athletes can use to remind them what to focus on and refocus their attention in stressful situations. We also develop plans for how to spend their free time and how to minimize distractions. Using routines, self-talk, imagery, and energy management through attention control and breath work can help increase confidence and comfort with the unknown.

What are some examples of focus cues and instructional self-talk strategies?

Focus cues are words or actions that help direct attention (or focus) to stay on task in the present moment. They can be verbal (“read and respond”; “compete”), visual (the front of the rim for a free throw), or physical (throwing the ball for a volleyball serve).

There are different types of self-talk. I often simplify it to helpful versus unhelpful. Negative self-talk tends to be more critical and harsh and is generally unhelpful. Positive, encouraging self-talk (“you can do this”; “you’re okay”; “you’re okay”) improves mood and motivation. Instructional self-talk is a verbal cue used to focus attention on the task at hand. It is usually short, specific, and action-oriented. Examples include: “breathe, focus, go hard”; “take a deep breath, see the ball, trust.”

Can these techniques also be applied to ordinary people?

I believe there are many applications of performance psychology in everyday life. Awareness of different stressors we may encounter and typical responses to stress can help us choose an effective response. Increasing our self-awareness and attentional control (i.e., choosing what to pay attention to and what to ignore) can help us focus on what we are doing in the present moment rather than worrying about what we are not doing, what we think we “should” be doing, what just happened, or what might happen in the future. Breathing and relaxation strategies can help us stay calm and collected in stressful moments.

Are there ways to increase our resilience in high-pressure situations?

In addition to having tools like those described above to deal with internal and external stressors in the moment, we must also remember the importance of having a foundation of self-care and well-being. This increases our ability to deal with stressors in the moment.

Sleep, exercise, and nutrition are essential to maintaining our physical well-being; building authentic connections with others—practicing gratitude and self-kindness—are examples of ways to increase mental and emotional well-being; and pursuing activities that we find important and meaningful can improve our spiritual well-being. I see these as building the foundation for effective stress management.

What are some common misconceptions about stress?

We can sometimes focus too much on the negatives of stress and often assume that stress is always bad or even a sign of weakness. While stress can certainly have problematic consequences, especially when it is chronic, it is important to remember that our stress response is our brain’s way of preparing us for action so that we can overcome a challenge. Sometimes athletes fear their body’s healthy stress response and see it as “bad” for performance (e.g. performance anxiety), instead of recognizing that the nervous “butterflies” are the excitement and energy that prepares them for action for their peak performance.