Coaching practices for How to Get Over Performance Anxiety in Sports

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Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• Right before I go on, my heart’s pounding, my hands are shaking, my mind’s gone tunnel-narrow and blank
• Right before the test or the big moment, my head is so jammed with what-ifs and dread that there’s no room left to actually think
• There’s a big thing coming up
• The moment I’m up there performing, my head fills with "how do I look, am I blowing this, what are they thinking"
• In practice everything is automatic, but the second the stakes are real I start second-guessing and improvising

Practices that may help

1. De-activation Strategies for Over-Arousal
   Use targeted techniques to reduce arousal when anxiety or over-activation is undermining performance.
   The Yerkes-Dodson Law: Finding Your Optimal Performance Zone
2. Write about your worries before a high-stakes performance
   Offload performance anxiety by writing it out in full immediately before the event.
   Choking Under Pressure, Made Practical
3. Pre-Performance Routines, Made Practical
   Pre-performance routines are standardized behavioral and mental sequences performed before a performance that direct attention, manage arousal, and activate well-rehearsed movement patterns. Sport psychology research (particularly Stuart Cotterill’s work) and multiple meta-analyses find they reliably improve consistency and reduce performance variability across athletic and skill-based tasks.
4. Apply EFT to specific performance anxiety triggers
   EFT has the strongest self-guided evidence for test anxiety, public speaking, and sports performance stress.
   EFT Tapping: What It Is, How to Do It, and What the Evidence Shows
5. Shift to task-focused attention under performance anxiety
   Redirect attention from self-monitoring and outcome worry to the specific process cues of the task at hand.
   Attentional Deployment, Made Practical
6. Anchor clutch performance to a practiced pressure routine
   The most reliable way to perform under pressure is to execute the same routine you have practiced hundreds of times.
   The Clutch State: Performing Under Pressure
7. Design your pre-performance sequence with clear functional anchors
   Build a sequence where every step serves a specific psychological function — not just habit.
   Pre-Performance Routines, Made Practical
8. Reappraise physiological arousal as activation, not anxiety
   Tell yourself "I’m excited" rather than "I’m nervous" — the physiology is identical; the label changes performance.
   The Clutch State: Performing Under Pressure
9. Reframe high-stakes moments as opportunities to demonstrate capability
   Treat pressure as validation that the performance matters — which is exactly why you prepared for it.
   The Clutch State: Performing Under Pressure
10. Use mastery imagery to build confidence before high-stakes performances
    Replay previous best performances in imagery before high-pressure situations.
    Mental Rehearsal and Imagery, Made Practical

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