Optimal Performance Training
For Young Athletes
Mindful Sports™ Optimal Performance Training teaches preadolescent and adolescent athletes how to manage stress and activation levels. Participants develop self-regulatory strategies, build confidence, and learn how to optimize their performance. And they have fun doing it!
Participants play interactive games and use biofeedback-assisted self regulation to help learn breath-training, mindfulness, somatic exercises, and sports specific guided imagery. Sessions include:
• Introduction to mindfulness for performance, physiological reasons and reactions to stress, and biofeedback training
• Discovering how to raise and lower personal stress and activation levels to determine optimal zones for performance
• Development of unique and effective pre-performance routines before training and competition
• Learning coping strategies to manage stress and failure using fun and engaging computer games
• Learning to transition new self-regulation skills to training sessions and competitive performances
• Development of recovery strategies for post-competition
Sessions are available for teams, small groups, and individual athletes
For Coaches
Private programs are available for coaches and organizations. Sessions are a collaborative process designed to teach mindful leadership, team building strategies, and create strategies for improving young athletes’ overall mental and emotional development. Programs include:
• Foundations of mindfulness training and development of personal practice
• Guide for teaching mindfulness, self-regulation, and optimal performance in specific sports
• Creation of mindful leadership approaches to the season, team building, and player development strategies
• In season follow up and program adjustments
The experience at the baseball tournament—and especially the counsel you offered at a tough time—left a powerful and lasting impression on my son. It’s such a privilege to be able to understand how a young player works through adversity and uses it to motivate himself to improve. What you’ve done for him (among many other things) is give him the language and perspective to process and gain from the inevitable lows that players face. Your words of reassurance carried authority and credibility for him because of your own background as an athlete and your study of the complex emotions that athletes contend with. I really do think it was a profound moment of learning for him. Thanks for making that possible, and for so much else.
Parent of youth baseball player
What young athletes say about Mindfulness Training:
“It calmed me down when I was annoyed/stressed”
“It helped me focus more”
“I inhale and exhale while making a play”
“I use it to calm down when I start getting mad, sad, etc…”
“It helps me be confident”
Children ages 8-12 who participated in Baseball & Basketball Mindfulness Training with Coach Sam