One of the biggest challenges for sports kids today is oursociety's view of achievement. We live in a world that rewardsperfectionism in school, sports and work.
We receive a lot of emails from frustrated parents and coacheswho are bewildered by their kids' untapped physical talent. Theyworry that their kids are not fulfilling their potential.
Often, parents are worried about kids who are too hard onthemselves, demand perfect performances, and unravelwhen they make mistakes.
Here is a very recent example from a baseball parent:
*****************************************************"My son is so hard on himself. Our expectations as parents arethat he have fun and improve. He is 11 years old. Unless hepitches a strikeout or gets a base hit at-bat he feels like hehas failed. Please help!"*****************************************************
Perfectionists are usually easy to spot. They are very hard-working athletes and usually are highly motivated, but often forthe wrong reasons.
Here are the top eight signs of perfectionists. They:
* Generally perform better in practice than game situations.
* Want to excel badly, which makes them anxious and afraid offailing.
* Are afraid of making mistakes.
* Worry too much about what other people think about them.
* Try too hard to ensure their performance is "perfect."
* View performance as either good or bad, with no middle ground.
* Harbor unrealistic or very strict expectations about theirperformance.
* Are fearful of letting others down if they make mistakes.
Perfectionists have a double-edged mentality. They love to workhard and make their performance perfect. However, the same workethic holds them back in competition because they want so badlywant to succeed.
Fear of failure causes them to fold under pressure.

There are some helpful books and seminars that can assisst athletes to improve their mental game, give me a call if you want to look into that for your player.