Mental Skills Series: Concentration

(Photo courtesy of excitebuzz.com)


Part two of the mental skills series will focus on concentration.

The ability to concentrate is not only important to sport performance but performance in general. Doctors, musicians, lawyers--you name it all must have the ability concentrate on the task at hand in order to perform at their best.

When things don't turn out the way we wanted them to, a frequent comment may be, "I lost my focus," or "I just couldn't concentrate!" But what does that mean exactly? Well, the major component of concentration is the ability to selectively attend to appropriate cues in the task at hand such as environmental stimuli or internal stimuli while also being able to screen out those distracting external OR internal stimuli (Williams, 2006).

When you think of external stimuli that might be distracting, it could be the audience booing, a bad call from an official or...say for example focusing on what other runners are wearing and deciding if the they are fast based off their outfits . (Photo courtesy of Sofiahedstrom.com)


Internal distractions may include distracting body sensations that lead to thoughts and feelings such as, "Gahhhh this hill is so hard, my legs are dying!!" or, "That girl looks pretty fast while doing her warm-up drills..." Even though it may seem like internal and external stimuli might seem to be different, they are always working with each other, holding hands and affecting one another (Williams, 2006).

When thinking about strategies for building concentration skills, an athlete can work with a sport and performance psychology consultant on techniques such mental rehearsal, mindfulness and attentional cue training.

The reality is that with all these mental skills there is a component of individualization that must be taken into account. The goal is to find a positive level of concentration during performance.

Mental Rehearsal: Mental rehearsal is a lot like visualization. In this instance mental rehearsal is used to practice competition concentration skills to learn to not react to intentionally induced external distractions.

Mindfulness: Mindfulness is defined as an "open-hearted moment-to-moment non-judgmental awareness" (Kabat-Zinn, 2005. pg. 24). Mindfulness is a bit different than other techniques in that instead of attempting control or attain an optimal state of performance, mindfulness based techniques suggest that optimal performance does not require control, but instead is looking for non-judgment (ie. not good, not bad) moment-to moment awareness and acceptance of one's internal state--no matter what that state is--and furthermore a focus on the task-relevant external cues and behavioral choices that will support one's athletic endeavors (Moore, 2009). It's a little bit different than what we are normally taught, but it's an interesting way to think of athletics--and life. A way that I have used mindfulness to help maintain concentration is at races. As I have said, this is a place where distractions abound for me. I try to tune into how I feel at the present moment, be aware, and even if I AM anxious--I try to tell myself that doesn't have to affect the outcome of the race.

Attentional Cue Training:
If you do lose your focus or concentration, visual, verbal, and kinesthetic cues can help bring you back to the present moment
(Photograph: Murdo Macleod/Guardian)
("see it, hear it, feel it") and avoid those distracting thoughts and feelings. Much like mindfulness, it is helpful to find cues that are positive, are present-centered, and focus on the process rather than the outcome (Williams, 2006). Attentional cues are an interesting thing, because they are pretty individualized. Some athletes work very well with a lot of cues, but some people only need a few.

One attentional cue I use all the time is when I'm going up hills. When hills are long and drawn out--it's easy for me to get distracted on the pain, the length--and well..the pain and the length.
It's also easy for me to want to go fast up the hills (who doesn't want to get them over with right?) but I've learned pacing is important and on hill climbs that are say, more than 3 min, when I start to feel that distracted feeling, wanting to quit--I tell myself "Just go your pace, your pace, your pace." It sounds strange but saying that helps me focus on the process of moving and nothing else, and it actually works well for me, but as you can tell--it's very simple and individualized for the setting and goal.

So, there you have it a bit about concentration, and an introduction to some techniques for improving concentration. As before there are a lot of great resources out there for learning more about concentration, including working with a professional sport and performance psychology consultant.