What is Emotional Intelligence Training?
A relatively new concept, emotional intelligence training goes beyond memory tests and the ability to solve problems. Rather, one focuses on managing their feelings, controlling their impulses, and finding internal motivation. This type of intelligence allows individuals to not only regulate their responses to their own thoughts but allows them to effectively interact with others as well.
An emotionally intelligent individual can:
- Recognize different emotional states;
- Assess how their emotions affect their behaviours;
And alter their emotional state to best manage a particular situation.
What is Emotional Intelligence in Sports?
Success in sports goes beyond physical capabilities, testing the athlete’s mind just as greatly as their body. To make quick and appropriate decisions, athletes need to be aware of their emotions to best regulate their reactions. This is needed to recognize, assess, and manage the emotions of themselves and others to further their physical performance
Why is Emotional Intelligence Training Important in Sports?
Without emotional intelligence in sports, it’s difficult to achieve peak performance. Athleticism is physically draining and requires a deep sense of internal motivation and drive. To effectively channel those impulses, athletes need the ability to regulate them first. Ultimately, the key to excellence in sports begins with the right mindset. Athletes face a great deal of pressure daily. Therefore, when emotional intelligence is prioritized, athletes can effectively manage their stress and mental blocks, resulting in a stronger performance.
6 Stages to Enhance Athletic Emotional Intelligence
1. Develop Emotional Self-Awareness
To alter an athlete’s emotional state in response to their performance, they need to be aware of how their mentality positively or negatively affects the outcome. This involves evaluating how their performance is impacted by the changes in their emotional state. To evaluate this, athletes should first identify the emotion. Secondly, they must determine if the emotion led to a successful or poor level of performance. Lastly, they need to evaluate the relationship between the emotions felt and their final performance.
The same emotion can lead to different performative outcomes. The crucial difference between a successful and poor performance is how the emotions are self-received. For example, athletes can use a format like the one below to gain self-awareness:
Performance: successful.
Emotions: calm, nervous.
Relationship: I expected to feel nervous and was able to accept these feelings. In the end, I felt at ease and was excited to start.
Performance: poor.
Emotion: nervous.
Relationship: I couldn’t shake the nerves and started to doubt my abilities.
How the emotion is interpreted and the thought processes that follow determine their performance. If athletes can pair their negative emotions with positive ones, their performance is less likely to suffer due to self-doubt.
2. Engage in Emotional Self-Assessments
For effective self-assessment, athletes should evaluate their emotions throughout the day. This will display areas of mood fluctuation and how that affects their athletic performance. Furthermore, athletes can identify the cause and effect of these emotions to monitor how their training was impacted.
For example, here’s a sample of a journal entry from a training athlete:
7 AM: Felt angry on the drive to training. Was cut off multiple times, traffic was bumper to bumper the whole way. Why do I bother leaving early just to deal with bad drivers?
9 AM: Kept making mistakes during training. Felt frustrated and tired.
12 PM: Felt happy that I showed up to training even though it wasn’t my best performance.
4 PM: Kept getting irritated at little things. Grew angrier throughout the day, not sure why.
Due to the negative emotions felt in the morning, the athlete’s tolerance of mistakes by themselves and others lowered. This negatively impacted their performance at training, followed by emotional fluctuations throughout the day.
3. Identify Strategies to Regulate Emotions
When evaluating their emotional assessments, athlete’s will likely experience a mixture of positive and negative responses. To effectively regulate their emotions, it’s important they understand that they cannot control the actions of others. However, they do have power over their responses and how it affects their overall performance.
Furthermore, athletes should attempt to regulate their emotions for the benefit of their peers. While the athlete themselves can identify the reason for their outbursts, their teammates and coach cannot. As such, athletes must identify strategies to stabilize their emotions, such as listening to music or confiding in their peers. For coaches, they must encourage their athletes to discuss their emotions with one another, increasing awareness and developing understanding throughout the group.
4. Set Emotional Goals
At this point, athletes should be aware of their emotions and capable of answering the following:
- What emotion was I feeling?
- Was the emotion helpful or unhelpful?
- How did it affect my performance?
- How did it affect my teammates and coaches?
The next step is changing the emotion through goal setting. An effective way to intervene a thought process, resulting in increased emotional intelligence and performance. Athletes should set small goals that are designed to control their feelings while remaining open to change.
5. Increase Self-Confidence
Now it’s time to change the dialogue in the athlete’s mind. While it’s easy to let negative thought processes stream through the brain, engaging in positive self-talk is crucial. It’s difficult to think positively when an athlete’s emotions are encouraging the opposite. However, if an athlete can think of a sentence to repeat to themselves when experiencing negative emotions, the destructive spiral can be avoided. Engaging in positive self-talk can increase confidence, efficiently regulate emotions, and improve emotional intelligence.
6. Role Play to Develop Emotional Control
This can be an effective and enjoyable strategy to increase emotional intelligence and performance. Coaches can use an athlete’s self-assessment from stage two to re-enact a scenario. Say the athlete experienced feelings of frustration and anger, coaches can have a teammate play the role of a referee whose goal is to frustrate the player. Coaches can monitor the situation as the frustration builds, identifying patterns and strategies for emotional regulation in the player.
Emotional Intelligence Training Program
Currently, there’s limited awareness of emotional intelligence in sports coaching. The system relies too heavily on physical achievements, often neglecting the state of the mind. To maximize performance and mental well-being, our emotional intelligence training program provides effective strategies for athletes and coaches. We understand the role mental health plays in an athlete’s development. Through designing a plan to enhance emotional intelligence, athletes and coaches can pursue their aspirations effectively and healthily.
At Aimability, we provide the tools needed to implement the six stages of emotional intelligence into athletic training. Available in-person or online, our programs promote athletic growth and emotional development. Through gradual and consistent execution, our program helps athletes and coaches gain control of their mental health, improving their emotional intelligence and performance.