My name is Tami Eggleston and I'm a
professor of psychology at McKendree
University and I'm also a member of the
Association for Applied Sport Psychology
Sport Psychology performance consultants.
It's a long name but basically it means
that I work with teams and individuals
at McKendree I also work with teams and
individuals though outside of McKendree
University on all kinds of things and
now recently sports psychology has
gotten a lot broader than just working
with athletes. Right now there are
actually performance consultants that
are working with the military working
with people and their jobs and just
working with people in their lives in
general. In the last month I've actually
worked with the McKendree University
band to help people kind of deal with
their stress when there may be getting
ready to perform a big band concert and
I've even gone to some elderly care
facilities and helped older people with
their memories and what's interesting
it's all the same theories it's all the
same kind of background and techniques
that can help people in sports and can
also help them and sort of their lives
in general. When people think of
psychology I think a lot of times they
think about depression and schizophrenia
and kind of negative things, but
psychologists also study things like
success and optimism and confidence and
helping you do better in your life, so
it's not just negative things that
psychologists study Psychologists also
study really positive things now at
first on the surface that seems kind of
like okay be more confident set goals be
happier and you'll be more successful
and that kind of seems kind of simple on
the surface but human beings are pretty
complex and what's interesting about
sports psychology and positive
psychology is you can't have too much of
a good thing. So if you're overly
confident or you're overly optimistic
that can actually cause you problems so
for example an athlete who is so
successful that they think that they can
never make a mistake they may not
practice hard enough so then when they
get ready to actually perform they may
actually start to make more mistakes or
a business person who's so optimistic
and so confident might actually not make
any contingency plans so then when
something bad happens in their business
they're not actually ready for it
because they're so optimistic that they
never thought anything bad could happen
to them or a politician might be so
confident and so full of self-esteem
that they actually might make mistakes
that later on could hurt themselves
personally or they could hurt their
whole country if they make really bad
mistakes. So it's interesting in sports
psychology positive psychology that
these traits like self-esteem, confidence,
optimism, that sounds so great you
actually don't want too much of but you
also don't want too little of and I
think that's what makes sports
psychology and positive psychology so
interesting is that complexity of having
enough to be confident but not having so
much that you're overly confident and
then you don't prepare very well. One
little thing that I think is fun to do
when I talk to people about what is
sport psychology and how can it help you
in your sport how can it help you in
business how can it help you in life I
have one really simple little thing that
I like to share with people I want you
to kind of imagine a circle and then
another circle and think of anything in
your life right now business related
maybe you want to quit smoking maybe you
want to be a better golfer and in the
inside circle think of all of the things
that you can control think of the things
that you're totally in control of like
you're breathing your preparation you're
attitude those are all the things that
you're totally in control of and then in
the outside circle think of all of the
things that may be influencing your
business your sport your life but you
don't really have control of. So that
might be things like the weather that
might be things like your teammates, or
the other people you work with, or your
office size, or the price of fuel, or all
these things that are on the outside of
you and what sports psychologists and
performance consultants say is you
should spend all of your time on this
inner circle really focusing on the
things that you can control and not
wasting your precious mental energy on
all those outside things that can make
you a better golfer that can help you
quit smoking that can make you better in
your business world better in your
personal life. So that's a whirlwind tour
of sports psychology positive psychology
and hopefully I gave you one little
piece of the puzzle of this big huge
picture of sport psychology and positive
psychology.
