I was sitting in my office a few years ago with a high level athlete as she described her recent experiences with continued health concerns.  She was facing another flare up of symptoms, which prompted feelings of isolation, uncertainty, and frustration regarding her season and the need to dial back her training.  “I feel like I’ve lost a huge part of myself,” she said, as she reflected back on the last decade of competition.  Her current reality no longer matched the trajectory she set for herself just a few years prior. I have seen several clients over the years who have faced complex and chronic health concerns: Diabetes, Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, autoimmune conditions, asthma, Meniere’s Disease, bone infections, Post-Concussive Syndrome, and most recently, metal poisoning.  Though these health concerns are not visible to the naked eye, they become central to an athlete’s life and often define an a...

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Last season, our Premier Team worked with a Division 3 Women’s Basketball team to pilot our new Athletic Wellness and Performance Assessment (AWPA).  The young team sought to kick-start their development, creating the perfect opportunity to introduce our new measure.  Their sole senior would be graduating after the season, and this would be the first collegiate season for the first and second year students due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  The team and coach had goals for the season, though they weren’t sure where to start with respect to their mental game.  Like a lot of teams, the athletes wanted to target the areas that would make a difference in their game.  The coach wanted to assess strengths and growth areas so the athletes could come together as a team at the start of the season....

What is resilience?

The most useful way to think about resilience in performance settings is as the ability to manage adversity.  It’s our resistance to challenges, and our ability to bounce back when those setbacks invariably occur.  To be resilient is to see obstacles as challenges, and to see the overcoming of those challenges as a necessary step in the lifelong process of becoming better.

Why is resilience important?

The value of resilience can be found in all sport and life performance.  Even near-perfect performances contain moments of imperfection, and the potential for those moments to create doubt, uncertainty, and negative outcomes.  Resilience keeps perfection from becoming the enemy of persistence.  To struggle is human, but to navigate struggles with flexibility and strength, and to use them to increase focus and motivate positive change, is to be resilient. Among the most targeted attributes for high school and college coaches, amateur and p...