The library
Advice
Articles on the mental side of sport — written by athletes, coaches, and mental performance experts. Free, always.
Athletes and Mental Health: The Hidden Opponent
USC volleyball player Victoria Garrick shares her experience with depression and anxiety as a college athlete — and why the sports world needs to change how it handles mental health.
The Toxicity of Sport Culture on Athlete Mental Health
Sport psychologist Dr. Hillary Cauthen identifies the three cultural mechanisms that damage athlete mental health — and what programs can actually do about it.
Win the Game of Life with Sport Psychology
Dr. Jonathan Fader, mental conditioning coach for the NY Giants, explains the sport psychology tools that elite athletes use — and how they work.
The Weight of Gold: Inside Olympic Athlete Mental Health
Michael Phelps narrates this HBO documentary examining post-Olympic depression, anxiety, and mental health crises among elite swimmers and Olympic athletes.
The Mental Pressure of Playing for a D1 Offer in Lacrosse
How recruiting pressure changes the way you play lacrosse — and what to do about it.
When the Team Culture Is Toxic: Protecting Your Mental Health in the Locker Room
What to do when your team culture is making sport a source of damage rather than growth.
How to Come Back After an Error String in Volleyball
What causes error strings in volleyball — and the mid-match mental process that breaks them.
Slumps Are Mental: Breaking Out of a Hitting Drought
Why hitting slumps are 90% mental after the first few games — and what actually breaks them.
The Mental Game of Pitching When Your Stuff Isn't There
How to compete effectively as a pitcher on days when your physical stuff isn't there — the mental game of adaptation.
The Long Season: Staying Mentally Fresh Across a Full Baseball Schedule
How to stay mentally present and motivated across the longest schedule in team sports.
Playing Through Physicality Without Losing Your Head
How to compete physically in lacrosse without letting the physicality disrupt your mental game.
Goalie Psychology: How to Forget the Last Goal
The mental skill every lacrosse goalie needs — and how to build the reset that the position demands.
The Mental Game of Free Throws
Why the simplest shot in basketball is the hardest — and how your brain is working against you at the line.
Losing Your Starting Spot: Identity After the Bench
What losing your starting spot actually does to your identity — and how to rebuild it from the bench.
How to Lead a Team Without Burning Out
What it actually costs to carry a team — and how to lead without running yourself into the ground.
Penalty Kicks and the Psychology of Pressure
What the research says about why penalty kicks are missed — and how to prepare your mind, not just your technique.
Recovering Confidence After an Own Goal or Major Error
How to recover your mental state after a major error — while the game is still being played.
Playing Through Injury: When to Push and When to Stop
How to separate athletic toughness from self-harm — and why the pressure to play through injury is a mental health issue.
The Mental Reset Between Plays
How elite football players manage mental carry-over between plays — and the 40-second reset that separates them.
Getting Cut from the Depth Chart
What happens mentally when your status drops on the depth chart — and what it takes to come back.
Managing Performance Anxiety as a Quarterback
What performance anxiety looks like in quarterbacks — and the mental tools that actually work under center.
Alone in the Lane: Managing Mental Isolation in Swimming
How swimmers manage the unique mental challenge of competing alone — and what happens when isolation becomes a problem.
When Your Times Don't Drop: The Mental Side of Swimming Plateaus
Why swimming plateaus are especially hard — and the mental strategies that get you through them.
The Psychology of Taper: Managing the Mind Before Championship Season
How to manage the anxiety, doubt, and restlessness that hits most swimmers during taper.
Between Points: How to Reset Your Mental State in Tennis
The 25-second window between points is where tennis matches are decided — here is how to use it.
Playing Through a Mental Block in Tennis
What a tennis mental block actually is — and the counterintuitive approaches that break through it.
The Mental Toll of Individual Sport Pressure in Tennis
Why individual sport pressure is different — and how tennis players build the mental separation between performance and identity.
Weight Cutting and Mental Health: What Nobody Talks About
The psychological cost of weight cutting in wrestling — and why the culture of silence around it is harmful.
Losing a Match You Should Have Won
Why the matches you should have won are the hardest to process — and what they're actually telling you.
Building Mental Toughness in the Wrestling Room
Mental toughness isn't about suffering silently — it's a set of specific skills built intentionally in practice.
Race Day Anxiety: A Sprinter's Mental Toolkit
What pre-race anxiety looks like for sprinters — and the mental preparation stack that elite sprinters use.
The Mental Side of a False Start
What a false start does to your head — and how to prevent one mistake from becoming a pattern.
Goal Setting for Track Athletes: Thinking Beyond the PR
Why PRs can't be your only metric — and how a three-level goal structure changes how you compete.
Serving Under Pressure: The Mental Game of the Final Set
What the best servers in volleyball do mentally at 24-24 — and how to train that mindset before the moment arrives.
How to Stay Motivated During a Plateau
What's actually happening when you stop improving — and how to push through without burning out.
How to Talk to Your Coach About Playing Time
A step-by-step approach for a productive conversation — without sounding entitled.
Pre-Competition Anxiety: What's Normal and What Helps
How to reframe pressure as a signal, not a threat — and what research says actually helps.
Setting Weekly Mental Goals
How to set mental goals that are specific enough to actually train — not just hope for.
The Practice-to-Game Gap: Why It Happens and How to Close It
Why your brain treats games differently than practice — and what to do about it.
Pre-Game Confidence Routine
A 5-minute mental warm-up you can run before any game or competition — no equipment, no coach required.
Dealing with Mistakes During Games
What to do in the 3 seconds after you mess up — a skill the best athletes train deliberately.