{"id":2649,"date":"2015-09-03T16:28:21","date_gmt":"2015-09-03T16:28:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/?p=2649"},"modified":"2025-07-11T07:17:47","modified_gmt":"2025-07-11T11:17:47","slug":"why-sports-kids-resist-mental-game-training-and-what-parents-should-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/why-sports-kids-resist-mental-game-training-and-what-parents-should-do\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Sports Kids Resist Mental Game Training\u2014And What Parents Should Do"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Mentally strong athletes<\/strong>\u2014those who have done some mental game<\/strong> training\u2014don\u2019t balk after making mistakes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They don\u2019t call themselves negative names. And they\u2019re often great team players because they\u2019re so positive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Truth is, however, that sports kids resist mental training<\/strong>, and miss out on these and other important benefits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why? Because they hold onto myths about mental training<\/strong> that don\u2019t really make sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s look at two of these myths.<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Kids often say they\u2019re already mentally<\/strong> tough, and therefore don\u2019t need mental training.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Truth is, everyone can benefit from mental training. Even if they are mentally<\/strong> tough, they can work on their mental game and make it even better!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kids say they think mental training<\/strong> involves a psychologist who sits them on a couch and analyzes all their deep-seated problems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a funny stereotype, and is not true. Kids need to understand that mental training<\/strong> means working with an expert who can help them boost their skills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s no different than working with an expert to improve other skills\u2014like boosting their physical game, for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s get back to the benefits of mental training.<\/strong> Above we mention that kids who have done mental training<\/strong> are less likely to balk when they make mistakes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a critical skill that boosts kids\u2019 confidence and helps them play intuitively and freely\u2014critical traits for young athletes!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Check out our video of the week, How To Boost Your Confidence In Sports And The Confidence Roller Coaster.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Want to learn more about how to explain to kids the benefits of mental training?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 At Kids\u2019 Sports Psychology, we\u2019ve got a great resource for our exclusive members, \u201cHelping Young Athletes Embrace Mental Training.\u201d It explains common myths about mental training and how to talk to kids about the benefits of mental training in sports.<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Our exclusive members can download it immediately here:<\/strong><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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How Kids Can Embrace Mental Training<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Plus, at Kids\u2019 Sports Psychology, our members have access to loads of other resources: ebooks, audio interviews with youth sports experts, articles, Q and A, videos\u2014and more!<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mentally strong athletes\u2014those who have done some mental game training\u2014don\u2019t balk after making mistakes. They don\u2019t call themselves negative names. And they\u2019re often great team players because they\u2019re so positive. Truth is, however, that sports kids resist mental training, and miss out on these and other important benefits. Why? Because … Read Sport Psychology Tip<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4824,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,13,23,4,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-confidence-in-young-athletes","category-mental-training","category-sports-kids","category-sports-psychology-for-sports-parents","category-youth-sports-tips"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2649\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.youthsportspsychology.com\/youth_sports_psychology_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}