Sport Psychology Q&A: Social media stress
Helping athletes manage pressure, improve attention, and stay grounded in performance
Watch the full episode above.
In this solo episode of The Mentally Fit Athlete, I answer a new set of questions from high school sport psychology students. These are pretty consistent with what comes up in sessions with athletes: social media pressure, motivation dropping when goals feel far away, and what happens when attention keeps drifting during performance.
Most of this shows up in real time. During games, during training, and in the space between competitions where athletes are trying to make sense of how things are going.
The Stress of “College Commitment” Culture
Social media is one of the most common stressors I see with high school athletes.
Commitment posts, highlight reels, awards, stats, training clips. Even when athletes aren’t actively comparing themselves, it still gets in.
What tends to happen is pretty straightforward: athletes start to lose their own sense of timing. Everyone else looks like they’re moving faster. Progress starts to feel off, even when nothing has really changed in their training.
Most athletes don’t describe it as “I’m comparing myself.” They describe it as pressure. Or a sense that they’re behind without being able to fully explain why.
That pattern shows up a lot.
Process Over Outcome
This is one of the core pieces of sport psychology work.
Outcomes matter. They’re part of sport. But they don’t give you much to work with in the middle of performance.
When athletes get locked into outcomes, you usually see the same shift. They start checking the score more. They start thinking ahead. They start trying to protect results instead of playing.
That’s usually when performance tightens up.
So I tend to bring it back to what’s directly in front of them:
What did your preparation look like today?
Are you actually engaged in this rep or possession?
What do you do right after something goes wrong?
Are you staying in the next action, or getting pulled into the last one?
That’s the level where performance actually lives.
The Three-Minute Mindfulness Rule
A lot of athletes describe the same thing during competition: something happens, and their attention just doesn’t come back cleanly.
They’re still in the last play while the next one is already happening.
Mindfulness is one way to train the reset, but I usually start very small with it.
Three minutes a day.
Not because that’s some optimal protocol, but because it gets people to actually do it. That matters more at the beginning.
What you’re really training is pretty simple: noticing when attention drifts and bringing it back without turning it into a second problem. That’s the same skill athletes need between plays.
Revisiting Motivation with SMART Goals
When athletes say they’re unmotivated, the assumption is usually that something internal changed.
A lot of the time, it’s actually the goal structure that’s doing less work than it should.
Goals can sound solid but still be too vague to guide anything day to day.
SMART goals help tighten that up:
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Time-sensitive
“I want to get better this season” is common, but it doesn’t really tell you what to do this week.
When the goal is structured well, athletes usually don’t need more motivation. They just need clearer targets.
Advanced Composure Training: Learning to Stay With Distraction
Once athletes are comfortable with basic mindfulness work, I’ll sometimes increase the difficulty.
One version of this is practicing while adding distraction on purpose—music that’s irritating, emotionally activating, or just hard to ignore.
The point isn’t to get comfortable or calm.
It’s to learn that you can stay with the task while your internal and external environment isn’t cooperating.
Because that’s what sport actually looks like. It’s rarely quiet or controlled. There’s noise, emotion, mistakes, momentum swings, and plenty of internal commentary happening at the same time.
The skill is staying engaged anyway.
Neurofeedback and Brain-Training Games
Neurofeedback comes up a lot because it sounds like something out of a performance lab.
It uses EEG sensors to track brain activity while someone works through tasks or simple games. The feedback helps train attention and arousal regulation over time.
In some setups, athletes might control something like a game through focus states or relaxation levels.
At a basic level, it’s operant conditioning applied to attention.
Some athletes find it useful as part of a broader plan. It tends to work best when it’s combined with actual mental skills training, not used as a standalone fix.
My Approach to Sport Psychology
My approach sits between clinical psychology and performance work.
Depending on the athlete, that can include CBT, exposure-based work for anxiety or OCD, mindfulness skills, sleep work when needed, visualization, and straightforward performance strategies.
I’ll also use improv-based exercises at times, especially when athletes get stuck in their heads or lose flexibility under pressure.
A lot of the work comes back to a simple question:
Can you stay effective when things feel off?
Because that’s usually where things break down. Not in practice when everything is predictable, but in the moments where it isn’t.
Key Takeaways
Social media often shifts how athletes perceive their own progress
Outcome focus tends to increase pressure during performance
Three minutes of mindfulness builds attention recovery through repetition
SMART goals work because they give structure to daily behavior
Composure is about staying engaged under distraction, not waiting for ideal conditions
Neurofeedback is one tool within a broader approach to attention training
Final Thoughts
A lot of what comes up in sport psychology comes back to attention.
Where it goes, how quickly it shifts, and how quickly it comes back.
That’s really the core skill underneath a lot of mental performance work.
Not perfect focus. Not trying to eliminate distraction. Just noticing what’s happening and coming back to what’s in front of you.
That’s the work.
Looking for Sport Psychology Support in California?
If you’re an athlete dealing with performance anxiety, OCD, sleep issues, or stress that’s affecting sport or school, I work with athletes and performers throughout California via telehealth, including Long Beach, Los Angeles, and the South Bay.
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Los Angeles
South Bay
Reach out by clicking the contact button to schedule a free consultation here:
Related Listening
If you’re interested in these topics, you can also check out my other podcast, Movie House Sport Psychology, where I look at mental health and performance through film and television.
Special guest appearance: Taco the cat.