Beating the Winter Blues: How to Stay Motivated During the Holiday Crunch
It’s late October and you’re heading into the holiday season with feelings of dread rather than cheer. You may have been pretty good about eating healthily and working out regularly, but you know that November and December are different. You’ll be busy with holiday parties which means eating more. To make matters worse, it’ll be […]
Read MoreWith Off-Season Training, You Pay Now or Pay Later
The off-season is now well underway and you are probably hitting the gym and, hopefully, hitting the slopes soon as well some time in the next few months. Though getting the miles on snow is very important, a key focus during the summer should be on building your fitness that acts as the foundation for […]
Read MoreThe Ultimate Price of Our Hyper-Achievement Culture
A truly tragic story of Madison Holleran, a U. of Penn student and track athlete, who committed suicide in early 2014. On the surface, she was a happy, and successful young woman. But inside there was turmoil. It reminds me of Sarah Devens, another star student-athlete, this time at Dartmouth (I wonder if the fact that […]
Read More5 Reasons Athletes Don’t Do Mental Training
Over the many years that I’ve been working in the field of sport psychology, I have championed the benefits of mental training for sports to thousands of athletes. This work has ranged from talks to junior programs to ongoing consulting with individual athletes and teams. As many of you know from my dozens of articles […]
Read MoreEven the Best Struggle Mentally
Here’s a great article about Rafael Nadal in which he describes struggling mentally this year on the pro tennis tour. Roger Federer also discusses his mental difficulties. For most people, it’s hard to imagine that such such gifted and experienced athletes who have had so much success in their careers could, for example, lose confidence and get […]
Read MorePoints aren’t the Only Criterion of a Successful Season
With the season drawing to a close, it is, for every racer, a time of reckoning in which you look back and evaluate what kind of season you had: one to be proud of or one to reflect back on with disappointment and perhaps regret. One of the primary criteria that racers use to judge […]
Read MoreAre Coaches the Real Bullies in School?
A truly eye-opening and painful article in The Atlantic describing how many coaches are the real bullies in school and, by extension, youth sports. Moreover, this abusive behavior is applauded by many parents who see this treatment as character building. These parents have seen too many so-called inspirational movies (such as the recent film Whiplash about […]
Read MoreTaylor Interview on Sport Psychology with Former NFLer Isaac Byrd
I was recently interviewed by Isaac Byrd, a former NFL player. We talked about sport psychology and the mental preparation for sport. Might be worth a listen.
Read MoreSports are Like Sleep
Having just read the title of my new article, You may be thinking: “Has Dr. Jim finally lost it? What does sleep have to do with sports?” Let me explain. Have you ever tried to sleep? You lie in bed and tell yourself that you have to sleep and you try, try, try to sleep. […]
Read MoreTaylor Radio Interview about the psychology of sport
I was recently interviewed by Glenn Whitney of SportsCoachRadio.com about the many different aspects of the psychology of sport. A good listen (scroll to bottom) if you want to learn more about how the mind impacts athletic performance.
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