Refocus When You Get Too Far Ahead

Do distractions cause you to become sidetracked during baseball or softball games? Are you anxious about what the outcome of the game might be? Do you tense up and put more pressure yourself to win? If you said yes, then you focus too much on results and not enough on the process. You should learn when and how to refocus your mind on what’s important. Many baseball and softball players forget that winning comes from taking care of the process and executing one pitch at a time.

This is an important lesson I teach–to get a hit or to get an out, you must pay attention to task-relevant cues. This simple concept is easy to forget when you care too much about winning or what winning means. “Don’t strike out,” “Don’t walk this hitter,” “Don’t miss this pop up ball” are examples of what you might say to yourself with a result-focus. A result-focus–worry about the consequences of your actions–does not help you perform; it only creates tension and leads to worry. This is when you have to refocus your mind on the current pitch.

How do you stay focused on the process? Focusing on the process means knowing what performance cues are in baseball and keeping your mind focused on those task-relevant cues. You need to define what is relevant to performing the task. In baseball, the batter has specific cues for each task he must attend to. Some of the task-relevant cues are: studying the pitcher, knowing the count, setting up in the batter’s box, visualizing success, feeling confident, and focusing on the ball as the pitcher releases it.

If your mind wanders off task, that means you are not “on-task” and you are too focused on results or some other distraction. It’s OK if your mind wanders momentarily, but you want to be able to catch yourself and refocus on the current pitch as soon as possible. In this example, I would ask the baseball player to stop his at-bat routine, clear his mind, and restart his routine from the beginning.

To improve your mental game for baseball or softball, define the cues that are relevant to baseball execution and success–one pitch at a time. Also, know when you get off-task, and be able to stop and refocus on the task when you wander to results or are distracted!