The brain plays an important and often overlooked role in pain and injury.  Here are five things you can do to train your brain when you are injured… 1. Visualise The same parts of your brain are activated when you imagine doing an activity as when you actually do the activity.  Studies show that athletes […]

In my experience, there are two types of people – those who want to succeed and those who hope to succeed.  Over the years, a lot of athletes have started our work together thinking they don’t need to work on the mental side of their game, hoping that it will happen, only to realise that they […]

To say that the last few weeks in Australian sport have been heartbreaking and tough would be a massive understatement.  Not only has the Gold Coast professional football community been the centre of serious drug allegations but cricket royalty has also come under fire. When things like this happen, the age-old role model debate comes […]

The more time I spend on the golf course the more I am fascinated by the decision-making process and the variety of decisions that golfers have to make.  Players have to assess a hole in terms of distance, lie, and obstacles.  They have to then work out what club to use out of their bag, […]

One of my favourite sayings is, “If you can train your body you can train your brain.”  For me, this phrase sums up what we do as sport psychologists.  It was once believed that the brain could not be trained or changed; in other words, you were stuck with the brain you were born with. […]

Sleeping is an everyday ritual that is essential to our daily lives; without the right amount of sleep we are unable to function effectively.  From a very early age we begin to form sleeping habits and patterns.  These are the habits that we will take through to our adolescent and adult years so it essential […]

It is generally accepted that children are naturally physically active.  If you watch children in a park or in a playground they typically enjoy running, climbing, swinging, jumping – being able to challenge their physical abilities whilst having fun.  What you may not realise is that these natural physical abilities and what we class as […]

There has been a lot of discussion in both the media and around the school gates about the increased pressures that youths are facing in their school, family, and social lives.  The youth of today are experiencing increasing amounts of stress as their worlds are more demanding than ever before.  This is due to the […]

We have witnessed a number of incredible feats of courage and outstanding performance over the past few weeks with athletes overcoming incredible odds to achieve at the pinnacle of their sport.  One highlight was Dennis Kimetto’s world record at the Berlin Marathon and the toughness shown as always, throughout both the AFL and NRL finals […]

Football player Mia Hamm is often credited with the quote, “Success breeds success”.  On most occasions this principle is seen to be true.  If you are successful, you begin to think more confidently, feel more confident, and perform more confidently, resulting in increased likelihood of success, which makes you think more confidently…and so on. But […]