Learn Game Changing Sports Psychology & Mental Training
Up your game for good with one-on-one mental performance coaching. Tested & proven to help athletes build mental toughness and high level mental skills. Learn to consistently perform at your best during competition!
Learn Game Changing Sports Psychology & Mental Training
Up your game for good with one-on-one mental performance coaching. Tested & proven to help athletes build mental toughness and high level mental skills. Learn to consistently perform at your best during competition!
The Only Thing Between You And Repeatable Success On The Field Or Court Is Your Mind
Success Starts Within’s training has shown to break athletes out of all kinds of mental game challenges that keep them from performing their best in games. Leave the fear, anxiety and low confidence in last season!
What Are The Benefits?
IMPROVED CONFIDENCE
Mental coaching helps you build confidence in yourself and your skills.
INCREASED FOCUS
Gain better focus and concentration skills with proven mental training.
BUILD RESILIENCE
Learn how to be more resilient and grow from failure.
DECREASED ANXIETY
Master your nerves and overcome performance anxiety.
INCREASED MOTIVATION
A mental coach will help you understand what drives you to succeed.
POSITIVE SELF-TALK
Mental coaches empower you to take control of your internal dialogue.
Get Affordable, One-on-One Mental Performance Coaching
One-on-one mental coaching to help you build mental skills, overcome your mental game challenges, and elevate your performance.
Not Ready For 1-1 Coaching? Get Started With the Confident Competitor Academy On Your Time
The Confident Competitor Academy is a 6-week course that will teach you how to trust in yourself, let go of fear & anxiety, and play freely during competition.
Eli Straw, M.S. - Mental Game Coach
Eli Straw holds a Master’s Degree in psychology with a sport psychology specialization. Combined with his expertise in mental performance coaching, Eli has extensive experience coaching, teaching, and consulting with professional, elite, college, high school, middle school, and youth athletes. Eli also has experience playing baseball at the collegiate and professional levels. Eli works with athletes of all sports and all levels and is a current member of the AASP.
Meet Your Coach
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Sports Psychology Articles
Why Athletes Play Scared (And How to Stop)
Quick Summary:
- Athletes play scared because of fear, not because they lack skill. Playing scared shows up as hesitation, second guessing, and holding back during games, even when athletes perform well in practice.
- The most common driver of scared play is fear of negative consequences, such as making mistakes, getting embarrassed, losing a starting role, getting yelled at, or letting others down.
- Outcome-focused thinking increases fear. When athletes fixate on results they want to avoid, their brain shifts into protection mode, leading to cautious, timid decision-making.
- Fear of injury or contact can also cause athletes to play scared, especially when they try to avoid physical situations that are required to perform at a high level in competition.
- Athletes stop playing scared by accepting fear, shifting from avoidance-based goals to controllable process goals, and training themselves to play aggressively and freely under pressure.
How Does Attitude Impact Performance?
Quick Summary:
- Your attitude directly impacts your performance by affecting your resilience, focus, effort, and actions during competition.
- A negative attitude makes it harder to bounce back from mistakes, stay locked in, and put yourself in positions to succeed.
- Attitude is driven by your thinking—not the situation—meaning the same moment can produce very different performances.
- A positive attitude improves focus, confidence, and effort, helping athletes play better and more consistently.
- The most effective way to improve attitude is by changing your thinking, especially after mistakes, tough calls, or when things aren’t going your way.
Setting Goals for Practices & Games
Quick Summary:
- Goals give athletes clear intent, direction, and focus during both practices and games.
- The most effective goals are process-based (controllable), not outcome-based.
- Long-term goals provide motivation, but daily practice and game goals should focus on improvement and performance.
- Two key questions guide goal-setting: What will help me improve? What will help me play my best?
- Clear, controllable goals improve practice quality and help athletes perform more consistently in games.
- Process-focused goals reduce anxiety, keep athletes present, and support confident performances.
Three Pillars to Becoming a More Consistent Athlete
Quick Summary:
- Consistency comes from mindset, not results—repeat the same confident, present-focused mentality each game.
- Weekly physical preparation and extra skill work reduce worry and build trust in your abilities.
- Mental preparation tools like visualization, self-talk, and pre-game routines create a reliable game-day mindset.
- Consistency depends on how you respond to mistakes—reset quickly instead of letting errors snowball.
- Respond to bad games with learning, not overthinking; avoid unnecessary mechanical changes driven by fear.
Is it Okay to Feel Nervous Before Games?
Quick Summary:
- Nervousness before games is normal and can even boost performance, but it becomes harmful when it leads to anxiety or timid play
- “Playing nervous” happens when fear of mistakes, worry about others, or outcome-focused thinking changes your style of play.
- Accepting nervousness is the first step—fighting the feeling creates more anxiety and tighter, more fearful performances.
- Staying present is key to overcoming nervousness; focus on breathing, controllable objectives, visual cues, or simple self-talk.
- You can feel nervous and still play aggressive, confident, and free by accepting the feeling and redirecting your attention to the moment.
Mindset Shift to Play Better in Games
Quick Summary:
- Shifting your focus from yourself to helping the team win reduces anxiety, fear, and self-doubt.
- Self-consciousness and overthinking often fuel performance issues like the yips and fear of mistakes.
- A high school catcher overcame the yips by unintentionally focusing fully on supporting his struggling pitcher.
- A college basketball player improved her performance by ignoring field goal percentage and prioritizing team impact.
- Focusing on teammates and team success helps you play more freely, naturally, and without overthinking.
About Success Starts Within
Success Starts Within provides sports psychology resources to athletes and performers looking to improve their mental game. Success Starts Within offers 1-1 mental performance coaching and mental training courses to help you build confidence, mental toughness, and all the mental skills you need to elevate your performance. We also provide many free resources, including weekly articles, podcasts, and videos that cover sport psychology topics to help you master the mental game. No matter your sport, skill level, or financial ability, you will find the mental training resources you need here at Success Starts Within.
Mission Statement
Make mental training and sport psychology accessible, affordable, and achieveable to all athletes.
HELPFUL DEFINITIONS
Mental Game Coach
A mental game coach helps you build mental toughness and overcome performance blocks. So much of success is mental and a mental performance coach helps you build the mental tools needed to achieve your goals.
Sport Psychology
Sports psychology focuses on helping athletes, performers, and other individuals reach their goals and achieve success. This is done by helping to cope with anxiety and other negative forms of thinking, along with teaching mental skills that will elevate performance.
Performance Anxiety
Performance anxiety occurs when you experience extreme nerves before or during an event. These feelings often result in lower levels of performance and are more severe than normal nerves.
Peak Performance
Peak performance happens when you perform to your maximum capability. This will be accompanied by feelings of confidence, effortlessness, extreme focus, and joy. This is often referred to as the “flow state.”
Mental Toughness
Measure of your mental strength, resilience, confidence, and ability to cope with difficult situations. This means you can push past failures and remain confident and positive in the face of adversity and challenges.
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