• Concentration/attention skills (focusing)
• Mental rehearsal/visualization/imagery
• Relaxation techniques
• Goal-setting

Concentration/Attention Skills (Focusing)

• The ability to focus on the actual task rather than the auxiliary surroundings and environmental events.
• Involves controlling the mind and centralizing the concentration at a single focal point.
• Distractive triggers include crowd, pressure, opposition, anxiety.

Mental Rehearsal/Visualization/Imagery

• A combination of these techniques allows a performer to visually create a representation of their performance, prior to execution.
• An individual mentally repeats movements and sequences they are about to execute, which helps in making the mind familiar with the motion (almost similar to ghosting lines on a paper before actually drawing them).
• Often applied in gymnastics, weight lifting and diving.

Relaxation Techniques

• Used to calm the mind and control excessive arousal.
• techniques include focused breathing, progressive tensing and relaxing muscles and mental imagery.
• Application of techniques often differ from sport to sport and athlete to athlete as each sport demands different techniques of concentration and relaxation.

Goal-Setting

• Setting an achievable and measurable target often provides directional motivation and sense of commitment.
• Helps athletes keep their anxiety under control and boost intrinsic motivation.
• Goals are often short term, which acts as checkpoints towards a bigger achievement or long term goal.
• Setting of goals should be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Accepted, Realistic, Time Period).