Vince Lombardi once said, “Mental toughness is many things and rather difficult to explain. Its qualities are sacrifice and self-denial. Also, most importantly, it is combined with a perfectly disciplined will that refuses to give in. It’s a state of mind – you could call it ‘character in action’” (Family of Vince Lombardi, 2010, Famous Quotes).
Mental toughness, or more recently 'grit', is a term tossed around within the sports world as if everyone knows what it means and who has 'it'. There doesn't seem to be a consensus on what mental toughness is, what it looks like, or how to develop it. When asked what mental toughness means, most people begin to falter, trying to grab onto a definition that eludes them. On one end of the spectrum many people fall back on the you know it when you see it description, and on the other end other folks say mental toughness is akin to not giving up.
People talk of mental toughness as if it is a mental state you will yourself into on the field. The goal is for athletes to compartmentalize their struggles and push all of their fears/doubts/worries aside. The ability to compartmentalize is glorified and pervasive in sports culture with such idioms coming to mind: leave the last play behind you; leave it all on the field; shut out the rest and just play; shake it off; don't think about it, etc. But the truth of the matter is our brains do not work this way--there isn't a separate brain structure for competing athletically that shuts down other areas of the brain. We are a collection of our experiences and we can no more tune out the rest of our life during competition than we can breathe underwater. It's just physically not possible. In this way, we're setting athletes up to fail by glorifying an impossible way of being and performing.
Instead, perhaps we should be taking a step back and helping athletes develop resilient mental health, which must be developed and continually supported. More on that another time.
Family of Vince Lombardi (2010). Famous Quotes. Retrieved on October 5, 2012 from: http://www.vincelombardi.com/quotes.html.