As part of our partnership with SportsAid and to support World Mental Health Day on the 10th October, BelievePerform hosted a mental fitness session for the royals where we explored different ways in which people can build their resilience recipe. After the session Their Royal Highnesses took part in netball & goalball, and were given an opportunity to practise skills such as mindfulness and imagery to understand how wellbeing can boost performance.
The above was part of a larger project with SportsAid where BelievePerform have developed an engaging, digestible, self-reflecting programme which sparks interest and gives athletes the tools to be able to develop their mind health. The programme seeks to empower athletes and give them the opportunity to practice mind skills that allow them to thrive in life and sport.
Built around evidence-based core pillars. The mind health programme provides videos, tools and infographics that give the opportunity for athletes to take a proactive approach in developing their mind. The programme will incorporate 6 sections. Resilience, Challenge response, Healthy comparison, Confidence, Performance anxiety and Identity. To make the programme as relevant as possible, videos of SportsAid ambassadors discussing their own experiences of the above topics have been included to ensure maximum impact and relatability.
The programme is timely as recent research from the British Medical Journal, “Starting young to protect elite athletes’ mental health” (Purcell R, Henderson J, Tamminen KA, et al. Br J Sports Med 2023;57:439–440 indicates that mental ill health is a health condition that affects young people globally, 58% of mental disorders in adolescents go undetected and untreated. As SportsAid work directly with young athletes it is of particular interest that young elite athletes are highlighted as being a group who are critically under-researched.
Overall, the aim of the programme is developing young people with the skills to be able to go and thrive mentally whatever the conditions they find themselves in, this could be in sport, at school or at home.
