“Be Elite” Series: How To Be Present On The Softball Field
Some of the most successful people have mastered skills and strategies that have helped propel them to their peak performance. Whether they perform as an athlete, business leader, or in another type of field, this set of skills spans across professions. In this series of articles, I'll break down the most-used mental performance skills of the elite.
Let's start with a skill that lays the foundation for almost every other mental skill you'll encounter. This foundation skill is mindfulness, or the skill of being present in the moment.
What Is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is paying attention on purpose to the present moment without judging yourself, others, or the environment (Kabat-Zinn, p.4). You simply allow yourself to hold a broad scope of awareness of what's happening around you, including what's going on outside of yourself and the thoughts and feelings happening inside.
There are two key components of mindfulness: 1) You pay attention with purpose. This means there is a reason you want to hold attention on the moment. 2) You pay attention without judgment. This means you allow yourself to feel, think, and observe whatever it is you experience without trying to label what you feel, think, or experience as good/bad/neutral or right/wrong (Buggy, 2025).
You don't let yourself get caught up in these thoughts or feelings, and you don't try to change them. You accept what you think and feel and continue to let yourself be in the moment. Keep in mind, judgments can be helpful to you sometimes, and that's why your brain is wired to judge.
For example, your judgmental thoughts can help you figure out things you want to keep doing or not. However, if you're not careful, you can get caught up in these thoughts, which not only drains your brain energy, but also distracts you by pulling your attention and focus away from what's happening in that moment.
What Happens When You Judge?
The non-judgment element is vital to staying present. If you do get caught up in your thoughts or feelings, or you try to change them before accepting them, then your attention shifts. You are no longer holding your attention on what is happening in that very moment.
Instead, your attention is on the past or thinking about the future. When this happens, you miss important cues in your environment. Think about a time when you got caught up in a game perhaps thinking about a mistake you made (strikeout, error, etc.). You may have thought about this mistake for the rest of the game. Now think back to how you played after you made this mistake. Did you make another mistake? Did you miss information or get late jumps? If you answered yes, that means you were making judgments, and you were not present.
Another reason not judging is important to being able to stay present is that we behave in different ways depending on the judgments we make. Now, this can be useful for us in certain situations, but when we think about how we change behavior based on judgment, this can make our performance worse.
Here's what I mean: When you judge something as bad, you may avoid it in the future. When you judge something as neutral, you may ignore it, and when you judge something as good, you may cling to it and crave more of it (Buggy, 2025). Let's think about this with softball. If you make a mistake in a game, you may judge that scenario as "bad." When this scenario (perhaps a certain pitch or play, or a certain pitcher or hitter) happens again, your "bad" judgment mindset shifts your attention to trying to avoid that scenario. You may play hesitantly and lack confidence because your brain is focused on what happened in the past.
On the flip side, you may have been very successful in a scenario and judged the scenario as "good." Now you crave that scenario so much (because you did well and want more!) that you think you can only do well in that specific scenario. So you put yourself in a performance box by thinking everything has to be perfect for you to have a "good" judgment and outcome again.
There are many other examples of what can happen when you judge. The point is that judging in the moment makes it difficult for you to truly pay attention to the present situation in a way that will help you be the most successful.
How Can You Stay Present?
One way you can practice staying present is to be intentional with what you're paying attention to. This means, pay attention on purpose. Another way you can practice mindfulness is when you have distracting thoughts or feelings, let yourself have the thought or feeling instead of trying to ignore it.
Let yourself feel it, then intentionally redirect your attention back to the task or present moment. This is accepting how you think and feel. It's okay to think and feel the way you do, so give yourself that, but then redirect your attention to what you want it to be on. This sounds easy, but you may be surprised by how often your attention gets interrupted. To start, pick a small span of time or task to practice.
For example, maybe you practice intentionally while you're cleaning your room. Take note of how many times your mind wanders, you have a judgmental thought, and you have to redirect your attention. Pick different tasks, including practices and games, and apply this same concept to each task.
Mindfulness, or staying present, is a skill. This means you can practice it, and you can learn how to do it. This also means it can take time to get good at it and see the benefits of this skill in your games. The good news is that mindfulness is an easy skill to practice, and you can start right now! So, what are you waiting for?
Dr. Megan Buning is a Certified Mental Performance Consultant (C.M.P.C.) with over a decade of experience training the mental game.
References
Buggy, P. (2025). Non-judgement: What is it? And why does it matter? (4 benefits). Mindful Ambition. Retrieved from https://mindfulambition.net/non-judgment/
Kabat-Zinn J. (1994). Wherever you go there you are: Mindfulness meditation in everyday life,(p4). New York, NY: Hyperion.
