5 Ways to Help Your Child Manage Performance Anxiety

The mental health of children and adolescents is of huge importance at all times. Our kids are the future and they are in dire need of gaining tools to help them deal with the many challenges they come across on their life journey.

Anxiety appears in many different forms in people of all ages. Some children experience a form of social anxiety that shows ups as feeling extremely nervous when meeting new people and others don’t get nervous at all in social situations. Kids that are in sports or theater can feel anxiety about performing in front of an audience while some kids thrive on the stage or field.

Performance anxiety is common for many people at different levels. Getting the jitters here and there is normal and can motivate children to practice and be ready to perform, but high levels of anxiety can disrupt performance by triggering your child to go into flight, fight, or freeze mode.

Performance anxiety is a fear experienced by those that feel they can’t perform a certain task. The performance that is feared can include sports, theater or musical performances, classroom presentations, and test-taking. This begins with negative thoughts and these thoughts trigger physical symptoms such as nausea, excessive sweating, and increased heart rate. A child might decide he or she doesn’t want to perform if the anxiety reaches a very high intensity.

When people experience anxiety, their brain is not working optimally which can lead to forgetting much of what they learned for the performance. It’s important to teach our kids how to manage these worried thoughts that are showing up as negative self-talk and irrational fears. When children have the tools to conquer anxiety, they experience feelings of growth and success and this helps them feel confident when trying new activities.

Here are 5 Strategies to Help Your Child Manage Performance Anxiety

Acknowledgment

Make sure you acknowledge that your child is experiencing anxiety. Instead of saying, “Stop worrying,” say, “I see how hard this is for you, but I know you can get through this. Let’s try to take deep breaths together.” Your child needs to feel validated and supported before you can teach the following tools.

Mental Rehearsal

Using imagination as a form of additional practice is valuable. The brain doesn’t know the difference between what is imagined and what is happening in reality. This means a child can practice playing a musical piece on the piano for 5 minutes every day through imagination and the child will show improvement. Think about all the times you’ve put yourself into an anxious state just by imagining something negative happening at a future event. We can use the power of visualization for the opposite effect; Let’s imagine what we want to happen instead of what we don’t what to happen. The imagination must be as detailed as possible with feelings of gratitude and confidence. Children can use visualization to rehearse for a play, or practice feeling calm and confident during a test. I believe the power of imagination is the most important tool we can teach our kids.

Deep Breathing

When kids get fearful thoughts, they start shallow breathing from the chest, and this creates more anxiety. Teach your child to take deep breaths from the abdomen. Have your child put a hand on his or her tummy to feel the stomach move up and down as he or she takes deep breaths.

Fake it until you Feel it

Faking it is not lying about who you are. It is imagining and pretending that you are feeling a certain way so that you can produce the thoughts and feelings to get into that state of being. A good example of this is when you pretend you are asleep and then you start to get sleepy. It really happens! Tell your child to think of a positive performance from the past and to feel gratitude and confidence from that memory. Those emotions will bring in more positive thoughts and eventually your child will feel more at ease with more confidence.

Mantras

Have your child come up with a few encouraging sentences to repeat over and over before the performance such as:

-I am learning from this opportunity.

-I love (the task) and I am going to do great.

-I am good at this. I am grateful I have this opportunity.

Mindset Coach

Finding a life coach to teach your child tools and guide your child to feel in control of the fears that come up before a performance is a good idea. Your children will learn best when they get guidance from parents and an outside source.

Teach your children different tools to help manage their anxiety and let them explore and find out which ones work best for them. Every child is different and will find relief from different techniques.

If you are looking for personal coaching for your child, please reach out and together, we can empower your child to feel more joy and less fear before and during performances.