You will experience failure. Softball is a game of failure; the only way to avoid it is not to play. Even the best players make outs, boot ground balls, walk in winning runs, drop game-losing fly balls, strike out with bases loaded, slump for two weeks and have a bad season. The question isn't whether you will face adversity but how will you respond to it.

It's OK to Feel Down

It's natural to feel upset when you perform poorly or to feel a sense of losses when your team is beaten. You can be upset, dejected or sad for a little while, give yourself permission to feel that way. Of course, it's not OK to do anything damaging to yourself, anyone else, or anything of value, and we recommend putting off any major decisions until you get over these feelings.

To help move through your "down time," set a time limit for yourself to let go of the negative emotions, learn from the experience and get on with life. give yourself an hour, three hours, overnight, or 24 hours, then shift your focus. There's no benefit to "spiraling out of control" with negative thoughts for days.

If you think moping around fro days shows your commitment and how much you care, think again. Are you committed to playing your best softball or are you demonstrating that you care about loss or mistake? Learn from the experience then shift your focus from the failure to your next task.

Define Failure Intelligently

How do you know when you fail?
How do you know when you succeed?

Your answers reveal your perspective on the game. If your answers to the questions mention things outside of your control, such as losing, getting hits or getting batters out, reconsider your thinking. Basing your feelings on success and failure on things outside of your control sets you you up for a roller coaster ride.

Feeling badly about a loss or a slump is OK, but don't let these temporary shortfalls define you as a failure. Feeling dejected because you lost is one thing, labeling it a failure is destructive. Make a clear distinction between your performance and your feelings about yourself as a person. Although your performance didn't allow you to get the outcome you were hoping for, your value as a person is not diminished because of it. Even if your performance was terrible, it doesn't make you a terrible person.

Evaluate your performance on things that are within your control.

Were you focused on the process of playing or were you focused on the results of your actions?
Were you in control of yourself before each pitch?
Were you committed to your plan on each pitch?

Keep Your Mission in Mind

When you're struggling, the advice many people offer is "keep things in perspective." In our terms, they are telling you to get back in touch with your mission. Use answers in the exercise "Why do you play softball?"

You didn't answer: "I enjoy mentally beating myself up after a loss," or "I love getting depressed after I make an error."

The failure in softball is part of what makes it a great game, but the frustration, anger, pain and anxiety that come with it won't lead a list of reasons for why we play the game.

Focus on what you love about the game instead of negative events. Be aware of how much you enjoy the competition, the joking with your teammates, the smell of your leather glove or the feel of your cleats sining into the grass. Enjoy the challenge rather than fighting it helps you leave a failure in the past and gets your mind where it needs to be to perform well in the present.

Take the Bathtub Test

Put 2 inches of water in your bathtub and step into it with both feet. If you are able to stand on top of the water it's OK to demand perfection of yourself. If your feet come to rest on the bottom of the tub, however, what you've always known is obvious- you are not perfect.

Striving for perfection is admirable, but perfection as a measure of success is dangerous. Give yourself permission to make mistakes frees you from worrying about them.

Learn from It

Failure is feedback. It's like a yellow or red light indicating that you need to check in with yourself to determine how you can improve. It's saying you've now got an opportunity to learn.

Step back from your failure and examine it as someone else might see it. Pretend it happened to your best friend on the team. What would you say to her? Distancing yourself from emotional impact of failing makes it much easier to draw the important lessens from it. Finally, force yourself to answer the question, "how can this experience help me become a better player?"

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