Why can skills that feel completely natural in practice suddenly seem to disappear when it really matters?
Most of us know the experience of being able to do something perfectly well in practice, only to find that it suddenly feels much harder when the pressure is on. Whether it is a presentation, interview, sporting event or performance, anxiety can pull attention away from the task itself and towards questions such as “How am I doing?”, “What if I mess this up?” or “Can they see that I’m nervous?”
From a CBT and Metacognitive Therapy (MCT) perspective, this shift in attention can be important. The more we monitor ourselves, check our performance or try to control every detail, the less naturally we may be able to use skills that are already there. The problem is not necessarily a lack of ability, but the way anxiety changes where attention goes and how much importance we give to thoughts about performing badly.
In my work at Symmetry CBT, I help people develop a different relationship with performance anxiety, so that attention can move back towards what they are actually doing rather than towards constant self-monitoring. The aim is not to eliminate every anxious feeling before performing, but to make anxiety less influential so that existing skills have more room to come through.