Michelle O'Connor - Coach

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Your nervous system is always listening 🧠

We often think regulation has to mean meditation, therapy, or finding 30 quiet minutes in an already busy day.

It doesn’t.

Sometimes regulation looks like walking. Laughing. Singing in the car. Being outside. Spending time with someone who feels safe. Moving your body. Taking a slow breath.

These seemingly small behaviours can influence our physiological and emotional state, helping us shift attention, reduce arousal and create a greater sense of safety and control.

And this matters in sport, work and everyday life 🔑

Because you cannot always control the pressure around you… but you can build a toolkit that helps your mind and body respond to it differently.

The key isn’t to use all of these.

It’s knowing which ones work for YOU - and practising them before you desperately need them.

Regulation isn’t about never becoming dysregulated.
It’s about knowing how to find your way back 🧠🤍

My new favourites are singing out loud (Shania has the best support act if she ever needs it 😂), dancing in my kitchen as I make breakfast or dinner, & practising daily gratitude… because we have a lot to be very grateful for 🥰

What ones can you try out this weekend?

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A little glimpse of last week… 🌍🧠

From boardrooms and offices to clinics, pitches, airports and conversations with athletes, coaches and performers across Ireland, England and Australia.

Different sports. Different environments. Different pressures.

Yet wherever the work takes me, one thing remains remarkably consistent:

Performance is human before it is physical.

Behind the confidence, pressure, expectations, mistakes, results and medals is a person trying to think clearly, regulate emotion, trust themselves and perform when it matters.

Grateful for the people who continue to trust me to be part of that process.

And apparently… very grateful for coffee too 😂☕️

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The best coaches don’t lower standards. They create environments where athletes can rise to them

High Performance and Empathy are not opposites.

You can challenge without humiliating.
Demand without threatening.
Correct without attacking identity.
Hold athletes accountable without creating fear.

Because fear might create short-term compliance… but effective coaching develops athletes who can think, adapt, communicate, recover and perform when the pressure is highest.

From a psychological perspective, athletes thrive when three fundamental needs are supported:

Autonomy 🗣️ - I have a voice.
Competence 🛠️- I can improve.
Relatedness 👥- I am valued here.

The goal isn’t a comfortable environment with low expectations.

It’s a high-challenge, high-support environment where standards remain high and people feel safe enough to learn, make mistakes, take responsibility and grow.

🔑 Most important message:
Great coaching isn’t about having power over athletes.

It’s about developing power within them 🧠🏆

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🧠 WHY DO SO MANY ATHLETES & COACHES CHEW GUM?

It might be doing more than simply keeping your mouth busy.

Research suggests chewing gum may support perceived stress regulation, alertness and sustained attention… all highly relevant when pressure rises and the ability to stay present matters.

And importantly, this isn’t only for the athlete on the pitch.

🏃 Starting? Stay regulated and locked into the next action.

🪑 On the bench? Stay mentally engaged and ready to enter.

🔄 Waiting to come on? Manage nervous energy without mentally playing the game before you’re in it.

🧠 Coaching or managing? Regulate yourself so you can scan, assess and communicate, rather than emotionally react.

Because whether you’re playing, waiting or leading, your nervous system is still involved in the performance.

Just sometimes… The goal isn’t always to become calmer.

Sometimes it’s moving from:

CHAOTIC AROUSAL → CONTROLLED AROUSAL

Regulated. Alert. Ready.

And gum can become an even stronger performance cue when paired with:

CHEW → BREATHE → FOCUS → RESET → NEXT ACTION.

The gum isn’t magic.

But the routine and regulation around it can be powerful🧠

Just some food for thought 💭 (no pun intended)

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The last 10 days, in pictures… 📍🚗🧠

13 talks.
3,000+ kilometres.
16 counties.
Multiple 1:1 sessions.
And a serious amount of time spent on Irish roads 😂

It’s been one of those stretches where I’ve almost had to remind myself what county I was waking up in.

From team rooms, pitches and 1:1 conversations to long drives across the country (with a few very worthwhile detours along the way 🏞️🌊🏖️)

Achill Island. Keem Beach. Croagh Patrick. Galway Town. Birr. Killarney. And plenty of little moments in between.

Because amongst the busy schedules, the travelling and the work, I’ve learned the importance of finding those small opportunities to switch off before switching back on.

Sometimes that’s a walk on a beach.
Sometimes it’s taking the scenic route.
Sometimes it’s simply stopping long enough to appreciate where the work has brought you.

The kilometres and numbers tell one part of the story.

But behind every talk and every 1:1 is a person, an athlete, a coach or a team trusting me to be part of their journey… and that will never be something I take for granted ✨❤️🙌

A hectic ten days? Absolutely.

But also a pretty special reminder that I get to do a job I genuinely love, meet incredible people and see some beautiful corners of this little country while doing it 🇮🇪

Tired? Yes.
Grateful? Even more so ❤️

(for now anyway 😅)

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Four European gold medals🥇🥇🥇🥇

The medals are what we see.

What we don’t see is the identity built before the outcome ever arrived.



Amy Hunt’s performances are a powerful example of something we work on constantly in Sport & Performance Psychology:

You don’t have to wait for the result to become the athlete capable of achieving it.

Build the identity.

Practise the behaviours.

Rehearse the moments.

Choose your self-talk.

Reset when things go wrong.

Learn to interpret pressure as an opportunity to compete.

Then… collect the evidence.

Because confidence isn’t only created by winning… it’s created by repeatedly proving to yourself who you are

Identity → Behaviour → Ex*****on → Evidence.

The medal may confirm the performance.

But the person capable of winning it was built long before.

Become it before you prove it 🧠🏆

Because you have to see it first, in order to be it 👀

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5 Well-Intentioned Phrases Coaches Should Rethink 🤔

The goal isn’t to make coaching language “SOFT”. It’s to make it “EFFECTIVE”.

Under pressure, athletes don’t necessarily need more words, more emotion or more criticism. They often need greater clarity.

Good coaching communication helps an athlete answer three questions:

What can I control?

What do I need to do next?

Where should my attention go now?

Sometimes changing one sentence can completely change how an athlete experiences the same coaching message.

Mindful acts make a difference… this is the difference between a good leader/coach and a great/coach leader.

One leads… the other, builds a platform to allow others to lead too.

Words have meaning… use them effectively 💭

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5 Truths You Need To Know 🤔

What do high-performing people actually need to know about their psychology? 🧠

Probably not that they need to be confident all the time.
Or positive all the time.
Or calm all the time.

One of the biggest misconceptions about high performance is that the goal is to create the perfect mindset.

It isn’t.

The goal is to develop the psychological skills that allow you to perform effectively across different internal states.

To recognise when your attention has drifted — and bring it back.

To experience nerves without automatically interpreting them as a problem.

To notice an unhelpful thought without allowing it to dictate your next action.

To make a mistake, regulate your response and re-engage quickly.

And to recognise what is — and isn’t — within your control.

Because at the highest levels, pressure doesn’t disappear.

Your relationship with pressure changes.

This is why so much of performance psychology isn’t about eliminating difficult thoughts, emotions or experiences.
It’s about developing psychological flexibility — the ability to notice what’s happening internally, adapt appropriately and continue behaving in a way that serves the performance in front of you.

You don’t need to feel perfect to perform well.

Notice. Adjust. Re-engage.

Again and again.

That is a psychological skill set worth training 🧠🏆