Welcome back (to me, mostly). I’m happy to be back this week to share five links that I’ve selected: for importance, for comfort, for empathy, for inspiration, and for practice.

timely and yet tough
COVID and mental health of athletes {via TIME}

what exactly do you do here?
I love to see articles about my industry that helps explain a bit about the work I do. It helps to bring awareness to performance coaching (in that “what do you do exactly?” kind-of-way) and helps to de-stigmatize working on mental skills as though we’re always trying to “fix” something. The Craft of Mental Skills Coaching {via Sports Illustrated}

when I dip you dip we dip
Some great points from Zen Habits about what many of us are currently experiencing with changes in routine, depletion of energy, and subsequent loss of motivation. Though even in pre-COVID times, someone can do really well with habit change… and then comes The Habit Dip. Keep on, keepin’ on.

I am ironman
A dose of athletic inspiration from IRONMAN Roderick Sewell

click to embiggen
Do you maintain a regular journaling practice? This is an important task in increasing your awareness and targeted work in a variety of areas – including but not limited to self-talk, sleep, gratitude, and goal progress. Journaling is also good for a regular ol’ brain dump (or to get super existential, if you’re like me). That said, I really like this prompt from Austin Kleon: Will this enlarge me or diminish me?