Who Said That?

If I asked you a question — who do you spend most time listening to?

Or who takes up most of your time in conversation?

Who would you say?

A friend?

A parent?

Your family?

Or were you clever enough to realise… it’s yourself.

That’s right — you speak to yourself more than anyone else, and that voice is always going to be with you.

Psychologists like Ethan Kross have shown that we are in constant conversation with ourselves (4000 words per minute!) — more than with anyone else — and Clark and Rhyno suggest we have 5000 thoughs a day - this inner voice plays a powerful role in how we think, feel, and perform.

But if we were to display that private voice — that inner voice — on a banner above your head, what would it be saying?

Would they be things you’d be happy for people to see?

Would you be proud of how you talk to yourself?

Thoughts like:

“What if I don’t win?”

“Don’t miss, please don’t miss.”

“They’re looking at you.”

“They’re laughing at you.”

“I can’t believe you’re so useless — how did you mess that up so badly?”

These thoughts and chatter are perfectly human — they are our Inner Worrier. They’re trying to protect us, but they’re not always helpful. (We’ll learn more about where they come from on the camps.)

Left unchecked, however, these thoughts and conversations can drag us into a pit of despair — where we start to believe them as truth, and they begin to affect both our performance and our confidence.

The way we speak to ourselves doesn’t just affect our psychology — it affects our physiology too.

Our body responds to our thoughts.

That’s why, in the Warriors 2026 camps, we’ll once again be focusing on self-talk and the power of the inner voice.

We’ll help athletes to:

Recognise spontaneous self-talk (automatic thoughts)

Use goal-directed and strategic self-talk

Build awareness of the voice in their head

Learn how to use that voice to support performance — not sabotage it

We’ll also explore the IMPACT guidelines for successful strategic self-talk and help build your Inner Warrior.

Thoughts happen to us.

Self-talk is what we get to decide.

On this camp, we’ll be building our Inner Warrior — to help replace the Inner Worrier.

A Tip for Parents

If you hear your child speaking badly about themselves, you could try asking:

“Would you speak to a friend like that?”

“If that had happened to your best friend, what would you say to them?”

Sometimes the most powerful coaching starts with changing the voice in our own heads.