Why High Performers Freeze: The Hidden Biology Behind Fear, the Yips, and Performance Anxiety
Jun 5, 2025
3 Mins
Imagine this: you're an athlete, executive, or high-stakes performer, and suddenly, your ability to do what you've done a thousand times before—whether it's pitching a ball, making a critical decision, or swinging a golf club—falls apart. It's not a lack of training, preparation, or talent. It's something deeper. Something biological.
This is the silent sabotage of the nervous system.
The Nervous System's Job Is to Keep You Safe
When we experience a life-threatening event, our nervous system kicks into gear to protect us. This response—fight, flight, or freeze—is essential to survival. But what happens when this same reaction gets triggered by something that's not life-threatening, like a game, a boardroom decision, or a trading moment?
Our biology doesn't know the difference. And that protective system becomes invasive.
Over time, this hijacking by our sympathetic nervous system begins to compromise our peace, our relationships, and our performance.
Why Talk Therapy Alone Sometimes Falls Short
In traditional talk therapy, we analyze our thoughts and feelings around performance. We might try to develop better coping strategies, gain insight, or reframe our thinking. These are valuable tools—but they don't always reach the root of the problem: the body.
Every time we talk about the specific failure or revisit the anxiety in a sports psychology setting, we might be reinforcing the same neural network that leads to fear and failure. We activate the same biological response, and the cycle continues.
The Yips: A Biological Breakdown
Consider "the yips." Everything in an athlete's muscle memory says they know how to throw, swing, or perform. But at the point of release—where control is relinquished—the nervous system jumps in. The amygdala screams, "DANGER!"
And in a nanosecond, faster than the body can react, that fear response hacks their biology. The brain overrides muscle memory. The athlete freezes.
This is not a mindset problem. It's a nervous system problem.
And the more the athlete tries to overcome it using effort, repetition, or more coaching, the more ingrained that neural pathway of failure becomes.
The Trail in the Woods: How Neural Pathways Form
Think of the brain like a forest. Every time you walk a path of fear or failure, it becomes more worn and visible. Even if you don’t want to go there, it’s the easiest, clearest route your brain knows.
What therapy can do—when it works with the nervous system, not just the mind—is help you branch off that old trail. At first, the new path is overgrown. But the more you walk it, the more defined it becomes. The old trail, meanwhile, begins to disappear.
This is neuroplasticity in action.
And it’s where trauma-informed therapy offers a path forward.
Coming Up Next: In Part 2, I’ll share how EMDR and trauma-based therapy are helping athletes and professionals create these new trails in the brain, overcome fear, and get back into their flow state.
If This Resonates With You... You’re not broken. And you’re not alone. If you’re a high performer who’s tried coaching, talk therapy, and still feels stuck in fear or anxiety, trauma-informed therapy might be your next step.