In these tough times, it is important to ensure you are looking after yourself both physically and psychologically. Gold Coast 2018 Rugby Sevens Bronze medal winner Heather Fisher has given some of her top advice for staying psychologically strong during these unique times. 

Despite what we are going through right now, we’re still performing. You’re still trying to find new ways of doing stuff and it's probably causing us or forcing us to be more creative with our thoughts, but the other thing is, being happy. 

I’m fortunate that I’ve got my own gym around me and can take myself off to that space where I feel like I can just let go of a lot of things that are in my head. But I was thinking about what does it take for you to perform at your best? 

I perform at my best when I’m happy, when I feel content within myself, when I know where I’m going and I’ve got a purpose, and for me, happiness is a massive thing because if I’m happy, right or wrong, I play how I feel. So if I feel happy in myself and I’m in a steady place then I actually go and play with freedom, so for everyone out whether you’re in a small business, large business, whether you’re in a team sport or you’re in an individual sport, you’ve got to find your happy place right now. 

It’s a conversation that probably the whole world is talking about, but this version of isolation and social distancing is a case of making it work for you. We’ve all got our own versions of making it work, and it will be different for everyone, but making sure within your system that you're making it work, you find that you’re still smiling within. Because there is a lot of negativity being fed into us daily on the news, on TV, on the radio, but you’ve got to find a way of switching off.   

The second bit of advice is, when all this goes away, and it will, the world will carry on. I can’t take away what’s happening because it is tragic, we’re losing lives and it can’t be taken lightly. But the world is still going to continue, so when the world continues and when people decide to get back on it, we’ve got to be ready to go straight away.

So how do you put your best foot forward now to make sure that when you get going, when that time comes upon us when we are told ‘right, get out of your houses, carry on with life’, how are you in the best position to do what you were doing best to carry on and make sure you haven’t gone backwards? What have you learnt, what new skills have you created for yourself, what new ways of doing things have you developed so now you’re actually in a better position than you were before. 

Those two tips for me are massive in terms of performance mindsets, whether you’re in sport, business or just in life. It doesn’t matter, young or old, we’ve all got a brain and it’s all going to be mentally stimulated at the moment by negativity, so can we switched that around, find a happy place and  keep an eye on the bigger picture, because the bigger picture will be there I promise.