5 Questions at the Intersection of Mental Health, Faith, and Sports
The following post is a 30 minute presentation to the athletic department of a Christian university that has been transcribed. The university is prioritizing mental health conversations throughout the school year and Linsey and I provided the introduction to the topic. We asked and answered 5 questions at the intersection of mental health, faith, and sport.
How do you define mental health and why does it matter?
Is it Biblical to talk about mental health?
What is the athlete’s responsibility?
What is the responsibility of the coaches and support staff?
Does pursuing mental health help us flourish athletically?
You can listen to the presentation here or read through the transcript below.
Brian Smith: Thanks for having us this morning and for that gracious introduction. Let’s jump right in. She will refuse the label, but Linsey is an expert around this area of mental health, not just because of her education in it, but her experience and engagement with this topic, in the intersection of faith and sport really over the last decade. And so I'm gonna do a lot of just peppering Linsey with questions, but our topic today is mental health and this is gonna be a Mental Health 101 because Ross informed us, this is gonna be an ongoing conversation at Dordt this year. And so we're excited to take it off.
Breaking the stigma takes teamwork
Linsey Smith: Yeah, thank you. That is very kind of you. I, have been a staff at Athletes In Action since I graduated from the University Of Wisconsin and I came on staff because I loved people, did not know that the Lord would use my background in social work and my experiences with staff and interns and athletes around mental health to equip me for the role I am now as our staff care director for the US Athletes In Action staff with a focus on trauma and mental health. And you all know this, this is not a news flash, but we are in a mental health crisis. We were before the pandemic. We still most certainly are now. And so this is... Could be very, very depressing topic. But to me, it's actually a beautiful opportunity that we have because we know the hope of the gospel and the hope of the gospel is the restoration and the redemption of all things.
And so, as people are experiencing such broken mental health, there is an opportunity for them to come to understand the gospel. And so this morning, I wanna just set us on a trajectory of living out the hope of the gospel in the midst of our mental health brokenness. And we all, every single one of us in this room have a broken mental health. And I can say that because Jesus has not yet returned. We are all living in a broken world. So every one of us has broken mental health. And so for our time here this morning together, I really wanna kick Satan out of this place because Satan's tactic has really been to keep us in isolation, keep us in shame and hiding about our mental health's challenges and our mental health brokenness. And I wanna kick him out, take that tactic away from him and bring this conversation into the light.
Because when we bring this conversation into the light, that is where we can really connect with God on this and we can connect with each other on this, and then we can start to experience some healing. But what I don't want you to hear this morning, what you will not hear is something that many Christians have heard throughout their journey in this area. And that is if you just had enough faith or the right type of faith, your mental health challenges would go away. You're not gonna hear that from us this morning, 'cause that simply is not true. We don't see that anywhere. So many people have falsely been told that lie and that has kept them stuck in shame, stuck in their mental health brokenness. And that, we don't see that anywhere in the scripture. You guys know this probably just as good as me, that what we see in scripture is that God's strength is made perfect in our weakness.
That is our mental health weakness, right? God's strength is made perfect in our weakness. None of us are whole. We all lack, and that includes our area of mental health. So God wants to meet each one of us in our areas of need. He wants to provide for us what we need to get through the challenges of life. And for some of us, God will use modern medicine. He will use therapists, doctors. He will use the new brain science we've gotten. And for others of us, he's gonna allow us to endure some challenges and he's gonna give us what we need to endure the pain and the suffering, and to be able to glorify him in the midst of our pain. And so this morning you are not going to hear me say that you guys just need more faith or the right type of faith to get through these challenges.
And you're also not gonna hear us talk a lot about the medical side of the mental health recovery. That is a very important side, and I don't want you to think our silence about medication and therapists and psychologists. And, I don't want you to hear our silence in that to mean we don't care about that or we don't think we don't believe in that because I have celebrated with so many people when God has used medicine to bring chemical balance to their brain. So, but we are missionaries, and so we're gonna talk more from a holistic, a whole person theology side of mental health.
BS: Yep. And so the kind of the trajectory for the rest of our time is we're gonna target five specific questions around this idea of mental health. The first one is. Let's come up with what we mean when we say, mental health. So let's define it. Talk about why is it important? Is it important to talk about? Two, does the Bible have anything to say about it? Because, if it doesn't then our talk's gonna be a lot shorter. Three, what is the Athlete's responsibility when it comes to mental health? Four, what is the coaches and support staff's responsibility when it comes to mental health? And then five, answering the question, will this help us flourish athletically. Will the... Will engaging our mental health in setting us on a trajectory of growth and positive mental health help us flourish athletically. But let's start with defining terms to talk about like, why is it even important for us to talk about mental health and what is it?
What is mental health and why should we care about it?
LS: Yeah. So let's talk about something that's even more common to talk about. That doesn't have any shame or stigma around it, heart health, right? We see billboards. We know the signs of a heart attack. We talk about if we're experiencing anything that might say our heart is in jeopardy, we raise our hand quick. We call somebody, we let somebody know, right. And heart health is super important to our flourishing in life.
And in heart health, you can have something as minor as a heart arrhythmia, that's not gonna be such a big deal, or a heart disease, that's actually a really big deal, right? It's the same with our mental health, our mental health, there's a spectrum, you can be on one side and just have some mental health challenges like maybe you're in a season of great anxiety, because of circumstances in your life. Or, you actually have a mental illness. And a mental illness would be more described as genetic or circumstantial factors causing a disruption in your brain affecting your thoughts, moods, behaviors, and relationships. So when we talk about mental health here this morning, we want you guys to know that there's a spectrum, you all have broken mental health, we've already established that, you all fall somewhere on this spectrum, at some point in your life, you'll experience mental health challenges. And it could be just like heart health, it could be anywhere on that spectrum. So one of the main reasons we should care about it is because it affects every single one of us. And we all want to flourish, we want to steward our lives to the best that we can.
BS: So what I heard you say was the definition of mental health is that it's our brain's ability to function, or just to cope with the demands of everyday life right? Okay, and so, a good way to think about mental health is that it's not a positive or a negative term, it's actually just a neutral term. It's almost like a thermometer, it tells us what the temperature is. So it's not good or bad it's just, it's a measurement of where we're at mentally.
So we were talking about mental health, but I'm reading my Bible, and I'm not seeing the phrase mental health come up anywhere. And so is this something that's just like a cultural flash in the pan moment that we're giving too much credence to? Or is it grounded in scripture that we really need to care about it, because it's coming from a biblical perspective?
Is it Biblical to talk about mental health?
LS: That is the greatest question we should ask about anything we're dealing with in life. And I would just take us right to Mark 12:31, Jesus is actually quoting Deuteronomy 6, when he's asked, "What is the greatest commandment?" You're all probably familiar with this. He says, "To love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength." How are you going to love the Lord your God with all your mind if you're not aware of what's going on, in your mind, in your brain? And so it matters. It is biblical because God has actually commanded us to love him with all of our mind. The unique thing though here that I wanna point out is that it is a... It is a catchy thing. It was... I'm actually in some ways the pandemic helped us make it a trending thing.
And we needed to expose the mental health crisis we are in as a society. But this is not new. You guys, this is not... Like you don't have a monopoly on mental health challenges in this generation, in this culture, in this time and space. Actually, even though the Bible doesn't use the DSM-5 labels and stuff for defining our mental health challenges analysis. We can see it all over the scripture and so I'm just gonna give you a quick fly-by just listen to some of these characters that you may be familiar with. Let's look at Saul first, he wrestled with feelings of worthlessness, excessive guilt. He had suicidal ideation, you read about that in 1st Samuel or how about David, we see in the Psalms, he had experience, he experienced depressive moods, a lot of insomnia, tons of fatigue, right diminished ability to concentrate, you can read some of his story in 2nd Samuel or Gomer, she sought adulterous relationships to meet her needs.
She exhibited all kinds of emotional and relational instability in her life. And she had major issues with her identity. And there's Jacob, he had a long bout of depression and self-destructive behavior, you can read about those parts of history in Genesis. And then, of course, the more popular one of Job, we know Job himself experienced a persistent negative state and had shame and all kinds of fear and then Samson, he was way impulsive, easily irritable, and he actually ends up dying by suicide and you can read his story in Judges.
Just from a small glimpse, a fly-by in Scripture, there of just few of those people are... We can see that we all can give ourselves permission to struggle to admit that we have broken mental health because these people that also had broken mental health, some of them are assumed as a man after God's own heart, right. That's David and so we can give ourselves permission to admit that we too are struggling. There's this great quote, I read, it says, 'Silencing our pain behind statements of God's goodness' this is what we do. 'Silencing our pain behind statements of God's goodness sounds spiritual,' you think you're doing the right thing, 'While really it's just a churchy form of self-sufficiency.'
We all know what Jesus had to say about self-righteousness and self-sufficiency, right? So, so often what we need to do is we actually need to bring our struggles to God and to people. And like I said earlier, shame keeps us from doing that, that's the chief weapon of the enemy, wants to draw us away from relationship with one another, away from relationship with God so that we can stay in this place of isolation. And that's the perfect breeding ground for depression, anxiety, negativity, abuse, addiction, right? But we have the gospel of Jesus who's able to redeem and restore what sin has taken away from us. He can bring us back into right relationship with one another relationship with ourselves and relationship with Him.
We don't have to live with a misplaced identity and shame or trying to fake it till we make it type of thinking. Our stories don't have to end on a painful note because we have a Savior who left his glory to come into our mess to show us a way out. He wants to show us the way out, Jesus offers us a way to live in the light so on that note, let's talk about how do we live in the light when it comes to our mental health?
What is the student athlete’s responsibility regarding mental health?
BS: Yeah, I love swimming in the pool of practicality when it comes to intersection of faith and sports. So, yes, that's awesome. Yes, that's biblical. Yes, we should pursue it. But what does it actually look like practically to pursue mental health in the area of our sports? And so specifically with the athlete's responsibility, I think Linsey touched on a great starting point is there needs to be this level of honesty between us and God about where we're at, but also honesty between us and our teammates, or our coaches or a trusted person in our lives. And we can just say, this is where I'm at and not have the shame attached to it. For a lot of us out there, though, it could be a struggle to even say, "I don't even know where I'm at," like. What are some categories for me to think through when it comes to the weight that I'm feeling in my life and mental health challenges? And so I grew up Baptist, I am a list guy, so I have five things and they all start with S.
I think this will help at least get our feet out the door and give us a framework to think through. When it comes to my mental health, what are some basic categories of potential stressors in my life? So the first one is going to be obvious to all of us, it is social media or our smartphones.
Social Media/Smartphone
You've probably heard and read all the statistics around it. Stats consistently show us that an increased use in our cell phones leads to depression and feelings of unworthiness and unhappiness because we're obsessed with the dopamine hit that comes from checking social media, and even the light that our phones produce does something internally and so there's this addiction that happens, a couple stats that you probably know these already but a study found that 94% of people who reported feeling troubled, reported feeling troubled when they didn't have their phone, 94% of people reported that. 80% were jealous when somebody else used their phone, 70% expected to feel depressed, panicked, or helpless if their phone was missing or they couldn't find it. Another study found that 89% of undergraduate students experienced phantom vibrations, who here has ever felt like their phone is vibrating in their pocket...
89% of people have experienced that and so there's something with our device that is doing something to our system that is not healthy and that can be a contributing factor to mental health.
Social Life
Another one is the social aspect of our lives and so broken homes, broken relationships. Relationships that are not broken but just need maintenance and need care, relationships with teammates, classmates, coaches, but the increasing amount of digital communication that you are required to upkeep as a student athlete in today's world, I would argue all of that demand on you in the social space begins to outpace your capacity to actually handle it.
And so that's another potential stressor in your life.
School
Another one, because I just saw a schedule for today from one of you and it was busy from 7:00 AM to 1:00 PM with recruits, classes, meetings, training—a couple hour break, and then going through the rest of the night. There's demands as a student on you, course loads, plus weight of expectations plus the diminished time that you have because of your sport and social life leads to anxiety and stress so that's persistent reality for many of you.
Sport
The next thing is your sport. Studies for student athletes have shown that if you are an athlete in college, you are probably going to report more mental health issues than your counterparts in college, who are just students and don't have the sport. So the fact that you are an athlete adds to the fact that you probably are more prone to mental health challenges.
Sin
The last one, the last category to talk about is sin. And so we were driving 10 hours to get here from Michigan listening to a podcast and one of the things we listened to was this guy who had this extra marital affair, he confessed it to his wife, but he was talking about while he was going through this affair, there was just this weight on him, this heaviness that he constantly felt because he had this unconfessed sin in his life. And when he confessed it to his wife and even his community, this weight slowly began to lift and that. That's a super extreme example but it points to a reality of when there is unconfessed sin in our life that could contribute to additional mental health challenges and this additional weight that we feel as student athletes.
LS: Yeah. And I wanna say that what you did not hear Brian just say, is that your mental health challenge, your depression, your anxiety, whatever it is, like your OCD, like your eating disorder. We're not saying that that is a result of sin in your life. Job's friends had to do that, that's not right. We are not all knowing. We cannot say why something has necessarily happened to us but those categories that Brian just worked through for us give us areas to look at because we are complex people and so oftentimes many factors are contributing to our mental health challenges, our mental health brokenness, and one of them could be unconfessed sin that's producing a lot of anxiety or depression or dysregulated, whatever it is and so those are... We're not saying that you can go around to your friends and like, "Oh, you have all the sin guilt in your life 'cause you are super depressed." No, it's not your place. These are categories for you to think through for yourself as you're trying to get a gauge on how am I doing with honoring God with my mental health? How am I loving God with all of my mind?
BS: Yeah. And this again this is not an exhaustive list, but what are the major potential stressors that could contribute to mental health challenges in the life of a student athlete? These were the five that we kept coming back to. And so what it could look like for you practically going from here is just have maybe a daily or even a weekly rhythm of checking in on these categories of your life and just taking a couple minutes of silence before the Lord and say, "God what's going on in my social life right now. What's going on in my life in my relationship with my phone." And just see what He has to say and to bring up. So that's for the athletes. But for coaches and support staff, what are next steps or the responsibility for them?
What is the responsibility of coaches and support staff regarding the topic of mental health?
LS: Yeah. So we wanna speak to you guys in the room as well. And so, I have three thoughts here as like, kind of in the first step. And one is just to kind of put on a lens once in a while to which you see your athletes through. And so, we talk about this a lot as like a trauma-informed lens. So you see behaviors that are kind of odd or out of sorts with your athlete, perhaps there's something more going on. So could you as a mentors, coaches, support staff, could you once in a while put on a lens and think, "I wonder if there's something going on with their mental health here? I wonder if there's a reason beyond they're just being disrespectful and being late, or they've just gotten lazy and given up?" So let me give you an example... A story example, recent story. There was a girl named Kaylee and she was doing... Working out with her strength coach, doing her thing, great, positive, giving it her all, really crushing it. He came over to give her some corrective feedback on one of the drills she was doing and help her do it better.
Didn't do it in a mean or condescending way or anything, but whatever, however he said it or whatever she heard from him, it triggered a memory from growing up when her father always corrected her in the sport and the unhealthy relationship she had with her father in the sport. And so, that really messed with her, right? And so, the rest of that weight-lifting session, she... Like, her mood had shifted, she wasn't able to complete all of her sets, she was essentially dysregulated. She was kind of somewhere else, and thankfully, she had been doing some of these practices Brian talked about. So after the weight session was over, she was able to use some self-evaluation and realize, "Oh, that's what happened. Like, I went back to that memory, I was thinking about that time." And so, for her weight coach to be able to then maybe move towards her and say, "Is there anything you need to talk about or can I help you at all? I noticed that... " So there's just one example of... As a coach, maybe you could lean into that a little bit and just think perhaps there's more going on. Not that you need to go there every time, that's not always the reason, but just have that lens through which you can think through.
Another example... Another practical step would be to kind of just build off of what you said, Brian, and create space for your athletes to talk about it. Help them... Again, remember this conversation, especially in the Midwest, especially in athletic culture, is pretty taboo, right? You guys, you push through, you fake it till you make it, you grind it out, you know? If you're struggling, don't show it, don't show weakness, right? That's what athletes do. So we wanna counter that because that's a false narrative. That's not true. It doesn't show strength. So maybe you could do like the former Wisconsin Cross-Country coach did with her girls, she would have them turn in a mileage log every week. Well, with that mileage log, she asked them to list out what are some of the stressors that they experienced this week, what was the predominant emotion or feeling they had this week. So she was giving them space actually to bring this into the light. She was actually also helping them by some of the other questions she said of like, "What is true of you right now?" Some of the other things she added in there to create new neural pathways in their brain.
So, just create space for your athletes to practice what Brian said of reflecting, evaluating, where... What is going on in their brain, in their thought life? And then lastly, I would say as coaches and support staff, can you just equip yourselves? You don't have to be an expert in this area, but just equip yourself with some expert resources so that when you notice things in your athletes or it could be your family, your friends or anybody, you have some tools that you could pass along to them, point them in the right direction. And there too, I would say, "Don't discredit your life as an example." There is a place for you to kinda live appropriately, vulnerably before the athletes, and model to them, "What does it look like to be self-aware, what does it look like to have good self-care and to engage this part of your life?" So you can love the Lord, your God with all of your heart, mind, soul, and strength.
And so Brian, I wanna pass it back to you for our last question. Of course, all of us in this room should care about this because we're all image bearers of God, but we're here in the Athletic Department. So can you speak to, "Does this actually help their athletic performance?"
Does intentionality about our mental health help us flourish athletically?
BS: Yeah, we're here in an athletic department that values the Great Commission, but also values pursuing championships. And I think pursuing a positive mental health is an active ingredient in a championship culture. I don't think that should be the primary motivation, but I think it's a by-product of pursuing a positive emotional health. And so Linsey, through her role with staff here has talked a lot with our staff and other student athletes about this idea that through an engagement in your mental health, you can begin to create new neural pathways in your brain.
So I'm coaching my son right now, sixth grader in football and he is pretty small. The kids are not very big, but I have one kid on my team, his name is Kyle, who shows up the first day of practice, and he's the biggest dude on the team. And so as a coach, you're like, "Yes, we got our offensive lineman, this is gonna be the guy that's gonna push people around and make room for the running back to do his thing." So Kyle, the first couple of days of practice, would get on the line, and we have him block somebody else, usually his size, and he was just getting destroyed. Getting destroyed. It's like this big, strong dude, could be the strongest guy out there, was getting pushed around by even the littlest kid, like, even my son is pushing Kyle around. And one of our coaches talked to Kyle after practice, and Kyle had mentioned to the coach that at school, all the kids tell him he's not strong. So this is a soundtrack Kyle is playing in his head, "I'm not strong, I'm not strong, I'm not strong." Then when he gets on the football field, what's he telling himself?
"I'm not strong, I'm not strong," but he, physically, should be the strongest person out there. So we just learned this yesterday, actually, about Kyle. So next week, what we're gonna do before practice, is we're gonna sit down Kyle, we're gonna have him look us in the eye and say, "My name is Kyle, and I'm really strong," like five times, and before every single practice we're gonna do that. And I'm gonna line him up against people that he can push around a little bit, so that he also has an experience connected with this new truth that he needs to believe. So he's gonna say, "I'm Kyle, I'm strong," and then he's gonna start pushing kids over and connect that truth to an experience that back it up. I don't know if that's the Jesus thing to do or not, but we're trying to create new neural pathways. This kid who is strong has believed this lie his entire life. He needs to start believing the truth, and not just to help him in sports, but to help him in life, right? That there's other voices besides the punk kids at school that he needs to listen to. There's other voices that will get him through that he needs to listen to.
LS: And what I love about this is that you guys, brain science is caught up with Scripture. Scripture already taught this, we saw this... And we see this in the 2nd Corinthians, where it talks about taking your thoughts captive and making them obedient to Christ, right? That's one of the best practices in secular therapy right now is cognitive behavioral therapy. That's what therapists are doing, they're literally practicing Biblical principles to heal brains. So, it's cool.
BS: Yeah. So, this next part is definitely above my pay grade, but I'm just beginning to learn about it, and super excited. So, your brain, this is essentially how it functions. You have a frontal cortex, which is controlling the executive functions of everything. It's your logic, your rational thinking. It is basically the knowledge center of your brain controlling your ability to solve complex cognitive issues. The backside of your brain is made up of the limbic system in the brain stem, which is more like your physical control and your emotional reaction. When you are in a dysregulated state, which I would argue if you're struggling with mental health challenges, your brain is probably going to interpret what's going on internally as a threat and could push your brain towards dysregulation. What your brain does is it starts sending all the blood away from the frontal cortex, where you should be executive functioning complex issues, and it sends it to the back because of your brain, interpreting that you are in danger.
If you have increased stress and anxiety and mental health challenges, your brain is sending messages to the rest of your body saying danger, danger, danger, protect yourself. And so, you begin to lose all rational and logical thinking and give way to an emotional response. And so, I just want you to think for a second athletically, and this may not be applicable to runners as much, because you can just kinda zone out and go. But if you're playing a ball sport, football, basketball, volleyball, soccer, which requires complex cognitive thinking on the spot, really quick decisions. If you're operating under stress and anxiety and there's things in your life that are mental health challenges, which is taking away your ability to actually think rationally, can you begin to see how mental health challenges put a cap on your athletic performance?
LS: This is your brain. This is your brain stem. This is your frontal cortex. And so when your body goes into a fear space where there's a threat, you're feeling like there's something wrong, you say you flip your lid, you no longer can engage your frontal cortex. You're only thinking with that survival part of your brain, right? So when people say you flipped your lid, like you went crazy, you went... You reacted whatever, you flipped your lid. You could not use the frontal cortex any longer effectively, and now you're just operating using that fear brain.
BS: Yeah. And we're talking sports right now, but hopefully you can see the... Draw the line over to life too. If you are struggling with mental health issues and you have problems accessing the rational logical part of your brain, we need community around us. This is why there needs to be openness. And the shame around it needs to be destigmatized. We need the logical and rational voices speaking into us when we are in irrational states.
So the other point about this, which again, way above my pay grade, but when we operate out of the, kind of the back side of our brain, this fear side of our brain, what our body does is it releases the hormone cortisol which is a stress hormone. It's protection, it's plays things safe, be careful. Instead of what's normally the hormone that’s released through our body when faced with a challenge or opportunity, testosterone and adrenaline. And if you're playing sports, you're wanting testosterone and adrenaline going at full force through your body, not cortisol.
So, again, operating under stress and anxiety and mental health challenges puts a cap on our athletic potential, because at the end of the day, we're competing and operating out of fear instead of the freedom that God wants us to. Yes, in sport, but more importantly in life.
Keep the conversation going
LS: So it matters. It matters for our athletic potential in glorifying God through the talents and gifts He has given us in the athletic context, but it matters for all of life. So this feels like maybe a lot to some of you. So kinda where do we go from here? So, I just want to give you guys one next step. And I know you guys are gonna lean into this all year as an athletic department, but one next step is just keep the conversation going, right? We started it today, just keep it going, keep talking about it, bring it into the light. And it's not just important because it's honoring to God, we talked about the greatest commandment. It's not just important because it's going to help you in your athletic endeavors. It's important, you guys, because this is a life and death issue, right? There are people all over the world that are choosing despair and are choosing death over thriving, because they are so helpless and they are so isolated.
And they think they're the only ones, right? Like the enemy is trying to tell them, you're the only one struggling with this. So you guys, you can... Your easy next step is just to keep the conversation going between you and God and between you and the safe people around you. We need, like you said Brian, we need other people speaking into our lives because we all are broken. We all have blind spots. We all don't see a perfect version of what is real, right? We need one another. And so, I'm grateful that on this campus, in this athletic department, in this small spot on the globe right now, you guys are trying to lean in to bringing the light of Jesus into this really dark place, that's... You know, that's wreaking havoc on our societies and specifically, I would say in our athletic context.
So, one other practical next step would be if you're hearing Brian and I speak and you're like I need to talk, I need to keep this conversation going, you can contact either of us. You can come down here right after this. You can get our email addresses, our phone numbers. We are so accessible. We are... This is our full-time gig is spreading the hope of Jesus with people through this area of faith and sport. And so, we are so available to you now, or even digitally after this through a phone call or a video chat. So, I think that's it.
BS: Yeah, that is, thank you, Ross and everybody for your time. We love what you guys are doing here and completely support it. Like Linsey said, if there's anything that we can do to help come get our contact information. We are in your corner and we're cheering for you.
If you are a coach or an athletic director and believe this presentation could be beneficial to your team or athletic department, please feel free to pass it along to your people—or reach out to talk about the possibility of us coming to you.
