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This phenomenon was foreign to me as a player who as a kid was always a first line offensive type of guy and never had to question my own ability or place on the team. I didn't know what confidence was as I was never in a position up through all minor hockey and highschool to deal with it - I was always top six guy and I felt I belonged there and everything was "normal" all the time. Fast forward 20 years and I'd been away from the game for 10 years after starting a career and family, and as I got back into it I was just playing beer league with variety of skill levels and quickly enough everything was normal again. But then as I started playing again more regularly, I got invited to some more competitive skates, and at one point I'm in a room with a bunch of guys, some ex-pro players, most of whom played at least junior or senior level hockey whereas I pretty much stopped playing competitive after highschool. Now the tables are turned - I'm out on the ice and although we're all guys in our 40s at this point, I'm feeling like my credentials are sub standard vs the majority of these guys, especially the ones that played pro, and I'm doubting myself. For a couple of games, I'm pretty hopeless. Rushing passes, missing easy passes, not feeling part of the flow. Then I have a light bulb moment - we were all pretty much the same players in highschool, I just went a different path and didn't keep at it like most of these guys did, but we're all in our 40s now and old-farts from a competitive hockey POV, and I told myself I belonged on the same ice and to play the way I would if it was just a bunch of my highschool buddies. Immediately everything changed. I relaxed and had fun and made nice plays and scored some nice goals and joked around on the bench instead of worrying if I belonged. So that was my first experience with what a loss of confidence does to a player and it was a real eye opener. Had I not been on the ice with that group at that point in my 40's I never would have understood it, and I had been a decent player and played hockey for 30+ years up to that point. It's a powerful thing.