To improve athletic performance, it is important to be aware of what goes through your mind in any given moment. Do something different tomorrow when you wake up. Take note that it take a few moments for your thinking to kick in. In this brief period of time you are in a subconscious state and soon will shift into wakeful consciousness. As this happens, observe the thoughts entering your mind, and how you feel as a result. Some people feel anxious due to thoughts of the days’ activities and obligations that lie ahead. Other people feel lethargic and overwhelmed, and want to stay in bed despite having slept for eight hours. Yet others feel energized and excited to get on with their day. Why such a difference among people?
Your mental habits determine your experience.
As human beings, we operate habitually, and our habits determine how we feel and act. Our habits are formed through repetition over time, and get memorized in our subconscious. This means we often operate automatically without much awareness of what’s happening subconsciously. We may know how we tend to act and feel on a daily basis, but there is much more beneath the surface that we generally don’t pay attention to.
You can change your experience of life. If you find that how you feel in the morning is not ideal, then it’s time to explore your habits of thought. Thinking precedes feeling and action. When you have a thought, your mind goes through a translation process and attaches meaning to the thought, which subsequently creates a feeling, and then a reaction or action. All of this happens in a split second, without you knowing it’s going on. Usually all you know is how you feel, but you have no idea why. And when it comes to athletic performance, it’s important to understand your automatic reactions.
There are a few ways you can find out what your habitual thought patterns are. All of these involve observing your thoughts from a distance, without identifying with them, as though they are not a part of you. One way is to observe your thoughts upon waking. As you awaken, notice when you start to think. As that happens, identify the thoughts that are coming in and what messages they carry. A second method for doing this is meditation, which involves focusing your mind on a single point of attention, which creates distance between you and your thoughts, allowing you to ‘see’ them more objectively. A third method is through hypnosis, which is a similar state to meditation.
Once you know your thoughts, then what?
Once you know what your thoughts are, it’s time to decide which ones support your best interest and which you can do without. This is where subconscious reprogramming comes in. When you identify a thought that is not serving you, choose a new thought to replace it. For example, if you find the thought ‘I am not strong enough for this’ frequently enters your mind, you can replace it with ‘I have all the strength I need for this’.
When is the best time to replace your thoughts?
In the morning during the moments before thinking arrives, your mind is in a subconscious state. The same is true when you are in meditation or hypnosis. These are opportune times to replace your thoughts because your thought patterns are stored on the subconscious level, which means you must be in a subconscious state to replace them.
How does this help improve athletic performance?
There are times when athletes experience mental obstacles that impact their performance. These show up in negative ways such as ruts, self-doubt, anxiety, low confidence, lack of motivation, etc. These negative states can be routed back to disempowering thought patterns. Once an athlete identifies the thoughts that lead to these feelings, he/she can change the thoughts to ones that are empowering. This will lead to improvements in athletic performance.
Decide and do!
Start tomorrow morning and begin to observe your thoughts. Take your time with this. With practice, you will become more in tune with your inner landscape. You may find it helpful to write down your observations. Seeing your thoughts on paper helps you decide which ones you want to replace with more helpful thoughts. And remember, habits take time to change! However with repetition the new thoughts get stored in your subconscious, and you will notice the effects on your sport and your life more and more. With practice you will be able to identify your thoughts throughout the day. From there you can move forward and determine what needs to change in your thinking to improve your athletic performance. Have fun with this. Your inner world is a fascinating place.
Want to make a positive change? There’s no better time than NOW!
Lynne,
Your Mindset Mental Coach
