Mind games – life on the road
It all seems pretty glamorous, jet setting around the world to perform or compete in your chosen sport, living in foreign countries, being the envy of all. But is it really? This week I’m going to take a look into the mental stresses put on athletes, the often unseen aspects of sport and the toll it can take on mindset, health, fitness, and performance, and how you can overcome it.
Being a professional athlete is a unique lifestyle opportunity that only a select few people will ever experience, or want to experience for that matter. I know of many amateur athletes that just couldn’t cope with things like it when their passion became their job, and I don’t blame them. Because this is the hidden side of professional sports away from the glamour, it is the reality.
Now don’t get me wrong, riding professionally was hands down the best job in the world, I absolutely loved it and would not change a thing (except maybe for a few injuries), but it did come with its challenges. It can be very easy for negative thought patterns to manifest and take root; once there, like any weed if given the chance they grow and can begin to take over. This can happen for a multitude of reasons, such as, missing home/family/pets, not having the usual luxuries because you are in a non western country, language challenges, food choice or illness to name a few and every experience is different for every person. But at the end of the day none of the causes really matter because they all have the same effect internally on the body and mind, which is where you have more power than you know.
Every day of your life you make choices about your experiences. For example, when something happens you subconsciously ask is this a bad thing or a good thing? That is a choice that you have control over, you can make that decision and perceive it how you wish. The problem is that most people don’t realise their level of control they have on their own mind and they allow their past experiences to dictate how the subconscious perceives events, rather than actively participating in these decisions of perception. Have I lost you yet?
Ok let me bring this back down a little. I’m currently living in China, China is an interesting place, it is very developed in that it has huge modern cities, but is also lacking many attributes that I am used to in Australia like quality control with building and construction, good plumbing and drainage, drinkable tap water, reliable internet etc etc…. the list goes on. Now I could get all angry and pissed off about living here and say things like, this place sucks, nothing works here or f*** China. But the truth is that I have been given a fantastic opportunity that most people can only dream of and I am very fortunate to be living here. Yes, there are a few aspects that aren’t as good as home, but hey at the end of the day it only really matters if you let it matter. If you take the negative in your strides and focus on the positive then guess what? Your experience will be positive. Focus on the negative and the negativity will destroy your experience.
Sounds pretty simple hey? And that’s because it is, kind of. You see you can’t be negative and positive at the same time, the mind does not work like that, so by filling it with positive thoughts or finding the positives in bad situations you are able to leave little or no room for negativity to manifest in your thought process. The problem is that it can be hard to focus on the positives if you have trained your brain to focus on the negatives and this is the trap that many people, athletes included, fall into.
This is where practice comes into it, I believe it was Milton Erickson, who was one of the forefather of clinical hypnosis, that said his patients that were the best at being hypnotised were the ones that had done it the most. Just like every other skill, developing a particular mindset becomes better with practice. By consciously looking for the positive aspects in every situation as well as performing visualisation techniques and positive affirmations, that conscious focus on positive aspects moves to become subconscious and eventually completely automatic. This is one of the main differences between positive and negative minded people.
These techniques are very powerful and enable people to rise above adversity and take control of their lives. They are no longer the victim of their circumstances but rather the master of their destiny. Sounds pretty cliché but it’s true. This and many other techniques can be used to improve your life, performance and experiences. If you would like to know more about this and understand how to create the mindset of the champion and progress your own life then click this link and contact me today.
Train hard and stay safe.
Your strength coach,
Cam
