Originally published Oct 1995
Catherine Martin, Psychologist, South Australian Sports Institute
The list below outlines a range of situations that you might regularly face in your training and competing. As you read through the list, think about whether each situation is related to skill, fitness or mental approach.
- learning a new skill
- making a skill automatic
- going to the gym/training when you don't feel like it
- pushing through the tough bits in training
- tackling a new weight confidently
- missing a weight
- "putting in" during a tough training session
- concentrating after a difficult day at work
- keeping up the effort through the middle part of a race/ergo/ aerobics session when you are tiring or hurting
- persevering when you're not getting the weights or seeing the improvement in skin folds or fitness tests
- coming back after injury
- staying motivated and positive when injured
- enjoying workouts
As you read through this list, you may have thought to yourself that most of these situations are not only related to skill, fitness or mental approach but to a combination of these. For example, when you learn a new skill you are also using your powers of concentration and perhaps perseverance.
Your attitude and frame of mind can either help or hinder your progress regardless of whether you are fine tuning your technique, lifting a new weight or on an endurance ride.
So ask yourself this question, "Does my mind give me positive messages which encourages me onwards or do I put myself down and give up on myself?"
Even though you may not be aware of it, your attitude and frame of mind before and during training will affect how well you train.
Many people believe that their attitude, their levels of self confidence and their powers of concentration are things that cannot be changed.
However, you can learn to improve your confidence, concentration and attitude so that they help you to improve rather than hinder your progress.
Train your mind like you train your body!
By training your mind regularly with some practical techniques you can maximise your progress and ensure that when you get to that all important competition or race, you perform well and don't waste all that hard work and effort.
Training your mind is very similar to training your body. For example, after being shown the correct technique for squats, you wouldn't expect to do it perfectly every single time and to never have to think about it again. You would have to continually remind yourself of the important technical aspects until it was automatic. You may even find that you have to be reminded of it again by your coach or instructor.
Your new mental techniques may help you to make improvements quite quickly but they also need to be practised regularly over time so that they automatically become part of your thinking and acting and so that they hold together in pressure situations.
It is very easy to be positive when things are going well but when the going gets tough does your mind get going in the opposite direction that you want it to or is it focused on the task in a positive, disciplined way?
So over the next few weeks be more aware of your attitude and situations where your mind either helps or hinders you. Once you are aware of these situations you can then begin to change them.
