Mental Training for Peak Performers
Everyone has to perform at some point in their lives and performance requires preparation! Whether you’re an athlete training for a marathon, weekend warrior working out stress, CEO prepping for your next big pitch, or parent prepping the weekend activities, everyone prepares. Regardless of who you are, preparation means taking some type of action, usually physical, to get ready for the upcoming stressful event: getting in extra miles, hitting the gym harder, practicing your speech, or meal/party prepping.
But what about prepping your mind? If you’re overworked, stressed, or in the worst case, burnt out, how do you summon the energy to prepare for that big event?! The easy answer, you don’t! At least not well. When the human mind is overworked and burnt out, preparation falls by the wayside and performance suffers. While the importance of mental preparation and training may by theoretically understood, most individuals fail to follow-through and instead only focus on the physical. When I talk about this with my clients, they usually tell me they either (A) don’t have time or (B) don’t know how to mentally prepare.
Let’s handle (A) first with an example. Imagine you have a task to complete, such as preparing for a big presentation to give to your boss, and it usually takes 60 minutes to prep. But, if you’re super stressed and overwhelmed (and possibly exhausted), the task will now take you 90 minutes. That extra 30 minutes typically is caused by mental fatigue (aka no brainpower), which sets you up perfectly for procrastination and distraction. What if I told you that you could have avoided that extra 30 minutes of frustration by taking 5-10 minutes out of your prep time to reset your mental batteries? Would you be interested? Is 70 minutes shorter than 90? Of course! The key is recognizing that not taking the time to mentally prepare actually interferes with your performance AND adds time to your task. So in fact, you don’t have the time to not mentally prepare!
Now that we’ve covered that you do have the time in your hectic life to mentally prepare, we come to (B): how?! I like to use two exercises (any more than two can feel overwhelming!): one that helps you mentally activate and one that helps you relax. I recently put this plan in place for a group of ten runners that are preparing to run 360 miles from Santa Monica, CA to Las Vegas, NV in 48 hours. They are practicing these exercises while they train and prepare so that when race day comes, they’ve built up mental muscle memory and can use them on command! Here’s what do to.
1) Challenge Mindset Visualization: pick a snapshot in time when you pushed yourself beyond what you thought was possible. That big play in the 4th quarter of your high school football game, the last half mile when you set your personal record in a 5K, crushing a presentation in front of your boss, or even prepping that last minute family party. The goal is to make that snapshot as vivid in your mind as possible by engaging all 5 senses. You want to see it, hear it, touch it, taste it, and smell it! What time of day was it? What were you wearing? What does the air smell like? Can you hear the crowd? Is your mouth dry or can you taste the sweat? What does your skin feel like? Did you get the chills? The more vivid this picture, the stronger the visualization, the more your mind is prepped for the challenge that awaits, the less threatened and stressed you feel! Do this exercise daily for 5-10 minutes a day.
2) Progressive Muscle Relaxation: this is an oldie but goodie! The key in this exercise is to train your brain to recognize the difference between tension and relaxation, as you can’t be tense and relaxed at the same time. Start by closing your eyes and taking 5 deep breaths. Put some relaxing background music on if you‘d like. Then you will tense a muscle group for 5-10 seconds. Holding as tight as you can. After 5-10 seconds, exhale and relax. Let go of all the tension and begin to recognize how different it feels to be relaxed and not tense. Take deep, slow breaths for another 5-10 seconds. Rinse and repeat! For example, start by curling your toes under your feet. After you’ve tensed the muscles for 5-10 seconds, relax and breathe for 5-10 seconds. Then move to your calves, then hamstrings, core, etc. All the way up to your face. Practice this at least once a day for 10-15 minutes.
That’s it! In 15-20 minutes a day, you can mentally prepare for that peak performance situation on the horizon. It’s much easier to prepare than it is to panic. So don’t wait, start today!
-Dr. Doug