My Mental Game – Response to your Questions
Hello, my name is Diane and I enjoy kick boxing.
I love teaching it and competing. I love training and staying in shape. I enjoy the relationships I have at the club with the students and the parents. I eat healthy and I exercise healthy. I am always at competition level when it comes time to fight, my heart & lungs are strong and my power is great. My skills are there and I practice them often, in hopes that when I compete I will react more naturally instead of wasting time trying to think about what I should do. My Physical game is good, but my mental game is not, and I have tried several self talk methods that I use with the students, but for some reason I have a hard time performing because I’m nervous, or I seem to be in a state, when I compete, like it’s not as important as it really is. I feel like I’m in a day dream and I hate it! I am disappointed that I couldn’t effectively execute the skills I have to overcome my opponent the way I need to.
Need some guidence if you have some suggestions I would really appreciate them.:)
Hi Diane
Thanks for your email.
There are a couple of things that you may want to inquire into.
What do you want the most:
1) to be a performer or 2) to be the good teacher and inspire your students.
First, follow whatever it is that you love to do the most as love is the best teacher.
There are four parts to peak performance.
Thinking
You must have very little thinking going on in your brain and what you do have must be positive and relaxed yet still intense and watchful. When you think too much, focus on your breath and do everything from you breath. Whatever action you do, master your breath in every kick, punch and movement. Learning to master your breath, you then with master yourself and then you will master your situation.
Never trust what you’re thinking – always listen to what you feel.
Thinking is very limited and only useful in technical things.
When you compete your will to win must be second to the production of the quality kicks, punches, and blocks you perform. Producing quality in the moment, your mind must be free of the past. Thinking breeds fear, and fear is always the future of what might happen. Be it two minutes from now or ten fights from now, fear is always the future. This means you are in the cycle of doubt.
What does a quality punch look like? feel like? breathe like?
Compete from there and you compete from the cycle of inspiration which involves learning from everything you do. If you look at your life, you will see the same problem in relationship with someone you can’t get close to and you resist them.
As you resist your own growth limited by your fear in competition so you limit your life. The two are one. Change in one area causes the other to follow.
Coachbri