WHY THOUGHTS REALLY MATTER!

WHY THOUGHTS REALLY MATTER
IN SPORTS, ACADEMICS AND LIFE

Athletes are always advised to manage the mental aspects of their game; their mental approach to their game. Unfortunately, they are rarely taught specific ways to do it. If a negative thought pops up, they are told to be "mentally tough" and get rid of it immediately---just put it out of your mind. Only “getting rid of it,” without methods, usually means trying to avoid or suppress the thought; waiting, wishing and hoping it’s gone when a similar game-time situation arises. At the same time, coaches are under a lot of pressure to figure out what is going wrong.

In this article, I intend to explain what happens. I will take the seemingly complex topic of human psychology in sport and make it easier to understand. I will introduce methods that an athlete can actually practice to deal with producing consistent top performances under the pressure of game time "between the white lines."

“Did you know that every thought you have sends electrical signals throughout your brain? Thoughts have significant influence on every cell in your body…Every cell in your body is affected by every thought you have,” says Daniel Amen, M.D. in his book, “Change Your Brain—Change Your Life.” We are learning from Dr. Amen and other brain researchers that suppressed thoughts aren't just in your brain, they are energy that goes into the body, and when the thoughts are stressful and negative, it messes up athletic performance. Remember, all of our physical body movements are controlled by our brain. Consider the idea that your thoughts can either work for you; or work against you, especially if they go unnoticed.

Why do athletes and/or coaches keep getting performances they don’t want?

It is also unfortunate that people are not often taught about the value of “thought-watching practice” as a key way to start managing the mental part of the game. It is important to know that your mind can only hold one thought at a time (positive or negative) and we act on what we think about!

In regard to the question above, it is my observation that an individual players’ or several team members’ or a coaches' main mental focus stays on what they don’t want; working their hardest to avoid reoccurrences of negative game-changing events. Often, without using “thought-watching practice,” they don’t notice that this predominant mental focus (PMF) on what they don’t want continues to produce negative results. Then the I-don’t-want-this-to-happen-again thoughts go from the mind into the body and can really mess up the body; such as heart rate, breathing, muscle function and physical movement, visual acuity, mental clarity and decisiveness, decreasing blood flow to the thinking part of the brain, and more.

The critical “other-side-of-the-coin” is to MAKE THE MENTAL-FOCUS SHIFT to "seeing" and constantly stating THE PERFORMANCE YOU DO WANT! This is about deliberately directing your thoughts to what you do want your performance to be. Remember that you always have the ability to choose thoughts that boost your performance. When athletes fully understand this key idea, they say, “Oh, I’ve been working so hard to not let this poor performance happen again that I have had my mind on the wrong thing.”

Did you know that, when people talk about the "power of the mind" most think that thinking is their only mental ability? It is critical to know that you have other mental "powers" that you can use besides thinking. With "thought-noticing practice," we are talking about using your mental ability of attention; deliberately directing your mental focus onto what you choose to notice.

Athletes ask me, “How do I get started actually managing the mental aspect?”

I respond, “The starting place is to practice noticing your thoughts; deliberately directing your focus onto your thinking about your current performance in each area of your game---do it, though, without judgment, self-criticism or evaluation." This is using your mental ability of attention. I call this process "self-honest self-observation;" telling yourself the truth about what you are noticing.

You are NOT trying to control against or suppress troubling thoughts. You ARE working to become aware of your present-moment thoughts because you can’t clearly know what you want to do to correct troubling performances until you notice what you are habitually thinking and believing about your performance.

Since a key aspect of this practice is having the courage to self-discover, as you begin to practice thought watching, use the preface, “When I tell myself the truth about this part of my game or that part of my game…this is how I am presently thinking.” As you begin to “catch” your thoughts you then create the point of power to decide whether a certain thought will work for your desired performance goal or against it. You can literally ask yourself questions like the following:
• “Which thoughts have clout in my mind?”
• “Will this thought work for me or against me?”
• “Is this thought focused on what I don’t want or on what I do want in my performance?”

Did you know that asking a question is a way to instantly change mental focus? Your mind will immediately go to work on answering the questions you ask yourself. So you want to ask good questions (like those noted above), not questions like “Why can’t I ever, how come I never, when will we ever, what's wrong with me? etc.”

Players ask, “How do I do it—How do I make the mental shift you are talking about?”

Following are just a few examples of shifting mental focus from the I-don’t-want-this-to-happen-again thoughts changed to this-is-how-I-CHOOSE-to-play thinking:

I keep hitting right at people--change mental focus to--I’m hitting into the gapsr
I don’t want to take a called third strike-----I see the ball clearly with two strikesr
I can’t have any more throwing errors----I throw the ball exactly where I want tor
I don’t want to give up any lead-off walks----I’m staying ahead in the count each time I pitchr
I have to get out of this slump----“kick” the word slump out of your vocabulary and think-- I’m focusing on my true hitting ability
The ball looks so small lately----I see a ball as big as a softball; I clearly see the spin and movement of the ball with each pitchr
I keep getting jammed at the plate----I fully extend my arms and meet the ball just in front of the plate.

You can begin practicing shifting your own thoughts to the performance you want right now. You can practice changing your mental focus for any of your own troubling thoughts you “catch” yourself having. Once more, it is important that you don’t put yourself down for what you notice—the starting place is to just notice, which is always in your power to do. Remember, you can’t change what you don’t “see.”

One last time—our brains run our bodies so you want to constantly put the "do-want" performances in your brain. And if you get knocked off this track, remember you can diligently practice coming back to the "do-want-performance" focus, even if you have to do it 10, 20, 50 or even a 100 times a day. When you make up your own mind that it is important to develop an effective mental-game approach, your task with this method is to "master the art of thought noticing."

As former Olympic champion, Lanny Bassham, says in his book, With Winning in Mind:
...the only thing that separates the winners from the others is the way they think.
Winners are convinced they will finish first. ... About another Olympic champion,
he writes that the champion said, Everyone is after my medal, but they cannot
take it from me! I asked him why he was so certain he would win, Darrell's
answer was, I am more committed to mental training than any of my competitors!

Champions developing a mental-game management system is not a new idea; it is just way under-practiced, in part, because players don't have specific methods to practice.

Coaches and athletes are very clear about the value of practicing physical skills in sports and they are willing to devote hours and hours of time refining physical skills. I am teaching the value of diligently practicing “thought-noticing” and thinking and behavior change until it is an automatic skill that you can depend upon.