Thursday, July 16, 2009

Mental Might


So many times throughout the course of our Hi-5 FitCamp, there are people who drop off or don't get the results they are looking for. There are a variety of reasons for this, but one of the biggest is mental fatigue.

With mental fatigue we start to talk ourselves down from working hard. We use "self-talk" in a negative way. We say things like, "Well I wasn't able to do pull ups before, so its not that big of a deal" or "there is no way I can keep going!"

Well the truth is you can use self talk to get yourself through those tough times. Those times when it would be easy to slow up on intervals, the times when its easy to cheat on repetitions because you are the only one counting, or those times it would be easy to stop doing pull ups because they are too hard.

Here are a couple of things you can do to fight back and that voice who says YOU CAN"T DO THIS.
  1. Use positive reinforcement with key words to motivate yourself. Use firm, positive words that describe how you want to feel, look or be. Use words like STRENGTH, POWER, or SLIM to push yourself through those tough times.
  2. You can use negative reinforcement as well. Use words that describe what you do not want to be, what you are working to get away from.
  3. Talk yourself through the work by challenging the "old" you. The you that used to be weaker, bigger and not nearly as able. For example, if you are doing a plank, the old you used to only be able to do 2:00 but the new you is going to DEMOLISH THE OLD YOU by doing a 2:30 plank. Compete with yourself and beat the OLD YOU!!
These are just a few things that will help to really get you motivated to really push harder, faster and ask for a bigger challenge. You can take the pain, you can handle the work and you're better than the old you. Now you have to step up and walk the walk!!

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