Athletes!
Coach Andrew here from Players Fitness and Performance. I am so excited to share with you this secret formula, if you will, to getting in the zone. We talked for a little bit about the three questions you've got to ask yourself when you're in your head to get out of your own head but now I want to share with you this four pillar formula to get out of your head and into the zone more often.
You're looking at this graph right here (if you're watching the video) and you see these four things.
- Visualize success
- Get it out, literally!
- Positive input, positive thoughts
- Self-talk Prep
These are the four things that surround “the zone”.
Getting into the zone requires you to do these four things.
Today I want to talk with you specifically about pillar number one, which is visualizing success.
If you want to be in the zone more often and out of your head, one of the ways you can proactively do that is by visualizing what you want, every single day.
Visualizing success.
What does that mean? Well, I'm going to give you a quick little research study done by a basketball coach that explains this perfectly. A basketball coach took five players and he had them shoot 100 free throws every day after practice for 12 weeks.
He took a second group of five and had them ONLY visualize making 100 free throws every day after practice. They just THOUGHT about what their form would be like, how they would flick their fingers, how the ball would go through the net. (The more vividly they visualized, the better they got.) They did that for 12 weeks.
Then the third group did both. They shot 50 and they visualized 50. Can you guess what happened?
The first group, the one that shot the 100 free throws, they improved by 10%. They went from making 70% of their shots to 80%. The second group, who just visualized, went from making 70 to 77, which doesn't sound like a big increase but they didn't touch a basketball.
This is the lazy man's dream! If I can get better at something just by thinking about it?
The reality is that visualizing is the opposite of lazy. It actually takes work.
It takes you calming down, pausing your day, not doing a bunch of random stuff and being distracted but going off in a quiet place without your cellphone, closing your eyes for five, 10 minutes, and just visualizing the exact results that you want.
Close your eyes and just THINK about it. Run through the plays, run through your form, run through the technique, run through how pumped up and excited you're going to be after you are successful. I'm talking about visualizing the entire movie. Play the movie out in your mind every single day. That's what group number two did.
Group number three, they took it a step further. They went up by 15%. Group one, just shot, improved by 10. Group two, just visualized, and improved by seven. Group three did both. They improved by 15%.
My question for you, athlete, is are you taking time to visualize success? Or are you spending more time thinking about what you don't want to happen? Are you thinking about the fears? Are you thinking about the doubts? Most athletes get this wrong.
If you want to take your game to the next level and be the Taylor Cummings of your sport, be the Michael Phelps of your sport, be the Kobe Bryant or the Michael Jordan of your sport, you must do what they do. They are not different than you or I. All they do differently is they visualize what they want to happen and they do it day after day after day.
“Michael Phelps, Taylor Cummings, Derek Jeter, Lebron, Kobe, Federer...they are NO DIFFERENT from you or I. They simply DO things to get out of their head and into the zone more consistently than you or I.”
You might do it today and then you might forget tomorrow. How do you set yourself up for continued visualization success?
I recommend putting some reminders in your phone. I recommend getting some accountability via a coach, maybe a mindset coach, maybe you hire me to help you visualize and hold yourself accountable. Maybe you tell your parents and coaches.
You need to give yourself reminders. You need to hold yourself accountable. You need to give yourself a REWARD for doing it. If you do those three things you're going to be more successful through visualization. That's just step one.
Next video we're going to talk about the second pillar, which is getting it out of your head, LITERALLY! If you want to get out of your own head, you've got to get out of your own head.
For today, just focus on visualizing. I'm going to keep saying it, guys.
Close your eyes right now after this video and visualize yourself being massively successful in the field just like so many of the other collegiate and high level athletes I'm working with right now. They're doing this every day. They're visualizing success and they are being more successful because of it. Thank you so much for watching (or reading), guys. We'll see you on the next video.
Dedicated to your athlete’s success,
Coach Andrew Simpson
