Visualization can be the mental fitness practice you need to help elevate your level of performance. In this blog, you’ll be introduced to seven tips to help you become a master of visualizing high performances.
1) Start off slow:
Much like starting a new skill or play at half speed, using visualization to practice the mechanics can add quality to your mental practice. The reason why is because visualization is seen as a functionally equivalent response in the brain ( Lang, 1977;1979; Whetstone,1995). This means that every neurological pathway used for actually doing the skill (such as shooting a free throw) are being used in visualization, minus the motor cortex. Several high level athletes have touted the benefits of visualization such as Aaron Rodgers, Apolo Ohono and Michael Phelps.
2) Get Specific:
What do you want to do? By setting objective goals to your visualization practice you can quickly master a lot of skills. I tell athletes the closer they get to their big competition that they should start wearing their uniform or practicing visualization in a similar environment, their brain will start making critical connections. If you’re having nerves going into a big game, practicing breathwork and visualization can be a powerful technique to overcome pre-performance anxiety.
3) Remain in control:
When practicing imagery, it’s paramount that you remain in control of the situation. You can watch yourself in either third person, first person, or both (Hardy & Callow, 1995) to overcome difficult situations. Visualization can also be used for motivation to get to the top of the podium stand, but think about what steps you need to take to get there. These can be different ‘practice sessions’ to help you piece together a high performance experience.
4) Make it realistic:
One of the most important aspects of visualization is making the environment as real as possible. If you’ve seen the place where you’re competing, think about all the nuances of that environment. If it’s a new field or court, consider finding pictures on the internet to help you visualize the landscape, sounds, smells, even the feeling of the air around you. The more realistic stimuli you add, the more real it will feel.
5) Practice daily:
Visualization can easily be as much of a part of your training as going to the gym. Aaron Rodgers has mentioned that he learned how to visualize when he was in the 6th grade and has used it time and time again to practice difficult situations out on the field. Simply take 5-10 minutes to start. Whether you’re rehearsing a new play, or running a race, imagery can be included in any mental-fitness technique.
6) Write out your own script
If you have a hard time getting clear and specific on what you want to mentally rehearse, consider writing it out and recording it. If you don’t like listening to your own voice then ask a friend to record it for you. Guided scripts make it easier to help you focus on what you can control. You can also use Rewire’s mindset recovery options which has several visualization practices to help give you different ideas on what to write your script on.
7) Combine it with Rewire
If you’re not training for anything specific, consider using rewire to help you train your motivation. Rewire’s motivation visualization can help you remain focused on your goals during long extended bouts of training. If you’re reading this on mobile, click here to check out Rewire’s pre-flight checklist to help you practice visualizing your upcoming races.
The purpose of mental fitness is to achieve a state of well-being, feeling calmer and more prepared to tackle a mix of life’s responsibilities and challenges.
Being mentally fit does not mean achieving a high IQ test score or being able to read a book a day. Mental fitness is a lot more holistic — it’s less about one thing and instead a mix of components and exercises that create a healthy mind.
This blog post will explain more about the purpose of mental fitness — we’ll discuss what it means to be mentally fit, the benefits, a few exercises to get started, and more.
What does it mean to be mentally fit?
Physical fitness relates to how the body looks and functions. If you exercise regularly, you improve your health and reduce your risk of disease. If you lift weights, you’ll build bigger and stronger muscles. If you run or cycle long distances, you’ll better develop your cardiovascular system.
But what about mental fitness? While exercise improves physical fitness, it also improves mental fitness. When we exercise, our brain produces and releases endorphins — also known as “feel-good hormones.” It’s why you feel happy after exercise, and it’s likely one of the reasons you keep going back — whether you realise it or not.
The purpose of being mentally fit is similar to that of physical fitness — to improve the function of your brain and how you think, feel, and react to the world around you. And while that may seem somewhat far-fetched, it’s actually rather straightforward.
What are the benefits of mental fitness?
As you likely already know, there are many benefits to focusing on mental fitness.
For example, benefits include:
Increased presence and focus
Improved sleep quality and quantity
Increased resilience
The ability to be more present
Build confidence
Improved cognitive function
Build new skills
Unsurprisingly, the benefits are centred around how we think, feel, and interact with various situations.
Mental fitness training — a few exercises to get started
If you want to get bigger muscles, you go to the gym and lift weights. But if you want to train your mind, you need to adopt a different approach.
As previously mentioned, your mental fitness is made up of several components. For example, this could include how much sleep you get, how stressed you are, whether or not you exercise regularly, your immediate environment, and so forth.
There are, of course, plenty of exercises you can do to get started:
Regular exercise
Practice mindfulness
Do mind games
Read
Increase awareness and reduce stress with journaling
Regular exercise
Let’s start with a more obvious one: regular exercise.
The CDC states that adults need 150-minutes of exercise each week. Ideally, this should also include two days of muscle-strengthening activity. We recommend splitting the 150-minutes throughout the week — 30 minutes a day, five days a week, or something similar to best suit your schedule.
Exercise releases endorphins — these make you feel good, can elevate your mood, and improve your outlook on a certain situation or even life, in general.
Regular exercise should be a part of your mental fitness routine — it’s easy to do, it’s super rewarding, and you’ll feel great physically and mentally for doing it.
Practice mindfulness
Mindfulness and meditation often go hand in hand, but you can do one without the other — meditation is not the only form of mindfulness.
Despite this, many people find that meditation helps them achieve a more calm state of mind and improves focus and concentration.
But you can exercise mindfulness in different ways — it could be a short walk, perhaps creating a list of things you’re grateful for, gardening, cooking, or performing another hobby that you find rewarding.
We’re all different — you may enjoy yoga or meditation, or you might find that noting down your thoughts and tracking your goals in a notebook works best for you. You can also try our Rewire mindset recovery sessions, or, if you prefer, our open recovery post-workout deep mind and body session. And if guided sessions are more your thing, click here to give one a go!
Do mind games
There are loads of mind games that help reduce stress and improve cognitive performance and function. For example, it could be something as simple as a crossword puzzle, sudoku, or a game of chess.
Alongside traditional games, there are also reaction tests and other brain-stimulating tests and activities that increase cognitive function and focus. We recommend trying a mix of Rewire neuro-training sessions, designed to temporarily increase mental fatigue, and build long-term mental fitness. If you’re reading on mobile, click here to try a 3 minute neuro-training session.
Read
Regular reading keeps the mind healthy — it stimulates the mind, reduces stress, improves knowledge, and facilitates better focus and concentration.
Also, reading may keep the brain active, potentially slowing the onset of dementia in Alzheimer’s disease by up to five years, as found in a 2021 study.
Increase awareness and reduce stress with journaling
Journaling can be as simple as writing down your thoughts for a few minutes each day. But writing down how you feel can increase awareness, contributing to better mental fitness and reduced stress.
It’s a basic practice, but many people find it useful to note their thoughts on paper, almost clearing their heads and sharing the responsibility.
Mental fitness is a holistic practice
Mental fitness is a lot more holistic than you might think. Improving your mental fitness is not as simple as going for a run, playing a game of chess, reading a book, or performing reaction tests.
Instead, it’s a mix of several activities — there is no finish line, and you must constantly perform these activities to ensure optimal mental fitness.
To get started with your mental fitness journey, we recommend using the Rewire daily readiness assessment. The short 90-second assessment looks at your unique needs day-to-day, recommending specific neuro-training and mindset-recovery protocols to set yourself up for success.
Ciomag, V. and Zamfir, M.V., 2016. The Benefit of Physical Exercises of our Own Body and Health. Univers Strategic, (2), p.26.
Horowitz, S., 2010. Health benefits of meditation: What the newest research shows. Alternative and Complementary Therapies, 16(4), pp.223-228.
Wilson, R.S., Wang, T., Yu, L., Grodstein, F., Bennett, D.A. and Boyle, P.A., 2021. Cognitive activity and onset age of incident Alzheimer disease dementia. Neurology, 97(9), pp.e922-e929.
Winter-Hébert, L., 2019. 10 Benefits of Reading: Why You Should Read Every Day. lifehack. org, Retrieved, pp.22-4.
https://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/iStock-492491888.jpg14142121Matthew Macehttps://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Rewire_Fitness_menu_logo_340x79-full-1.pngMatthew Mace2022-11-14 13:10:282023-03-15 13:52:21What Is The Purpose of Being Mentally Fit
As children, we were always taught to use our imaginations when we were playing. How often do you remember creating vivid worlds that felt so realistic with your friends? This is what Corbin (1972) would define as visualization or the “repetition of a task, without observable movement, with the specific intent of learning”. Visualization (which is also called imagery) is simply using your imagination as a mental training. However, as we got older this skill was covered by other skills within our brain. The use it or lose it principle can be applied to our imagination, and relearning how to apply it to sports can enhance your athletic potential and abilities.
Several studies have shown the benefits of using imagery and how it plays a role in athletic performance. Visualization for athletic performances dates back over 100 years. One of the strongest early models came from Bioinformational Theory back in the 1970s, which has been validated by modern neuroimaging techniques (Lang, 1977,1979). Lang’s Bioinformational Theory has made the hypothesis that the mental responses from an imagery script are functionally equivalent in the brain. Meaning, visualization is a way of creating mental reps for several skills. In addition, modern day imaging has shown that when practicing skills, visualization uses the same neural pathways in the brain, minus the motor cortex which executes the physical skill (Decety,1996). Visualization has been a go-to skill for both Olympic athletes and coaches to utilize during their training (Jowdy et al., 1989). Michael Phelps was an avid user of imagery and mentioned that visualization was almost videotape running through his head.
This article will cover four ways to use visualization:
Skill Development
Building Confidence
Motivation
Energy Management
SKILL DEVELOPMENT
One of the easiest ways to use visualization is for skill development. Indeed, imagery can be used to create new strategies, solve-problems or practice existing skills when physical practice time is limited (Munroe-Chandler & Morris, 2011). This also includes time outside of the weightroom. In 2018, a meta-analysis done by Paravlic et al., found that athletes who performed motor imagery to practice muscular voluntary contractions (MVS) increased their MVS greater than the no-exercise group, but less than those who were in the weight room regularly.
Apolo Ohno, the most decorated winter Olympian in US history, was known for breaking a sweat during his visualization practices. Ohno was an avid user of imagery in his mental training and had this to say about his visualization practice:
“I think the mental component is probably the most overlooked part of any training regimen. It’s never inside any training program or manual. There’s never a time that says, ‘mental prep’ or ‘visualization time’. It was a real critical piece for me. It was literally the difference between me winning and me not even making it into a final oftentimes.”
— Apolo Ohno
BUILDING CONFIDENCE
Another way of using imagery in your mental training is to work on your confidence in specific situations. In the late 1970s psychologist Albert Bandura found that there were several ways to build self-efficacy, which can be applied building confidence in high performing athletes. Visualization can be a powerful technique and one of the ways Bandura noted that efficacy can be built to help people reach their potential. One study (Abma et al., 2002) showed some benefit to using visualization to build confidence, and that high performing athletes are already using visualization! This technique can be used to practice achieving a desired outcome, which has been shown by several studies (see Callow et al., 2001; Mortiz et al., 1996; Vadocz et al., 1998) to be linked to a positive development of motivation. Meaning, the more you see yourself successfully practicing a skill, climbing a mountain, the more motivated you’ll be when you actually do it. While using visualization, athletes can rethink a time when they felt confident, or imagine themselves practicing a skill or running a race with confidence. Rewire has several readiness assessments which you can use to jumpstart your visualization training. My personal favorite is found in the Pre-Flight Checklist where you visualize your game plan. If you’re reading on mobile, click here to open the pre-flight checklist on the Rewire app.
MOTIVATION
Another way to use visualization is to learn how to motivate yourself. Paivo (1985) discusses in his model that athletes can practice this by imagining themselves standing on top of a podium after winning a competition. Another way of practicing motivation is by thinking of a motivating image (moments, colors, animals, etc), that elicit meaning for the athlete. Athletes can also use motivation visualization to help them mentally stay present during long extended training bouts to reconnect to the reason why they’re training.
ENERGY MANAGEMENT
Nerves under high pressure situations are always going to be present, but you can use visualization to practice remaining in control of them. This is a great strategy to pair with practicing breathwork during intense performances. It can also be used to relax yourself before bed. Athletes can practice coping and remaining in control of their emotions during difficult situations. Think about a quarterback who needs to remain composed while trying to throw a game winning touchdown. Or, how about an Ironman athlete who needs to stay in control while hitting the proverbial wall? Imagery can help you mentally rehearse how to overcome difficult situations.
WHEN CAN YOU USE VISUALIZATION?
The beautiful thing about visualization is that since it’s practice away from practice, you can practice visualization anywhere! I remember reading an excerpt from Mark Champagne’s Personal Socrates on Apolo Ohno. Champagne wrote that when practicing imagery on an airplane, Ohno would break an actual sweat because it was so intense. Holmes & Collins (2001) write that when practicing away from practice, athletes can wear their uniform or practice in a similar environment to where they’re performing and do their imagery practice. Athletes can also use pictures or videos of where they will compete to complement their visualization practice. Here’s a more in depth guide on how to create and implement a visualization practice.
Five tips to get started:
Start off practicing your skill slowly in your head, then bring it to full speed. Just like starting out a new skill at half the tempo, you can practice the biomechanics in your head.
Make it realistic. Michael Phelps often referred to this as having a video tape running in his head.
Practice both visualizing yourself from a 1st and 3rd person perspective. Start out with first, then third, then both
Start off with small pieces of your sport, then start imagining the entire thing if you’re an endurance athlete
Rewire’s Mindset Recovery collection offers protocols which include visualization, self-talk, binaural beats, subliminal priming and breathwork, allowing you to increase your performance confidence and experience the benefits of visualization anywhere you need.
Abma, C. L., Fry, M. D., Li, Y., & Relyea, G. (2002). Differences in imagery content and imagery ability between high and low confident track and field athletes. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 14(2), 67–75. https://doi.org/10.1080/10413200252907743
Callow, N., Hardy, L. and Hall, C., (2001). The effects of a motivational general-mastery imagery intervention on the sport confidence of high-level badminton players. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport,72, 389-400.
Corbin, C. (1972). Mental practice. In W.P. Morgan (ED.), Ergonomic aids and muscular performance (pp.94-116). New York: Academic Press.
Decety, J. (1996). The neurological basis of motor imagery. Behavioral Brain Research, 77, 45-52.
Holmes, P. S., & Collins, D. J. (2001). The PETTLEP approach to motor imagery: A functional equivalence model for sport psychologists. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 13 (1), 60–83. https://doi.org/10.1080/104132001753155958
Jowdy, D., Murphy, S.M., & Durtschi, S.K. (1989). An assessment of the use of imagery by elite athletes: Athlete, coach, and psychological perspectives. Colorado Springs, CO: Olympic Sports Committee.
Lang, P.J. (1979). Imagery in therapy: An informational processing analysis of fear. Behavior Therapy, 8, 862-886.
Lang, P.J. (1977). A bio-informational theory of emotional imagery. Psychophysiology, 16, 495-512.
Moritz, S. E., Hall, C. R., Vadocz, E., & Martin, K. A. (1996). What are confident athletes imaging? An examination of image content. The Sport Psychologist 10, 171-179.
Munroe-Chandler, K., & Morris, T. (2011). Imagery. In T. Morris & P. Terry (Eds.), The New Sport and Exercise Psychology Companion (pp. 275–308). Fitness Information Technology.
Paivo, A. (1985). Cognitive and motivational functions of imagery in human performance. Canadian Journal of Applied Sport Science, 10, 22-28.
Paravlic, A. H., Slimani, M., Tod, D., Marusic, U., Milanovic, Z., & Pisot, R. (2018). Effects and dose–response relationships of motor imagery practice on strength development in healthy adult populations: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Sports Medicine, 48(5), 1165–1187. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40279-018-0874-8
Perry, C., & Morris, T. (1995). Mental imagery in sport. In t. Morris & J. Summers (Eds.), Sport psychology: Theory, applications & issues (pp. 339-385). Brisbane, Australia: John Wiley. Vadocz, E. A., Hall, C. R., & Moritz, S. E. (1997). The relationship between competitive anxiety and imagery use. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 9(2), 241–253. https://doi.org/10.1080/10413209708406485
https://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/iStock-530907415.jpg14112124Ryan Teigenhttps://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Rewire_Fitness_menu_logo_340x79-full-1.pngRyan Teigen2022-11-10 15:38:192022-11-18 11:32:45Visualization Techniques: A Guide to Unlocking Your Ultimate Performance Potential
Join us for a conversation with Sonya Looney, world endurance champion, pro-mountain biker, plant-based athlete and mindset coach. In this episode, Sonya Looney shares stories about her journey and experiences as a professional athlete and the way she frames her mindset to lead to her success today. We cover many topics such as having a growth mindset, self-belief, adapting to challenges, cognitive fatigue and mental resilience.
To start building your mental fitness and reframing your mindset today, check out our collection of mindset recovery sessions on the Rewire Fitness app which uses scientifically proven protocols to reduce stress and anxiety, develop a positive mindset, and prepare for competition.
https://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Podcast-App-Banner-19.png6871030Daniellehttps://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Rewire_Fitness_menu_logo_340x79-full-1.pngDanielle2022-11-10 15:20:042022-11-11 12:00:38How to Rewire Your Mindset for Success With Sonya Looney, Pro-MTB Racer and Mindset Coach
Joe Fuggle is a former elite GB Junior 400m hurdler and founder of The Athlete Place.
In this episode, Sun and Joe share an in-depth discussion about burnout, describing their personal experiences and the deeper insights they’ve gained about how they have been able to reframe their mentality around sports by changing motivation and how they measure success. Joe also shares how he now uses his experiences, knowledge, and passion of helping others to create The Athlete Place, a brand supporting athletes and parents in track & field.
You can find Joe at The Athlete Place — The place to go for track & field athletics guidance, support and storytelling.
At Rewire, our mission is to help athletes thrive by prioritizing their Mental Fitness and well-being. Make sure any signs of burnout are not going unnoticed by completing a readiness assessment today. You can also try a Mindset Recovery session for free to manage your emotional fatigue and stress to avoid experiencing burnout.
https://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Podcast-App-Banner-18.png6871030Daniellehttps://rewirefitness.app/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Rewire_Fitness_menu_logo_340x79-full-1.pngDanielle2022-11-04 22:19:112022-11-04 22:19:13Overcoming Burnout and Reframing Success with Joe Fuggle, Former Elite GB Athlete
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