By establishing and connecting with your personal preparation (mental and physical), understanding and acknowledging your unique qualities, and celebrating with the people who believe in you, you begin to embrace improvement and feel good about your effort and progress. This creates a cycle of success! When we experience any degree of success, we learn to look for, and expect, good things to happen. You begin to feel in control of your life, and your sport. You might consider the following techniques to get you on a roll.
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Develop an awareness of your intentions.
Knowing what it is that you want sets in motion creative energy that merges with your potential. Remember, you are never given a wish without also being given the power to make it come true. When you discover this synergy, you are well on your way.
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Be willing to accept the challenge of the task.
We may be given wishes, but they do require work to make them come true. Celebrate your desire to create your future in advance.
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Place attention on your intentions
When we place attention on what it is that we want, it allows us to bring ourselves fully to our training opportunities, commitment to nutrition, our rest and sleep, and our sense of joy, passion, and fun.
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Consider a growth mindset.
When we focus on our growth, we allow ourselves to we open to mistakes and setbacks. When we expect ourselves to be perfect, or think that we absolutely must make a time standard right now!, we create a fixed mindset that creates a good/bad, talented/not talented approach. If you have ever been in this mindset (like me) you know that not only isn’t it very pleasant, but it leaves us stressed and anxious.
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Act As If.
Another term for this is “fake it till you make it.” When we carry ourselves as if we have already accomplished our goals we grow our intentions, thus creating optimism and hope, and manifest a cycle of success that not only focuses on the moment, but also supports our long term future. So, act as if you have already made your time standard, mastered your technique, nailed that turn and breakout…You get the idea.
Give it a try and create your personal cycle of success! Let me know how it goes!
ABOUT PETE THOMPSON
Pete Thompson, headshotPete has worked in the sport psychology and human development fields with Fortune 500 companies, Division I,II, and III collegiate athletes, as well as high school and middle school staff and students. He was a swimming coach at the club, high school and collegiate level for 30 years. Pete now runs a private Sport Psychology and Adolescent Life Coaching practice, working with student-athletes nationwide. His life coaching sessions for adolescents are designed to create challenge, teach resilience, and instill self-esteem. For information regarding Pete’s Life coaching and sport psychology services click here.
I think it’s also important to set realistic and achievable goals. While it’s great to have a grandiose long-term goal; reaching smaller, stepping-stone goals along the way can greatly boost confidence as you know you’re on the right path.
“Learned Industriousness” Theory’s finding of a positive relationship between Task Difficulty and Effort reminds us also not to lose sight of those high difficulty goals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_industriousness#The_Relationship_Between_Effort_and_Task_Interest.2FDifficulty