POWER OF MIND

Part 1: Meditation and positive dialogue...

The human body is remarkable. The way it works, grows, learns, and heals is nothing short of a miracle. You would be hard pressed to find anything on Earth that is more arresting then the human body. Tried through centuries of tribulations, the body has proven itself time and time again.

Herein lies the dilemma; our greatest strength is also our weakness . We tend to perceive ourselves in two dimensions. The problems we face:

The mind we possess is efficacious. It’s saved mankind from the brink of oblivion more than once. Why do we neglect the potential of the mind? We neglect it’s power - its ability to change the outcome.

I’m alluding to the mind’s ability to drive us from failure to victory. Cultivating it to thwart negativity, and reinforce positivity is paramount for success. This holds true whether you are competing, training, or just exercising.

Every athlete, gym rat, or average exerciser needs to traverse this road. Otherwise your performance, gains, or weight loss goals will suffer. You won’t reach your full potential if you’re plagued with negative thoughts of failure. Sadly, we’re naturally prone to thinking negative. Ever heard of the fight or flight response?

Our Achilles heel is negativity. You don’t have to be subservient to it! How do we over come it? You can accomplish this in several ways. The two ideas that follow are the most beneficial…

I’m not orating spirituality. If this is your craft, I commend you! What I’m bringing to light is shifting the mind from negative to positive through mental preparation.

My time in the military taught me this on a grand scale. Any soldier can tell you preparation is key. From receiving the operation order to rehearsals for actions on the objective; you are always preparing. You don’t have to join the military to learn this concept.

Every morning, upon waking, I prepare myself with meditation. As your day begins, you must go through a preparation process that sharpens the mind, wards off negativity, and rehearses your day’s events.

In a world full of meaningless chatter, several minutes to silent meditation focuses you. It calms you. It allows you to escape the prison of our perceived reality, and puts things in perspective. Situations that may have been perceived as negative obstacles soon become small mounds, instead of hefty mountains.

We are prone to negativity. How do we overcome this? Negative thoughts lead to poor performance. Performance leads to failure, and failure leads to distortion of our self image.

Cultivation of positive self talk is crucial for performance. Where the mind wanders the body is sure to follow. We literally set our defeats and wins by what we say to ourselves. If you say you can’t, then you won’t. If you say you can, you will.

The best method I have found is the practice of witness, interdict, redirect, and maintain. I can’t claim this process as my own. Author Mark Divine in his Unbeatable Mind Academy lays the method out clearly,

The two ideas mentioned are not one time fix it solutions. It takes practice and desire to use these tools. Utilize them in life, and you will see change. You will gain an edge over others who are trapped in the vicious cycle of self defeat.

This week, practice silent meditation for 5 minutes upon waking up each day. Throughout your day find two instances where you can shift the the outcome with positive self dialogue. Do this, and begin moving what used to be immovable summits.

Reference:

Divine, M. (2014–2015), Unbeatable Mind Academy: Lesson One, Pg 11.

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