Transcribed from video:
– This is the important bit for you, because this is the real practical bit. Again, hands up, if you need to improve your self-talk. Alright, here’s exactly how you do it. Firstly, three steps, firstly being aware that the self-talk exists. You’re doing a bar muscle-up drill, and it’s not going well and you’re getting down and angry at yourself about that muscle-up drill. That was stupid, that’s not what it’s supposed to look like, I’m a failure. That’s the awareness. Stop. Thought stopping. As soon as you’re aware, just tell yourself to stop it, say a word like stop. Because you go okay, yep, I need to stop this self-talk. Then we need to change this to a positive form of self-talk. And this is where most people struggle. Who has exercised in the heat, when it’s really really hot and oppressive and it’s hard work? Yeah, really hard work. What’s the self-talk in that situation? Someone throw some, in a dialogue at me. I’m going to die, it’s hot, I can’t do this, are we almost done? I can’t breathe, yeah. It’s all negative self-talk there, isn’t it? Yeah? It doesn’t help you. In fact, you get this self-fulfilling prophecy, you’re probably not actually going to die, but this self-fulfilling prophecy where it becomes harder, yeah? If you make a face, then you actually feel more pain, et cetera. So what do we do in this situation? What if we say to ourselves, it’s really cool, it’s a nice day, who thinks that might work? It won’t, because we’re lying to ourselves, and we’re not stupid, we know when we’re lying to ourselves. It’s not going to work, so yes we have to acknowledge that this environment exists, but then put a positive spin on it. So, here we go, it’s a really hot day, like oppressive, you can’t see because the sweat’s in your eyes, and the bar is too hot to hold, and there’s a run, and it’s on like black bitumen, it’s hot, yeah? Uncomfortable. This sucks, why am I doing this? I don’t like to exercise that much. Stop. Thought stopping. It’s a really hot day, what a great opportunity to do something that my opposition won’t, and man I’m going to get some serious physical conditioning out of this. You’re not lying to yourself, in fact that’s more true than saying I’m going to die or I can’t breathe. ‘Cause you’re definitely not going to die, and you definitely are breathing. So, thought stopping, or firstly an awareness, then thought stopping, and then put a positive spin on that.
