How to hypnotize yourself to improve sports performance

This is a technique that I personally use and I am passing it on because of the amazing results it has brought me. Now this can be used in any situation but I will relate it to my personal sporting experience.

So hypnotizing yourself to increase sporting ability is done by most professional athletes and there have been some studies done that prove why. Back in the times when there was a soviet republic they did tests with athletes they had in 4 different groups.


Group 1: 100% training and 0% visualization

Group 2: 75% training and 25% visualization

Group 3: 50% training and 50% visualization

Group 4: 25% training and 75% visualization



Guess which group had the best results? It was group 4, that’s right the group with the least training time and the most visualization time had the best improvement out of everyone.


How does this work?
Being stronger does not mean that your technique will improve and practising the wrong technique over and over will actually hinder your progression. When your mind is not focused on a task then your focus on technique will waver and you will be practising incorrectly. You can probably relate this to day to day tasks that you need to do and if you are not focused on what you are doing accidents happen e.g. driving, mowing the lawn, even cutting your nails. So it is up to yourself to make sure your mind is in the right place and focusing on the correct motions before beginning your skill.


My example of how I hypnotized myself
When I was training gymnastics there was a skill that was a dismount from the high bar which would “freak” me out because I did not want to hit the bar. This would cause me to let go early and ignore the correct technique.. I knew that I was going to let go early before I even started the skill. As you can imagine this did not help my progression, it actually taught me the incorrect technique. So I had to get over this problem and I began to break down my insecurity of anticipating a negative whenever I thought of doing the skill. The answer was to repeat to myself just before attempting the skill “arch”, “drive”, “wait” and immediately do the skill. It worked incredibly because I was using words that had absolutely no negative connotation and was not allowing anything else enter my mind except the correct motions to follow. I started applying this to all my problem areas and the results have been amazing.


The basic’s to follow

• 
  Take time to understand what your reaction is prior to and after the skill you are having trouble on
• 
  Create simple words to follow in association with the correct technique
• 
  Stay away from negative words “don’t do this”, “this is wrong”
• 
  Take a time out if repetition is not working and your focus wavers.

This is obviously a basic example but it works for me, everyone is different so it will change with each individual but the principle will stay the same. For a good resource to learn more about self hypnosis I would recommend looking at the conversational hypnosis link above (top/right of screen)