In CrossFit® it is very common feel love and hate at the same time; often, you start this sport hoping to change your physical shape and for some it is difficult to accept that the results will not come immediately.
When you're just starting out, you assume that things will get better over time, and sometimes you get overwhelmed by impatience: “Why don't I achieve results if all I do is train?”; this attitude easily leads to gods mental blocks that can make you believe you can't make it.
The causes of these mental blocks are many: fear, demanding too much of yourself, feeling under pressure, etc. There are, however, different solutions to manage and overcome these blocks; let's find out!
Index
Physiological techniques
In order to make a good use of our mental faculties (thinking, planning, attention), the first requirement is to be physically and psychologically calm; There are two techniques, simple to learn and apply, that can help us achieve a good state of balance when we are upset:
- Progressive muscle relaxation technique: consists of relaxing the muscles in two phases; tense your muscles (starting from face, arms, back, waist, belly and finally legs) and then release them focusing on how they relax. It can be done sitting, lying down or standing, always adopting a natural and relaxed posture
- Full breathing technique: breathing is one of the few automatic things in the body that we can control; focusing on relaxation and using the full breath technique helps the body reach a state of extreme calm, lowers heart rate, blood pressure and cortisol levels in the blood. The sequence begins with one hand on the chest and one on the stomach, trying to inhale through the nose and exhale through the mouth; you must then concentrate on the breaths by slowly moving the hand upwards on the chest first and then the one on the belly, always upwards.
cognitive techniques
There are many techniques dedicated to influencing the way we think and act; for example:
- Thought stopping technique: it is ideal for those moments when we are obsessed with negative thoughts. One has to concentrate one's attention on these thoughts, to become fully aware of them, then one has to immediately stop these thoughts with a sharp means (no more yelling, pinching or slapping yourself); if the command was strong enough, the train of thoughts will stop leaving a temporary state of emptiness. At this point, you need to generate useful and positive thoughts
- Live exposure technique: blocks generate unpleasant states (anxiety, depression, frustration, impotence) which lead to avoidance actions WOD; with this technique we are going to make a systematic change to get closer to what we are avoiding, in order to get used to it again and turn off the negative sensations. We start from a relaxation and breathing phase, then we start a light workout or muscle warm-up, focusing on the small results we are achieving; changing perspective from what we used to avoid to what we're achieving helps motivate and makes you want to try again.
emotional technique
This technique allows us to control our emotions by imagining specific situations. In this mental exercise we evoke what is scary, we imagine a different reaction to this stimulus and we try an alternative method to deal with it.
In this way, it is possible to reduce the effect of negative emotions when the stressful stimulus occurs and one is already prepared to face it with a new technique.
And you, did you know these techniques to eliminate mental blocks? Let us know in the comments and remember to follow us on our telegram channel
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