So, I went to a Greg Louganis lecture on Sunday. It was about 4.5 hours long. The name of the lecture was called, "Performance Enhancement of the Natural Athlete". That should have clued me in right there. "Natural Athlete". I'm not an athlete. ( let alone natural) I have never played a sport in my life. I sucked at all sports. I was the last picked in school for any teams sports we had to play. I got a "c" in tennis in college. But, I digress. I really don't know what to say about this lecture. It started off with him asking everyone how much they use mental imaginary. Me, huh never. He asked me why. I guess I never felt the need for it. Never did sports. As a nurse, no need for mental imaginary there. You don't have time to imagine. You think quick and react. Someone stops breathing, act quick. Call for help, turn on the oxygen , grab the bag, put it over there face and start bagging. Also, I'm not one for imagining. I'm a very concrete person. I see things very black and white. ( not always a good thing).
Anyway, I'm not really sure what I learned. He is interesting to talk to. I asked lots of questions. When I was driving home, I started thinking. Was I one of those irritating people that wont quit asking questions? Was everyone behind me rolling there eyes at me and wanting me to be quiet? I don't know, I couldn't help myself. I was just trying to understand it. I think if feels natural to him because he has been doing it a long time.
One thing he did say that hit home was , "visualize success, not perfection". When he was diving, he would practice his dives with mistakes so that he was prepared for it in competition. So if he didn't jump up high enough off the board, he knew what he needed to do to correct for that because he had practiced it.
Something that I do to myself on course is, if I walked the course and I feel that we can really do this course. It shouldn't be a problem. I see the results before its happened. That a negative thing to do to yourself. You should always be on your game. Don't think, "I got this" before you do. Because you will usually screw it up. ( These are my words not his) .
We practiced some relaxation techniques and did some mental imaginary.
The only bad thing was when I was driving home , there was a tree on the side of the road. It didn't look like it was over the road. But it put a big scratch all the way down the side of my nice shinny van. Crap. I'm hoping I can buff it out.
Money, money, money…
5 hours ago
4 comments:
I used to compete in gymnastics - long, long ago. One time I used visualization and it really, really worked. I pictured myself doing the perfect vault, and the movement just really clicked in my brain. The next day at the competition I nailed that vault.
I thought about that vault before our agility trial, and tried to visualize oreo and I out on the field. It was hard since it was our first trial, and I had no idea what to expect from Oreo. I think next time around, I will know which parts I need to visualize.
How cool that you got to meet a famous athlete!
Greg's seminar sounds interesting...mom is exactly like you described too - not an athlete and not natural, etc. And she got a B in tennis in college (she was lucky she got a B and not a C or worse)!
Sorry about your van! Surely they can buff it out!
Greg competes here in my area, but I have not seen or been to any of his seminars, so interesting to hear what it was about. Humm, I am totally like you and I have always sucked, no natural athlete here or I have never connected with my natural athlete, but you are so right and I have screwed myself up a bunch of times walking a course and thinking I have this down, then of course I really muck it up, but then other times I get myself wigged out and panick over something that actually is not that bad, guess I need a mental seminar for sure, LOL
I'm sure you weren't asking too many questions, I tend to ask a lot of questions/comments too. Sounds like it was an interesting seminar! I definitely need to learn some mental imagery!
~Nat
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