Get the Picture: Mental Imaging

What the mind of man can conceive and believe,

he can achieve.

Napoleon Hill,

Think and Grow Rich

Mind over matter. A phrase that we have all heard throughout our lives. We have heard countless times used in innumerable ways. Some sites claim it first appeared in 1863 in a work called the Geological Evidence of the Antiquity of Man. It was used in reference to an evolutionary growth of animals’ minds in relation to humans. Personally I have used it, tongue in cheek, as “If you don’t mind, then it doesn’t matter!” The trouble I got into that way.

Napoleon Hill knew about this concept when, in 1937, he wrote his book Think and Grow Rich. He instructs readers to write down positive affirmations and solid goals. You read this list several times during the day, but most importantly just before going to sleep and right after waking up. These two times are paramount.

Right before sleep and just after waking up, Hill knew, that the line between our conscious and subconscious minds was the thinnest. This is when the messages of success are going to pass into the subconscious mind. That is of primary importance. It is the lynch pin on which everything else will hang in this piece.

Why? Because our subconscious mind does not know the difference between what is reality and what is not.

MEDITATION

When we meditate and focus on thoughts and images of strength and success and get those images into our subconscious, they become a reality for our mind. What becomes a reality in our minds becomes a reality in our actions. It is a natural cycle. What we believe, we do, say, and perform. These outward actions bring success. This success reinforces our thoughts and beliefs. So the cycle continues.

I want to introduce you, in a manner of speaking, to Mark Divine. He is a former Navy SEAL Commander, an entrepreneur, an author, and a very successful man in very many ways. In his book The Way of the SEAL he teaches what he calls the “envision The Future Me” exercise.

Getting ready to do this mental imaging is the same for meditating and very similar to what I have experienced in some forms of yoga and what is done in tai chi and in many sports and arts.

First, find a comfortable seat or place to recline. The intention is not to fall asleep, but if you do, oh well. So long as you get the images into your mind.

Second, breathe deeply. Most of us only breathe into the upper part of our lungs. This restricts the amount of oxygen we take in. Think of the air coming into your lungs and filling them from the bottom up while you breathe in and push your belly out at the same time. As you are breathing, lightly press the tip of your tongue to the top of your mouth just behind your front teeth.

While breathing in, picture bright light coming in through your nose and into your body to illuminate all the dark recesses. As you exhale see and feel the darkness and dust leaving with your breath.

After several breaths of the light, just breathe and feel your body relax. Feel every muscle hanging under the effect of gravity.

Visualize what you want. Focus on it with laser like intensity. Go through your routine. Do your warm up. Feel all the stretches. Experience it in as much detail as possible. Use all of your senses. You already know how your workout area looks. Call up how it feels, smells, sounds. There is a unique taste to it as well, find it in your mind.

Go through your workout or the event you’re training for. Go through each play, each step, every single minute detail of what you will do. Experience it as a champion. Experience the victory. The deeper and richer the detail of sensations, the more real it becomes to your conscious and subconscious minds.

Back to Mark Divine. He writes about the Future Me exercise. Mark says in his book, The Way of the SEAL, on page 28 that

“Even though you may not feel or look the part now, you must envision yourself in your ideal state, activating your personal power and living in alignment with your stand and purpose. I learned in the SEALs that there’s no such thing as perfection, only perfect effort. Through practicing a “perfect” version of ourselves mentally, we’ll slowly become that person in real life.”

            Scientists are beginning to understand more about the mind/body connection. They are finding evidence to support this. One such study published in the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine just this past September. In this study participants were divided in two groups. Both groups had one of their wrists and forearms put into a cast for four weeks. One group would perform guided mental imaging and the other group would do nothing for the duration.

            During the guided imaging the study group was led to envision themselves doing gripping, flexing, and extending exercises.

            The key points from the study are:

·         Coupling mental imagery with physical training is the best suited intervention for improving strength performance.

·         An examination of potential moderator variables revealed that the effectiveness of mental imagery on strength performance may vary depending on the appropriate matching of muscular groups, the characteristics of mental imagery interventions, training duration, and type of skills.

·         Self-efficacy, motivation, and imagery ability were the mediator variables in the mental imagery-strength performance relationship.

·         Greater effects of internal imagery perspective on strength performance than those of external imagery could be explained in terms of neural adaptations, stronger brain activation, higher muscles excitation, greater somatic and sensorimotor activation, and higher physiological responses such as blood pressure, heart rate, and respiration rate.

·         Mental imagery prevention interventions may provide a valuable tool to improve the functional recovery after short-term muscle immobilization and anterior cruciate ligament in patients.

Both groups lost grip strength. The control group registered a 46% loss overall while the study group registered 24%. That is a significant difference for a four-week period.

There is also a correlation in how hard you focus on the image and how detailed you make your images. Frequency is also a factor.

Bill Bradley, who served as a democratic senator from 1979 to 1992, used visualization throughout his basketball career. To him, that was a key part of practice and training.

For us, as athletes, whether we are training for fitness, flexibility, or one event or another, we can also benefit from this fact. When coupled with training, the effects of mental visualization are going to speed up recovery and improve our training. Our training will improve in our ability to focus while there, our muscles will benefit from a stronger mind-body connection.

So, when you go to bed tonight, fall asleep focusing your mind on the experience of The New You.

From the No-Budget, No-Whining, No-Excuses Basement Gym. Stay safe. Train hard.

Common Injuries and Treatments

We are into the second week of Tabatas. We all know what muscle soreness is and what is not, whether you are new to physical training or not. I wanted to take a little time to cover some of the more common calisthenic related injuries and how to treat them.

I am not a physician, sports therapist, nor a trainer. I am an athlete with a long resume of training, training mistakes, and injuries. I was a professional research writer for the government for 12 years, 10 in the military (Active and Reserve and a few as a contractor). That being said, if you have any injury related pain, GO AND TALK TO YOUR DOCTOR.

For those of you who don’t trust the medical and pharmaceutical industry, because they only make money when we get sick or injured, let’s get started.

COMMON INJURIES

With calisthenics, there is far less risk of injury than of a weight dropping on you, or doing a movement with absolutely injurious form. Even using machines to isolate a muscle group can cause painful injuries to joints. With bodyweight-only exercises, our bodies move more naturally. We find our groove faster and easier. There are still injuries to be had. The two most common are pattern overload and a muscular imbalance that causes a tit in the lumbo-pelvic girdle.

The two most Pattern Overload, as explained at T-Nation, is one cause of joint pain. You could also call this overuse of pattern movement or repetitive stress The same thing can happen with other joints.

Quarterbacks throw passes in the range of hundreds of thousands to the million range, causing shoulder and elbow injuries. Tennis players get elbow and knee injuries. We have mentioned carpal tunnel syndrome. Runners often develop knee injuries, as do soldiers in the infantry who spend weeks on end conducting long foot patrols with one or two hundred pounds of gear on their backs, not to mention the back problems they develop in the process, too. These are examples of Pattern Overload.

The military, by the way, has a very skewed view on doing physical training. Just as an FYI, folks, the Army and Navy, having served in both, I can say this about both of them. They will insist that there is absolutely nothing wrong with doing the absolute same exercise daily. Do it the same way. Every day. Day after day. The number of soldiers I have seen develop confirmed shoulder injuries by just doing the one standard type of push-up leaves me shaking my head. So, how does one deal with pattern overload? Grunt Candy (a handful of 800mg Motrin washed down with a Red Bull and coffee)? No, not if you have any intention of keeping your kdneys. Here are the two things you need for prevention:

1. Stretch and warm up/cool-down, before and after your workout. This gives your body time to adjust and move blood and nutrients into the regions that you will be stressing. This should take no less than 10 minutes.

2. Change the manner in which you are doing the exercise. There are many different types of push-ups. Diamonds, wide spaced, and turning your hands to different angles to change the direction of stress and the muscles involvement. Pull-ups and chin-ups engage muscles differently, too. Vary hand width. Switch it up as much as you can. Even try throwing a towel over the bar and grabbing each end to do your pull-ups. This is a fantastic way to firm up your grip if you’re into grappling. Keep your training fresh and creative to avoid the mental rut and Pattern Overload.

Muscular Imbalances occur when one muscle group around a joint is trained to be stronger than the other muscle groups around that joint. The result is pain and injury. The most common areas where this happens that I am familiar with are the hips and pelvic girdle and in the shoulders.

The technical term for the region we are talking about is the lumbo-pelvic hip girdle. It’s where the lower lumbar region of the spine connects to the hip girdle. That should be the most technical we get in terminology.

By using treadmills exclusively or too frequently, the muscles and tendons at the front of your hips and hip flexors getting most use. This is because the motorized belt is assisting in bringing your legs back while you are using the muscles and tendons in and around the hip flexors to lift and bring your legs forward. It is this mechanical assist from the moving belt that effectively eliminates use of your glutes and anterior muscles & tendons around the hip girdle.

Over time this muscular offset will create a tilt in the pelvis. This tilt leads to increasing pain in the lower lumbar region.

How these injuries occur is really quite simple and, thankfully, so is avoiding them. The treadmill is a really convenient training device to have. You live in an apartment or a condo and don’t have a place to go running, or maybe your gym doesn’t have an attached running track. Whatever it is, you have the best access to a treadmill.

Treating

Treating these injuries takes nothing more than patience and time.

1. Use a Lacrosse Ball to deeply massage the injured area. You don’t need to spend $30 or even $20 dollars on some shiny plastic vibrating thingy from the electronic gadget store at the mall. You can, if you want, but it’s not necessary. You could save a few bucks by just getting a lacrosse ball. Use it by pressing it as deeply into the sore or injured areas as you are comfortable with and roll it around. Press it between your back and the wall to hit those hard to reach places, too.

2. Sometimes, using wraps like lifting straps or ace bandages may be useful in supporting the injured joint until healed and back to full strength. What that feels like and what that level is will be up to you and your physician. 3. Use the R-I-C-E acronym to treat pain and injuries. This means Rest Ice Compression Elevation during the first 72 hours after the injury.

From my own experience and what I have read these should be the best and the worst of the injuries you face. No guarantee on this. There will always be someone who makes it happen...maybe they blow an ACL or tear something or were recovering from a previous injury. If you are concerned about a pain or these tips are not helping, see a professional without any further delay.

From the No-Frills-No-Cost-No-Excuses Gym, Train Hard. Train Smart. Train for life!

Explosive!

     One of the points relating to the Tabata Challenge that we have not discussed is the tempo at which we should be doing these. That is a point I wish to rectify here and now. It is important and it will make a difference in your training, strength, and stamina.

      Joe Weider is the Father of Modern Bodybuilding. His creativity, intelligence, curiosity, and determination paved the way for many of the greatest. Lou Ferigno, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Franco Columbu. Not to mention the hordes of athletes who train to day using the principles he developed without ever knowing who came up with these ideas.
      For this month's challenge, we are using Weider principle #27. This principle states that muscle contractions should be done as quickly as possible and the extension at a more normal speed. What this means and looks like is this:
     Push-ups; lower your chest as close to the ground/floor as you can without touching it doing so at a speed that takes two seconds. When you press against the floor to raise your body up do so explosively. It's as if you are trying to do a clapping push -up,  but not quite. This explosiveness results in more strength in less time. Studies have proven this. Time has held this as one of Joe Weider's principles. If it didn't work it wouldn't be in his list.
     You can do pull-ups with the same explosiveness. If doing free-hanging pull-ups with that much force limits you to one or two, it's not going to accomplish much. In this case, you could benefit from elastic bands to assist with the explosive reps for the first two sets. Then, lose the straps and do the best you can for the other 6 sets in the Tabata. If that means you’re doing cheats by hopping up to get your up over the bar, then so be it. Get yourself up over the bar and hold it for at least one second before beginning your decent. The decent should take about two seconds. Not that it will destroy the universe if you are unable to hold that pace. You are, after all, employing some intense techniques to really burn out your muscles. Another option might be having a friend help you up over the top so you can focus on the negative portion. There's nothing wrong with that.
     Employ explosiveness and enjoy newfound strength.
     Train daily. Train hard. Be strong.