0.1.0. Lessons From The Mat: Mantra of Prana

Self awareness is a crucial to improving performance in ones martial art game (and in life). You need to be aware of what is working for you, and what is not. But yet to over think what you should be doing can shift your focus away from tending to the moment of performance.

Personally in my own training I always make the distinction between technical and performance training. In technical training the goal is to be aware of what you are doing, what’s working and what isn’t. It’s the time to fix technique, to improve upon weak areas, and strategise. Here your partner needs to be open to slowing things down, to stopping in mid action so you can troubleshoot, and to give you just the right amount of energy so you can work the aspects of your game that you want, and need too.

Performance training is far harder for most. We have a natural tendency to believe that we need to plan and that we need to think our actions through. Most people ‘think’ that they should be working specific strategise or techniques in order to achieve success in the midst of a live roll or in sparring. Typically though in a performance environment such as free rolling in jits, or sparring in MMA, things are moving way to fast for thinking to catch up. Thinking is far to slow for the speed of the action, and unpredictability of the fight. In fact, the more you think, the more your movement stutters and the more you second guess yourself. The paradox of performance is that in order to perform at your best, you need to think less.

But here is the crux of the matter. Take a moment now and try stop your thinking?……..

Were you successful?

Probably not!

Thinking happens if you like it to or not. The paradox of thinking is, the more you try to think less, the more you often end up thinking. Nowhere is this more evident when you plan for a certain action in a live roll or sparring match, which sets up an expectation of success — but when it fails — you find your thinking and feeling spiraling into a mental vortex of self-doubt. Positive expectations unfulfilled create a negative, for example self doubt, apprehension, anxiety , etc. My experience on the mat in performance has shown that one of the simplest tools to overcome this, is to use thinking, to defeat thinking.

Rather than seeing thinking as the obstacle, it is better to see it as the solution. As we have already concluded, you can’t stop thinking. Thinking itself is not the problem then, but rather where it is placed, where it is focused. When it comes to performance, thinking that holds you in the past (“I shouldn’t have done that”) or projecting into the future (“the next time he drops his hand, I am hitting into the opening”) — is what causes the problem. For one simple reason, if you hold onto thinking in the past, or project your thoughts into the future, you cannot attend to the present moment, the only moment where action is happening. The only moment where true performance lives.

It is far better then to use neutral thinking, focusing on single word that is not anchored in the past, or projecting in the future. Think of it as a mental mantra. The one that is the easiest to use is simply to say to yourself breath (and attach it to the physical action of breath too). Every time you catch yourself thinking in the past or the future, gently remind yourself to come back to breath. Not only is breath a neutral act, it is also crucial to succeeding in the moment of performance. Try not breath when live rolling, or sparring and see how successful you are.

Crucial, bringing the mind back to breath, by reminding oneself too, is not attached to a past experience or a future expectation, it is right here, right now — and completely applicable to the performance in the moment (i.e., saying to yourself however, “I need to remember to focus on breath” is a sentence that is not neutral, it’s already anchored in the past). In other words, as you catch yourself holding onto the past, or planning for the next moment in sparring and rolling, you simply want to be aware that you are, and then gently bring yourself back to the physical act of breathing, by saying to yourself, “Breath”. No other thoughts are necessary.

The hardest thing for people to grasp is that the body is a natural intelligence. Your body is not a workhorse, although most of us treat it as such. As a natural intelligence you will be surprised what it is able to do if you just get out of its way. Thinking in the past or the future is the surest way to get in the way of this natural intelligence. Anchoring the mind in a neutral, present state, is one simple way to allow the body to do what it needs to, without interference of the judging mind. Try it, you will be refreshingly surprised.