Whether you’re a salesperson, manager, entrepreneur, trial attorney, weekend warrior, or professional athlete, you often need an edge to perform to your best potential.
If you know how to enter the zone and stay there, you will definitely have the edge or edge you need to win, beat your competition, and perform to your best potential.
What is the zone?
In short, the area is a state of relaxed concentration where there is no self-criticism. You are confident, relaxed, focused and living in the present. In addition, there is a sense of enjoyment, your actions seem automatic and easy, and there is a greater belief that your dreams can come true.
It is interesting to note that the zone is parallel and coincides with a hypnotic state of mind.
Thirty-one tools you need to use effectively to stay in the zone
The author has worked with thousands of world-class athletes, young athletes, and weekend warriors. He has evaluated and assisted Olympic champions.
Below you will find a simple quiz and ranking system that can help athletes, coaches, and parents of athletes understand the elements that understood the zone. Readers of this article will also understand what the common barriers to entry are.
Here are the questions.
Simply rate yourself from 1 to 10 on each of the questions.
You can use grades from zero to ten and you can use decimal points. Ten is the highest rating you can get and zero is the lowest rating.
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How safe do you feel?
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How relaxed do you feel?
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How focused do you feel?
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How well have you been practicing?
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How tough do you feel?
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How well do you sleep the night before a competition?
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Are your eating, sleeping, and exercise patterns in balance with each other?
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How much fun do you have when you compete?
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Can you shut up the self-criticism?
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Do you engage in positive self-talk?
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Are you able to disconnect from distractions?
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Are you able to stay in the present?
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Do you have pre-shooting routines that you use constantly?
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Do you have a “Plan B” if your “Game A” doesn’t work out?
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Do you follow a diet that makes sense for your body and your sport?
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Can you empty your mind and trust your athletic body?
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Can you quiet your mind to focus on just one thing?
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Are you injury free?
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Are you able to control any interpersonal or stressful problem?
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Do you use a simple mantra, phrase or melody to reset your mind and body before, during and after competing?
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Do you know how to recover from a loss, a setback, or a downturn?
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For young athletes: how is the relationship with their parents?
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Have you seen yourself on video in the last 90 days?
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Are you grateful for your opportunity to master a sport or skill?
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Do you have a technique to go from suffocation to zone?
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Are you having fun competing and practicing?
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Do you set measurable short-term and long-term goals and objectives?
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If you are a religious or spiritual person, do you use prayer as part of your training and as part of your pre-game routine?
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How well do you handle the ups and downs that are part of any challenge?
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How is your relationship with your coaches, teammates and colleagues?
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Do you practice meditation, visualization, guided imagery or visualization before competing and when you practice?
“Ideally, I like to see athletes scoring 8.5 on most of the above points. Being eighty-five percent ready is generally enough to produce good performances. Therefore, a perfect score on this test is approximately 263.5. Yes you get this score, it is very likely that you are in a state of mind that will allow you to perform well.
If you discover weaknesses that cause you to lose matches and tournaments, you need to develop strategies and techniques to overcome these weaknesses.
It’s difficult to make these kinds of changes on your own. A sports psychologist, coach, or mentor can often be very helpful in building confidence, reducing anxiety, improving concentration, and showing you how to enter the zone more often.
If your scores are very low, you can probably benefit from some form of counseling, mental resistance training, or self-hypnosis training.