Question: What is a good way to overcome competition anxiety and keep thinking and riding normally at a competition? Answer: One of the great benefits of competition is that you actually know that it is coming, and in having it as a set point in the future, you can really prepare for it! There is so much that you can do to overcome competition anxiety, and all of it has to do with the ability to control your focus and your emotional state- which again is a muscle that you need to exercise in advance. You need to anticipate the stress prior to the event and train yourself to deal with it, as opposed to just trying to “cope with it” on the day. The ability to relax and focus is a learned skill, and something that you can teach yourself to do. If you are experiencing anxiety and have muddled thoughts at competitions on a regular basis, you will be repeating a pattern of behavior that allows you to become anxious. This can be a confronting idea to get your head around, but just for the sake of experiment, remain open to the idea that instead of certain emotional states being “inflicted” on us, we actually create certain feelings and emotions through the images that we see in our mind, the way that we talk to ourselves and the way that we hold our bodies. What we need to identify is these processes that you go through in relation to all of the above- what is it that you are thinking, seeing, how you are moving- when you are in an anxious state, and compare it to how you think, see and move when you are feeling really strong and empowered- and then we replace the old pattern with the new. The other technique that I work with a lot is anchoring the feeling of relaxation in the body. Whenever we feel a strong feeling and it is combined with a specific trigger, that feeling essentially anchors itself in our body. Music is a really great example of this- think of a time when you have been with friends, or in a fabulous situation and you have heard a song. You can hear that song 10 years later driving down the road to the supermarket and all of those feelings will come flooding back. Why? Because the song has provided an anchor to that feeling, to that state. We are anchoring feelings consciously and unconsciously all the time. The skill is consciously anchoring desirable states- such as confidence, relaxation- and then combine them with a cue that we can produce “on tap”. So state change and anchoring are two such examples of what you could use *********** Just a reminder, in case you need one, your answers are coming from Jane Pike. You can find out more about her on the website here: myequicoach
Posted on: Mon, 06 Oct 2014 07:20:17 +0000
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