Have you ever wondered why, despite knowing what you needed to do to achieve your goals, you simply didn’t get there? The difference between achieving or not depends on your mindset. We hear this a lot but what does it actually mean?
A mindset is often defined as a collection of beliefs that determine your thoughts, behaviours and actions.
Its more than that though. Everyone has a unique collection of experiences that inform their beliefs. We all have areas that we have strengths in, and areas where we know we need to do some work. It’s not fixed. We can learn to develop the parts of our mindset that are holding us back, and develop our strengths so that we become unstoppable.
There is no singular method that is going to be useful for everyone. However, if you combined the knowledge from sports psychology, sports coaching and life coaching together, broke it down into 8 components and enabled people to learn strategies to strengthen both their natural strengths, and develop the areas that needed work, you would have a pretty powerful formula.
This is the challenge-ready mindset.
I have spent months working on a mindset model that works.
I have spoken to ultra-runners, endurance athletes, business owners and entrepreneurs to gather their knowledge. I have researched theories and used my own background in the science of sport and exercise to see what works and what doesn’t. I have attended webinars, asked questions, and built, developed and tweaked a mindset model that will help people achieve the success that they have been dreaming of!
I am the first to confess I am a nerd – so Sunday’s experiment to test my theory was essentially testing a hypothesis – and that is, that the mindset model that I have been developing really works.
I am not a runner. I have not trained in years, and six years ago, after surgery on my right knee didn’t go particularly well, I was told that running would be off the agenda, probably for good.
Last week though, I had an urge to run. I tried to ignore it, but it wouldn’t go away and so tentatively, during a walk with my dog, I tried a few steps at a jog. I was expecting pain with every step, but none came. I probably managed about five minutes of jogging throughout the whole walk.
And so I decided to test my model by taking myself through all of the stages of it. I made commitments by joining a virtual running team who had an event on Sunday, and I went public and told people that I was doing it, I even made a commitment to raising money for charity. I checked my motivation levels and whether or not I believed that I could realistically complete the event before I set off.
In the morning, the weather was cold and windy, but I set out anyway, despite the weather. And as I set off, I ran through my mental checklist. Each time I felt like I was slowing down or struggling, I took myself through the checklist again, reminding myself of what I needed to do and using the strategies that are all part of the model. I ran with joy and a smile on my face. I was running!
There were plenty of times that I wanted to stop. Without referring myself back to the mindset, I have no doubt that I would have. And at every stage I found that I had more to give when I checked in with my motivation, my commitment, my body feelings and sensations. I found reserves of mental toughness and I was kind to myself.
I started to find the last kilometre a struggle, so I broke down the task, counting my steps and encouraging myself to run just 100 steps more, and then another 100. By the last 300 steps I felt as though I was flying and although when I got to the 5km mark I was ready to stop, I didn’t even need to fall back onto the last part of my mindset model, which looks at what you need to do when you feel like giving up.
If this mindset can work for a non-runner, on her first run for over 8 years, to complete the whole distance with a smile, then I am so excited to find out what I will be able to achieve when I combine this with some training.
I have created a min-guide to the mindset so that I can share the key components to being ready for whatever challenge you want to accept. You can get it here. In this 9-page guide you will find out what the components of the mindset are, and score yourself to find out what your current mindset looks like. It’s important to recognise where your strengths are as this is what you will call on when the going gets tough. It is also useful to know where your weak spots are so that you can see problems coming and be ready to overcome them.
There’s an e-book on its way as well, where you’ll be able to find out how you can develop your mindset by applying strategies and practice so that you can be challenge-ready for anything – I’ll let you know when it’s ready.
In the meantime, why not have a read of the guide and see what your mindset looks like today?
If you missed the link to the mindset mini-guide, here is is again. You’ll be asked to sign up to download it. By doing this you’ll be added to my mailing list, so you will receive useful coaching tips and strategies, and will be the first to know when the full e-book that will share strategies to develop each of the areas of the mindset comes out.
Don’t worry, you can unsubscribe at any time – you still get to keep the guide.
