Never Focus On Your Competitors
What motivates you to swim well in a race? The answer to this may reveal more than you think.
A common trap some swimmers fall into (especially young swimmers) is to focus upon beating their competitors instead of trying to achieve their own personal best time. This approach takes your mind's focus off your true goal (which is excellence in the pool) and changes it into more of a 'personal vendetta'.
This is often called negative motivation, an attitude which generally creates pretty average results! Negative motivation is rarely seen at the elite level of swimming, it's mostly common amongst intermediate swimmers, and unfortunately those swimmers generally don't go very far.
This is because negative motivation is mostly emotion-based - and negative emotions such as jealousy, envy, anger, revenge etc are renowned for creating bad performances in the pool. Negative thoughts create negative emotions, and we already know what direction negative thoughts takes you in - the wrong direction. This is a simple case of focusing upon the 'obstacle' instead of the 'goal'.
Some overly-competitive swimmers may even use this to their advantage by purposely trying to get you emotionally angry before a race, by making comments such as "you're going down!" right before the race is to start.
Never, ever fall for this! A good swimmer would just laugh, disregard the comment, and then get on with the 'real' job at hand. Focus purely upon your own swim, do not let your thoughts leave your own lane. Because otherwise you may often find that you may in fact beat that particular swimmer, but find you came 7th overall in the race, and this is not what you want. Or even worse, you wind up coming last AND losing to your arch-rival, not pretty! However, if you focus purely on your own race, you may swim a PB, win the race, AND beat your competitor as well! Now that's what I call a win/win situation!
If you get caught up in the emotional way of thinking, such as "I have to beat that #@#!!" then you have fallen into their emotional web of deception - and your powerful subconscious mind suddenly loses its clarity and becomes clouded. You mind suddenly thinks "OK, I have a NEW goal, I must throw away the thought of swimming a good time or winning the race - my new goal is to beat the goofy-looking guy over in that lane!".
Focus only on your own swim, and your own lane. This is positive motivation, which is proven to work by every champion swimmer.. Anything else will only bring mediocre results. Revenge is not only stupid, it doesn't work!! It's far better to be the cool intelligent swimmer who keeps their mind focused on the job, not on other swimmers' performances which you have no control over whatsoever.
Winning
and
swimming
PB's
is
much
'cooler'
than
beating
a
nobody.
Be a
winner
and
keep
your
mind
on
the
job.
You
have
the
most
powerful
computer
in
the
world
at
your
disposal
-
your
mind,
so
make
sure
it is
programmed
correctly
if
you
want
a
good
'printout'
in
the
pool.
Remember
that
no-one
can
stop
you
unless
you
stop
yourself
-
keep
your
mind
focused,
positive
and
powerful
at
all
times.
"The
Mind
controls
the
body,
and
the
mind
is
unlimited".
The
best
of
success,
Craig
Townsend
"These
'Mind
Training
for
Swimmers'
tips
are
written
by
Craig
Townsend
from
It's
Mind
over
Matter,
who
runs
mental
training
programs
from
Sydney,
Australia.
You
can
subscribe
to
his
free
swim
tips
at
his
website
http://www.swimpsychology.com
or
send
an
email
to
subscribe@swimpsychology.com
Each
tip
is
Copyright
©
Craig
Townsend
and
is
fully
protected
by
Australian
and
International
Copyright
Laws."