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Extra Inning Softball has partnered with former DI softball coach Julie Jones (Akron, Cleveland State) and current Mental Performance and Mindset Coach to help give athletes, coaches and others in the softball world the “Mental Edge.”
Julie spent 26 years leading Division I softball programs with her mission being simple: to build smarter students, stronger athletes and better people.
Today, she also serves as an Adjunct Professor at Ursuline College teaching well-being and performance, mindset training, athletic coaching and career development courses in both the undergraduate and graduate studies programs.
Continuing her work of helping student-athletes reach their goals on and off the field, Julie regularly sends Mindset Made Simple Tips to players and coaches across the country as well as posting them on her site, SSB Performance.
Today’s “Mindset Made Simple reinforces what study after study shows: visualization works!
Be it in sports or music or simply as an important part of our everyday lives, “living our performance in our mind’s eye performs the same function and provides the same or improved utility as the actual physical practice of the skill!”
Coach Julie shares some recent examples of this to emphasize that “visualization isn’t hard, but making it a habit IS hard.” However, like with anything, the more it’s practiced, the better it gets!
Here’s this week’s Mental Edge if you’d prefer to watch it:
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Did you see the emotional display captured on camera during the 2023 Super Bowl broadcast?
I don’t mean Rihanna’s half-time show or even Patrick Mahomes’ incredibly gutsy performance.
I’m talking about the National Anthem and Eagles’ Head Coach, Nick Sirianni’s response to it!
If you missed it, here it is:
It was an emotional national anthem for Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni ❤️pic.twitter.com/YX6deRKPVO
— Yahoo Sports (@YahooSports) February 12, 2023
Why am I focused on this… a grown man crying?
First let me say that from where I sit, there is no shame in crying during the National Anthem. I am a habitual Anthem crier. I know there is a lot of emotion surrounding the playing of the National Anthem and for me, it has always been a tear-jerker.
My focus on Coach Sirianni’s emotion is not a judgment of his response, it is a celebration of his habit of visualization.
Before Chris Stapleton’s rendition (despite my general aversion to country music) the commentators told the story of Sirianni’s habit of listening to or imagining Whitney Houston’s iconic rendition and picturing himself at the Super Bowl!
Here’s Houston’s amazing performance before the 1991 Super Bowl:
As my dad said as we listened and watched the Anthem unfold, “Dreams do come true!”
For a guy from a little DIII school in Ohio called Mount Union (winning three National Championships, of course) to the highest honor in the game, that’s a pretty cool dream to realize for Coach Sirianni.
How much did this visualization matter to his success?
Steve Magness, author of Do Hard Things, talked recently about his experience in running the mile on The Mark Divine Show podcast (episode 390). Steve said he was a 4:17 mile runner in high school until he began to “see and feel” his race.
He pictured every aspect of it, the pre-race feelings and emotions then on to every aspect of the race in vivid detail. He mentioned that he paid special attention to the struggle he knew he will feel as he pushed his body past what his mind thought possible.
He embraced the discomfort and imagined himself fighting through it. He attributes his 4:01 mile time, which put him at 6th fastest in the country, to this practice.
Here’s the entirety of that show which is a great watch!
Study after study shows the benefits of visualization.
Whether we are imagining our future successes, or upcoming races, preparing to present to a client or practicing to perform on stage with a full orchestra and choir with whom we have practiced only once, mounds of research show that “living” our performance in our mind’s eye performs the same function and provides the same or improved utility as the actual physical practice of the skill.
Aaron Williamson in the book, Musical Excellence: Strategies and Techniques to Enhance Performance simply define visualization as “cognitive or imaginary rehearsal of a physical skill without overt muscular movement. It goes on to say that this practice is used to create or recreate an experience that is similar in as many ways as possible to the physical skill, event or performance.
I mention visualizing a performance with a full orchestra and choir a few lines ago because I got to experience this on Saturday as we listened to a national recording artist sing with the Akron Symphony and the Gospel Meets Symphony choir.
I am confident the soloist was not in on many if any rehearsals. This means she, the orchestra and the choir all spent time imagining what it would feel like, sound like and perform like when she joined live, most likely for the first time.
Music doesn’t change. The score doesn’t change. But the emotion, the tempo and the environment does. Being there before they were there made for an electric performance… and another tear-jerker!
To me, the operative word in Connolly & Williamson’s instructions is “experience”. And that “experience” allows for full emersion in the performance. It isn’t about just “seeing” what we want. It is about feeling or pre-experiencing our performance. It’s about living it before we live it.
It isn’t just about imagining standing on the sidelines as some superstar sings the National Anthem. It’s about feeling the emotion of getting there. It’s about reverse engineering the steps to get there and watching ourselves do what “that person”, that future person did to stand there and be overcome with joy and humility.
We are, in effect, practicing success. We are practicing what we want to do.
We are focusing on what we MUST DO to get the results we dream about. It’s about taking each step before we get to take each step. It’s a preview that primes our mind and body to take those steps with more comfort and confidence…because we already took them…many times!
Remember the fMRI picture I have shared many times that shows how the brain activates when we see something with our eyes and when we see something with our mind’s eye? It’s the same! More of the same is found when looking at activity in the auditory and motor systems involved in performance. CRAZY!
But just like anything, for this tool to work, we must practice it. You see things all the time. Your brain is wired to use this. Now it’s time to make it an intentional practice.
You don’t need 20 minutes in solitude. You need a few minutes… and sometimes just a few seconds… and a simple plan (and I’m always available to teach you and your team the nitty gritty!)
- Decide exactly what you want. You are the director of your mind movie. Make sure it looks exactly the way you want it to look…down to every detail.
- Be sure you see yourself performing at your best…confident, capable and succeeding.
- LIVE the experience. We don’t do anything that matters without emotion. Feel it, smell it, taste it, hear it and, of course, see it with VIVID detail.
- Mix it up. Watch yourself overcome and be the hero. And watch yourself dominate from start to finish. Experience the flow and the fight through. Sometimes things go perfectly. Most of the time they don’t and we must deal with the reality of pressure, adjusting, etc. This isn’t about pretending you will be without nerves or doubt or that everything will be perfect all the time. It is about responding to those with action and trust in your preparation and skill.
- Even though we must acknowledge pressure, stress, etc., be sure you ultimately see yourself performing at your best…confident, capable and succeeding.
- Keep it simple. Replay highlights. Rescript things you can improve.
Visualization isn’t hard. Making it a habit is hard. Focusing with intention on what we want to see is hard.
This is a tool we have access to 24/7. The benefits are endless. How will you start your practice and help those you lead to do the same?
Where do you see yourself? Are you in front of a symphony, in front of the board room, at the NCAA tournament, at the line in a crucial situation or at the Super Bowl standing on the sidelines?
Wherever you want to go, go there before you get there. Then get there with more confidence and preparation by using your mind’s eye to prime your brain and your body to be your best!
Manage and “live” the moments, the ones that are about to come and the ones you have!
Julie
To learn more from Julie check out her social media sites below; to contact her personally, she can be reached via email at: juliej@ssbperformance.com
SSB Performance:
Website: www.ssbperformance.com
Facebook: /ssbperformance
Twitter: @SSBMindset
Instagram: /ssbperformance