What "Mental Talk" Do We Use When Training?

[jklunder]

Hi Everyone,

What maxims or idioms do we use when training, in order to push ourselves hard and persist?

In my own head, I say:

1. "Pain is weakness leaving the body"

2. "Hurts so good"

3. "Blast It"

4. "Everything I do now rewards me later"

5. "Push Through"

6. "The less I notice the stress and tension, the more I can pay attention and get in sync with others"

What stuff do you guys use?

 

[rodefeeh]

I was picked on quite a bit in high school. When I'm going for a PR or something similar, I say that douchebag's name that picked on me over and over right before the set. I haven't used this in a long time. So at 38, I think I'm finally getting over that f*ck, haha.

I also like the phrases "F*ck Sh!t Up" and Ronnie Coleman's "Lightweight Baby".

 

[BBiceps]

I also like the phrases "F*ck Sh!t Up" and Ronnie Coleman's "Lightweight Baby".

I came to say this, “LIGHTWEIGHT BABY”!
It sounds so much better in Coleman’s voice

 

[GreekTheBrick]

When things get hard and I shouldnt lift or practice judo or muay thai, but I do anyways, I ask myself, "what are you made of?"

 

[Sean1332]

In a sense, I meditate. Then I visualize. Before I get ready for a big squat, I'll close my eyes and just listen to the sound around me and refrain from my mind wondering. Then I shut all that out and I'll visualize every aspect of the lift. Unracking the bar, how it'll settle on my back, walking the weight out, watch the whole movement in my head, and walking it back in. Then I allow my mind to get amped and approach the bar.

 

[Hyde]

“Light weight baby!”,
“Yeah Buddy!”
“Ain’t nothin’ to it but ta do it”
“Ain’t nuttin’ but a peanut”
“Don’t be a pussy”
“Last set, best set”
“C’mon, you can do ONE more!”
“You gotta train hard!”
“Make the decision”
“You gotta want it, more than the next guy”
“Yep, yep, yep!”
“Let’s go baby!”

Sometimes I just shout, like a loud short burst. It’s a switch. Sometimes I will whack my hand on the side of my head similarly if really psyching up.

Like Sean said, visualization before big lifts is super helpful. It just works.

If I am exhausted or doubting, sometimes I close my eyes and focus on an imaginary flame. As I focus I’m able to slowly raise my level of mental arousal as I let the image build in severity until it totally engulfs me - when I open my eyes from that, it’s going down.

 

[Fabulous One]

I just visualize myself lifting the weight, just sort of like watching myself in a movie. I used to try to get all ramped up and the negative type talk seemed to have the opposite effect on me. It has to be a natural internal focus for me to really hit big weights. I have to be in the now and not putting on a spectacle.

 

[Fabulous One]

all though I have written "just one more" in some tactical places in my home gym. I also have "to be a lion you have to do lion things" written in a few places also. I also have this printed off in front of my power rack...

“The blood of your fathers has turned to water in your veins. Not your lot is it to be strong as they were. Having tasted neither life’s sorrows nor it’s joy, like a sickling you look at life through a glass. Your skin will shrivel, your muscles grow weak, tedium will devour your flesh destroying desire. Thought will congeal in your skull and horror will stare at you from the mirror. Overcome yourself, overcome yourself. I tremble, I seethe, I clench, I seize the haul.”- Yuri Vlasov

 

[BOSSMAN]

While I workout alone I'm always talking to myself. When a heavy lift occurs and the right song comes on, one of my favorite sayings is " gimmie that sh1t"!!
Yelling at the weight

That's usually when the wife pops her head in the gym and says "what's wrong with you?, your physco!!

 

[~Vision~]

When I am smashing out a session I like to put my earbuds in, hoodie up and I just get into a zone.
I look very unapproachable, that is not my intentions because I'm too focused on myself.
I don't stress the numbers,some days I'm feeling good and I'm up a few pounds on my lifts, and some days I'm down a couple pounds. That doesn't affect me, because where I am at during those reps is all that matters to me. I've had days where I just wasn't feeling it, my numbers were down a little bit, but I just stayed connected mentally and ultimately it turned out to be some of my better sessions.
If I start beating myself up inside of my head, I break things down and just think of the moment and just those reps. Not what transpired prior or what is to come with the rest of my routine but rather just that given moment.

If I'm not there in that moment during those reps than I just wasted my time.

If my head is down and I'm rocking back and forth, and my eyes are glassy or even slightly tearing up. Just leave me alone, because I'm right where I want to be.

If I had to go back 25 years and explain to the younger version of me, about this place that I need to get to inside of my head mentally, I wouldn't understand, but I would tell myself "when you do find that place, you'll know exactly what it is and what to do from there on out".

When I see new people joined a gym,or heavy people that are continuously pressing forward, or average guys that are struggling to forge forward all the while they look unapproachable and in a zone, I mentally give them a high-five because I know right where they're trying to go. Their making it happen, they are at war with their own demons!