I have been working on this blog on and off all summer. There is so much to write about but it’s been hard to put into words without it being much too personal or much too vague.
I know that what I’m working on mentally is just as important if not more important than all the on snow training, work in the gym, nutrition etc.(!), so I want to share how I think about my mental prep. It’s also tough because, while it’s easy to show pictures of the skiing and the gym and everything else I’m doing, the mental training all happens without anybody seeing it.
The truth is that some of my biggest obstacles and (as a result) some of my biggest lessons have come from the mental battles I’ve had to face.
After a lot of writing and editing and reflecting, I’ve realized that there is really way too much to put in one blog. So this will only be the tip of the iceberg, and I will commit to sharing more of the mental struggles and lessons I’ve learned along the way in future blogs.
I read a quote this morning from my favorite newsletter https://jamesclear.com/3-2-1 that asked:
“What stories do you need to let go of so you can walk freely?” - James Clear
I loved this, and have actually been thinking about and working on letting go of some of my own past experiences. I also think it’s the perfect start to this blog because so much of our mindset and mood and happiness is tied up in the narratives we tell ourselves. Are you thinking about everything you do have or everything you don’t have? Are you thinking about what someone else did to hurt you or how someone else was kind to you? Are you letting a small interaction or negative experience ruin your entire day or are you feeling energized from one small random act of kindness? These are all questions I ask myself daily, because what I’ve realized is that the more stressed and nervous I feel the more negative my thoughts get. And so this daily routine helps me check in to see where I’m at and catch the negative thoughts before they spiral into something worse.
One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned from working on my mental toughness for skiing (with the help of many podcasts and books and a couple different sports psychologists) is that you’re never going to be able to stop all the negative emotions and the bad thoughts and feelings. This has been a huge realization for me because part of my problem is I get very self critical when I start to recognize how negative I’m being which isn’t productive at all! So the only way forward for me is to think about where the negativity is coming from and how to address it moving forward. This is super broad, but it has been the foundation for all my mental work.
For example, the area I work on the most, in regards to my skiing, is how to find and form consistent and genuine confidence in myself. I talked last year about how confidence comes from all different places for different people, and for me confidence comes from working as hard and smart as possible. I think this is still very true for me and I am happy to reflect on a lot of hard work the last couple of months! But there are inevitably still lapses in my confidence so what has also been helpful for me is to think back on the races where I wasn’t able to find this confidence and try to understand what went wrong in order to learn from those experiences and not follow the same mental patterns.
I found that there was always a similar pattern of events when I lost confidence in myself last year. It started with something very small: a bad feeling during a training day, a mix up with logistics, someone being late or changing the plan. Then I would overthink this small thing (usually something totally outside my control) and start spiraling down a very negative thought process. I would start thinking about all the reasons why I couldn’t succeed and all the odds stacked against me. I was talking to my sports psychologist about this and it turns out this is a very common habit/pattern that can happen in high pressure environments. It’s almost like a coping technique because you feel so much pressure, and thinking about what you need to do seems so impossible, that you create this absurd scenario in your head that makes up multiple reasons why you won’t succeed. This has components of the victim narrative as well because it is easier to create situations or excuses in your head where it’s someone else’s fault.
It sounds so irrational and self sabotaging when I write about it and think back on how it would happen last season (and it is!), but it definitely happened, and it was really hard to snap out of. So I’ve been working with on a couple of tools for addressing this (which are pretty much the steps I mention above): understanding why this happens in the mind from a chemical/biological standpoint (environment/stress), identifying where the negativity is coming from (past experiences) and being able to notice this pattern happening (self aware) and stop it in its tracks (change my internal narrative).
One thought I’ve noticed always comes up is ‘the US Ski Team doesn’t believe in me so why should I believe in myself’ or ‘my own National Team doesn’t support me and is trying to prevent me from succeeding’. Obviously these aren’t very productive thoughts to be having before a World Cup race :) But the tricky thing is that there is a little bit of truth in all of the negative thoughts I have. So as hard as I tried to push them away and deny them, they just kept coming back. What I realize now is that I do need to address the things that have happened to me and how I have perceived those events. But then I need to move on from them. As James Clear said ‘I need to leave those stories behind so I can walk (ski) more freely.’
Another important realization was that the dangerous part of a victim narrative is that you’re giving away your own power. By creating those negative narratives in my head, I was giving the people that don’t support me the power over my own success. But in coming to terms with this, I am also able to realize that as simply as I gave the power away, I can take it back. And this is incredibly empowering.
This is why the community I have formed through my ski racing is so special to me. Because on the days when I struggle to believe in myself or the negative thoughts start to creep in, I think of all the support I have received and the people that DO believe in me and I am able to find the confidence to believe in myself again.
If I had to summarize the lessons I’ve learned mentally from skiing so far it would be this blog. Accept that the bad days and negative thoughts are inevitable, figure out where the negativity is coming from and find a way to process it so you can let it go, be proactive with addressing them by working on different tools and perspective shifts, and find ways to focus on what you do have and what you can do.
Like everything I write about in this blog, this is still VERY MUCH a work in progress for me :) so I’m always open to tips, tricks and talking it out.
Flying to Europe tomorrow to prep for the first World Cup of the season in Zermatt Switzerland on Nov. 5th!
Hi Trish, I recently heard a wise piece of advise about making your dreams your goals. It is not to compare yourself with others, but when striving to be better, compare who you were yesterday, with who you are today. This story about Wilma Rudolph may be encouragement as you pursue your dreams -https://scroll.in/field/962732/against-all-odds-the-wilma-rudolph-story-beating-polio-breaking-records-blazing-a-trail. Happy trails, Laurie K
Tricia - Have a great flight (with all that gear!) to Europe. And thank you (again) for writing with honesty and deep reflection. You know those days where you read something that helps so much with the immediate thing you're dealing with? Well you hit that one today for me. Thank you! This blog post was worth the effort as you just helped me through what was looking to be a tough day that could have turned into a spiraling week. You wrote exactly what I needed to be reminded of:
"-you’re giving away your own power. By creating those negative narratives in my head, I was giving the people that don’t support me the power over my own success."
-as simply as I gave the power away, I can take it back. And this is incredibly empowering."