The Baseball Observer - May/ June 2016
18
Be Realistic
The best imagery is the most realistic. So if you’re going to visualize yourself squatting 405, go through your pre squat routine, putting on the plates, tightening your belt, smelling the rubber from the weights, and walking the weight out, before you even get to the actual lift.
If your current squat max is 315, also don’t visualize yourself squatting 900lbs. To get the benefit out of this technique, you need to recreate the events in your mind exactly how they’ll happen in real life. The same for sports, if you’re playing high school basketball, visualizing playing in the NBA playoffs isn’t going to have the impact you want.
Go Slow and Control Your Thoughts
At the beginning, it’s important to go slowly through your visualization technique. Although it sounds simple, many times insecurities will play out in your imagery, such as getting pinned underneath the weight, a false start off the blocks at a track meet, missing an important layup.
When going slow, it’s easier to rewind this mental imagery and play it back until you have it perfect. When visualizing something like a deadlift or a squat, make sure that your form is in check and everything is as tight as you would want it to be when actually doing the lift.
Maintain Consistency with Your Practice
It wouldn’t be effective to only lift weights once per week, and it’s not ideal to only use imagery techniques now and then. However, it can often be daunting to dedicate an hour to sitting down and visualizing.
The solution to this is to use the 30-60 seconds between each set to visualize your next, final, or PR set, depending on your goals. Additionally, if you find that bench is a strong point, but you’ve been struggling with your deadlifts, arm development, or losing the last bit of fat around your waist, use the breaks between your chest day to visualize resolving the problem area.
Imagery should be used 3-4 times per week for best results. And honestly, there isn’t really any such thing as overdoing it. Mastery takes time, so put in the work.