The True Power Of Positive Self Talk

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Have you ever said to yourself during a workout: “I can’t do this exercise. This is too hard. This weight is too heavy.”

Well, I’m sorry to say but whether you say you can or you say you can’t, the fact of the matter is, in both cases you are right and you will then set out to prove yourself right. Confused?

Recently I had two clients experience massive breakthroughs all because of this exact phrase and here’s what happened.

But before I go on I want to make a profound statement. As an exercise professional I have never in my 10,000 odd pt sessions asked a client to do an exercise that I believed they were physically incapable of doing. That would just be insane and a great way of running my business into the ground. So with that safely tucked away let me explain the True Power Of Positive Self Talk.

On two separate occasions just recently I had clients who were experiencing a bit of difficulty in completing a exercise set. Both of them kept repeating to themselves, either out loud or in their head, “This is too hard. I can’t do this. It’s too heavy.”

Given that the two clients had huge negative talk issues going on, I sought to get them to change what they were saying to themselves in their heads. For one, we almost ended up in tears. For the other we got there quite quickly. In the end though, both were able to change their self talk from the negative to the positive and guess what happened? Yep you guessed it, not only were they able to complete the exercise without any difficulty, but both were surprised at the ease at which they did.

You have no idea the power of positive self talk is until you experience a massive breakthrough such as these two clients did.

While I don’t profess to understand the exact mechanics of how the brain and the mind work, what I can tell you is this. No matter what your self talk is telling you, your sub-conscious mind has this uncanny ability to make true what it said to itself. It’s almost like it’s got a point to prove and so it goes all out to prove itself correct.

I didn’t change the exercise at all to make it easier for either my two clients. Nor did I reduce the weight or the reps. All I got them to do was change what they were saying. I asked them to stop saying, “I can’t do this. It’s too heavy.” I asked them to say, “I can do this, just one more.”

Here’s my point. Whatever you say in your head, your mind will set out to prove yourself correct. I’ve experienced this hundreds of times during workouts with clients. I’ve seen it happen on the rugby field more times than I’d like to recall.

We’ve even taken to imposing a small fine on our clients for negative words spoken in the studio. $2.00 every time you say the words, “I can’t”, “Its too heavy”, “It’s too hard” and “I’ll try”.

So, change your self talk to positive optimistic thoughts (P.O.T.S) and see the world through a different mindset.

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