How Positive Affirmation and Meditation May Improve Performance
Posted on April 15, 2015 by David Hester, One of Thousands of ADD ADHD Coaches on Noomii.
Examples of how athletes and Buddhists use affirmations and meditation to increase performance. The great thing is, anyone can do it.
Some are unaware of their strengths and weaknesses, even when prompted. Negative phrases such as “I can be such an idiot”, or “I am not that smart”, will result in negative consequences. Inferring this message and subsequent programming into the subconscious may be harmful. What separates functional people from exceptional people are their attitudes about themselves, and this is where positive resonance and affirmations come into play. Affirmations are a form of words used to encourage and shape the mind and views on a particular subject. Affirmations are used to increase self-concepts and rationalization. The purpose of these constant explanations (and rationalizations) is to maintain a phenomenal experience. And the experience of the self—self-conceptions and images – as adaptively and morally adequate, that is as competent, good, coherent, unitary, stable, capable of free choice.
The main benefit of positive affirmations is that it applies to any and every aspect of your life that you wish to improve. The benefits can include your career, health, relationships or finances. There are other benefits to utilizing positive affirmations for the subconscious mind. People who constantly affirm their minds with positive words and thoughts have stronger and more active muscles. On the other hand, if you give free reign to negative thoughts you will find yourself often feeling tired. Affirmations are similar to futuristic thought, for a business owner to say ‘ I Am successful ‘ and two years down the line own a multifaceted professional organization is no fluke. The culprit is words in the form of affirmation. It’s similar to putting out mental pictures and focusing on them, even meditating on them. The most commonly used term for affirmations is "I Am”. At times, we have difficulty dislocating “I Am” and normal statements, such as tired, bored, scared, useless, and weak. Here is an action item that will help put things into perspective. How long can one go without saying I Am Sorry? Acknowledging thoughts and words for what they are allowing you to gain control over your mind, quieting the monkey mind and developing insight. The practice of meditation or reaching meditative states, comes to fruition by using deep concentration on the breath or mind and body. Within the Buddhist tradition, concentration is also highly valued. But, a new element is added and highly stressed: the element of awareness. Buddhist meditations are aimed at the development of awareness, using concentration as a tool toward that end. Mediation has spread throughout the planet, as of late it is becoming a staple in western culture. The practice of meditation is linked throughout different religious groups, such as; Hindu, Sufi, and Christianity. In our stressful and perhaps, swift moving society, professionals have found a need to adopt meditation. Meditation is a way to bring the mind to stillness giving the user an internal balance, mental connectedness, and acute awareness. All of which may help the increase individual performance. Practitioners have shown meditation, helps to reduce anxiety levels, making the mediator calmer, less worried and possible more confident. Relaxation and the easing of mind may be helpful in almost any undertaking. Harvard psychologists showed that even novices who had learned to meditate for the first time that day in the lab were less anxious after a stress inducing film, and recovered from it quicker than non-mediators. Meditation has been proven to ease the mind, clear moods, invigorate, and inspire. The prolific use of meditation has reached all professional groundwork. Athletes like Tiger Woods, Shaquille O’Neal, Pete Sampras, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, incorporate meditation into pre-game routines.Abdul-Jabbar augmented his practice of yoga and martial arts with meditation to relieve pre-game stress and improve performance. On April 5, 1984, he scored his 31,420th point, to become the NBA’s all-time scoring champion, a record he still holds as of this writing and for the foreseeable future. Mindfulness meditation improves cognition. It’s time for you to take your skills to the next level. There is no need for mastery status to wield results. Even a novice can create an opportunity to increase productivity, skill, and capacity. The implications of effectiveness will manifest when the professional takes into account the practical use of this sublime tool.
