The Glowing Edge

Tag: mental game

  • Don’t Give Your Brain to Boxing Zombies

    Don’t Give Your Brain to Boxing Zombies

    It’s been a busy week. I spent most of it on the road, driving the seven hours to Atlanta for the pre-fight press conference and photo shoot for Atlanta Corporate Fight Night. Before that, though, I scrambled madly to make sure I had all my work sent out to clients, so when I hit the road I was already a bit spazzed.

    The multiple days of shenanigans in Atlanta went fine; I drove back home, had a glass of wine and jumped in the hamster wheel to catch up — no time for workouts, barely even time to breathe. In the end, I went an entire week with no solid workouts (I did run a few rounds of steps when I got into town in order to pull the worst of the road kinks out), and certainly having never entered a boxing gym for anything other than a photo shoot.

    Your brain on fear

    So I was facing my regularly-scheduled sparring session with a fair amount of gut churn. Here’s what was going through my head. No filter, no prettification, my actual thoughts:

    • I can’t spar.
    • I’m going to get my ass kicked.
    • I won’t be able to breathe.
    • I’m fat.
    • I shouldn’t go.
    • I suck.
    • Cancel, cancel, cancel!
    • Red alert! All systems shutting down.
    • I’m not feeling so good.
    • My ________ hurts. (fill in with anything from eyelash to toenail)
    • I hate boxing.

    When I caught that last one flying past I did a double take. WTF, self? You LOVE boxing, you’re practically married to boxing, you have a fight coming up in January, and you’re writing multiple books about boxing. What is your problem, dumbass?

    The problem was that I had willingly handed my brain over to boxing zombies who promptly ate the offering and left me with a giant head sticky with brain remnants and crawling with fear maggots. (Disgusting enough for you? I got more.)

    How fear multiplies

    My single biggest problem is that the longer I’m away from the gym, the higher my fear factor goes.

    It doesn’t seem to matter how long I’ve been doing this boxing thing, I still want to hand over my rational mind and operate on terrified reflex when it comes time to get back in the ring.

    Here are some of the other issues that go into the fear factor:

    1. There are a lot of unknowns in boxing.
    2. Sparring demands a great deal, physically and mentally.
    3. Performing poorly can get you in trouble.
    4. There’s always the potential for injury.
    5. You don’t always remember what your specific goals are.
    6. An emotional setback is hard to overcome.
    7. There’s no crying in boxing! (Hey, just like baseball.)
    8. You demand a lot from yourself in boxing (or your coach demands a lot).
    9. It’s critical to “fight until the bell rings” at the end of a round. Can you make it?
    10. Your gear may or may not be in great shape, clean, or performing well.
    11. Your sparring partners are depending on you to give good game.
    12. You don’t always know who your sparring partner will be. Can you trust them?
    13. People are watching, dammit!
    Add up just a few of those, and suddenly you are out of your game. Which sucks, because the longer you’re out, the harder it is to get back in.

    What really happened

    So I took my freshly de-brained head and drove (very slowly and carefully, like a heavily sedated geriatric asylum escapee hoping to avoid the attention of the fuzz) to the gym.

    I stretched, loudly bemoaning my limber-as-a-stack-of-timber muscles, making sure everyone in earshot would be hearing my (excellent!) excuses well in advance. I got through jump rope rounds, ring slide rounds, rope slip rounds, and shadowboxing, and then the time was at hand.

    And I was fine.

    A brainless idiot, but fine.

    I did three or four rounds, starting seeing the specific things I needed to work on, and took a round off with my partner in order to do some drills, then got back in for some more rounds.

    And I drove home, mentally rolling my eyeballs at myself and feeling sheepish.

    How to avoid this mess in the first place

    I’ve written before about overcoming reluctance to train, but the zombie days are a particular challenge. Here’s my take on it today.

    Train regularly. Obviously, my main goal is always to keep my training up. Going more than two days without moving my ass off the couch is verboten. It doesn’t have to be furious interval training, but I can’t sit around and suck on Tootsie Pops while the boxing zombies lurch nearer and start to salivate over the giant slimy loops of brain I’ll soon be handing out, for free!

    Get a goal! Even if it’s just a small goal. You don’t have to trade a non-essential body part for one, goals are lying around unused EVERYwhere. For me, it was as simple as finally remembering (while doing slip rope) that I needed to explode up from a dip with a ready shot. So I worked on that.

    Keep your gear in shape and ready to use. Mine is sweaty, stiff, and stinky. I haven’t washed my mouthguard in so long it tastes like Dempsey Dumpster. But everything works. Eliminate the gear excuse in advance.

    Make a Reese’s Pieces trail. Put on your workout clothes (or underclothes) before you go to work. Promise yourself that if you just get your ass to the gym, you don’t necessarily have to spar, you can just do a good warm up and some rounds on the heavy bags. Tell yourself that you only have to do one round of sparring. Because once you do that one, you might just feel good enough to do two. And so on. Lead yourself a merry little chase, straight into your workout.

    Develop solid relationships with great sparring partners. The more you trust your sparring partners, the better your really horrible zombie-feeding days will be. Which reminds me: Thanks, Alex, for the good sparring work today, even after the boxing zombies ate my brain.

    Celebrate your wins. I’m having a giant bowl of steamed kale (which is a personal fave, and a damn fine zombie repellant), a glass of red wine, and a couple of Paleo chocolate-peanut butter balls (If you’re subscribed to The Glowing Edge you’ll get the recipe! If you’re not already subscribed, click here, get a free book, the inside story, recipes, workouts, and more embarrassing stories about boxing, monsters, and such. Yay!). And just to cap my celebration, I’m writing a post, which makes me happy even though I’m willingly exposing my grade-A idiocy.

     Your turn to spill your guts

    But not to zombies, hah! Leave a comment below and share your stories about having given your brain to boxing zombies, or how you masterfully took out a shambling pack of them with your beautiful, brutal, and efficient zombie-conquering skills.

    It means SO much to hear other people’s stories, doesn’t it? They remind us that we are not alone, that we ARE fighters, and with just the right chainsaw, we can WIN, by Buffy.

    Wait, she’s vampires, isn’t she…?

    Awesome CC image by Juliana Coutinho on Flickr

  • Getting Ready for the Next Fight: Cutting Weight and Mental Prep

    Getting Ready for the Next Fight: Cutting Weight and Mental Prep

    Next fights are always iffy, partly because it’s boxing, and also because I’m in the Masters (over 35), and female. There just don’t seem to be that many of us out there.

    I went to weigh-ins for a match a month or so ago and didn’t get an opponent, which is fairly standard in boxing. In fact, 12 of my team went, and only 6 got matches.

    This time I am a bit more hopeful, but I’m keeping my expectations tamped down. I’ll be very pleased to get the match if it does come through, but it will not be a huge deal if it doesn’t.

    My opponent weighs 125, which means I’ve been cutting weight, which is miserable, since I’m already on a clean diet and normally fairly light (142). But I’ve been managing, and I hope to weigh in at 136 if I possibly can this weekend. If she’s gained at least a few pounds we’ll be in range and the match will be on.

    I was chatting with Amy Scheer about this and told her about the weird rule in boxing (not all jurisdictions follow it) that you can’t weight in 1. Unshaven — no beard or ‘stache, boys, or 2. In jeans or pants. I told her that I plan to weigh in in my lightest ever undies, shorts, and a tank.

    To cut the weight, I’ve mostly chosen to eliminate sugars and processed carbs. No Cheetos (aaaaugh!).  Goodbye to my periodic slice of whole grain toast. Tortilla chips reduced to 6 at any given time (I love hot salsa). No popcorn with the family (they have it all the time). No bread. No pasta. Bread and pasta were already nearly non-existent, anyway. Nothing processed or canned.

    Even the sweeter fruits are gone — apples, oranges, and most bananas. Only raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, and cherries remain right now.

    I’m eating a ton of raw broccoli, almonds, bell peppers, fresh asparagus, lean meat, onion, spinach, egg whites, plain yogurt, cottage cheese with berries, almonds, smoothies…

    And I’m adding more green tea and oolong tea. I drink at least 3 cups a day now.

    I’m still fantasizing about what I want to eat after the fight. Hot fresh donuts are currently leading. (Hellllllooooo, fast carbs!)

    And I learned something new from Amy as I described my eating plan and we discussed particular food choices. In addition to choosing the right foods and maintaining an excruciatingly careful timeline of eating every day (to avoid the insulin spikes), I told her about one cutback issue I’ve been aware of and successfully dealing with this time around.

    There’s only a difference of degree between dieting and starving. When your leptin levels drop (because you’ve cut back calories, which I’m doing right now) so does your metabolism and fat-burning ability. It usually happens after a week of dieting. Leptin is doing it’s job to make sure you have enough fat and energy to survive. That’s not good when I want to cut weight.

    So I have to increase leptin levels in order to convince my body I’m not actually starving.

    Amazingly, this can be done with a whopper of a treat. It takes a week of cutting to drop leptin levels by half, but only one “overfeed” to bring them back up. So a hunk of greasy pizza, some mac n cheese, a coupla Reese’s PB cups — but only once a week, and not crazed. The point is to give your body a good dose of carbs and fat together and your leptin goes back up to normal levels.

    Amy mentioned that this was called “Carb Cycling,” which I had heard of, but didn’t know what it was. I used my formidable Google skillz and discovered she was right.

    The other thing I’ve been doing is following my normal mental prep plan.

    This really only has three steps:

    1. Envision all the women I see in the course of my day as a potential opponent.

    I look at the women in the gym, in the grocery store, at the park and everywhere, and I size them up. Rarely do I immediately dismiss any of the women I see as potential opponents. If they are three times heavier than me, I think about how I will have to be fast in order to avoid their power hits. If they look small and quick, I run through my defenses against the inside game. If they have big biceps I go over my own strengths and brace myself for a slugfest.

    This seems to really help with the shock of seeing your opponent for the very first time.

    2. Work through a round or two of boxing in my mind as I go to sleep each night.

    I imagine my opening moves, my defense, and my general energy level. I replay certain things over and over again, and make myself quick, strong, and mentally on my game. I try to go to sleep boxing well.

    3. Radio silence at all other times.

    It doesn’t help me to focus too much on the upcoming match. I just get worked up and have a hard time focusing on other things, like my full-time work, family, or the crazy eating plan I have to be on. So I maintain mental white noise on the boxing channel, which helps keep this whole event from draining energy.

    And that’s it! That’s my plan, and it’s what I’m going with.

    How do you get ready for a big event? Do you have a plan you follow, or do you just do everything on the fly?

    Images by Peter Gordon and Ravensmagiclantern

  • Overcoming Reluctance to Train

    Overcoming Reluctance to Train

    You might think that I wouldn’t have any trouble overcoming the “I don’t want to work out today” blues, as much as I train. You’d be wrong. For me it happens about once a week.

    However, I’ve been doing it long enough to have developed a few tricks to deal with my periodic reluctance to train or go get my workout done.

    1. Set a goal you can keep

    This is where it all begins. If you work out I’m guessing you have a goal in mind, even if you haven’t put it into words very clearly yet. Do that. Put it into words. Why are you packing up all your crap and heading to the gym every week? Be able to name your answer every time that question shoves its way to the forefront of your reluctant-feeling brain.

    Oh, and make it a goal you can actually achieve. My main training goal is to be in the gym three times every single week. I set it there because I know I can do that, and more. So when I actually train four times a week (which is nearly every week), I feel like I’m going a step above. I’m a rockstar.

    2. Keep your gear always packed, always in the car.

    I can work out any day of the week at any time, because I always have my gym bag packed and ready. Every time I get back from the gym I carry out the sweaty stinky stuff and go put the clean stuff in, ready for next time. There’s also a non-melty power bar of some sort in there, so that I don’t have the “I’m famished” excuse.

    Probably the nicest side-benefit of this is that I can stop at any cool new park or trailhead I happen to discover, pop the trunk, change shoes, and I’m off. Not my regular workout, but a fabulous addition which really lifts my spirits.

    3. Know your biggest excuses, and defuse them in advance.

    My biggest excuse for not training used to be the fact that I hate taking a shower in a crappy gym. The way I defused it was by visiting my all-time favorite luxury bath goods store (Hello, Lush!) and stocking up on the best soaps, shampoos, and other fragrant treats. I put them in my gym bag, and poof! Suddenly I’m looking forward to my shower.

    Now my go-to excuse is “I don’t feel like going.” For this one I offer “discounts.” Rather than my regular 30 minute cardio sprints session, I tell myself I can simply run easy for 30 minutes. Or something similar. Generally what happens is that I get to the gym, get started, and my spirits improve! I find myself rising to the bar, even though I’ve told myself I can take it easy.

    4. Give yourself incentives.

    Once in a while I promise myself one of my favorite post-training treats: a berry smoothie. These babies are better than fried donuts at the fair, in my estimation. One cup of frozen raspberries, strawberries, and blueberries, a scoop of protein powder, a scoop of creatine (on weightlifting days), and a splash of orange juice. If I have plain yogurt, I’ll throw that in too. This is my version of the Scooby Snack, and I will pretty much walk over hot coals to get it. Can you say Incentive Program?

    Another way my husband helps is by offering to meet me after my hardest boxing nights and take me out for a drink. I adore him for this, I truly do! A man and a martini can very nearly heal the world and bring about world peace in my universe.

    5. Keep it interesting.

    If I had to run on a treadmill for 30 minutes I would probably expire from misery. But tell me I have to throw sprints on jump rope for 10 minutes, do spin bike hard for 10 minutes, row for 5 minutes, and run stairs or do box jumps for 5 minutes and I’m all over it. Ta-daa! There’s your 30 minute cardio.

    6. Shorten that damn thing!

    Here’s the deal. Most of you are spending too much time in the gym. This is because you’re slouching around, watching television, trying to avoid the next set, or simply moving too damn slow. If you put some intensity into your workout you don’t need to be there for three hours. Or even two hours. Hell, you can be trained, changed, and outta there inside of an hour if you work it just right.

    Dump your endless, boring, low-level cardio jog for a series of hard sprints and recoveries in whatever thing you do — run, bike, swim, row, heavy bag, etc. You can even incorporate skipping, jumping, ladder drills or agility dot drills. Whatever it is, do it in intervals and do it hard. Recover for 30 seconds or a minute from each hard interval, and start the next one.

    Get a solid 30 minutes in and move on. Studies show that this method actually burns more calories (if that’s what you’re trying to do) than the death-by-treadmill stuff anyway. (Google Tabata workouts and read up on it if you like. Or just ask any boxer in the world.)

    7. Don’t train hard all the time.

    When I have a fight I’m training for I ramp up my workouts 7 weeks in advance. Afterward, I take it easy — I don’t ditch my training, I just relax the pace. I’m not a machine, I’m a human, and I allow myself to enjoy the ebb and flow of a healthy life.

    Nobody stays in peak condition 100% of the time, nor should they. Maintain a solid baseline, and jack it up for the important stuff. That’s what makes staying healthy sustainable.

    What are your tricks to beating the “I don’t want to work out” blues?

    Leave me a comment and tell me how you overcome your reluctance to train.

    Image by Steve Maw on Flickr

  • Shiner

    Shiner

    Okay, so yeah. It’s a shiner. And my nose kinda got in the way of a southpaw’s straight left, too.

    I did five rounds last night but wasn’t on my mental game, which seemed to glue my feet to the canvas. I could see lots of punches coming, but it was like one train seeing another train coming head-on down the exact same track and being utterly powerless to unshackle those iron wheels and get the hell out. The best I could do was barrel foward and hope that I could take more impact than the other could. There was damage involved.

    I was hungry and contemplative after I showered and got back on the road home, so I detoured into Wendy’s for a small fries — a treat I would otherwise never touch. It was 10 pm, and the flourescents were not kind. The hispanic woman taking my order looked everywhere except at my face, and after I sat down, the only person in  the place, I caught her gazing at me thoughtfully. Later the lineman glanced out as well, but when he started to comment she shushed him and pushed him back out of sight. It took me a bit to figure out what was happening.

    Given my state I felt like I held up well both in the ring and out of it, and today I have a sense of being just a little closer to the mental situation I need to get into before I hit the ring again. I’m scheduled to be in tomorrow, but I’m not wanting to take certain punches just now. We’ll see.