The Ultimate Mind-Body Workout

Maximize your sports performance and tone both your mind and body with four techniques the pros use.

At a tennis tournament last summer, my father, a 57-year-old computer programmer, was crushing his opponent. He focused entirely on the ball, and looked forward to it coming back so he could hit it again. As the match progressed, however, he lost his concentration. He started thinking about work, about where to eat dinner, about everything but that ball. Suddenly the match was even, so he began to scold himself for his lapse in attention. He tensed up and played even worse. When it was over, his opponent--whom he'd whipped before and should have beaten again--had won the match.

As my father's story illustrates, athletic success isn't just about moving your body skillfully. Whether you're facing an opponent on the tennis court or walking two miles on a treadmill, success depends largely on your ability to engage your mind and keep it focused.

"Our performance is a direct reflection of how well we contend with our inner issues and self-doubts," explains Jerry Lynch, Ph.D., co-author of Working Out, Working Within (Tarcher/Putnam, 1998) and director of the TaoSports Center for Human Potential in California. Fitness is a mental as well as a physical pursuit, and many people, like my dad, can benefit from mind-body training to keep them on track. This guide introduces you to four methods--relaxation, imagery, self-talk, and goal-setting--that will help you conquer the inner issues or self-doubts that hinder your own fitness routine. It doesn't matter if you're a yoga enthusiast, fitness walker, or marathon runner--each method has something to offer no matter how you exercise. These techniques have the power to focus your mind when you're distracted, increase your motivation, and perhaps even lower your blood pressure.

Although the techniques are described separately, they work best when used together. For example, beginning with a relaxation exercise helps clear your mind for an effective session of mental imagery, Keep in mind that these techniques--like fitness activities--take practice. "The traditional mind-body benefits take time to achieve," says Michael Youssouf, manager of trainer education and advancement at the Sports Center at Chelsea Piers in New York City. But once you learn them, you'll wonder how you ever worked out without them.

TECHNIQUE 1: RELAXATION

What It Is: Relaxation methods clear your mind and loosen your muscles by easing tension. They include breathing exercises, meditation, progressive relaxation, and yoga.

How It Helps Your Workout: Sports are full of potentially stressful events, from teeing off first in your foursome to racing against an old rival. When we're stressed, our bodies react with the primitive survival mechanism known as the fight-or-flight response. Metabolism, heart rate, and blood pressure rise, and blood flow to the muscles increases by 300 to 400 percent, preparing us to run from danger or fight our foes. Although this response is well-suited for survival, it doesn't always help sports performance.

The opposite of fight-or-flight is the relaxation response, which Herbert Benson, M.D., founding president of the Mind/Body Medical Institute at Harvard Medical School, first studied in the late 1960s. Benson found that when subjects calmed themselves by meditating, their metabolism, heart rates, and blood pressure all decreased, while slow alpha brain-wave activity increased. "Immediately after you elicit the relaxation response your mind is quieter--less static, less noise," Benson says. You're better able to concentrate on your fitness routine.

With all relaxation methods, your muscles relax, too. This is good for your athletic performance because tense muscles make it tough to produce the fluid motion needed for sports. In fluid motion, one muscle engages while the opposing muscle relaxes. "But when you're tense, the muscle that's making the motion is tight, and so is the opposing muscle," says Judy Van Raalte, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology at Springfield College and co-editor of Exploring Sport and Exercise Psychology (APA Books, 1996). "So you're almost fighting your own muscles to move."

After you've relaxed, however, you don't want to stay completely limp and empty. "The balance is for the muscles to be relaxed, but for the energy and the mind to be intense," says sport psychologist Jerry Lynch.

While relaxation can reduce mental and physical tension immediately, long-term changes occur only after weeks or months of practice. Research shows that the daily practice of relaxation techniques can reduce your body's reaction to stress hormones, not only while you're working out, but throughout the day. The techniques may also cause an overall reduction in your blood pressure. (Your doctor may need to adjust the anti-hypertensive or anti-anxiety drugs you take, Benson says.) And when you combine relaxation techniques with other mind-body tools, such as imagery or self-talk, the effect is even stronger.