The Mind Body Connection

The general rule of the thumb when doing most things is that if you don’t feel that you are ready to do something, then it should not be attempted. This article goes into the “mind” aspect of an action, and the outcome thereof.

I believe that there are two components to doing any action; the first component that needs to be present is the physical capabilities needed for a person’s body to physically and successfully carry out the back flip. In other words, your body needs to first become physically able to do a certain movement, before you WILL be physically able to perform a certain movement.

The body

A lot of people would think that I have just needlessly stated the obvious, but a lot of people still underestimate or incorrectly assume the current condition of their body. It took me months (over three months) to learn a back-tuck (and I am still trying to improve it today). As soon as I had the back-tuck under my belt, my side flip was easy to learn followed by a front flip, then b-twist, then gainer, and so on and so forth.

I had to ask myself why the relatively easy back-tuck took so ling to learn, but the harder tricks came so easily, and the answer is that I should have been spending two of those three months conditioning my body for the back flip, before actually attempting it. By the time it came to learning the others, my body had already gone through over six months of Parkour conditioning, and not just three, and so it was relatively easy for my muscles to carry our the necessary movements needed for the tricks.

If your body is not conditioned properly for a certain movement then doing the movement will only lead to injuries, which could have been avoided.

So the first of the two components is the body side of things, namely conditioning. Always make sure that your body is adequately conditioned before trying to attempt a certain movement.

The mind

The second and equally as important is the mind aspect! “If your mind aint in it then you just aint gonna win it!”

Not being completely mindful of your actions can be a result of many things and aspects, but I think that the main aspect is one of confidence. A successful movement needs to take place in a mindful state. So if you are half way round in a back flip and you suddenly find yourself thinking about the fall, or about not falling, or about guarding your head so you don’t fall, or about not extending the jump before the tuck so that you don’t fall from too high, then you will only fall on your head, for as long as you are thinking, you are not doing.

So to carry out a successful movement your mind needs to be one with your body, and in agreement with one another with regards to which muscles need to contract at which times. If you are still “thinking”, you will not be “doing” what you need to do next.

Yes, practice the move in your head over and over again before going through it, when you do the trick or the particular movement, you need to know what is going to happen and how it is going to feel, so that instead of wondering what to do next, your mind is free to just guide your body through what will happen next.
Going into a trick with no confidence is the biggest contribution to an unsettled mind. Because when you go into a movement with no confidence, you are not even thinking of the trick or movement, but only of the consequences of not doing the movement correctly. So instead of thinking about what the movement feels like, your mind is preparing your body for they fall!

I recommend meditation practices of most kinds, to help strengthen I mind. I have always thought that an athlete, who does not train his mind, is only running on half of his potential. Visualization and meditation help strengthen a mind and will therefore help you guide your thoughts when it comes to training.

A healthy, strong, confident mind, paired up with a healthy, strong, confident body, is the key to strong, injury free, practice and improvement!