You know that feeling, right? When you feel like you have hit a wall and everything feels like it has to be forced. We often think of this as a slump. One thing is for certain, if you have not hit one before, you will at some point in your life. Slumps don’t just happen overnight, they happen over a period of time until which point it begins to become visible to the mind. Slumps often appear to happen all of the sudden but they don’t. What you do with yourself during a slump has a direct correlation to how long you will sit in a slump.
What do you usually do when you hit a slump?
Do you get irritated? Maybe your self-talk goes south or you feel discouraged…as if it is not worth all the hard work. This is not where you want to pull the eject cord. A part of life is having problems so in order to live, we must face them, not run from them. There is power in you so great that you can overcome this.
So how do you overcome a slump?
First, you must tell yourself that slumps don’t really exist. You heard that right! Slumps really don’t exist. It is not like you all of the sudden forgot how to swim or bike. It is your emotional state in which is triggered by not performing to expectations, most likely your own. What you focus on you create more of and when in a slump, you obviously will spend a ton of mental energy thinking about the slump. This can cause loads of stress and anxiety. When our stress levels or anger gets too high, the part of the brain used for problem solving is turned off which leads to the inability to “think your way out of it.” By recognizing you have a “slump” , you are really living in the past. The past is place in which no longer exists and a place in which you no longer have control of. That time period is over and you are burning your thoughts of the past in your present state. You can only have one thought at a time and if you are spending that thought thinking of the past, you will continue to live in your “slump.” Poor performance happens anytime we live in our past or in the future. Peak performance can only be had by living in the present moment.
Things you can do to rid yourself of the slump:
- Breathe! Just relax.
- Go back to the basics by focusing on Process Goals. Stop placing pressures on yourself from outcome goals (pressure cooker!) - Click here for more info!
- Focus on the positive comments, do not allow negative comments to creep into your mind
- Work on your internal confidence (click here for the link) especially the positive self-talk
- Do not force things, trying too hard will certainly lead to bad outcomes.
Nothing physically has changed during a slump, what has happened is your mind has taken a dive south and where the mind goes, the body follows. No matter how bad things get, never QUIT, never GIVE UP. Keep your chin up and follow along with the steps above.. You got this!