See It before you do it!
Elite warriors, athletes, lawyers, and successful business leaders do it. This simple technique will prepare you for almost any situation. This simple technique is seeing it before you do it.
You will see days before a football game the team is out running plays. These plays are what the coaches believe the opposing offense will run. The purpose for this is so that the defense can get use to the plays and start to see it happening before it actually does. This is practice. Paraphrasing Emit Smith, and probably one of the reasons why he ran for so many yards, he visualize myself being successful, I see myself running down the field, breaking tackles, and scoring touchdowns.
Elite military teams do the same thing. Mark Devine has called this dirt diving, they practice over and over again in a controlled environment, adding elements of surprise where the result is a busted ego. This practice enables the teams to sharpen their skills and when it comes time to perform the mission they don’t need to think, they just do.
Attorneys will practice this as well. They will mental rehearce their line of questioning and visualize what the person on the witness stand will say. This will help the attorney have rebuttal arguments for whatever comes out of the person’s mouth. This visualizing not only prepares the attorney for the what if moments, but builds their confidence as well.
Sales people will visualize the room full of prospective buyers and they will go through their presentation. Good ones, will visualize interruptions, faulty equipment and even fire drills. This will all mental prepare the salesperson for any situation when they walk into the room.
When I use to speak I would visualize my audience and see them interacting with me in my mind. I would see them laughing at the points I wanted them to laugh and see their hands rise when I would ask questions. I would mentally prepare for interruptions like cell phones are the pair that could not wait to discuss lunch plans. These mental practices prepared me for the above situtions and for ones that I did not even think of.
When can you mentally prepare for a future activity?
Anytime, I would visualize before I went to bed, when I woke up, eating breakfast, riding the bike at the gym, sitting in the sauna, taking a shower, or if the event was major, I would schedule time each day to specifically visualize the event.
If you have never visualized a future event before you can start now. Visualize your tomorrow. What do you have planned? See yourself doing each activity in your mind today, the potential hazards, and the potential wins. See it, then do it!