Do Not Trust Your Mind by Caryn Nath

Most of 2010, I was on the "injury reserve list " due to a hamstring injury. What I discovered during that time is that injuries are not that fun and they test your mental fortitude, just like training can. Starting this season, I decided to take things slower to build my fitness back up and do more mid-late season races. During my injury, the one sport I that didn't bother me was swimming. Go figure. As a result, I decided that perhaps this was the time to get some lessons and become as efficient as I could in the water.

In January 2011, I started my first swim lesson. To my surprise, I was not as bad as I thought I was. I was told that I would have to work on a few things, like kicking too much (unlike most triathletes, I love to kick and hate to use my arms) and letting my left arm be lazy, but there was hope. I will not lie, it is hard to correct bad habits. The first couple of months every time I did my swim workouts, I was mentally exhausted. I was focusing so hard on having correct form, I barely could complete the workouts.

When I discussed this with my swim coach, he told me I was analyzing my form too much. My response was, "I feel like I am crossing the center line, that I am not finishing my stroke, that I am not rotating enough, etc." He had me swim a couple of laps and imparted these words of wisdom, "you cannot trust your mind." My initial thought was, "WHAT???!!" Then, I thought about it, and he was right. Sometimes when I make something a focus, like learning to swim efficiently, I add pressure on myself to see results quickly instead of trusting in the process and letting things come together naturally.

Once I really accepted that what I think I am doing during my swim workouts may not be what I am actually doing, it took the pressure off. Today, I noticed that I am more efficient than when I started in January. So, maybe there are other areas of my training where I need to think about not trusting my mind.