Let’s start with the Cycling mindset

Where would you like to be with your cycling in a year from now?

What could you achieve in a year from now and where could you be? actually let me change that…What would you like to achieve in a year from now and where would you like to be?

Having the goals clear in your mind is like setting the brain on a journey, like you would with a car sat nav, if you don’t know the destination then you can put in a lot of empty miles. We have our own sat nav and it is called Reticular Activating System or RAS for short. Your RAS filters out the non-essential messages and provides you with the information that is most important to you at the time. Ever thought about buying a car and then you see lots of them on the roads, or in our case a certain brand of bike? This is your RAS doing its job. Now for the science…

Your Reticular Activating System (RAS) is a collection of cells at the base of your brain stem. It processes all of the information that the senses create and prioritizes the things that need your attention immediately. So, as you can see this is a real tool, we have to help us, and we didn’t even know it had been doing it! How your RAS can help with goal setting. The processing powers of your RAS can help in two main ways when it comes to goal setting.

• 1. The written word- The simple act of putting pen to paper engages many of the senses. The feel of the pen in your hand engages your touch. Seeing the words appear before your eyes engages your sight. The scent of the ink, the sound of the pen scratching across the paper, and the auditory experience of saying the words in your head as you write them. Engaging your senses in this way puts your RAS on high alert. It helps to focus your mind. Suddenly all that information and opportunity that relates to your goals is now deemed ‘important’ and fed through to you.
• 2. Imagination Your mind cannot distinguish between reality and something that is vividly imagined. It only believes the messages it receives. So, that piece of seaweed that brushed against your leg in the ocean suddenly becomes a jellyfish if you let your imagination run away with you. That is why it is important to master the art of visualization. You can then use the vivid image of your dream life to convince your brain that it is possible.

Visualization 

To do this, you will need to have a clear visual in your mind of how you will feel, where you will be, and what it will look like when you have achieved your goal. Then, repeatedly visualize that same situation in your mind at least once a day. Put your passion and energy into the visualization, really feel it. If you do, your mind will begin to accept this visual as normal and achievable.

Homework

Now we know about RAS let’s put it to work and set ourselves a future destination that our own personal Sat Nav can take us to! First the written word – Write yourself a future you letter. Date it in a year from now and put it somewhere to open in 12 months’ time. The more information you can get into this the better. Questions like Where will you be? Where will you live? What will your cycling ability look like? How will you feel? Free you RAS to go out and help find these things with you, don’t hold back, remember if our dreams don’t scare us, they aren’t big enough 🙂 Second the Imagination. Let your imagination go wild, get into the future you character, enjoy seeing what it looks and feels like, you smashed that Sportive, you have the latest bike in your pain cave! The sky really is the limit!