High Performance Mental Training

Michelle Blasen of Blazen Systems discusses her  personal journey from the disappointment of an injury costing her a university sports career but led her down the path of sports psychology.  We discuss her work with top athletes and how to keep "your head in the game" but also how to "leave it on the field" afterwards in order to achieve balance.  In this episode, we discuss how to use the traumas in life to empower you and the power of visualization for changing our beliefs of what is possible and attainable.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:22

Hello, it's Penny Meginson from the Meginson Method, and welcome to Penny for Your Thoughts, where we discuss how our thoughts and our mindset affect our health, our happiness, and our performance. I'm joined here today by Michelle Blazen from Blazon Systems, and we're going to talk today about how to bring sports psychology and more specifically mental training into our daily life, especially for achieving our goals. So, Michelle, welcome. And I first want to say thank you for joining. And um, Michelle, why don't you got a fascinating history that kind of got you into this? And I'd love for you to share with the audience a bit more about your personal journey.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

Yeah, well, thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure to be on. So, yes, I was a competitive soccer competitive soccer player, starting at the age of six years old. And before that, started gymnastics when I was, I was three, four. So I started sports very, very young. Um, but soccer was my love. And I started playing year-round, started club when I was seven, so started traveling, different states and training very intensely around seven, eight years old. And I knew at around seven I wanted to go professional. It was like I didn't know it at the time, but I was already visualizing then. And um uh so I committed everything to that. I played basketball in the offseason um to stay in shape, and then um I ended up graduating in high school early when I was 17. I had to move out when I was 16 due to personal circumstances, and so I decided to graduate early to get to college so I could get to college ball and get one step closer to professional. Um, so I ended up moving. I originally grew up in Oregon and then I moved to California after that. And it was two weeks before official college triouts where my knee actually gave out on me. And so I had a complete ACL, MC, MCL, medial, lateral, meniscus tear, um, the whole knee just gone in a one simple turn. And that kind of sent me on this spiraling journey of personal development and discovering who I was, and it all led me to coaching. Um, so I always say that trauma, that event was the hardest thing I've been through, but it was the best thing that ever could have happened to me at that time.

SPEAKER_01 2:50

Okay, okay, and that got you into coaching. So it's interesting that you did something that was a very negative traumatic experience for you. Um turned it into something that was very positive that's really changed who you are, really, um, in terms of what you're doing with your life or the direction you thought your life would go in. That's really interesting. Let's talk more about that. Um, so a lot of the work that I do is with trauma or what I like to call micro-trauma, because I think a lot of people think of trauma as being something, you know, terrifying or something really, really awful. And often it's these little things. It could even be, you know, your parents getting divorced when you were young or something like that, that really creates, you know, a hole for you. And that's all it needs to be to be traumatic for someone and to have a really big impact in every aspect of your beliefs and how you live your life and that sort of thing. And I'm gonna say, how do we reframe that to make it more positive? So it's actually the thing that motivates us and makes us go forward. And I think that's something athletes tend to do. I mean, you work with a lot of athletes, right? So, how do they take all of those negative experiences and put it into their sport? Um, how does that work?

SPEAKER_00 4:05

I mean, you first have it's all about perspective. So, how are you going to look at it? Are you going to choose to look at it as something that happened to me or happened for me? And it's that comes with education behind it, you know, discussing, hey, yes, these things happened to you, but hey, let's look at the positive effects of it and starting to get them to see, bringing that awareness to them. Awareness is the first step, no matter what. It's just bringing that awareness to, hey, this, yes, this happened to you. You're managing it this way, whether it's with anger, shame, guilt, frustration, any of these what I call lower vibrations, which ultimately lower vibrational emotions, which are going to keep you stuck and keep you in a certain place if you don't turn to them and start to work through them. Um, so bringing that awareness around it. And hey, this is, you know, yeah, it happened to you, but you know, let's start to reframe it. And so, first it's okay, bring the awareness. Where did it happen? Why did it happen? Who was there? Start to do the healing work around it. Because first we can't move forward if we don't heal from it. And that's the hardest part, I think, for a lot of people is like, why would I face this again? Why would I turn and face this trauma and this pain all over again? But acceptance, I suppose, right? The acceptance phase, right? So it's, you know, first bringing the awareness, awareness, then the acceptance to it. And in that phase, what I have them do a lot of the times is okay, where do you want to be? And we go into this vision of feeling their future self of where they want to be and what they want to look like, how they want to feel. And then so we get into that glimpse of it, and you know, it's usually excitement, it's joy, it's peace. Um, and then I tell them this is on the other side of healing from this trauma and this pain, but you get to feel this more often, and you get to choose to feel this if you choose to face the pain, and this is on the other side of it. And that's usually for the first time, the emotional freedom that they haven't really felt before. And it's obviously a very great feeling to not feel that pain and that anger and anxiety and depression any longer. And it's like, okay, I'm willing to do this work, and then we can go in and start to do kind of like peeling back the onion of the inner work of okay, what needs to be healed? And then all those different methods of healing through trauma can be it's very, yeah, it looks very different for everyone and it has to be customized. But really, there's it's it's awareness, acceptance, and then okay, what do we need to do? What action do we need to take to start moving through this and creating those new behaviors to create those new beliefs and pathways in your brain to start tapping because it's all about emotion and those pathways thrive on emotion and um, or I should say, your subconscious thrives on emotion. So we need to make sure as we create those new pathways of the new beliefs that those actions um include the elevated emotions that they want to feel in their life.

SPEAKER_01 7:03

Yeah. So a lot of the work that I do is uh using EFT tapping and things like that. So we're trying to clear these, but it it dawned on me when uh I started thinking about sports and people that really use it and channel it to motivate them. If you clear it, then does that give you less access to being able to use it? That works. So, how do you choose? Do you want to get rid of this connection that you have to it, or do you want to use that in a certain way um to help you move forward? Um, what are your thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_00 7:36

I love that. Thank you for bringing that up. Um, I think it depends what it is. I know it's at least for me personally, it was choosing. There's, I always say forgive, but never forget. And can we reframe it in a way that it's used in a positive? So you're able to regulate your emotion and tap into it. You know, what does this actually give you? You know, what drive does this give you? And then we pinpoint that and we're like, okay, now are you able to regulate it to where you can use it to an extent, but it doesn't take over? And that's observation and emotional regulation. Um, but it again, it's bringing awareness, acceptance, healing from it from a certain extent, or at least starting to heal. Um, I think it depends on the trauma too. I think there's some things that we can completely clear. I think there are some things that are always going to stick with you, and I think that should stick with you because it make you who you are. You know, some of the traumas I've had, I absolutely love now. You know, I, you know, I've done the healing work around it and I can tap into them and I use them to coach and I use them to have more empathy. And so they can be extremely powerful once you've done the healing work and accepted them, and then it's up to you. Do you want to keep them to use them for a drive, or is it something that you want to really forgive? And I I honestly don't think you can forget ultimately, but I I don't know. That's yeah, I mean it's different for everyone. I agree with you.

SPEAKER_01 8:59

I don't think you forget, you just can um lose that connection emotionally. The yeah, the yeah. So it's do I want to have some connection to this so that I can use it in a way, or do I want to just let that go? And so you always remember, but you're just not so triggered by it, you're not emotionally connected. And so that's pretty interesting. So it takes it a step further, um, really thinking like, do I use this? Um, and and then how do I compartmentalize that to I need it? Which is probably another problem that you see in sports psychology, where um athletes that take all that anger and frustration and use it in their sport, what do they do when they go home and they're in their personal life? Um, how do you manage that?

SPEAKER_00 9:46

Because a lot of them, yeah, it's great. They can use it on the field, on the court, but then they get off and they're like, it's all over the place. And that's really why I'm doing what I am, because athletes need to be looked at as a whole. And sports psychology primarily looks at, okay, what's the problem in your sport and how do we solve it there? Whereas I believe in the more holistic view, and okay, I want to look into every aspect of your life and how is this leaking into every area? Is it your personal relationships, is it spirituality, is it finances, is it your passions? Um, so I really look at them as okay, I'm great, we're gonna figure out where you're, you know, not performing the best and we'll deal with it. But at the same time, I'm gonna dig in and do root cause coaching and figure out where this is coming from. Because ultimately, if we don't go to the root cause, right, a band-aid will only last so long. And if we want to see ultimate like sustainable success, we need to go to the root cause. And it's more than likely leaking, it's from a trauma with our mom, or it's something that happened in a relationship, or it's leaking somewhere, and ultimately that's gonna, for better or more than not, blow up at some point, especially the further they get and the more successful that they get. It tends to get bigger and bigger and bigger, yeah, until you do something about it, or it does something, unfortunately. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

So it's interesting um talking about getting to the root cause. Like I always use the onion as well, like just peeling back those layers to that root. Because I think a lot of people will stay in sort of the layers that they're comfortable talking about, and they'll make that story that they're okay talking about. Um, but when you start peeling back those layers and getting to the uncomfortable stuff, the stuff that we face, it's that's where where you really need to get that acceptance and really face it and deal with it. And and that's that's where the change and the transformation happens. So, what technique um could you um offer or teach right now to the audience that could help them to even just start thinking about asking themselves the right questions to help transform some of the things that they're being stuck with, um, decisions that they can't seem to make or just feeling stuck.

SPEAKER_00 12:03

Yeah, yeah. That's a great question. Um I think first you have to choose it. You have to choose to actually want to change or choose to take that step to figure out what's going on. And I always say take a second, if you've never done breath work or meditation, make this your first time. Doesn't have to be super long, but two minutes of breath work, something to calm you, turn on that parasympathetic nervous system, clear your mind, and then do like five minutes of meditation. It could be guided meditation. But what this is gonna do, it's gonna clear that space for you to go inward and to ask yourself, okay, what is the one thing that is stopping me from taking this next step? Or, you know, what is this recurring emotion that keeps getting in my way, that's causing an argument, or it's preventing me from playing well, or it's preventing me from, you know, moving forward in my career somewhere or somehow. We all know it. We all know. We all know this one thing that we're holding on to. And it doesn't mean that you're gonna know how deep it goes yet, but you know that first thing. And so quiet the mind, be honest with yourself. I think that's really important is be honest with yourself and have a lot of self-compassion. We all have this dark side, we all have trauma, we all have things that we aren't proud of or that we've been through that are painful. And it's okay to feel whatever you're feeling. So have a lot of compassion and you know, it's choosing that personal responsibility to do the work of okay, I'm gonna stop blaming and putting this on someone else. I used to do that a lot. I used to blame and victimize like crazy because it was easier to push it off. So it's taking that acceptance first and being okay, and I walk them through it. Like just do what I do, start to ask open-ended questions to yourself. When did this start? Where did it come from? How long have I had this? How has it prevented me from moving forward? What do I actually want? And then it comes down to your goals and what it is that you want. And does it align with that? Is feeling this way and doing these behaviors aligning with where you want to be? And if not, okay, what do you need to do? We all know the answers. It's just, but this is why coaching is so powerful because it's the other person just walking you through this, and sometimes it helps to get out of your head, but you can do this. I walk myself through this same process when I'm trying to figure out what's going on with myself. So I think that's a really it's free. It's, you know, I say easy, it's not easy, but it's easy in a sense. It doesn't take a lot of, you know, things to do it. Um, it's just sitting down and taking about 20, 30 minutes to be honest with yourself and decide what it is you want to do and if you want to heal and if you want to start to move forward. And it's a great connect technique to do with clients as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

That's great. Um, so how I I do a lot of work with I'm a physiotherapist myself or a physical therapist. Yeah. Whether I'm in the States or in Europe, what to say. Um being a physical therapist, um, I like taking these ideas, um, all the coaching and trying to help uh patients get over uh chronic symptoms that they have, um, chronic injury sorts of things, and really delving deeper for those sorts of things. How can um how could you suggest um other osteopaths or doctors use these methods um to help? Um do you have any suggestions?

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Yeah, um I want to always give this complicated answer, but it's really so simple. It's really looking into the relationship that you have with your client. How much trust and rapport do you have with them? And if you don't have a lot, make that an effort, make that your number one thing to build that trust and rapport with them. Because the more that you have that with them, the more likely you can start to dig in and ask these deeper questions of where this pain, whatever it is, is coming from. And a lot of the times, we all know if it's pain from an injury or it's um an issue that's more physical, right? But if it's kind of a nagging pain that's sitting there and it's numbing, nagging, that's usually a sign that it's an emotional trauma that's stuck in the body. So pay attention to your, you know, your clients. What how do they describe the pain? How do they describe what's going on in their body? Is it, you know, it probably is something physical, but you know, are you noticing that it's flares up with certain triggers or it flares up at certain moments in their life when they're having conversations with somebody or they're doing a certain movement? These are all little signs that you can start to, you know, keep a checklist in your head of, okay, this might be emotional trauma. This might be something that you know they're holding on to and it's literally sitting in this place in their body and it needs to be released. I don't know how many times I've heard like people go in and they have fascia release and they just start bawling because that's where they're holding on to a trauma. And so I think it's important to really care for your clients, you know, sit there, listen to them, empathetically listen, and um pay attention to the words that they're using, their body language when they talk about their pain. Um, and you can start to get clear signs of okay, this is probably something more physical, or this might be actually something deeper or something emotional going on. And it doesn't mean you have to say a lot of words, it's just holding that space for them. A lot of times, my most powerful sessions, I don't do anything, I'm just holding that space. And I might ask one or two questions, and it's just them like being able to freely express themselves and let all this come out. So that can be really powerful and sometimes release pain. I I've done it myself and I've seen it in clients too.

SPEAKER_01 17:37

So hopefully that I think that's that communication is such an important part of it. Sometimes it's just getting it out, being able to just talk about it or cry about it and just get and that's all that needs to be done. And they might not ever talk about it again, but you'll see that there's a change and um they uh have a positive uh response from that. And you don't really have to do anything but ask a few questions and then leave the space for them to just talk and um and say whatever needs to be said. And I agree. I think that's um, and I think sometimes in healthcare uh when someone has a chronic problem, um, we're so busy trying to find a diagnosis that we don't really ask these questions because we don't think it's the um our area of expertise, so we don't talk about it at all. Um, and I mean I'm always surprised by how many people have um slight depression or my, you know, very minor depression, but they're still not asked any questions about what's going on, you know, what has gone on this past year or what was going on at the time that these symptoms arrived, and you know, these sorts of questions. Um peeling back the layers of the onion. And so yeah, thanks for bringing that up. And and I think it is important because I think a lot of times therapists think, well, I I wouldn't know what to do with that, so I wouldn't ask. It's not really, you know, or I'm just here for the you know, back pain or whatever. Um, but it is important to um just scratch the surface and allow the space if uh they feel comfortable doing so. And so yeah, I think that's great.

SPEAKER_00 19:22

I think that, and that's why having a network is so powerful too. Like I have other psychologists and therapists, and I know when I'm out of my scope or like it requires different profession, that's why it's great to work with these other individuals because they can do their specialty, I can do mine, and it's just that much better for the client. And so I'm I see that it's slowly becoming more popular than it used to be. Um, this networking of different professions. And I've seen uh I've worked with a few clients who had a therapist and I did my work, and it was so great for the client. And it you know, I could let them do their their specialty, which helped me a lot, and then I was able to do mine, and she brought what we did, and it was just very effective. So I would say be open to networking and using other professionals to help your clients as well, because it can really help them. Yeah, yeah, a real holistic approach, yeah, all around.

SPEAKER_01 20:17

Can you think of a particular client that you've worked with and where you had some great results that would be interesting for our audience?

SPEAKER_00 20:25

Yeah, there was two I thought of one more general population and one for an athlete, depending on where we want to go. But one of the most interesting ones was um a client I had that was a smoker, and she had been smoking for seven years, and she was young, she was only 25. And um, I asked her like how long she'd been smoking, and she wanted to quit, and she tried several things. She was even on a medication to quit. And you know, I asked her why she wanted to quit. We went into the why and everything, and I just my intuition was like there's something more, there's something deeper with this. And so we actually started going inward, and I think I was like, there's a trauma attached to your smoking, and she was like, What? Like, no, and I was like, okay, so we like kept working and she was great, she was very open-minded. Um, but I had her start doing meditations and start going back to her time when she started smoking when she was around 17 or so. Um, and she realized that there was so much trauma with her dad and her parents, and specifically with her dad. And there was one particular incident that she had kind of blocked out. And then I had her go back and explore that. So I call it like younger self meditations, actually going back and going into your younger self and feeling that incident all over again, you know, made sure she was open to this. Um, but she found the exact emotions and triggers as to why she turned to smoking. She even went to the memory of when she picked up that first cigarette and all the thoughts and emotions that were going on with that. And we actually did a healing process with that, you know, actually hugging her younger self and, you know, forgiving herself and having compassion and telling her, like, you don't have to do this anymore. Like, I love you. Thank you for surviving this long and doing these things to survive. And from there, on top of the anchors that we created for the habit, because of course it was, you know, naturally she was addicted because she'd been smoking for so many years. We were doing things on top of that, but combined with the emotional, mental, emotional, even some spiritual healing work around it, she was able to quit within four months of us working together. And it was just the coolest thing. Not only did it bring so much healing, but she also was able to quit this habit. And I thought that was really cool to like be a part of and very humbling to be a part of as well. Um, but just another showing another example of how you know a lot of things that we do now, a lot of these habits that we have, were created out of survival mechanisms for ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 23:01

And it's getting down to our roots, the root cause of why you're smoking is to the root.

unknown 23:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:08

Always. Exactly. Whether it's over eating, snacking at midnight, smoking, whatever it is, there's always some root cause. And it's usually the same cause for all of our bad habits. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:28

Yeah, so um this was really cool. Um, so we started working together, and at the point where we started, she was about, she's she's a tennis player. Um, she's about 600 in the world. And about a year, year and a few months, she got climbed to the top 200, which was amazing. And a lot of that was due to routines, meditations, visualizations, uncovering subconscious beliefs and rewiring, creating those new pathways in her brain of what she wanted to feel and think. Um, but it was interesting that it was in January, February about this year, right before COVID hit, um, we were on track to get into the US Open, pretty much all the Grand Slams this next year. And um there's a few tournaments, and she just she would get to a certain point and then lose. And it was this repeated pattern. And I brought it up to her. I was like, okay, we get to here, and then you always lose out. And she's like, Yeah, I don't know. It kept her and her coach were like chalking it up to just the players, whatever. But at the same time, she had the skills to break past that 200 mark. And long story short, we did some digging and found that this root cause of her actually sabotaging herself from winning these tournaments and breaking that top 200 was actually belief tied to all the way back in her childhood with her mom of worthiness, and that there was this belief that was put upon her that if you're rich and famous, you're bad. And so that was one of them. And knowing that subconsciously breaking into the top 200, right? It's gonna be sponsorships, you're gonna be known, you're in all the grand slams, more money's gonna come in. She had this fear, it all comes down to fear, but underlying fear of actually breaking to that point because it was deemed bad growing up. And then it was also we found one very traumatic event when she was about 14, tied with her mom again, um, that caused her choking right before winning. Like she would get to finals, and then it happened right. That choking happened right there. And it was because this very specific event happened when she was 14, about to win a huge event. And her mom yelling, there's a lot of shame. Don't want to get into too much detail, but it was all tied to that. And then realizing it, it was all this anger, shame, um, judgment came up. And it was like, that's what you've been bottling, and that's what you've been like using. Yes, it's gotten to this point, but now it's sabotaging you because you know, subconsciously you're not allowing yourself to go further because of these things. So yeah, yeah, yeah. It's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

That's really interesting. I think self-sabotage is something we see a lot, and I even look at entrepreneurs, people that are trying to set up their own businesses and that sort of thing, just as you're getting um to that point where you know success is gonna happen or the business is finally going to happen. Um that's when they start to sabotage. It's like you're so close, and yet um you end up creating this whole self-sabotage to keep it from happening because of fear, and it's usually fear of failure. And we see that a lot. And so um fear of success. That was one for me. Exactly. Um, money issues, just like you said. I think a lot of people, um, unless you really like you were saying earlier on in the show about just being honest with yourself and just sitting with yourself and thinking about where what the root cause is and peeling back those layers, I think taking the whole step and thinking about what your attitude is about money, um, being really honest about your upbringing and what that was like, because I think a lot of people, if they came from humble backgrounds, it's really hard to break through that because there's this whole mindset about money that might not necessarily be a positive one. And unless you ask yourself and you're really honest about it and analyze it, um a lot of us, I think, have a negative view that was placed on us. Um, and it might not necessarily be your own belief, but it was just the belief that was around you that creates that self-sabotage where maybe you feel like you're not going to be accepted by your social circle in the this point in time because you're breaking out of that and becoming something different. And so um, I think people self-sabotage because of those sorts of things. It's really interesting.

SPEAKER_00 27:51

Money is um, it's a good point that you brought up. Money is a really big one. That's one of the sections I work with them on. Money mindset is huge, yeah. Um, yeah, yeah, it's a big big one for a lot of people.

SPEAKER_01 28:05

And little tips that you could give to our listeners um who uh might be dealing with some of these issues like fear of failure, fear of success, money mindset issues, um, and little tips before we go.

SPEAKER_00 28:20

Yeah, let me um let's see. When it comes to money mindset, uh, I love what you just said. Um, are these beliefs yours? And how do you react to money? Um, I always work with this with clients. The first step when it comes to money awareness is are you aware of the money coming in and out? And then if you are, are you grateful for it? Gratitude is the highest emotion that we can have, and it really changes your perspective and like what can happen day to day for you. And so I actually have them, as corny as it sounds, I want you to be grateful and say thank you every time money comes in and every time money goes out, even if you're paying a bill, you're paying a credit card, you're paying on debt. I am so grateful for this debt because at some point this really helped me. I needed this credit card for something, and I'm so grateful that it was available to me. And I'm so grateful I can pay this now. And that can be really hard for some people. That was really hard for me to do at first when I was working on my money mindset. So I would say start being really grateful for all the money, everything that you're paying, and everything that's coming in. Um, and then you can go a step further and start to ask yourself where these money beliefs came from. Like you said, are are these mine? And how do I view people with money? Do I see them as bad? Do I think that money doesn't grow on trees? That was saying that I grew up with money doesn't grow on trees, or there's never enough. If you're constantly repeating to yourself that money is bad and there's never enough, you're never gonna bring in more money and you're never gonna be able to use that money for good. You're probably it's money is not bad. Maybe we can get into it. Money is just a tool, it's just energy. It's the people behind it and beliefs and emotions behind that money is what makes it good, bad, a greater impact, not used for anything. So it's really up to you what you want to use it for and what you're putting out there, your belief in it. Um, money's one we could go into for a while. So it's start with those.

SPEAKER_01 30:17

Um, um, so going back to performance, um, when we think about our uh how mental training can help, I think to summarize, it's really giving yourself that time to think about um what is holding you back, maybe, and being honest with yourself, giving yourself that space to think about what um limiting beliefs you have and where those beliefs come from and are they really yours? And then talking or taking that next step to thinking about how you view money and other aspects of your life and that sort of thing. Do you have anything else to add? Um before we have to go, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:57

Seek out like resources, you know, read a lot of different things, listen to podcasts, listen to different people because you learn a lot of different techniques and ways people have processed their emotions and healed from certain things that might really resonate with you, and then you can apply. And then when you're ready for that next step, get a support system. Whether it's somebody in your house, it's a good friend, it's a coach, whatever it may be. If you really want to start digging deeper in this, like definitely reach out and get that support system and accountability to help you through it because it can be really difficult, and we're not meant to do this work alone. We're really not. There's a reason why there's so many of us, and so many of us with different skill sets and abilities, we're all here for one another. I have coaches, I'm a coach, I have coaches, so you know we look at these top athletes and and all the athletes have a number of coaches, you know.

SPEAKER_01 31:45

So that's that's great advice. Yeah, thank you so much. Thank you. Um thank you for listening until next time.