Athletes: How To Create Your Playlist For Unstoppable Performance
/Do you feel and think negative and unhelpful things before a competition, like anxiety, nerves or self-doubt? Lack motivation before training? Just don’t feel you’re in the mood to really push your limits in training and competing?
Music is one of the most powerful tools at your disposal to cue positive thinking and feelings. It changes your mindset and mood in an instance!
Here’s how you can harness its power and create a playlist for unstoppable performance
1. The Extraordinary Unkown Power of Lyrics
Did you know the LYRICS of a song could SABOTAGE or ENHANCE your performance?
The WORDS you HEAR change the way you FEEL!
If you're not pushing your limits to the max in training or competition, it could be your playlist (or lack of).
Music is EPIC for changing how you feel - whether you want to squeeze everything you have left in training or get into the best competition mindset.
Pro tennis player Naomi Osaka listens to music before a tennis match to reduce performance inhibiting anxiety. Ex-pro swimmer Michael Phelps listened to music before racing to reduce distractions and get into the zone.
But most athletes don't realise the very song that makes them feel awesome, could actually be sabotaging their performance.
The lyrics of songs send subliminal messages to your brain, so if Eminem is rapping about collapse, COLLAPSE is the message being received by your brain, which isn’t helpful when you want to run as fast as you can.
I've had so many athletes knock their performances out of the park once they've overhauled their playlist to ONLY include songs that have POSITIVE, POWERFUL, PERFORMANCE ENHANCING LYRICS and BEATS.
This means the words can only be positive, productive, powerful, life and performance enhancing lyrics like;
“Work it, Make it, Do it, Makes us Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger” - Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger by Daft Punk
“I'm breaking in, shaping up, then checking out on the prison bus. This is it, the apocalypse” - Radioactive by Imagine Dragons
“He was big and strong, in his eyes a flaming glow” - Rasputin by Boney M.
“They keep watching (they keep watching), Keep watching, Feels like the crowd is saying, Gimme, gimme (more), Gimme (more)” - Gimme More by Brittany Spears
So if you want to level up your performance, check out the lyrics truly are performance-enhancing.
2. The Power of the Beat
Listening to music exercises your brain in a unique way that changes the way you think and feel.
Linked to the brain’s reward system, when you hear your favourite song, your brain releases dopamine, which is a similar response to when you experience food or sex!
Research continues to show just how powerful music is:
Certain beats actually help those with motor disorders, such as Parkinson’s disease, walk better (than without music)!
Helps you remember things. Our ancestors used songs to help them remember things including specific locations and routes, like to a water source.
Changes how you process information and listening to especially happy or sad music, it alters the way you see the world.
3. Music is a Powerful Mood Changer
A few years ago I was celebrating New Years Eve in Quebec, Canada and all of a sudden they played Bonkers by Dizzee Rascal. The Canadians had no idea what had hit them, but this song gave me such a high and I still knew all of the words, despite not listening to it since I was 19 dancing in Soho, London!
This is because different songs, artists and music genre activate and change personal thoughts, emotions and feelings.
Meaning you can transform and enhance your mood, feelings and mindset by choosing songs or playlists that evoke a unique emotional response.
So by intentionally designing your pre-training and competition playlist, you can choose what moods, feelings and mindset you activate that will empower you to take your performance to the next level.
4. How to use music to enter your optimal pre-training and competition mindset
Before a competition, you often see medal and champion hopefuls with headphones on, listening to their intentionally designed playlist for optimal performance.
Over the years, world-class athletes develop tried-and-tested playlists to enable them to enter their ideal mindset for peak performance.
Their music enables them to more easily enter their competition mindset, increasing feelings of optimism, certainty, positivity, belief, confidence, power, strength and more performance-enhancing feelings - despite their external environment, whether it’s raining outside orthey’re about to compete in the most important race of their life.
In 2005 swimmer and world’s most decorated Olympic athlete Michael Phelps revealed he always listened to music that helped him relax and get into his own world until the last moment possible.
You can see a list of songs here that athletes use in the London Olympics 2012 and Canadian athletes use in the Rio de Janeiro Olympics 2016.
5. How to Create your Playlist for Unstoppable Performance
Deliberately develop your Unstoppable Performance playlist by testing out different songs that trigger the thoughts and feeling you desire.
Ask yourself these questions;
What mindset do I want this playlist to help me enter?
What feelings do I want to activate?
Does this song evoke positively powerfully those feelings and thoughts?
Does this song make me feel energised, sad, calm or focused?
What songs remind you of strength, power and performance?
What songs elicit strong feelings and emotions - what songs inspire, motivate, energise, focus and/or calm you?
Do you have a theme song that captures the essence of your competition?
Turbo upgrade #1: Keep your playlist on shuffle. Randomness in music is also associated with increased levels of dopamine.
Turbo upgrade #2: On repeat. Having said that, a great way to get into flow state DURING trainng and/or competing is listening to one song on repeat.
What’s your favourite song to tune into before competitng and/or training, share it below!
You can find my playlist below or by searching on Spotify ‘Adelaide’s Unstoppable Performance Playlist’ .
