Working on your Mental Edge - can't imagine !

Do things that you don't want to do

That is rule number one. These are the little things and the big things. When you train your muscles, heart and lungs, later on when you race, you use that experience.  There is no like, brain work involved. It is not like, that you call on an experience during a race, that "yes I did this and this workout, with these and these splits, at this HR, so now I can go faster and tough it out". No. Your body has changed it's physiology, so now you can descend better, your muscles work more in harmony, your fibers are tougher, your tendons have more resistance and more elasticity, your joints are more bouncy, you have better quality intro-articular fluid, better electrolyte use, better carb/fat use ratio and so on and so on. You have a measurable improvement present in your system so you can perform better. 

This is why, for me, imagination work, visualization techniques, thinking about winning or battling it out, about completing and finishing a challenge will just not do he job. That is not work. It is imagining the work. It won't trigger adaptations. You cannot call on experience that you did not have. Imagine that you imagined something multiple times and it would materialize and it would become a reality. No, it won't happen, ever. What you do, is TAKE ACTION. Baby steps. Towards your ultimate goal. Visualization for me, is not laying back, going into alpha and putting images in your head. Visualization is having a goal that you created for yourself because of a personal call and you take steps towards it. Sometimes you run for it, some periods you snail crawl for it.

Action

First of all, take a cold shower in the morning, or a cold bath or a cold water swim. Most of you will stop reading here, but some of you are still curious about the why of it. Yes it is good for your circulation, for your nervous system, for your well being in general, for breath control and so. 

The most important part of the cold shower morning routine, that it makes your day start with a thing you hate doing, that lasts only 5 minutes, that you know that it gives you tremendous benefits, still you absolutely hate it, but YOU DO IT. Every day. The things that you don't want to do in life, are the stuff, that you absolutely should do first and act towards them. 

When you contracted a loan, that slowly chips away your salary every-month, that you regretted taking, you should pay it back and get the hell out of it.
When you prepare for an ultra, you need shoes, you need gear, you need supplements and training fuel, walking poles, backpack and so on. You need to do elevation gain, that might lead to car travel and sleep away. All that is money. Money, Money. I talk about this as in life, any financial problem is a giant mental enclosure. A gate. A barrier.
If you calculate, that if you did everything right and you would get rid of this loan, one month before the ultra you planned, you should do it. Forget about what ever you need for the race. You already have everything. Your brain and your body. You figure it out. You don't need anything fancy. You don't need the latest shorts and shoes. You don't need the latest hydration pack of 250€ with the 200€ carbon sticks, nor tune up races with travel and hotel expenses.
I am telling you, all the sacrifices that you make on the way, what in reality are not even sacrifices, but simply being responsible, will strengthen your mental like hell. In addition, one month before the ultra, you'll finally have a full salary, knowing that next month and the month after you'll have the same, a giant rock will roll off your mind. No more burden, but can run your race free of obstructions. 

Little things are also causing giant bonds in the brain. When you finished your dinner, you just want to read and go to bed. No. You stand up, wash the dishes, arrange the apartment, prepare your work and training clothes for the next day, have a medium heat shower, brush your teeth and then read a couple of pages and go to the bed. Morning and evening routines are the best to captivate habits and to train the mind. First thing in the morning, last thing of the day, you do stuff that you don't want to do. 

These minuscule habits, will help you at work. There are stuff that you were shoveling under a tower of folders. You stop doing that. You get the folder on top and start handling it. Even if the tower is building up, you just keep on treating a bit of it every single day. Maybe the pile will never cease to increase. It is not your fault, that your employer overcharges you. But you still chip away from it every day.
When a customer is rude with you, you handle it correctly. Instead of sending him away to go and f-himself, you respond calmly, carefully choosing your words and give him a respect. This means respecting yourself and staying at an elevated state.
There are days, when traffic is dense and on these days you are often late, so you must stay in after to catch the hours. Why not go way earlier, do some training, avoid the traffic and save a lot of time, do some light breathing, start working 15minutes earlier than everybody and get ahead of all the colleagues.
If there are issues at your work, that don't concern you, but impact you, try learning about those. It can be a printer not working, an insurance policy out of control or obsolete, a transporter always being late, a colleague getting bad treatment from the boss and you stick out for him and so on. These things over time, will increase your self reputation. 

What is happening recently with me is very interesting. When I am writing about a subject, a couple of days later I have a confirmation on it. Either from books, podcasts or blogs. Right here, I talk about doing things that you don't like. That you hate. That you despise doing. Then this morning I have listened to the podcast between David Googgins and Andrew Huberman. They talked about the anterior cingulate cortex or ACC. A partof the brain that is trained by doing things that you hate and don't want. Also they talked about it's elasticity. If you don't do those things anymore, it shrinks. There is not stop, it means. You just have to keep on doing stuff that makes you mad, that you hate doing.
Guess what. This part of the brain is responsible for decision making, cost-benefit calculation, learning, motivation, conflict and error monitoring and so on.
These are basically the functions that either can help you and make you progress throughout your training and racing, or prevent you from stepping up your game. The great thing about ultra running and especially ultra running tough events, that physical capacity and genetic pre-dispositions are out the window. Your brain comes into the picture. UTMB had been won at 19h and 50 something minutes. Imagine that because of environmental conditions, at one time, you would need 27hours to win, but you would understand this only during the race. Your training of fast running at altitude in Kenya is out the window. Your training with your lightest gear for fast moving serves you not anymore in constant -5 to -7°C. Your descending abilities and quad resistance built up will be unused due to slippery frozen ground, where precautions and smart terrain handling will bring you forward faster, than actual fast running and the risk of falling and slipping.
This is why Killian is so good in the world of running. Have you seen his videos ? I don't talk about the danger and the risks of death, the glories magnificent views and so on. I talk about that rocky, un-marked, wet, boggy, no-trail terrain, what he handles every single day. I talk about running in wind, in snow, in rain, in cold, in hot. I also talk about living in a real mountain environment. Horizontal rain, horizontal snow falling. It is harsh. He is not just a genetically gifted athlete. Hi mind has been blown to pieces and reconstructed every frecking day. Every day !

Most people imagine mountain life as something magical. Living in Boulder Colorado in a heated house or apartment with 300 sunny days a year. A couple of -5°C days, ridable roads and magical trails with loads of mountain lover athletes around.
Killian lives in Rauma, Norway. Freckin, bone churning high humidity cold weather all year around. Little sunshine. Loads of types of rain, snow and hail. It can snow mid summer. The temperature ranges for the next 10 days are +3°C to -17°C. The air is salty. Food accessibility and organic produce accessibility is not great. Nothing is like easy, glorious or magical about being here. You got to be strong in your mind daily. He doesn't live the life of a pro cyclist, being pushed around in 5 star buses, fed by Michelin Chefs and so on. He lives like a mountain man. He doesn't say no to stuff he doesn't like. He just does them. 

Do things that you don't want to do, so your brain will be lit up every single day.