Ever wonder if there is an ideal way to prepare for volleyball practice and training sessions? Is there a way to get yourself in the right mindset to play your best?

Everyone knows they can play volleyball better than they actually do.

Even if you play great, I bet you still think you could be an even better volleyball player.

Physical practice and physical training take you to a certain degree, but when you want to go beyond that, and you sense that you should be doing better than you are, and you know that you have the capacity to do better, then you have to deal with the mental, emotional, and psychological realm of sports performance.

The whole athlete and the whole aspect of who you are has to be addressed to get the most and best out of you.

Difference between Conscious Mind and Subconscious Mind

Psychologists deal with what’s called the conscious mind (for example, the ability to interpret and sensor negative, conflicting or disagreeable ideas). Basically, they help you evaluate and make decisions to determine what is incorrect or correct. This is the conscious level of mind.

Sports psychologists use understanding and reason to get you to understand what you can do. They try to get you to believe and agree that something is possible. If you have a problem, (for example, you hit every ball out, you double contact every time you set the ball, you get in the net every time you jump to block, etc), a psychologist uses reason and logic to get you to understand what you should do to solve the problem.

What the psychologist is trying to do is tackle the problem on the conscious level. There is a reason why tackling the problem this way usually doesn't work.

What I want to talk about is how what's happening on the subconscious level is very much different than what's happening on the conscious level.

The reason understanding and logical reasoning doesn’t work is because subconsciously it’s in conflict. Subconsciously there are ideas, beliefs, and thoughts that are contrary to this reasoning.

Have you ever seen a coach tell a player they need to serve the ball "in" after they’ve just missed a serve? Does the coach really think the player didn’t know to serve "in"? Did the player miss the serve on purpose? Of course they didn’t. The problem is, they can’t understand it on a level to where a behavioral change can occur.

This is the difference between the conscious mind, and subconscious mind…

Subconsciously (without thinking about it), you have capacities that far and away exceed what you consciously even know you’re capable of.

There’s been times when you did what even you didn’t believe was possible.

Have you ever felt sometimes it’s there, and sometimes it’s not there… and you scratch your head trying to figure it all out?

What I want to talk about today is how you can pre-program yourself to play at your highest level. There’s a way you can prepare yourself before practice and before games so you can play at your highest level whenever you want.

The power is in the subconscious mind.

Maybe you were told one day that you can't pass. The idea that you can’t pass became lodged into your subconscious mind… it became what you now believe to be true. Learning how to pass isn't necessarily the issue. You know how to pass. The way to solve your passing problem isn't with more passing drills or skills training. The way to solve your problem with passing is by changing what you believe - changing your subconscious programming.

Follow the link for my latest article on playing out of your mind. Have you ever heard the expression, "playing in the zone"? When you're in this state, you are literally, "out of your mind". Learn about the 7 Sensory Factors that pre-program your mind giving you the ability to put yourself in the zone whenever you want.