Strengthen Your Brain to Master Your Art

July 7, 2022 Danny Indio M.B. Training Tips 0

A glimpse into the human brainJust like we take care of and train our bodies to help us perform martial arts, at our best, we need to take care of and train our brains for the same reason. I’ll call this process “mental training.” By mental training, I am talking about doing things that improve your memory, focus, mood, and emotional intelligence. Just like you get side benefits from working out your body, such as better health and a nicer physique, the side benefits of mental training will improve all areas of your life outside of martial arts.

5 Mental Training Tips

Here are 5 things for you to do, starting today, as part of your mental training regimen:

  1. Eat Brain-Friendly Food and Supplements
    • I won’t endorse any specific diet since there are so many and different ones work for different people,. However, I will recommend adding the following foods to your meal since they increase brain power, according to Harvard Medical School research:
      1. Green, leafy vegetables. Leafy greens such as broccoli, spinach, kale, and collards are rich in brain-enhancing nutrients like beta carotene, folate, vitamin K, and lutein.
      2. Fish. Fatty fish are rich sources of omega-3 fatty acids, which aid brain function and help fight against Alzheimer’s disease. Eat fish that are low in mercury, such as salmon, cod, canned light tuna, and pollack.
      3. Nuts. Nuts, especially walnuts, are excellent sources of protein and healthy fats which are linked to improved memory.
      4. Coffee and Tea. The caffeine in tea and coffee is known to enhance mental function and help store new memories.
      5. Supplements. There are a number of supplements that tout a variety of benefits for your brain, so before taking them, do your research.  Based on my experience and research, 3 supplements critical to optimal brain function that you should use are multivitamins, omega-3 fatty acids, and vitamin D.
  2. Practice Mindfulness with Meditation
    • Mindfulness is defined as the quality of being conscious or aware of something in the present moment. This state of mind is important to practice because it trains you to focus and concentrate better, which will help you learn and retain what you learn. It also affects your mood in a positive manner, which can help you deal with unpleasant or depressing situations. And it even has direct benefits in martial arts as it can make you more aware of your surroundings in case of danger or to sense your opponent’s intentions when you’re grappling or fighting with them.
    • Although there are many different ways to practice mindfulness such as taking mini-breaks throughout the day, writing in a journal, or going for nature walks, I will recommend the following for martial artists because it will help your mood AND your learning ability:
      • Make a habit of meditating daily, or at least, regularly, for 2-5 minutes. Focus on your breath, specifically the inhale and the exhale. Don’t worry if your mind starts to wonder; simply acknowledge the thoughts, feelings, or sensations that arise. Then let them go and redirect your attention back to the breath. If you’re having difficulties, find an app that can provide better guidance.
  3. Use Anchors to Control Your Subconscious
    • Anchors are conditioning patterns in neurolinguistic programming that can help you deal with your thinking patterns and behaviors in a more positive way. Essentially, they are stimuli that can bring about certain feelings and thoughts, specifically memories of earlier events. Think of them as things that can cause you to suddenly stop, like a ship at sea, and think or feel something, such as a specific time in your youth. They can be smells, sounds, sights, flavors, or touches that take you to that memory.
    • Anchors can be positive or negative. And just by virtue of having lived, you have already created subconscious anchors without even realizing it. Many of them are negative. However, you can consciously implant anchors in your life to impact you in a positive way.
    • To build Positive Anchors:
      1. Recall a moment when you were happy or feeling accomplished.
      2. The root of your anchor can be the smell of your gloves when you won a fight or hearing people cheer your name at a tournament. Whatever it is, it should be an intense positive feeling that allows you to engage your senses.
      3. Bring that memory to its most intense point and then associate your feelings to an anchor by doing “something,” such as pinching your earlobe or twisting your ring on your finger.
      4. Take a break and then repeat the steps above 2-3 more times.
      5. Finally, test the anchor by doing the “something” (ex. twisting your ring) to see if it generates that feeling of happiness or accomplishment.
  1. Improve Your Emotional Intelligence
    • “Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognize your feelings and understand how you’re responding to them… without judging yourself,” according to psychologist Susan David, Ph.D. and author of Emotional Agility. Although many in the martial arts community may be unwilling to admit it, no matter how tough you are, your feelings impact your training and performance.
    • Feeling unfairly ignored by your coach or instructor no matter how well you do or frustrated with an inability to do a move that seems to come easy to everyone else can hamper your training and sense of confidence. And, to make it more complicated, the source of those feelings can come from stuff that happened to you before you even started training. That is why working on your emotional intelligence will not only help you in your martial arts training but also in your day-to-day life. So, improve your emotional intelligence by doing the following:
      1. Pay attention to your feelings. Don’t ignore them or pretend they don’t exist. Accept your feelings.
      2. Remind yourself that, in and of themselves, feelings aren’t good or bad. They’re a coping mechanism you’ve learned to use to deal with the situation that triggers those feelings.
      3. Notice the feeling when it appears and label it. Go beyond generic terms like “angry” or “sad.” Use more specific labels to get at the source of those feelings.
      4. Interrogate your feelings: What is the source of that negative feeling? What is this feeling telling you?
      5. Disassociate the feeling from yourself. You are not nervous or scared, you are feeling nervous or feeling scared. This lets you see that you are not the sum of that negative feeling but only briefly experiencing that negative feeling. That minor shift in perception will change how you see yourself and other see you.
  1. Sleep in 90 Minute Cycles
    • Although we take sleep for granted since we are accustomed to late night parties and all-night study sessions, sleep is critical for our learning, performance, and overall health. You are lucky to live in an age of so much sleep research because these insights will improve your life. One book I found very helpful was Sleep by Nick Littlehales.
    • One of the key insights I got from it was the idea of thinking of sleep in cycles, not hours. The common wisdom is that you need 8 hours of sleep. But that is not necessarily true. What is more important is that you get sufficient cycles of sleep.
    • What is a cycle of sleep? It is a 90 minute period in which you go from:
      1. Non-REM sleep, where you are half awake to half asleep to…
      2. Light sleep, where your heart rate slows, body temperature drops, and improved motor skill performance and information consolidation takes place, to…
      3. Deep sleep, where your get the majority of restorative benefits to…
      4. REM sleep, where you enter the dream state…
      5. Then you wake up (but don’t remember this) and the sleep cycle begins again.
    • According to Hales, the goal is to go through sleep cycles uninterrupted. To get the best kind of uninterrupted sleep that is beneficial to your brain, do the following:
      1. To reach the magic number of 8 hours, complete 5 sleep cycles.
      2. In addition, pick a constant wake time, for example, 7 AM, and adhere to it, even on the weekends.
      3. Furthermore, your wake up time should be 90 minutes before you have to be at work, class, or some other event.
      4. Finally, get in bed at least 15 minute before your sleep cycle is supposed to begin.

Practice, Practice, Practice

If you don’t train your body, you won’t get in shape. The same principle applies to your brain. Practicing these tips will be beneficial to your brain and it will serve other areas of your life, as well. If you want more news, information, and advice on using neuroscience and sports psychology to enhance your training and learning, then click here to read more about the MYM Method. Until then, Make Moves or Meditate.

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About Danny Indio M.B. 6 Articles
Hi, I’m Danny Indio M.B. and I am a Jeet Kune Do instructor and the author of Mixed Martial Arts Fighting Techniques. While I was in the USMC, I became an official instructor in MCMAP aka the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program. I credit my success in learning, teaching, and fighting to the different scientific and traditional studies, tools, methods and notebooks I discovered and used over the years. Everything I've learned and practiced to this point, have led to my development of the The Master Your Moves (MYM) Method and the J.I.M.I. (Journal of Instant Memorization Input) Notebook. And I'm still learning all the time... ;)

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