Train your brain

I think alot of us tend to focus on the physical demands of Crossfit, and give little, to no respect to the mental. Such blatant disregard to training our brain in unison with our body is a mistake that will break you. Every action that we perform begins with the brain...it's our hardrive, that without, we would be helpless. And much like a hardrive, if you don't take care of it, it will develop a virus, and it will crash. I consider myself an analytical person, I like to understand the mechanics of moving, why we do the things we do, how can I break down a movement to its simplest form and understand the basics before taking on the whole. By doing this, it allows me to avoid getting overwhelmed by the complexity of things. I have come to realize that there are cues that coaches tend to give that will cause our brain to spark, to cause things to start to fall into place. "Open those hips" , "Keep the core tight", "Push that head through", "Tight Back"...you hear them all of the time, but do you really hear them? Do they mean anything to you? Ask yourself this, because the cues don't work for everyone. In my quest for my first muscle up, I was constantly given the following cue...."Its like a chest to bar, followed by a huge, strong, fast, situp." Sounds simple enough, right? Maybe for some, but it never clicked. It wasn't until I broke down the movement to a kipping pullup, followed by a box jump movement with the knees, that I finally got it. Now, that previous sentence might not have made any sense to you whatsoever, but it clicked for me, almost immediately. So what I am getting at is, if a movement is not making sense to you, take a step back. Break it down to its basic componenents, and work on those individual components. Understand why you have to open your hips on the snatch, or why we keep our core tight on the strict press. If a cue does not make sense, ask for another one. Our brains function in different ways, want a different cue?....take the time seek one. The path from point A to point B can be a windy road, or a straight shot. Sometimes it is not always about the heavily traveled route, it is about taking the route that gets YOU there.