MY MIND GYM.
BY MCKENZIE RYAN P.1

What pushes you, inspires you, drives you, and most importantly what makes you? What makes you succeed at whatever you put your mind to, what causes you to take that extra step that may hurt now but that you won’t regret later? How do you escape the sometimes craziness of your everyday life? Any athlete or any true athlete would know that the stake of the game lies within their hands; they know that they have the power to control how they play and what their outcome is. Now imagine if every player on a team realized this, they would be unstoppable right? Now the question going through your head is,
“How do they have the power, how can they control their own outcome?” but you know the answer already because… it’s all in your head. The tool to success is the three pound organ that sits between your ears; it has infinite abilities so why don’t we use them?
Something that brought me to the realization of the fact that your brain is the most important tool of success, was a book called Mind Gym this book ultimately changed my life and sports careers and opportunities. When you open to the title page the first thing that catches your eye are the words,
“An athlete’s guide to inner excellence.” These words made me open my eyes and realize that this wasn’t going to be any ordinary book when I read the first two quotes that set off the book I realized that it was one of those books that could influence and change my life forever. The book Mind Gym was first given to me by my mom about a year ago or so, I failed to read the entire thing, I had a lot of trouble getting into it then my hitting coach recently gave it me again and told it was my job to read it, accepting this challenge was probably one of the best things I’ve done. The book is full of exercises that are helping you train your brain, I had to be honest with myself and I had to push myself to think in the way the book was suggesting I should think. I’m most defiantly not saying I am a master at what this book is teaching, I am not saying that I constantly pick the positive out of things or that all of the visualization and everything has become second nature because it hasn’t. I am trying to say that out of every game I’ve played or every rodeo I’ve competed in my best were the ones that I had prepared mentally for.
Basically the message I’ve been trying to give is that if one thing even something as simple as a book can change a big part of your life for the better then let it. I have been inspired and pushed and motivated by many people and this book just added to the bunch making me who I am today.

NINTEY PERCENT OF THE GAME IS HALF MENTAL- Yogi Berra
YOU HAVE TO TRAIN YOUR MIND LIKE YOU TRAIN YOUR BODY.- Bruce Jenner