Photo by BuzzFarmers, used under Creative Commons licence.

This is a true story about raising energy. By that I mean – getting ourselves really pumped, feeling fired, focussed, unstoppable.  It’s a powerful state of mind.

At Panther Taekwondo, two coachloads of supporters would always come along to our tournaments. We supplied them all with a horn so that they would blow them when our fighters went on.  We were once asked to quiet our crowd! But we were up in the stratosphere: the goal was to raise our energy and keep it high.

Even if was an early start on the road, we’d begin in the coach, chanting and singing – we’re up, we’re awake, we’re going to do this.

Then we’d harness our competitive instincts and take bets: who’d deliver the quickest knockout to an opponent? Fun, friendly competition within our squad kept the energy high and everyone on their toes. Who’d do the prettiest knock-out (meaning using the most graceful and stylish technique? We even bet on who’d wear the flashiest suit or eat the biggest packed lunch. What it was didn’t matter. What mattered was us, bonding as a team.

We used chants and slogans both to enthuse our supporters and to inspire ourselves to perform to the very best of our ability – and beyond.

One of them was a tribute to the late, great boxer and fighter Mohammed Ali:

Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, your foot can’t kick where your eyes can’t see! That meant our fighters were moving too quickly for their opponents to land kicks on them… and one thing was for sure: when they heard that chant going up from our supporters, they moved even faster!

We’re tougher than tough!

We’re rougher than rough!

We’re lions, we kick through iron!  

We even used Bob the Builder:

Can we kick it, yes we can!

This was fun and we intended it as fun, But we also use the chants during training so the fighters would get used to a sound like a mantra, inspiring them on. Then when they heard the mantra again in a tournament, they could access the energy of the training session to help them fight harder.

Make sure that the messages you send to yourself are positive, encouraging and full of uplift. Don’t let yourself get dragged down by negative self-talk.  The more you practise lifting your energy, the more natural it will feel to you and the more effective it will be.