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LIVING IN THE ZONE

Pele, the great soccer player whose spectacular performance almost singlehandedly inspired American awareness and appreciation of his sport, wrote of his experience of the Zone in his autobiography, My Life and Beautiful Game. “In the middle of a match, I felt a strange calmness I hadn’t experienced before. It was a type of euphoria. I felt I could run all day without tiring, that I could dribble through any or all of their team, that I could almost pass through them physically. It was a strange feeling and one that I had not had before. Perhaps it was merely confidence, but I have felt confident many times without that strange feeling of invincibility.”

Baseball players are famous for their exotic pregame rituals in hopes of entering the Zone, in hopes of seeing baseballs as big as watermelons floating to the plate. Superstitions such as wearing dirty socks or garter belts for weeks on end are not unusual. Former Boston Red Sox third baseman Wade Boggs was famous for his pregame chicken dinners. Almost all professional athletes, in their own ways, search for the effortless performance of the Zone.

It has been called many things. Researchers speak of it as “peak experience” or the “flow state”; they say it is an “altered state” of human consciousness that cannot be intentionally created. Athletes find it difficult to describe when they return from it, although they may attribute it to supernatural concentration, religious mysticism, Zen, visualization, or biorhythms. More commonly, athletes refer to the Zone as the “exercise high,” the “runner’s high,” the “groove,” being “unconscious,” or being “locked in.”

Byron Scott, of the Los Angeles Lakers, said that when he finds himself in the Zone, “All you can hear is this little voice inside you, telling you ‘Shoot’ every time you touch the ball, because you know it’s going in. Nobody outside can penetrate this world and the person guarding you wishes he wasn’t….I could shoot blindfolded from half court over my head and it would go in.”

Joseph Campbell, considered the world’s foremost authority on mythology, was interviewed for a PBS series shortly before his death in 1987, when he was in his eighties. During the interview, Bill Moyers asked him, “How do you explain what the psychologist Maslow called ‘peak experiences’?” After a pause, Campbell replied, “My own peak experiences, the ones I knew were peak experiences after I had them, all came in athletics.”

The field of sports psychology, which was developed in part to help athletes reproduce the highly coveted experience of the Zone, has failed in its attempts. Dr. Keith Henschen of the University of Utah, who specializes in the field, recognizes the elusive nature and apparently unreproducible experience of the Zone, but at the same time he believes it can be randomly accessed by anyone. That is, it can come to anyone, but it comes when it comes, not necessarily when you want it to. Perhaps the most certain limiting factor, according to Henschen, is that “the harder you try to get there, the less likely it is that you will.”

This generates an interesting paradox. Modern exercise theory revolves around one central pivot, the stress-and-recover cycle, which boils down to this: We must repeatedly push ourselves to our limits and then let the body recover; that is how we become stronger, faster, and so on. The Zone is defined antithetically: The harder you try to reach that state, the less likely it is that you will. Conventional training demands that we put out tremendous effort; the Zone is an experience of absolute effortlessness.

Before 1954, the 4-minute mile was considered beyond human capability. Then Roger Bannister, an English medical student, cracked the barrier, running a mile in 3:59:4. Bannister said, “We seemed to be going so slowly….I was relaxing so much that my mind seemed almost detached from my body. There was no strain. There was no pain. Only a great unity of movement and aim. The world seemed to stand still or even not exist.”

Bannister’s experience was not “No pain, no gain,” but rather, “No strain, no pain = historic world record.” Although Bannister told the world his formula for success, during the nearly fifty years since his achievement, athletes have continued to train using the stress-and-recover method.

If we want to reproduce the Zone, doesn’t it make more sense that we should reproduce its qualities? If the experience is effortless, then we should cultivate effortlessness, rather than push the body to its limits. It seems naïve and foolish to expect the light, comfortable, euphoric feeling of the Zone to come with any regularity after the mind has driven the body into exhaustion.

This is one of the strategies you will learn in this book: capture the ease of the Zone from the first step of each workout, and gracefully build on that experience without dis-integrating the mind from the body.

DO LESS AND ACCOMPLISH MORE

Warren Wechsler had never considered himself an athlete. He had spent most of his adult life developing his mind, while paying little attention to his body. A successful businessman at 33, Warren suddenly found himself with a burning desire to run and set himself the goal of running a marathon by age 40.

He had a long way to go. He was overweight, stressed from his job, and completely out of shape. But he bought a pair of top-quality running shoes and started jogging. Very quickly he realized that he felt happier and healthier than before and that he had a natural talent for the sport.

After four months of pounding the pavement, Warren developed Achilles tendonitis. To alleviate it, he stretched more, went for physical therapy, and took more rest days, but the tightness on long runs persisted. He decided to “run through it”—a common technique among die-hard runners—hoping that the pain would disappear. After four more months Warren’s ankle pain worsened. It soon developed into calf pain as well, then worked its way up to the knee. Undaunted, Warren continued his workouts, convinced that “all good things have their price.” The aches and pains soon appeared in the other knee. When they reached his back, he was forced to hang up his running shoes.

Three years later, in 1989, Warren attended my Body, Mind, and Sport seminar. He wanted to get back to running, but, afraid of reinjury, he didn’t let himself get his hopes up too high. On hearing the principle that “less is more,” and that running, if done properly, should remove strain rather than produce it, Warren decided to give it another go. He began exercising again, cautiously this time, following the specific advice for his body type and listening carefully to the needs of his body. (Body types are fully explained in chapter 4.)

Warren was so conditioned to expect strain and pain that he found it strange not to hurt during his workouts. At first he noticed that his heart rate would jump from 75 BPM (beats per minute) to 170 or 180 as soon as he started exercising with even moderate exertion. After three months of reconditioning his body to do less and accomplish more on his exercise bike, he found that he could pedal for over an hour with his heart rate around 120 and his breath rate even and comfortable at around 15 breaths per minute.

In January 1990, Warren felt ready to run and rejoined his health club, which featured an indoor track. At first, finding himself lapped by his old running partners, he had to struggle against his desire to keep up with them. Listening carefully to his body—not to the ambitions of his mind or to his sense of pride—he let them pass him. Gradually he picked up speed. Soon he surpassed his former running partners, only this time he did so without injury or pain.

He called me at my office eighteen months after starting the Invincible Athletics program and gave me this report:

John, I’m 38 years old. I’ve never been an athlete in my life. I took your course to give my running one last try. Since then, I’ve lost 30 pounds and 6 inches of girth without trying or dieting. I don’t get sick or anxious anymore, and I’ve got more vitality than I’ve ever known.

Yesterday, running on my indoor track, I ran 17 miles. I felt absolutely fantastic the whole way. I felt as good when I stopped as I did when I started. The amazing thing was that I ran a 6-minute-mile pace for the entire 17 miles. It was unbelievable. I was in the Zone. I felt like I was running on air. It was the easiest thing I’ve ever done.

The most incredible thing was that my heart rate averaged about 120 BPM during the entire run. Sometimes it went even lower, but it never went over 130 BPM while I maintained the 6-minute pace. When I counted my breath rate, it was between 12 and 15 breaths per minute. [The average breath rate at rest is 18 breaths per minute.] At this rate, when I’m 40 I could be running marathons with the best runners in the world, having the runner’s high experience the entire time.

For Warren, exercise had become a means of removing stress. The more he ran, the more rejuvenated he felt.

We had been working with many athletes at our health center and finding some dramatic decreases in exertion during high-level exercise using our techniques, but a heart rate of 120 BPM while maintaining a 6-minute-mile pace was hard to believe. I figured that perhaps Warren’s monitoring equipment wasn’t first-rate and invited him to our health center to verify his findings.

When he came, I put him on the treadmill. It wasn’t long before he had the equipment “maxed out” at 10.5 miles per hours (a little better than a 6-minute mile), and, sure enough, his heart rate was stable at about 125 BPM and he was breathing easily at just the rate he had reported. The average runner would have to strain pretty hard to run a 6-minute mile, showing heart rates up to 180 BPM and breath rates up to 40 or 50 breaths per minute.

Warren’s success came because he was determined not to incur stress but to let his body gracefully improve from the inside out. He never put pressure on himself to reach any specific time, either to meet an arbitrary deadline or to compete in a given race. He simply wanted to see how fast he could run and with how little effort.

Lowering heart and breath rates while running faster and faster is like driving a big old Cadillac and getting 50 miles per gallon. This possibility provides a new level of motivation: to see not only what one can do, but with how little effort and with how much efficiency it can be done. (I discuss how to do this in chapters 13 and 14, which describe the Three-Phase Workout.)

Not long after Warren’s visit to me at the health center, he ran his first marathon. He cruised at a comfortable 6½-minute-mile pace the whole way, finishing with ease and comfort at 2 hours 53 minutes. The next day he went out and ran 5 miles. Even more amazing, four days later he did a 10-mile run in a time that was his personal best.

Warren’s strategy was to treat every race as a training race. He felt that if he could stay within himself, taking his cues from himself and not from any preconceived or outward standard, he would continue to rejuvenate himself with each run and steadily get better. More important, he would enjoy every race.

With this attitude, Warren fell in love with exercise. He was becoming fit, but this time it wasn’t a case of his body being whipped into shape by his mind. He was feeling a deep sense of integrity and efficiency, as if he could run all day without strain. As he continued to improve, he would monitor his heart and breath rates and watch them remain low while he effortlessly attained competitive speeds and distances. To his amazement and delight, the harmony of his mind and body was reflected in his increasing ability to be in the Zone.

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The principles described in this book are derived from ancient teachings that far predate the sports psychologists’ discouraging pronouncements that the Zone is not reproducible. I believe—on the basis of my professional experience—that not only should the runner’s high or Zone experience be expected with every workout, but that reaching this experience is the primary purpose of exercise. Only through this experience can we access our highest physical potential.

To prove this very bold point—that the elusive Zone is readily available within all of us and can be called up intentionally—we must look into the origins of exercise and sport.

TRAINING TIP NO. 1
THE ACID TEST

Try your normal workout while breathing through your nose. If you find it more difficult than usual and can’t get enough oxygen, this indicates that you do not have maximum respiratory efficiency, and that you need this program! You can reach your full respiratory potential when you learn how to draw on it.

BACK TO THE FUTURE

If we went far enough back in time, we would see that the purpose of exercise was not to build muscles, lose weight, win races, or receive gold medals. To the ancient Greeks, for example, exercise was a vital part of daily life. The historian Xenophon said, “No citizen has any right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training; it is part of his profession as a citizen to keep himself in good condition.” He added that it is “a disgrace for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and the strength of which his body is capable.”

This attitude had a deeper, spiritual basis, explained by the great Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle. Plato, throughout his writings, emphasized the importance of exercise for developing the spiritual side of life. His ideal was harmonious perfection of both the body and the mind, or soul, and exercise was one of the methods he advocated. Aristotle also favored exercise and emphasized a theme that I will return to often in this book: that exercise should be moderate rather than excessive or insufficient, and that it should be undertaken in accordance with one’s individual physical capacity.

Today, historians point out that the original martial arts did not consist solely of kicks, blocks, and punches. Their real purpose was to be found in the spiritual side, an aspect largely missing in modern American dojos. Even members of the U.S. karate team lament the absence of a spiritual base.

The history of the martial arts is sketchy in places, but most historians now agree that its roots in China were actually seeded from the even older Vedic culture of India. About fourteen hundred years ago an Indian monk named Bodhidharma journeyed from India over the Himalayas to bring the teachings of Buddha to China. He stopped to teach at the Shaolin Monastery in the Honan Province of central China. Tradition regards his teachings at Shaolin as the origin of the martial arts in China. This traditional lore gained credibility recently when two books attributed to Bodhidharma were discovered in the temple walls.

According to legend, Bodhidharma—who later became known in Japan as Daruma—taught a form of Buddhism for developing mind and body that is now known as Zen. He told the monks of Shaolin that he would teach them techniques to develop the necessary physical and spiritual strength to master the Way of Buddha, but he soon found that they were physically weak and unable to keep up with his training.

The focus of their life in the monastery had been on the inner aspect of life—the mind, or soul—with little attention to the health and strength of the body. Bodhidharma taught them that although Buddha’s message was about the soul, body and soul are really inseparable. You cannot train one without the other.

The physical techniques that Bodhidharma taught were not for the purpose of overcoming opponents but for the integrated development of body, mind, and spirit. Using these methods, which are recorded in the ancient Ekkin Sutras, the Shaolin monks became renowned for their physical and spiritual strength, courage, and fortitude.

The message of Zen Buddhism, brought first to China and then to Japan from the Vedic civilization of India, was that enlightenment was not meant to be enjoyed only in silent, disembodied contemplation. It was a way of life, to be lived at all times, or, as the famous Zen saying goes, “while carrying water and chopping wood.”

Bodhidharma’s work at the Shaolin temples led to the development of Kung Fu and Tai Chi. Kung Fu is the more aggressive form, which displays the dynamic “yang” aspect of nature, and Tai Chi reflects the more peaceful and silent “yin” component. Both of these qualities must be developed and expressed during exercise in order to cultivate regular experience of the Zone.

In martial arts, or in any other sport, the only way man can harness the power and the strength of nature and the universe is to mimic nature’s way. Wherever nature exists, this formula also exists: dynamic action along with perfect silence. The dead of winter is balanced by the activity of summer. The more dynamic the activity, the more dramatic the contrast of opposites. The bigger the hurricane, the bigger its eye.

Exercise is a proven approach to life’s ultimate goal, which modern Zen master D. T. Suzuki called “motionless realization.” Tennis great Billie Jean King described it in her autobiography: “I transport myself to a place beyond the turmoil of the court, to a place of total peace and calm.” She was on the court but beyond the turmoil of the court. She was in the Zone, where the most dynamic physical activity coexists with mental composure, peace, and calm.

The legendary Ted Williams, who coined the phrase “the Zone,” said he could see the seams of the baseball as it came whirling up to the plate at 100 miles per hour!

Williams had no doubt that he had seen a 100-mph fastball with the close-up clarity of a slow-motion instant replay, yet “experts” claim that it is optically impossible. The 4-minute mile was once considered impossible, as were the 500-pound lift and other feats that today are accomplished by many. I read recently that experts now predict a 3:30 mile by the year 2054, one hundred years after Roger Bannister’s boundary-breaking achievement. Records fall every day. So, what is “impossible”?

New records generally do not leap far above previous ones, yet no one can predict final limits. As soon as a record is called “unbeatable,” someone inevitably comes along who is capable of going faster, higher, farther. It is said that fish are 80 to 90 percent efficient in the water, while a world-class swimmer is only 8 to 9 percent efficient. Does this mean that we will never be truly efficient in the water, or that our potential gains are unlimited?

IS THE SKY THE LIMIT?

In northern Mexico live the Tarahumara Indians, a native Mexican tribe with an unfathomable skill in running. The Tarahumara run from their first steps to their last; it is their way of life. These remarkable people can run down deer and horses; they can run 50 to 100 miles in a day with ease, and up to 150 miles seemingly without effort. They have been known to run 40 to 50 miles at a time, taking only the briefest of breaks. Even more striking, they are said to improve with age and the young look up to their grandfathers as the runners with the greatest skill.

ONCE A TOURIST DROVE BY A RUNNING TARAHUMARA AND ASKED IF HE WOULD LIKE A LIFT. THE TARAHUMARA SAID, “NO, THANKS, I’M IN A HURRY.”

A few years ago, a group of North American researchers visited the Tarahumara to study their feats. They staged a 26-mile run—a marathon, a run the researchers considered most grueling and demanding. The Indians laughed at the distance, regarding it as child’s play.

The test took the Indians over rugged, extremely mountainous terrain in the scorching heat of the Mexican desert. The runners averaged 6 miles per hour including breaks; they took no food or water. At the end, they stood calmly near the finish line, breathing effortlessly as the researchers examined them in disbelief. Pulse rates averaged about 130 beats per minute, and blood pressure, which had been low at the start, was even lower at the end of the run.

The scientists concluded that what they had witnessed was not humanly possible! Yet the Tarahumara were decidedly human, possessing no “super gene” or any other unique physical quality.

This kind of accomplishment should not be considered mystical or magical. Throughout history, man has harnessed similar powers. There are tribes in the Andes Mountains of South America whose accomplishments in running are similar to those of the Tarahumara. Holy men in the Himalayas live virtually on roots in freezing weather at fifteen thousand feet the year round. The Hunza of Pakistan are known for their extraordinary longevity. Yogis and Zen masters have displayed breath suspension and lowered metabolism while performing amazing deeds of strength and endurance.

We usually assume that such phenomena occur only among monks or martial arts masters who have abandoned our modern ways in favor of austerity. But human potential is unlimited and can be achieved by anyone who desires to do so.

Certainly the message of Bodhidharma contains a resounding vote for the unlimited potential of the human body. Modern researchers agree. According to neuroscientists, humans use less than .01 percent of our potential brain power. Translated into economic terms, we are surviving on $1 while $10,000 sit in the bank. A state-of-the-art computer with the same number of information bits as there are neurons in the human brain would fill a 100-story building the size of Texas.

Using conservative estimates, there are 100 trillion neuron junctions in the brain. (Some scientists are now saying that there are closer to two to the trillionth power connections among brain cells.) This means that there are more possible mental states than there are atoms in the universe—which makes it seem even more unlikely that anything should be impossible for us.

Mind-body reactions take place at phenomenal speeds. Messages from the brain to the body and back are measured in thousandths and ten-thousandths of a second. Evidence even exists that every one of our thoughts affects every one of our cells instantaneously.

The hardware for maximum integration of mind and body is built in. If we could access even a little bit more of it, athletic performance would soar far beyond what we believe are our normal limits. Considering the potential that lies within us, it is more remarkable that we are ever out of the Zone than that we are only occasionally in it.

TRAINING TIP NO. 2
COUNT YOUR STEPS

Go for a walk and count how many steps you can take per one full inhale and exhale through your nose. Keep trying to increase the number of steps per one complete breath. Anything over 18 steps indicates a good start toward total respiratory efficiency.

THE ILLEGITIMATE ZONE

There are two different experiences of the Zone. One is born of integration and harmony between mind and body, the other from a breakdown between the two. Many instances of “runner’s high” occur after or toward the end of long endurance events. The Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run is known for producing such experiences. After enduring 70 to 80 miles of canyon heat, followed by high-altitude climbs, the body reaches its limits. The mind, however, is still on its goal: to cross the finish line, no matter the cost.

When exhaustion occurs and the body is in pain—severe overheating; painful knees, ankles, and shins; aching lungs; and so on—the body begins to produce painkillers to help the person endure the ordeal. These painkillers, in the form of endorphins, enkephalins, and other morphinelike substances, are generated to combat the physical punishment inflicted on the body by a mind that is out of touch with what is happening on the physical level. The runner feels high, but his performance has disintegrated.

As the flood of endorphins is released into the bloodstream, it does more than kill the pain; as the mind swims in the pool of morphine, it becomes numb to the body. The result in some cases is complete dissociation of the mind from the body.

During the Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run in 1983, I was a pacer for one of the seeded runners, Bill McKean. After Bill broke his ankle, I pulled another runner from the bottom of a canyon at the 45-mile mark. Exhausted and delirious, he had collapsed and couldn’t take another step, yet he said he had been feeling “fantastic” until his legs gave out and he collapsed.

How did he go from feeling so good to so bad, so fast? Painkilling endorphins gave him a false sense of euphoria, which masked the body’s extreme fatigue. Because his mind was disconnected from his body, he could not muster the simple coordination needed to stand up and walk.

As the man’s exaltation wore off, unbearable pain set in. I watched him flip from an unintelligible babble to uncontrollable tears as we dragged him to safety five miles out of the canyon. One might label it a runner’s high, but it’s not the legitimate Zone athletes seek, where the mind and body are inseparable.

ENTER THE ZONE

The euphoric experience that athletes call the Zone or exercise high is now, at best, random. It comes when it comes—or it doesn’t come at all. When athletes lock in to it, exceptional performance seems automatic. Sports psychologist Bruce Ogilvie says that when they are in the Zone, “these athletes are able to relinquish a conscious awareness, and to focus in an internal way. It’s a harmony of mind-body experience, a lack of interference. It’s the essence of focusing, the art of the flow.”

Nancy Kalil, the number-one ranked U.S. women’s handball champion, wrote of her experiences in the Zone:

I began playing handball in 1981. Handball is a game that develops both sides of one’s body—the left and right sides must be developed and coordinated. As an athlete I had the strength and coordination, yet the mind-body connection was not balanced. There was a period when I became more involved in the mental aspect of the game, yet there was always something missing.

I continued to excel in handball, winning national titles, and have remained in the top four among women since 1985.

The 1991–92 season was my best, as I became the #1 ranked U.S. woman. Although I accomplished this, I realized that there was still something missing—the total mind-body connection, how to be in peak performance when I needed it, not just when it happened randomly. Not just training and hoping I’d peak when the tournaments were scheduled. Not just playing great during preliminary matches, only to “not have it together” during the semifinals or finals.

In July 1992, while taking a break from handball, I learned of John Douillard’s Invincible Athletics course, and began training using its principles.

As I first began to apply the techniques, I felt as though I was hardly working out. I was enjoying myself too much, and not straining myself: this couldn’t be right, I thought! But to my amazement, within a few weeks my body began to recondition itself naturally. I was able to do more, while keeping in my optimal training zone (50 percent of maximum heart rate), and I was stress-free.

Where I notice the greatest difference is in my actual handball game. As I began to become in tune with my mind and body—through the breathing techniques, heart rate monitoring, and focused attention, becoming absorbed within myself—my handball game jumped to a whole new level. What I have practiced over and over to do on the handball court for the past five or six years all of a sudden began to happen. I am covering the court, forty feet long, effortlessly and easily from back to front, with a speed I’ve never known. I’m playing two-hour matches and still feeling fresh and energetic.

In the past, I’ve been known as a defensive player, conditioned to keep the volley going and waiting for my opponent to make a mistake. Now, with my performance at a new level, and playing in the Zone each time, I have become a very offensive player, hitting shots I always dreamed about but rarely did. It still feels funny to be playing so well while staying so relaxed and full of energy, being calm and almost moving at a slow pace in between volleys. Even during the volleys the speed seems slow and relaxed, although in reality the ball and I are moving very quickly. I am amazed at how I am getting to the ball so quickly and effortlessly.

The opponents I play on a regular basis are also amazed. I play men (there are few women players in my immediate area) and the strength and quickness factors are apparent. I’ve always played men who are better than I, so I can improve my game. I am now consistently either beating them, or almost beating them, staying neck-and-neck during the match. They have all commented on how much I’ve improved since I incorporated the Invincible Athletics principles into my life.

Even my husband, who is on the men’s pro tour in handball, used to easily beat me 21–0. He says he now has to push harder when we play. The volleys are longer, and I win a number of them. My husband, who also started the techniques, has noticed benefits in his own play, most notably a heightened desire to work out. The motivation has been higher, and the workouts more fun.

Although scientists and sports psychologists insist that the Zone experience cannot be generated at will, I’ve seen case after case of enhanced performance, many similar to Nancy’s, and heard many descriptions of being in the Zone, as a result of using the techniques in this book.

Until recently, scientists had been unable to measure the elusive runner’s high, to see what it’s made of, so to speak. But a growing body of scientific information and a preliminary study (Travis et al., 1993) seem to be breaking new ground.

ALPHA POWER

We took ten athletes who had been using our techniques for at least twelve weeks and compared their mental and physical performance during conventional exercise and Invincible Athletics. The preliminary findings were unprecedented.

Using Body, Mind, and Sport principles, the athletes achieved a psychomotor state that differed from that reached through conventional techniques. This state had both the subjective and objective qualities of ease and comfort that athletes commonly say characterize their experience of the Zone. Their EEGs indicated that their minds were in a state of relaxation, and their breath rates, heart rates, and perceived exertion were lower throughout a workout when compared to conventional exercise. Yet their actual level of performance was the same or higher.

In graph B (see this page), you see the typical brain wave pattern expected during exercise as measured on the EEG. These brain waves, known as beta, are common to all activity with the eyes open, such as conversation, eating, walking, or exercise.

Graph A shows a pattern of brain waves that is obviously more coherent. At first glance, if I asked you, “What style of functioning would you rather have, A or B?” you would likely say that graph A seems more appealing.

The brain waves depicted in graph A are predominantly alpha. They reflect a state of mind that is more relaxed and composed, as compared to graph B, which portrays a mind full of active thoughts. Alpha is usually found during sleep, deep states of relaxation, biofeedback, and meditation.

What is so unusual about the alpha bursts seen in graph A is that they were produced during exercise. Yet they are characteristic of a style of functioning in which thoughts are minimal, and mind and body are relaxed. This seems to be the neurophysiological correlate of what athletes sometimes call the “mindless state,” where everything just happens and you’re not thinking about it.

In sports, particularly in competition, there is no time to think. If the right action or reaction, the right move, doesn’t just flow, it’s too late. That is why athletes practice so often. If you do it a thousand times, hopefully there will be no distracting thoughts in the game.

Tim Flannery, formerly of the San Diego Padres, said, “When I’m locked in, I feel like a giant eye. I don’t feel my hands, I don’t feel my stride, I don’t know where my shoulders are. All I do is just see the ball and everything else just happens.” Flannery is obviously not describing an analytical or “mindful” state but an automatic and highly coordinated flow between mind and body. This is the kind of experience that is predicted when alpha bursts are lively in the brain. (Previous research has indicated that 20 percent of the population seems incapable of producing alpha waves. Although the number of subjects we have studied is still quite small, we have seen alpha bursts in all of them. A heightened state of ease and comfort appears to be possible for everyone.)

Glance again at graphs A and B and consider this: Both graphs portray brain waves produced during exercise by the same person, at the exact same workload, on the same exercise bike, during the same standard exercise stress test. There is only one difference. The second time—graph A—he was using the principles in this book.

Here science opens a window on the familiar formula for the Zone: dynamic action and composed silence coexisting, as the eye of the hurricane coexists with the wind.

We did an exhaustive search of past research, looking for the production of alpha waves during aerobic exercise with the eyes open. As far as we can tell, ours is an unprecedented finding.

Of course, more research is needed to confirm our findings, but it seems reasonable to assume that the exercise high, the Zone, which embodies the experiences that occur when alpha waves are present, can now be the expected result during exercise. This means that the Zone is reproducible. You don’t have to wait and hope for it to come, you can create it.

When the brain is in alpha, reflecting a quiet mind while the body is dynamic, the athlete will naturally slip into the Zone, and the performance will be from the inside out.

When the brain is in beta, the mind is active, the body is active, and the competition becomes enough of a distraction to disintegrate the mind from the body. The flow between body and mind is restricted, and enjoyment vanishes.

When our research subjects were compared on the Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion, as seen on graph C, these conventional exercise methods produced significantly more sense of strain. As the workload built up, the athletes’ subjective experience of exertion increased proportionately, so that at maximum workload, the subjects felt the maximum strain. Our athletes experienced far less perceived exertion. At the maximum workload, one of our subjects experienced just 50 percent of the exertion he felt with conventional methods.

When exercise is experienced as strain, it is no wonder that so few people—only about 10 to 15 percent of the American population, according to a government survey—participate in a regular exercise program.

TRAINING TIP NO. 3
LET COMFORT BE YOUR GUIDE

Begin your exercising, gradually increasing the pace while monitoring the subjective experience of comfort. Note exactly where during the workout comfort becomes discomfort—heavy breathing, heart pounding, pain, or strain. For more details see chapters 13 and 14.

BODY, MIND, AND BOW

The great warriors of ancient times were said to experience sleep and inner alertness simultaneously. Even while asleep they would remain completely aware of their environment. This ability to remain alert while asleep made them immune to surprise attacks during the night.

Their inner wakefulness was accomplished through certain meditative practices for developing the highest mental and physical capacities. These practices were reserved for the warrior class and for the rulers, whose superior development was considered essential for a peaceful balance in society.

By cultivating calmness along with dynamism through their training methods, the warriors gained the physical precision and mental composure needed to excel in the pandemonium of combat. Their extraordinary psychophysiological development gave them a reputation for being invincible. Who would attack a nation whose great warriors were invulnerable to surprise attack and too skilled to defeat in open battle? This strength acted as a natural deterrent, and—so say the legends—their nations lived in peace.

Today our national defense is also said to depend on strength, only now strength is believed to lie in the most potent offense. In this system, the country that is the largest manufacturer of weapons is the most feared and therefore the least likely to be attacked. While we sport weapons of external destruction, the ancient warriors drew their invincibility from within. By mastering the forces of nature through discipline and training, they established a state of composure that remained undisturbed even amid the rigors of battle. This is the formula that athletes seek in their quest for the Zone.

Among the physical and mental techniques employed to develop the superior warrior, the art of archery was the foremost. The ancient warriors of China and Japan recognized the power of the bow, although the most ancient reference to the military use of the bow appears in India’s Dhanur Veda. (Dhanur means “bow”; Veda means “knowledge” or “truth”; hence, the “Pure Knowledge of the Bow.”) The texts of Dhanur Veda expound the means of developing action in harmony with nature.

In our search for studies showing the production of alpha waves during exercise, although we located no cases of alpha during aerobic exercise, we did find one study that showed that during the practice of archery a high percentage of individuals were found in a state of alpha. This substantiated what the ancient cultures knew to be true.

The correct shooting of an arrow from a bow requires the ability to maintain mental composure and physical calm. Pulling back the bowstring requires great strength. The body’s muscles must be in a state of dynamic contraction, yet they must become perfectly still as they bring the arrow to rest on the string. The slightest movement of the bow, when drawn, will exponentially distort the flight of the arrow. Perfect physical silence must exist along with the dynamic power and strength needed to carry the arrow with precision and accuracy.

The mind of the archer must also be composed and still while at the same time dynamically focused on the target. This mental silence and composure must not be disturbed any more than the physical stillness. Any mental excitation, any unnecessary or inappropriate thoughts, will distract the mind from what the body is doing and break down the fine coordination essential for this harmony of mind, body, and sport.

According to the Vedas, the power of the universe is reflected in archery during the split-second release of the bowstring. As the arrow is released, the muscles are sprung into a heightened state of activity, then quickly relax. The release of a 60-pound bowstring creates a dynamic physical transformation from muscular action to muscular relaxation. At the same time, the mind releases its intense focus on the target. As the mind lets go, the focus is transformed into silence, where there is no focus, just a heightened state of awareness. At this instant, there are absolutely no thoughts, just a mind suspended in alert awareness as the arrow races to its target.

During this instant, when the mind has let go of its focus and the body has relaxed its muscular contraction, the archer slips into the Zone.

Everything comes to rest. But it is a dynamic rest, awake, alert, ready to move again with great power. It is like slipping for a moment into the hurricane’s eye, but using it as a command post to direct the force of the hurricane at will.

On the battlefield depicted in the epic poem Mahabharata, Krishna revealed the secret of victory to the great archer Arjuna. He said, Yogastha kuru karmani—first establish yourself in Being, then perform action. (“Establish in Being” defines yoga as literally “union,” the permanent, living coexistence of inner silence with outer activity.) Establish first a composed and calm mind and body, then you can create a hurricane. Billie Jean King called it “a perfect combination of violent action taking place in an atmosphere of total tranquillity.”

TRAINING TIP NO. 4
SILENCE IN ACTION

Take notice while playing a particular sport—for example, when you shoot a basketball. Note the immense focus during the shot, followed by an immediate mind-body release right after the ball leaves your fingers. For a second, the mind is totally free of thoughts and the body is totally relaxed. It’s the same silence ancient warriors sought in the release of the bow on the battlefield. Find this silence in your tennis shot, soccer kick, or any other skill-related activity.

SILENT GLORY

Patsy Neal was captain of the U.S. women’s team in the 1964 World Basketball Tournament. In high school, Ms. Neal set the Georgia State women’s basketball single-game scoring record with a fabulous 64-point performance. She later competed in the Pan American Games and played on the U.S. All-Star Team against women stars from Russia, France, and Germany. She also taught college health and physical education courses for nineteen years and published four books on sports. In her book Sport and Identity she related her experience of being in the Zone when she won the 1957 Free-Throw Championship at the National AAU Basketball Tournament:

When I shot my free-throws in the finals, I was probably the calmest I have ever been in my life. I didn’t even see or hear the crowd. It was only me, the ball, and the basket. The number of baskets I made really had no importance to me at the time. The only thing that really mattered was what I felt. But even so, I would have found it hard to miss even if I had wanted to. My motions were beyond my conscious control….If it were in my power to maintain what I was experiencing at that point in time, I would have given up everything in my possession in preference to that sensation. But it was beyond my will…beyond my own understanding…beyond me. Yet, I was it.

That evening, I hit 48 out of 50 free-throws to win the 1957 Free-Throw Championship. The only thing that surprised me was the fact that two of the shots missed. I felt in such a state of perfection that it seemed only right that my performance would have been perfect. Even now, when I think of the Free-Throw Championship, I don’t think about the fact that I won it…I think of what I was that evening….

There have been other moments in my life when I have touched on this unlimited source of power—where things happened in spite of me. But never once have I been able to consciously will it to happen. I have been open to it because I know it’s there.…But the occasions are so rare—perhaps this adds to the preciousness of it.

As a result of that experience, I know that spirit and bodily movements can be correlated. As they intertwine, one seems to hang between the real world and another world of miracles. One accomplishes things one never dreamed of doing. One walks beyond the usual physical powers and goes into the power of the universe, finding streams and sensations that seem to have no beginning or end within the self.