Rewrite Your Story, Rewire Your Mind

Ever feel stuck in a rut? Like the voice in your head keeps telling the same old, negative story?  Ditch the drama! This episode is all about rewriting those pesky narratives that hold you back. We're going to flip the script and turn those downer stories into something way more empowering. Get ready to level up your mental toughness with me.

I get personal with examples from my own kids, who struggle with endurance stories. We’ve been working on rewriting those stories together, and the shift in their mindset has been incredible. It's all about turning "I can't" into "I can."

We explore mental toughness exercise number four: rewriting the stories we tell ourselves. Through everyday and athletic examples, we show how to swap doom loops for helpful narratives that support action and confidence.

• difference between goals and stories
• the missed call scenario as a thought trap
• how negative loops form and drain energy
• crafting alternative, helpful narratives
• applying story rewrites to sports and training
• coaching kids to reframe endurance beliefs
• daily pen-and-paper practice for new scripts
• treating life as your movie and editing the narrator
• real-time reframes when anxiety spikes

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review, share it with your friends, subscribe, like all the good stuff

About This Podcast

It takes a village to raise a pro athlete.

For the first time ever this channel takes you behind the athlete’s ‘unspoken’ road what it really takes to raise athletes.

What to expect when you listen:

Real, Raw Truth

Laughter

The Struggles & Successes

ABOUT YOUR HOST:

Marina Kuperman Villatoro, a mama who is on a mission to help her sons reach their athletic (rock climbing) goals and dreams.

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Chapters

• 0:00 What Stories Really Are
• 0:18 The Missed Call Example
• 1:13 Spotting Negative Thought Loops
• 2:24 Choosing Helpful Alternatives
• 2:48 Applying Stories To Sports
• 4:28 Rewriting Endurance Narratives
• 5:15 Daily Practice With Pen And Paper
• 6:32 It’s Your Movie, Edit The Script

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Mental toughness exercise number four. Stories or rewriting your stories. So what are stories? Stories it can be complicated because people think that they're like goals, but they're not, right? So what is a story? A good example of a story is for instance, you just you have met somebody that you like and you want to either be better friends with them or it could be an intimate partner when you first meet them, and the way goes is hey, you know, I'm having let's pretend this is the scenario. Hey, I'm having a party and I'd love to invite you to give me your phone number and I'll call you tomorrow with the information. And the next day comes and goes, and that person never calls you, right? I mean, we've all gone through this. So what starts to happen in our minds? Stories, bad ones, usually. I don't know why that is, but they're always negative, right? And what happens? Did I say something wrong? Maybe they don't like me. Maybe after I left they decided not to call me. Maybe they met somebody else that they mentioned they're gonna invite me, and that person didn't like me. All these negative stories, right? Like that's just common. If you're seeing sitting here saying, Oh, that doesn't happen to me, it does. We all do stories, we all create stories, and then two days after that person called and they're like, Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry. My phone fell in the toilet, I lost all the contacts, but now I got it, so please come to my party. Blah, blah, blah. That's the reality. That the story that we had was just it was negative, it was bringing us down. It wasn't true when the reality was completely different, something that we probably couldn't have even recognized, right? So, what could we have done to salvage and not to feel crappy? We could have rewritten that story instead of oh my god, maybe they don't like me. Maybe they lost my contact. Maybe they're looking for somebody to give me their contact. Maybe they couldn't do the party and had to cancel, and they're gonna call me when they are gonna be doing it. These are all positive stories, right? So stories isn't it, they're just thoughts, literally. They're just thoughts. And wouldn't it be better, because neither one is true, right? Neither one is true, the negative nor the positive, but wouldn't it be better to have the positive in your mind versus the negative? You feel better, right? And this could be done for anything, right? Especially in sports. A lot of times is oh my goodness, I cannot do this. This is too hard for me. Or how about, yeah, I could certainly do this. I've been training hard enough. I know that I could totally manage this. Yeah, I'm gonna give it a shot. Or in our case, like a good example of a story that my kids right now are telling themselves, or both of them, interestingly enough, is that they don't have enough endurance, they don't have the proper endurance, right? So, what do you what it was happening here is every time they go to the gym or every time they go to the rock, they're telling themselves the story. Oh, I my I don't have enough endurance, I don't have the proper endurance. Yet they've been practicing endurance every single day for months. So now we're telling them, let's rewrite this story. Instead of saying, I don't have enough endurance, I have really bad endurance, I've been working really hard on my endurance, I'm getting better every day with my endurance. My endurance is getting better every single day. Look, it's the same story, it's the same thing that's going on, right? They're still there, but now with a positive story, their mind is driving them to a more positive outcome as well. And guess what? They're feeling better about themselves. Now, the coolest thing about stories is that you could have thousands of different stories because we are telling ourselves stories about every single thing, right? Um, go into a competition. Oh, I'm not as good enough as those kids have been training for a lot longer. How about telling yourself, wait, I've been training every single day for three to four hours a day. I could definitely be, I am as strong as them. It's a story. Now, take a new story because a lot of times you don't even know that there's a story going on, but a lot of times you will recognize that. And if you have that proper communication with your kids, you can see when they're telling themselves weird stories. So those stories are going in their minds a thousand times a day, right? It's literally said that we have over 60,000 thoughts per day. So what we have now done is we are now rewriting those stories, right? We've picked, we've been able to focus in on several stories, and maybe there's even more. And now that my kids, part of this eight-minute exercise routine that we do, they are actually rewriting new stories, whatever it is that they want to do. And sometimes they have like five or six stories that they are writing about. Oh, I have better endurance, or I am definitely as you know, I have been putting in as much work and I am definitely, you know, at the same level as this person, or I definitely for sure am able to win this competition, or I am meeting new people, whatever the stories are that are bringing you down, and you need to be able to find them out. Now you have to start to write them. And it's really important to put that pen to paper because you're already telling these stories in your head. Now you have to do this every single day, along with your goals. Do not misstake goal writing with rewriting your story because they're two different things. And the other thing is that I'm constantly telling my kids is this is your life, it's your movie. You could write it any way you want to, and that's important. And you know what? I've been using this exercise for myself because I also am full of bad stories, and that's just normal, right? So when you can recognize these bad stories, rewrite them on the spot. Rewrite them on the spot. Somebody didn't call you back? No, it's not because they didn't want to. Oh, maybe they were busy or they forgot or they they didn't even notice the message from you. Whatever. That's a much better story, right? Versus, oh, they don't like me, they don't want to be with me, they don't want to hang out with me, right? These are stories, guys. None of them are real because the only reality is when it actually happens. So when you're in a more positive rewriting story mode, a lot more cool things can actually start to happen. And they do happen. I guarantee that. All right. So start rewriting those stories. It's actually really fun, it's a really fun activity and exercise. And my kids are actually really enjoying it, even though they want to fight me. I don't feel like it. But when they do it, I see it. They're happier, they're just in a better mood. Trust me, this stuff works. Do you guys ever do this? Have you ever heard about rewriting stories? Let me know your thoughts. And if you enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review, share it with your friends, subscribe, like all the good stuff. I'm Marina, your host, mother of two aspiring rock climbers, and wife to an extreme athlete.