Week 6

We had an interesting and very helpful meeting with Capt. Nigrelle at PAO. She gave us great tips for reaching our pushup goals. For pushups, she demonstrated a technique that helped her and described it like this: Set a number goal for your pushups, let’s say 20. So, start by doing as many of the 20 on your toes that you can. If you do less than 20 on your toes, do the remainder up to 20 on your knees. Then do an additional 20 pushups from your knees, then 20 more from your hips. We like this idea and have been trying it. 

We are still several weeks away from the test day, so we need all the encouragement we can get. We so appreciate the soldiers who stop us to say that they are reading the blog, those who write comments on the blog itself, and the many who offer great tips/suggestions to help us improve! We try to remember and practice all of the helpful hints. 

Mental Fitness Tips

Add the word ‘yet’! 

During times of struggle, we often have negative thoughts or doubts about our abilities. We are noticing these thoughts creeping in lately. Thoughts like, ‘I can’t do this’, ‘I’m not good at this’ or ‘I don’t know what I’m doing.’  When you think this way, try adding the word ‘yet’ to the end of the phrase. For example, ‘I can’t do 32 sit-ups’, becomes ‘I can’t do 32 sit-ups ‘yet’.  Just adding the small word ‘yet’ opens the door to feeling more hopeful and motivated to keep trying. 

We think this strategy could apply for any challenge or struggle in your life when your self-confidence is waning. To read more about this and other strategies to build self-confidence, go to http://mindsetonline.com/index.html.

Commentary by Courtney J. Lynch and Tracy K. Ward, Psychological Health Coordinators