How endurance athletes are using the power of the now | Ned Phillips | TEDxUWCSEA

I had 15 minutes today to try and tell you about something that's taking me almost 20 years to learn so I really hope you're quicker learners than me because we've got to condense 20 years into 15 minutes what I'm going to try and tell you about is what we call what we call what I call the power of the now the idea that if when you're doing inactivity you can stay in the present moment and only think about that activity then you get the best performance possible and the reason I talk about this is about 20 years ago I found something that I fell in love with apart from my wife of course which was endurance sports and running a long way and what I hope to do is tell you through my journey of running and endurance sports how I've learned that what I used to think was just the body is actually nothing without the mind and I only got one slide today if any of you know my son don't tell him I use this picture he won't be happy that we use the picture he says dad I'll be embarrassing this is my son jumping across a gap at Bondi Beach he's 12 years old all of us and all of us know this feeling he's flying through the air arms out wide and he's hoping he's gonna land on the other side of that gap now even though he's my son I don't know exactly what he's thinking here but I'm pretty sure he is only thinking about jumping across that gap there's nothing else he can't be thinking about his schoolwork he can't be thinking about anything else and it's that mindset that I'm talking about if you can get to where his head is right there he's gonna do that jump to the best of his ability there's no doubt about that because it's a very special activity so it's kind of strange it took me 20 years to get here to learn about this because at the age of 7 my dad who's a professor of psychology had a computer in the house and that was 40 years ago and he had me hooked up and was doing braying experiments on me and my brother of my sister and you would have thought wow I would have realized that if my dad in the 70s was putting wires to my head then I would have realized that the brain was important but I didn't I'd thought maybe like most men particularly I think men are less sensitive or less realization of this is that if you don't think about what you're doing you don't do it as well and it wasn't allowed about twenty-eight and living in Hong Kong that a guy in the office stood up a guy called Justin halogen I'll never you know you have these moments in your life when something strikes you this guy stood up in the office and said I'm gonna run 100k 100 kilometer race who wants to do it with me and something in my mind went yes that'll be fun I don't exactly know why and the funny thing was Justin looked around the room and he went Ned do you want to do it and I hadn't even said anything I just sat there and I'm like yeah I do and off we went and that that first hundred K run I learned a lot I learned nothing about the brain all I learned was number one 100 K is a long way I told you I'm not a quick learner not a quick learner number two you look what not I won't go through numbers but you learn you learn what to eat on 100 K because you can't run a hundred K without eating you learn what to wear let me tell you wearing a normal t-shirt and cotton shorts for 100 K it's not a good outcome you know what backpack to wear you learn how to pace you also learn a fascinating thing then in the world of certainties one K at the beginning of one K at the end they do not feel the same let me tell you that's that's for sure they're different but but they're not are they and so I ran 100 K and when we had a great time and I don't know 18 hours and for whatever reason I really enjoyed it so I kept on doing this kind of activity and that first hundred K was very we just did it I didn't really think about it we just did it we did a bit of training we got out and we did it we did okay and so that was in 98 or something like maybe L in 95 and I kept doing I kept enjoying I run a long way and kept doing this kind of activity and then 2003 and moved to Singapore and then in 2006 I had this idea that I want to run around the country I live in I'm lucky I live here for you people from Canada or America don't ask me to come there that's not happening and I looked at him I thought I looked at her map looks on a map on I had a map my little office I'm like wonder how far that is and this is before Google Maps and I literally I got a piece of string that's 125 K okay I've run 100 okay let's go I can do this look so for the next few months I would you know by the weekend or before work out go and run a little bit and Mark out the route trying to keep to the coast as much as possible you know in Singapore this there's only so much you can roam right on the coastline and then in February 2006 I used the fullerton hotel as my gym because my wife was right next door turn up there 4:00 in the morning changing to make here but at 5:00 a.m. I started running and at the end of this run I learned something but it's only because of the journey I went through so the first 30 K you run it's and I whenever I say there's people say it's not easy to run 30 K but if you're running 125 30 K is easy so the first 30 cambogia hey this is easy it started raining songs in my head lalala 30 to 70 is the hardest by such a long way because the reality is you haven't achieved anything when you run from 30 K to 70k me running 125 if you stop at 60 I hate to use the word failed but you can really achievement and you can't say to yourself oh I've almost finished yeah I'm almost at the end and you can't but you haven't come far enough but you're really tired but you haven't done anything and it's it's a really weird feeling at 70 km met my family they were waiting for me upper kranji and you know they give you love and affection and say yay well done and that gives you a boost it gives you an emotional boost it's they started going and so I got going again I thought ok 70k I've been going but 1011 hours you run down the West the loss West goes down from cran G run down a friend ran with me and he talked to me and he's a guy I ran 100 K race with so he knew what's going through my mind and that had 100 K I was down at the far by Jurong at the far west coast of Singapore and my friend had gone family wasn't there it was dark at 100 K and I thought I'm just gonna stop but didn't done I really don't have much interest in this anymore there's no one there like it's not like I was in a race it's not like you know I'm gonna get sacked from my job or my family who love me any less or anything all change I wake up the next day I'll still be saw where I run 100 km hundred twenty-five and then I thought to myself and this was supposed to start of the realization that it's the mind not just the body I thought to myself how about I don't think about the 25k I've got to go how about I just think about that next step how about I just think okay take one step okay that's done let's take the next up okay that's done and at some point you'll get 25k done it sounds cheesy in a just take one step at a time but that's what happened and 18 hours later I'd found myself back at the Fullerton Hotel my wife was there and family was there an you feel this amazing difference what's the difference with 100 125 K this these are bird true things we set up I sell run round Singapore you know well if I'd run 90 percent around Singapore is still the same isn't it but it's not but what I learned in that thing was that last 25k I did with this I didn't do with this yeah and and yes I ran but they didn't do with that but I couldn't quite put my finger on it something I try to explain it to somebody I'm like yeah like I just didn't think about it or I stopped thinking or I had another Coco Kirk I couldn't rip I couldn't really put him a finger on what it was that had changed in my mind anyway I carried on doing other long-distance staff and there's a fairly strange bunch of people we have a little chat group guys who run hundreds miles 150 miles believe me they're like what you only around 50 today what's wrong with you you know and you start to think of things in a different way you know so you find that believe me there's there's the crazies out there there's there's there's some people who run a long way anyway I found something called Iron Man Iron Man is like a long triathlon it's a 3.8 kilometer swim it's a hundred eighty kilometer bike and it's a 42 kilometer all in one go and it's a race the difference with this thing it's a race everyone's out there alpha males are for females everybody's out there fastest bike fastest everything trying to trying to kick you about and with all it became an addiction it became an absolute addiction and I think I'm as a wonderful thing but believe me so any of you know an imine out there it's it's addictive stuff and when you get addicted to something you want to take it to an extreme and the extreme in Ironman is the Hawaii Ironman it's a race in Kona in Hawaii that is the world championships and it's it's once a year the world championships it's in Hawaii and to get there you've got a bit you go to an Ironman race somewhere in the world and you try to qualify boom in the top two or three percent of your age group so you have to go and beat everyone else to get the one that's like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory you know you get the one golden ticket and you get to go to Hawaii and everyone's there and it's so exciting you know and the next three is I tried really hard and you know I got close but I just couldn't do and I looked at my times and my times are like okay should be able to do this but I would come top 10% I took care it's fine you know but I was half an hour I was an hour behind the guys you know and it and it really it's it starts to bother you you know and and it was getting a bit dispiriting until a friend of mine said you should talk to this guy and I said who's this guy I said like he's a coach he's a bit weird you're a bit weird you should talk to him and believe me so I've I have changed from a cynical person I think someone else in their presentation will forgive me who was put up if it doesn't exist if you can't measure it it doesn't exist I used to be so like that like if it's not real all of this mindfulness and thoughts and I was absolutely not you want to run faster run faster you want to swim faster swim fast that was it nothing else so I funded this guy grant and he said to me okay look I'll train you for Hawaii here's what you need to do I'm gonna give you physical training and mental training every weekend and get five pages of mental training on why okay and he said to me this and it something it connected back to my Singapore when I ran that last twenty five K's he said because if you don't use your mind you are never going to Hawaii ever I think and a lot of people didn't sign up with grant because of this because people were like that's just silly just run faster you'll get there but something about my Singapore run made me think okay that makes sense and rather than read you out the whole five pages of of what he sent me every week it came down to this and this is the simplest philosophy and it made me realize wow he's right when you're running and you're doing activity let's say I'm running if I'm in the middle of a race and I'm thinking about how far I have to go and I'm thinking okay I've got 10k to go I've got to catch that guy ahead or I'm thinking geez I've come a long way I'm tired that's been a long way I can't be thinking about what I'm doing if I'm thinking ahead I'm thinking I can't be thinking about what I'm doing and if I'm not thinking about what I'm doing how can I be doing the best of what I'm doing I'm like okay that makes sense I get that it seems obvious but it seems he said so you got to concentrate on the now so he gave me one task I'm gonna get you to do it and you're gonna think wow he's gonna get me to run 100k this is gonna take more than 15 minutes hello and but it won't he said to me this right here's how you gonna do it simple stuff when you run you're going to count your footsteps 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 it took me a month to get to 10 I told I wasn't very smart 1 months to get and I'm like but here's the thing when you count to 10 no other thought in your mind nothing else just the number 1 2 3 4 okay so when I say now in your heads don't say that laughs in your head see if you can count to 10 and don't think I'm at the TED talk what am i doing this afternoon when this guy gonna shut up all this kind of stuff let's just see if you can count to 10 from when I say now okay No okay now try mm because that's my record that's that that's the best I ever did with no other thought coming in my head I did a run that's nothing else I won't look down my watch I gone further and faster than I thought I was like what happened there because it only be thinking about running I hadn't been thinking about anything else and it was that I was suddenly like wow okay I got it I got it I get it that's how it works so I went forward with this went to try and qualify Hawaii went to my throne I'm I done many Iron Men it never got there went to Ironman Korea I'm an average swimmer I swam okay I kept in the moment okay 380 point okay I bite 180 K took me like five and a half hours trying to stay in the moment and it's really hard to stay in the moment the whole time somebody goes past you something happens and then I got off the bike and somebody said to me something I wish I never had so in this race in my age group there was 250 people and there was 11 slots to Hawaii eleven eleven golden tickets with Charlie in the Chocolate Factory to go to Hawaii and I wanted one and what when I got off the bike Sammy said to me you in 33rd oh my god that's rubbish that's I'm not gonna do this and for the first one or two came like and I suddenly round like no stop stop stop stop stop if I'm thinking about the goal you're not thinking about what you're doing okay good stop stop thinking about this just think about running and when I got to the halfway point about 21k to go I was only in 25th because I passed like eight people I'm like okay and I remember this thing that gran has said to me said that's it right now the halfway point of the marathon you stop thinking about everything else in you runners how do you can with every step that you can that's all you're gonna do you're not going to think about where you're gonna get to and you're not gonna think about where it is you're just going to do that and luckily but the video we saw the lady earlier on who said this did not have a good ending when she talked about her going through his therapy I didn't go to therapy what it does have a good ending in that at the 15k mark I was in 22nd at the 10k mark I was in 17th at the 5k mark I was in 15th at the 1k mark I was in 13th sand a 400 meters to go I passed a guy he'll never forgive me she's actually a friend of mine and I passed him and I got 11th spot and when I finished I realized that I couldn't remember that whole last 20k because all I'd done was thought about what I was doing that's the only thing that I had thought about and it was that really I was like wow that's so cool and so I then looked at the time what I'd run that last 20k in and was pretty much faster than not everybody in the race that was pros or whatever but I ran the last 20k pass than the first 20k at the end of a 10-hour day you run faster and I ran faster than people who are faster than me I don't know who I'm faster than me and that's when I realized okay so what I did was I concentrate every bit of my effort and this will have a door but I'm not gonna ask you to run 100 K and at the end of this talk you'll you'll you'll realize how this might be able to relate do you be able to do it so then I realized that you can improve your performance but I also had two events that made me realize that you can use it for everyday life as well well well I'm gonna say everyday life I'm talking about a thousand K ride across Mongolia and another Iron Man which is maybe not everyday life for everybody but I use it in two circumstances where I wasn't doing my best where I really wasn't doing well and where I actually had to use my mind just to get through it when I got my golden ticket to Hawaii what happened was I've lived in Asia for 25 years I've eaten it every food stall at every place and I have never got sick it's just where it is I've lived in every every country and Singapore cleanest place in the world four days before the race flu on Tuesday night I've got food poisoning I got real sick real sick and the race was on Saturday and so you fly from Singapore to Hawaii but that amazing effect you leave on Tuesday you arrive almost on Mondays bazaar and then I arrived and I could meet for four days goodnight couldn't drink couldn't do anything four days before the biggest race of my life and I couldn't eat I couldn't drink I couldn't do anything and then the night of the race you know you have these two little things like oh my god you shouldn't race this this is wrong or then look the little voice is this the only time you're ever going to get to race and then you only be able to achieve my goal my goal was a certain time but I used the same mind technique I said to myself okay you're gonna race you're gonna go out there you're gonna be slow are you gonna enjoy this and you're gonna just think about every moment you not gonna think this is so unfair you're not gonna think this is runo I've tried all my time and I've got a bad outcome so I spent the whole time just thinking okay I'm gonna stay in this moment I'm gonna swim slowly I'm gonna bike slowly I'm gonna run slowly today because that's all I can do and I used that same concept that same idea so even though it was my slowest Ironman and it wasn't it wasn't the day I wanted it was an amazing experience which strangely enough I remember quite clearly because I tried to enjoy every moment rather than erase every moment and that was the same idea of using the mind and then I had a really strange experience with it I've been telling you and I was saying to Bent when I first gave the talk people who run 100 miles on hundred K no one you're not meant to talk about it you don't meant to boast about it you don't meant to say it's a world of people who just don't really thought about the ex-girl they run and I'd be talking about trying to qualify for hire at Hawaii World Championships um I went to Mongolia to do a 900 km or so thousand K race across Mongolia seven days on mountain bikes across Mongolia across and it's an amazing country across the world of Mongolia and it was on a mountain bike not very good at mountain biking and the 70 other guys was some of the best amateur mountain bikers in the world and on most days I was lost and it was a really unique experience it was unique being in Mongolia but as unique trying to tell yourself even if you're last even if you're doing an activity that you're not familiar with it's not an activity that you do every day what I found in Mongolia is if you still concentrate and do it enjoy each moment and focus each moment then you'll do it better than you thought and it came home to me one day when we had 170 K day taken me maybe 11 hours the first 80 K was through sand this deep I know if you've ever ridden a bike through sand in Mongolia when you're lost your brain starts to deteriorate the sand feels this deep and actually for a long time I wasn't lost until this 65 year old dude cycled past me I remember I was like you know it's still he got that stupid male ego you're like really and I'm looking back for this other dude who should be behind me and he wasn't there you know and on this day we did 80k and then we passed by the camp for that night was and you couldn't literally pass the camp it was right there your tent was right there you have to do another hundred K loop in the sand and I'm last and I remember thinking wow okay this this this this is I didn't think this is not fun but your mind and I actually got off my bike and I stood next to my bike and I put it here and I looked at the tent look take your bike looked at the tent looked at your bike if they cannot care what I need to do and he came back to that same point a little you know again I was always cynical about gurus but a little message from grants like get on your bike turn one penalty see what happens just get on your bike turn one pedal that's all I want you to do then turn the next pedal seven hours later and back at the camp you know you take that long to go all the way around so what I've tried to do is to give you an idea that when you're doing your activity and look I've used my activities in insurance sports to try and communicate that I understand that's not not everybody's cup of tea it doesn't matter what activity next time you do an activity you love and you're passionate about try to only think about that activity I'm not snicker try counting to ten I won't ask you for show hands how many if you hit got to ten though don't tell me without thinking about something else it's not easy and I'll leave you with this last thought and it's this and it was something I've started doing mindfulness because I feel if I'm going to talk about this kind of stuff I should know about it and the lady crystallized it exactly ins in my last sentence than that I'm finished you know when you're thinking about something that you didn't do you regret it they could have shoulda woulda which had done that oh I didn't do this didn't didn't invest in there didn't learn that didn't talk to that person all you think what am I going to do tomorrow I wonder about all of that they don't exist the past is gone it doesn't exist the future it doesn't exist the only thing that exists is now and she said to me this so if you're not living in the now you're not really living I was like okay that makes sense how hard is it to do very I'm not asking you to do all the time just try it next I'm you're doing your favorite activity have a little salt see if you can see if you can count to ten that's your challenge for the day thank you very much

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 611,535

Rating: 4.8916011 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Singapore, Life, Mindfulness, Personal growth, Self improvement

Id: _tc4K5Zujqw

Length: 21min 9sec (1269 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 09 2015