Mental Blocks

I have a mental block on the amount of time that I can hold plank. When I get to a minute and 30 seconds, there is a click in my brain and I convince myself that I can't hold on any longer. Even though I totally can. I got 2 minutes and 4 seconds a week ago. Haven't come close to it since. I'll have to figure out what was going on in my head that day and get back there, because it must have been a great mental state.

I've come to realize that holding plank is all about the mental state. I was thinking about why I let go of plank too early and realized that I do many things that are much more physically demanding than holding plank. I have no reason for not being able to hold plank for 2 minutes all the time.

So tonight I tried something to see if I could break the timer in my brain that seems to be set on 1 minute and 30 seconds. Between my second and third plank of the night, I did an exercise that my trainer calls inchworms. Inchworms used to be my most feared exercise. I even added a negative anchor right before I did the exercise that would guarantee its failure. Negative anchor: I shook out my hands by my sides - an act of complete nervousness. As soon as I recognized it and got rid of it, inchworms were fine. And that's a good thing because inchworms are the basis of so many exercises. Anyway...I went back to something that used to be difficult (inchworms), then decided to try holding plank again. The plank after I did an inchworm exercise was the best one of the whole night. (My third plank is rarely the best one. It's usually the worst.) The last plank of the night was 1 minute 40 seconds.

Breaking my mental blocks - one plank at a time.