Chelsea Natural Health Clinic

How to get fit by using your mind by Keith Dorringto, Master in Hypnotherapy, Time Line Therapy™and NLP and qualified personal trainer at Cheslsea Natural Health, Fulham Rd, SW10

Recent scientific research carried out by the Institute of Sports Science at the Justus Liebig University Giessen in Germany, showed just how much we can incorporate or replace actual physical training with training in our minds.

Tests were carried out on 5 groups of people. This is what they did:

Group one – 100% of a training program physically
Group two – 75% of it physically and 25% of it in their minds
Group three – 50% physically and 50% mentally
Group four – 25% physical training and 75% mental training
Group five – no training.

The training consisted of doing 4 sets of 2 exercises (bench press and bicep extensions) for 12 sessions.

The results showed that there was only a very small difference in strength gains between doing 100% of the training in the gym and doing just 25% in the gym and doing the extra time mentally. The authors come to the conclusion that ‘high intensity strength training sessions can be partly replaced by mental strength training sessions.’

This means, by purely doing the whole session in your mind, you can increase your strength and fitness levels.

A great way to train in your mind is to visualise yourself doing your workout, looking through your own eyes (associated). Imagine you can hear the music playing (if you listen to music when training), you can feel the weights in your hand, get as much detail as possible. This is because the mind doesn’t know the difference to what is real or what is imagined.

For people with illness or injury, professional athletes or people who exercise just to keep fit, this result is fantastic, because they can visualise working out in their minds. Neuroscience research shows that all the same areas of the brain are activated, whether a person does actual physical training or training by visulisation, and amazingly, the more you use the brain through mental visualisation, the stronger the muscle can become.

Research like this really shows how powerful the human mind can be.

My name is Keith Dorrington and I am a Master in Hypnotherapy, Time Line Therapy™and NLP. I am also a qualified Personal Trainer. If you want to experience for yourself positive and permanent changes in your life, then please contact me on 07764 580438 or email me using the form above.

You can find out more about these powerful techniques and how I use them to treat a wide variety of issues at www.mind-body-fitness.co.uk

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How to slow down your life by Philip Waldman D.O, Registered Osteopath at Chelsea Natural Health Clinic, Fulham Rd, SW10

We have all heard of the health benefits of slowing down but in this busy world we live in it can sometimes seem hard to work out how to do this.

Over the years I have come to realise that it is often far better to focus achieving excellence in a few areas than trying to be good at loads of things.  On the back of that I recommend the following simple steps to slowing down your life, to the benefit of yourself and all those around you.

WALK SLOWLY

Through the simple act of walking slowly you will find, by default, that life takes on a more gentle pace.  By walking slowly I mean walking slowly enough such that most people are walking faster than you and so will overtake you.  If you are barrelling down the pavement overtaking people then you are walking too fast.  The caveat here is that you allow yourself to understand that you aren’t going to save much time by walking fast, so even if you are late for something, walk slowly.  This advice applies to day to day life, but should you wish to exercise with a brisk walk then that’s great.

PUT DOWN YOUR KNIFE AND FOLK / SANDWICH / PASTRY BETWEEN MOUTHFULLS

Though this might appear like a piece of advice from an ettiquette handbook, there is a logic behind this suggestion.  The aim is to make yourself eat slowly.  By putting down your knife and fork, or sandwich etc, you will be forced to slow down your eating.  This has numerous benefits, not least aiding digestion and allowing you to fully savour and appreciate your meals.  In eating slowly, as with walking slowly, you will find that if you let it, the rush drops out of life and a calmness will descend..

If you combine these two simple actions then you should find that on one hand life take on a more sedate pace, and on the other, that you get as much, if not more done in the same amount of time.  Soundbites like “Less is more” and “Less haste, more speed” sprng to mind, adn yes they are definitely true in this case.  Why not give it a go, even if only for a day and report back what you experience via the comments section of the website, or via our Facebook page?

Any questions please do just ask.