So recently, I heard a friend mention she wanted to get better at visualizing and it got me thinking, “Hey, I feel like I’m kinda decent at that.” I haven’t necessarily been trained, but if you multiply the number of team training jumps by minutes in a plane ride to altitude, that ends up being a lot of time that I’ve spent visualizing.
I Have Visualized A LOT
[Let’s conservatively say half of my jumps are team training which is 650 jumps. And let’s say I spend 8 minutes of an Otter ride visualizing. Ten minutes seems realistic but I don’t want to pad my numbers; five minutes seems too short. If my math works out, I’ve spent 87ish hours visualizing. Wow, I am shocked by that number. Plus, that estimation completely leaves out half of my jumps, which isn’t a good representation, as I visualize for fun jumps and jumps at events.]
I also have gone through periods where I visualize 5 minutes a day at home, walking and visualizing skydives. I often do this to prepare for team training camps, a new position, a new team, or some other event that will require seeing a lot of new things in the sky.
Since, I’ve spent a lot of time visualizing, I thought I’d share some notes about my process and what I’ve found works for me.
Side Note: The first time I asked a coach how I should visualize, the answer was “Try something, do it every jump and be consistent about it. Then change it if it doesn’t work.” That was more vague than helpful so I’m going to get very descriptive when I tell you what I do.
Ride to Altitude: Team Training
This is my process for my ride to altitude during team training. I’ve broken it up by altitudes.
0ft – 1,5k (seatbelts off): Breathe
Here, I breathe. Specifically, I breathe in for three, out for three. On the count of one, I breathe into my upper chest. On the count of two, into the sides of my mid-ribs. On the count of three, into my tummy. For the exhale, I reverse that, breathing out of my tummy, then my side ribs, then the upper chest/collar bone region.
Why? Because I have to focus to breathe like that. I want to maintain focus on my breath and only my breath to get calm and steady before I visualize. Plus, when I wear a weight belt, it’s really easy to breath shallowly, so I force myself to breathe deeply with my whole chest. (I use the meditation practice called Noting. Any thought I have unrelated to my breathing, I try to “note” as a thought, and avoid engaging with the thought, diverting my focus back to my breath.)
1,5k – 5k: Visualize the crux
I think about the jump and identify the part that will be the hardest part for me, the crux. In 4way and 8way, that tends to either be a block move or some blind move from one random to another. (For example of blocks, in 4way point’s move on the 22. Or in tail, the 10. In 8way, the three person piece on the 8.)
First, I would not generally conjure an image but keep my mental “vision” blank, thinking about how I engage certain muscles to do that movement. I would “see” blackness, but think about my body moving in an empty space, a void. How do my hip and leg muscles contract? Where are my arms? When is my headswitch? What does my core feel like as I’m arching or hopping someone’s burble? I think about those mechanics a few times.
Then, I envision in my minds’ eye how move looks, generally from the camera flyer’s view. I envision my helmet, my jumpsuit and my shoes in the correct color. I envision my typical flying form as it looks in videos, but doing the move absolutely correctly. For example, I fly with a very uniform arch and wide legs, so I envision me doing the moves with my signature flying tendencies, big arch, wide legs.
Sometimes, my brain takes control and I have to correct it. For example, I’ll try to envision myself doing a 360. However, my brain plays a video in my head of me doing over-rotating, even just a few degrees. Or perhaps my brain shows a video of me me wobbling during a turn, instead of turning smoothly. I have to stop my brain and try again, slowing down the mental video of the move until I see my body doing the move perfectly in freefall.
5k-8k:
Goof off. Joke with my team. Make faces. Stare out the window. Sing a song. Whatever.
8k:
Gloves, put on my helmet and buffs, zip up the jumpsuit.
8,5k-slightly before exit: Visualize the jump
I visualize the entire jump from climb out to pull time, from my view. I visualize the colors. I visualize what my cross partner looks like, their helmet, the emotions on their face. I visualize having to see them over my shoulder if I’m outfacing. I visualize seeing their side or their legs, if they’re in a sidebody or outface position. I think about how I engage my muscles as I do my moves, and what I see as I do that. That includes imagining my grips, my de-arching or arching (depending on whether I’m going over or under on the burble hops), pointing my toes, extending my arms or pulling them in, etc. I even imagine the muscles that will be tired as I do a difficult block. In that view, I visualize one more page than I expect to do (in the past, that was generally 2 or 3 pages).
Then, I visualize the entire jump from climb out to break off, from the view of the camera flyer. I visualize the colors correctly, rigs, helmets and jumpsuits. I visualize perfect points, with the entire team moving, gripping, and releasing in sync. Again, I create that picture in my mind for a couple of pages.
Door!
Jump out and do it.
Tada! That’s it!
Those are the basics of how I visualize team training jumps. I’ve tried my best to capture my process clearly; it’s a rather abstract thing, like trying to describe your dream, or the precise way your brain assembles thoughts and memories. If you have any questions, I would be happy to chat.
This post has gotten pretty long, so I’ll continue this post next week. In that post, I’ll cover how I visualize at events or on fun jumps, which tend to be much less predictable than team jumps. I’ll also cover how I visualize when I’m not in the plane on the ride to altitude, as that is different for me as well.
Until next week, toodles!