Snapshot · The Mel Robbins Podcast
Research shows athletes who mentally imagine practicing basketball or soccer have better performance than those who do not include imagination in their training.
Where this was said
At 55:55 · chapter starts 54:20
This is the scientific spine of the episode. Dr. Vieten explains that the brain differentiates much less than expected between real experience and vividly imagined experience: your visual cortex lights up when you imagine seeing something; your auditory cortex fires when you imagine hearing something; your motor cortex activates when you imagine movement. The practical implication is that sitting in your pajamas imagining yourself training is still training your brain. She cites Billie Jean King's pre-sleep practice of mentally rehearsing every possible ball angle, and notes that research consistently shows athletes who include mental rehearsal outperform those who don't. The flipside is equally important: if you imagine threatening or worst-case scenarios all day, your body releases cortisol as if those events are actually happening — making chronic negative imagination a genuine physiological stressor.
When you vividly imagine something, your visual, auditory, and motor cortices light up almost identically to when it actually happens. This means daily visualization is genuine neural training — not wishful thinking.
The brain's visual, auditory, and motor cortices light up nearly identically whether an experience is real or imagined, making visualization a form of actual neural training.
Imagining threatening or worst-case scenarios releases cortisol in the body, nearly as if those events were actually happening, keeping the body in a chronic stress state.
Dr. Vieten had everything — great career, beautiful life — and was secretly drinking heavily. She imagined asking for help would end her career. When she finally called a colleague, he showed up immediately and gave her 60 days off with full support. The story she'd been telling herself was a lie.
Thomas's wife is already ranked in the top 2,000 CrossFit athletes in the world — roughly the top 1% — and Thomas wants her to pursue the sport professionally now that he is graduating law school.
Shelly-Ann went from being the 6th reserve (last on the relay) at the 2007 Osaka World Championships to winning Olympic gold in 2008 — all by changing her mindset and becoming consistent.
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce has won 19 gold medals in track and field, including 3 Olympic golds and 10 World Championship titles.
Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce became the first Caribbean woman to win an Olympic gold medal in the 100 meters when she won in Beijing in 2008.
Shelly-Ann won the 2022 World Championship at age 35, becoming the oldest man or woman ever to win the 100-meter world title.
Shelly-Ann is one of only approximately 2 to 3 women ever to win a global sprinting championship after giving birth, making her 2019 World Championship win historic.
At age 35 in the 2022 season, Shelly-Ann ran 10.60 seconds or faster in the 100 meters six or seven times — an extraordinary level of consistency.
Shelly-Ann won World Championship gold in 2019 and 2022 after giving birth to her son Zyon in 2017 — feats almost no other sprinter in history has achieved.
Nike honored only two athletes with statues at the 2024 Paris Olympics — LeBron James and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce — to celebrate their iconic legacies.
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