Customer Reviews

10-Minute Toughness: The Mental Training Program for Winning Before the Game Begins

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

A friend recommended 10 Minute Toughness to help give me a mental edge while running. I had always wanted to run in marathons, but my breathing hindered me from running long distances. The centering breath and mental workout have really helped me mentally and physically. The plan is easy to follow, and it has now become second nature to me. I can run twice as far as I could a year ago. I am not a coach, but I highy suggest this book for coaches of all ages.

Jason Selk has created a winner in this small book about developing mental toughness. While geared towards athletes, this book is for anyone who has a goal to improve in any area.

The entire 10-minute mental training consists of:
5 minutes with the mental workout
Centering breath 6-2-7
Performance statement
Personal highlight reel
Identity statement
Centering breath 6-2-7
4 minutes completing the Success Log after each event/practice/game
1 minute review of the previous Success Log before the next mental workout

Sounds easy, right? It is and it isn't. Although the book is small and less than 200 pages, it is one which should be worked through slowly and thoroughly. Selk advises the reader to really think through his/her answers to the questions. Take your time. It will be worth it.

The middle part of the book focuses on Goal Setting and Rewards. This is much more difficult than you may think. He asks, "What are your priorities in life? What are your short-term goals? Long term goals? Is what you are doing right now going to get you to your long term goals and still allow you to maintain your priorities in life? What are you willing to sacrifice?" Again, this reader advises you to take your time and think through these questions. Get a small notebook to write your answers...and be willing to revise them.

The final section of the book is the Relentless Solution Focus. Selk contends that there's always a solution. Think positively about what you want and don't focus on what you don't want or what is going wrong. Sounds easy again but it's much more complicated.

If the reader puts in the time to thoroughly read and do the exercises, then the daily Success Log will be a snap. It is not overly complicated, which is where many programs fail, in my opinion. Anyone can work this program for nearly any kinds of life or short term goals.

Jason Selk's accompanying website is also valuable. He outlines his program on it with short video clips and has loads of free downloads. This book is great for coaches of all kinds or just about anyone who wants to improve his/her performance in any field.

Even the relaxation and focusing breathing tool that Selk gives in the section will bring immediate results. I've even tried this while I was doing aerobic exercise on the treadmill and it immediately brought my heart rate and blood pressure down.

Another similar book is Finding Your Zone by Michael Lardon, M.D. It is a little more cerebral and idealistic but makes a good companion to the 10-Minute Toughness. However, if you can only buy one book, get the 10-Minute Toughness. I've already purchased an additional copy for a friend.

In the last several years, we've been bombarded with books like `The Secret' and its ilk - all basically claiming that we can "manifest" what we want in our lives by simply holding the thought in our minds until it happens. Even Napolean Hill's classic `Think and Grow Rich' is similar in its relatively nebulous, goal-setting vagary as it instructs us to simply focus on a `product goal' - repeat a daily positive statement about the goal - and let the subconscious somehow "take over the details" in making it a reality.

If such ambiguity within the realm of achievement and `peak performance' has left you frustrated, you'll likely find Jason Selk's '10 Minute Toughness' just what you need to fill in the pieces of the puzzle. Whether your "game" is an actual sport, college exam, business negotiation, writing project... (anything), Jason helps you break a goal down from `product' to `process' and turn that goal into reality by creating a 10-minute daily "mental workout" for its achievement.

I was surprised to see an earlier review claiming the book is "long-winded." One of the things I loved about it is its brevity; Jason is concise and provides just enough examples within the field of sports. In fact, if you're looking to improve your performance in any athletic endeavor, look no further; `10-Minute Toughness' provides the mental tools you'll need.

While acknowledging that the book is about sport performance, I would have liked some examples from Mr. Selk in how he's used these techniques to improve performance in other contexts. He's worked with corporate teams, Fortune 500 companies, CEOs, etc.: Examples of translations to these realms of performance would have been nice. However, if one's "game" falls within these areas, a modicum of common sense in identifying one's performance levers will make the book applicable and highly effective. That said, I'd be first in line to purchase a follow-up book on applying the '10-Minute Toughness' techniques to contexts outside of athletics.

Bottom line: If you want to improve your performance in sports or any endeavor, '10-Minute Toughness' has your simple yet comprehensive mental formula. It provides clear and powerful instruction along with relevant examples. All necessary worksheets are in the back of the book as well. Highly recommended!

This would have been a super helpful book for me to have had as a high school basketball player back in the late 1970s! It is a disciplined approach that can be applied on a daily basis for athletes and I suppose individuals in the business world. Anyone who needs to be mentally disciplined on a daily basis will benefit from the program in this book.

The author is a sport psychologist named Jason Selk. The program focuses on helping the reader develop his or her own individual program to develop mental toughness as well as eliminating mental distractions, improve work and practice ethic and develop a useful and targeted goal setting program to self-motivate on a daily basis.

There are lots of books about motivation and sport psychology, but few that are practical and that can be easily applied by individuals or teams of athletes.

Kevin Sivils author of Game Strategy and Tactics for Basketball
Game Strategies and Tactics for Basketball: Bench Coaching for Success

I have been an amateur athlete for over 20 years and have never been able to perform at my peak consistently during competition. This book has given me specific tools to not only prepare for competition, but perform at my best when it counts. I now use some of the basic tools that the books teaches with my kids in their sports. It is by far the best book I have read on the subject of sports psychology or mental training, and I highly recommend it.

I got good value out of this 192 page hardback. This is a practical, no-nonsense guide to getting tougher. There's a little bit of padding, repetition, the inevitable string of anecdotes and a few stories, but in essence you're buying a gym programme for your head.

Like any gym programme, the results come from putting the programme into action - doing it, not talking about it - day in day out. I think Jason Selk has done a nice job wrapping the way to make profound changes into a simple, paint-by-numbers, approach. The mental work out is not Pulitzer or Nobel prize material, but it is practical. Follow it and do as he suggests and you will make significant progress.

(To complement this book, try "Finding Your Zone" by Michael Lardon. Pretty much the same stuff but from a conceptual perspective. Lardon tells you where you need to go to achieving an optimal state of mind for perfomance; Selk tells you how to get there.)

As a graduate student in the field of Sport Psychology, I come across a lot of books that talk about concepts and give examples of techniques. However, 10 MT is the first one that has been able to lay out a specific plan to be used daily to make athletes stronger in their mental game. As an added bonus, after reading 10 MT, I was able to apply the phases of Jason's plan to my own life as a student, coach, and employee.

I have applied these principles of the mental toughness to loose weight and work out at my peak performance. The biggest problem for me has been weight loss, but this mental work-out is empowering and life changing. It will work in many aspects of life to lead to higher success and a happier outlook to problems. I highly reccomend to those that struggle with a weight problem.

Bought this book for one of my grandsons who is among the top 50 junior golfers in our state. He was able to improve his scores by several strokes using some of the techniques from the book.

I was just browsing through some of the sports psych books and came upon this one. Read the little blurb and bought it. It literally changed my life. So many other books suggest what your end result should be, but not any help on HOW to actually do it. This book is a step by step guide to helping people achieve their goals and being tough when it matters the most. Without this book I never would have been able to go to the Olympics in 2010 and win a bronze medal. Everything in this book directly helped in developing a mental plan and putting it into action. I really suggest this book to anyone (athlete or not) who needs help in putting together a plan to reach their goals. Seriously, a MUST read!!