Customer Reviews

Peak Performance: Mental Training Techniques of the World's Greatest Athletes

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Although this book appears to be only for sports and the athletic minded, Dr. Garfield also provides examples on how to use these techniques in business as well.

I used Dr. Garfield's techniques in the late 1980's and it made a significant difference in my sales career. I blew past previous limits and won sales contest after sales contest. The techniques work.

I noticed a previous reviewer mentioning NLP techniques. I know of many NLP practioners who wholly endorse Dr. Garfield and in the techniques are similiar. Both involve visualization. Dr. Garfield offers techniques that are not quite as complicated and deliver the same or similiar, or in some cases, better results.

Highly recommended if you can still get a copy. I also have a set of tapes by Dr. Garfield that he did for Nightingale-Conant back in the 80's.

How unfortunate that this great book with it's fantastic principles has been left behind in the wake of newer technologies like NLP.

I first became aware of Dr. Garfield back in 1984 when I was preparing for an athletic competition. I bought Peak Performance, began doing the exercises starting with volition using clusters and the other visualization exercises and it made a huge difference.

When going through a box of old books, I came across this book and started doing the exercises again. Still a winning formula, in my opinion as effective as NLP and a definite under-rated and nearly forgotten but excellent book.

This book is accessible and pertinent to anyone who wants to perform more consistently and effectively. While it focuses on sports, it has a number of useful lessons that can be applied to any aspect of life. The book sets up a program step by step that builds on a very solid foundation of research in both the U.S. and the former U.S.S.R. All of the information is, and will continue to be pertinant. A friend lent me his copy and I was overwhelmed.

The information in this book is excellent! I use it regularly with my hypnosis clients for sports and this author really did his research. His information is very valuable and easy to understand. I recommend it for any athlete who wants to take their sport to a higher level of performance

as a college student athlete, i was assigned to read this book for a sport psychology class. I found it very interesting and followed the phases of each section. After reading this book, i have found myself applying many of its lessons in my athletic performances as well as everyday tasks. This book was borrowed from my professor and even as a broke college student I can't wait to get my own copy in the mail. I highly reccomend this book.

This book really is one the definitive discussions of mental training from the first chapter where Charles Garfield describes an actual experience with, and the remarkable results of, Soviet-style mental training. The exercises are generally excellent (although I found some of the exercises for planning to be a little bit difficult to follow). I believe that if you're serious about this subject, you have to read this book.

I first came across this book 20 years ago while I was playing basketball for my high school. Twenty years later - I am still referring to it from time to time to help me in my business career. It is sad that such relevant book has gone out of print.

It uses mechanical step by setp approach. No irreverent pie in the sky commentary here; just practical exercises. It also has inspirational stories and explanations in each chapter that motivate you to continue.
One of the best chapters will teach you biofeedback, so you can control stress by controlling you bodily functions like heart rate and body temperature (takes about 2 months to finish the biofeedback exercises).

Every chapter ends with an explanation as to how one can apply the techniques in either personal or business life. So it goes beyond sports.
If you are serious about success and high performance, get this book. It has stood the test of time. Just read some of the other reviews here. I am not alone.

Charles Garfield was a computer analyst for the first Apollo mission to the moon, so his scientific explanations are right on the money (he uses science). My final note is this: to get the full results you have to do ALL the exercises from start to finish.

Good luck.

Update: I have found a even better solution: "The Open Focus Brain" by Les Fehmi

gives me knowledge on how an athlete prepares oneself for an event. I have enjoyed quite a few of these motivational books and has given me deatils on how to stay focused on accomplishing goals. thanks!

The author provides many stories about people who operate in a zone with peaks of performance but provides little advice on how to enter this zone.