Sports Psychology Made Easy
How to find your mental game, Fast

Every athlete from grammar school to the pro's needs to discover how their mental game works. Some athletes play on raw physical talent and get by while others discover how to maximize their physical abilities with a strong mental game. How you play when it counts (under pressure) is more important than being the best physical specimen on the field. If you agree, read on!

When the game is on the line, is your mind your best friend or your worst enemy?
Choking under pressure, slumps, loss of concentration, inability to recover after a mistake, unable to do in the game what you do in practice and no confidence are all examples of how your own mind can be your worst enemy.
I know how to fix that!

Hello, I'm Paul S. Palmer, Ph.B., A.A.P.H, founder and director of the Sports Motivation Clinic and the Palmer Smoking Clinic. I know the SECRETS to discovering your mental game. As a mental skills coach, I've been working with Chicago-land athletes, using sports hypnosis techniques for over thirty years. My program is easy to understand, easy to use and the fastest way I know of to get your head in the game. I speak to you in plain language, I have a sense of humor and I might scold my athletes for not doing their mental exercises!!!

As an expert in clinical hypnosis I have a unique understanding of how the brain works and the best ways to train your mind to perform under pressure. My program is designed for speed. I won't teach you any more than you need to know. That may sound strange coming from a teacher but most of my athletes aren't interested in becoming a sports psychologist or care about the long history of hypnosis in sports performance. They want results. You can learn all the basics of mental training in one session from me. If you want more, I'm always here for you.

"Every athlete has the potential to play at the top of their game on every play."
Paul S. Palmer, 1987

Note to Parents:

Your student/athlete has a lot of pressure to deal with. The pressure to perform in their sport, pressure to perform in the classroom and pressure to fulfill the expectations of family, friends, the entire student body and often the community at large, is an awesome responsibility. If they are blessed with physical ability, they can play that card for a while. But as they rise through each new level of competition the need for mental toughness increases. You already know that. Helping your student athlete discover and develop their mental game is a gift that keeps on giving. The original intent of the student/athlete was to prepare them for life. Life is about pressure and competition, winning some and losing some. Developing the tools to help the athlete play at the top of their game is a life lesson that lasts beyond the next game. I help them find their mental game. Note: I always work with a student athlete with a parent present.

Step One: Understanding how your brain works.

Every athlete should understand how their brain works during athletic competition. The smarter you are about how your own mind works, the better chance you have of mastering the mental side of competition.
THE BASICS: The mind has two important parts that contribute to sports performance the conscious and the subconscious. They are very different! They have different roles to play in your development and success as an athlete. If you don't understand their roles, your game performance will always be a crap shoot. If you slept through science class and can't even spell sighcollogee (psychology), you can still benefit from my program. I keep it simple.

Conscious Vs. Subconscious OR
The Learning Part Vs. The Automatic Part

The Conscious mind is what you use anytime you're awake. It's how you learn. A big part of its' job is to pass on information to the automatic part of the brain. That's why you go through endless hours of repetition in the hope that some day the automatic part of the mind will know exactly what to do. With your conscious mind, you can take apart your performance, analyze, analyze and then analyze some more. Some sports can spend 98% of their time at practice/analysis and physical training. I other words, you spend most of your time in the learning part of the mind. It's where you are most comfortable, it's home.

But wait! There is more the conscious mind does for you. It knows if it's a real game or just practice. It's the part of the mind that recognizes that at this very moment the game is on the line! You are up to bat and the success of the entire season rests on your shoulders. If you blow it, you'll be remembered forever as "the choker." As a social pariah, you'll be forced to leave town in the middle of the night, change your name, live in a trailer park and have ugly children. That's what else the conscious part of the mind does for you. Sound familiar?

The subconscious mind on the other hand doesn't care about the situation. It's the cool part of the mind. Its' job is NOT effected by pressure. It is the automatic part of the mind that handles all the mechanics of your swing, your muscle memory, your hand/eye coordination, your fast twitch muscle response. It instantly recognizes and adjusts to changing situations and it does it all behind the scenes in a split second, without you having to consciously direct it.

Question: Which part of your brain do you want working for you on the next pitch?

The automatic part, of course! You can't be in the learning part of the mind during those moments of truth. Has your coach ever said to you "DON'T THINK, REACT!"? Do you know what that means? Do you know how to stop thinking and start reacting? Do you know how to make sure the correct part of the mind is working for you every time it counts? If you don't, then you need to came and see me and the sooner the better.

Next Step: Finding your mental game.

Finding your mental game on your own is not easy. An entire branch of psychology developed over the past 40 years to try and uncover how the best athletes think during their peak performance moments. We've learned a lot about how the mind works during competition. You need to know it too. That's where I come in. I can offer you a crash course in how to get your mind working for you on every play. What I teach you is the culmination of over thirty years of working with athletes plus my field of expertise, hypnosis. Hypnosis has been helping athletes develop their mental game for almost a century and every new discovery in sports psychology confirms the oldest tool (hypnosis) is still the best and fastest way to develop your mental game.

Did you say hypnosis?

Yes, I did. Pretty scary stuff, huh? Hypnosis has been around for a few hundred years and yet most people have no clue what it actually is. I'll answer a number of hypnosis questions on my "Why Hypnosis" page but for now lets call the process Relaxation, Mental Imagery or Visualization or even Meditation if it makes you feel better. When you begin to understand what these simple techniques can do for you, you won't care what they're called.

Attention Coaches and Instructors!

I don't tell the athlete how to play their sport, that's your job. I don't interfere with coaching, but I can make you look like a genius.
I teach the athlete how to master the mental side of competition and maximize your coaching talents. My area of expertise is in hypnosis, a recognized therapeutic tool that can help the athlete get in touch with the part of the mind that controls sports performance. I get their head in the game and the coach gets all the credit! Is that fair, I ask you?

I Coach the Coaches too. If you don't know squat about this mental conditioning thing, Mr. Palmer can catch you up, fast. See my coaches corner for more info.

But, I have a whole team that needs help!

No problem. I have worked with High School and College teams for years. My 1 1/2 hour workshop explains the mental conditioning process in a easy to understand, enjoyable way. I won't even call it hypnosis if it makes you more comfortable. See my teams page for all the details on how I can help your athletes. Team Workshops in the Chicago area start at $600. for up to 20 team members (you don't need 20) and includes a practice CD for each participant.

What does an office visit cost and how many visits?

For any amateur athlete, a private hypnosis session and your own custom CD, the cost is only $250. Can one session do it? One session can do a lot. You will get all the basics you'll ever need in that first session. If you need more help, I'm always here for you. Mental conditioning skills are no different from other skills, they take some practice and there are many levels to challenge even the best athletes. Most clients use the CD very successfully and others work better with periodic office visits. Pros pay $2500.

You learn at home

Mental training is a separate skill from physical training. You don't need the playing field or the gym to work on your mental game. You work on your mental game in the most comfortable environment you can find. At home is good if you can get some privacy. You are looking for a place to relax with no distractions.

How much time does mental conditioning take?

Learning to master your mental game will be the shortest thing you ever did to improve your game. An office visit is one hour and I make you a CD of the relaxation process (15 minutes). The CD will guide you through the process each day until you can start doing short sessions (5 minutes) on your own. This isn't like physical conditioning and repetitive practice sessions, that can go on for hours. How can these short mental exercises help? The short answer is, you are using techniques to train the mind. Longer is not better, it's the precision of the process not the length of time you spend at it.

What is a session like?

It starts with a visit to Mr. Palmer's office or a SKYPE interview. I explain how the process works, tell you the secrets that make it work, answer all your questions and then take you through the hypnosis (relaxation) and make you a custom CD. The idea of the CD is to short cut the learning process so you can develop your mental game FAST. I'll guide you. If you are a quick study, practice daily and can follow simple directions, you can be off and running on your own in no time at all. Clients come back for more because they want more guidance in taking their mental game to the next level. A session with Paul S. Palmer, Director of the Sports Motivation Clinic, will be the best thing you ever did to improve your game. Who's Mr. Palmer? See Bio.

Next, you'll need to answer a few questions.

Before you come in for your private session, I ask my athletes to fill out a short Sports Performance Questionnaire. It saves a lot of precious time, and asks you to start to focus on the things we will work on during your session. Use this link to get to a printable questionnaire.

Can you help a PRO?

Sure, unless you're a real dope, my program can benefit any athlete. If you watch professional sports, you know there are more head cases out there than the local barbershop. Many pros are just like the amateur athlete, they hope their mental game is there when they need it. But, how many times have you seen a million dollar baby fold under pressure? I don't care how much you get paid, where you played, or who you know, if you don't practice being on top of your mental game, rehearse competing under pressure and prepare the mind specifically for the moment of truth, it won't magically be there when it counts!

If you are a professional athlete, chances are you make more money than my cardiologist and my preacher, combined. I'm not saying that's a bad thing, but you have to pay accordingly for my services. Add a "0" to my single session rate for starters, call it a seat tax, guaranteed money or a sign-up bonus. An individual office session plus custom CD is $2500. You'll get the Deluxe Treatment with an hour and a half session. I'll explain the history of sports psychology and how it relates to you, in plan language that should make perfect sense. I'll take you step by step through the relaxation process several times and make you a custom CD. The CD will guide you every day through exactly what you need to do to develop your mental game until you feel comfortable doing it on your own. Once you master your mental game and start winning, a few tickets and a limo, would make your hypnotist happy. And, we all want a happy hypnotist, don't we? DON'T WE!

My help is always in confidence. Our secret!

Most of my athletes seek my help and don't want the world to know how they improved their performance. There are a couple good reasons for this. Some don't want to alert their competition about how they improved but most discover their coaches don't teach Sports Psychology and know nothing about the oldest tool to enhance athletic performance, HYPNOSIS. If you want to learn how to master your mental game you have to learn it on your own. The good news is, you practice and develop your mental game at home, not during practice or on the field. Nobody can tell how you are developing your mental game unless you spill the beans.

But I don't live in the Chicago Area!

I would prefer to work directly with all my athletes, my explanation of the process is priceless. If you can't come to my office, the second best option is to order a Custom CD for the same cost as an office visit. I'll arrange a face to face interview via SKYPE. Amateur athletes only pay $250. Pros pay $2500. US first class shipping included. FedEx or UPS extra.

Check my Tips and Topics.
See how other athletes use Hypnosis

I'm always happy to talk to you by phone about my services and explain anything and everything before you would make an appointment.

Call to make an appointment or to ask questions at ...
Office Number 708-233-1111

mailto:palmer-paul@sbcglobal.net

Sports Motivation Clinic, LLC

14810 S. Keystone Ave

Midlothian, IL. 60445 Hours by appointment, Monday through Friday 2:00 pm to 10:00 pm