What you think matters

Recently I read a story about Jamaica’s Ellaine Herah-Thompson’s road to Olympic double gold.
I mean, a lot of stories have been told, but the one that stands out for me was the one in which she spoke about her worries before the race and how she resorted to using her thoughts positively to achieve success.
I always tell friends and family that the energy that you send out in the world has a way of coming back to you two-fold.
Now, before the Olympics, my money was on Shelley-Ann Fraser-Pryce. Yes, Herah-Thompson was good, but at that time, in my mind, not as good as Fraser-Pryce.
Boy, was I wrong. Herah-Thompson wasn’t the best athlete in school, and she wasn’t the best in Jamaica. In the article I read, she spoke about her fears before the Jamaica’s trials due to the tendon pain she had been experiencing on and off for about five years.
The latest bout of pain was intense and she feared, as the tendon stayed tender, that she might miss the trials.
She iced the tendon like any athlete would do, but at some point, she realised that that was not enough. She realised that her mind was not in the right place and she had to change the way she thought and spoke to herself.
Sometimes, as humans, we tell ourselves the wrong things. Today, I’m not feeling well, I’m in pain and I won’t go to work or I won’t train, and we believe that and stay away. Now, every morning, Thompson-Herah would wake, pray and read the Bible.
She told international media that after every practice session, she would reach for her phone, open up the notes app and write down and read out a series of affirmations.
The affirmations read "I will run 10.5 seconds. I will run 21.5 seconds. I can do it. I’m a winner. I’m a champion".
It continued: "I will be the fastest woman alive. Say it, believe it, work for it and pray for it. I will be the double Olympic champion. Today is my day. I’m the greatest”.
Trials came and she made the team for the Tokyo Olympic Games. Enough to get her a spot. But more work needed to be done. She was third in the 100 metres. Fraser-Pryce, the fastest woman alive and the world champion, was well out in front. Shericka Jackson, usually a 400 m specialist, also finished ahead of Thompson-Herah.
She, however, continued with her affirmations and also continued to tend to her tendon.
She ran 10.71 seconds, her fastest time in four years, in her last race before Tokyo. She then ran 10.82 seconds in her first 100m heat. Then 10.76 seconds in her semi-final. Now, in Afrikaans, we say ‘bietjie warm’ as she was getting to the final race.
At that point, after having watched her through the heats, I started to see something different. Her confidence was growing, it’s like couldn’t wait to take her gold home.
Herah-Thompson became the first woman to do an Olympic double-double in Tokyo. Lesson learnt, pay attention to detail, to your thoughts and feed the universe good energy.

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