Our thoughts count in every aspect of our lives, of course, but our limiting thoughts are somehow more noticeable when we're competing against others. Take sport for example.

'I bet he gets me caught out with his spin bowling', 'He looks as if he's got more stamina than I have', 'All these other competitors look better than me', 'She looks fit'. And the doubts begin to creep in.

And then - when we finally see these people perform in the pre-match or pre-event warm up, it's even worse! 'Wow! - she can hit that ball hard', 'He's on middle stump every time', 'I'll never be able to return those serves?', 'That winger has amazing stick work', 'How'm I going to scrum down against that guy?'

Poor brain! It doesn't really stand a chance does it? We've worked so hard at our technique, our skills, our fitness, our endurance - every aspect of training our bodies.

But have we made sure that we've worked just as hard on our thoughts? It's our thoughts that count! We only need to concentrate on our own performance, our own excellence. We only need to remember every aspect of our very best skills and strategies. Depending upon which sport we're competing in, all we need to think about is when we played the perfect passing forehand in tennis, or the greatest lob or drop shot in squash, ran the 400 metres in a record time, swam the strongest leg of a triathlon, scored the most unbelievable try, jumped highest in the line out, or did whatever we do in our chosen sport. And because our brain can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality, we can hear the roar of the crowd, see the cheering faces of our supporters, and feel the ecstasy of the moment.

In that 'zone' there's no room in our brains for negative thoughts, for doubts, uncertainties or fears. We are supreme. Entertaining those thoughts, instead of the limiting ones, we are much more likely to be successful and experience great happiness and joy.