In her blog last month, Performance Psychologist, Dr Anna Waters, highlighted how useful mental imagery can be in managing performance anxiety. Here, she expands on how this powerful technique can help you achieve your creative goals.
“Before stepping on stage, I close my eyes and mentally perform every bar, hearing and feeling each nuance.” — Yo-Yo Ma
Thoughts, feelings and images run through our minds as we approach important events. Do you mentally run through an upcoming audition, or important performance? Do your images and thoughts help you create the performances you want to deliver? If not, then you could be overlooking one of the most powerful tools for success: mental imagery.
For performing artists, mental imagery (MI) consists of guiding your images in a constructive positive way to enhance your performance in practise and on stage. Backed by science, mental imagery (MI) is an excellent tool to prime the brain and body for optimal performance.
What is Mental Imagery and why is it important?
- It is often called visualisation or mental rehearsal
- It involves using all of your senses (see, feel, hear, taste, smell) to rehearse your performance in your mind
- MI is a skill which can be learned
Structured MI programmes are supported by science and proven by elite performers, to help refine technical skills, deepen emotional expression, and manage stage-related anxiety.
Mental imagery provides a valuable opportunity to prepare for and practise dealing with problems, challenges, or upcoming performances in your mind before you tackle them in real life. As conductor Gustavo Dudamel highlights, “I imagine the entire orchestra; then my part fits naturally into that picture.”
Scientific Support for Mental Imagery
Recent neuroimaging techniques have enabled researchers to examine the neural underpinnings of MI in the brain. MI has been found to use similar neural mechanisms used in perception and motor control, which is relevant for performing artists too.
In a review of the literature on the benefits of imagery use for peak performance in sport, Janjigian (2024) concluded that MI is a rigorously supported psychological tool for athletes across all skill levels to enhance performance. Janjigian (2024) found evidence to support psychological, physiological and neural mechanisms, underpinning it’s effectiveness.
An exploratory study by Gregg, Clark and Hall (2008) into musicians’ use of mental imagery found that, musicians reported employing imagery to limit distractions, recover from an error, maintain mental toughness, demonstrate confidence, and overcome mental and physical fatigue.
Furthermore, performance majors indicated using imagery significantly more frequently to see themselves overcoming a difficult situation than non-performance majors, while voice musicians employed imagery to see goal achievement more often than instrumental musicians.
Key Benefits of Mental Imagery for Performing Artists
Build Confidence – imagining yourself performing a piece you have been practising, will help give you a feeling of mastery, which in turn boosts your confidence.
Managing Performance Anxiety – Imagining yourself feeling calm, focused and confident on stage, can rewire your typical stress response. Repeated mental exposure to performance scenarios reduces fear and equips you with coping strategies, if you start to feel nervous.
Performance Preparation – Mentally rehearse how you would like to perform (e.g. calm and focused). Imagine the theatre, the audience and use all your senses to create a real-life experience.
Enhancing Expressivity – mentally rehearse expression and dynamics of piece to deepen interpretation. Use to plan and explore the expression and message of the piece you are playing.
Enhancing Technical Skills – MI allows you to rehearse and address tricky passages, before you physically perform them. Mentally imagining them, strengthens neural connections related to timing, coordination and accuracy.
Reinforcing Muscle Memory – kinaesthetic imagery, feeling the tension, release, and flow of your movements, is a brilliant way of boosting learning of new skills. It speeds up motor learning by replaying movement patterns in the brain.
Key To Effective Mental Imagery
To maximise your imagery training effectiveness focus on:
- Vividness and detail
- Controllability – being able to control and manipulate your images as you want to, a bit like editing a film in your mind
- Using all senses (see, feel, hear, smell, and taste) and emotions
Tips for getting Started
- Practice makes perfect. Imagery is a skill that needs to be practiced to be effective.
- Aim for quality practice. It is important to start with brief high quality mental imagery training sessions. Effective imagery is mentally tiring, so aim for quality images over short periods of time and increase your training times as you master the skill.
- Identify your scenario to image. Pick a specific performance you want to image.
- Add detail and make it as realistic as possible. Imagine the stage, the lights, the audience, the sound of the others performers around you, taking a sip of cool refreshing water.
- Include all your senses. What can you see, hear, feel, smell, touch and taste? Feel your body moving as you would when you perform.
- Imagine setbacks and mentally rehearse your response to them.
- Make MI a habit. While brushing your teeth in the morning imagine a few bars of a current piece/a few lines of a play. Spend a couple of minutes before practice/rehearsal imagining any difficult passages you will be practicing. Whilst commuting home after a show, do a MI review of your performance.
Additional suggestions
- Keep a MI training journal – note what you imaged, rate how it went and what you learned.
- Use guided audio scripts, or even better, record your own to stay consistent.
References
Gregg, M. J. and Clark, T. and Hall, C. R. (2008). Seeing the sound: an exploration of the use of mental imagery by classical musicians. Musicae Scientiae, 12 (2) pp. 231-247. ISSN 1029-8649 (print) 2045-4147 (online).
Holmes, P. S., & Collins, D. J. (2001). The PETTLEP approach to motor imagery: A functional equivalence model for sport psychologists. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 13(1), 60–83.
Janjigian, Kiersten. “Picture perfect: the science behind mental imagery for peak performance & best practices for mental imagery protocols in sport” Journal of Imagery Research in Sport and Physical Activity, vol. 19, no. s1, 2024, pp. 20230027. https://doi.org/10.1515/jirspa-2023-0027