It's okay to be nervous, Clair. Everyone suffers from it just prior to any form of testing.
The trick is to recall that you have trained in what you need for your test to the point that it is a spinal reflex activity. What this means is that you don't need to think about what you're doing.
So it doesn't matter if your mind is chattering like a box of agitated monkeys, it just has to start the ball rolling, get out of the way and let your body get on with what it knows how to do.
If you're finding that your nerves are really intefering, then a trick that I used to use, prior to kata testing, is a form of self-distracting visualisation. I would build in my head the mental image of a picturesque vista with a lake in the foreground, forested shores and lofty mountains rising behind, their heads shrouded in cloud. That used to calm me right down.
The trick is to recall that you have trained in what you need for your test to the point that it is a spinal reflex activity. What this means is that you don't need to think about what you're doing.
So it doesn't matter if your mind is chattering like a box of agitated monkeys, it just has to start the ball rolling, get out of the way and let your body get on with what it knows how to do.
If you're finding that your nerves are really intefering, then a trick that I used to use, prior to kata testing, is a form of self-distracting visualisation. I would build in my head the mental image of a picturesque vista with a lake in the foreground, forested shores and lofty mountains rising behind, their heads shrouded in cloud. That used to calm me right down.
