This story is part of Peak, The Athletic’s desk covering the mental side of sports. Sign up for Peak’s newsletter here.

Brandon Guyer spent seven seasons in the big leagues with the Tampa Bay Rays and Cleveland. He went 3-for-10 with four walks and four runs scored during the 2016 World Series.

I stood near the on-deck circle at Progressive Field. The Chicago Cubs had just taken out Jon Lester, and they were bringing in Aroldis Chapman to face me. It was the bottom of the eighth inning. Two outs, a runner on first, down by three.

By the way, it was Game 7 of the 2016 World Series.

And here came that negative voice, a voice I named “the scared sheep.” That’s the voice that starts to stir in high-pressure moments, when I’m out of my comfort zone, and, well, that was the biggest at-bat of my life. My team, Cleveland, was four outs away from elimination, or four runs away from nirvana.

I could just feel the scared sheep coming. Don’t strike out. Just put the ball in play. Don’t look bad.

It was on me to stop it, to take control. Thankfully, I had trained for this.

Fear and anxiety are common emotions. Feeling them doesn’t mean something’s wrong with you; it means you’re human. Once you embrace and accept those feelings and turn them into fuel, that’s how you tap into what you’re made of and come through in those moments, whether it’s a big sales call, a presentation, a pressing conversation … or a critical at-bat in the World Series.

As Chapman warmed up, I acted like I was in the batter’s box. I took my slow, meaningful breaths and looked at a little speck on the barrel of my bat. As I walked to the plate, I repeated to myself, “Bring it on, Chapman. This is what I train for.”

The best-self voice inside of me, an alter ego I named “The Hungry Lion,” is the one that conquers that “scared sheep” voice. Think of it like Kobe Bryant and the “Mamba Mentality.” It’s a flip-the-switch routine. I close my eyes and embody the hungry lion version of myself. It’s the most amplified, confident, powerful, present-moment-focused version. It’s a little weird, but I see a lion eating a sheep. In my mind, that’s me taking control. It gives me a different posture — this big, powerful, 10-feet-tall, bulletproof body language.

I stepped into the batter’s box, kicked around the dirt, conducted my pre-pitch routine. And then the entire at-bat, it literally felt like I had been there before.

In my mind, I had.

When we found out we were playing the Cubs, I knew I would face Chapman in a big at-bat at some point. I was traded from Tampa Bay to Cleveland just a few months earlier. I went from last place with the Rays to first place with Cleveland. I had never been in the playoffs, and now I was in a pennant race. I had new teammates. I moved my family from St. Petersburg, Fla., to Cleveland. There was a lot going on, a lot of anxiety and fear. I had to fall back on all of the mindset training I had done.

The first time I came into the locker room in Cleveland, I was called to manager Terry Francona’s office. I sat on the couch, and he told me, “We wanted you because we knew how good you can be against left-handed pitchers. Don’t try to do more than we need.”

That wasn’t a surprise. That team was great. It wasn’t my first time hearing that message, either. For the majority of my career, I was a platoon hitter. You’re here to rake against lefties. They didn’t say this, but I knew that if I didn’t, I would be out of the league.

I decided to star in the role I had while I worked toward the role I wanted. Be the best right-handed-hitting platoon player you can be. When I would catch myself spiraling or frustrated when things weren’t going my way, I would try to step back and appreciate what I did have. “Oh, I might not be playing every day, but I’m not playing every day in the big leagues.” I used gratitude as a tool to shift from negative to positive energy. It’s impossible to be in a state of misery and a state of gratitude at the same time.

That changed my outlook on everything, and when adversity came, I had this different energy: freeness, looseness, being in control.

I wanted to visualize every possible situation, so when I got into it, I would feel like I had been there before. The best place to do that? The ballpark sleep room. It was really dark. They had zero-gravity chairs that you could fold back and put up your legs. Super comfy. There was some white noise. I would set an alarm; I didn’t want to stay in there for more than 25 minutes, because I didn’t want to fall into a deep sleep. I just wanted to rest or meditate. I would focus on my breath — inhaling through my nose, drawing the air deep into my stomach as if inflating a balloon, and then exhaling through my nose, making the exhale slightly longer than the inhale.

If I wasn’t starting that night, I would think about a reliever that I might face, like Chapman, and mentally rehearse different situations, different forms of adversity I could face: getting down in the count, an umpire making a bad call, having to replace an injured hitter in the middle of an at-bat. I believe everything happens twice — first, in our mind, and then in real life. I’d meditate by counting in my head until I fell into a deep, relaxed state.

When I played, it was the No. 1 hack to feel better before a game.

Obviously, meditation doesn’t guarantee success. But I felt more confident, more in control, and that feeling goes a long way to help any athlete — or any individual in any walk of life — show up at their best when it matters most.

In the eighth inning of the World Series, I fell behind in the count 1-2 against Chapman. I stepped out, took a deep breath and stared at a little speck on the barrel of my bat, and then thought about exactly what I wanted to do in that moment. I remembered a quote from Derek Jeter: “The last thing you think is the first thing you do.” I didn’t want my last thought to be that scared sheep saying, Don’t strike out. Just put the ball in play. Don’t look bad.

Instead, it was, “Bring it on, Chapman.”

Biggest at-bat of my life. RBI double to right-center field.

But the real win was showing up as the version of myself that I’d trained to become. That identity is what I still carry with me today, and what I now strive to help others build.

— As told to Zack Meisel