From my previous post on the mindset and athletic performance, you’ll notice that this self-criticism is an extension of the fixed mindset.  All that results from this situation is you feel more stress, more tension, and that leads to more mistakes.  The cycle repeats.  A recent book I read, The Inner Game of Tennis, helped me understand how to change your psychology to lead to better performance on and off the field.

It all begins with a simple concept and builds from that understanding: there are two main selves in us on and off the field.  How these two selves interact with each other determines our ability to execute successfully.  Through improving the interaction between these two selves, we improve our ability to execute successfully.  Think of it in the following way:

• Self 1 – This self is our conscience.  Through this self, we make judgements  of our performance.  These judgements hurt our performance regardless of if they’re good or bad thoughts.
• Self 2 – This self is our unconscious.  This is our muscle memory, nervous system, etc, all wrapped up into one.  This self is directly impacted by the judgements of Self 1.

The key.

The key to the inner game we play at all times, on or off the court, is to let Self 2 do its job without Self 1 interfering.  When Self 1 tries to control Self 2, our performance suffers.  We get in our own heads (”Make a shot already!”).  We try to make corrections forcefully, making us more tense (”Move your hips! Great, now your wrist is too stiff to swing, idiot!”).

So how do prevent Self 1 from controlling Self 2?  The answer is to quit making judgements of our performance as either Good or Bad.  It just is.  Trust Self 2 to perform well.  If you’re a basketball player, you’ve taken thousands of shots throughout your career.  Your body knows how to shoot the ball.  Let it do what it has done thousands of times without your interference.  The problem is, it’s easier said than done to just suspend all judgement.  However, we have a tremendous aid in this.

Get in the zone.  Focus your concentration.

We’ve all heard about “the zone.”  We’ve all heard the cliche: “it’s like time slows down!”  By getting into the zone, we don’t give our Self 1 the ability to make judgements on Self 2.  So how do we get into the zone?  Through focusing our concentration on something minute.  That can be the stitches on a baseball, the way a basketball spins in the air, even our own breathing.  By focusing our concentration so intently, we accomplish two things: letting Self 2 do its job without judgement, and expanding our senses to pick up more information leading to better performance.

The final step: practice your inner game.

Unfortunately, and fortunately, the inner game does not come easily, it takes a lot of practice.  This is both a good and bad thing: it’ll be hard for you, but your competition will have just as hard a time (if they even know about it).  Practicing is simple: go shoot hoops and focus on the arc of the ball.  Go practice your batting, and focus on the stitches as it comes to you.  Play catch with a friend, and focus on your breathing.  By practicing the inner game, you’ll get better.

Tying up some loose ends…

Positive thinking – The reason why positive thinking is detrimental is because we often lie to ourselves or fail to see reality as it is.  If our shots aren’t going through the hoop, saying “It’s okay, the next will go in,” only hurts our performance.  By failing to failing to see reality as it is, we lose the opportunity to make a positive correction to our technique.  Which leads us to…

Criticism / Instruction – So where do these fit in?  These are important, even more in the inner game.

1. As instructors, we want to provide instruction, but we have to provide it in a way that guides athletes to discover what works for them.  For example: bending the knees in a free throw.  There is no target amount. Everyone is different. An example of a good instruction would be: experiment with your knee bend.  Pay attention to how bending your knees feels, and what feels natural to you. This allows the athlete to experiment to find what works best for them.
2. As athletes, we want to experiment with what feels and works best for us.  When it comes to personal techniques, don’t take instruction literally.  How much you swing your hips, how stiff you keep your wrist, etc, changes from athlete to athlete.  Sometimes however, you need to take instruction literally, such as in football.  “You need to be ten yards before you cut to the left.”  Realize the difference between the two.

Finally, don’t think you’ve got the inner game down 100%.  Like many things in life, it’s one of those things that needs constant work,  As soon as you think you have it down, realize that Self 1 just made a judgement, and you’re back to the beginning.

In closing…

Read this post along with my post about mindsets and athletics, and analyze the similarities between the two.  Practice the concepts in both, and let your performance reach new heights.  Finally, buy both The Inner Game of Tennis and Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.  Devour both books.  While I do a pretty good job of expressing the information contained in both wonderful books, there is still much more to be learned from them directly.

I’ve repeatedly wrote about the benefit, and necessity, of hard work.  While I knew this intuitively, my thoughts have always been scattered.  That all changed recently when I read Mindsets: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck.  I had a vague idea of what the book was about before I read it, figuring it would be just another book about the importance of not fearing failure, working hard, etc.  It’s a great philosophy to promote, but this is something I already knew.  I want this concept expanded.  Well, during my reading of the book, Dweck really tied up a lot of loose ends in my thinking about this whole philosophy, and helped my form more concrete thoughts.

Dweck is currently a professor of psychology at Stanford (previously at Columbia).  The main thesis of the book is that there are basically two mindsets we can adopt, they are:

• The fixed mindset – “Believing that your qualities are carved in stone – the fixed mindset – creates an urgency to prove yourself over and over again.  If you have a certain amount of intelligence, a certian personality, and a certain moral character – well you better prove that you have a healthy dose of them.”
• The growth mindset – “This growth mindset is based on the belief that your basic qualities are things you can cultivate through your efforts.”

That’s it.  It seems pretty simple, but the implications for this are tremendous.  Through realizing which mindset we currently utilize, and switching from the fixed to growth mindset, we can greatly improve ourself in athletics, school, relationships, etc.  As she goes on to write, we can utilize both mindsets at the same time.  For example: in high school I believed I was either good in math or I wasn’t.  Yet after school every day I could be found in my school’s weight room, improving myself for the upcoming football season.  Funny, isn’t it?

Let’s examine these mindsets in an athletic context.  The athletes with the fixed mindset will be those who will never be found working out or practicing, hate playing against superior opponents, and take losing personally (those are just some of the characteristics).  These athletes, through believing in only a set amount of innate talent, want to constantly prove how great they are.  If they lose, have to work hard, etc, then clearly they don’t have as much talent as they think they do.  See how this mindset can be terribly limiting?

Now let’s examine the growth mindset.  The athletes with the growth mindset will always be seen improving themselves in the weigh room or practice field, love the challenge of playing against superior opponents, and view loss as feedback as to what they need to improve on.  Everything is an opportunity for growth for these athletes.  They’re always striving to take their athletics to a greater level.  Take Michael Jordan for example (which Dweck also uses in the book).  Jordan was cut from the team in high school.  If he would have utilized a fixed mindset, he would have said “well, basketball isn’ t my sport,” and quit.  But, as we all know, he didn’t.  He turned around, worked his butt off, and is the greatest basketball player to ever play the game.

I strongly encourage you to buy the book (it’s ten dollars, I think), analyze your mindsets in all areas of your life (not just athletics) and make the necessary improvements.  At the very least, answer the following questions and, based on your answers, analyze your current mindset and how you can improve upon it.

• Would you rather play against an opponent that will give you a sure victory, or against an opponent that will be a challenge?
• Do you believe that you’re born with a set amount of talent, and that no matter what you do, you can’t change it?
• Do you look forward to practicing, working out, etc?
• If you were losing in a competition, would you rather play it to completion or quit?
• Do you take all losses extremely harshly?  Or do you take losses as an opportunity to find weaknesses and improve upon them?

Many people I talk to about visualizing then succeeding don’t believe that it works.  I believe that it works for some people, and it doesn’t work for others.  Try it out.  Practice it.  If it works for you when you practice or exercise, keep working on it to develop it further.  If it works well enough for you, do it before competition.  It can only help.

Either way, whether you believe it works or not, check out the article.  It’s always good to be familiar with these different concepts pertaining to athletic performance.

A little bit of talent/intelligence + a lot of hard work + dedication = success.

Most people focus too much on the talent/intelligence part and not at all on the hard work or dedication.  The reason for that is simple: people want to believe there’s a reason other than themselves for their lack of success.  When you realize that what truly separates the successful from the non-successful is their work ethic and dedication, and not some unnatural genius or ability, you can truly achieve your goals.  In many peoples’ minds, including my own, Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player to play the game.  Yes, he had some natural ability, but he himself gives his credit to his extreme work ethic.

You might not get a chance to play in the professional leagues or on a D1 college team, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make it farther and pursue your goals longer than others do.  There is no secret to success.  No special book to read, no special practice technique to use, no special ability to have.  People want to believe that the formula for success is black and white, cut right down the middle.  It’s not.  Success lies somewhere in the middle, in the shades of grey.

Fortunately for us, Jedd was kind enough to take some time out of his extremely busy schedule to answer a few questions for us here at the Athlete Resource Center.Athlete Resource Center: Why did you start DieselCrew.com, and what is it about?

Napalm Jedd:  Jim Smith and I started the DieselCrew.com site, because we love all forms of strength training.  We had been training together for several years, and we were developing our own training method we called the Diesel Method, and we thought we truly had something to offer the strength community.

ARC: What is your training and nutrition program like?

Napalm Jedd: I have 3 or 4 training sessions a week in which I focus on full body training, including powerlifting, strongman, and shades of bodybuilding.  Each day I workout, I do various forms of Grip strength, or hand strength training.  I also add an extra workout, generally on Sundays, which is focused solely on Grip strength.

I focus on Grip strength a great deal because I compete in Grip strength competitions.  I am involved heavily in this sport, and have been ranked in the top 5 in the United States for the last several years.

My main objectives with my full body training these days are strength and fitness.  Although I do not compete in Strongman anymore, I still perform several of the events.  I am always training to be as strong as possible.

ARC:  What are your thoughts on supplements?

Napalm Jedd: I believe supplements are good for athletes who train hard to prevent injury and speed recovery.  I take a few supplements, mainly protein, creatine, and vitamins.  I choose to support supplement companies who support the sport of Grip, especially AtLargeNutrition.com

ARC:  What motivates you?

Napalm Jedd: I am motivated by many things.  One of them is the developing sport of Grip strength.  We have recently begun setting up our annual Grip contest as the National Hand Strength Championship.  You must qualify at a previous contest that took place during the season in order to compete at Nationals.  I want to be the best in the nation and in the world, and my training is designed to support that.

In the last year, I have also begun trying to make the transition back into playing more traditional sports in my hometown.  I do this because I enjoy playing them, but also because I want to promote healthy activities in this area, hopefully leading to a healthier community.

ARC: What achievement are you most proud of?

Napalm Jedd: In my training career, I have accomplished many things I am very proud of, especially in the realm of Grip strength.  I have closed many heavy-rated hand grippers and performed many other renowed Grip strength feats of strength, including pinching two 45-pound plates, six 10-pound plates, and lifting block weights in excess of 60 pounds.

ARC: What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

Napalm Jedd: The best advice I’ve ever received would have to be to work hard.  I got this from my dad, who taught me at a very young age that you get results from hard work and dedication.  If you are not willing to work hard for what you want, you will never accomplish it.

ARC:  What are some of your future plans?

Napalm Jedd: My future plans are to continue to develop my website, DieselCrew.com, further the sport of Grip strength, and offer more products.  In fact, after the success and recognition from the Nail Bending eBook I published in 2006, I plan to release a Card Tearing eBook very soon.

ARC:  Where should athletes go who are looking to get into Grip?

Napalm Jedd:  There are a handful of resources for your readers for buidling a powerful grip.  There is no better site for developing Grip strength than my site, DieselCrew.com.

Jim and I are heavily involved in a forum relating to Grip strength feats and the sport of Grip strength, called GripBoard.com

Finally, I work very closely with Scott Bird, who has built a tremendous strength training resource site, with a great selection of Grip strength information, StraightToTheBar.com.

However, these people are missing the forest for the trees.  Gladwell even comes out and states what success is on pages 30-31:

Success is the result of what sociologists like to call ‘accumulated advantage’.  The professional hockey player starts out a little bit better than his peers.  And that little difference leads to an opportunity that makes that difference a bit bigger, and that edge in turn leads to another opportunity, which makes the initially small difference bigger still–and on and on until the hockey player is a genuine outlier.

If that isn’t enough, Gladwell states on page 246:

Success is a function of persistence and doggedness and the willingness to work hard for twenty-two minutes to make sense of something that most people would give up on afiter thirty seconds.

Gladwell’s theory of success doesn’t jive with what these people are saying.  In fact, he basically says its the exact opposite.

I agree with him.  Success is the “accumulated advantage” (what those sociologists were saying).  I already know what you’re thinking.  I can read your thoughts: So what?  What does that mean for me?  How will I be successful? I’ll tell you how: you accumulate your own advantage.  You need to work on incremental change.  Go to sports camps to get your name out, and develop your skills as an athlete.  Develop a nutrition program, an exercise program, and stick with them.  Don’t worry about making ground-breaking changes: to drop your 4.8 speed to 4.4, or to increase your free-throw percentage by 20%.  Focus on small, incremental change.  If you can improve your performance a little bit here, a little bit there, it’ll add up.  And guess what, everyone can improve themselves in small amounts to see big results.

Re-read Gladwell’s second quote.  That persistance and doggedness will lead you to success. It’s hard though.  When you see all your taking it easy, going home after to school to play video games while you’re pouring sweat, blood, and tears in your pursuits, you’ll question yourself.  Everyone does that.  That’s a good thing, because your opponents will be questioning themselves too.  When they decide it’s not worth it and go home, you’ll still be there making yourself a better athlete.  Then, when the time comes and you compete against them, you’ll be victorious.

Focus on small, incremental accumulated advantages, and you will succeed.

An Example – Deconstruction:

Let’s take football for an example.  What separates the professional players from the rest of the athletes able to play in the NFL?  Their height, weight, speed, agility, etc, right?  They’re just all-around better athletes.  While this is true, there is still a lot of tall, big players who don’t make it.  Also, there’s quite a few “skill-position” players (running backs, wide recievers, etc) who aren’t the tallest or the biggest guys in the world, so that can’t totally be it.  They have to do something with the size they have.  They need to push players around, run others over, get out of their stance fast to get downfield.  Most contact occurs at close distances too.  Just watch any offensive line square up with a defensive line.  They’re not thirty yards away from eachother, running full steam towards their opponent.  They’re inches away.

Those inches of space between opponents is where the key to football lies.  This is true of all football.  Most of us have heard the saying that football is a game of inches.  Even wide receivers beat their opponents by utilizing their skills the most in small spaces.  Blown assignments by the defense don’t occur that often.  We just notice them more, because they’re so out of the ordinary.  Most wide-receivers use their skills to get the offense five or ten yards.  Ask any head coach/offensive coordinator if they would take five or ten yards every play.  They would love it.

An Example – Deconstruction’s Result:

Okay, so now we know small space is the key to football.  We also know that size, speed, strength, etc, and how players utilize that in these small spaces, is what determines who will beat who in that battle.  That’s the textbook definition of power.  Power = mass x acceleration.  So as a football player, we want to increase both our mass and acceleration to improve as a player.  I know what you’re thinking, “No kidding.  That’s why we’re always in the weight room.”  True, but examine the exercises you do.  Do bicep curls really increase your power?  No, not really.  So what does?

Implementing the Deconstruction to Better Our Ability:

Well, football players gain their power from their legs, so that should be your primary concern.  Squats, deadlifts, and especially plyometric exercises.  Go into any high school weight room and you’ll see basically three exercises: bench press, bicep curls, and calf raises (only the bench press is beneficial for football players, and this isn’t even as beneficial as squats).  Utilizing this knowledge, especially while others aren’t, will lead to huge success in tryouts and during the following season.

The Good News and Bad News:

The good news is that anyone can deconstruct their sport to find out what truly separates better athletes from average ones.  You can use this knowledge and implement it into your exercise program and goal setting to improve your athletic ability in leaps and bounds.  The bad news: it’s time consuming and hard.  It’s up to you to determine if it’s worth it, and that’s good too.  By you doing all the little things to improve yourself, while other athletes aren’t, will lead to huge results.  You may not see it right away, but come game day, you’ll see the fruit of your efforts when you are victorious over your opponent.