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AUGUST, 2000
"Thinkin Is
Stinkin"
What are you thinking about when you are
performing at your best in anything you do? If
you are honest with yourself, you will realize
that the answer is always the same. You are not
thinking. You are operating on instinct!
So how do you train your mind to stop thinking in
order to perform on instinct? You do it in the
four stages of learning which are the unconscious
incompetent, the conscious incompetent, the
conscious competent, and the subconscious
competent.
When you start learning a new skill, you are an
unconscious competent. You are not even aware of
what you are doing wrong. Once you begin to
become aware of what you are doing wrong, you
move up to the stage of being a conscious
incompetent.
Through practice and lots of mistakes, you
gradually become proficient at your new skill.
You know what you are doing and you can do it
well. Congratulations, you are now a conscious
competent and ready for the final stage of peak
performance or being in the 'zone' as a
subconscious competent.
This is the tricky part because a subconscious
competent performs without thinking or having
concern about the outcome. It's a catch 22. If
you want the outcome, you can't have it because
it will bring you back into thinking about the
results. If you don't care about the outcome, you
can have it because you mind is free to perform
without fear of failure.
Once you become a subconscious competent, what
keeps you from remaining there is that you forgot
what got you there in the first place. In order
to become a conscious competent, you gave
yourself permission to fail over and over until
you got it right. Now, that you are competent you
expect yourself to be perfect and never fail or
make a mistake.
Well, it isn't going to happen, especially in
golf. Golf is such a precision sport that it is
mechanically impossible to repeatedly strike to
ball perfectly every time. Without giving
yourself permission to fail, failure to hit the
perfect shot will pull you out of the zone so
fast it will make your head spin. What is worse,
it will make you start thinking about what went
wrong and keep you from getting back into the
zone.
If you dwell on your failure long enough, you
will start pressing and find yourself at stage
one of being an unconscious incompetent all over
again. This time your incompetence will be caused
by distorted brain chemistry that will rob your
body from its natural flow and rhythm. You will
not even know why your performance stinks. This
is why it is so hard to overcome a bad case of
the yips.
You have to go back to square one and give
yourself permission to fail all over again. Since
your skill level is very high, you may not fail
very often. But, it is important to allow
yourself to fail so you can stop thinking. After
all, thinkin is stinkin.
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"My game had
improved since reading your book and applying
your Mental Tips. Last year was my first year of
golf. When I applied your techniques, I
immediately took 10 strokes off my game. I am
also able to get my game back on track after a
"bad" hole. Thank you for taking the
time to write this book. Not only has it helped
in my golf game, but in other aspects of my life
as well! Thanks again."
-Nancy Edwards
Phoenix, NY
"I partially put your program to work after
reading the material. When I began, my golf
league average, at several courses was a 94. My
last three rounds have been 83, 86 and today an
80! I putted for birdie on the last hole and that
would have given me a 79 for the first time ever.
I made the par.
"I am now rereading your material and plan
to absorb more from it and put it to use in a
more organized way. Being focused on the process
rather than the outcome has definitely helped my
score.
Visit Michael Anthony's
THE
MENTAL KEYS
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