With Winning in Mind

by Lanny Bassham

Winners are convinced they will finish first. The others hope to finish first.

When athletes have the mind-set that they expect to perform well, victory is automatically an option. For others, hope is their mind-set. Who would you pick to win that competition? I certainly wouldn’t rely on hope.

you can define a thing you can duplicate it. If you can duplicate it you can achieve mental consistency. If you have mental consistency you can win.

“Mental Management® is the process of improving the probability of having a consistent mental performance, under pressure, on demand.”

Be careful not to complain. I often hear people in both business and sport, complain about their circumstances. Complaining is negative reinforcement. I teach my students not to reinforce a bad shot by getting angry. Do not reinforce a bad day at the office by complaining to your spouse.

Don’t let caution keep you from experiencing life. Go out and find a dream worth trading your life for because in the end, that is what you are doing. Set big goals. You do not want to end up regretting your life.”

Schedule your plan. We often fail to remember that scheduling is a vital art of the planning process. Put your plans on a calendar. I use both a large monthly calendar on my office wall and technology provides me with a calendar on my computer and phone. If the goal is not scheduled, it will not get done. Goals written down in your handwriting makes you more accountable to the goal.

There is one acceptable reason to let your goal go; you trade up. Do not be surprised if on your way to one goal you discover another that means more to you than the one you are working toward.

When we worry that bad things might happen to us we are actually rehearsing them. We are building new neural pathways toward failure.

the 1976 Olympics, I was very calm because I had rehearsed over and over every possible thing that could happen in the match and how I should respond. I was confident that I had planned for every possible contingency, which reduced my stress level, allowing me to shoot well.

Here is the good news, fear is overcome by experience. I’ve got to admit I was scared in my first big competition but the fear dropped with exposure to pressure situations.

thinking about outcome instead of process. If you are worried about your score, your competition, your last failure or anything other than the process of executing, you are thinking about outcome instead of process. You cannot think about two things at the same time so your focus is pulled away from execution and toward outcome.

The best time to practice your drives on the driving range is right after you have crushed some good ones. Keep hitting the driver. If you’re on a roll, keep on going. This helps to reinforce the good experience you are having and therefore make it more likely to occur in the future. Likewise, if you are slicing badly, now is not the time to hit another bucket of balls. If you are having a bad day, stop training. Do not practice losing.

We become what we think and talk about. Mental images that are written down have a greater impact on the Self-Image than those that we simply talk about.