How Champions Think: In Sports and in Life

by Bob Rotella

You can think of your self-image as an archive of all the thoughts you have ever had about yourself. However, all thoughts are not equally important. Recent thoughts are more influential than thoughts that occurred further in the past. Thoughts associated with powerful emotions are more memorable, and thus more influential, than thoughts to which you attached no emotion.

The musician will need to take extra care to make sure he rebuilds his self-image and confidence. How do you do that? You understand that you are not a helpless victim of misfortune. You don’t have to be a prisoner of a bad experience. You make sure you continually feed useful, positive thoughts to the subconscious. If one of my golfing clients has a problem with skulling or chunking pitch shots, I often advise him to begin keeping a notebook in which he records every good pitch shot he hit during the day, even in practice. The act of writing down a thought about a successful shot helps reinforce its importance in the subconscious registry.

A champion understands that it’s fine to savor an experience when it’s positive, to remember it, to celebrate it. When an experience is negative, he understands that he can’t let himself get stuck in it. He can see no benefit from ingraining a bad experience by reliving it.

The champion doesn’t care about keeping an accurate record in his own mind. He thinks and remembers in ways that will help him achieve and maintain a confident self-image.

This ability is counterintuitive for a lot of people. We’re taught in school to revisit and think about our mistakes. Our correct answers are passed over and taken for granted; the teacher puts a big, red X next to mistakes.