The Thirteen Commandments

These beliefs allow us to change the way we think, feel and behave.

These beliefs can affect positive change.

These beliefs can improve our results.

The Map Is Not The Territory

If you look at a map, it does not actually consist of the territory it represents. It is merely a representation.

This is EXACTLY the same as our version of reality. The world we live in is made up of billions and billions of bits of information. This information is filtered and re-constructed by our brain. We can picture an event, we can hear it, feel it, taste it and smell it but we CANNOT represent an event exactly as it exists.

Therefore, two or more people can witness the same event and yet recall that event differently. This is a powerful concept to take on as it means that if we are not happy with what we are experiencing, we don’t have to change ‘reality’, we simply change the map!

Experience Has A Structure

Every thought or memory that we have has a structure or pattern. By changing the structure of a thought or memory it changes our whole experience.

This can be done by changing our internal representation of our experience.

If One Person Can Do Something, Anyone Can Learn To Do It

By modelling successful performance, anyone can achieve excellence. By establishing how a high achiever thinks and operates, we can replicate similar results.

People Have All The Resources They Need To Succeed

There is no such thing as non resourceful people, there are only non resourceful states.

If someone tells you they have ‘zero confidence’, the chances are that this only exists in one particular area of their life, not in everything. Therefore, confidence IS a resource available to them.

The Meaning Of A Communication Is The Response It Gets

Because we all filter information differently, we all possess a unique model of the world. For this reason, what we communicate may actually get a different response to the one we intended.

Therefore, when you get frustrated with someone for not understanding, you can alter your communication to achieve the desired result.

There Is No Failure, Only Feedback

This is a great way to see the world. It is also very useful in a sports context because if you believe there is no failure, then there can be no fear of failure, which is a massive positive when performing.

Whenever you do something, you get a result. Sometimes it’s the result you desired, sometimes it’s not. When the latter occurs, it’s so easy to say ‘I’ve failed’. People who excel do not think in terms of failure. They look at the result and look to modify it.

There is a saying “if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got”. To change this, simply study your results and modify.

People Make The Best Choice They Can At The Time

As individuals we make our choices based upon the resources available to us at any particular time.

We can only make our choices from OUR OWN knowledge and experience that we possess. Only through new learnings and experiences are we able to make different choices.

The Person With The Most Flexibility Of Behaviour Will Control The System

This means that if someone has only one way of behaving or communicating in any given situation and you have several, you are the more likely to control the outcome.

Problems often continue longer when there is no degree of flexibility or options available.

A great example of this from a sporting context would be two golfers. If golfer A can only drive the ball well but golfer B can drive it, pitch it, chip it and putt it well, then there is only one winner!

You Are In Charge Of Your Mind And Therefore Your Results

It is very easy in life to attribute external factors to your problems. There are many available and some may well be valid. However, by taking control of your thought processes, you can affect positive change and create the behaviours you wish to have.

Every Behaviour Has A Positive Intention

Even the most negative or malicious behaviour has a positive intention. The key is to separate the intention from the behaviour as a person isn’t always their behaviour.

When people get angry, they often show a side that they cannot control. The positive intention is that they care about the issue at hand. The situation doesn’t necessarily define an angry ‘person’, it defines an angry ‘behaviour’.

It is always possible to choose better choices of action to achieve a positive intention in a more resourceful fashion.

The Most Important Information About A Person Is Their Behaviour

In order to gain a good understanding of a person, the best way is to study their behaviour.

For example, you may explain something to someone who in agreement says “yes” but at the same time their face looks confused. The reply may be “yes” but the behaviour says “no”.

The behaviour is a signal from the unconscious mind and tells you far more than words.

Resistance Indicates A Lack Of Rapport

Whenever you find extreme resistance from someone, this shows that you lack rapport.

There are very rarely terribly resistant people, only ineffective communicators. By gaining rapport with anyone, it is possible to break down barriers.

There are ways and means of doing this.

The Mind And Body Are Parts Of The Same System

People often discuss the mind and body as being stand alone entities, working separately from one another.

However, the mind and body cannot work independently. It is impossible to change one without affecting the other.

When we alter our physiology, it changes how we think and feel. When we think in a certain way, it changes our physiology.

A Game Changer says...

Some of the above will definitely have more resonance than others.

By referring to and using any one or several of the above principles, I have no hesitation that they will be of huge benefit, be it in your personal or family life, when around friends & colleagues, within the workplace or when practising & playing the sports you love.

Start integrating some of these principles into your daily life to notice how it can change the way you consider and view the world around you. The results will follow.

Pressure

Pressure plays a massive part in people’s day to day lives. Very often it arises during a big moment - an important presentation, a first night performance or perhaps an incredibly tight match.

All these situations would naturally incur added pressure.

We’ve all experienced it; freezing during a key presentation or speech, missing the penalty or free throw that would have won your team the game or saying foolish things on a first date. No one is immune.

Some of the best examples of handling pressure occur in sport. Over time we have witnessed many instances of athletes coping and not coping, being successful and not successful.

There are two types of negative behaviour that can occur when under extreme pressure - Choking and Panicking. Contrary to popular belief, the two are very different albeit they exhibit similar outcomes.

In the book, ‘What the Dog Saw’, there is a chapter called ‘The Art of Failure’ in which the author Malcolm Gladwell does a brilliant job of describing the differences between Choking and Panicking. To do this he discusses behaviour, brain processes and psychological studies.

“Choking is about thinking too much. Panic is about thinking too little. Choking is about loss of instinct. Panic is reversion to instinct. They may look the same, but they are worlds apart”, says Gladwell.

First up let’s take a look at Choking.

When an athlete begins to focus on a future outcome and has negative thoughts, they become tight and do not play to their ability. At this stage, the primary physical area of the body that becomes affected is the neck and jaw (the latter holds more tension than any other muscle in our body). These muscles begin to tighten under pressure hence the name Choking.

When working with people who operate in high pressure scenarios, teaching them to be aware of the tightening of these muscles can allow them early recognition that they need to refocus. The thought of even the possibility of choking can ruin a person’s ability to enjoy their big moment. These thoughts can be very debilitating.

The answer is to understand the importance our self talk plays in shaping our behaviours. What we say to ourselves REALLY does matter.

For an athlete, using emotional control in stressful situations will help tremendously. It is a skill that can be learned and is part of understanding emotional intelligence.

Panic is slightly different.

It is the abandonment of everything an athlete has trained to do and relies on instinct. This is the limbic system (a part of the brain known in Dr Steve Peters book ‘The Chimp Paradox’ as the “Chimp”) at work. Here, an athlete seemingly just loses the plot (or control of their minds) and panic sets in. It can often become apparent that athletes simply break down and all their strategies and tactics go out of the window.

Sometimes, in short bursts due to their immense talent, they can play OK but invariably their focus is gone and they often react contrary to game plans and ultimately without success.

With regards both Choking and Panicking, the issue remains similar in that performance degrades completely. This is where experience plays a vital role and why coping behaviour is so important.

It is important to note that the often heard phrase ‘practice makes perfect’ is not exactly correct. It is in fact ‘perfect practice’ that indeed makes perfect. If one can implement this philosophy, then it is easier to understand what happens during those big pressure moments that we experience.

If when we panic the more ingrained perfect practice is, the more likely we can rely on that experience. The use of imagery rehearsal and the practice of stressful situations with positive results can help us to rely on a system that is highly practiced and trained thereby resulting in better performance. This can all be performed very unconsciously rather than the conscious act of choking.

A Game Changer Says…

Above, we’ve taken a look at the impact pressure can have on our performance via means of both Choking and Panicking.

So, how can we further prevent it? Here are our theories based around pressure and how best to handle it.

Taking Conscious Control

You become a stronger performer at anything by putting in hours of practice.

The point of practice is to outsource skills from your conscious mind to your subconscious mind so you can perform those skills automatically when they are called upon.

We take for granted many of the skills we outsource to our subconscious. Think of something you’re good at and then break it down into the individual skills involved. A good example could be say driving, which is automatic for most people.

Driving requires many skills. You need mechanical coordination to work the pedals and steering wheel, visual perception to stay in lane and avoid other traffic and symbol recognition to read road signs and instruments on your dashboard. Let’s not forget the processing power needed to make quick decisions on all that information!

Despite having to use these skills simultaneously whilst driving, we don’t pay any attention to them.

For any skill, the more your subconscious takes over, the better you’ll be (providing you've practiced the skill properly). All the best performers outsource their many skills to their subconscious, that’s why they perform so effortlessly - because it is.

So why then can these so called top performers choke?

It’s because they start to take conscious control of the skills they have already outsourced to their subconscious.

In key, high pressure situations, they want to perform so well that they try and ‘take control’ of their actions consciously thereby sabotaging their performance and ultimately their chance of success.

AGC Fix: Trust yourself and the time you’ve put into practice. You will always be better off letting your subconscious take control so long as you haven’t been practicing bad habits.

Revisiting The Past Or Projecting The Future

Think back to your best performances. What was going through your mind? You probably can’t remember thinking about anything. You were just in the moment, doing not thinking!

Throughout our lives we collect experiences and file them away for future use. Before high pressure situations, our brain searches for similar experiences. It will review the results from similar situations in the past and then project those into the future. That is why those who have choked in the past tend to choke again and again.

As bizarre as it may seem, we can even take on other people’s experiences. If your mind is filled with examples of people being nervous and freezing up during a speech, what do you think may happen when you give your first speech?

When we reflect back to past experiences for information and to predict our future, we often don’t take into account all the further training, practice and learning we have done since then. It is IMPORTANT to recognise that your past experience can be obsolete.

AGC Fix: Mentally rehearse successful outcomes. All memories are reconstructions and your brain can’t tell which really happened and which are made up. Collecting positive experiences will create a positive future. This will bring confidence as oppose to anxiety and self-doubt.

Another strategy is to stay in the present. Focus on the now and pay attention to the input from your senses. For example if you are playing tennis, notice the feel of the racket in your hand, the sounds on the court, the smell of the ball and the face of your opponent. When your mind is occupied in the now, it won’t slip into the past or the future.

Attracting Negative Results

The most common phrase people tell themselves when having to perform in a high pressure situation is:

“Don’t mess up”

Whether they are thinking this or saying it out loud, it usually leads to one result:

Messing up.

When you tell yourself not to do something, you cannot help but imagine doing it. Some people take it one step further and imagine how performing poorly in this one moment may affect their lives. When your whole life is on the line it’s pretty hard to stay relaxed and perform to your best!

AGC Fix: Focus on what you want to happen. If you are going on a big date for example, tell yourself to be charming rather than “don’t be quiet”.

Summary

Deep down we all want to win and do well. This is natural and normal. Many of us have been brought up to believe that by increasing the stakes we will try harder and thereby perform better. 

We would encourage you to do exactly the opposite - don’t worry about the results.

Do what you’ve practiced doing and let it happen. The key here is that if you’ve trained hard enough and employed perfect practice well enough then you’ll succeed.

Focus on what you can do and not what you should have done. Results are in the past and cannot be changed in the present. Results are to be learned from swiftly not reflected upon constantly.

For those of you who want a basic reminder to carry around with you, here is a four step, 20 second version of how to deal with high pressure situations without choking:

Trust your skills and all of the time you spent practicing

Mentally rehearse vividly (using all your senses) the outcome you want before your performance

Focus on all of your senses to stay in the present during any performance

Let go of the results and decide what you’ll do next

Involvement Alone Can Help Create A Positive Mindset

Being included and getting involved in a sport or group activity can be a sure fire way to start up a positive mindset. Especially within kids.

More often than not it ends up increasing both confidence and belief within people. In many  circumstances it can hugely improve communication skills and also assist with behavioural change.

Teachers, Coaches and Trainers can be highly instrumental in helping people achieve happiness, enjoyment and success in their lives.

A Game Changer says...

Attempting to solve problems and finding solutions by oneself can be a difficult task. The role of a good Mentor or Mind Coach is not to be underestimated.