How do you get out of a slump

Go back right at the beginning, forget how good you can usually play. Give the same attention to every shot. Try to be precise as a millimeter, slow your game down and zone in that contact point. Stalk it, own it! Rediscover the game, walk into the shot from 3 feet behind.
 
I got out of my latest slump by just throwing racks of balls on the table and hitting them with out worrying about rotation or shape. I had been getting too precise (which isn't my game) and just needed to loosen up my arm and pull the trigger when things felt right. I stopped aiming and began to let my instincts do what they should, and my game has taken back off.

Good luck!
 
I do believe there is an answer, but it's different for everyone, and it depends on your speed to begin with.

I'll tell you something to try, and I'd love to hear feedback from you whether it works or not. This generically has helped a lot of folks I mention it to so I'm curious.

It consists of doing two things a bit differently and one thing more deeply. 1. is slightly loosen your grip hand and 2. is slightly shorten your backstroke while lengthening your forward stroke through the CB a touch more. Lastly, envision the entire shot in more depth, more clearly prior to getting down on the shot. ( this includes being sensitive to the sounds of the shot, balls hitting balls and OB hitting the pocket.)
 
Slump

I would not quit I would show up every day I knew if my fundamentals were solid that the magic would come back. Last night finished in the $ for the first time in a while.
I did not know when but I believed.
MCP
 
Slumps don't exist !!!

Big Pappa Pool said:
I am looking for advice on how to work through a slump. I have tried practicing more, playing in more tournaments, taking a week off from pool and everytime i play a match in league i lose. Last session I only lost once, the session before that I went undefeated. But now im losing and cant stop. any suggestions?
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It's like believing in the boogie man, he can't hurt you unless you believe he's real. Slumps are like the boogie man, if you don't believe in them, you can't enter into one in the first place. The slump was created by our own fears...it can only be dismantled by understanding what causes it.

You have a choice...you can try everything under the sun, play thru it, and sooner or later...you'll just give up...quit caring so much, and that's when you'll take off and start playing great again. And wait for the next one to come along in a few months.

Or.."."....

You can understand it, deal with it for good!!!!!!!

Here is my post on the subject from another thread I answered...hope it helps...

Funks don't exist - 04-21-2013, 10:16 PM
I used to go through slumps like what you are referring to. The last slump I can remember was about 10 years ago. Now I have good months, great months, and decent months, no more slumps.

What did the trick for me, was a good friend that owned the pool hall where I played, explained to me what a slump was. How slumps were nothing more than something made up by our imaginations. How slumps dont exist in the real world, we mentally create them and foster them. He referred to a book, don't know which one, as he explained.

He explained, ...a guy gets up to the table,...
1. Forgets to chalk
2. Miscues on the shot
3. Gets nervous about the miscue..and nervous about if there's something wrong with his stroke.
4. Miscues again, due to being nervous about miscueing.
5. Starts using less English/draw due to the miscue being stuck in his head, trying not to miscue.
6. Misses shape on the shots, due to lack of confidence in the stroke
7. Starts to miss shots due to lack of confidence, cause he's losing games.
8. Starts to question himself, question his equipment, question his team-mates intentions.
9. Starts to change things...
10. Starts to speed up his game, due to nerves.
11. Starts to tell people that he is in a slump.
12. Starts to believe the words coming out of his mouth.
13. Has now completely convinced himself that he can't even hold a cue right now.

Lets examine............
No such slump ever existed...
The only mistake was not chalking the cue, simple, repairable.
This player CAUSED all of this mess, un-necessarily, himself, mentally CREATED a slump which didn't even exist...through his actions.
Had he taken that first miscue with a grain of salt...and said...damn, I gotta remember to chalk, or ...I just miscued, ..no big deal. I'm awesome, I'm gonna rock and roll when I get up. ...he would have woke up the next day in the same good mental place he was in the day before.

Now, I always remind myself, when I miss an easy shot, miscue a lot, lose, whatever, that it happens...I tell myself that if everything always worked out the way I wanted it to, that I would quit playing cause it wouldn't be fun or challenging anymore.

I remind myself that the only reason I keep playing is BECAUSE things don't always work out the way I meant them to.

After all, easy games cannot hold our attention.

THis guy that helped me see out my last slump 10 years ago, was Mr. Jerry Johnson - of CR BILLIARDS in Coon Rapids, MN ...
thanks for everything Jerry

Now...I play badly sometimes...but notice that I don't believe that it's a slump. It's just a bad night...u can't enter into a world u don't believe exists, can u???
 
Thanks for all the input! Im gonna take eveyones advice and I will let you know the outcome

Sent from my SCH-S720C using Tapatalk 2
 
Stop thinking about it. Allow your muscle memory to do what it knows how to do. Get your brain out of the way and just shoot pool.

See the scene in the movie Tin Cup where Cosner goes through a bout of the shanks. Focus on the scene where Marin has Cosner do a bunch of totally unrelated shit and then Cosner straightens out his swing.

Shaquille O'Neil went 51% in free throws because he was a choker. Easy shot in a pressure situaltion and he blows it. The pre frontal cortex (yeah Shaq has one too) gets in the way and over thinks something that comes naturally.

Distract your pre frontal cortex. Try humming a tune while you shoot and just allow yourself to play while you focus on the melody.

Sounds like bullshit but it works.

:cool:
 
Big Pappa Pool said:
Thanks for all the input! Im gonna take eveyones advice and I will let you know the outcome

Sent from my SCH-S720C using Tapatalk 2
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One more, we all are humans, when we are tired, lacking some sleep, or even the slightest alteration of conditions effect our memory. Pool depends a lot on memory, and unfortunately, does impact the out come of a shot making, luckily that gets mastered down the road, the harder part is mastering speed, CB angle after impact, position play and patterns, that takes years and LOTS of practice, and usually the reasons of what makes your game suffer, and requires full time attention to be master at the game. If you do not have the time (2-4 hours of practice daily, and 2-4 hours of gambling) you will continue to be inconsistent, could be another word for slump! So what degree of slumping you are allowed to have, for a C & B player often, for A player few, for A+++ once or twice, for a pro maybe none..
 
The "How do I get out of this slump" question has been asked many times before, and, as far as I know, all the answers have never been satisfactory to the person asking the question. That's because a slump is such a personal thing.
The best advice, in my opinion, is to simply play through it. It can't last forever.
And, if it does, then you're probably not a very good pool player in the first place and should think about acquiring a new hobby. :smile:
 
Tramp Steamer said:
The "How do I get out of this slump" question has been asked many times before, and, as far as I know, all the answers have never been satisfactory to the person asking the question. That's because a slump is such a personal thing.
The best advice, in my opinion, is to simply play through it. It can't last forever.
And, if it does, then you're probably not a very good pool player in the first place and should think about acquiring a new hobby. :smile:
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There is good support for this position. Back in the late 50s a study of psychotherapists was conducted. Fifty percent of the patients who asked for therapy were put on a waiting list and never saw a therapist. The other 50% were seen by a therapist. Six months later both groups had resolved their problems.

Psychologists have not been able to answer these findings.

Most problems resolve themselves eventually. Now if someone is really messed up, that is another story.
 
Tramp Steamer said:
The "How do I get out of this slump" question has been asked many times before, and, as far as I know, all the answers have never been satisfactory to the person asking the question. That's because a slump is such a personal thing.
The best advice, in my opinion, is to simply play through it. It can't last forever.
And, if it does, then you're probably not a very good pool player in the first place and should think about acquiring a new hobby. :smile:
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One of the best answers, i have read in a while..
 
Visit a shrink, seems there's an abundance of them on AZB. I myself am a non certified shrink. Here is what I advise all my customers;

Step 1 - Drink. Not so much that you develop an addiction, just enough to make your confidence sky rocket and make you say things that you don't mean to people you care about

Step 2 - Do not talk about Fight Club

Step 3 - Buy a bonsai tree and take good care of it

Step 4 - Wax on, wax off

Step 5 - Don't worry about it

I think I might be the one needing to see a shrink...
 
JoeW said:
There is good support for this position. Back in the late 50s a study of psychotherapists was conducted. Fifty percent of the patients who asked for therapy were put on a waiting list and never saw a therapist. The other 50% were seen by a therapist. Six months later both groups had resolved their problems.
Psychologists have not been able to answer these findings.
Most problems resolve themselves eventually. Now if someone is really messed up, that is another story.
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I couldn't agree with you more, Joe.
I very rarely think about my three ex-wives anymore, and those were the three biggest slumps in my life. :smile:
 
justadub said:
Personally, I'm thinking about an exorcism. Or maybe a lobotomy.
Maybe both.
:p
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My cardiologist told me that exorcising would be good for my heart, so I signed up for some exorcism at the local Y.
My sister works at a lobotomy. She grows specimens in petra...petro...in a dish named for some guy named Pete Tree. :)
 
boatbeach said:
CHANGE YOUR DIET
i'm not kidding, try a fruit diet and juice for one week, ten days.
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More fiber? Get the poop out of your game?
I think it's a mental thing, like Crash Davis said,"If you think you're playing well because you're wearing womems underwear, then you are playing well because you're wearing womens underwear."
If you think you're in a slump, then you are in a slump. Find your basic game, your fundamental game, find the things you do well and get back to them, have a drink and change your mindset
....or find a slumpbuster. Either way you get your confidence back
 
A friend of mine was not playing very well so I got him to start talking to me about something personal that happened when he was younger. He would talk than shoot, talk a little more than take a shot or two, shoot while he was talking. You get the idea. I didn't tell him until we were done, but he didn't miss a ball during the time he was talking about something that was very meaningful to him.

In other words, he did not let his mind get in the way of his shooting because it was preoccupied with something else (besides second guessing his shot or thinking about consequences, etc) - he simply lined up and stroked the ball the way he knew how.

I agree with those that mentioned your slump could be something personal that may be getting in the way of your play and that it may not be pool related at all. But it's hard to tell. The trick is to get back to "trusting" your pool game again and get your mind out of the way. Things to do while you're figuring it out that others may have covered are:

- Do all your thinking standing up (once down on your shot simply execute it)
- Concentrate on keeping your head still
- Exaggerate your follow through
- And until you get out of your slump, maybe hit the balls a little harder than normal (do not try to finesse the shots until you're back in stroke - this may promote deceleration, which you definitely do not need at this point)
- Play to a certain rhythm (fast or slow does not matter) and try to keep it consistant
- If you are playing well and miss a ball, don't sweat it - we all miss. Continue playing at the same rhythm/pace/thought process.

If these were covered already I apologize, just trying to help.

Good luck,
Dave
 
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Worked on my basics tonight and went undefeated in a tournament tonight! Thanks for your input guys!

Sent from my SCH-S720C using Tapatalk 2
 
if you work on your fundamentals and are consistent with your pre shot routine, you shouldnt have a slump.
 
Big Pappa Pool said:
I am looking for advice on how to work through a slump. I have tried practicing more, playing in more tournaments, taking a week off from pool and everytime i play a match in league i lose. Last session I only lost once, the session before that I went undefeated. But now im losing and cant stop. any suggestions?
Click to expand...

One time I went through months of slump, I can't remember winning more than one match. I remember losing without winning a single game. Then it all suddenly changed and, before I knew it, I was playing better than ever. I took on players who used to make me look like a dumb cripple during my slump and defeated them regularly. Maybe it had something to do with my full body techniques I discovered then, but I feel that most of it was due to my subconcious mind and my confidence which greatly improved back then, especially after that discovery. My advice would be to have patience, or maybe try experimenting with new techniques. Do something to surprise your own brain. I wish you luck :-)
 
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