All aiming methods rely on experience to enhance/improve accuracy and consistency. In other words, using any set of instructions to perform any hand-eye coordination task, with enough practice the brain eventually develops the required muscle memory and synaptic connections needed to perform the task flawlessly with just a little input from the working conscious area of the mind.
From what I've read, the absolute best performances for athletes, musicians, artists, etc.... occur when "in the zone", when all you're consciously doing is seeing or realizing what needs to happen and then doing it automatically with very minimal, if any, concious/purpose effort. The senses trigger a developed/trained skill, and it runs automatically like a computer program called upon when the proper input is entered.
The TOI example is no different than anything else that requires the development of individual fine tuning in order to make something work consistently. The final result, once the method is learned and perfected, is actually a mix of short-term/"working" memory and long-term stored memory, where we are consciously following instructions/steps and subconsciously fine tuning when needed.
A person can perform very well in this combined state, like a great piano player sight reading a piece of music for the first time. They may or may not make any mistakes in the performance. But once the piano players plays that piece several hundred times they are no longer looking at the sheet music, which means the amount of conscious effort involved is much less, if any at times, and as a result they can easily find themselves playing in the zone. At this level the sheet music is no longer being used, just like a road map is no longer used for the routes you've traveled hundreds of times.
It's a little different with pool, where quite a bit of subjectivity is involved. Aiming methods first require conscious/deliberate effort to learn. Due to differences in visual acuity, visual perception, muscle memory, feel, cue deflection, stroke, etc... we each fine tune our method to make it work more consistently. We use our experience (our long-term memory) combined with real-time inputs that get used/analyzed in working/short-term memory. And the result is a mix of conscious effort and subconscience performance. Trying to consciously perform a task that is best performed at the subconscious level results in less than optimal performance.
