is it possible that we already know how to make the shot and where the cueball will go long before we actually "think" about it? I am guessing we do but would like opinions.
Secondly, I believe active thinking can mess up a shot or leave as well.
is it possible that we already know how to make the shot and where the cueball will go long before we actually "think" about it? I am guessing we do but would like opinions.
Secondly, I believe active thinking can mess up a shot or leave as well.
i agree with you. other night in the playoffs i was hill-hill . my opponent broke and ran 5 balls before he missed. i got up and ran 6 balls without thinking , was shooting like that all night with the help of a few beers lol. anyway on my last ball i started to shoot then stopped and thought about where the 8 was. bent down to shoot and missed. it was probably the easiest shot i had all night and i missed because i stopped to think. lost the match because of it.I speak for myself, and possibly many others, when I say yes to your question. I have always played my best pool when I didn't know what I was doing.....and just did it. (if that makes any sense).
Some of the best pool I ever played was running a 5 pack (on a very generous table) in a tournament race to five. In Japan, they usually play with the rule that you mark your win before breaking the next game, or the other player has the option of calling you on it, and you not being credited with the game you forgot to notch. I ran all five racks not only forgetting to mark my score, but had to be stopped after the 5th rack and reminded that "we were only playing to 5." My opponent joking pulled the score rule card on me, but gave it to me anyways.
I have no recollection of anything that happened in all five racks.
I've never understood how a guy might ask me after an out something like "we're you trying to play the 6 like you did, or did you just end up that way?" If I was in the zone, I have no idea where the 6 was or what I did with it.
dave
is it possible that we already know how to make the shot and where the cueball will go long before we actually "think" about it? I am guessing we do but would like opinions.
Secondly, I believe active thinking can mess up a shot or leave as well.
Great post, bud.
I'm a firm believer that you should let your mind and body's natural "built memories" do the work for you. All too often, I see all these aiming system threads, and I'm thinking to myself, "Folks, you've got it all wrong. You're overthinking this stuff. You're not supposed to be making this a cerebral endeavor. You've already got the built-up and built-in memories -- both subconscious mind and 'muscle memories' -- to make that shot."
But unfortunately, many of us want "control" and to "stay in control." We think that if we're not cerebrally thinking about every aspect and nuance of the shot, that we're not "putting all we can" into the shot. And nothing could be further from the truth. We're actually short-circuiting and end-running our most powerful tools -- the subconscious mind and muscle memories. Granted, good fundamentals need to be committed to muscle memory, and there's something to be said about cerebral practice to "commit" those fundamentals to muscle memory. But practice is one thing; matches (whether tournament, league play, or gambling) is quite another -- that is then SHOW TIME! Time to shut the cerebral/analytical mind off (at least when you're down on the shot), and play from the subconscious. Trust your massive storehouse of "how to play the shot" -- your subconscious mind.
It may be a shameless plug, but I wrote an article about this very topic that I keep bookmarked, that seems to be well-received:
"Leveraging your subconscious (read: don't let your conscious get in the way!)"
http://forums.azbilliards.com/showthread.php?t=216564
Give it a quick once-over, and see what you think.
Hope it's helpful/useful!
-Sean