Since I've only been playing for a year, I think I'm a little worried that it would come off as snobby. But I guess so does expecting perfect shape all the time. I guess I'm just worried about coming across as being better than I actually am.
Well your post here kind of says it all
1. It doesn't matter how long you've been playing, you cannot start forming proper perception early enough.
2. The fact that you "worry" about others perception of you or your game indicates your conscious mind is far too involved when you're playing.
3. You SHOULD expect to play each shot correctly, to attain the shape you desire every time.
What I'm about to state I've done before in other threads. In order to truly excel at this game it requires dedication and great effort. It is a discipline truly. You must first develop proper technique and a rock solid PSR. Once you have played enough and have developed these and learned muscle memory you will find yourself where every other person that wants to play seriously does, staring at the abyss that is the mental game. The ability to navigate this is the difference between those that plateau & never get any better & those that break through and become great players.
This is a visual game, what I mean by this is it is pictures that get your subconscious to draw on learned muscle memory to not only execute a shot but to get the desired resulting position and that isn't even going deep enough. Not only do you need to attain position but you need to be in position on the RIGHT side of the ball to get to where you're going on the next shot and the one after that. Conscious thought will not get you there, visualization will, you have to "see" it.
Your conscious mind has a very small part in this game, while you are upright & surveying the table before you its place is to decide upon the path you will take to navigate the rack, not just the next shot, but at least the next 4 shots because if you're not looking that far ahead then invariably you will eventually end up on the wrong side of the ball & be out of line.
Once you have decided how you will navigate the rack your conscious minds job is done & you need to disconnect it & activate your subconscious to draw on learned muscle memory to execute that path. This is not done with talk inside your head, that inner chatter is your conscious mind & if you can hear that voice you haven't disconnected it. You disconnect it by visualizing the path your conscious decided upon. You have to really "see it" in your minds eye and you better not drop on that ball until you do. Once you have "seen" it you have activated your subconscious to draw on muscle memory to turn that vision into reality, not only pocketing the ball but in placing the cueball into position for the next shot. Once you've "seen it", then & only then do you drop on that ball and allow your subconscious to execute that vision & it will. There is no wavering in this, it requires focus, an inordinate amount of it. This is why an unwavering, unchanging PSR is critical, it becomes ritual & allows you to produce a consistent pattern of training your conscious & subconscious to work together to produce the desired result, each knowing its place and part in the process.
When these get out of whack & fight each other you're in trouble. If your down on a ball & that voice in your head starts yammering you better get back up because if you don't you will not execute, you have a better chance of throwing a snowball and hitting the sun.
Lastly lets talk about the bane of all pool players, that voice of the conscious mind. You hear people talk about pressure of a shot or situation, there is no such thing. Next is fear, of failure, of losing, of how you will appear to others that are watching, that doesn't exist either. Pressure and fear are not created by a situation, a shot is a shot, whether in practice or the final shot to win the final of a tournament or the case ball in a gambling match up. If you drill that shot 50 times in a row in practice & then you should be able to drill it to close out a match for the cash or to win a tournament, it's the same shot. Fear and pressure don't exist, they're not real, the only place they exist is in your mind, the place where YOU create them, because situations don't create them, YOU do.
The good news is you can also choose not to create them, to not feel them because it IS a choice. That shot in a situation to win is no different than the same shot you drill effortlessly in practice. The only difference is your perception of it, if you feel pressure it is because you have created it by placing more importance to it in the situation to win than you did in practice. So it stands to reason that you can also choose to not place more importance to it. In closing I'll ask you what is the difference between 2 players of identical ability when one has ice water running through his veins in competition & executed flawlessly & the other is a nervous wreck and drives the ball into the rail dogging it? One has learned to control his mind & the other hasn't. You will either control your mind or it WILL CONTROL YOU. If you learn to control your conscious mind you will free your subconscious mind. If you free it your ass will follow.
