Find the roadblocks

Step 2 - Find the roadblocks

The next step is to identify the situations that are your recurring distractors.

During each game, whether a practice game, or after a competition, make a note of the things that made you lose focus. Make sure you work out what the catalyst was. If you made a mistake when you know better, you will always find the distraction that took you mind off the ball.

It could be something internal - like a thought (eg. “I can believe I made that bid!”), a feeling such as anger at something your partner or opponents or teammates did, or a sensation that your performance is decreasing?

It could be something external, like another player being obnoxious, a unexpected card hit the table, your partner throwing his cards on the table.

Also try to make of note of how were you feeling just before the distractor appeared? Tired? Anxious? Focused?

You may get a long or short list. If it is very short, consider that you have not tried hard enough.

Once you have this list, prioritise the sources of distraction - Take the top 3 to 5. (Any more that than, and you will drown) and especially any pattern you noitced in how you were feeling just before the distractions got to you

On the road to improvement

The next few posts will focus on improving one's focus styles and the steps involved that journey.

Step One - Know yourself

Determine your personal focus style . Get yourself a little red book.

To do that, you have to take the first step: you need to know when you’re focused.

During your next several practice games, try devoting time to observing yourself . Possibly just after a hand has been played. (this may well have a negative impact on your performance) or just after a match.

Using the table on focus style from my earlier post, make a note of the things you focussed on during each stage of the game (bidding, declaring, defending, dummying) focus styles

Make also a note ofthe things you focussed on after each game. Also and just as important, make a note of the things you miss.

Notice when you felt focused, and remember everything you can about the sensation. Is it a lack of thoughts? A single thought? A feeling? A sensation of being consumed by driving power into the pedals? After each match, make a few notes on the topic

Eisntein said so

How It Works


"Imagination more important than knowledge" !

Mental imagery (such as “visualizing,” “seeing in the mind's eye,” “hearing in the head,” “imagining the feel of,” etc.) is an quasi-perceptual experience. It resembles a real experience but it occurs in the absence of the appropriate external stimuli.
The deal is that when you imagine yourself perform to perfection and doing precisely what you want, you are in turn creating a physiological neural patterns in your brain, just as if you had performed the action. The purpose is to obtain a level of arousal that is optimal for your performance.


You are developing a mental blueprint of key performance (the much thought-after zone) and you improve your confidence by using all your senses to recreate the sensations of a previous or future performance in a positive image of doing it right.

• When you are replaying a hand in your mind, you are using imagery.
• When you are REplaying a backward squeeze in your mind, you are using imagery. (No looking at the hand record)

It is like playing a movie in your mind. Some people will see the images as if they are watching a movie (external) while others will see them as if they are behind the camera (internal). Either one approach will work. Some people are better at forming pictures in their heads than others. Or some people may excel in certain sensory experiences and not others. Find what works for you through practice.

How to do it

A long version of the technique would be used before the competition to optimise your chances to get into the zone. While a “quick set routine” will be useful during a match to ward off any wanted state of mind or between two matches.

1. Use imagery to get pumped up or conversely, use it tone down if you are over excited
2. Use imagery to practice card play techniques

In either cases, it requires practice. The more you do, the better you become. Practice your imagery for 15 to 20 minutes a day initially to ensure that you're learning to do it properly. But as you become more skilled and comfortable with the technique, you'll be able to do it for just a few minutes at a time as needed throughout the day. Use it every day, on your way to a practice game, during practice, in the evening...
How much time it will take before you begin to see results depends on the vividness of your imagery and your own determination.

Going though Justin Lall blog, I found this post where he talks about his own pre-game preparation. Going through books, techniques already known etc, is also a form of imagery Justin Lall - back to basics

Step by step

Select a previous event where your performance was very strong – Not necessarily an event when you won but an event where you performed at the top of your potential.

• Make it a world championship you won if you have one behind your belt
• If not make it an event you won and you know you were playing your best game (it is not sufficient to select an event you won, you may have been just damn lucky)
• Or make is just one tough match against very skilled opponents (per your own standards)
• First make sure you practice away from distractions
• It may help to start by imagining yourself relaxed, or alternatively imagine yourself smiling, feeling good
• Bring back to your mind all the elements of the event
• Revisit the venue, use all your sense to bring back the scene
• See yourself going to the venue, inspecting the venue
• Use all your senses to bring back the scene – (visual, auditory, touch, smell) as if you were there. The physical layout, the weather, your route to the venue, (even if just going down the lift) the various players who were there, the organisation of the event
• Bring back how you felt,, going through your pre-game routine, your emotions, your state of mind
• Select a game and imagine getting to the table, sitting down, remember your opponents, inspecting their cards
• Bring back a particular contract, the card play, the result (pick one where you went plus through good skills )
• Imagine the end of the event, the last score up
• Bring back the apotheosis, the results being announced, walking to the podium to receive your trophy.
• See yourself standing up accepting the award.

Open your eyes again (if they were closed that is) and then rejoin the real world


Tips and tricks

If you have trouble forming images:

• Try thinking in pictures rather than words
• Look at pictures or videos prior to using imagery
• Stay in a quiet, relaxed and calm environment to avoid distractions

Some general principles:

• Make the movie seem as realistic as possible by including all senses, in full color and detail, within a similar emotional context
• Practice imagery regularly as it may take months before seeing improvement
• Believe that imagery works, as your attitudes and expectations enhance the effect
• Keep a focused yet relaxed attention while using imagery
• Internal imagery is most effective. Picture yourself actually accomplishing the feat (from your minds eye), rather than viewing yourself from the outside looking in.
• Only imagine perfection. This will boost your self-confidence and reinforce good habits.

Random collection

I have been a bit busy and I do not want to butcher the topic of imagery. I have to research it, then digest it, then write it, then practice it. I am exhausted really !!

In the mean time, here are a quote and a story that relate to peak performance.

"The principle is competing against yourself. It's about self-improvement, about being better than you were the day before."

Steve Young San Francisco 49er'sSuper Bowl-Winning Quarterback

(Steve is a former star of the American NFL. He holds the record for highest career passer rating and won six NFL passing titles)

This next one is a story from Jean De La Fontaine. It tells a story where persistence and determination wins over natural talent and speed. It is about a race between a rabbit and a tortoise. It is in french, but I include a link to a clip that says the story just as well. But if you want a translation (english only, let me know)

The clip: The hare and the tortoise

...

.Rien ne sert de courir, il faut partir à point :

Le lièvre et la tortue en sont un témoignage.

« Gageons, dit celle-ci, que vous n’atteindrez point

Sitôt que moi ce but. ─ Sitôt ? êtes vous sage ?

Repartit l’animal léger.

Ma commère, il vous faut purger

Avec quatre grains d’ellébore.

─ Sage ou non, je parie encore. »

Ainsi fut fait ; et de tous deux

On mit près du but les enjeux.

Savoir quoi, ce n’est pas l’affaire,

Ni de quel juge l’on convint.

Notre Lièvre n’avait que quatre pas à faire ;

J’entends de ceux qu’il fait lorsque, prêt d’être atteint,

Il s’éloigne des chiens, les renvoie aux calendes,

Et leur fait arpenter les landes.

Ayant, dis-je, du temps de reste pour brouter,

Pour dormir, et pour écouter

D’où vient le vent, il laisse la tortue

Aller son train de sénateur.

Elle part, elle s’évertue ;

Elle se hâte avec lenteur.

Lui cependant méprise une telle victoire,

Tient la gageure à peu de gloire,

Croit qu’il y va de son honneur

De partir tard. Il broute, il se repose ;

Il s’amuse à toute autre chose

Qu’à la gageure. À la fin quand il vit

Que l’autre touchait presque au bout de la carrière,

Il partit comme un trait ; mais les élans qu’il fit

Furent vains : la tortue arriva la première.

« Eh bien, lui cria-t-elle, avais-je pas raison ?

De quoi vous sert votre vitesse ?

Moi l’emporter ! et que serait-ce

Si vous portiez une maison ? »

...Jean de La Fontaine, Fable X, Livre VI.

Real men don't eat quiche

But will they accept the use of imagery as something they can use to improve their game?

Imagery is a powerful technique used by top athletes to get themselves in the right state of mind. My previous post was about stilling the mind. But it is not enough to chill out. We have to be combat ready !

"Imagination is more powerful than knowledge." Albert Einstein

Like everything, reader beware. It takes practice to make it work.

to be continued...............

Stop digging

Regaining focus - RRR

If you want to climb out of a hole, the very first thing you must do is stop digging…

Once something happens that affect your focus, there are 3 basic steps to regain focus. This must be practiced actively in training games until it becomes automatic.

Recognise

To ensure you regain your focus when a distraction does interfere with your state of mind, it is essential that you are consciously aware that you are at a distraction point. Through experience, you learn what situations are more likely to infer with your mental state. You mind may feel restless, your breathing changes, your body temperature rises. Or if a game is not going well, you may feel overwhelmed, despondent. Make a list of them and learn to recognise your mental reactions.

Refuse

Create a trigger to interrupt or stop the counterproductive thought(s). This trigger can be a:

• Verbal cue – Develop a few key words or phrases that you will use to stop your mind. Examples words are: Cards, stop, switch on, 7NT ( J ), I love this game…

• Visual picture – the moon, water..



• Physical action – Put down your cards, pick them up and re-arrange them, hit your fist against your hand, stretch, get up and get some water, throw away the distraction by putting it in your pocket ...

Relax

You now need to get your mind back to the bridge focused state. This is equivalent to a mini repeat of your pre-game routine. Use a focusing technique that you are comfortable with

• Count backward from 10
  


• Take 5 to 10 deep breath. It may help to count each breath you take



• Imagery – This is something you will have developed and practiced before hand. You may have a few images that can be used depending on how much time you have. Between games, you may bring back the image of the last word championship, or one event where you performed well. Or instead of bringing back the image, bring back how you felt at that time.


• With less time available , try to find your center, or imagine yourself bending all your energies toward the game

Now the world is your oyster

PS : Just remember that RRR must be used in practice matches. It must become second nature

Still your Mind – Pysch up

To maximise our chances or getting into the “zone”, mental preparation is essential. The purpose the pre-game routine is to help us find this place wihin ourself where external and internal meaningless distractions cannot enter.

The goal is to let go of our ego – self consciousness, to shut out the distractions and to become the performance (without judgement and evaluation). Our bridge actions must becomes “autotelic” ( an end in itself, done for it’s own sake).

Listed below are a few techniques used to attain the state of mind where we lose this self-consciousness. Mainly, I have found some of these techniques useful when something happens at the table and I am risk of losing my cool. A key point is that you can trigger yourself back to intense concentration in any way you like but it needs to be consistent. Practice us and use the same cue for the same situations.

Imagery

Find Your Center
Now don’t think I have gone mystical. The concept of Chi is used in martial arts. It refers to our internal life-force energy. The major location of chi in the body is a space located just a few inches below the navel, which is also the body's center point of gravity. A number of techniques are based on focussing on your center as an energy source. I have found that focusing on my center was an effective technique for me at the table.
The black box
You imagine you have black box, and you consciously imagining stowing distraction and worries away in the black box, leaving your mind free to focus.

Deep Breathing

This is a well know method of achieving relaxation, of quieting our mind. So I won’t go in to the steps.

Count backward from 100 to 1

It is likely that as your start, you may loose count. If this happens start again.

Mindfulness Upon Details

Brine you mind to observe – really observe what is going on around you? Slowing down forces you to bring your mind into the present moment. This moment of awareness can be amplified by bringing all of your mind unto the thing that is in your present. This forces the mind to be aware.

Affirm Your Present

Repeated mantra, where you repeat a chose set of word or phrase over and over again.