| I remembered giving advice to a young player that I would rather miss the shot playing for position than to make the shot and leave me no shot on the next ball. I decided to use my trust skills. I would trust myself to deliver the proper stroke. I leaned in, forgot about results, forgot about everything except the stroke and speed I needed to use. Two things were going to happen on the shot. One, I would miss it. Two, I would make it. I did not know which of the two things would happen. I did know however, that I would look good shooting the shot. I pulled it off and it looked easy. My opponent did not know that I was shocked about my new and favorable position to win the match. He never know that I did not think I would make that shot but that I did think I would look good shooting it. Trust skills are vital and we need to acquire the shooting skills so we can deliver the right stroke. |
The Fine Art of Sighting. Here is a unique way to look at sighting and your approach to shot making. There are a few elements that must be in place if we are to succeed with the shot at hand. The feet must be in proper alignment to the target. Your brain will not allow you to deliver a committed stroke if you are not lined up to the shot and the most important part of the alignment is your feet. For right handed players, your inside right leg must connect to the line you intend the cue ball to follow towards the target. Once you go down in your stance, we should be able to draw a line from the inner right part of your right leg to the spot on the object ball you want to hit. This part of the set up can be done through the intellectual part of our brain. In other words, we can do this just about every time we go down in our stance. In the first article I talked about myelin and the roll this plays in our game. Myelin is a chemical that wraps itself around your brain and remembers exactly what you did to succeed with a shot. When you practice your stance, you are building this substance that will bring your game to a higher level. Without proper feet alignment we are forced to over ride the brain and shoot the shot on our own. This can be done and some players do this but you will wear out before the tournament is over and fall by the wayside exhausted and overcome with fatigue. Now you need to move from the intellectual side into the instinctual side. This is where most players come up short. They try to shoot the shot with the intellectual side of the brain and this does not work in the game of pocket billiards. We shoot the shot with another eye. We see several things when we are in our stance if we have contact with this other eye, the minds’ eye. Here is the sequence a master goes through when he is shooting a shot. First he sees the line from the pocket to the object ball. This line goes into the head part of the object ball and out through the back part. We want to hit that back part of the object ball so we can send it along the path to the pocket. The ball must travel along that line you drew in your mind from the back of the pocket to the object ball. Draw another line parallel to the object ball pocket line from the cue ball. Make sure they run parallel just like train tracks. Where that line connects to the front of the cue ball is the spot that makes contact with the back part of the line through the object ball. As you go down in your stance, your well trained instinctual eye sees the line through the object ball and the line through the cue ball. The eye sees the back part of the object ball and the front part of the cue ball. In other words you line up the front part of the cue ball to the back part of the object ball. This is done through your well trained instinctual abilities. You must be well trained in this art if you are to become a real fine player. In your training, make it a point to go through this sequence. Amateurs do not look at the front line of the object ball. They do not look at the front line of the cue ball. They only look at the back lines and are hoping that they get it right when they deliver the stroke. The art of sighting is found in the instinctual side of our nature therefore it is difficult to teach. During these classes we actually train in seeing the shot with our instincts. It takes a little time and a lot of trust. I have only given this lesson a few times because many students are not ready to turn their intellect over to their awareness nature. During this transition they fail and then revert back to their old ways. The Main Event is a five day intensive workshop limited to eight students. We do not work on profound secrets. We train our minds to deliver the perfect stroke and with this ability, our mind sees the right shots. Sometimes you have to fail before you can succeed. Take one step back so you can take two steps forward. I once played a guy for three hours and he did not win one game. He asked me how I could be so cruel as to play like that. I did not know what he meant by that question. |
| This game becomes pure joy when you reach dead stroke and know you will make most shots reality is, dead stroke is stingy with its visits. Dead stroke is about trust. When you know the shot you want to shoot and can trust yourself to deliver the stroke, you will visit the land of dead stroke. Here are five things that must happen for you to reach this wonderful land. 1. You must have command of the Four Strokes of Pool. 2. You must have command of Cue Ball Speed. 3. You must have command of "Self". 4. You must have command of your trust skills. 5. You must be free of preoccupation with results. I was faced with a tough shot to win a tournament. It was tough because I had to deliver a power stroke to move the cue ball the length of the table for the winning shot. There was no other way to pull this off. I thought about cinching the shot and then banking the money ball. But in my mind, I knew what the right shot was and still I did not think I had the skills to pull it off. I needed all of my trust skills..... |
| Your training must be specific and deliberate. When you go to the practice table make sure you are doing what the hub of your wheel suggest. Make sure your actions reflect your purpose. You will need to master the four stages of pool. When you pull your cue out of the case work on Shot Making, or work on The Four Strokes of Pool, or work on Cue Ball Speed or work on Mastering self. Tournament players DO NOT BANG BALLS AROUND. You are always working on your spokes to make a strong wheel. |
| Aiming can play tricks on you. Your eyes see the shot and then your brain begins to process how to shoot the shot. The mind calls upon past experiences with this particular shot and then issues instructions to the shooting arm. If you have built up strong Myelin in your brain you will have confidence and thus, deliver a smooth stroke. What happens when you have confidence, deliver a smooth stroke and you miss the shot and miss position by a large margin? What happens when you make the shot and completely miss position on your intended target zone? Your mind loses confidence and then cannot see the shot anymore. Your eye sees the shot and tells your brain where to aim but the brain simply will not cooperate because something is wrong. Has this ever happened to you? You are so far off you have no idea of what to do. You are afraid to come to the table. I played a match where nothing worked at all. I missed shots, I missed position and blew safeties. When I leaned over for a shot I had no confidence in making it. I actually thought I was going to miss every shot I faced and I was sure I would not deliver the right speed. What happened to me? How could someone who won a tournament the day before suddenly be so bad? |
| I knew I was aiming properly. I knew what stroke to use, yet I knew it was not going to work. I am lined up perfectly, my feet in the right place, my right leg locked in line and yet my mind would not allow me to feel any confidence what so ever. In desperation I made a dramatic discovery. Something was wrong so I put down my cue and picked up a house cue. When I lined up I suddenly knew I was going to make the shot and deliver the correct speed. I ran the rack just as I thought I would. It was as if I never went into that mini slump. I was back in stroke once I put my cue down. So I examined my cue carefully and discovered the cause. My tip had been damp from leaving it in a case on my motorcycle the night before. With this damp tip I lost all feel for the shots. Once that happened my mind simply quit on me and wanted no part of what I was doing. My mind knew I was going to mess up so it would not allow me to see the shot at all. |
| Eighty five per cent of this game is in the mind. Master self and you will master pocket billiards. "Thou you beat a thousand players a thousand times you are not a master until you master self." There is no deep dark secret to mastering self. You find this self mastery in the way you approach each shot. If you connect to the shot, land on the cue ball, set and sight, deliver the perfect stroke you are a master. It all comes from hard work. |
“When you win a tournament you don’t beat the players, you beat the demons”. The Chalk Tip Demons is the cue tip telling you not to use chalk. The Table Demon tells you there is something wrong with the table. The Reminder Demon tells you where you are in the tournament. The Competition Demon tells you why you should be worry about who you are playing. The Hanging Ear Demon gets you to listen to the voices around the hall. The Warning Demon warns you about how people will feel when you win. She warns you that you will choke. The Fear Demon is most powerful. He is afraid of everything. The Self Image demon does not want you to be a winner, more safe to wallow in mediocrity. |
