READY FOR A CHANGE?

If you want to change your 'basketball life,' there are three keys to succeeding at the highest level that will not only create the change you want to make, but also make that change sustainable and lasting.

Model Strategies That Work

Remember, success leaves clues.  There’s a Pathway to Power; a way to achieve what you want in a shorter period of time.  And the way to find it is to model someone who’s already achieving what you want.  If someone is successful at anything, whether they have a great relationship with their teammates, or are extraordinarily successful in basketball, or they have the body and energy that you desire, they’re not just lucky.  They’ve got a set of strategies that they apply and those strategies work.  You don’t need to reinvent the wheel.  You don’t need to reinvent a way to succeed.  It’s best to learn from others.  That’s how you compress months into days. Emulate what already works.

Intensify Your Emotions

It’s inevitable that life will give us obstacles to deal with, whether we just aren’t as athletic as others, maybe we don’t have the basketball skills of others or maybe we feel that we are physically limited.  But the critical moment in your basketball career is when you face your obstacles directly.  Once you face them, you will start to gain the muscle of life -- psychological strength – to conquer those obstacles.  If we can simply look at it as a gift from God and find a way to use it – you WILL succeed.

Lance Armstrong is a great example.  When he faced cancer, what did he do?  He didn’t give up. He intensified the emotions that he had to find a way to succeed more than he ever had in his entire sports career, even though he thought he had maximized his capabilities.  And what happened?  After conquering cancer, facing another biker was nothing.  He won seven Tour de France events in a row.  Remember, he had never won any Tour de France before that.  He turned something that could have been the most traumatic moment of his life into a launching pad for some of his greatest victories.  He chose to intensify his emotions and find a way to conquer, not be defeated by what life offered him.  The moment we turn to face our obstacle is the moment that determines our destiny.

Raise Your Standards

While this may sound like a tired old thought process, none of us who are honest can deny the truth that changes do not last long term until they become a part of our identity, until we literally begin to see them as the standard we live by.  Raising your standards truly means turning your shoulds into musts.  Everyone has a list of shoulds: ‘I should spend more time working on my ball handling.’  ‘I should spend more time working on my shooting mechanics.’  ‘I should push myself harder in practice.’  I should, I should, I should.  People don’t actually change.  They just end up what I call, “shoulding” all over themselves. Convert those “shoulds” into “musts” and your entire basketball life changes.

Identify the ‘standard’ and then live it every day.  When you feel that you absolutely must get something done, you will find a way.

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