Do you remember the age old adage about the chicken and the egg? Isn’t it the same with confidence and winning? They both fit into the category of a paradox that leads to a path of confusion. And although the mind puzzles are thought provoking and a fun conversation with friends, my contention is that they are a waste of time to think about, when there is work to be done.
Yet the word confidence and its meaning have been correlated so heavily with winning and losing that it is almost a mainstream postulate (fact) that people rely on to describe why they performed the way they did. Almost as if it were an accepted variable in the formula of success – Confidence + practice + fitness conditioning + strategy + experience + luck (luck is a whole other discussion for another day) + other = winning/success.
Let’s look more closely at the conundrum of confidence as it may relate to the outcome of our performances. Even Marrium-Webster has success tied to confidence in their first two definitions of the word:
1. a feeling or consciousness of one’s powers or of reliance on one’s circumstances – had perfect confidence in her ability to succeed
2. the quality or state of being certain : certitude they had every confidence of success
I would like to offer a different approach to winning and success, one that does not lead, typically, to a provoked emotional response when things don’t go the way you expect them to go – the experimental method.
The prime method of inquiry in science is the experiment. The key features are control over variables, careful measurement, and establishing cause and effect relationships. An experiment is an investigation in which a hypothesis is scientifically tested.
So then, the key is to understand what a hypothesis is.
a supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation.
Therefore we must make a game plan (hypothesis) based on variables that we know about a situation or opponent, add in what we know about ourselves (strengths and weaknesses), create a system of measurement and evaluation, take a deep breath and then “grip it and rip it” as my coach used to say. In other words, just start playing and see what happens, evaluate the cause and effect of what happens, adjust, readjust, stick to this process and navigate your way to improvement and success every time you play.
Please comment below with questions and or feedback from your own experiences….
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Part 2 in the “Learning How to Win” series will focus on how to create an evaluation system that takes the focus off of winning and places it on the process of winning.
FUTURE DISCUSSION:
– Performance Evaluation Systems
– Game Plans
– Expectation Management
