Mental Management

[USNAVYCHIEF(Ret)]

So there you are, you have been introduced to 3 position rifle marksmanship, and are attempting to score Rifleman on the AQT.

Possibly you nailed it on your first attempt! Awesome!

But what if you did not? Why didn't you? Was it equipment related? That is easy to fix.

What is not as easy to fix, is your attitude and thought process, call this mental management.

There is a guy, an Olympian Rifleman by the name of Lanny Bassham. He won GOLD in the 1976 Olympics and has written novels about mental management. Highly recommend anyone interested in improving any aspect of their life, to include fun stuff like Rifle Marksmanship to read his books. Particularly, his book titled "With Winning In Mind".

He speaks of the 2 parts of the mind, the conscious and the subconscious. Simply explained, the conscious mind and subconscious mind are always competing for each other's attention.

Also...THIS IS IMPORTANT, the conscious mind can ONLY THINK OF ONE SINGLE SOLITARY THOUGHT at a time. That is it! Just one thing. Sub conscious can MULTI Task!

Here is an example of that all should be able to relate to. Remember when you first were learning to drive a car? Stick Shift? WOW.....you were thinking about each little thing, push in clutch, let it out slow while giving gas, red light, orange light, brakes etc etc!

Now the above is what the conscious mind is doing, thinking of each little task, and only that task.

When we start to learn something new (marksmanship) we typically SUCK at first. Because we are overthinking with the conscious mind. But.....what we are REALLY DOING is training the subconscious mind. THIS IS WHY IT IS IMPERATIVE! IMPERATIVE to not learn BAD HABITS. Imperative to learn to shoot FUNDAMENTALLY!

Another example, any golfers here? Are you GOOD at Golf? I surely am not. My grip is awful, my stance is awful and my follow thru is awful. I did not learn to play golf FUNDAMENTALLY, but worse than that, I DEVELOPED BAD HABITS!

Unlearning an act that the subconscious has learned is very difficult.

So best to start out with rifle marksmanship and learn to shoot with the absolute fundamentals.

Back to the car example, and the conscious mind. Fast Forward 20 years, you are a safe proficient driver that has perfected the fundamentals thru years of conscious mind training the subconscious.

Remember how I said conscious mind can ONLY DO 1 thing and a time and subconscious can multi task?

Now look at you, driving to work fast/speeding in the morning, shaving with your right hand and your electric razor, music blaring and steering with your knees!

That is the subconscious mind doing what it does best.

Now back to that AQT......

What are you thinking about when you shoot? Cause, it has been established you can only think of 1 thing at a time! Don't believe me? Try to think of a good thing and a bad thing simultaneously. IMPOSSIBLE

SO....what we think has a LOT to do with our performance.

In the beginning, it may be "hold that trigger back" to learn to start following thru. Or maybe it is "exhale and pause" or maybe it is "sight alignment" or maybe it is "Front Sight Focus".

Thru practice, if you are practicing (DRY FIRING) fundamentally, your subconscious will take over all the above tasks! Trust me it will!

Then what should we think? I think X, X, X, X X.........., for AS it is V, V, V, V

The most important shot is the one we are taking, it is impossible to do anything about that previous miss.

This is what most are alluding to when we say "TRUST that position".

LOTS more to this, but what we are thinking, can lead to poor or stellar performances.

From personal experience: I use this A LOT to help with my standing position particularly. I place High Master scores somewhat routinely in seated and prone, but standing at 200 yards is my toughest position. My goal, thru training, is to have that shot go off standing, as a sub conscious act. ALMOST there..., I am 8/9 ring average now......and all shots are on call. Just when conscious mind takes over....I try to FORCE that shot I suffer.

Mental Management.....give it a shot!

R/
Chris

[USNAVYCHIEF(Ret)]

In order to go somewhere, we must have a starting point. It is important to know where we are currently and have a GOAL for improvement.

Take that AQT, let's assume you qualified Rifleman. Scored a 215, great!

Let's also assume, you desire to improve upon that.

So we need a goal, lets make that a realistic goal. 230.....

"I want to score a 230 on the AQT."

How do we get there.

Above I mentioned the competition between conscious and subconscious. Subconscious is your current baseline for example. 215 average.

Now you are shooting that AQT and are SMOOOKKKING it! You are shooting a 225 and are almost there.

What happens typically? Our SELF IMAGE takes over and says "I'm not supposed to be doing this well" "Lets shoot a miss so we get back to our average"...LOL

It really works that way. In High Power, I am shooting a match very well on my feet standing. 3 10s in a row.....I think, "Wow, I am doing GREAT" and my self image says "Your not supposed to be here....this is weird, lets get back to where I am comfy"

Next shot a 6!

LOL

SO....positive reinforcement is needed for the self image. Say "It is LIKE ME to shoot X's and 10's (or V's and 5's)".....say it over and over. Write it down.....

If you shoot an 8 or a 6, say...."THAT is NOT me, it is NOT LIKE ME to shoot anything but an X or a 10 (or V/5)".

SELF IMAGE plays a HUGE part.

You have to work on it all, to improve. Improving the self image helps with that constant battle for attention between sub and conscious.

[Monkey]

I'm reading With Winning in Mind now.

Reminds me of Earl Nightingale's "The Strangest Secret".

[Gus]

This is a good topic.

I've been involved in many of our shooting sports over the years and have seen people, myself included, go through the mental game a lot.  Last century, when I was shooting handgun metallic silhouettes I got pretty good at it.  Before I made International class, and was a class A or AA shooter, I'd get all my chickens, then all my pigs: 20x20. Then, I'd clean my first bank of turkeys.  While the target setters were downrange I'd start thinking about running the rest of the targets for a perfect score: 40x40.

Right about then the demons would come to call.

I'd tense up and my grip on the pistol would change.  First shot at #26 is just under the tail. Or over it's back. #26 was my nemesis at many ranges for several months.



I've also witnessed this in skeet shooting. Get a shooter clean through station 5 and at 6 the wheels come off.  We've all done it.

I'm sure this isn't a new strategy, but over the years I have developed a three pronged attack on the demons: Maintain your equipment, master your technique, and commit to the ideal that only the next shot matters.

When I did (and do) those three things in any the shooting sports I've been involved in, the demons are held at bay. They never totally disappear, but when the chips are down, you have a solid foundation to rely upon and beat them back, even when there's an audience.

Now I have a new passion with Project Appleseed. I truly enjoy the challenge of riflery-it's fun and satisfying to direct shots to a specific point on the target purposefully and consistently. Now the task is to get good at teaching it and telling the stories.  I think learning how to teach is harder than scoring 210+ on an AQT.

Work continues on both.

Gus

[Captain]

This particular book has also been incorporated into some shooting courses of a military persuasion. The mastering of a "martial art" has long been seen as a path to self-improvement . . . mastering the self.

"Come out to Appleseed, become a better person, save the country."