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| Basketball star Doug McDermott uses hypnosis for in-game performance. (Photo credit: SI.com) |
As you improve and advance in any endeavor – whether
it is athletics, music, theatre, academics, etc. – the quality of competition
ratchets up. What then is the
differentiation when everyone is talented, gifted and focused on success?
The answer lies in the ability a person has to
prepare themselves mentally and emotionally.
To sharpen their mind on the positive; building a strong base of
confidence and self-esteem.
Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks subscribe to this
philosophy. Here’s a link
to a wonderful read in ESPN Magazine about how this NFL franchise invests
in meditation and positive visualization to drive a higher level of
performance.
College basketball star Doug McDermott of Creighton
is also a believer. This recently
published profile by Sports Illustrated overviews McDermott’s use of hypnosis
as a tool to improve game performance.
Almost all of Doug McDermott's points -- including the career-high 45 he dropped against Providence last Saturday -- have been scored in a state of posthypnotic calm. At the CenturyLink Center he enters this state before warmups, when the 6' 8" senior forward retreats to an empty hockey locker room with Jack Stark. The Omaha-based psychologist worked with Nebraska's football dynasty in the 1990s, helps NASCAR drivers Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr., and has become attached to the basketball program at Creighton, a Jesuit school, partly because he believes he's doing his Catholic duty but mostly because he loves being around Doug and his father, Greg, the coach of the Bluejays.
Stark has McDermott lie on a training table and talks him into a deep-relaxation phase. Stark counts backward from five to one. McDermott arrives at a beach. There, he removes the clutter from his mind -- the anxiety of game day, the pressure of carrying an offense for a top 10 team, the desire to not let anyone down-- and puts it in a box, on a raft, and pushes it into the blue water. The tide carries it away.
Hypnosis opens the mind to suggestion, so Stark begins refilling McDermott's with positive past experiences, reminders of times when the points came easy.
