Change Of Perspective

[Bigbadaboom]

I've been reading "Performing Your Best" by Tom Kubistant and I came to a part in it which refers to the whole "Glass half full" cliche. I dealt with this cliche in another area of my life and when my instructor told me to always look at the glass as half full I responded "What if I'm in a water drinking contest?".

The point is that in order to remain positive and perform good you must keep it real. You must adjust your view of things in order to conform to the given situation.

Example: When presented with a tight shot target between 2 no shoots you should probably take the whole "Glass half full" approach i.e. "I only have the A-zone exposed so I'm guaranteed 10 points on that target". But when you have a bunch of full size targets with no tight shots the "Glass half full" could cause you to gat alot of C's and D's. i.e. "I've got a bunch of open targets and if I don't keep my shots tight I'm going to drop points".

In my opinion, there is no standard positive mind set for every given situation. You must adjust your perspective to adapt to the environment.

"Think outside the box" is another. Sometimes thinking inside the box is required.

Just food for thought.

[XRe]

I've been reading "Performing Your Best" by Tom Kubistant

Someone else drinking the Kool-Aid

The point is that in order to remain positive and perform good you must keep it real. You must adjust your view of things in order to conform to the given situation.

The "glass of water" analogy is almost too vague to be applied to anything, to me. It's reasonable to use it to make a point, but... It's not applicable to *every* decision you make, to me...

Example: When presented with a tight shot target between 2 no shoots you should probably take the whole "Glass half full" approach i.e. "I only have the A-zone exposed so I'm guaranteed 10 points on that target". But when you have a bunch of full size targets with no tight shots the "Glass half full" could cause you to gat alot of C's and D's. i.e. "I've got a bunch of open targets and if I don't keep my shots tight I'm going to drop points".

I approach these sorts of things with a completely different mindset - it never occured to me to apply "glass of water" to how I'd engage a given target presentation. I don't get that granular with it I take the "what no-shoots?" approach. Seriously. I'm not going to shoot at them, why should I even pay attention to them?? My aiming point is the largest piece of A-zone available on the target - regardless of the target presentation, that's where I'm going to be putting my sights and my bullets.

In approaching shooting challenges, I know what my current abilities are. I recognize when something plays into my strengths. When presented with a tight shot in a stage, I know that I have the visual patience and requisite skills to put the bullet where I want it to go. I just identify where I want a bullet to go, and what I need to see to get it done. Contrast that with worrying about how hard that shot is going to be, or how many no shoots there are, or whether or not I know what order to shoot in, or if I hit a no-shoot the last stage/match/practice, etc...

Where I get the "glass of water" thing coming in is more in my situation overall. Like, how come I didn't score better in the match than I thought I should, etc...

In my opinion, there is no standard positive mind set for every given situation. You must adjust your perspective to adapt to the environment.

Definitely There's positive and negative in anything - and sometimes there's neither, actually. Strive to find the positive, and go do it.

"Think outside the box" is another. Sometimes thinking inside the box is required.

Creativity is great. So is the ability to recognize that what seems creative might not be the best route I shot a stage this past weekend where you could do a couple of different "creative" things, including two different hard leans, shooting some tight targets strong hand only, etc. One of the paths had you bound up pretty hard in a prop, and then having to move. I looked at all of those, and took the "inside the box approach" and shot it straight up, including taking a 30-40' run, in lieu of making that hard, strong hand only lean around a wall. I finished 2nd overall on the stage, shooting L-10 - and basically missed the stage win by 1.25 or so seconds (IIRC) - which I lost on the third port when I stumbled setting up on the port (darn terrain ). That includes the extra reloads in L-10, etc. (I'll add here that it looks like the top couple of Open class shooters had problems on that stage, as well, but.... I still finished 2nd... heh heh...

You're right, sometimes "thinking inside the box" works best. The reality, though, is that there is no box - just think creatively and accurately, and you'll find the best path, even if it's the simple, obvious one

[Flexmoney]

The glass is too big...

[Bigbadaboom]

The glass is too big...

[shred]

[dilbert]

"It's a good thing I put half my water in a redundant glass"

[/dilbert]

[BSeevers]

I drink mine and fill it with beer. Put's all that philosophical stuff to rest

[caspian38]

maybe every target is Easy to shoot A's on ...you can put the bullet into a few inches of exactly where you want it right? ... so why do we let inconsequential's effect our performance ?

its not that the glass is half full... its that you need to focus on what you HAVE. I have the skill to make this shot ... why should I allow the possibility of a miss to affect anything I'm doing now?

half full ... I can

half empty .... what if ?...I might ? it complicates the now/shot.

I don't have it figured out yet but i think this may be the key to everything! when I shoot good that is all I'm thinking about. When i shoot bad all sorts of stuff is floating around in that half empty space!

C-38