How To Become More Confident in Games

Foreign. Welcome to the Vision to Basel Trading podcast. Appreciate every single one of you guys for tuning in. Whether you're an Apple podcast, Spotify or YouTube. If you want Apple podcasts, go ahead and scroll down, leave a five star review at bottom of the page real quick. Really helps me out, helps the show to grow. Really do appreciate that. If you're on YouTube, make sure you subscribe if you're not already and hit that like button as well. Dropping up new podcasts every single week. And like I always tell you guys, a ton of what I talk about comes from your guys questions, which is exactly what today is, is going off the questions I get over and over and over again. So if you have questions for me, make sure you send me a DM on Instagram @visiondrivenbasketball. And again, I really appreciate every question that I get. It's hard to get to all of them, but especially when I get questions over and over again, then that lets me know I gotta talk about that. So that's what today is. And so just kind of give you an idea of what I mean by that. You know, today we're going to talk about confidence. Confidence is a question I get so much like probably maybe more than any other question definitely up there in terms of the questions I get asked the most is coach, how do I become more confident? Coach, I feel like I lack confidence. What do I need to do? I'll just give you an example of a question that I got last week that really sparked me to make this video when I, that kind of put me over the edge. Like, yeah, you know, I need to talk about this. Coach Ethan, I need some advice. I just lose confidence when I get in games. I don't play well and I train almost every day. I'm going to my first year of high school and I want to prove people wrong because the talent is there. It's just mental for me because I think about it too much. And so this is the type of question I get all the time. And it's something that I've talked about before. I have a couple of videos on my channel that are a couple of my more popular videos, but that are from almost a year ago talking about the same topic. Okay. But I feel like it'd be good to brush up on it and get a more long form version of it in the, in this podcast. So it's gonna kind of break down everything that has to do with confidence, reasons you might lack confidence, how to, how to overcome those reasons that you lack confidence. And Become, you know, be able to play at a high level in games because that's ultimately the goal that we're going for. So that's what I wanted to talk about. You know, it's, it's such a massive problem that, that plagues so many players. And, you know, I've dealt with it for my entire career. You know, it's not. Again, we're gonna go over this more, but confidence is not something that it's not a quick fix, okay? There's usually multiple underlying reasons and it takes time, it takes effort, it takes focus to be able to overcome that. Okay? So that's something that I learned and just talking with other coaches and now being in the coaching world for the past couple of years, strictly coaching and training, I see it myself now and I'm able to see those same patterns and I'm able to see, you know, I've been able to help some players overcome it and some who just have a, have a tougher time doing that. So I wanted to kind of dive in today and just talk about that. But let's just be clear. I'm not telling you that over the next however many minutes this is that I'm going to cure you of your confidence issues, but my goal is to put you on the right path to overcoming those issues that you might have. Because again, like I said, it's not a quick fix, it's not a straight path, there's ups and downs. But if you can get moving along in the right direction, as you continue to put the work in and put the time in, you're gonna get to the point where you want to be at, okay? So that's ultimately the goal that I have and that you should have as well. It's a process, okay? It's a process that usually is going to take a little bit to fix, but to me, that's really how confidence is gained. You can't gain confidence quickly, okay? Confidence that comes quickly usually leaves pretty quickly as well when things start to go wrong. Confidence that you've built over a long period of time after repeated successes over a long period of time, that confidence usually being longer lasting. And that's the type of confidence we want. We don't want the confidence where you, you're going to go out in one game, you're going to be great, and the next team you're going to miss a couple shots and then be terrible because you're not confident anymore, okay? We don't want to be wishy washy with the win like that. We Want to be okay, every single day, every time I step on the court, I'm confident that I execute my skills, I'm confident that I can compete, I'm confident that I can win against anybody. That's what we want to get to. So this isn't a one size fits all issue, okay? There's not one reason that everybody's going to struggle with confidence. There's going to be a couple different levels to this that you need to understand. And so as I'm talking about this, think about how this might relate to you or not relate to you, because maybe it doesn't. Maybe you have a different situation that you struggle with, but there's going to be, there's going to be aspects of these that are going to apply to you. So think about how that's going to apply to you, what you can take from it and how it can make you better, okay? So the main thing and point number one that I want to talk about is to the players who never feel confident, okay? And this is a question that I got last week as well. If, if you never feel confident in your game at all, it doesn't matter if it's practice, doesn't matter if it's an actual game, it doesn't matter how you're performing, it doesn't matter, you know, any of that stuff, you don't ever feel confident. It's probably because you just haven't put enough time in on your skills. That's. That's usually the issue. Okay? 99% of the time it's that players who just aren't very good, just to be honest, players who aren't where they need to be skill wise, typically, they're never going to be confident. Because how can you be confident in something that you're not very good at, right? Or that you haven't put enough work into. Again, you want confidence to be long lasting. You need to spend a long period of time working to earn that confidence, right? That comes through your skill work, the workouts that you go through. If you don't, if you haven't done that for long enough, then you're going to lack confidence. And that's especially a big thing with younger players. Like, you know, a lot of players start playing basketball seriously when they're like, you know, maybe 12 or 13, and then, you know, they're 13 or 14 years old and they're, you know, they're like, oh, man, Coach, why am I, why am I not confident? Well, it's because you've only been playing basketball For a year, two years. Like, it takes a long time. Unless you're a naturally gifted athlete. All right? Unless you're very, very gifted off the bat and you're just better. You're. You're faster, you're stronger, you're quicker than everybody else. You just naturally are good at basketball, then maybe that's not an issue for you. But for most players, if you're just starting, you're new, you've only been doing this for a couple years. That's not a lot of reps that you've gotten up. It might seem like a long time. It's really not, though, okay? So what it comes down to is you need to keep doing what you're doing, keep working, and you're going to start to gain that confidence as time comes, okay? So don't try and rush it. It's going to come. But you need to be willing to put in that time and that effort. Now, that is not just about skill work, though. And I want you guys to understand this. It's not just about going out by yourself and getting up some shots or working on your ball handling or your moves or whatever it might be. That's great. And you need to do that. I'm not telling you to not do that. You need to do that. But the. The area that a lot of players skip out on. And I was guilty of this when I was younger, too. When I was first starting my first couple years, it was like my. My biggest issue is I would go in the off season, I'd be in the gym every single day by myself, working on my ball handling, my shooting, my finishing every single day. And it took me to an ext. It got me better to an extent. It took me from, you know, I remember back in middle school, we were, you know, my first year really playing basketball, okay, My first year really playing basketball was my seventh grade year. That was where in my area, that's when, you know, you can actually start competing for your school. So that's really when it becomes actually serious. And so, you know, I wasn't. I wasn't that good. I was a good athlete, and that kind of got me by that year. But I wasn't that skilled. I just hadn't really worked on it after that seventh grade year. That was when I was in the gym every single day over the summer, working on my skills by myself. And I needed that, right? And I got better because of it. And I came back the next year and I was a better player. And I was. I started the entire Year. Okay. But you also have to consider the fact that that's only going to take you to an extent. Okay. A lot of you guys do need to work on your skills a lot, and you're going to see a lot of improvement just by doing that. But also you need to play in the live situations because another factor of confidence the players don't have is they say, hey, coach, I have skills. My skills are good, but I get into games and I don't know what to do. I feel like my confidence goes away. I feel like I'm not confident anymore, even though I was just in practice and I felt great. Then I got to the game and it's like everything's just spinning and I don't know what to do. Okay. Now usually that comes from a lack of playing experience. Okay, so you aren't playing enough live situations. When I say live situations, I mean 1 on 1, 2 on 2, 3 on 3, 5 on 5. I'm talking with a defender on the floor. Okay? Anybody can look good, anybody can play good, anybody can hit shots when there's no defense on the floor. But it's a whole different, it's a whole different type of thing when there's defense out there. When you have teammates or defense, that, that, that changes how things, how things are out on the floor. Okay? So, you know, I, I work with some players who have really developed their skills to a high level, right? But when it comes to playing, they just, they aren't where they're, they aren't matched up to where their skill levels are. You see them, you know, in practice, you see them shooting around like, okay, that, that kid's good, right? But then you see them in the games, they don't make the same impact. You feel like they probably should. And typically that comes down to they aren't, they haven't practiced those live situations. Playing basketball is just as much of a skill as shooting is, as ball handling is. Understanding the game, understanding when to score, where to score, when to make a pass, understanding how to make different reads that comes through playing, and that's just as much of a skill as your ability to shoot the basketball. If you, you can be a great shooter and a great ball handler, but if you don't have a, if you don't have a good iq, you don't understand when to do what, you don't understand the reads to make, you don't understand what to look for, then you're, you're going to struggle to, to play at the level that you probably should. Even if you have a high, even if you have a lot of skills, okay? So playing is such a massive key that I completely ignored. Nobody told me about that when I was. When I was younger. The. That's something that you need to make sure that you are worrying about when we talk about developing, okay? It's not just about your skill level. Your skill level is important, okay? It's very, very important. But also you need to make sure that you're playing as well. You're putting yourself in those live situations. Because the thing about basketball is that it's a complex sport, okay? There's a lot of complexity to it. And what I mean by that is that when you're playing by yourself, right, just you on the floor, that's very, very simple, okay? You're working on your shooting. Even if you're working on a new move, all you have to account for is what you're doing, okay? I'm going to go between the legs, and then I'm going to go in and out, and then I'm going to go into a step back. That's my move. I'm working on. There's no defense here. All I got to worry about is what I'm doing, okay? So even if you're working on a new move and it seems kind of difficult at first, it's really pretty simple because it's just you on the floor. Add a defender to that. Now all of a sudden, it's a lot more complex because now you have to be able to read what they're doing, okay? You have to be able to react and you have to be able to play when somebody's trying to stop you from scoring. That makes it a lot more complex. And then add on to that teammates and other defenders help defenders. Well, now all of a sudden, that's a completely different story than playing by yourself, okay? The level of complexity raises significantly. So if you're only training by yourself, you're only training when it's simple, when it's. When it's by yourself, it's going to be very, very difficult for you to thrive in those complex situations, which is what it is when you get to the games, okay? So if you aren't doing that, if you aren't playing basketball enough, raise up. Raise the amount of time you're going to play. I've talked about this before on the podcast, but get a teammate, like, call up a teammate, say, hey, you want to play some one on one today? Get a couple teammates, play some two on two, some three on three. Okay. And ideally, try and find some five on five to play, some good five on five to play because that's really, really going to help you develop as a player. Okay? That, that whole, that whole aspect, that whole side of the game is what you develop through playing. Okay? Drills are great. Working on your skills is awesome and you should keep on doing that. But also do not neglect the ability to play. Okay? So, you know, that's kind of what I would say to people who struggle either, you know, always, like I'm always, I always lack of confidence or you know, for example, you've, you've, you know, put in a lot of time on your skills, but you feel like you aren't confident in games yet. You know, maybe, maybe that's, you, like, maybe you've put a ton of time in developing your skills. Maybe you're one of, maybe you feel like you're one of the better players on your team and maybe you're one of the better players on every court you step on, right? Maybe you go to play, pick up and you're usually one of the better players. There's. Yet you still struggle with your confidence. Okay? And this can be for a couple reasons too, in addition to what we were just talking about. But the first thing is I kind of want to give you guys an analogy and I talked about this during one of my videos from a while ago. But you know, you can imagine it like this. So let's say you have a balance beam, right? Just a 10 foot long balance beam that's just laid on the ground, okay? And somebody says, you know, I say to you, hey, I'll give you $100 right now if you can walk across this 10 foot balance beam right on the ground. Just walk right across, okay? Everybody, every single one of you is going to try. Like, maybe you fall off but you're on the ground, so who cares, right? Every single one of you is going to try because a lot of you are going to be able to get across and get $100 right? Now, let's say, okay, I'm going to raise that balance beam 10ft in the air. Okay? That balance is now 10ft in the air. I'm going to give you $100 if you can cross this balance beam, okay? Now I'm sure, you know, maybe some of you will still try it, but some of you probably be like, ah, I'm good. Like I'm not confident my bill to do this now because, you know, I might, I might fall off and like, look, this 10ft, I don't want to fall 10ft, right? So that'll be kind of, you know, that'll be kind of split, right? Now let's say I raise that balance beam 100 stories in the air, okay? And I say, okay, you walk across this balance beam, I'll give you $100. I'm gonna assume that almost none of you guys would be like, yeah, I'll do that. I wouldn't do it. Right? I'm not like, I'm. Most people would just. Would not be comfortable doing that. But the point I'm trying to make is that the task itself, the challenge itself never changed. Okay? The goal is walk across a ten foot balance beam. When it was on the ground, you were confident. You were like, oh, yeah, I can do that. It's easy, right? All of you guys would have tried it, okay? Raised it up a little bit. The stakes are a little bit higher. Now you start to second guess yourself, and then you really raise the stakes, and now you're out. Okay? That's the confidence analogy, right? When you're in practice, you're by yourself. That's when the balance beam is on the floor. You miss a shot. Oh, well, you're in practice, right? You lose the ball. Oh, well, you're in practice, right? It's easy, right? It makes everything a lot easier. There's no pressure, okay? There's no pressure. If you fall off that balance beam, you're on the ground already. You're not going to hurt yourself. You're just not going to get $100, okay? But as soon as we raise that balance up, the pressure is raised up. Now, if you fall, there's consequences for falling. Okay? You got to fall 10ft now. And then if we raise it up 100 stories, then there's really consequences if you fail. Okay? And that's the basketball analogy that I'm trying to make right here. Practice. No pressure at all. So it feels like, oh, this is easy. Of course I can do this. Okay? And I'm sure most of you guys would make it across when it's on the ground. I'm sure most of you guys would. Okay, 10ft up now all of a sudden you're starting to think about, oh, man, I'm kind of high up. Now. Most of you guys are gonna fall off just because you're thinking about it. And you raise it up 100 stories. No one's gonna make it because you're way too high up. And now you're so focused on what's gonna happen if you fall that you can't actually focus on doing what you're supposed to be doing. That's the issue that players have, okay, Is as soon as we get to a game and all of a sudden that balance means raised up and it's the same exact task, the same task you've been doing in practice, it doesn't change in the game. The same shots you've been taking in practice doesn't change in the game. The only thing that changes is how you view it. Okay. The pressure that. That's there. But if you're able to separate yourself from that and you just say every time that you go into a game, you're only focused on doing the task, right? I'm going in there, I'm playing, I'm giving my best effort. That's all I care about, right? That's my goal in workouts. My goal in workouts. I'm going to go in there and I'm going to give my best effort for an hour and a half, okay? That's my same goal in games, right? Maybe there's coaches, now there's another team who was game planning, now there's referees, now there's a time, now there's fans, right? That's all cool. But at the end of the day, it's the same exact task, okay? So you need to be able to keep that in mind. If that's something that you struggle with, okay. As opposed to letting the pressure kind of hurt you, your focus just should be on giving your best effort because that's all you can do, right? If that's what you do in practice and you've seen success doing that, the game is no different. The only thing that changes is your look, your outlook on it. Okay? Your outlook on the game changes. That's all. That's all. So you need to be willing and able to only focus on that sort of effort. We're going to talk about that a little bit more in a minute. But, you know, the. The becoming comfortable with pressure is. Is something that's important for you to be able to do. And how do we do that? That's. That's the question. I think one of the biggest things you can do is play 5 on 5, and specifically is play 5 on 5 against good competition. I always talk about, like, you know, when I was, when I was in high school, really through my entire career, I've really been fortunate that there's been a lot of good basketball around me. Like, I've been able to play in a lot, in a lot of good situations. Okay. Going back to aau, where I had a lot of really, really great teammates who played at a high level, getting to go and play against them every single practice, okay, that made me better, right? Even though, like, there'd be times where I just get ran, right? Like, those are. Guys are really, really good. Makes me better as a player, though, and I'm very, very thankful to be able to experience that. And, you know, going throughout high school and post high school, when I was preparing to play in college, being able to play 5 on 5 against some of the best players in my area, that. That helped me a lot too, because I'm playing as guys who, you know, my high school, like, my high school career, our schedule really varied in terms of who we played. Like, we play some teams that we were like. I mean, we played some teams who would go to the state championship that year, and we played some teams that were just terrible, right? So it was a real broad spectrum of teams that we played against. But when I was going against these guys and these pickup runs in my town, you know, it was guys who were the best on their team, right? And guys who really can challenge me a lot. And because of that, I always talk about, like, I love walking into a gym and being the worst player in the gym. I love that because it means that gonna get better. Like, my, My, My. My focus always has been long term. Like, I don't care if I go to a gym and get ran. Like, how am I gonna look in two months, right? If I. If I continue to stick with it and go against this level of competition for two months, how am I, like, how much better am I gonna be because of that? Okay. That I'm never, like, I've never been someone who's gonna shy away from playing as somebody who's better than me. Like, I don't. I don't care because my focus is, like, if I win in this pickup game, if I. If I, you know, you know, if I hit some crazy move in this. In this pickup game, if I do this, do that, like, who cares, right? What matters is how much better will I be in six months from now, okay? So that's the focus when it comes to. To playing. And my level of confidence raised so much because I was able to play against those guys who. Who were better than me, who pushed me to have to be better, right? So that's what I would encourage you guys to do, is try and find the best players you can and play against them. And it sounds simple, but it really does improve Your confidence, it improves your. Your ability to have to make quick decisions and against a struggle. Like, you know, the. I think one of the things, and I've talked about this before the podcast, too, but being. Becoming comfortable, being uncomfortable, right? Like, you know, if you walk into the gym every single time, you're like, I'm the best player here. Like, it doesn't matter what I do. Like, I'm gonna. I'm gonna. I'm gonna work everybody in this gym. There's no one who can guard me. Like, how do you expect to. To get better? How do you expect to go from that? If that's. How. If that's where you play throughout the entire offseason, you play against guys who you're better than, and then you go to the season and all of a sudden you're playing as teams who have guys who are better than you. How do you expect to. To be confident yourself? You can't expect to be confident yourself if you are only playing people who are worse than you. You'll never feel confident playing against guys who are better. Right? It just doesn't make any sense, okay? So you need to be willing to go find players who are better, who are going to push you, okay? You got to be willing to do that. Because, like I said, end of the day, that is going to make you so much more confident in yourself. And, you know, I can. I can speak to that myself. It's something that I'm very, again, I'm very, very thankful for. It's just. Just that the entire, you know, ability that I've had to be able to do that. And, you know, aside from that, there's a couple other things you can. That you can do that I think would also, again, kind of work towards that confidence. And the first thing I'd say is being prepared. And when I say be prepared, I mean physically, like, you know, make sure you're warmed up before every single game, okay? That's one thing that you need to be able to do. Okay? Make sure you're warmed up, making sure you get enough sleep. Right? Making sure that you got enough rest before, and then making sure that you're eating well, you're not eating a bunch of trash before games. Be prepared to be able to do things, to play at the highest level that you possibly can. If you're going out there on four hours of sleep, you're not getting warmed up, you're goofing around during warmups, not taking it seriously, and the game starts. How do you expect to be confident in Yourself and your abilities. It's just not something that you can realistically expect to do. Okay? So going along with that, it's also a mental thing, right? Mentally, be locked in during practices, during games, during workouts, okay? Be there, be present the entire time. Give your best effort to it as well. And also, I've talked about this on the podcast. I had a whole episode on this, talking about control, what you can control, control those things, can know the plays, know the place better than anybody on your team. If your issue is that you're not confident in your ability to know the plays, right, you go out on the floor and you're like, oh, man, I know how to run this. That's your fault. Like, that's. That's a hundred percent on you, right? And at that point, that, that, that becomes. Do you care enough to. To play at the highest level? Do you care enough to. To be the best you can? Because if. If I see you go out there on the floor and you don't know the plays, you. To me, that. That makes me think you don't really care that much. Okay? Because if you did care, you'd go home after practice, you'd write out all the plays, and so you know them easily. You'd ask the coach before the games, coach, can you draw up this play for me real quick just so I can see it? You'd ask him after practice, actually, that'd be even better. Before. Don't even wait till the games after practice. Say, hey, coach, can you explain this play to me a little better? Can I. Can you draw it up for me just so I can. I can see it and study it? That's someone who cares about it. If you get into a game and you don't know the plays, you don't care, okay? That's gonna be. That's just how it is, right? And you can't be confident if you don't know that if you're not taking care of those little things for yourself. So preparation is such a massive key. But I wanted to read you guys this comment that I wrote. This was 10 months ago, actually, was going through a video. I was looking through my old videos yesterday, and I saw this comment that I wrote, and again, it kind of goes to the same thing. It was a player who was saying, hey, coach, you know, I feel like I have a high skill level, but I just get to games and I can't. I just. I lose my confidence. Like, what should I do? And I'll just read you what I told you and I think there's a lot of stuff we can take from this as well. But I said I've been there. Trust me, I know the frustration. Here's what I'd say to the younger me in addition to everything in this video. Make sure you're in the gym outworking everybody. You have to. You have to love the grind, right? You should love the grind so much that you aren't even affected by the outcomes. If you have a great game, you go back and you work. If you play terrible, you also go back and you work. The process is what matters. When you're in the game, the only thing that you're worried about is doing your best. That's the process. Don't worry about makes or misses or any of the outcomes. The makes will come when you commit to that process, to. To playing that process to the highest level. Keep working hard and doing the right things, and eventually the right things will happen to you. Results are not linear, but at the end, it's going to work out if you keep on doing the right things. Do not be afraid to take losses. Go find the best players in your area and play against them as much as you can. Play people who are better than you. Don't be afraid. You get crossed up and lose to somebody, you're going to get better, and eventually you're going to be good enough to be on their level, and your confidence is going to steadily increase. Again, it's all about getting better. Ultimately, you have to be addicted to the game. You have to live it, and you have to seek out people who will make you raise your game. That's going to get you the confidence that you need. A lot of players are just so focused on going out and doing things perfectly, and they start to overthink things, and it seems like they've. They almost forget the skills that they practiced. And a lot of times there's a shift in your mentality that can kind of fix this. And, you know, kind of before I get to that, it's like when I talk about your mentality is such a big thing, because I know players personally who. And I think everyone struggles with this to an extent. But a lot of players have it a lot worse where they miss a shot, they turn the ball over, and immediately they're like, I'm terrible. I can't shoot. I can't dribble. Like, I'm just. I'm off today. I can't play today. That. That's. That's not like. That's just weakness. That's just Mental weakness, right? If you allow yourself to talk to yourself like that, you're not going to be confident ever, not consistently. You're only going to be confident when you hit every single shot. And you never make any mistakes, which is not going to be very often, because nobody does that. Nobody. Nobody plays basketball. They're making mistakes, right? So if you want to consistently be confident, you have to change the way you talk to yourself. If you catch yourself talking negatively to yourself, you need to stop doing that and start talking, speaking positively to yourself, saying, look, I've shot that shot so many times, I'm definitely going to make the next one, right? I know I can handle the ball. Just those little changes in your. In your mentality is going to go a long ways for you, okay? And also kind of going to that. That mentality thing, and I talked about this a little bit earlier, but, you know, instead of trying to shoot perfectly, instead of trying to handle the ball perfectly, instead of trying to make the perfect read every single time, instead of trying to never make any mistakes, your. Your focus when you go on the floor should only be on your effort, okay? Your only focus is, I'm going to give my best effort this entire game. I'm going to give 100% effort, okay? Because if you've put the work in, you've done the skill work, you've been playing, you've been doing the things that I explained earlier, you've taken those steps, you've done the work already to be prepared. The only thing now is to go out there and give your best effort, because that's what you've been doing in your practices and your workouts, okay? You just go down giving your best effort. Now, like I said with the beam analogy, it's no different. It's just a game now, okay? The actual task at hand is not any different. You're just going on doing the same exact thing. So your effort, that's what you need to focus on. Stop trying to focus on hitting every shot. Stop focusing on, oh, man, I'm shooting 2 for 3 right now. Oh, I'm shooting 4 for 7 right now. Just go out there and the only thing in your mind is giving your best effort, okay? Forget all the other stuff in there. Just focus on that, and you're going to see things just flow a lot easier, okay? All of a sudden you're going to start to make more plays, and you're not going to be the one who's overthinking things, taking your spot of the game because you missed a shot or you turn the ball over or whatever it might be. You don't control whether or not the ball goes in the basket. Okay? You can shoot the ball perfectly and it can still go in and out, right? You can shoot a ball and it can still get blocked. Okay? That. That stuff is not stuff you control. You control your effort, though. So that. That's what matters, right? That's what matters. The other stuff will take care of itself, okay? Like I said, if you put the work in, if you really have, then. Then you're not going to. Focusing on. On the, you know, those individual skills. Oh, is my. Is my. Did I shoot the ball high enough? Is my elbow sticking out? Is that like. That's not. That shouldn't be what you're thinking about. You're only thinking about your effort for that time, that time being okay. And that's going to make a difference for you. And really, at the end of the day, what it comes down to is you have to love the game of basketball. That's what it comes down to. It's not a straight line to becoming great or getting where you want to go to, and that's with anything. Basketball is just an example of that. It's never going to be a straight line in terms of getting to the level you want to be at, but it's not a straight line to gaining confidence either. Okay? It's up and down. There's going to be some days where you feel great, and there'll be some days where you don't feel great. And that's just kind of how it is, okay? The goal is to start to have more great days than bad days, right? To move in the right direction. But if you let those good moments or those bad moments derail you, then you're never going to get as far as you could. And so the question goes back to how much do you actually love the game of basketball? Because do you love it enough that you're going to keep putting in work? And even when you lose, even when you play terrible, are you willing to go back to the gym and still get that same amount of effort that you've been doing? All right, are you able to keep out working everybody else even when you don't see the results right away, even when you don't see it pay off right away? This is not an overnight thing. I said this before already. This is not an overnight thing, okay? It takes a lot of time and a lot of work over a long period of time to be able to do that. Do you love the game enough that you can work long enough to actually get to that point where you want to, where you can be confident. And again, this is not, this isn't just basketball. This is really with everything. Okay, but this, again, great example. Are you willing to say, you know what? I'm going to work at this and it might not pay off for me this year, right? It might not pay off for me, but maybe next year if I keep on doing that same amount of work, maybe then I'm going to see it. Okay, that's, that's how it is a lot of times. Again, that's why I said if you're playing for your first year or two and you're not confident, that's because you haven't put enough time, okay? You need to stick it, to stick it out and keep on going. You need to keep a long term perspective at all times. That's why I said, like, if I walk into a gym and there's something way better than me that just destroys me, whatever, right? That's going to make me better. Like, I don't care. That's going to be better. It's a long term perspective you need to have when you're playing pickup when you're in these workouts, right? This workout might be terrible, it might be awful right now. You might want to be done with it, okay? But this uncomfortable feeling that you have right now is going to ultimately make you better long term. So you need to be able to keep that, that, that, that focus, right? Keep on working and keep on trusting that work is going to pay off. And, you know, I have a podcast episode about why hard work always pays off. And it's a very interesting thought. So I want you guys to go check that out after this one's done. It's one of my earlier episodes. Just scroll back and you'll see it. But what I'm saying is like, there's always a silver lining to hard work. Okay? There's always something you're gonna get out of it, whether it's just the ability to actually work hard or whether it's actual results. When you go in there and you're willing to work hard for a long period of time and you do that, you're going to see benefits in your life regardless of whether or not you get what you want to get. Exactly. Okay? You might not get exactly what you want, but what you do get is going to be a good consolation for the work that you've put in. Not all work is equal. Okay, let's think about this, let's talk about your actual training. All right? There are two players, let's say there's two players right now who are both going to go to the gym. Let's say one player lives in New York, one player lives in Florida. Okay. Or you know, for you guys who are international, one player lives in America, one player lives in Australia, okay? Player. Both of those players are going to go to the gym today and they're both going to be in there for an hour, okay? But one of those players, the player in New York is going to get significantly better than the player in Florida, even though they're both putting in the same amount of time. And this is a real thing and this is something that, that, that separates a lot of players. Not all work is equal right there. A lot of players might be putting in work, but the drills or the workouts that they're doing are not preparing them to play at a high level. Okay? They're not. The, the drills and the workers are doing might not really translate to games. Okay? You can go into a gym and, and you can work hard and you can sweat and you can feel like, oh, man, I push myself today. But did what you actually. Is what you actually did going to benefit you long term in the games? Okay. Or is it just a good workout? Right. You know, if I go into the gym, I can do 10,000 knee high pounds with my right hand. And that might take me, you know, might take me 20 minutes, you know, for 10,000. If I say 10,000, both hands say, it takes me 30 minutes. Okay. I go and say, you know, I worked my ball 30 minutes today, but did you though? Like, yeah, you probably, it probably was a little tough. You probably got. We're sweating a little bit, but like, how much did that really help you? When we talk about actually in a game, how many times are you just standing there pounding the basketball? Not a lot. Now, I'm not saying there's not a time for that, but I'm saying that can't be the only thing that you're doing. And that's an extreme example, obviously. But you know, if you go into the, into the gym and you're working on things that you never do in a game, how are you going to be confident getting to a game where you're asked to actually do things that you're expected to do? And that's kind of how it is, okay? You need to be doing the things that are actually going to pay you those dividends to help you see results that translate to the game. Okay. So I always love to shout out guys who I think are doing a great job of this on YouTube and really on Instagram as well. Guys who are, who give great training, great knowledge by any means. Basketball. Shout out to Coleman. Hoop study. Shout out to DJ Sackman and Tyler Elf as well. Those are three of my favorite guys out there. There's a couple more out there who I put up there with those, with those three. But you know, those guys really do a great job of breaking the game down and, and, and giving great advice and great knowledge and a lot of, you know, really research backed knowledge, especially Coleman. A lot of stuff that, that is, it's awesome because I love, I love to see it because, you know, for a long time it's always been. And you see a ton. Like, I'll see coaches now who are like, you know, they just do things because that's how it's always been done, right? We're gonna do this drill because I did this drill and my dad does drill and his dad did this drill. But there's, there's people then who are like, okay, why, like, can we find a way to do this better? Right? And that's really what we need in, in the whole basketball training kind of realm. So again, shout out to those guys for being innovative. You know, when I was in middle school, early high school, this would be, man, about seven or eight years ago, this was like, there wasn't. Those three guys weren't where they are now. Like, it weren't big like that. Like, I didn't, I didn't know about those guys back then. You know, I know Coleman would have been like, I'm not the same age as him, so obviously we're both really young then and, but Even, you know, D.J. sackman, Tyler Rolfe, like the guys who I, who I really enjoy learning from now, those guys weren't around back then. And unfortunately for me, for everyone else who's there, like, we missed out on that. But that's the great thing about YouTube and the Internet now is that there's. There's these guys out there who are really, really good at what they do. And there's a lot of stuff out there that, that is popular, that's been popular, but I don't think it's anywhere near as good. Okay. And I think overall we're moving in a very good direction. The guys who aren't good, the guys who are, the guys who are, who are not really for the players are kind of getting weeded out. And those guys who are really about it. Those top guys are really starting to grow, which is great to see. But you know, being where we are today, there's no excuse for you to not be training the right way. There's just no excuse for it because again, there's all this great training out there. And for, you know, that's kind of my thought I'll leave you guys with is just being able to understand like if you aren't sure what you're doing, if you aren't sure that the stuff you're doing is going to get you results, be sure about it, okay? Don't just go out and do something because you know, it's just easy, right? I go out there, the first workout I found, I'm gonna go do it right. Have a reason for why you do what you do, right? If you're the one who's training, if it's your game, have a reason for why you do what you do. And obviously check out my channel. I have a ton of workouts on there you guys can use and for all different sorts of things, whether it's a player workouts and then there's workouts that are shooting, ball handling that work on specific skills that you need to have finishing all those things. So again, check that stuff out. Also, if you want to check out just a step by step laid out plan, I have my online training that's linked down below the perimeter score system and elite ball handling. So you guys want to lay it out the system. And of course with with the perimeter score system comes the mental toughness masterclass which goes even in more in depth with this confidence stuff. So you guys want to get that, that training and the additional confidence, confidence kind of breakdown and how you can apply it to your own game and strategy you can use to see these kind of jumps happen. Go ahead and check the link in my description down below and you're gonna see that and but before I let you guys go, I want to give a quick shout out to my guy Eric, who's been working hard with the primitive score system. And actually what he kind of sent me really relates to what I just talked about to kind of close out. So I want to read you guys two different messages that he sent me. First one he says, what's up, coach? Just finished up my workout for Thursday and I did great. I did really well with the drop as well. Today was one of the my best days because I pushed myself as hard as I could. I would go over the demonstration video and look at little details from the footwork and I tried to get as good a footwork as I can. So even if I made the shot, if I use bad footwork, I redid the rep to get the best reps in I could. And with this I did all the drills and I did all the drills good and I got most of the drills down. I shot really good and consistently throughout the whole workout and did really good on the double between the leg drops into a float series, the self toss wing lifts. Thanks for all the support and great advice you've given me. I've improved so much. That was a couple weeks ago and in this one he says, what's up coach? Just finished my workout from Monday and I did great. I did your at home strength training program in the morning. In the afternoon I did my workout for today and really pushed myself. I've been listening to your podcast a ton and one flaw I realized is that I was doing my training is that during my training I was not pushing myself as hard as I could to make my workouts harder. These past weeks I've been really focusing on pushing myself and doing things like pounding the ball really hard during dribbling drills and allowing myself to make mistakes and losing the basketball. Same thing for with focusing on a move to a scoring move. I've really been pushing myself and I've really seen the improvements from pushing myself. Then in the later evening I got to play one on one versus my friend. I lost two out of three games, but I did well. All three games were tight and I've really been practicing on working on I've really been working on the moves. We work on the primitive score system with defense and keeping it more random. I try my best to get one on one, two on two, etc. After every workout to help me sharpen the moves I've already known. I've already worked on know how to use against defense, but also to work on new moves. We were learning and trying to get those new moves down against defense and so that was kind of a lot. Those are two messages he sent me. The reason I want to bring him up is because the attention to detail and the the focus he puts into what he's doing is, is what I'm talking about when I say being committed to the game, right? Loving the game when it becomes like, okay, what can I do to maximize the work that I'm doing? Am I trying hard enough? Okay, I'm going to talk about this in a future video, but there's a lack of I'm trying to Think the right word to use for this. But there's a lot of players will message me and it's with questions or with things that you should be able to figure out, right? If you just play, like, if you're playing, you go and you're like, okay, how can I do this? Right? What? Like, and I'll give you guys better examples in the end, the podcast that I talk about this. But like, there's just a lack of like, you know, being able to figure something out yourself, right? It's always got to be, I gotta ask somebody about it. And there's, there's, there's obviously benefits to asking people questions, but there's times where like, there's things you just need to figure out yourself. Okay? And what I love about this, this question or this, this message you sent me is that it comes back to listen, I feel like maybe I'm not trying hard enough. I'm going to put in more effort now. My results are better. So now I know if I give more effort to each workout, I'm really working on not being afraid to mess up, pushing myself with the dribbling drills that I'm doing, really paying close attention to the details, to the footwork of everything, even if it means that I have to redo some stuff because I don't do it right the first time. That's where you see the guys who are gonna, who are gonna make it, the guys who are gonna be successful and the guys who don't. The guys who are, who are okay with not putting in that extra effort was saying, you know what? It's good enough, okay? That's where the difference becomes. The guys who aren't able to self, to be kind of self self critical of themselves and be like, okay, you know what? I probably need to do a better job with this footwork. I probably need to do a better job with the effort that I give. Okay? That's not something you need to ask me. That's something you know for yourself, okay? And again, that's why I wanted to give a shout out to Eric. The guys who can do this for a long time, who can be focused on the details, who can, who care about their effort, those are the guys who are going to gain that confidence and be successful long term, okay? And there's a lot of other guys that are in the permanent score system too, who I get messages from that are like this. But I want to give a shout to Eric because I feel like this kind of directly applies to what I was just talking about. So shout out to you, Eric and all the other guys who are working out right now. Again, like I said, if you guys want to join, the link is going to be down below in the description to check it out. But just kind of leave you guys with a quote. And I said this before in the comment, but you know, when you do the right things, the right things start to happen to you. And what I mean by that is when you start to do these things, when you start to train the right way, when you start to play in those live situations, when you have positive self talk, when you focus on giving your best effort instead of trying to be perfect, and if you truly love the game and are willing to endure when it's not that good, you're going to move in the right direction and eventually you're going to reach the place that you want to get to. And again, it's not an easy road, it's not a straight line, it's ups and downs. But again, if you're willing to tough it out, you're focusing on training the right way and you put that in over a long period of time, you're going to get to that point and that's ultimately all you can ask for. Okay? So again it's all about the time you're willing to put in. And at the end of the day that's something you have to determine for yourself. What are you willing to put in? How are you willing to care about the details? Are you willing to care about your effort? And if you are and you're willing to do that for a long time, then you're going to get to that point you want to get to. So hopefully that answers your guys questions about confidence. If you have any more questions specifically, be sure to send me a DM about it. Again like I said, love getting questions from you guys. And it again fuels what we're talking about today. Everything that I talk about today is questions that I've gotten. So you have a question, go ahead and send it to me. VisionDrivenBasketball and even if you don't have a question, just go ahead and give me a follow. VisionDrivenBasketball on Instagram just you see what I'm posting, what I'm doing, all those, all those extra things that, that you guys should hopefully care about a little bit. Like I said, Apple podcast. I appreciate all you guys for listening Spotify, YouTube, make sure you subscribe on YouTube. Leave a like and drop a comment too and I'll talk to you guys soon. Peace.