PNTV: Attainment by Troy Bassham (#154)

Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to Philosopher's Notes tv. Today we've got another great book, Attainment by Troy basham. Attainment, the 12 elements of elite Performance. As always, Philosopher's Note. I got a bunch of big ideas. Handful of my favorite big ideas here. Troy Bicham is Lanny Becham's son. We did an episode on With Winning in Mind by Lanny Becham. Very recently, Lanny won a gold medal in the Olympics. One of the best rifle shooters in U.S. history. His son Troy grew up with him and Olympic athletes, the world's best performers in their respective domains. And he's been working with his dad for the last 20 years on what they call their mental management system. Troy is an accomplished athlete in his own regard. A bunch of national championships, an international world championship. Just a great guy and a great storyteller like his dad. This book is packed with Wisdom. It's only 100 pages long, but my book is literally more of it is underlined than not. Five big ideas we're going to have fun with right now. 12 elements of elite Performance. So these guys coach Olympic athletes, Navy seals, FBI, the top performers in the world. What's the number one quality they all have? Elite performers? Passion. If you don't love something, there's no way you're going to perform at a peak level. At an elite level. He says, look, Tiger woods dad didn't need to tell him what time he needed to practice. He had to tell Tiger when to stop practicing. He was so into it. He was so passionate about it. Troy goes through the book and juxtaposes the elite performer versus the ordinary performer. The elite performer absolutely loves what they do. The average normal performer, even above average, likes what they do. There's a big difference between love and like. So the question for us is, what do we love to do? What do you love so much that you would pay to do it? That's what you need to be doing if you want to perform at an elite level. Passion. Element number one. Second element. Not the second element, rather, because he's got his 12. I'm not going to walk through the 12 elements, but the second big idea is we need to constantly improve. So yesterday we talked about the talent code. Deep practice. Well, Troy calls deep practice purposeful. Practice. Purposeful. So you need to have a purpose when you practice and you need to constantly try to improve. Emphasis on constantly and improve. The day before I read Attainment. I'm sorry, the day after I read Attainment, I read Pete Carroll's Win Forever. Seattle Seahawks, super bowl champ, win forever. What does he say? Well, Troy tells us we need to constantly improve, right? Pete tells us we need to always compete. If you want to win forever, you want to be an elite performer, you need to constantly improve. You need to always compete. What does compete mean? Compete means try to do something better than it's ever been done before. See if you can do something to the best of your ability. The word that I like to use to describe that is the Greek word arete. Moment to moment to moment. Can you express the highest version of yourself if that's what you're capable of doing and that's what you're actually doing, and there's a gap between the two, that's where regret, anxiety, disillusionment, depression exists. We need to close the gap. So what we're actually doing matches what we're capable of doing. That's always competing. That's living with the arte. That is seeking to constantly improve. Not once in a while when you feel like it, constantly. How can you get a little better day by day, moment by moment? That's a key attribute of elite performers. Again, the top top performers, Troy tells us 5% of performers account for 95% success. That's insane. 5 to 95. So there you go. Constantly improve. Third big idea we're going to talk about is think. He says, look, people say you are what you eat. Well, you are what you think too. You are what you think. So the question is, what are you thinking? Because whatever that is is going to dictate the quality of your life. Elite performers think at an elite level. Again, both Troy and his dad Lanny go into some extraordinary wisdom on how to gain control of your conscious mind to influence your subconscious mind to drive your self image so you believe that you're the kind of person who can perform at an elite level. Check them out for more. I'll put some links below. That's the third big idea. You are what you eat and you are what you think. So pay attention to what goes into your mind. In the note, I talk about another idea from another book where the guy says he's a healthy thought nut. Not just a healthy food nut, but a healthy thought nut. That's how we want to approach things now. The next big idea is just insane to me. It's amazingly inspiring. I shared the Did I win? Story from with winning in mind. And this story is right up there. Troy tells it brilliantly. I'm going to look at his name, make sure I get it right. A shooter Karolee Tekash Karali Takash. Amazing guy, Hungarian pistol shooter. He's the best in the world. Should use this hand. 1938, right. He's favored to win the Olympics in 1940. He's also in the Hungarian army. He's a sergeant in a routine training exercise. A grenade blows up in his hand. Guess which hand. His right hand. That happens to be his shooting hand. Well, that's a bummer. If you're the best shooter in the world and your shooting hand is blown off, that doesn't lead to a lot of happy times. He spent a month depressed in the hospital. And then what did he do? He decided he was going to be the best anyway and. And he secretly started to train shooting with his left hand. 1939. Fast forward a little bit. He's at world championships, wherever he's at, and he runs into his fellow competitors from before and they say, wow, you're back. So great to see you. He says, yeah, it's great to be back. And they were really surprised to see him. And they were even more surprised when he won the competition with his left hand. What, so then 1940 is coming along. He's excited about going to the Olympics and fulfilling his lifetime dream. But the 1940 Olympics are canceled. The 1944 Olympics are cancelled because of World War II. Ah, bummer. 38 years old, now, left handed, he shows up at the 1948 Olympics in London. And the competitor, the best guy, the favorite to win the gold, says, what are you doing here? He says, I'm here to learn. And then he wins the gold. Apparently when they're on the podium stand, the silver medalist says to our hero, you've learned enough. It's time to retire. But he didn't retire. He came back to the next Olympics in Finland, Helsinki. And he won that one too. Unbelievable. So Troy says that that's an extraordinary story about someone not quitting. It's renowned in the international shooting circles. I'd never heard it before. Ridiculously cool. But Troy says, look, the most important thing to note about that story is he never stopped thinking about what he wanted. Most people in his situation would obviously ruminate about the fact they just lost their shooting hand. He didn't. He focused on the fact that he wanted to win a gold medal. Nothing changed in his mind regarding his ability to do that. Absolutely remarkable. So think about what's going on in your life that might be challenging you and see if you can reinterpret it. Be inspired by our hero and do whatever you need to do to move through your obstacles so you can go out and crush it. Keep shooting. You don't need a right hand, you need a right mindset. I say in the note, alright, that's our fourth big idea. We're going a little long here, but that's alright. Reload. So again, Lanny and his dad talk about your conscious mind, your subconscious mind and self image. Imagine. And they map this out in a way I've never seen mapped out before. It's really, really powerful. It's the function of decades of peak performance by true champions. Now they have this idea called reload. And the idea is the most important thing for a peak performer is what they're thinking. Or one of the most important things is what they're thinking after they perform a task. So after they do something, that's when champions are made. So everybody knows you need to imagine your ideal outcome before you do it. But the truly elite performer is very clear on how they respond after they do something. So Troy maps out a three step process. One, two and three. One is, let's say you do something. So if you're a rifle shooter, you shoot right well, you evaluate. Step one, you see how you did. Step two, if it wasn't quite what you wanted, you rehearse what your ideal would have been. And step three, you let it go. So let's walk through that really quickly. Step one, you're a rifle shooter and you're a little bit off target. Let's say you hit the target perfect, 10 out of 10. Well then what do you say? You say great. You say great to yourself. Troy says when you have a success, you need to feast on it. Feast on your success. Imprint your mind with goodness. That's how a self image is cultivated right now. What if it didn't go great? What if it was just okay? If it was just okay, you say okay, okay. No big deal, neutral, whatever. Now if it wasn't a great shot, then what do you say to yourself? Most people, particularly average performers, say, I can't believe I did that again. I missed again. Right when it matters the most and the pressure's on, I miss. That's not a good set of imprints. That's not going to lead to elite performance, period. What Troy says we need to do via his mental management system is say, needs work. You miss the target, even if it's by a long shot. You don't berate yourself. You say, needs work. Needs work. What an amazing statement. What does needs work conjure up in your mind? Needs work Conjures up. How do I fix it? What work do I need to do on it? Then what you do is after you've done that evaluation and you come to the needs work. If it's great, you just affirm it. If it's okay or needs work, then you rehearse what the ideal outcome would have been, what the ideal shot would have looked like, and you imprint that rather than the negative stuff. Now, this applies whether you're shooting a rifle, trying to win a gold medal, or you're setting the dinner table and your kids are being a little out of control, or you're sending an email to your boss, or you're talking to a colleague, or you're writing a blog post. You need to think about how you're responding to each thing you're doing. Evaluate it, and then if it's not what you want, rehearse the ideal. Don't beat yourself up. Imprint good stuff. This is huge. And then you let it go and you move on. You're in the moment again. This is obviously all done rather quickly, but this is reload. Check out the book for more. I'm excited to share it. In that super small little nutshell there. Hope you got something out of it. And remember, feast on the good stuff and make sure you're not beating yourself up when something negative happens, which it of course will. Just imagine. Okay, that needs a little work. Imagine your ideal outcome, how you wanted it to go, and then be prepared to let that go. And go perform to your best in the next moment. Quick look at attainment. Troy. Thank you. The bachoms are awesome. Two of my favorite new teachers. Elite. Performance starts with passion. Do you love what you do? That's key. Constantly improve. Not once in a while, when you feel like it. Constantly strive to improve. Always compete. As Pete Carroll would say, live with arete. As the Greeks would say, moment to moment to moment. And you are what you think. Keep shooting. What? Right hand's blown off. No big deal. I'll go master with my left hand. Focus on what you want. Not the problems, but the solutions. And then reload. How you respond after a task is as important as what you're thinking about before. Hope you enjoyed. I look forward to sharing more with you soon. Have another awesome day. See you.