Shownotes
Tuck Taylor is the Founder of Neuro Beast a science-based peak performance company that is designed to give athletes a competitive advantage by optimizing the way they perceive and process information. Taylor helps athletes reach optimal levels through enhancing mind, body, and spirit.
Tuck attended Palm Harbor University High School where he went on to earn both an athletic and academic scholarship to the University of West Florida. At UWF, Tuck majored in exercise science and graduated with honors. His love for basketball and his knowledge of exercise science fueled his passion and desire to enter the arena of health, wellness and sports performance training.
On this episode Tuck Taylor shares insights on achieving flow states for athletes, emphasizing the importance of mental preparation and self-awareness in sports performance. Flow state, often described as being 'in the zone,' is characterized by effortless action and heightened focus. Taylor details a structured approach to help athletes cultivate this state through a series of mental exercises. By revisiting moments of past flow experiences, athletes can identify key triggers that enhance their performance. The discussion also highlights the significance of managing expectations and cultivating a playful mindset, as fun is integral to accessing flow. Coaches are encouraged to create an environment that fosters creativity and reduces pressure, allowing athletes to thrive without the burden of perfectionism. Taylor's method combines mental techniques with practical strategies, making it accessible for athletes at all levels.
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Take some notes as you listen to this episode with Tuck Taylor, Founder of Neuro Beast.
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Tuck Taylor:You by Head Start Basketball.
Tuck Taylor:The last part of it is just a confidence checklist.
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what I want to do?
Tuck Taylor:Can I see myself doing it?
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what happens when I lose my confidence?
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what to do to get it back?
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what I look like when I'm confident?
Tuck Taylor:So it's a series of visualizations that the athlete goes through and as they come out of it now they are optimized to go in focus on the process and have that not be interrupted by any of these triggers.
Tuck Taylor:And now they're in a flow state.
Mike Lindsay:Tuck Taylor is the founder of neurobeast, a science based peak performance company that is designed to give athletes a competitive advantage.
Mike Lindsay:By optimizing the way they perceive and process information, Taylor helps athletes reach optimal levels through enhancing mind, body and spirit.
Mike Lindsay:Tuck attended Palm Harbor University High School where he went on to earn both an athletic and academic scholarship to the University of West Florida at West Florida.
Mike Lindsay:Tuck majored in Exercise Science and graduated with honors.
Mike Lindsay:His love for basketball and his knowledge of exercise science fueled his passion and desire to enter the arena of health, wellness and sports performance training.
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Tuck Taylor:Coach at Calvin University and you're listening.
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Mike Lindsay:Take some Notes as you listen to this episode with Tuck Taylor, founder of neurobeast.
Mike Lindsay:Hello and welcome to the who Pets podcast.
Mike Lindsay:It's Mike Lindsay here without my co host Jason Sunkel tonight.
Mike Lindsay:But I am pleased to be joined for the second time by Tuck Taylor from neurobeast.
Mike Lindsay:Tuck, welcome back to number two, buddy.
Tuck Taylor:Glad to be back on the show, man.
Mike Lindsay:Looking forward to diving in with you tonight.
Mike Lindsay:Getting a quick update on where you've been, what you've been doing.
Mike Lindsay:And then we're going to dive into a conversation about flow state.
Mike Lindsay:Talk about it from the perspective of an athlete, how you can get there quicker and from the perspective of coaches, how you can get your athletes to the flow state a little bit faster.
Mike Lindsay:But first, talk, give us a quick update kind of on where you've been.
Mike Lindsay:I know you and I talked in our pre call a little bit about some of the different athletes that you've been working with and branching out into other sports.
Mike Lindsay:So just kind of give us a quick feel for, for where you're at, what you've been doing lately.
Tuck Taylor:Yeah, so when we talked before on last episode, I think I was primarily working with basketball, maybe a couple of baseball.
Tuck Taylor:Since then I've been able to work with more NFL players.
Tuck Taylor:Also have some clients out in the Asian pga, some able to work with some golfers.
Tuck Taylor:And I've done extensive work with volleyball, both indoor and beach volleyball.
Tuck Taylor:So branched out a little bit.
Tuck Taylor:It's been great because I'm kind of getting, you know, different perspectives on what athletes need when it comes to the mental game.
Tuck Taylor:And it's actually made me a better practitioner because now I'm able to kind of go into more of the nuanced levels and kind of see what is the same across the board.
Tuck Taylor:Like all athletes need this, you know, and that's why, you know, I wanted to get on to you and talk about flow states, because flow states is one of those things that I think we can all agree that when you see an athlete in flow, when athletes are experiencing flow, they're playing at a lot higher level.
Mike Lindsay:Absolutely.
Mike Lindsay:There's no question about that.
Mike Lindsay:I think any of us who have played sports, and I don't care what sport you're talking about, but I could think back to times when I was a player or as a coach watching a player who you're just like, man, you know, that dude got it into, into the flow state right there.
Mike Lindsay:And I can remember times myself when I'm playing of it just felt like no matter what I was doing, I could Throw up anything and it was going to go in.
Mike Lindsay:And then there were other days where you just knew, man, I don't, I don't have it today.
Mike Lindsay:So if you could get, if you could get to that point where, man, I can, I can get to that flow state easier.
Mike Lindsay:I can make it work for me instead of against me.
Mike Lindsay:I mean, that's an athlete.
Mike Lindsay:That's a, that's a key that any athlete's going to want to unlock.
Mike Lindsay:So let's start with it from the athlete perspective and just talk to me a little bit about how you work with your clients, how you talk to them about achieving that flow state.
Tuck Taylor:Yeah, so the first introduction, the flow state is I have them talk about a time that they were in flow.
Tuck Taylor:So like describing a time that the play felt effortless and their performance was elevated and they were losing kind of a sense of self and became one with the sport.
Tuck Taylor:And they were having fun, right?
Tuck Taylor:Where they were having a lot of fun.
Tuck Taylor:So I have them go back into that and I was like, well, that flow, you know, you were in a flow state or, you know, a lot of people used to call it the zone.
Tuck Taylor:Yep, flow states kind of like the catchphrase now for it.
Tuck Taylor:And so I want them, I always have them go back to it so that they know one, that they can experience it.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:We've all.
Tuck Taylor:We all can kind of get into that state.
Tuck Taylor:And then the next thing I teach them about is this kind of like, what are the requirements?
Tuck Taylor:What.
Tuck Taylor:How do you set the stage for flow?
Tuck Taylor:You know, and it comes from.
Tuck Taylor:There's a multifaceted approach, but one of the main things is how we prepare their mind prior to the game.
Tuck Taylor:And so one of the first steps we always say is like, you gotta make flow a priority.
Tuck Taylor:Like, we all agree that flow is the ultimate state of way of being.
Tuck Taylor:Well, now we got to make flow a priority.
Tuck Taylor:How can we make our game feel more effortless?
Tuck Taylor:How can we make.
Tuck Taylor:How can we reduce self doubt and overthinking and just really be in a state that.
Tuck Taylor:Where we're one with the game and one with our environment?
Tuck Taylor:And so one of the first parts of that is really understanding one, what are the potential things that could take me out of flow?
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:Because if flow shouldn't be elusive, flow is actually our natural way of being.
Tuck Taylor:But it's our attachment and our reactions to certain things in our environment that takes us and pulls us out of flow.
Tuck Taylor:And so we, you know, we'll go over it might be they miss us or they Have a bad at bat or they have a not ideal serve, right?
Tuck Taylor:These are things that can potentially take them out.
Tuck Taylor:And so then we go in there and we unpack those things on why those things are taking you out of flow.
Tuck Taylor:Because contrary to popular belief, this is one thing I tell them too, is that you're not performing perfectly in flow.
Tuck Taylor:You're still making mistakes, you're just not triggered by your mistakes.
Tuck Taylor:So you're able to move on to the next thing and the next thing and the next thing and the next thing.
Tuck Taylor:And you're staying in this more process based thinking and moment to moment thinking.
Tuck Taylor:Instead of your mind getting too far ahead of you and too far behind you in the past, you're able to stay present in the now moment.
Tuck Taylor:And so the first thing I haven't identified is just different things that can possibly take them out of this divine state.
Tuck Taylor:Right?
Tuck Taylor:And then we, we unpack those things and I help them, you know, depolarize some of the things.
Tuck Taylor:So for instance, one of the things one of my athletes brought up to me one time was that when he walks into the gym and maybe sees an athletic player, someone that looks just physically more gifted, it's hard for him to get into a flow state in those games.
Tuck Taylor:All right?
Tuck Taylor:So that's a polarized that he's polarizing the way that the athlete looks, which is now sending signals to their brain that there's a threat and you can't be in flow when there's a threat in your environment.
Tuck Taylor:Right now your fight or flight nervous system is activated.
Tuck Taylor:So depolarizing that is like, okay, I understand that that guy can do what he can do, but what can I, what do I bring to the table?
Tuck Taylor:He has to guard me, he has to deal with me.
Tuck Taylor:And so now it's not so black and white that this guy is this amazing player.
Tuck Taylor:It's also that I can do some things now, right.
Tuck Taylor:So it kind of disarms the athlete as far as like making them be so revved up about who they're playing and to the where they can go into it at a more base level state of consciousness where they're not, their nervous system isn't too revved up.
Tuck Taylor:Does that make sense to you?
Mike Lindsay:It absolutely does.
Tuck Taylor:Yeah.
Mike Lindsay:I mean, I think when you start talking about, okay, I might have this ideal vision of what it's going to be and then something is interrupting that ideal vision, I have to be able to ignore that, put it away in order for me to get towards the flow state.
Mike Lindsay:If that is that accurate how I'm describing it?
Tuck Taylor:Absolutely.
Tuck Taylor:So that's like what I call, like depolarization.
Tuck Taylor:And the other part is dropping.
Tuck Taylor:And what are we dropping?
Tuck Taylor:We're dropping expectations.
Tuck Taylor:So that's another flow buster, is when you have these toxic expectations.
Tuck Taylor:So like, anything that leads with I have to or I should be or I must.
Tuck Taylor:When you start to put those strict demands on the way that you're performing, and nine times out of 10, you're not going to live up fully to that, you're going to start judging yourself too much while you're performing.
Tuck Taylor:So let's say I say, like, oh, I want to score 30 tonight or I should at least get 20 on this team.
Tuck Taylor:And it's the fourth quarter and you got eight.
Tuck Taylor:Well, now you're like, oh, like I'm underperforming.
Tuck Taylor:I should have been doing that and that.
Tuck Taylor:And now you're no longer present, you're no longer present in the moment.
Tuck Taylor:And that will take you out of that flow state.
Tuck Taylor:And so the times you've played the best are in the times where you're just like, let me see how good I can do.
Tuck Taylor:Let me go out and just have fun.
Tuck Taylor:Let me see.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:It's more from a state of curiosity.
Tuck Taylor:So because now you're curious, you can go out more confident, more trusting, which is now going to prime your nervous system to be more loose, to be more present.
Tuck Taylor:Also, when it goes down to even like blood flow, like your blood flowing better when you're.
Tuck Taylor:There's no threats in your environment, you see better right now.
Tuck Taylor:You can make better decisions.
Tuck Taylor:And now you're going to perform optimally.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:You're going to feel those feel good neurotransmitters and you're going to get into that flow state.
Tuck Taylor:But when athletes go into these games with these, the strict demands on their performance is when they aren't fully optimized to get into flow because there's going to be something that's going to happen that's not optimal and they're going to overly address that.
Tuck Taylor:They're going to spend too much time thinking about that one thing instead of getting on to the next thing.
Mike Lindsay:What vocabulary words, when you ask the athletes to describe what the flow state feels for them, feels like for them.
Mike Lindsay:I'm just curious, what, what words, what vocabulary do people use to describe their flow state when they're talking about that with you?
Tuck Taylor:So there's a sense of ease.
Tuck Taylor:So like things are, things are a lot.
Tuck Taylor:Easy, effortless, fun.
Tuck Taylor:Fun is a big one.
Tuck Taylor:Like One of, one of my sayings is fun is flow and flow is fun.
Tuck Taylor:You know, and you know, we could end this podcast in one sentence is if you want to get into a flow state, set the intention to have fun, Boom, you know, like that's it.
Tuck Taylor:And we can kind of go over some of the nuances of that.
Tuck Taylor:But like, you know, those are, those are the main ways that they describe it.
Tuck Taylor:They also, they also talk about like.
Tuck Taylor:And this is this concept of like action and awareness become one.
Tuck Taylor:And what that is is it's like as you set the intention to do something, it happens.
Tuck Taylor:It's like the game is playing out in theater in your mind and like in your reality.
Tuck Taylor:Actually, like, you, as you want to do something, you do it.
Tuck Taylor:There's no resisting thoughts that you can't do anything.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:Very non resistant, very intuitive.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:I remember a time where I was experimenting with this process that I have for my athletes now to get it in the flow.
Tuck Taylor:And anyways, I was in a game, it was like a Saturday league I was playing in and I was like, I was in full blown flow mode to where I got this offensive rebound and I turned around, like, bring it back out.
Tuck Taylor:But I saw a guy cut.
Tuck Taylor:I just stood over the back of my head and it hit him like right on the money.
Tuck Taylor:But it was like, there was no hesitation, there was no worry of like, what if it goes out of bounds?
Tuck Taylor:What if there was no resistance?
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:I was completely clear and I was completely okay either way.
Tuck Taylor:It was just as if my body had its own intelligence.
Mike Lindsay:Yeah, I love that.
Mike Lindsay:I love that phrase.
Mike Lindsay:Your body is almost its own intelligence.
Mike Lindsay:I think about.
Mike Lindsay:And again, I'm going to more relate this as an old man thinking back to my, thinking back to my playing days.
Mike Lindsay:But I know when I had that feeling that, yeah, it feels like you no longer have to think about the processes of what you need to do in order to do whatever it is that you're doing out on the basketball court.
Mike Lindsay:So when I was in that flow state and shooting the ball well, I wasn't focused at all on my mechanics, my balance, my.
Mike Lindsay:I'm catching the ball here, I gotta do this or I gotta do that.
Mike Lindsay:It was just, it was automatic.
Mike Lindsay:And then I'll give you another example which I've shared a couple times now on the podcast.
Mike Lindsay:But it's relevant here in the sense of when you were talking about the distractions that take away from the flow state.
Mike Lindsay:So when I was a high school player, Tuck, I shot, I think 89.5% from the free throw line as a high school player.
Mike Lindsay:And then when I was a sophomore, when I got became a starter at, at Kent State, when I was playing in college and I was about halfway through the season, I was shooting, I think like 93% from the line.
Mike Lindsay:And I never once, ever prior to that time, I never thought about free throws at all.
Mike Lindsay:Like, I was just like, part of my identity was, Mike is a great free throw shooter.
Mike Lindsay:If you put Mike on the free throw line, Mike is not going to miss a free throw.
Mike Lindsay:And then at some point midway through my sophomore year, there was a time where we did a drill where you had to swish like five in a row in order to avoid like getting up the next morning at 6:30 to come in and shoot free throws.
Mike Lindsay:And here I am shooting like 93%.
Mike Lindsay:And for whatever reason, my free throws just completely abandoned me.
Mike Lindsay:So I went to the whole, the full on Chuck Knoblock can't throw to first base.
Mike Lindsay:Ben Simmons can't get to the free throw line.
Mike Lindsay:Yeah, completely.
Mike Lindsay:My shot just completely, it just completely abandoned me, I think the rest of the season.
Mike Lindsay:And then I kind of like Ben Simmons.
Mike Lindsay:I was afraid to get fouled and change sort of the way I played and whatever.
Mike Lindsay:And so my shot just completely collapsed for the remainder of my sophomore year.
Mike Lindsay:And when I think about the contrast between how I felt at that time when I stepped up to the free throw line and how every time I was there, I was just, I was thinking about every single thing I was doing and how do I do this and where's my hand and am I versus when I was playing well in the flow of a game, I never thought about anything about technique.
Mike Lindsay:I was just, I was just playing.
Mike Lindsay:It totally got completely inside my own head.
Mike Lindsay:It's funny now, Tuck.
Mike Lindsay:Cause I talk.
Mike Lindsay:I've talked to a couple different people, sports psychologists on the podcast and like, what would you, what would you have told me to do back then?
Mike Lindsay:Because back then I solved it by myself.
Mike Lindsay:Believe it or not, my coach has never even talked to me about it.
Mike Lindsay:Like, here's a kid who was shooting like 93% from the line and suddenly can't make one.
Mike Lindsay:Nobody ever talked to me about it, so I just kind of had to figure it out and solve it for myself.
Mike Lindsay:And luckily I never got back to the point where I was before that happened.
Mike Lindsay:Like, I never became 93.
Mike Lindsay:I'm never gonna miss, but I got it up.
Mike Lindsay:I shot like 82% as a senior, which honestly might be my best athletic accomplishment.
Mike Lindsay:Of my entire life that I was able to kind of over overcome that and do it by myself for sure.
Mike Lindsay:But to talk about this flow state stuff, it's so amazing to me that, to me that experience with free throws was so anti flow state because to go back to what you talked about off the top, it became such a distraction for me.
Mike Lindsay:It was just like I, when I thought before the game, I'm like, I don't, I don't want to go, I don't want to go up there.
Tuck Taylor:Let's unpack it.
Tuck Taylor:Like yeah, let's do it and let's do it.
Tuck Taylor:So this is interesting is one of the false premises about like sports performance is that when you perform well, you gain confidence.
Tuck Taylor:By performing well, you actually can start to lose confidence.
Tuck Taylor:Because now you have expectations.
Mike Lindsay:Correct.
Tuck Taylor:Now you're like I am a great free throw shooter.
Tuck Taylor:So now exactly.
Tuck Taylor:I have to, I must and I should be shooting better.
Tuck Taylor:And now you have all these expectations now and these strict demands, like telling yourself that you have to shoot 93% from the free throw line is a strict demand.
Tuck Taylor:That's a strict demand on your performance.
Tuck Taylor:Right?
Mike Lindsay:For sure.
Tuck Taylor:Now before when free throw shooting was just this thing you went up and did.
Tuck Taylor:Now you're overly focused, you're overthinking about it.
Tuck Taylor:Your Mrs.
Tuck Taylor:Thing more, they stay with you more you think about them when you're sleeping and they start to ruminate over them.
Tuck Taylor:And it's just not flow based.
Tuck Taylor:It's because you're, you've told yourself by saying it shouldn't be or it has to that the, the result of that performance is attached to your physical well being is what you told your body.
Mike Lindsay:That's exactly right.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:And that, and it's a very subconscious thing, but that's what you told your body.
Tuck Taylor:So now this free throw is more than a free throw.
Tuck Taylor:It's life or death to the body and to the mind.
Tuck Taylor:And so now with that extra pressure, of course it's harder to, it's harder to be in that flow state.
Tuck Taylor:It's harder to make them, make them the way you were before.
Tuck Taylor:You weren't thinking, you were just stepping up and doing it and allowing it to happen.
Tuck Taylor:There is no, there was no technique, there was no opponent.
Tuck Taylor:There was, there was nothing but just shooting and moving on.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:And so that's what ends up happening is as, that's why the mental game is such a big thing even at the high levels is because as these athletes start to accumulate success, success, here come these strict demands that they placed on their performance that they've never placed on themselves before.
Tuck Taylor:You know, they, they're, they're sitting there chilling, just doing their thing, happy to be in the league.
Tuck Taylor:They start playing well, then they, they get signed for 60 million on their extension.
Tuck Taylor:Now it's like, oh, I got paid this real money.
Tuck Taylor:I have to go out and prove to everyone that I'm worth this.
Tuck Taylor:I have to prove to the club.
Tuck Taylor:Now you're in a different state of consciousness that even got you there because you weren't playing with those strict demands before and now you're placing them on yourself.
Tuck Taylor:Now you could become a completely different player.
Tuck Taylor:And that's.
Mike Lindsay:Yeah, it's so true.
Tuck Taylor:Yeah.
Tuck Taylor:And that's why just having.
Tuck Taylor:You can have an intention, right?
Tuck Taylor:I intend to play well, I intend to shoot well.
Tuck Taylor:But you can't have expectations that are strict and that are toxic like that.
Tuck Taylor:Because that, those are, those are, you know, a lot of perfectionists, you know, go through that.
Tuck Taylor:You know, that's, that's the perfectionism trap, you know, and it leads to also a over analysis of whatever, whatever that wrong thing was.
Tuck Taylor:So, for instance, like, you could have had a good game, but you missed five free throws.
Tuck Taylor:You're harping on those five missed free throws.
Tuck Taylor:Like you like everything else that you did that showed up in the stat book, that didn't show up in the stat book has completely been filtered out and you're just zeroing in on that.
Tuck Taylor:And that's what makes these ant hills into mountains, you know, and it keeps people out of flow, you know, when you.
Tuck Taylor:We are our own worst critic.
Tuck Taylor:And that's what keeps a lot of people from just living and being more free and playing more freely because they are judging themselves so harshly.
Mike Lindsay:I feel like it becomes, and I know it did for me, that it becomes a part of.
Mike Lindsay:It's not just how I'm playing, it's part of my identity.
Mike Lindsay:Like part of my identity was Mike's a great free throw shooter.
Mike Lindsay:Like, that was honestly part of how.
Mike Lindsay:And that wasn't necessarily expectations that were placed on me from somebody else.
Mike Lindsay:That was my own expectation.
Mike Lindsay:And I completely relate to you just saying, oh, I missed five free throws and that totally ruined my performance.
Mike Lindsay:Man, if I had a good game and down the stretch at the end of the game, even if the game was over and I got fouled, and God Forbid I went 1 for 2 at the end of the game, whatever, like that one free throw probably just gnawed at me.
Mike Lindsay:And not at me, and not at me.
Mike Lindsay:And that was even when I was still shooting the ball, you know, relatively well.
Mike Lindsay:And it's.
Mike Lindsay:It's amazing now for me to talk to guys like yourself and to some of the other performance coaches that I've talked about, and everybody kind of has the same, basically what you're talking about, right, that.
Mike Lindsay:You can't.
Mike Lindsay:You can't let it become all consuming.
Mike Lindsay:You have to.
Mike Lindsay:You have to just be able to put it aside and accept what the performance is for.
Mike Lindsay:For what it is.
Mike Lindsay:And I just go back to knowing how isolated I felt back in those days when I was just.
Mike Lindsay:It was just me inside of my head trying to figure out.
Mike Lindsay:I didn't talk to anybody.
Mike Lindsay:Nobody talked to me.
Mike Lindsay:And me trying to just figure out, how do I make this work?
Mike Lindsay:How can I get past this?
Mike Lindsay:How can I overcome it?
Mike Lindsay: iness had been around back in: Mike Lindsay:I would have been in a lot better shape because somebody would have got to me right away, as soon as it started happening and said, hey, here's some things that you can try.
Mike Lindsay:Let's.
Mike Lindsay:Let's do this and see if we can.
Mike Lindsay:We can knock this out before it becomes this entire psychological warfare that you're having inside your head.
Mike Lindsay:It's kind of crazy.
Tuck Taylor:Absolutely.
Mike Lindsay:Just.
Mike Lindsay:And I was by myself.
Tuck Taylor:It's when.
Tuck Taylor:It's when we lose the curiosity aspect about, like, let's just go see.
Tuck Taylor:What I can do today is what ends up just triggering our nervous system into, like, fight or flight mode.
Tuck Taylor:And your body in fight or flight mode is just optimized to survive in that standpoint.
Tuck Taylor:It's not optimized to do nuanced tasks like shooting and dribbling, passing and seeing cutters.
Tuck Taylor:Like, your.
Tuck Taylor:Your body's essentially going into this, like, safety mode.
Tuck Taylor:Just like when your phone get ready to die, you can press that safety mode.
Tuck Taylor:The screen is going to be a little bit more dim.
Tuck Taylor:Your Internet's not going to work as fast.
Tuck Taylor:It's the same thing when we say constantly or subconsciously.
Tuck Taylor:I have to.
Tuck Taylor:I must.
Tuck Taylor:I should be.
Tuck Taylor:What if.
Tuck Taylor:Oh, boy, here we go again.
Tuck Taylor:Those things like that.
Tuck Taylor:It sets you up to go into.
Tuck Taylor:One of the.
Tuck Taylor:One of the books we refer to is from the Confident Mind.
Tuck Taylor:And in there, he talks about, like, the sewer cycle that you can go into thinking.
Tuck Taylor:It's when you consciously or unconsciously think these things, think these thoughts that lead to these emotions that then lead to these physiological changes that leads to These results.
Tuck Taylor:And so one of the big parts of being mindful as an athlete is understanding in that space between challenge and response.
Tuck Taylor:What am I saying to myself, both consciously and subconsciously?
Tuck Taylor:And if you can lead with curiosity, if you can lead with a little bit of optimism now, your emotions are going to be better now you're going to be more eager and excited to perform.
Tuck Taylor:Like I, like you said, when it became issue with the free throws, you weren't necessarily eager or excited to get to that line anymore.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:The one before you were, you were like, all right, let's see if I can knock both of these down.
Tuck Taylor:It was just like, right?
Mike Lindsay:For sure.
Mike Lindsay:Absolutely.
Tuck Taylor:Keeping your mind open and curious to see what's going to happen is what allows flow state to happen.
Tuck Taylor:And for you to get into these, into these moments because you're not, you're not polluting the brain and overwhelming the brain with extra thinking and so going, going back to flow state, what actually happens is that your brain is actually shutting down during flow state.
Tuck Taylor:The analytical part of the brain that is judging, and that's, you know, very old, maybe overly cognitive, is actually shutting down.
Tuck Taylor:And you're becoming very, very, very subconscious in what you're doing, even to where you're losing sense of self.
Tuck Taylor:Like, you're not worried about how your jersey looks or who's in the audience.
Tuck Taylor:Like, you almost lose orientation of who you are in space and time.
Tuck Taylor:And that's because the mechanism that's responsible for that is actually turning off.
Tuck Taylor:And like I told you in the pre show, this is where this starts to get flow, starts to get, in my opinion, very, very spiritual.
Tuck Taylor:And so what's happened this year, even with a lot of my athletes that we've gone this route is that when you, when you tack flow from a spiritual standpoint, it automatically purifies the mind, which optimizes the body.
Tuck Taylor:But when you just attack flow and mental performance as a whole from a mental standpoint, you may or may not be able to apply those things in time.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:Or, and, or you don't have a inherent foundation to be able to deal with them and understand them and like, understand these things at their core.
Tuck Taylor:So, one, one.
Tuck Taylor:There's a scripture in the Bible is John 3, 30.
Tuck Taylor:It says I must decrease so he can increase.
Tuck Taylor:And when I read that, I started thinking about sports psychology and flow, I was like, wow.
Tuck Taylor:Like, sports psychology says that the brain is shutting down as you're getting into flow, which in my opinion, flow is now the presence of God in your game too.
Tuck Taylor:We'll talk about that too.
Tuck Taylor:But I think flow and God are one of the same because he, he created us.
Tuck Taylor:And as we start to put more trust in our ability and trusting him, it starts to show up more in our game.
Tuck Taylor:But we have to decrease.
Tuck Taylor:We have to let go of overthinking.
Tuck Taylor:We have to let go of these toxic expectations.
Tuck Taylor:We actually have to do less so that we can get into these flow states and play better.
Mike Lindsay:So my question for you then becomes, if I'm an athlete and I want to increase my ability to reach the flow state faster, more often, and I'm getting ready to play a game or head into a practice, what should I be doing?
Mike Lindsay:Where should my mind be at?
Mike Lindsay:What is my process for going through the preparation required to get me ready to achieve that flow state when I get out into whatever the court, the field, whatever it is that I'm going to perform?
Tuck Taylor:Very good.
Tuck Taylor:So here, here's a process that's been relatively unique to our practice and it involves walking.
Tuck Taylor:And so a couple of things happen when you walk is it's bilateral in nature, right?
Tuck Taylor:So as your left foot goes up, your right hand goes up.
Tuck Taylor:And so what ends up happening is you create this hemi sync with your brain where now you're thinking both logically and creatively.
Tuck Taylor:And that's important to know.
Tuck Taylor:And so the first thing that I had the athlete do is like, again, identify anything that might pull you out of flow going into this game.
Tuck Taylor:Like, if I missed a shot, if I get pulled out, if I get this, whatever, right?
Tuck Taylor:And I had them envision that.
Tuck Taylor:And I also had them while they're envisioning that.
Tuck Taylor:I was like, well, how can you not be triggered by that?
Tuck Taylor:How can you allow this to happen and still stay in flow?
Tuck Taylor:What story, what narrative can you tell yourself that will allow you to stay in flow and not overthink these things?
Tuck Taylor:So like, let's say if I missed my first two shots, I realized that gets me out of flow.
Tuck Taylor:Or a question I can ask myself is, are there good players that missed their first two shots?
Tuck Taylor:Heck yeah.
Tuck Taylor:Are there great players that missed their first two shots?
Tuck Taylor:Heck yeah.
Tuck Taylor:So why should I worry about it, right?
Tuck Taylor:And as you're walking, because you're in this state of when you have that hemi sync, you're actually able to come up with even more creative ways to reconcile that thought is because your brain is actually working at a higher level of problem solving when you're walking.
Tuck Taylor:Another thing that occurs is called transient hypo frontality.
Tuck Taylor:It also Happens with low levels, low to moderate levels of physical exercise is that the analytical part of your brain starts to shut down.
Tuck Taylor:So now you're able to view, you're able to the part of your brain that like judges.
Tuck Taylor:So now you're able to like see that, see yourself missing those two shots, but there's no shame or condemnation attached to it, right?
Tuck Taylor:So now you're not, you're, now you're not criticizing yourself overly for doing it.
Tuck Taylor:And now you're able to.
Tuck Taylor:Allows you and opens the door for these creative solutions on how to deal with these things.
Tuck Taylor:And then I have them go through.
Tuck Taylor:So if it's three or four things, you do that with all, all the things that happens.
Tuck Taylor:And then the next step is to envision yourself playing.
Tuck Taylor:So a little bit of visualization work now envision yourself playing the game from a moment to moment basis.
Tuck Taylor:So you're not trying to accomplish anything like you're in the game.
Tuck Taylor:What are you focused on now?
Tuck Taylor:What do you focus on second?
Tuck Taylor:So I call them process based goals.
Tuck Taylor:So you're kind of going through your process based goals.
Tuck Taylor:If I'm a point guard and the other team scores, maybe I'm c.
Tuck Taylor:Cutting around, getting the ball, getting into our transition.
Tuck Taylor:I'm seeing myself do that from a step to step basis, right?
Tuck Taylor:Breaking the game down, things like most fundamental aspects and then the last part of it is just a confidence checklist.
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what I want to do?
Tuck Taylor:Can I see myself doing it?
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what happens when I lose my confidence?
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what to do to get it back?
Tuck Taylor:Do I know what I look like when I'm confident?
Tuck Taylor:So it's a series of visualizations that the athlete goes through.
Tuck Taylor:And as they come out of it now, they are optimized to go in, focus on the process, get deeply ingrained into a focus on the process and have that not be interrupted by any of these triggers.
Tuck Taylor:And now they're in a flow state, right?
Mike Lindsay:How do you as an athlete and how do you think about somebody who in the course of a game of practice that maybe it's not going as well as somebody had hoped.
Mike Lindsay:And so I'm trying to then make adjustments or make corrections as I'm going through.
Mike Lindsay:So maybe I play the first half of a game or maybe I play the first quarter and my shot feels off and I'm not shooting the ball the way I want to.
Mike Lindsay:And yet we're talking a little bit about, right, turning off that conscious mind of being aware of all those things.
Mike Lindsay:How do you kind of balance out the.
Mike Lindsay:I want to get to this flow state where it becomes automatic.
Mike Lindsay:But I also may want to make subtle corrections in whether it's my technique, my approach, all those things that requires more of a cerebral mind.
Mike Lindsay:If that question makes any sense.
Mike Lindsay:How do you balance those two?
Tuck Taylor:It does, it does.
Tuck Taylor:So making your cues while you're playing, making those cues and those corrections more external than internal, the more that you're focused on the internal, you become more self conscious in the body, which is anti flow.
Mike Lindsay:Right, right.
Tuck Taylor:That's.
Tuck Taylor:That's how you can get in someone's head when you're playing.
Tuck Taylor:Like, hey, like I like how you held your follow through.
Tuck Taylor:Like exactly the follow through next time for sure.
Tuck Taylor:And so it, it becomes a simple cues.
Tuck Taylor:Put the ball in the basket.
Tuck Taylor:Like simple.
Tuck Taylor:Like it's mo.
Tuck Taylor:It's the.
Tuck Taylor:@ its most simple fundamental level.
Tuck Taylor:Because you don't want to activate too much critical thinking and flow.
Tuck Taylor:You don't want to be like, oh, I got to keep my elbow and I have to follow through and I have to do this and I have to get my eyes up.
Tuck Taylor:It's.
Tuck Taylor:It.
Tuck Taylor:Flow does all that at once.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:And really it's just having confidence in that and being uninhibited in taking your shots.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:And being okay with missing too.
Tuck Taylor:Because like the other thing with flow is like, well, can I be in flow in a game where I didn't shoot that well?
Tuck Taylor:Yeah, because there's so many other nuances to the game, so many other boxes that you can be checking that those, those missed shots actually become minimal.
Tuck Taylor:Like you're on defense and you stopped your man, he had to pass out.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:You don't get a stat for that.
Tuck Taylor:But that was a good defensive stop for you.
Tuck Taylor:That, that's flow.
Tuck Taylor:And if you can stay present with those different processes, you could still be in a flow state in an optimal state of playing, still be a very effective player without having to play perfectly.
Tuck Taylor:Maybe you didn't shoot well, but you got to the free throw line.
Tuck Taylor:Maybe you didn't shoot well, but you had a lot of assist that game.
Tuck Taylor:You know, you found you've continued to.
Tuck Taylor:That's the thing about being in flow.
Tuck Taylor:You're in the state of like automatically problem solving to where it's like, yeah, maybe I'm not going to shoot as much.
Tuck Taylor:Maybe I'm going to play make.
Tuck Taylor:I'm going to find other ways to do it.
Tuck Taylor:That's what happens in flow.
Tuck Taylor:Is that like, yeah, you might recognize you're not shooting well, but Your mind is so open to other ways to affect the game.
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Mike Lindsay:Learn more@gc.com hoop heads that's gc.com hoop heads when the game or the practice or the performance finishes and an athlete is looking back on, hey, what went well in terms of me getting into flow?
Mike Lindsay:Maybe where did I struggle?
Mike Lindsay:What are those conversations that you have with athletes?
Mike Lindsay:What do those look like at the conclusion of a performance?
Mike Lindsay:That, what do you talk to the athletes about?
Mike Lindsay:How do you sort of analyze and look back at how it went?
Tuck Taylor:So that's, that's, that's a great question.
Tuck Taylor:So one thing that I teach them to do is have a really good athletic filter, which means when even talking about the way that they played, it should be the ESPN highlight version of it first and then a very almost business like response to the things that they did wrong.
Tuck Taylor:I just call it optimization data.
Tuck Taylor:So it could be.
Tuck Taylor:So I had a player that we worked with that plays for the Pacers and he had a good game, but from maybe a social media standpoint, it looks like Brunson got the best of him and he had 43 on his head and there was nothing he can do.
Tuck Taylor:And it was like, this is how I know this guy is like why he's elite is because when he talked about the game, there was no mention of the.
Tuck Taylor:I would say maybe he spent five minutes on talking about the game.
Tuck Taylor:I'd say four minutes of it was all the things that he did well from a nuanced version, like I stayed in flow, I got to my spots, I found my teammates here.
Tuck Taylor:Even though I had a good warm up, I had a good pregame, all the boxes that were checked that were right and then it's like, oh, you know, I could have gave him some different looks, I could have done this, I could have done that and that was it.
Tuck Taylor:And so what that, what that shows me and what that, what that's cultivating in the athlete is as they view themselves as in the athlete role, it's going to be more positive than it is negative, right?
Tuck Taylor:Not we're not giving the missed free throws a bunch of weight, but we are going to give some of the intangible things some weight and some attention that usually don't get any attention.
Tuck Taylor:Like, I had a stop on this play and I did this on this play that might not have showed up in the stat book.
Tuck Taylor:So it's really, you know, in terms of basketball, it's redefining what success is in basketball.
Tuck Taylor:And it's not only going to be the things that show up in the stat book, like really getting down to the nuance of, like what, what a real successful game looks like and having them be able to articulate that when they talk about the game.
Tuck Taylor:Now, if they're harping on some mistake that they had, it's like there's that filter still, isn't there?
Tuck Taylor:The filter is almost made to the filters almost set to magnify their mistakes and filter out the good things that they did.
Tuck Taylor:So that's one thing that we look at is like, how do they describe the game?
Mike Lindsay:That's the ability to one, recognize and acknowledge the nuances of the game, that maybe a player at a lower level might not be able to first of all see and recognize the value of those things.
Mike Lindsay:So I think the higher level that you go, players have a greater ability to be able to sense those nuances.
Mike Lindsay:And then I think the second part of that is the ability to self diagnose, hey, what did I do well?
Mike Lindsay:What did I not do well?
Mike Lindsay:And then to make those necessary adjustments.
Mike Lindsay:And again, I think when you talk about players at the highest level, part of what makes them elite and special is that they understand their own performance so well that they know oftentimes what caused them to perform well or perform poorly in a given moment.
Mike Lindsay:And so to be able to at the end of the performance or at the end of the game, to be able to go back and look at, hey, here's all the little small things that Joe Smith sitting in the third row may not know that I contributed, but I know that those are things that my teammates, my coaches, 100% want me to be doing.
Mike Lindsay:And then conversely, if there's things that I didn't do well, I know how to diagnose those and say, yeah, I was supposed to get here, or maybe I was a step slow defensively in my rotations, or, yeah, I just didn't get to my spots quick enough to be able to get the shots that we were supposed to.
Mike Lindsay:Those kinds of things are, again, a lesser athlete, someone who's less accomplished, isn't going to recognize those things.
Mike Lindsay:So for a player at that level, I think those are the two things to me that set apart pros and guys who are elite is their ability to self diagnose and their ability to be able to recognize the, the more nuanced contributions that they're making, if that makes any sense.
Tuck Taylor:It's, it's all summed up into self awareness.
Tuck Taylor:It's how aware they are themselves.
Tuck Taylor:And absolutely, I even see it because, like, my youngest client right now is 10.
Tuck Taylor:Then I have guys in their 30s.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:So I see it.
Tuck Taylor:Right, well, we'll do a drill.
Tuck Taylor:We'll do like a cognitive conditioning drill.
Tuck Taylor:I'll ask the athlete, how did you do?
Tuck Taylor:And then I had always had them rank themselves 1 through 100.
Tuck Taylor:And the younger kids, they always go towards the negative on how they did.
Tuck Taylor:And so we can have like 25 reps.
Tuck Taylor:They mess up on three, they'll be like, I did about 50%.
Tuck Taylor:I was like, you only met three out of 25.
Tuck Taylor:Like, you know what that, you know, you know what that comes out to.
Mike Lindsay:Right?
Tuck Taylor:You know, so it put it, doing it in time like that.
Tuck Taylor:That's why what I do is very valuable to the athletes because it also gives them the space to learn how to accurately self assess, you know, and that's so important because again, if your filter is in the negative, you're going to always think that you're performing bad.
Tuck Taylor:You're going to always think that you're not good enough.
Tuck Taylor:You're never going to feel that fulfillment you get from playing.
Mike Lindsay:So true.
Mike Lindsay:So true.
Tuck Taylor:All right.
Mike Lindsay:Is there anything else from an athlete perspective in terms of flow that you want to share before we move to what a coach might be able to do to help their team and their players who maybe aren't as familiar with doing it themselves.
Mike Lindsay:What can a coach do to kind of get their athletes more prepared to be in a flow state?
Tuck Taylor:Yeah.
Tuck Taylor:So I would say another thing, and this is from working with pros, I see this a lot, is flow state shouldn't just be something that you're practicing for your sport.
Tuck Taylor:Flow should be a priority for your life.
Tuck Taylor:So it's like trying to find flow in conversations.
Tuck Taylor:I'm sure you get into conversational flows all the time, you know.
Mike Lindsay:Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
Tuck Taylor:Podcast.
Tuck Taylor:So there's, there's different levels of flow and allowing yourself to experience it in different things and different aspects outside of your sport will Allow you to get into it in your sport a lot more easier.
Tuck Taylor:You know, you're practicing getting into flow, doing your homework, or you're practicing conversational flow, or you're working out and you're getting into a flow and recognizing it and feeling it.
Tuck Taylor:And what happens is then you begin to grow this flow sensitivity.
Tuck Taylor:So now you're more aware when you're in it, and you're more sensitive to when maybe you're starting to slip out of it.
Tuck Taylor:And you have the tools and strategies to get back in it, right?
Tuck Taylor:Which is usually the usual tool and strategy is just to get back to the present moment, get back present, like what's in front of me, what do I need to do right now?
Tuck Taylor:And as you do what's present over and over and over again, that's how you start to shift into that state of consciousness, of flow.
Tuck Taylor:So that's big is just practicing these things outside of it and like I said before, also exploring your spirituality.
Tuck Taylor:There's so much.
Tuck Taylor:There's so much in spirituality that coincides with flow and with letting go and submitting and not overthinking that is related to spirituality.
Tuck Taylor:And there's even research on it.
Tuck Taylor:There's called the Spirituality well Being Scale.
Tuck Taylor:And it showed that athletes that were.
Tuck Taylor:That reported they were had.
Tuck Taylor:They were good with their spirit and they understood their spirituality also perform better, right?
Tuck Taylor:Because now they're more equipped to deal with challenges.
Tuck Taylor:They know how to deal with adversity.
Tuck Taylor:Now there's spiritual aspects to handling all those things.
Tuck Taylor:And the whole path for me has been interesting because I got into the peak performance field first through the body, right?
Tuck Taylor:I was a strength and conditioning coach for 10 years.
Tuck Taylor:Then I started the mental route.
Tuck Taylor:I noticed that, like, the mental was starting to make the physical better.
Tuck Taylor:But now as I'm getting into the spiritual, the spiritual is making the mental better, which is making the physical better.
Tuck Taylor:So if you.
Tuck Taylor:If you can have a concept of spirituality and how that relates to you and your life and start to understand it, it will allow you to get into these states of flow a lot easier.
Tuck Taylor:You understand how to surrender to the moment.
Tuck Taylor:You understand how to be obedient to your intuition.
Tuck Taylor:You understand?
Tuck Taylor:And by doing it and living that way, you're able to do it more seamlessly when it comes to your sport.
Mike Lindsay:You're able to let go, right?
Mike Lindsay:I mean, you're letting go of that control.
Mike Lindsay:You're seeding that control.
Mike Lindsay:And I think that's really what you're talking about here when you're talking about bringing the spirituality piece of it into it.
Tuck Taylor:And then.
Tuck Taylor:Oh, go ahead.
Tuck Taylor:One more thing I'll say too, is integrating something into your pregame that allows you to do that.
Tuck Taylor:That is allowing you to feel your body move automatically, right, without thinking.
Tuck Taylor:And I don't know if you follow my page at all, but one of the things that's definitely.
Tuck Taylor:I'm seeing more and more and elite athletes that they're juggling before their performance.
Tuck Taylor:And there's, there's a lot of research on juggling and what it does to the brain.
Tuck Taylor:One of the main things that it does, it increases the white matter in your brain, which is the, basically the conduction.
Tuck Taylor:It increases the speed of the transfer of the signals in your brain.
Tuck Taylor:So things are transferring and flowing a lot faster, which now you're more automatic, you're responding more fluidly to things because the information is going faster in your brain.
Tuck Taylor:And Steph Curry does it.
Tuck Taylor:There's a crazy video of Webinaya juggling before one of the Olympic games.
Tuck Taylor:Sydney, Sydney McLaughlin, the hurdler that has all the world records, she does it.
Tuck Taylor:Jose Alvarez is a big juggler pregame, like the best of the best are starting to integrate more of these physical, mental, spiritual aspects prior to the game so that they can get into that flow state.
Mike Lindsay:I'm a two ball, one and juggler.
Mike Lindsay:That's.
Mike Lindsay:I never, I've never, I've never been able to get to the three balls, two hands.
Mike Lindsay:So.
Tuck Taylor:You're right.
Mike Lindsay:Look at you, man.
Mike Lindsay:That's, that's what I, that's what I, I.
Mike Lindsay:What's, what's funny is.
Mike Lindsay:So I'll tell you a good story.
Mike Lindsay:So I learned that in, I don't know what year I was in high school probably, I'm guessing maybe my junior year of high school in a psychology class.
Mike Lindsay:And it's one of the things that I just remember about that teacher.
Mike Lindsay:And I remember I learned a skill and it's a skill that I still have, still have today.
Mike Lindsay:And I actually have a girl now that is coming to some of the stuff that I do basketball wise.
Mike Lindsay:And her mom called me, we were having a conversation, she had some questions about some stuff.
Mike Lindsay:And in the course of us talking, she's like, hey, you know, I just wanted to let you know that, you know, my dad was Mr.
Mike Lindsay:Pershnicki, who was the guy who taught the psychology class where I learned how to juggle.
Mike Lindsay:And so she's, so, she's like, yeah.
Mike Lindsay:My dad always says, ah, Mike, you know, he's, he's a good, you know, he's a good kid.
Mike Lindsay:And she's laughing because, you know, I'm like, yeah, I'm 54.
Mike Lindsay:She's like, of course, you know, any teacher always refers to.
Mike Lindsay:Doesn't matter how old the people get, right.
Mike Lindsay:They're still, there's still, they're still a kid.
Mike Lindsay:But that's what I remember about him is I couldn't tell you anything about psychology.
Mike Lindsay:I couldn't tell you one thing that I learned in that class, but I remember that juggling was a part of it.
Mike Lindsay:It was a skill that I learned, and it's a skill that I still have today.
Mike Lindsay:I probably should have stuck with it and been able to do the, the three balls.
Mike Lindsay:I might have to put that, I might have to put that on my list to figure out how to do.
Tuck Taylor:I teach all my athletes how to juggle.
Tuck Taylor:I teach all my athletes how to juggle.
Tuck Taylor:And it's.
Tuck Taylor:It's definitely, it's definitely.
Tuck Taylor:I've seen even hockey goalies do it before, before their games.
Tuck Taylor:There's, there's definitely more to it than the research is showing on sports enhancement.
Tuck Taylor:But, you know, it's definitely increasing that white matter.
Tuck Taylor:It's definitely allowing.
Tuck Taylor:Because when you're juggle two, you're not looking at the, you're not looking at your hand catch the ball.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Mike Lindsay:You're not thinking about.
Mike Lindsay:Right.
Mike Lindsay:You're not thinking about each catch and each throw.
Mike Lindsay:Absolutely not.
Tuck Taylor:Exactly.
Tuck Taylor:So you're kind of getting to that, that level of trust that your body can do what it needs to do when it needs to do it for sure.
Tuck Taylor:Letting go of, like, overthinking.
Tuck Taylor:And it's.
Tuck Taylor:And it's fun.
Tuck Taylor:And it also produces a lot of the feel good chemicals that are responsible for flow.
Tuck Taylor:Like in flow, there's five different neurochemicals, props that are in the brain.
Tuck Taylor:One's called anandamide.
Tuck Taylor:And there's dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphins.
Tuck Taylor:And so why flow feels so good is because all of those neurochemicals are simmering in the brain.
Tuck Taylor:And so you know how juggling feels.
Tuck Taylor:As you start juggling, it starts to feel good.
Tuck Taylor:So you're completing a task, you're moving, so the endorphins are there.
Tuck Taylor:And so basically you're just priming the brain to be in these peak levels of flow by doing different hand eye coordination drills and different things like that for your performance.
Tuck Taylor:That's why, like, Steph Curry is someone that I study extensively, but his whole pregame routine is flow.
Tuck Taylor:Based, it's all flow based.
Tuck Taylor:You know, it's all about mind, body, brain, soul integration.
Tuck Taylor:And that's why he's, that's why he did that.
Tuck Taylor:Like there was no better display of him in flow than in the Olympics, you know, and, and the why, you know, he was in peak flow is basically off of that last shot where he, he had two people on him and he was kind of fading.
Tuck Taylor:LeBron's open, KD is open, book is open in the corner.
Tuck Taylor:And Steph's a cerebral player.
Tuck Taylor:Like, it's not like he's going to make bad plays on purpose.
Tuck Taylor:But when you're in flow, you have to be obedient.
Tuck Taylor:Like sometimes what you're going to do is going to be kind of irrational, but you are such.
Tuck Taylor:And you so into that state that you're just obedient to it.
Tuck Taylor:And that's where those moments like that happen.
Tuck Taylor:Those.
Tuck Taylor:How those moments like that originate from is from that, that high level of trust and intuition that you have when you're in flow.
Mike Lindsay:Yep, no doubt.
Mike Lindsay:Yeah, you can see it.
Mike Lindsay:You can see it when a player gets to that level, right?
Mike Lindsay:Yeah, it just feel everything.
Mike Lindsay:You could just see it looks, I go back to the word you used earlier.
Mike Lindsay:It looks easy.
Mike Lindsay:It looks easy when a player is playing at peak performance level.
Mike Lindsay:All right, give me it from the coach's perspective.
Mike Lindsay:If I'm coaching a high school basketball team, what can I do to help my team get to that flow state?
Tuck Taylor:Yeah.
Tuck Taylor:So one thing that comes to mind is when you are breaking down plays and different things like that, making sure that you are chunking it up to a moment to moment basis so the athlete understands the process that they need to be following.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:Like I do this, then I do that.
Tuck Taylor:If this happens, I do that.
Tuck Taylor:So they can stay in the moment of the process so they can continue to be deeply engaged in what's going on.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:When they don't know what's going on, they don't have a task to focus on.
Tuck Taylor:That's what allows crowd noise and all these other things to like get into the brain.
Tuck Taylor:So we call it keep the cup full.
Tuck Taylor:So you keep the cup full with your process based goals.
Tuck Taylor:Also your productive thoughts, like I can do this or get here, get there, run there and sprint back hard.
Tuck Taylor:Like a moment to moment basis.
Tuck Taylor:And then by doing that and by checking on those boxes, you start to feel good, you start to get into a rhythm, you start to understand the flow of the game.
Tuck Taylor:And then you start playing, you start entering into that flow state where you're not overthinking and you know exactly what to do and your decisiveness is heightened.
Tuck Taylor:You know, that's one thing that I saw in Steph in that moment in the Olympics was just how decisive he was.
Tuck Taylor:Like, it's going up, it's going up.
Tuck Taylor:Like there was no like thinking about if this is the right play or not.
Tuck Taylor:Is this what should I do?
Tuck Taylor:So another thing coaches can do is just be more mindful of how they respond to players mistakes.
Tuck Taylor:If the response is too knee jerk and you're too animated and you're yelling and screaming too much, it could cause like a low level of trauma to the athlete to where now they are second guessing everything that they do.
Tuck Taylor:So every shot that they take, every pass that they make, they're, they're thinking in their head, what if this gets stolen?
Tuck Taylor:What if I miss this?
Tuck Taylor:It's coach going to take me out, Is coach going to yell at me?
Tuck Taylor:And it prevents them now that now they're in that sewer cycle that we talked about before.
Tuck Taylor:You know, now they're saying what if?
Tuck Taylor:And they're starting to worry and they're not as confident and now their body becomes more tight and they're in that fight or flight mode that does not allow them to execute nuanced skills and tasks very well.
Tuck Taylor:So just being mindful of that, and those would be my two things is making sure that everything is broken down into a process.
Tuck Taylor:So there's a process for the athlete to be following.
Tuck Taylor:Make sure the athlete knows the process and then just be mindful of how you're responding to that and you know, you could take it a step further.
Tuck Taylor:Is just kind of knowing your athletes triggers too.
Tuck Taylor:So if they, if they are a player that gets down when they miss shots, you know, giving them some positive reinforcement, hey, keep shooting good.
Tuck Taylor:Like, you know, good players miss shots like different phrases like that that help them keep their performance in perspective.
Mike Lindsay:Yeah, knowing your players definitely helps.
Mike Lindsay:And the, the body language piece of how you react as a coach to player mistakes is a huge one.
Mike Lindsay:I know that my son played for a coach that felt like almost every time that something went wrong and the coach would throw his hands up in the air or stomp his feet or put his head down or have some negative reaction.
Mike Lindsay:I'm talking on like every play.
Mike Lindsay:Like seriously, like every play.
Tuck Taylor:I've seen it, I've seen it and.
Mike Lindsay:It just, you know, it just, it just, that just wears on players.
Mike Lindsay:And to that coach's credit he, he improved dramatically from one Season to the other.
Mike Lindsay:I don't know if he watched himself, somebody talk to him, what it may have been, but there was a dramatic, dramatic improvement in that area.
Mike Lindsay:And I'll just.
Mike Lindsay:My own, my own personal story.
Mike Lindsay:It's funny.
Mike Lindsay:So I've had my own kids say to me, dad, every time something goes wrong on the court, you always go like this, put your hand on, you know, put your hands on your head or just like.
Mike Lindsay:And it's one of those things that you don't think about it, but it does.
Mike Lindsay:Like when, when somebody starts to equate coach is unhappy, coach didn't like that play and coach doesn't even have to say anything like coach's hands go up on top of his head and all of a sudden I've conveyed a message.
Mike Lindsay:Message.
Mike Lindsay:And it's knocked a player out of their optimum state to perform at their best because now they're worried about, hey, what's my coach thinking about over on the sideline?
Mike Lindsay:So that's one of those things that as coaches we have to be very cognizant of what it is that we do on the sidelines.
Mike Lindsay:It does have an impact on our players positively and negatively.
Mike Lindsay:Especially when you're talking about how you react to mistakes.
Mike Lindsay:I think that's a really good piece of advice.
Tuck Taylor:Absolutely, absolutely.
Tuck Taylor:And you know, it's, it's a.
Tuck Taylor:If coaches, you know, coaches can get into a coaching flow as well, you know, and one.
Tuck Taylor:Another piece of information would be like, if you're having these visceral responses to everything that goes on, you're probably taking yourself out of your coaching flow for sure.
Tuck Taylor:Decision making is probably not going to be as good what you call after a timeout.
Tuck Taylor:And like the different decisions that you make on the fly might not be as flow based because you're having these visceral responses to everything that goes on during the game.
Tuck Taylor:Instead of saying like, I know that there's going to be turnovers, I know that's going to be missed shots.
Tuck Taylor:I know players are going to make mistakes.
Tuck Taylor:Like, and having a game plan for how you're going to, like you said, physically respond to these things so that you continue to think as clear as possible.
Tuck Taylor:That's what ends up happening.
Tuck Taylor:A lot of these, you know, you get too hot headed.
Tuck Taylor:I had, I had a, when I coached high school, I had, I remember I had an incident where I was just livid about something.
Tuck Taylor:I called the time out and I was just talking about what happened so much that I didn't even drop a play or tell them what they needed to do.
Mike Lindsay:Yep.
Tuck Taylor:I spent the whole time out like raging, you know, so like it definitely can get you off of your game as a coach and out of your flow state as a coach.
Tuck Taylor:If you're not present to that fact as well.
Tuck Taylor:You know, regulating your emotions and staying in that state is going to allow to give you that divine intelligence on what, what decisions to make that impact the game as well.
Mike Lindsay:Self awareness.
Mike Lindsay:I mean, it's the same thing we talk about with players.
Mike Lindsay:Right.
Mike Lindsay:If I'm a coach and when I become aware of the fact that every time something goes wrong, I'm putting my hands on my head and taking a deep sigh, well, I got to change that behavior.
Mike Lindsay:I got to correct that so that doesn't happen so it's not negatively impacting my athletes.
Mike Lindsay:I think that's a really good piece of advice for coaches.
Mike Lindsay:All right, before we finish up, Tuck, is there anything else that we didn't hit on or you want to kind of give one final summary statement and then we'll let you share how people can get in touch with you?
Tuck Taylor:Yeah.
Tuck Taylor:I would just say to sum it up is just don't forget to have fun.
Tuck Taylor:Like it's such a, it's such a cliche term, but when you're having fun again, you're from a neurochemical standpoint, you're producing the chemicals of flow.
Tuck Taylor:Things are more effortless, you're more delightful, you're more fulfilled without having to accomplish a task.
Tuck Taylor:Right.
Tuck Taylor:And that's like the deepest state of flow is when just being out there, you're in a flow state.
Tuck Taylor:They call it the auto telling.
Tuck Taylor:It's like someone that is receiving intrinsic reward for just participating in a task or skill, not saying if they're doing good or doing bad, just the act of participating, they are receiving that fulfillment.
Tuck Taylor:And that's, that's, that's the most sought after level to be at.
Tuck Taylor:And when you can find.
Tuck Taylor:And then one other thing I'll say too, along with that is that we talked a lot about flow being in the game and I did talk about flow being a lifestyle.
Tuck Taylor:But even looking at the athletic journey, the athletic journey needs to be flow based.
Tuck Taylor:And when you can find fun in the weight room, when you can find fun in the classroom, when you can find fun traveling with your teammates and all these things, that's when it becomes flow based.
Tuck Taylor:I work with a lot of collegiate athletes.
Tuck Taylor:When they got that schedule, when they got to school, they were like, coach, how am I going to do this Every Single day where I have 5am weights, 8am practice, 9, 9am classes, 2pm, second practice, 7pm study hall.
Tuck Taylor:How am I going to do that every single day and then travel and do all these other things?
Tuck Taylor:I was like, you got to take it one moment at a time and find the fun and everything.
Tuck Taylor:If you can't find the fun, you be the fun.
Tuck Taylor:You bring the fun to all of that.
Tuck Taylor:And when you think about your college career, when I think about my college career, I think about the good times.
Tuck Taylor:How like the road trips and the different things that we did, maybe going out as a team, like it's not just about what happened on the court and the way we were able to survive those times was having fun with our teammates, you know, so making flow a priority not only for your performance, but also your whole athletic journey is going to be important.
Mike Lindsay:Yeah.
Mike Lindsay:That's awesome.
Mike Lindsay:That's great life advice.
Mike Lindsay:I think anybody who's listening to that, if you can, if you can find the fun in anything that you do, find the fun in your job, find the fun in your daily interactions with your family, all that stuff.
Mike Lindsay:I mean, it's just if you can live in the present and find the fun and what you're doing in the moment, your life is going to be infinitely better.
Mike Lindsay:And that says nothing about what it can do for your athletic performance like we've been talking about here tonight.
Mike Lindsay:So talk before we get out, share how people can reach out to you, find out more about what you're doing.
Mike Lindsay:And then after you do that, I'll jump back in and wrap things up.
Tuck Taylor:All right, so I'm primarily at Instagram, guys.
Tuck Taylor:You can find me at Neuro Beast.
Tuck Taylor:I post a lot of like cognitive training content, a lot of mental skills.
Tuck Taylor:Starting to post more things about spirituality on there.
Tuck Taylor:You can DM me.
Tuck Taylor:One of the services that I am providing is a flow based athletic journey coaching program.
Tuck Taylor:So teaching athletes how to not only get into flow in the games, but to get into flow during their whole entire athletic journey.
Tuck Taylor:So helping them, walking them through a lot of things we talked about today, like helping them commit to a vision, helping them be more self aware, helping them learn how to drop and depolarize and detach from disempowering beliefs and how to engineer new beliefs.
Tuck Taylor:It's a framework that I work from called the peak performance code that I created that allows athletes to cut through all that resistance and so that their journey is more flow based talk.
Mike Lindsay:It's great stuff, man.
Mike Lindsay:I'm so glad that we were able to do this for a second time and talk flow state.
Mike Lindsay:I think anybody who listened coach, athlete, human being, you're going to get something out of what Tuck and I talked about tonight in our conversation.
Mike Lindsay:So really appreciate you taking the time out of your schedule to join us.
Mike Lindsay:And to everyone out there, thanks for listening and we will catch you on our next episode.
Mike Lindsay:Thanks.
Mike Lindsay:Your first impression is everything when applying for a new coaching job.
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Mike Lindsay:The Coaching Portfolio Guide is an instructional membership based website that helps you develop a personalized portfolio.
Mike Lindsay:Each section of the Portfolio Guide provides detailed instructions on how to organize your portfolio in a professional manner.
Mike Lindsay:The guide also provides sample documents for each section of your portfolio that you can copy, modify and add to your personal portfolio.
Mike Lindsay:As a Hoop Heads POD listener, you can get your Coaching Portfolio Guide for just $25.
Mike Lindsay:Visit coachingportfolioguide.com hoopheads to learn more.
Tuck Taylor:Thanks for listening to the Hoop Heads.
Mike Lindsay:Podcast presented by Head Start Basketball.
