MIAMI — The best coaches are part-psychologist when the time demands. They understand that attributes like self-confidence and motivation start in the brain. That how you practice is important, but how you think is more so.
Jimmy Johnson while coaching the Miami Hurricanes used to lay a long two-by-four inch strip of wood across a carpeted floor and ask his players to walk across it, tightrope-style. They did so without hesitation, with ease. Then he would ask: What would you do if that exact same strip of wood was laid across a canyon, with no safety net below?
The exercise was getting the mind to focus so sharply on the task at hand that it could be compartmentalized, made more digestible, less daunting.
