Curtis Dunbar: Vision, Mechanics, and the Glasses Story

Well, hello, everybody. This is part two of my conversation with Curtis Dunbar we for part one, we finished off on giving you a little cliffhanger about the Voodoo story that happened, the shooting voodoo story that I got Curtis to experience in his lesson with me a couple of weeks ago. So we start off this conversation immediately kind of getting into that going into it a little bit. And this conversation literally ended up lasting so long. I think all together, we recorded about eight hours of an interview. And it's, it's honestly all really really good information. And I didn't want to cut it down any I, you know, my original plan was to make this whole podcast around two hours, Part one was about two hours, or maybe a little bit longer. And so when we got into part two, it ended up going a long time because we kept coming back to the conversation to record more information. And so I just decided to split Part Two into two parts. So now we have a part two and part three, trying to halfway listen to you guys, and take some constructive criticism on my, the length of my podcast. And I did not want to release a eight hour total episode. So we're gonna have three parts to this podcast. And I think the cut in this in the middle of this is kind of good timing for it. We ended up having to stop recording this halfway through our conversation because I had to go to a YouTube Live video that we did. So we cut it there and then got into the next part for part three. So what I'm going to do is just because of my schedule, I don't I really hate releasing episodes, you know, week after week after week, if they're multi part series, I kind of want to just release the whole thing. So I'm gonna release both part two and part three today. So if you're listening to this now, you also have Part Three available to you listen to it at your own time, it's a great conversation. There's a lot of stuff to learn here. And but just because of the fact that this is a flowing conversation that wasn't planned, pre recorded and scripted. I mean, I don't script podcasts, I just hit bullet points. And then I talked about them and I can record them. And so everything is very organized in terms of the structure of information that I release, I can easily do timestamps. And but in interviews, I'm not going to do timestamps, because the conversation goes back and forth so much between different topics that it's not really possible to do timestamps, because we hit a topic, go up on a tangent, talk about something else, then come back to the topic. So the timestamps would be kind of confusing, anyway. But anyway, so go ahead and listen to this conversation. It's really great. If you have any questions about anything, feel free to send me an email. And, and also feel free to reach out to Curtis, he's on social media. He's got a, he actually does some coaching. So you can reach out to him there, send them an email. I will, I will have him on another live and get his contact information out there for you guys. And then we will go we'll go from there. So anyways, I hope you enjoyed this conversation. It was good. Thank you guys all for listening. I will mention again, that just stay tuned, because pretty soon we are going to be kind of going live with this little like three month long sweepstakes, so to speak. I hate that word, such a weird thing. But anyways, you guys have a chance to win some really, really cool valuable things. And that's going to continue to go in the future, I'm going to eventually get really cool prizes that you guys can win. And any any money that you spend on buying tickets or anything like that is all going to go to the podcast and help the experience for all of you be better and better as we go I want to grow this thing to have a huge influence and and help a lot of people that are unable to access professional shooting instruction or just live in an area where nobody comes. Whether it be that financially you can't afford taking lessons from a professional for a couple $100 An hour or you just you know can't afford the time to leave to travel to take lessons. I hope that this podcast helps all of you for that. So thanks a lot guys and we will see you down the road and enjoy part two of this conversation. Okay, so we're back with my translator. And we got Bella the dog here. And so we left off the last episode saying that we had Have a Vudu shooting story to tell? And serious video? Yeah. So do why don't we I'm gonna turn it over to you Curtis to set up the story.

Okay, we were we were working on something out at OK Corral. And it had to do with in some ways like how much I paid attention to a pair to shooting a pair that I was familiar with. And the targets weren't terribly difficult. I mean, they were decent, but not terribly difficult. And I was just, I would shoot them and I'd be good. And then I would just, like just randomly miss one and then and then just barely chip the other one like I wasn't paying attention. So it looks at me. And he said in his standard, let me wait

before you say that. Basically, what was happening was we had shot this pair, we started that lesson at 1030. And it was probably about two o'clock, and we had not left that station. We literally were there all day. Yeah. And this, but working on different things. And but when we got to this part of it, what I was noticing was something with your vision is that, you know, the your basically your attentiveness and focus on the bird was not as much as it should have been. And because it had gotten almost monotonous to and essentially what was happening to you kind of thought that you were looking at the bird, and Crete to in a way to create a proprioceptive feedback loop of target movement to body movement to connectedness in the hands and body and gun and eyes and stuff like that. You were experiencing it like it was what it should be. But it wasn't. And every once in a while

it was like because it was too. I was too familiar and comfortable with it. I couldn't. I couldn't get myself to see it. And feel it pure again. Yeah. And it was weird. Because to me it it just it was it had become elusive. Yeah, you know, you look, you know, when I would miss one, I would look at you like, I don't know if it was everything was the same? Yeah. And what it was, it was that familiarity, and somewhat boredom with the target. That that kind of was getting me. And I was convincing myself. I was doing everything and engaged at 100%. But realistically, subconsciously, I wasn't Yeah. And so he looks at me, and then says a standard phrase. I want to try something here. And I was like, What do you want to write? He was like, give me your glasses. I thought he was gonna, you know, put a piece of tape over one eye or, or, you know, like clean them or something like that. And he hands me his glasses. And he's like, put those on it My immediate reaction is I'm not gonna be able to see shit. What's your prescription? I don't know what it is. I have my eyes are good. With I mean with. With my RX, I can see 2020 Or a little better. But I have, I have really I have a lot of astigmatism in both eyes. And it makes it so that you know, the center of my lenses are really super thin. But the edges of shooting glasses because the glass is so big. I mean, it's it's three eighths of an inch. Yeah. Thick. Yeah. Over on the you know, on the far right and far left.

I mean, if you take your prescription off, how can you

right up? Yeah, it'll start a fire it'll focus it'll focus all energy of the sun into one one small

dot when you but when you take them off. Could you read your phone at all?

Yeah,

I can read my phone. Can you read my computer screen but nothing? Yeah, it's like the killer distance, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Like, all the edges of everything. And it gets worse at further distances. I mean, we're in a room and the edges of everything beyond beyond my hand really? Yeah. Our is our first Yeah. And when it gets Like if there was like a shoe box with the name of the shoes on it, and it was sitting across the room, I would barely be able to tell that there was a name on it. Wow. Like, because everything would be fuzzy together. So, you know, if I were to start looking at distances, I could see that there's a trap, right? I mean, I might be able to see that there's a fence but I might not really be able to make out each fence posts. Yeah. You know, they would be so some things shrink and kind of disappear. Some things get big and fuzzy and bigger, you know, but like street signs. No, you know, I drive with glass. I wear glasses all the time.

Yeah. For Okay, so what did what so what happened?

So you were like, here were my glasses. I can't see shit. Not only are they they're completely different color. They're made for people that can't see colors. Some crazy thing that I don't believe overdue. Yeah, more voodoo. More just excuses why he misses rabbits in the grass. But so he's like, Okay, we're gonna shoot this pair he puts on my glasses, which I can't imagine. I mean, I couldn't see a thing. He definitely couldn't walk with him on No way. I mean, I could walk with his glasses on because the ground isn't very far away. But if there was like, you know, if there was a little a little crack or a little rise in a sidewalk, no, I probably would trip on I wouldn't.

I wouldn't see up with your glasses. I could not see steps.

Yeah, I would struggle with your glasses to see the edge of steps. I can tell there were steps there. But I seen the edge and like putting my foot in the right place. Yeah, I probably would stumble going up. Yeah. So he says shoot these. And I was like, Okay, let me look at him. And he throws them. And you know, so like that. Things Up in the sky thinks things that distance, they look like Starburst to me when I don't have my glasses on. So it actually looked like I could not see the target. What I saw was like a UFO of five perfectly symmetrical. Like fuzzy balls that were tiny. Yeah. And the reality is the target was in the middle of those. Yeah. But I mean, I couldn't see any definition. I couldn't I couldn't tell distance, or anything on either one of the targets. All I could see was that UFO move across the sky. And it's not got any definition to

it. Yeah. And it's on a scale of one to 10 How hard was it the see?

On a scale of one to 10 Fucking 25 was really the new scale. I mean, it was like the I wasn't I couldn't see it. Yeah, realistically, like, you know, if it was if it was a baseball and somebody had thrown it, throwing it to me or a Frisbee. I would show up three feet in front of me. Yeah, like, I mean, I would see something blurry, but I wouldn't be able to tell where it was or how fast it was going until it got within a within kind of a close distance. And then all of a sudden, I'd be like, Oh, no, oh, here it is. You know, and swap my hand at it or something. Right. But you know, shooting this one one of the targets was, oh, maybe 35 to 40 yards crossing and the other target came in from maybe about 45 to 50 yards quartering and and kind of curling curling away to the left. And it was that way for both targets they never cleared up Yeah, there was never anything it's just I could you know, they could tell speed of the year of the UFO. And he said to shoot it. So you know, I made I made the move I focused on what I thought would be the right thing to do which is like basically trying to focus in the middle of the UFO which without my glasses, I don't know what my eyes were doing focus wise they they didn't really have something to focus on. But I could still feel the movement of of the little UFO in your body in my body in the gun and everything. And I shoot the first one in the UFO disappears. And I go to the second one, and I shoot the UFO And, and it does, it disappears. And when it disappears, you know, I can't see. I can't see, to the point where, when it disappears. If it were to break in half, I no longer would see that that would be too small. If not. And so I couldn't tell what happened to it. I couldn't tell if I chipped it. I couldn't tell if I smoked it. Or if you miss it in the record, yeah, it's just the five dots. And what made up kind of the UFO was gone after I pulled the trigger both times. And he was like, do it again. You hit those. So I did it a couple more times. And he was like, do you even do you even realize that you're smoking these

literal soot balls in the air?

And I was like, Man, I don't know what I'm doing. Right. I'm just shooting. I'm just shooting into nowhere. He's total voodoo. I don't even know how it shouldn't be able to happen. So I can't read at that distance if it was a billboard. Yeah. I wouldn't be able to read the words. Right. You know, and this is a target. That's four inches. Yeah. It would they were black. No one was black. The other was orange. Remember that? Yeah. The income was orange. Yeah, across the shondo

was black, and the cornering bird was orange.

Yeah. And, you know, and I did it several several times.

And you Curtis, you did it for a full box. And you missed one or two targets. Yeah.

So I mean, this goes back to, you know, do you have to see the rings? You don't have to see the rings? No, I didn't see shit.

So what it is, and so now I'm going to explain it from my perspective. Yeah. So in all actuality, I have to admit you didn't hit any of them. And I was No, just kidding.

I was like, I've lived the last three weeks. I did something amazing.

There's a psychological trick.

Go out there and big targets. Okay, okay, coach. Thanks.

Oh, you're good. We got y'all tuned up. You're good to go. You go to jail? Anything right? Now I gotta take my glasses. Oh, yeah. Okay, so here's what happened. And when I said I want to try something I was. So I was playing a little bit of psychological game with you on that, because I wanted you not to have expectations. But I knew that it would work. Because I both tested it. And I understand the neurological science behind that. So here's where it all comes together with what you experienced. It's the difference between so let me ask you this. Before I before I explain how much better did you feel the movement of the bird in your body when you had my glasses on?

That was the interesting thing. Because now it you know, for me now, like it changed it? Yeah. In me. Because, you know, when when you threw the first bird, it's like, now I have to try and see it. And I have to put everything into seeing it. Yeah. But I still gotta make the move. But the the move was very, very, and pulling the trigger was very, very subconscious. I had didn't have much consciousness of it less than I normally even shoot with, you know, even if I shoot something quick or something less like the least I'd ever shoot

something consciously, consciously. Yeah.

Did it how I was very, very conscious of my eyes. Yeah. And trying to see, you know, you know, it reminded me of being back in the back in the room back. Oh, no, we're good at the back at the back of the room. You know, when somebody's writing on the whiteboard or something like that. And, and not being able to see or, you know, and not being able to really stay with it, but I'm Oh, man, it was it was just 100% on on the on the eyes and nothing on the move. And, and, and I don't know maybe I was only I don't know, maybe I was 60 or 70%. On with the, you know, effort with the eyes prior to that. Yeah, I mean, so here's what makes it feel like I was only 50% effort with the eyes. You know, I mean, that that was comparatively like 120% effort with the eyes,

what it all goes into is kind of like the neurology of how your brain and eyes communicate and work together. A lot of it has to do with what I've talked a lot about in my podcast episodes in terms of the differentiation between learning a physical movement, and then having it already been converted into that nonconscious control, which is the CPGs, a central pattern generator is sending signals to your lower motor neurons, as opposed to the upper motor neurons doing that upper motor neurons is conscious. CPGs is nonconscious. CPG is central pattern generators controlling a physical movement would be something like your breathing, the contraction of your diaphragm, or when you're walking and not thinking about your feet, or when you're blinking your eyes, all of those things that's all non conscious. And that's controlled with the CPGs. Over time, we learn physical movement, consciously using it, controlling it with some upper motor neurons, but then it gets converted through all the stuff I've talked about, especially in that episode three of series one, it can get converted through, basically spikes of dopamine that get get catalogued, and then over time become their own system. So what's interesting about all that, when you take that into our understanding of how the eyes work, is that that proprioceptive feedback loop of of connectedness and synchronization and harmony to allow a CPG controlled, like motor control signal to be sent. Meaning that say it, I might need you as a translator on this one. But basically, what it is, is, in order to move the way that you already know how to because you've been working with me for a while and your nonconscious movement is the correct movement. The problem that happens though, over time, is that when we let psychology get involved in shooting, and we start to care about missing or hitting, or we start to try to force a result, you're no longer letting the CPGs control your movement. And you're deciding to make it be done consciously by how you're using your vision. There's a difference between XY location of your eyes and actual attentiveness to something in your vision. That's where we talk about the difference between smooth pursuit movement and psychotic movement, ocular movement, and when to fully engage smooth pursuit ocular movement with the eyes, it means that we have to have 100% conscious attentiveness assigned to something in our vision, you cannot engage full smooth pursuit, ocular movement, if you're if you're paying attention to multiple things in your vision. So what ends up happening is we end up a blend of like micro psychotic movements and smooth pursuit movements in our eyes. So basically, a translation of that would be we get snappy movements and smooth movements in the vision, and then we become much more consciously aware of what we're experiencing in the shot physically, because we're seeing everything happened more in terms of the relationship. And then that's where you get what you were having what was happening to you visually with the with those birds through monotony, which is that we feel like we're looking at them really well. But it's just because they're in our vision, we don't have our conscious attention assigned to those targets. And here's where the other interesting part of the neurology comes into play, which is kind of a farce when it comes to people talking about what needs to happen. With our vision and clay target shooting, you'll hear a lot of people talk about that you need to see detail in the bird and look for a spot on the target and you know, look for the shine or look for the rings or look for whatever it is on the target. Because you need to be able to do that when in reality all that is, is it important. Yes. Why is it important is the more interesting question. Because why it is important is because that acts as a conscious placebo to engage your consciousness into paying attention to something on the target because you start to look for it. When we start to look for the thing on the target that engages more and more and more of our consciousness on the target. And that allows us to engage more and more and more smooth pursuit ocular movement with the bird with It will increase that proprioceptive feedback, synchronization and harmony, harmony with the target and our physical movement. So all I did with your glasses, and this is why I knew it would work is because I know that it's not really important that you see detail. What's important is that you create smooth pursuit movement with the bird. Well, if I put a an obstacle in front of you consciously, that makes it harder for you to see, you are going to try harder consciously to see it, which is going to engage more smooth pursuit, vision, ocular movement, because you're engaging, more conscious attentiveness to trying to be engaged in looking for and connecting with the bird. So all of your conscious, hard drive or RAM, so to speak, in terms of computer language is being occupied in one pursuit of looking for the target as opposed to paying attention to other things. Yeah. And that's where and so and that proves to you that the other reason why I gave you my glasses, because they're very high contrast glasses, because I'm colorblind, which would allow you to see that a little easier, because if you had lower contrast lenses, it would be it would be harder for you to see without your prescription because it would blend into the color of the background.

Yeah, the contrast actually was was really dramatic. But it it really just made like the UFO or Starburst. Like just different. Yeah, like the clouds were amplified. But I couldn't even you know, I couldn't really see the clouds. I mean, it looked like, like the clouds in the sky looked like, like spilled paint. Yeah, type of thing. Yeah.

This is why for me as a colorblind shooter, who now let me make sure that I preface what I just said with what do you call when you the opposite of preface, posts on post fists. I'm gonna post this what I just setting with this, that what I'm talking about here is I am saying that, that acuity, envision is less important than we all say that it is. But that's, that's only if you have good visual discipline. If you don't have good visual discipline, you need to have visual acuity. So that you can distract your conscious mind by looking for something on the bird well as

an understanding that when you talk about visual acuity, visual acuity is a little more is a lot more important as you view targets. So that you can understand what the target is doing, maybe how it's rolling, when it's rolling, where it's crossing a branch in the background, so that you can get the line and stuff like that. But you don't need to see and register those things. When you're shooting, you need to understand what those are, you know, so you you you don't need to necessarily use the high acuity when you're shooting because the fact that the target rolls. While you're not, you shouldn't be processing that during the shot. Right? You're not trying to learn with that level of of sight detail at that time. You're trying to, you know, you're wanting to match the speed of a moving target and feel the speed of of the moving target and understand its location, and its future location. But you don't, you know, again, seeing the fact that it says white flyer on the top of it does, you know, good.

Well, where it comes into play is that basically we can kind of redefine what visual acuity should mean, it doesn't matter if I see more detail than you? Or if, if so, and so she's 10 times better detail than any of us. What matters is that like, none of those things benefit, like I'm not at an advantage if I can see more detail than somebody else. All that matters is that I know what my top end level of detail is, if I don't have good visual discipline, which would be defined as my ability to fully synchronize smooth pursuit movement ocularly with the with the bird, if I'm not good at doing that, if I don't have the discipline, and the vision and the control of my emotional state to allow my eyes to do that with the bird, then all of a sudden acuity becomes important because it's a way to act as a placebo in order to distract my conscious thoughts into looking for something on the bird so that I'm not look Looking for something on the gun. And but this is where I think that using a placebo both in it like in any application is never really that good. Because it doesn't give you what you actually need in order to be able to execute the real, actual fully put together move. If we have to use the placebo of looking for something on the bird to connect our eyes, what happens if we can't see anything on the bird? Because of the lighting? Well, then, well, I, I can't see anything on the bird. So then I'm not going to be able to connect my eyes to it, that we have to understand that those two things are not connected. They're not defined by each other your your ability to create a connected move physically with the bird and to synchronize with the bird has nothing to do with visual acuity has all to do with visual discipline.

Yeah, I mean, just take it. Like, would the shot if you if a tennis ball, a painted black tennis ball could fly in the same way. At the same speed in decreasing, curling, doing the exact same thing at the exact same rates as what a clay target does. Are you would you would you say that?

That was the food being delivered in Bella running?

I mean, you the shot would be the same. Right? So there would be no, you'd have no detail, it would look like a black ball. Yeah, flying through the air, you wouldn't need to see, you know, rings or or defined edges on it, the shot would be the same, the feedback would be the same. Right? You're not getting anything out of that level of detail. Yeah. Is the bottom line. Yeah,

I mean, you you you're not getting anything out of it. If you can optimize your discipline, you are getting something out of it. If you haven't worked on your visual discipline. Yes, we'll pause this go get food.

So we were talking about focus, and whether or not we need to see, you know, visual acuity, and how much detail that we need to see. And in that type of thing. Yeah, you know, and then we were interrupted by Indian food.

And Bella going and vote guard dog.

Yeah. Which is really not very good doggy. But she ran over quickly to get high. It is doggy. Yeah, that's for sure. So do we have any more to say on that? I mean, well, I

mean, I would, I would I mean, do you have any questions on it?

No, no. I mean, it was amazing to me. What that little experiment was in how it changed how I was basically being at the time, and it got me out of I don't want to call it a funk. Because I thought I was I was being fine. I've experienced that before. Where it's like, you're, you've convinced yourself that you're 100% in? Yeah. And if you're honest with yourself, you kind of know you aren't. But a lot of times we're not honest with ourselves on that. Right. You know, it's like, you know, I want to break the target. I want to feel this target, but I'm shooting it again. Right in there it is right there. Right, like

so. So my question to you would be, how will you avoid making that mistake in a tournament,

if I one thing that I can do and this is like one of the simplest things is that if I immediately feel I need to defend against that would be to make a new plan, and have that plan be a little bit different than the old plan, maybe I'm going to maybe I'm going to move towards shooting the target a little sooner or quicker. Or maybe I'm going to move towards shooting the target later. But I'm going to move off of that original plan, and I got to do it. I'm not gonna make that decision after I call poll. I'm gonna make that decision between the birds if I feel this starting to happen, maybe I took maybe I took a loss bird and I felt a complete disconnection. That's that's probably the easiest way to reengage like that is the new plan. I've had some success doing it like that when I've, when I've recognized sometimes I don't recognize another I'm not quite sure how to do it. I keep the same plan and, and get myself back to the way I want to be for that bird.

Yeah, so the, yeah, the approach of changing the plant, it's always important understanding really what's happening. And in order to do that, we have to really, very well define how we experience that thing that is happening. So it would be important for you to be able to this is why coaching is valuable as a competitor. Because when I have to explain to somebody, what it is that they're going to experience, or what is bad to experience, that means I have to understand it well enough to be able to define it and communicate it. And so that also means that it's much more easy for me to consciously recognize when it's happening. So one thing that you will have to do is in your own way, you will have to define the and differentiate those two, visually conscious versus unconscious experiences. And understand in every way that you possibly can, across all categories, what did it look like? How did it emotionally feel? How did it physically feel? What were you thinking about all the things that matter, you'll have to define what it is like to exist in and out of that desired state, visually. So that way, you know when you are and are not inside of it.

And that's, that can be if you if you're not familiar enough with yourself, and have put these things under scrutiny and under test and failed them, and gotten a better understanding of how you feel like you're like you're talking about, and what these things are like for you. Yeah, it's very hard to recognize. Yeah. And that's what takes, you know, as we, as we talked about, in, I think we talked about yesterday before, is a body of work of after you've had some of these realizations in what it takes to do some of this, you have to then create a body of work with that realization attached. So that now you have reference points for yourself as a, you know, MIB MIB are my eyes becoming lazy. And I think back to that, and I think now, as at that point, you know, if I had to kind of put it in layman's terms, like I was looking at the target, before we saw up the glasses, I was looking at the target, but I was actually probably more looking at a target. And what was in the nothingness around the target. Yeah. And I wasn't actually honing in on the target. And so one thing that could do that would change that is okay, I decide that I'm gonna look at the front edge, or the or, you know, depending on how the target spine or the bottom edge, or the back edge or whatever, make it a little more specific. If I've gotten unspecific in what I'm looking at, you know, if I'm, it's, I think it's fine to look at the target as a whole, I don't, I don't necessarily feel on a lot of targets that you have to be looking at that front edge array and the ring or whatever, right, like we've discussed, but I do feel that you have to be specifically looking at the target. And if you've, if you have sloughed off a bit, and I think people would understand what this what I mean by this is that you're you're seeing the target. That's not it, and you see it well. But you're you you're you're looking at a four inch disk at what is it, you know, 35 yards, and you're looking at the three feet around it. Yeah. Also, that's how far you've come down with your focus on the target. And sometimes that fools you into thinking that you're looking at the target. When you're really not you're looking at a picture of the target in and what's around it. Normally there's nothing it's literally

it literally can be defined and this is why I like to use this word it there is a difference and people say there's a difference between looking at it and seeing it. To me, those are still the same Same things, what I like to find it as, like in the example that you just gave, where, you know, even if you're looking at the whole area, or you're seeing a three foot area around, I still consider that that's look at like, yeah, you're looking at the target. But what I want you to do is pay attention to it. Yes, yeah.

And you can't, if you're looking at the picture of the target, and the target is in the middle, right, and you haven't shrunk down to really pay attention to the target. Yeah, you're not actually looking at your target you're looking at, I say, a picture, the picture of the target in the picture, instead of looking just at the target, and what is it doing,

you want to pay attention to the target and connect the consciousness of your thoughts to it?

Yeah. And that's where I say, if, you know, if you feel that you can't get that you know, that your eyes just are not cooperating with you, and they're not kind of zooming in on the target, then I feel that you got to, you have to change something about it. Yeah. Because you have to ask your eyes to do something, you already are asking them to zoom in on the target, and they're not doing it in the, in the plan that you have given it. Yeah, right. So change the plan, change what you're zooming on, right? Don't zoom in on the whole target, zoom in on the very front edge, make it different. So that, you know, your subconscious mind, you know, which does pretty well controls what the eyes do, you know, then it's got a new plane, it's got, it's got a new task, that changes what it's being lazy about.

One of the things that I really like to do myself because of what is important to do, what which is pay attention to the target as opposed to see the bird, what I like to do is I actually tried to find the thing, that's the hardest thing to see on the bird. And that's what I look for. And which is complete opposite of what I've heard every other person say ever, which is look, look for the thing that stands out to you on the target and look and pay attention to that. And the reason why I don't like that is the exact same reason why I had you take your glasses off and use mine when you were shooting is because you thought you were you were looking at the bird. If you're looking for the thing, that's the easiest thing to see, the thing that stands out to you, it's very easy to see it and look at it but not pay attention to it. What I want to do is look for something on the bird that I can't see on, let me say that better that I cannot see, I want to emphasize that I'm looking for something on the bird that I cannot see. Unless I'm paying attention to it. And that allows it even if I don't find it, then the purpose that I am doing it for has already still been accomplished. Because my attention is directed towards that bird, consciously and visually, which allows me to use smooth pursuit vision, that doesn't matter if I see that thing or not. The fact is that I'm looking for it. In all actuality, if I don't see it, that's actually kind of a good thing because it maintains and occupies my conscious thought and to continue to look for it. A really very simple example of this. That is, is a big thing on a target that is hard to see is if you get those orange, they're called Orange dome. But it's not orange tarp. It's like the birds that have the black rim. I felt like Graham Yeah, I call them black rim targets. Everybody tells me I'm wrong. But those things mean, visually those things are they're a little tricky. Well, this is what I do. If you haven't seen a lot of those targets. Yeah, they're my favorite you know, my favorite target because optically they give you such so much room to work with as a target center, both in that they you they are visible in every background. Yeah. But then the other reason is that in certain backgrounds, you can really play with other people's if they're not paying attention to look like a MIDI. Yeah, or a razor blade bat too. Yeah, or they can look like a bat. Yeah, so this is what I do. A perfect example for people is I'll throw like when I'm setting targets that I'm teaching on I throw kind of an edgy black rim bird in dark tree background. And everybody's going to look for the orange because it's the easiest thing to see and the orange looks like a piece of paper in thickness flying through the air and and and so Of course, that's going to elevate your emotional state, you're going to get amped up, you're going to move fast gonna lose control. But if you look for the black, yeah, instead of the orange because the orange is easy to see, if as that bird is flying through the air, you try to find the black part of the bird. Two things happen. Number one, you will notice the bird gets slower. Number two, you'll notice that it gets what actually this is the same thing and it gets slower and it gets way bigger, because now your brain isn't just paying attention to the orange and it makes the black disappear. You see the black and peripherally you see the orange and so the bird looks so much bigger, it removes your anxiety allows you to control your body better. And then the same thing happens when I don't know how much this this works for people that are not colorblind. But for me, if you throw that bird in the sky, kind of edgy, I don't see the orange. In contrast with a white sky, it looks just like the orange blends in with the white if I get the right lighting. And so I can only see the black and the sky there. Yes. And so I'll look for the orange little donut. Yeah, so I'll look for the orange in the sky, if it's edgy, and then that makes the bird bigger and everything like that. So that's an example of what I'm talking about. But it doesn't have to be that way. No, you know, I mean, it can be anything

can be, you know, the color variation because of a shadow, the shadow, if the if the pitch is right, if the pitch or roll or right is right. You know, it's like okay, well, you know, there's not much light on the underside front of the target. Let's look at the front. It's not just looking at the front edge of the target. Let's look underneath the front edge of the target at this at the darkest part. Yeah, right, and look for something like that, that target will slow down easily. You know, I think that's a that's, that's pretty. It's pretty amazing how that plays tricks on the other, you kind of sometimes you kind of have to trick yourself into doing it. Because you should so many plays. And I think everybody can kind of should be able to understand what we're talking about, as they think about how they've looked at clays. And they think about the ones that they could just see so good. And the ones that they had trouble seeing or that they had trouble making a connection within they can, you know, think backing is kind of a little photograph in their, in their memory about was I really seeing that? Or was I looking around it, you know, and not being specific enough about what I was looking at? Yeah. Yeah,

I think it's, I think I need to make sure that that we don't give a confusing message. Because before we went to, before we went to eat, we talked about how our visual acuity is not that important. But what we weren't really what we were saying if in case we we mixed up the communication and didn't communicate it well enough, is not that visual acuity is bad. Not that you don't want to look for detail. And instead, you just need to be able to see contrast. And so what we're saying is that we need to understand why visual acuity is important. It's not because it's important to see detail. Visual acuity is important because trying to see detail, or being able to see detail allows you to attach your attentiveness consciously to something and that influences how your eyes work better. So that's what we're talking about here.

They have if they're if your eyes are going to move fluidly, they have to be attached consistently to something.

Yeah, so in that case, it doesn't really, it's not like the detail that you see is the determining factor for the night you hit it, it just allows you to attach your consciousness to it. Yeah, and that goes into the whole example I've done multiple times on many podcasts where I'm not going to do it again. But where I talk about how you know, look at the wall and pick two spots moving eyes back and forth and you feel them snapping now look at the left spot and try to you know move your eyes smoothly in between from one spot to the other you can't you have to put something in front of your eyes focus on it and and then move the thing that you're looking at and then your eyes will move smoothly but they cannot move smoothly without something to consciously attach your vision to and your attention to and that's what we're talking about. That's why you see targets better and slower if you use smooth pursue vision. Okay, so that would be my question, which I feel like you answered which is that how will you ensure that you won't make that mistake in a match? Me Yeah, so

yeah, well, I'll make that mistake, you know, but I'm still learning enough about it on on how to recognize and correct it. Yeah, I still run into instances where, you know, it'll bite me on a stand, and I don't realize it's happening. And I don't, you know, I can feel afterwards. And during it, that something's wrong. And then afterwards is, sometimes when I identify, like, Hey, I just really was not looking at that target, I convinced myself I was, you know, and the tough thing is, is making sure you're doing it every time. Recognizing when, when you're not as readily doing it and correct and making a correction of it before before it gets you and cost you anything, but that's a learning that's a learning experience. I mean, the game is complicated. And that's, and that's getting really down into the, into the weeds. But, you know, here we are, you know, we're having a conversation you shot 100 The other day, you can't do that, without understanding that about yourself. Yeah, because you have to be that far in into the weeds, if you're gonna shoot 100 That's not just luck, right? If you're going to purposely go shoot 100 It's gonna, you're gonna have to be able to understand what you can do and how your eyes are working and how you feel before you take the shots because you hit one burden, you're 99

in there, yeah, it's on a on a course like that. It's not like there's courses where it can be, you know, if you a charity course, where everything has a spot that it hangs, yeah, you know, but on a course like that, or other courses that you know, some some of the pros shoot 100 Perfect 100 straights on you. I mean, I can tell you, I can't speak for anybody else. But I can't speak for myself. Like when I shoot 100 straight, I was thinking about this on my way home on Saturday, Sunday. And I was filling out my shoot analysis sheet. And because that was a monthly tournament, obviously, I didn't get a perfect score in every category, because it had no preparation, right? If there was an I didn't practice for it. I didn't sleep, you know, pay attention to my sleep. I didn't do any of that stuff. I you know, I got an hour and 45 minute drive. And I left that at 1115 when we start at one one day, you know, but

we were we were still eating dinner at 830 in downtown Texarkana. Yeah. And you drove home. And and Sunday when you shot the 100 it was a nine o'clock start. And you drove back.

Yeah, I think I got home at 1130 Yeah. But yeah, and so, you know, obviously that wasn't, you know, perfect sleep or anything or perfect preparation. So it wouldn't it be a perfect round on the shoot analysis sheet. But what, what I was very interested in was, because I knew, after Saturday, I had got the idea that I wanted to do this podcast, and with this topic, which is basically kind of all revolving around self awareness and being able to pay attention because I was, I was shooting good numbers, and I had a lot of people asking me questions about like, you know, you must have been hyper focused in the round and, you know, you, you know, you must be practicing a lot and you know, like, what do you do, and, and practicing a lot. I mean, this is gonna sound like, Yeah, this is gonna sound egotistical, but literally, I have that was, I believe, if I'm wrong, I'm wrong, but I don't, I can't think of a tournament in between nationals. And this past weekend that I shot, so that's five months. And I and I practiced once with Dawson once with you, and once with why inland and five months. And with you as 100 shells with Dawson was about a flat and with Wyatt and Lynne was 100 shells. So I've shot 450 targets in practice in five months, no tournament and shot

in that time. You have bought you have seen a lot of targets, because you have done a decent amount of coaching and instruction through throughout this.

Yeah, through and I've taken and I've taken shots as demonstrations in lessons, but all with my students gun. Yeah. So I've set

some targets. And you know, so you've been around it, right but actually running the full process up through pulling triggers, not all

well, and the worst thing is that, you know, I actually would have rather not done what I did in terms of coaching and being around shooting with because the In terms of being able to perform, obviously, I don't want to coach but because in every lesson at least a couple times, I'm going to demonstrate a movement or a shot, I'm using so many different guns, I probably go on an average of, I probably would say every day, if I'm being honest with myself, I'm shooting maybe five to 10 targets every day that I teach. So five to 10 times every time that I teach, and but the problem is that every gun I'm using is different. I was left handed, sometimes it's a 14 inch like a pole. So then when I go to a tournament, and I bring my gun out, my gun feels like a student's gun. It never feels like my gun. And so that's pretty awkward. And you kind of have to learn that as you go. But the reason why I'm talking about all of this is because not to kind of like showboat, because it's really not what it is, is I was thinking about that round on Saturday, I was driving home on Saturday, first and Saturday night. And I was thinking about like men to go from what happened to me on the Friday prelim when I shot 94 I think something like that 94 On the prelim on. And that was a friggin awesome course really hard targets as your 94 on that, and was just kind of like, very extra perceptive.

Yeah, that was weird, because the targets that you missed, it was just kind of random.

Well, it because what it was was I did not have a good hold on an assessment of all those things that are important to being able to make the shot that I plan.

Yeah. So I mean, that's what I'm saying is like, you know, that 94 Wasn't that oh, one stand to Stan's got me? For three birds apiece. No, it was just randomly. You dropped birds throughout the course. And they were, you know, you'd be info info info, nothing. And I'm like, he just missed that. You know, and it'd be no real reason. You know, it wasn't bad move. It was just well, you know,

it wasn't that for me what it was, was being aware and analyzing every shot, what I was making mistakes on, was thinking I was ready to do what I had planned to do, and actually not being able to be internally self aware enough to understand that I really wasn't ready. Like I was unable to do the finite finessed move that I wanted to do, and it just didn't happen that caused me to be offline. I was too amped, too much tension. My eyes weren't thrilled and

bowling didn't get you in weren't actually ready.

Yeah. And all the ways that only I would be able to tell. And so then on Saturday, I was like, Okay, I gotta go. I mean, I still won the prelim, but I was happy with the round, but also we were there to have fun on that round. And the

Saturday,

yeah, so Saturday, I'm shooting change. Well, I just tried to force myself to be more interceptive more self aware, make better decisions. But I still slipped up twice, one on my first station and one halfway through that funny one that I missed. The

second one was like, I don't know, you like everything about that one. Like, you just you just feel like okay, one out of 10 on all categories. I'm trying it right now.

Yeah. No, honestly, what that one was, was my eyes were so freaking, I was making micro adjustments and everything as I went from shot to shot. And my first pair that I shot I hid. But I did not make a psychotic movement with my eyes from the break point of the first bird to the focal point of the second. What happened was I shot that first bird. And then I came over to the second bird and my eyes came with my gun. And the bird popped up from under my gun that I didn't see it below. And I still hit it. But I wanted to get my eyes down and watch that bird come off the trap. And so I noticed obviously, I noticed that because that's a massively bad thing to do wrong. And so then I was like, Okay, I want that me rehearse internally what it would feel like to make that move with my eyes because I want to do that on the next pair. So I got to do it on the next pair. And I was it the third pair or it was a three pair station. So I got to do it on the next pair. And I saw it so freaking good. It was so perfect. My eyes went there. I saw I saw the arm being D cocked and I saw it pushed out and I literally saw the the bird being pushed off the plate from the arm and I was like Oh, time to go boom. When I pulled the trigger, and I wasn't even like a foot off of leaving the first birth. Yeah, it was just a missing

thing is like you. You're Barrett, you were there. Wow, you like it was it was five to eight feet off the trap. We were standing above the trap. And you shot beside it. Yeah, you didn't shoot in front of it you didn't shoot behind you shot beside it. And you for one, you were just too close. Like, just too close of a shot to make too close to the arm too close. Too early in the flight. Too close to you. You know, your pattern was it's not three inches, its head point, you know. And but, you know, had you placed the barrel? Actually, on that line? I'm pretty sure you would have you would have smoked it. Yeah, I mean, but you were you were five inches, right? Or something.

I have no idea where I was. It was a wild. So I started at

the mud. I mean, and it hit the mud, like at the same time the target was still above it. Right? Because it was only two feet off the ground three feet off the ground. Right. You know, I mean, I that target ended up splashed on the bottom with the mud.

It was wild. But yeah, so So Saturday, I'm running it. And I felt like I did everything that I wanted to do except for two times, I just got slightly out of control. And I thought that if they set the same type, of course on Sunday, I've never really actually done this before in sporting clays where I kind of like knew I was going to shoot 100 straight. And just because I had a really, really high level of awareness. And I felt like I was making good, good decisions. And all I needed to do was be able to be focused for the round in order to to maintain that self awareness. And so that's what happened on Sunday and took a lot of you. I'm still exhausted, it took

a lot out of you because we went and shot five stand. After we got done with that round mid afternoon. And you were you were just having so much fun you were all over the place you did not have it in. I'm be serious about all of those targets. Also,

my plan was to try to shoot well in five Santa and I shot four pair, I think and I realized I pretty much didn't even have the energy to move the gun anymore. And so I was like I can't I I'm just gonna get annoyed if I try for this whole 50 rounds. I saw what happened. It was Yeah. So I

was like you were you were like three quarters of the way. There's a 10 Bird 10 Bird stations in the five stands. Yeah, the Burj. And you were like at the fourth pair. Yeah, third or fourth page, and you just were, and then you just basically were like, I can tell when on something like that when you're just like, Okay, I'm having fun now. Yeah, you know, I mean that you were talking earlier, when we were talking yesterday, where you, you said that I still had gas in the tank after shooting my round on Sunday? Well, I actually, you know, I started messing around the five stand some, but I shot a lot of the five stand purposeful. And I actually shot it pretty well. You know, and I felt like I had it in me. You know, I was a little disappointed that I had jacked around at the five stand when I got done. And realized that I was only a few targets off of off of winning fives, Dan, I was like, Oops. Oops. But I didn't think I was gonna have it to be able to shoot the 5g. And so I started having some fun in some areas, and it cost me a couple, a few targets. You know, when I actually did have, you know, some something left in the tank, and I could have, but, you know, that's how we learn. Yeah, you know, and I, you know, I was never going to really, I was never taking the five stand very serious. I never woke up and said, you know, today's the day Friday and for me, I was just, you know, I hadn't shot five stand alone while so I decided to do it.

What What were we talking about that I was explaining something about the progression of Saturday and Sunday. And it was something I was

had to do it had to do with eyes and focus.

And I was I was backtracking to explain in the tournament. So I could set up what I was going to talk about for what happened on Sunday. And I don't I lost it in our conversation or what I was talking about. Now I'm not worried about that.

Come back. Yeah.

Yeah. Oh, well, if it doesn't it's probably not that important. I guess I just told the story. Yeah.

Yeah. No. Dang. No. Well the I mean, I'll tell you. I could see you progress from Saturday from Friday to Saturday to Sunday. Oh, yeah. That's what it was. There was there was from from Friday to Saturday, there's big difference from Saturday to Sunday. Not very noticeable. I noticed it. You were you were more intent on Sunday. Slightly more intent than you were on Saturday. Yeah. And it was and there wasn't a fluctuation in that. You were intent every station every time that it was your turn to shoot. You were you were intent on shooting? Yeah. And I can definitely tell you, we're not taking any targets for granted.

No, I wasn't taking anything for granted. And it was it was basically continuously dialing up and ramping up the intensity at which I was trying to use the feedback of information I was getting from trying to pay attention to myself in incorporating that into the decisions I

was making. I would say, I would even go as far as to say, on Sunday, I watched you do that. You know, for 50 pairs be 100% on all pairs. And on Saturday, I would say I watched you at 85% of the pairs and the other 13. That got you to 9598 where you just managed to break them. Yeah. And it worked. Yeah. But even you know, maybe those were easier burgeoning. But even on Sunday, even the easier birds you gave 100% Yeah. You know, on your prep and to be engaged with, you know, and on Saturday, I saw you a few times. You know, you ran a station. But were you 100% engaged in those birds. No, you just got you got to wait. I don't want to say you got away with six. But you got the you got those six. And but you did it without 100% engagement.

Yeah, the honestly a little bit of a difference in that. For me, it was the fact that Saturday being a day that we started at one o'clock versus Sunday being one that we start at nine with the way that my brain works, it's very hard for me to have a debt. You know, this sounds dumb. But I actually left late on purpose. Yeah, because I, I woke up that morning, I just was not in the mood, you know, we were supposed you might have we were all talking about oh, we get there at 10 kind of shoot around. And so I got I woke up, I was planning on leaving and getting there around 1030. But I got a call from Wendell and I was stuck on the phone with him for a little while. And just the mindset that I was in was like ADHD ping pong bouncing off the inside of my head mode. And I just, I was like, I'm not gonna shoot it today. I can't pay attention to anything. And it was like one of those days that I'm sure you might know in time, but you just you just cannot get moving. And so

as I look at the clock, you're looking at the clock. You try and get something done. And you barely have started. What should take a couple of minutes. You look at the clock. It's 15 minutes is gone. Yeah. I do. Yeah. Yeah.

So I looked at the I timed I'm like I know it's basically one road the whole way there. And it takes me an hour and 45 minutes to get there. I started at one and I left at

you came in so I you slid in sideways on Saturday, wasn't it?

Yeah, Saturday, I literally got there. I mean, I was pulling in at 1254 I think is why because I met you over at the car. Yeah, I left that I left at 11 But I had to charge first. Yeah. So um, my GPS. I was gonna get there at 110 When I left. But I did that I didn't I didn't realize I had to charge I thought I was I was planning on leaving 11 Oh, I'll get it to where I'm 15 minutes ahead of schedule, but I was like, Oh crap, I have to go charge that six minutes north and I gotta charge and I gotta go an extra six minutes south. I don't have any time to do this. So I had to cut off if In minutes during the drive, which helped me because what it did was it got me very, very focused in the drive, and intends starting about two hours earlier in the round than the round. Because for I hope none of my students assume this are police officers, but I was basically intently focused on making sure I didn't get pulled over for a two hours drive. And the intensity of that, which I know does this to me, like having ADHD, like, will take me two hours to ramp up into being focused. That did it for me, when I got there, I was amped and ready to go in a good way. Good. And so but then, if I would not have had something like that, it would have been hard to shoot that well there on Saturday on Saturday, because it's in the middle of the day with nothing before it. Whereas on Sunday, I basically my my schedule was wake up, get in the car and go and start, you know, so it's like a fluid start to the day all shooting based, I don't have to segment my focus. So that was a little bit easier. But yeah, going back to what you're talking about, with with, you know, you had mentioned that that's where we got on this conversation, which was talking about, you know, the 100 straight, and that I need to be able to do that with my eyes to be able to shoot 100 Straight on a course like that. And yeah, and and but you can't do that. If you're if you don't know where to segment your attentiveness. You know what I mean? So let me ask you this. Did you do you have any questions or notes? Like before we record this, that you wanted to ask me for this? Because if you do we can start with those? And then

I guess you know what you'd like with videos? Or what really caused you to ask me to switch? Switch glasses? What? What was it? What did you know? You know, what, what did you what? What feeling did you have in watching in watching where we were in what we were doing that said, You know what? Hey, let's, let's try switching glasses and see if this is amazing.

So are you are you asking what caused me to know that that would work? Or what caused me to see that we should try that?

Oh, just just to even try it? I mean, have you even tried it with anybody else before? Really?

I?

I had I know that you'd put you and I when we first started working together one time you asked me to, to try my glasses, and you were like, wow, yeah, and I tried your glasses, but that was I mean, that was two and a half years ago or so. Yeah.

Um, I had I done that before anybody else? No. But I do know, and I did understand the science of what that would cause. And, to me, the way that my brain works is just my logical, you know, pure acceptance of neurological fact was that I, I had no doubt that it would work because I understand the science of how the eyes and proprioceptive movement work. And the only thing I needed to have happen was for you to be able to see something. And honestly, the harder it was for you to see the better. We had talked after we paused you know, after the break that we just came back from, you know, you had mentioned that you wish that you could find a way to communicate to people what it actually looked like for you. And then I kind of explained what it looked like for me for the I don't think I mentioned it in the first half of this episode so far. But I took Curtis's glasses right then and then shot and had basically the same result. And the best way I can describe what it looked like, like what I was perceiving was that someone drew a moving image with painted it with watercolor paint and then just took a bucket of water before the watercolor had dried and poured it over the painting and it was just like,

bled everywhere. Yeah, that's that's like what I saw. Yeah,

there's just like, to me the target looks like there is I don't really see a target. You know, just like I see moving color in a big, bled out. Transparent looking thing. It's very hard to see. And you know, I had the same results so I knew the science of what would happen I knew that it would work. But as far as what caused me to say like okay, this is the thing that we need to try right now. Is something that is is hard to relate to to anybody listening to this unless you are very, very empathetic and read body language, and understand how to filter body language of your students through physical movements and thinking and what they're seeing and the emotional state that they're in. And that just comes with 1000s and 1000s of hours of, of teaching people through that filter, and being able to read and your body language, how connected your visual attention was to the bird. And you know, like, realistically, were you making a physical movement that was that much different than when you were hitting them all with my glasses on? No, and for 99.99% of people watching you shoot both times, they wouldn't see a difference physically. But what I see a difference in is a lack of fluidity and harmonic movement. And I'm in a, in a miniscule fraction of a percent. That just shows me that the attention your attention, is like Ping Pong Ping off of multiple different things in the shot.

Yeah, and that's just, I didn't have the pure connection. Yeah. And you know, you've you've, you've worked with me a lot, you've shot with me a lot. You know, so I mean, there's times when you're, like, quit doing this, you know, and most people wouldn't see it shot with me. And if you know what it looks like, when I'm doing it, well, when I'm, when I'm off of

that, yeah, well, the interesting thing is that because we're all human beings, we all show the same symptoms, when the same things are happening. So I don't I that could have been the first time I've ever seen your shoot, and I would have seen that go, okay. And in the it's just, it's like, think of it this way, it's a difference between if you want some, if a if a person that knows nothing about music, where to watch me sing and play the guitar, and be right next to me and watch me and watch my hands move on playing a song live rehearsal over and over and over again. And be like, Wow, he is pretty good guitar player, because his hands are moving like, calm and fluid. And, and there, he doesn't have to look at the guitar to do it. And it sounds really good. And there's like, rhythm and dynamics to the way that the sound is rather than just like straight chords. And then if that's all they think they're going to see that day, like, Oh, he's good. But then immediately afterwards, if you bring in Wendell, and you sit them down in front of Wendell, and you have him play, then all of a sudden, it's like, I didn't even know that that was possible to move your hands like that. It's, it's like, you can see the difference in the body language of the person. When they're doing it completely, intuitively, an innate verse, if they're not, and I'm a good guitar player, but I'm nowhere close to like what Wendell is. And when Wendell plays if you could have, if you could record Wendell, and in a video and mute it, so that all of your attention is on the way that he's moving, then you do the same thing to me, you would see the mass of the difference. Yes. And that's, that's what you're looking for. It's the fluidity and economy of movement, the efficiency and I

see it in, in other people who haven't trained with you. You know, and I see it in how you move. Yeah,

yeah. Okay, so let's go on to, to these. So we already got a little beef, beef, brief background of your beef, I'm sure of your experience shooting in the first part. So I'm gonna read off actually, what I gave you as a filter for everybody to hear this sound good? Sure. Okay. So what I did was I wanted I wanted I gave Curtis a filter to come up with questions and to think about how to answer the questions that I was going to give him. And I'm going to read this filter. So here's the filter during specific key moments or transitional periods of your learning journey, what were some of the main turning points or moments where if you had the answer to specific questions, that would have shorten the progression time of your learning, and then what would those questions have been? So do you want me to start off with my questions here? Okay. So here's the first question. So my first question to you is a long learning process of changing the way that you approached shooting mechanically, and technically, what roadblocks did you come up against, that created a level of confusion in your understanding of how to approach the following things, and we can answer each one individually. So the first one is your approach to practicing, then your approach to competing, and your approach to decision making during competition, in terms of what strategy choices to make, and then your overall grasp and understanding of what is in all involved in being able to accomplish your goals and shooting. So we'll start the first one. So your approach and practicing so basically, during the process of you learning and changing the way that you approach shooting mechanically, and technically, what roadblocks did you come up against, that created some confusion in your understanding, and how to practice.

So in, generally, across, across all four of these, it would be a reoccurring theme is the understanding of my eyes, body and mind, and how they work together, and how to allow them to work together. And that's just, that's just kind of generally across across all of that. As far as practicing it really. I guess it's the difference between fun play banging away at clays. Um, you know, going out there when I, you know, want to use to practice and shooting a lot, but not really having a direction just thinking that I was, you know, I was building the target library, so to speak. But when I went out there, you know, and shot a case to the, you know, 350 shells or something like that. I also hit shot. Maybe. Oh, let's see maybe 50 different targets. Yeah. Or 70 different targets or, and then shot them frontwards and backwards. And you mean prior? Yeah. Prior in the way that, you know, so realistically, you know, how was I learning? It was to I was elude learning. Yeah, it was it was too diluted on those days. And yes, so I'm, but I'm not focused on any one thing. Yeah, the volume other than breaking clays like, right, it goes back to what we were talking about. Before? It was I was focused on breaking clays. Yeah. Not on, you know, how do I want to break this clay? And spending time learning that clay developing that clay into something that is how I do it from now on? Yeah, or something like that? Yeah. Into something stable. Yeah. And so I basically didn't, I didn't necessarily and there were times, I had, by the time I found you. I had I had revised how I was training and I was doing I was doing things like going out and doing like a mock 100 bird round. And I was going out and you know, like say only shooting singles. And, you know, trying to break eight to 10 You know, in making good movie, you know, and making good shots, but it was all about the final of that shot. You didn't have it. I was never really working in the eyes, body and mind categories of getting it to be better. And recognizing what in the shot wasn't correct. And where and how I wanted it to be. Before I took the shot. I was just, you know, I was I was changing things and stuff like that as I was practicing at that time. I was, you know, I was calling poll and putting the barrel further in front. Yeah, and putting the barrel below and, you know, I was using other techniques to shoot the birds you know, pull through pull away. I was practicing these Different things, I was practicing birds, early, middle and late I was doing, I was doing some things that mattered and were good. But after doing that for a little while, I wasn't seeing consistency grow. Yeah. I wasn't in and I was looking at it. You know, because I guess when I became, you know, when I went from web to master, I was like, Okay, now, now I gotta get serious, I got to try, I got to start. So when I go out, I need to start practicing with some, you know, practicing some of this stuff in getting better. And a little bit that happened. But, you know, say a year went past and I always had dedicated to practicing more. And then I looked at at the end of the year, how much how much I had gained. And I was like, well, Gee, whiz, if I want to get to this place, yeah. It's, and you know, in each time, you each time you try and improve, as you start getting higher and higher. In your abilities. The return is less. Yeah. And I was looking at, it's a not gonna get there. I, there's a pretty good chance that over the next little while, I would get discouraged because I would feel stalled. Yeah. And so So then after working with you, I mean, simply put, started practicing with purpose. Yeah. And when I mean, practicing with purpose, I don't mean, I went out and had a quarter inch shot from the right that I spent a case of shells on, right. unsure if there's some problem that I've recognized in my game, or age, a particular shot that I want to develop, I may go out and do something like that. Yeah, where I spent several boxes on a particular shot. But that's because I'm, I'm trying to get the shot to become something that I'm not naturally comfortable with. I'm trying to develop this particular shot into something, I can break it other ways, but I want I want this shot to be even more special. In the bag of tricks, you know, that I can pull out when you know, when when it's my when it's my right time. Yeah. And so I still will do that. But the biggest thing I learned and then I guess I'm gonna jump forward to how I do it. Even even now. You and I went out the other day, we were both pretty burnt from shooting the tournament down in Texarkana. I pretty quickly realized that like, we were going to shoot through the course that you set, and I quit pretty quickly realized that this wasn't a Thank God, I was not shooting a competition today because I was not going to be able to do you know, 100 Birds straight of taking it completely serious. Yeah. But what I could do was take portions serious, I could see, I could see a pair or a shot. And I could say, Okay, for this one, I'm going to work on this. I'm going to work on how my eyes feel as I see that as I see that shot. And can I have that be better? And how how does that affect me? Yeah, I'm going to work on how I move the gun with this. With this next shot. I'm going to work on my transition from one to another, to be precise. And and where my eyes go after I shoot the first bird where my eyes snap to where the gun comes to. And how that next move. Goes goes forward. Yeah, I think and specifically, like, okay, that's for this pair, right. I'm a kind of take the next pair off in what we did the other day. Because that's just where I was mentally in because I was more exhausted than I thought. On a normal time. I'll do it a bit like that. But everything will be purposeful. Yeah, I won't take I went out there was a hit a good practice down in down in Florida after I hit shot. Blackjack. And I went back on I think it was Tuesday, Monday or Tuesday after blackjack. And they and I could ask Bruce Potter down there. If he was gonna change targets. And he said, No, there'll be the same on these two courses, one of the courses he had changed. And I was like, Oh, great, because those were the two courses that I had a couple of struggles on. And I remember exactly which stands. So I went back out to those particular stands with them fresh on my mind, and took a couple of moments. So just say, if we're talking about one standard, I took a couple of moments. And I looked at a pair. And I thought about how I shot it. And then I looked at another pair and thought about how I would shoot that now with a little bit of knowledge about it, made a new plan. And then I worked on that plan a bit.

Because it was a station that I didn't shoot, well, I didn't make the right choices I either didn't get for whatever reason. Maybe I didn't get my eyes there, maybe. Maybe I was over aggressive, overcooked, a shot, whatever it was. And I tried to get rid of that make a new shot, make a new plan. And then I tried to I tried to perform that and if it worked good. And then I tried to test it. You know, I tried to take Okay, if that's true. Can I do it sooner? Where is it that I just put my eyes and it worked? And what is it like if I move my eyes? To see it a little sooner? Yeah. Or am I even trying to see it a little too early? What happens if I move them a little late? Yeah. Where am I? Where am I start points. You know, how is my maybe I was in my transition from one bird to another. Maybe I was putting too much energy into that. What happens if I move more calmly move the eyes quickly to their spot, but move the gun more calmly. Yeah, and I specifically do that. I mean, if you watched me shoot that, that day, all you would have seen was me go and look like I was shooting bird single birds and pairs of birds. And it wouldn't look like I was doing something. But I was doing something I left that that little practice session that I had there. I blacked out I left to exhausted.

Yeah, I think the thing about what you're doing, that's important for people to take away is it's a it's a multi level involved process of practicing where you're isolating and picking a specific variable of movement that you're trying to both pay attention to, but also influence in some way you're trying to change it. And that would be your eyes or your you know, whatever it is whatever specific thing you know, you mentioned that about the practice. Two days ago, I blew rock and then at blackjack, but so it's like, you know, you're isolating a specific thing that you're paying attention to, to try to influence, then you're also taking in the information that you observed as you tried to execute it. And then you're also asking yourself in an analytical way, how did it affect me? What changed? What was that, like? You're you're assessing the experience to compare and contrast off of other ones. And in a way, it's a very analytical, but also exploratory practice, where you're, you're learning as you go by, like a comparative analysis, and you're gaining data points as you go as your as you work on practice. But it's important to understand that that's not really possible if you have your attention in the wrong place.

Yes. You know, when taking it back to a couple of a couple of episodes ago when you went over types of practice. Yeah. Now, it's important. It's also important to understand all the types of practice for the most part that you talked about, on in a practice session like that, for me, I'm doing almost all of them at different times for different reasons. Because I've worked with you enough to to know, you know, how to be able to go out on a day alone and mix them. Yeah, I mean, I was even I was even doing things like and I'll do this because I had to use the delay. Right. I was also changing delays so that it was kind of the amount of time that I had between me pushing the button and having the gun ready. testing to make sure I didn't add too. Like, didn't amp up and rush too much? Yeah, you know, how calm can I be? If I shrink the delay down? Yeah. Right. I was extending the delay. How calm do I stay? And how ready do I stay? If the delay is longer than anticipated, kind of, you know, playing around with some things that I noticed weren't good on on on a couple of days prior. You know, and just just testing, testing, testing, testing. You know, I wasn't there to I don't, I honestly really didn't care. Like, like, we've talked before. I wasn't there to break targets. Now the target breaking the target. Gives me, you know, an external that tells me okay, that worked at least enough to break the target. Yeah. Okay. But I'm looking for in some cases, I'm looking for more than that. Right, I'm looking, I'm looking for did I feel like I owned it the entire time, and got the result I was looking. And that's where that's where I'm testing, you know, all over the place, you know, and I'm testing for the future. Yeah, I see this target. I see a pair like this again. You have a good experience. Yeah. So like, so that I saw that the first pair that I do. I make the right choices, I choose the right guns, whole point and start point, I choose a break point that is familiar and comfortable. Enough to me that I Don't overextend myself right out of the gate on the first pair. Yeah. And get one of these pieces of the puzzle wrong.

Would you say that if you were to try to summarize everything, you? Because the question was like, How did changing like along your learning process of changing the way that you approach shooting mechanically, and technically, how did your approach to practice change? Would you say the summary of that would be prior to learning this, your approach to practice was learning targets? And after learning this, your approach to target your approach to practice? was learning you?

Yeah, learning me and movement in the process? Yeah, you know, the whole, the whole soup to nuts, breaking it down a bit more from the time, even if I'm out just banging away. Yeah, it appears on just banging away with a buddy. Maybe he's asked me for some advice. And I said, Okay, I'll go shooting with you, I'll take a look at what you do. And I'm going to shoot some to, you know, a vast majority of the ones that I take even doing that, I'm going to run a short little process a short little test on this bird, and see and see what it's like, it might just be as simple as you know, I'm going to make a quick little plan, not doing much setup. And I'm going to see if I can do this. You know, I'm gonna bridge everything and, and see if I can do to basically put the system under put the process in the system under a little bit of stress and scrutiny at all times. It's gonna look like I'm just banging away. Yeah, but I quit. I pretty much quit taking shots. That didn't matter in some way. Yeah. And in comparison, most of the other shots that I took didn't matter, right? They were all 100% focused on the break of the bird. Yeah. And, and only really that only the result. Yeah.

It's amazing how, how the quantity of shots that are taken that way in practice, if you don't really know what you're doing. Oh, I mean, it is. It's like it keeps

gun clubs in business. Yeah. I mean, I shouldn't

get a sponsorship from from gun clubs to not talk about this to keep them in business. I mean,

to be, to be honest, it's part of the reason that when, you know, it's, it's funny, because, you know, for, for people that are not pro, they always talk about, oh, I was listening to this podcast with X, Y, Z, who's also won the US Open, and they said they never practice. Yeah, or hardly ever practice or they only practice you know, this, this much or whatever. Well, what what nobody ever really says is that practice is different. Right? They may be tuning something, they, you know, they've already got all the skills they've already got, or most of them, you know, they've already got what it takes. The it's it's like a refresh. Sure, or it's a tune up, or it's something like that. And then once it's there, the rest of it, you could actually be doing damage by continuing to shoot because all you're going to do is develop lackadaisical bad habits, you know, because you'll, you know overextend on the focus that you have available to pay attention during that practice, or, you know, or in between shoots or something like that. And, you know, you'll actually go the other direction, right, and not, and start not focusing on birds, in things like that. So I actually don't shoot as much. Practice birds, I shoot a lot more competitions now. In bigger competitions, but I don't shoot as much practice as I used to, yeah, but every, every time I do, you know, I can go out now, shoot, I don't know, 100 150 shells, and feel like I really got something out of it. Or that I got triple what I would have gotten out of 350 shells, or something like that, you know, and I would have gone back and shot 350 The next day?

Well, a lot of it has to do with, you know, like, I detailed this neurologically in one of the episodes I talked about. But basically, if you're practicing with a focus on the wrong thing, you're, even though you think you're practicing, you're actually it's like, say that you need 51% of the catalog shots in your to use plain English muscle memory, which is not a real thing. But it makes sense for people. So that's a you need 51% of all of the shots you've ever taken in your muscle memory that have been cataloged. And not every shot is catalogued only when you get a dopamine spike, it's catalog. So you'd say you need 51% cataloged to, to make that be your go to move non consciously. If when you're practicing, and you're shooting high volume, and you're not paying attention to what your body is doing, or what your eyes are doing, or what emotional state you're in, but you're hitting birds, and you're letting yourself get pumped up about that, then the reality of the fact is that definitely not 51% of the shots that you're taking are the exact thing you're trying to learn. It's much less than 51%. So what ends up happening is you you get dopamine spikes, that just dilute that percentage of catalog shots that need to be good, but you're basically diluting it with bad shots. And so really, the more that you go to practice in that way, where you're just being in a way shots, and shooting, you know, you know, I talked to some students and, and I said, Well, how many how much do you practice? And I'm thinking they're going to answer me like, oh, you know, what, you know, one to four times a month? And it's like, oh, you know, two to four times a week? It's just like, holy cow. Okay, how many are you shooting each day that you're going every week? Oh, about, you know, maybe about a half a case to a case every time. And if that's the case, then, you know, for me to shoot a case

where I'm, you know, to interpret these shots, where I'm doing care about all of them, that takes a whole day. That's so that's a lot of caring. That's, and I mean, unless you're unless you're gonna set me, you know, the quarter and bird from the right, then I'm gonna work on and I'm shooting half of those at just that one bird. Yeah, right. That's a little different. Because so much of it ends up abridged, because you're using only the stuff for that particular bird.

Yeah, I mean, what you know, if I literally just the time it takes to pay attention to what happened to analyze, to, to put effort into into programming, what you want to happen to make a decision to assess all your awareness on the things that you need to be aware of, to execute the move then to assess what happened for 250 times. That's going to take me at a minimum, probably four hours. But yeah, it's gonna take a lot. Yeah. And so, so then that what that means is, if you're shooting that much, you're not doing it that way. Unless you're literally shooting, you know, four to six hours, four times a week, but then that's your job. And so nobody's doing that, you know, saying you're banging away and a lot of those shots. Yeah, you mean there's times when you know, yeah, there's times when you know you do and, you know, quantity is an important thing. to learning, but you also need that qualitative, focused approach to practice. That's less volume.

I mean, I think and a good volume, one might be okay. Everything else aside, I'm going to work on my feet task mount today is go out and shoot a ton of targets, with 100% effort on getting that mount to the right place every time. And don't worry, don't necessarily worry about the eyes. Don't necessarily worry about the rest of the move. Don't worry about the break. And it's just the move from touching your side. You know, nine inches down or whatever. 25 cent Yes, write up in touch in firing when you touch touch cheek or whatever. You know, if that's what you're gonna work on, okay, then that's so isolated that you can bang away. Yeah. And that's the only thing you're paying attention to. And you're gonna go through a bunch of shells doing that. Yeah. Right. But boy that, you know, if you're, if you're really working on the game, you're not, you know, you're working on more, you know, each shot, you're working on more than just your mount, typically, unless you found, you know, new gun. Right, you know, yeah, I would say, you know, you get a brand new gun go out and bang out a lot of shelves. Yeah. And get to know that thing so that you can even start doing the thing running processes. And not interrupted by this thing's lighter than my old one, right? Or it doesn't mount to the same place on my cheek than the old one and not interrupted by those types of things. Because those are distractions, and just get to know that gun. Yeah, right. That would be very

important. Yeah, that's a day where I mean, when I got a new stock, and foreign Oh, my God, I think I went out last year and my students 750 a day for three days in a row.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I've seen I've seen you struggle with like, something changed on your stuff. And we went out. We went out to shoot something. And I realized pretty soon that you were shooting Yeah.

You became a trapper? Yeah, I

was like, the one pushing the button all the time. You know? And that's because you, that's all you were doing? Yeah, it was just about like the stock isn't in the right place, not mounting to the right spots. All you were doing was taking shots, seeing if it was going to start getting comfortable for you. Yeah, you know, but you weren't really necessarily paying attention to the eyes and you weren't paying Caroline's to the swing or your foot position. You were just Can I move this gun and have it end up in the right, right place? On my

body? Yeah. What's the precision I have when it hits my body? Yeah, yeah. Any more thoughts on the practicing? Do you want to move on to the competing or? Yeah. Okay, so how did going through this process change your approach to competing?

And this is the answer, the answer is fairly simple. And it's something that as you know, I still have to work on an awful lot. And it's, it's something I struggle with. And it depends on what day it is how much sleep I've gotten stuff like that. But, and we talked a little bit about before, you know, whether or not you know, sometimes I don't really care about score, because I'm working on something that you know, so that that all being said 100% engagement. Yeah, I mean, the simple thing, this that the simple answer is learning how to be 100% engaged on every target in every plan on every pair, paying attention 100% to everything that goes into making that shot, and making sure that are not sloughing off on any of the aspects you know that as I've as I've looked at it a pair if it's easy parent that I've still taken the time to think about and look at and consider what could go wrong with that first bird what are my tendencies on that first bird I'll what are my tendencies on the second bird? What could go wrong? What is the best road to correct for me? And then in there, I didn't mention anything about the transition from one to the other. Yeah, if I forget to put, you know, 100% effort in I don't think about the transition. Yeah. And the transition could very well be the key to consistently breaking that pair for me. Yeah. So, of course, I

just said, Yeah,

I have to think about the transition, I have to consider the transition. You know, what's that transition? Like, for me, I may watch a person, a person right in front of me run the stand, and not even look like there is any problem with the transition? Yeah, between the birds. But maybe they were a right hander. And I'm a left hander. And maybe as a left hander, it there is a little bit of a complication to the transition from one bird to another, in the sense that when I, after I shoot the bird, maybe my gun will be in a place that I can't see the other bird. It's blocked by the gun. Yeah. And the only thing I can see is the gun. If I don't consider this, this is what I consider in 100%. Right? How is that? What is that target doing? Where am I? You know, I'm considering everything about the shot to shoot it. And I'm taking that all the way through the second barrel firing. Yeah. And then I'm starting over for the next pair. And, you know, and doing my analysis and going through, and doing that for what makes up 100 birds, or however many I'm shooting that day. You know, and that's tough for me. That's tough for me, because as one of the things that I that I changed, that was one of the things you're right, is this awareness of how much goes into the shot, if you're going to control it? Instead of just an awareness of whether or not I broke it in where the barrel was? Yeah. Right. It takes more to do, you know, I can be aware of where the barrel was, and whether or not I broke it on every shot. And, you know, leaving, leave, leave that round. And feel like I could shoot three more rounds. Yeah. You know, if I do if I really spend all of the diesel and go 100%. I don't mean fast. 100. Yeah, but just, you know, completely engaged 100% through an entire round. And that includes managing, you know, the water that I'm drinking, that I'm making sure that drinking water, making sure that I'm taking a snack at a reasonable time. That I'm not allowing myself to become too distracted. Oh, these different things. I can leave around utterly exhausted that the number of times that I ended up having to stop a half an hour from the club and take a nap in the truck. Yeah, for sure. You know, is is crazy, just because I just spent so much energy.

So let me ask you a question, then. Do you do you think that somebody can shoot their absolute best without doing that?

I think there's people. I think there's people that that don't know, I hope I wouldn't offend anybody by this, but maybe if you just are not very thick. In the skull. Yeah. I mean, like, if the world is so simple, that you literally just, it's just that simple. Yeah. And in you, you do it, and you're able to control it, but you're not even controlling it. It's just like how you are I mean, it's like you'd have to be I don't know the answer to this. Maybe it's, you just would have to be simple. Sorry. Sorry. Yeah,

I think, um, I mean, I think the answer that question is no. I don't think that you can be, I don't think you can shoot your best without doing some type of that. Because

you have to have a level where I think people have different levels.

I think it's not different levels. I think it's different languages. And, you know, I think depending on what language you use, then that's how you interpret that information. You know, like, what language do you use to communicate that? You? For me, I would say that, you know, you initiated an engaged in Microsoft Kotick movement with your eyes on that Bird instead of using smooth pursuit, and somebody else might just say the bird look jumpy. It's the same thing.

I think also I think there's a different perspective that you have to consider in this too, is could you do it and shoot at? And not write this kind of effort in? Yeah, for sure. Yeah, you can see Could you could you do it and shoot at five? Yet to Come be more difficult? Yeah. Can you do it and shoot 100? New?

No way. Yeah,

it's not gonna happen

on now. There's gonna be you know, there's 20,000 people that listen to this. So there's gonna be people that you know are gonna be like, these guys are full of crap because I shoot 90 sevens on time. But that's a charity course. We're talking about NSCA US Open Level world championship level that you still regional left are

talking about, like US Open? Pocket. Northbrook.

Yeah, yeah, like, or like it backwards this past year. I mean, the

even even at Cross Creek in the woods. You got to pay attention.

Yeah, you can't there's there's just, it's a different understanding of, of what's required because of different people's approach. Because of different people's experience with the game in whatever, you know, level that they've been engaged with.

Can you wing it and find 93? So, one time on a run a big course. Not on big horse? Oh, yeah. On a local, you can wing it fine. 93. Yeah, yeah. You might be a wing it and find 995 Good chance, you won't do it next time. Yeah, because you're not really, you don't really have a foundation, right? That you're working with when when targets become, you know, unfamiliar and stuff, you know, I was, I was talking to you about, you know, I was spent some time just shooting the Florida swing, you know, and when your comfort level is challenged, at 10 miles an hour faster, and every trap, you know, 10 to 15 yards further away, than what you normally would see. And backgrounds that you are not used to and styles of targets that you don't see very often. You're gonna have to have, you're gonna put some planning you're gonna have to do you have to do some things to get that to go your way. Yeah. Because otherwise you when you're doing something like that, I've done it, I've tried winging it. You know, when I, when I first went down to Florida a couple years back, and, you know, is you end up feeling beat up? You know, it's so

yeah, ain't happening. No. Um, any questions for me on that? Okay. Um, how about, as you've learned this new approach to fail, you're gonna have to, you're gonna have to pick a spot to, to hang out. As you criticize, and patent me enough, yeah. As you've, you know, have gone through the learning process of changing all this stuff. We kind of covered this in this in the last two questions, but talk to me a little bit about how your approach to decision making during competition in terms of your strategy to choices that you're making, strategy choices that are making, I can't talk how that's changed. I mean, we kind of really did just talk about basically it just has now existed.

Yeah, yeah. No, no. A consciousness of, of, you know, of prior to the shoot, what am I doing? You know, you know, how much coffee am I drinking? Some things like that, that then go and influence my shoot or consciousness during the shoot of what states that I'm in, in between stimuli like emotional, visual, physical, yeah. You know, are my eyes working? Say if you have like a baseline average that you expect out of your eyes, or do they happen to be working better today? Are they see more acute or do they seem sluggish and and trying to match up? My strategies with who I am and then also So, you know, endurance. Yeah, you know, we talked about that a little bit already, you know, instead of throwing the heat to every stand through 100 bird event, just just shoot in and break, and break some and move on. Yeah. And, you know, and put that put that one in the bank.

That's a, that's a big reason why I don't like, I don't like general applications and explanations of things. Because, you know, if you identify as a specific style of shooter, like in terms of how aggressive you are on pairs, or how, you know, the problem is that that's just not always applicable.

No, and that's, that's one of the things like, I'll go, I'll go to a local back home. I mean, do it this common Sunday? Just because. And I'll just right out of the gate, I'll be like, you throw me the heat. blasted him a little chin music. Yeah, I just, I'm just I'm gonna, you know, all day long. Showing them the stuff. Yeah, I'll just show I'm sure the stuff and be damned. You know, this might be the day at last for 100 birds, you know, 20 birds. And it's, you know, usually, you know, they'll go 20 birds, and it'll look amazing. And then I'll just, you know, and then I'll just turn it into a train wreck. You can't take your eyes off of them, it'll come back around for another 20 birds. Yeah, you know, and at the end, you can see it in the scorecard. Every time you can see it in the score. But you can also see it in the scorecard. It's like you could see where, you know, you, you started first five stations you ran, what happened to six, seven and eight. And then it looks stubborn, you know, 910 and 11. You were back, you know, and then what happened to 12 1314?

I mean, think about how many of the video calls we've done over the years where we're looking at

that. Oh, yeah, we are taunt taunt. Yeah, you know, we look at different things in those video calls. But that was one, you know, and it's like, I don't know why this is happening. You know? You turn the heat to it. Yeah. Right. You know, it's like, got to trash can lids. And I'm gonna see how quick I can shoot. Yeah, yeah, you're. Yeah, just yeah, just break the trash can lose and go to the one. That's next. Because that thing might be at 60 yards.

Yeah. And you might need to take it off like Usain Bolt On Off speed. floppers.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, I'm not finishing like Usain Bolt.

You are way ahead of the burden. Yeah, yeah.

So yeah. I mean, it's really it's a consciousness of having some strategy, and how to how to play the game. You know, like we talked about, from my round, you know, last Friday to Saturday to Sunday, you know, I played a conservative round, more so on Sunday, and it treated me pretty well. Yeah. But I had, I was purposefully going to break as many targets as I could, and not have it be, and not let myself get out of control. Yes. And, and that was my strategy that day, stay calm, maybe take the target a little later than I normally would, you know, and ensure some breaks. You know, when I'm learning that, I'm learning to learn and to control that some more.

Yeah, that that was very good. And you should feel really good about that. Because you know, the that I was so happy to see that in your in your approach to that round. Because it says it gives you so much valuable data.

Again, body of work, right, yeah. I take that experience that worked. And I move forward with that. Now, that might not be how I get to shoot next time. Right. Right. I might not be I might not have the patience to do that. I'm not have to, I might have to cook some birds to stay in the game. Because I just might not have enough patience. Yeah. And knowing it, but again, a body of work to learn from so that when you get like you look at a guy like Bill McGuire, Bill McGuire, Wendell ceria, has immense bodies of work of how they shoot and knowing how they what they can do. Yeah, right. Well, that's what you're talking about. I mean, you're talking about building that for yourself. Yeah. And when you start looking and considering things like emotional connectedness to the bird, and to the outcome, and, you know, you start talking about these extraneous things that are not just the move in the bird, you know, it becomes becomes a lot, it becomes a lot to work on, it does a lot to get a lot to get correct.

So that you just literally pulled me right into the next question, which is that I'll read it off, so I get it right. Talk to me a little bit about the, the change in your understanding of the, of what all is involved in being able to accomplish your goals and shooting now

the totality of it. Like there's, there's so much for me personally, I always preface it with me and how I think and how I do things, the totality of it, of what I what I want to achieve is one thing. But I don't want to say the complexity of getting there, because it's not necessarily complex, but, you know, the discipline, and the totality of working on my game, and working on, you know, the different shots and making the right decisions and, and playing the game. To win and, and, and picking the right strategy. And doing doing those types of things is the the totality of it. And then. And then the other thing is their continued commitment to change, and to learn, and to grow in the in the openness to let those happen. Yeah, because, you know, I've worked with you for quite a while now. And I'm still, we're still working on things. And the things that we now work on. Were very, very, very different. So and then when I first started working with you and first started, now every once in a while, there'll be something that maybe I'm getting a little bad habit on or something like that. And we'll have to do a little, a little reverse review of something. But it's like, oh, okay, yeah, I remember now, I I'm not taking that part serious right now. Right? And in that, but, you know, if you're gonna if you're really gonna, you know, if you're gonna commit to, you know, to the goals, you're gonna have to be willing to make some to make changes. And, you know, what, are you going to have to learn about yourself about the game? To make that change? Yeah. And then, you know, and then you're going to grow? And then what's, what's next? Right, you're not going to be done? Yeah, you know, even yourself, you're not done. I mean, I see you work on things for yourself all the time.

24 years into it? Yeah. You know, that kind of puts something into perspective. I was. I was watching him thoroughly enjoy. I was talking to you about it earlier today. Like I thoroughly have been enjoying that TV show on Netflix about the PGA Tour. And it's called, I think it's called full swing. And basically, at the beginning of the year, they picked a certain amount, they picked a few guys on tour. And they just literally followed them around all year at their house, to their trainer, practice rounds, hanging out with friends go into the tournament, fly into the tournaments and their Airbnbs of every tournament, and it's fascinating.

There's cases of not winning the stresses of

everything, you know, everything. Yeah. And, and what's so interesting and fascinating to it is because it is for me, being somebody that does that in a different sport. It's like watching my life, but on a golf course, instead of shooting and to put everything into perspective, when when I have people that come to me and or Lord, even if it go to somebody else if one of your goals is to compete with someone like me that and this is gonna sound egotistical, but, but it's just putting it into perspective. That just like me watching that show, and thinking that I'm gonna give myself three years to compete with those guys on their game. It's not possible.

I mean, it could be possible. It's

not possible. It's not possible.

I don't know that you could. I don't know that you could build the

inventory. You can't that's that's what it is. You need I can I can hit a ball as far And I can I can put pretty damn good I can hit I mean, I, for a long time was a really good golfer. And I know it would not take me long to make it to where if I go out to a course, like to pick the best golf course in Arkansas, I'll go out and I'll golf under par, I could do that in three months of practice, I guarantee you, and here's on that golf, this is what I'm saying, let me finish this whole explanation. In a few months, I can go out and hit those scores. And the and the other thing that I bring to the table is my experience of being able to handle pressure. I watch I actually watch and watching them struggle in matches. And I'm immediately like, immediately thinking like, oh my gosh, they're this, they're, they're nowhere near the competitors, that my peers are in my game. B They don't know how to deal with the mental aspect of it like their Brooks KEPCO they were showing him after he had gone three or four years in one like four majors, and he's in the biggest slump I've ever seen any person and, and he's so clueless as to what he's doing wrong. That he he, it's literally in his tone of voice as he talks, how he mentally approaches, every tournament, everything and I'm sitting there looking at it, like this guy is making hundreds of millions of dollars playing this game, he's looked at as a professional athlete, but every person that I have to compete against in my game is better than him at being an athlete. And so the interesting thing about it is that, like I would bring that aspect to the table. So immediately I have the mental aspect of golf to be able to perform equally as those guys. And in a few months, I could score equivalent scores as they could. If I took it as hard as they do, I mean, if you watch this show, you'll see how much they practice. It would take me 15 years minimum to be able to actually compete against them.

Yeah, it took to be to be out on the tour and show up to basically have your caddy go a half a week early. And him play the course. And then you show up on Wednesday to play around on Thursday. All you do is walk the course on Wednesday. They get practice rounds. Yeah. Yeah, some palatable and, and basically with your caddy, but good to play those sorts in those courses that they play. I've played some courses, Sam, that are on the page. They're not they're not your course that you for one. They're very expensive if you play them. But man, they are just they're full of dynamite. If

you think they're hard when you play them, play them when they have a PGA event. I mean, we're talking a whole nother level. Yeah. But it is but like literally score wise, mechanics wise, mental game wise. I'll be equivalent to them in a year. Yeah. I can't beat them for two decades from now. Yeah. And it's it

because they're they are showing up every day, on every course. For every swing. No matter what the conditions, you know. And I'm driver off the deck. Yeah, I mean, I'm one on one back. And I could I might be able to reach it. I'm driver off the deck and it could go in me go completely wrong. Yeah. Right. Like I couldn't. I, I would, I would be getting me to lay up in golf. And I can play some golf. Getting me to lay up and golf is I didn't happen.

Yeah. I mean, you you. When you listen, this is why I love the show, because I have so much respect for everything that I see. Like I said, I see my life in a different game. And, and it's cool to have the perspective that I have of shooting, but watch another game and be able to pick up on all the things that they're doing, and and listen to them talk about shots taught and it's like, this is where the difference is between me being able to have the mental game, have the scores be able to go out and put the round. And if you I mean with as much as I know about learning physical movement and mechanics and things. And as good as my golf already is. I know that if I studied Tiger Woods swing in slow motion in a few months, I would have an identical swing.

But think about it too. It's like, you go out you shoot. Not even not even a grand or grand prix fee test isn't just a standard feat has 100 words. Right 100 birds that are almost all different. Yeah, right. And they may Make 65 swings. Yeah, let's do this.

Let me finish my statement because it's gonna, if you cut me off there, it's gonna sound like I'm the biggest cocky asshole known to man. Okay, so don't let Don't cut me off. I'm gonna sound like a downer.

But, but

But yeah, so like, in a matter of months, I can have an identical swing to him if I study that with what I know about internal awareness and things like that. But when I listen to these guys talk about their knowledge of the minutiae of the game of things that influence like, you know, what, my ability to play, scratch, golf is all based off of feel, and very little knowledge, their ability to play golf, is based on a level of understanding of golf that I have in shooting, plus the feel. And that's, that's what's so hard in order to be able to do this. And that's why, like, the reason why I say decades for me to be, I don't even think it's part it's not possible for me, if I if, if you were to say, David, I'm gonna write you a blank check for the rest of your life and anything that you need, if someone came up and said that and all you have to do, your goal will be to become a professional golfer and be in the top five in the world, on average, every year, I would say I so much appreciate that. It's just not possible. Because I don't think I think, like, it's just not possible. And the thankfully, in shooting, though, it is still possible, because shooting doesn't have the scientific advanced research and the money in it, so that the professionals can be professionals, whereas in golf, it does. And those guys, I mean, when I watched that show, I'm like, my god, I'm thinking like, you know, every day, these guys are in the gym for half the day. And then they go to the range for the rest of the day. And then they have trainers, and they have, they have chefs that travel with them everywhere. And then they have planes that'll fly them. I mean, if I've had a life like that, just to be able to compete. And if every one of the top pros in the world and shooting head that the the skill that we would accumulate would be insane. But we don't have that, which is why it's open to be accessible for somebody in a certain amount of years to be able to get equal to us. Because we still have to work a job

if you if you were able to meet with an eyes coach, three mornings a week for an hour mornings, every day, three mornings, a week, every day of the year. You know, for an hour, just working on the eyes follow this.oh You know what I mean? Amazing. Then, later on later on that day, you know, and you got a massage after every round. And, you know, you there there was science behind listening after you finish around, and you're getting massage. There was science behind you listening to a waterfall while you're getting the massage. And in that being able to take what you learned in that round and solidify it. That's what they do. Yeah, right. That's how much that's how far they go. And we don't have any of that. Like, there's no i There's no my coach, you know, that's coming by my tent. Yeah. You know, or anybody's tent. Right. There's just, there's just you wandering around wondering why your eyes didn't work well. And hoping that by drinking some more water tonight and getting some more rest of their work tomorrow. Right. That, you know, I mean, it's, it's, yeah, I think if people, you know, just just, I mean, you talked about them being in gym. And it's not necessarily for for the 68 swings that they might make that day. It's for the 68 swings, that they're going to make four days in a row. And walking those courses,

where it's also to create like elasticity in their muscles. Yeah, and flexibility and to increase range. And if you

just if you've just walked a golf course, you know, one day, one time for 18. That's a that's that's 1/4. And that was one day that was first day. So you're fresh. Right? That is that is one quarter of what they do to get through a tournament. Right. And that's saying that they didn't have a practice day or two practice days, or do it the week before the weekend before? Yeah, right. I mean, walking in a golf course is no joke. Right? I mean, usually when I've walked in my carry my own bags, they have caddies, but still walking in a golf course, putting your brain under that amount of stress as far was making those decisions, you know, having some of the decisions go bad. Yeah, more stress. Right. And holding rounds together, you know, getting into, you know, leading, how hard is it? You know, how hard would it be? Our sport doesn't even have this moment to moment stroke to stroke, knowing that you just gave one up that he took from you. And he's two holes back. Yeah. Right. I mean that the entire time would be. That's a whole different level that we don't we we aren't even close to? Well, we've had

that we've for sure had that. I mean, we had that in the psca for four years. And then we had that in the Super squad this year. I think that's a personality based thing. I personally would love the sports go to that because it would help me. There's other guys who would hate for the sport to go that way because they don't know how to deal with that. And, but also the other subtle difference that in their sport, and everybody knows this difference, but you know, if they get one up on if they get one under you so to speak. You can I mean? There's a stretch. You can you can birdie one. Yeah, you can do an eagle one.

Yeah, you can take something back. Yeah. You know, you can in our sport, you can't really you're done. Yeah, you can't really put the screws to it, and in it and make comebacks that somebody else isn't already on par to do. Yeah. Right. I mean, the guy that's having a good day is already shooting what your comeback looks like,

Yeah, I think that that, honestly. I mean, I've played very serious golf, I think shooting is harder mentally. But I think golf is better, because it's not as demoralizing. If you're like you can it is for an optimistically minded person, you can always make up ground and golf, you can not make up ground and shooting you miss one you're out. And that has to do with if you're competing live with somebody or if you know a score in golf that you need to go beat and you need to make the cut. And you go Bogey, Bogey bogey well, and you need to go for under that day. Now you there's a seven there's a seven stroke, you know, difference, you you can birdie, you know, seven out of the next 12 And then in then you're back. So in that but also if you're playing head to head you can do that there's always that optimistic aspect of it. And that makes it that makes it easier mentally, but I will say that, so I would I would give a point to shooting for the difficulty of it. I would give 100 points to golf for the excitement of the possibility that you can go birdie birdie birdie birdie birdie. Yes, because that's that that makes golf the most beautiful game in the world because you can't get the most exciting thing in sporting clays. Is that you just do. What is there to do? You just hit them in golf. You can you can rally back and you can you know, well you can hit an albatross on a par five, you know from 200 yards out.

You don't get any kudos for doing doing something that's pretty darn cool in our sport, like so. You know, you shoot a bird an incomer? You shoot it off the arm. And it gives you tons of time on a bird that everybody's had trouble with. For the second bird. It's like oh, wow, that was that was that was gutsy and but Oh, you just break both birds.

Yeah, right. It's like a game you and I played in practice that one time at Remington gun club where we could get bonus points with that was that was fun. That was now would that not be a fun game to televise? Yeah, that

would be neat. That'll be neat. I mean, it's like okay, so yeah, you're worrying about your accent. You know, I made a joke earlier is driver off the deck. Oh, that's, that's possible. No, you're right. The impossible shot. You know, I love I love Bubba Watson, you know, because he's such a, he's such a sharp shaper. And it's like, you watch a lot above it. He doesn't do it quite as much. But when he was, you know, in his heyday, it was like, Oh, watch this. Right. He's gonna take he's taking something from somebody if he makes a shot. Yeah. Right. Just no one's gonna make this shot. Yeah, you know, here's some cool stuff like that. But, yeah, but I think you know, as far as you know, but, you know, back to the thing, you know, the grasp of the goals, you know, is just the tool Tality of it, you know, in a willingness to change, a willingness to learn something new, and to allow yourself to grow, and continue. Is how you're, you know, that's, that's a big part of how you're gonna get to goals. Yeah. You know, because, you know, if it, if you already had it, you'd be at your goal. Right? Right. So you're gonna do something? Yeah. And I don't mean just, I don't mean, just simply work hard at what you're already doing. You know, because you probably would be closer to your goal. If it was just simply about working harder. Yeah, you know, you're gonna have to work hard, but you're gonna have to be willing to change, you're gonna have to be willing to modify things, you're gonna have to be willing to be a little liquid in, you know, and, and the person that comes out of achieving that goal, might not be the same person that went in. Yeah. Oh, you know, you know, I mean, I don't mean, you know, I mean, you're still gonna be saying person, but I mean, like, the style of shooter, what you take seriously your grasp of or your grasp of the game. You know, what you the places you put the most emphasis in the game, all of a sudden, you know, tons of stuffs gonna be different on different now. You know, I'm different. Now, as a shooter, I don't know, you know, guys that have shot with me. Over time, you know, who who would recognize it? Who would be, you know, who paid attention enough before versus, versus how I shoot now, to recognize that I'm, that I'm different. My choices are different about how I shoot not just the style, that I shoot, but, but, you know, the choices that we make.

Yeah, you're a filter for comprehension of what you're doing.

And, and, and, and how serious I am, you know, I mean, it's, like, like I mentioned before, I mean, there's, you know, there's there's shoots that I don't care about the score. I'm working on something. Yeah. Well, there weren't shoots like that, right for, you know, in their shoots that I do care about. And I'm gonna try and do every pull out everything to see if I can use it, right. Yes. And and get a score that that I want. Yeah.

Okay, cool. Um, well, let's pause it there and do the live and then we'll come back to the second half of this

Transcribed by https://otter.ai