Brainwashing to Win

A large part of success does not come from your skills or knowledge, but from your psychology. Tom Gullikson is an American tennis player who has won sixteen top-level doubles titles in his professional life. At one point in his career, Gullikson had great trouble playing in tie-breakers. For those who have no idea, a tie-breaker in a tennis match is a kind of “sudden-death” play-off when the score is tied, and Gullikson always did poorly because of the tension it brings, which costed him many important matches. Practising tie-breakers does not help, because it can’t simulate the pressure in a real competition.

Therefore, he decided to seek help from a famous sports psychologist―James E. Loehr. According to several different sources, including Mentally Tough: The Principles of Winning at Sports Applied to Winning in Business (Loehr & McLaughlin, 1986), the therapy went like this―

“I hate tie-breaks and there is nothing that you can do or say to change my mind,” Gullikson told Loehr when they met. Loehr replied, “I have a very simple strategy I want you to follow; I want you to follow it for the next several weeks, and we’ll see the impact it has.”

Gullikson was expecting some really advanced formula which could change his career. Instead, he was a little confounded when Loehr told him a very silly idea:

“For every single day that passes, I want you to simply repeat to yourself twenty-five times, ‘I love tie-breakers.’” Gullikson looked at Loehr in disbelief and said it was the most absurb thing he had ever heard, but Loehr went on, “I want you to simply repeat to yourself, twenty-five times, ‘I love tie-breakers.’ And I want you to make a little sign and put it on your mirror in your bedroom or in the bathroom — ‘I love tie-breakers’ — and that's it. I want you to do it and I want you to give me the report.”

Despite the objections, Loehr insisted Gullikson to follow the plan, and the latter somehow reluctantly obliged.

In the first two weeks of the therapy, Gullikson kept telling Loehr that it wasn’t working, and he did not find himself loving tie-breakers more, but Loehr persisted. As time went, Loehr could feel that Gullikson’s hatred of tie-breakers had gradually deminished. Two more weeks passed, Gullikson called Loehr from Phoenix, where he was playing in a tournament, and he said:

“I won a tie-breaker today.”

“Great,” said Loehr.

“But I don’t think it has anything to do with that nonsense about ‘I love tie-breakers.’”

“Fine…” Loehr didn’t want to argue. “Have you been doing it?”

“Yes, it’s killing me, but I’m doing it, 25 times a day. I’ve got the sign on my mirror. I’m doing it.”

Two days later, Gullikson called Loehr again, and he said, “I won two tie-breakers today!”

“Yeah?”

“And I still don't think it has anything to do with that nonsense about ‘I love tie-breakers.’”

Even though Gullikson still verbally denied the effectiveness of the mantra, he confessed that he found something about him had changed mentally.

Gullikson said when he was playing in that particular match, he was two sets down. It was a best-of-five-sets rule, which meant that if he lost one more set, he would be out. It was funny that, in the third set, he found himself thinking, “If I can just get this guy to a tie-breaker, I’ll beat him.” And he duly did. He won the third set in a tie-breaker, and then went on to win the fourth set to get even. In the final set, the score was tied all the way through. Strangely enough, he found himself thinking the whole time, “If I can just get him to a tie-breaker, I’ll beat him.” He got into a fifth-set tie-breaker in which he won. Since then, Gullikson’s performance in tie-breakers has been incredible.

Tom Gullikson’s story demonstrated a very funny characteristic of our mind: if you repeat an idea many times enough to yourself, you will start to believe it, no matter how much you reject it in the first place. If it was not so, all the advertisements you see in the media would cease to exist. You must therefore pay a lot of attention to what you repeat to yourself every day―imagine what will happen if keep telling yourself, “I hate my job,” or, “I am a failure.” This is why the importance of self-affirmation cannot be understated.

Reference: Loehr, J. E., & McLaughlin, P. J. (1986). Mentally Tough: The Principles of Winning at Sports Applied to Winning in Business. Langham, MD: M. Evans & Company.