Nick Sheridan

If you’re constantly being zapped by the idea that you can’t do something, or that you’re stupid or less important than somebody else, then eventually you’re going to start believing it.

asked them to concentrate on making their imagination as vivid as possible. He wanted them to see the court and feel the weight of the ball in their hands. He asked them to hear the swoosh of the ball as it dropped neatly through the net.
The third group were told NOT TO PLAY basketball for a whole month.
At the end of the month, Alan got the team back together and recorded their accuracy again, just as he had done before.
The results were astounding.
The third group (who had done absolutely nothing) showed no signs of improvement. That makes sense – as we know, you won’t get better at something if you don’t practise.
The first group, who had practised for an hour every day, had improved – in fact, they scored around 24% more. For example, if a player had scored 16 baskets the first time around, one month later they scored 20 baskets.
Again, nothing very unusual about that – Alan expected the group that practised to get better at throwing, and that’s exactly what happened.
But what about the second group? That’s where the big surprise came.
That group had done nothing but IMAGINE themselves throwing the ball into the basket – but they had improved too! In fact, they had improved ALMOST AS MUCH as the group that had practised every day!

The second group were told to simply IMAGINE throwing the ball every day. Alan