Hi Nick! RE: Weekly Motivational Piece - June 30, 2012

Greetings Nick!



MY INSPIRATIONAL STORY THIS WEEK: I love to watch how teams win. I am not always enamored with statistics. It’s more about resolve and how individual players can sacrifice for the better, lay it on the line and perform in the clutch. Doesn’t matter how much fame you have or dollars in the bank account. Let LeBron James serve as your poster boy from now on when I speak of developing your “mindset” and how everything above your neck all connects the dots with your lower body and has the final say with your ultimate performance on the field.


The NBA hasn't really seen a player with LeBron’s physical gifts? He’s rare in that James is at or near tops in his sport with the ability to score, dish out and even defend better than most. But there’s been this knock on his basketball resume that he couldn’t perform in the clutch, especially at the end of games. That was painfully obvious during the 2011 NBA Championship series when Dallas ran past the same Miami cast of players and James averaged a dismal three points in fourth quarters of those six games.

Things were so bad that this past year, an NBA player poll was conducted and James did not receive one single vote for the “player you would want to take the last shot in a game.”


The key for any athlete, no matter their sport, boils down to your STOMACH and STAMINA; WILL POWER and MINDSET that determines many an outcome! At the pro level, the player that can block out the thousands of voices creeping into your head daily will make the difference.

What changed it all this year for LeBron when suddenly he put up Hall of Fame numbers during the recently concluded NBA Playoffs – averaged 26 points, 13 assists and 11 rebounds per game? “He was thinking too much” said Miami teammate Dwayne Wade.

LeBron realized that to manage expectation, to meet expectation, HE HAD TO REMOVE HIMSELF FROM THE EXPECTATION! Last year and in season’s past, LeBron was a tortured soul. Yes, he was hated for his decision to leave Cleveland and then to boast about the numerous championships he would win in Miami.

“The best thing that happened to me two years ago was us losing the Finals, you know, and me playing the way I played. It was the best thing to ever happen to me in my career because basically I got back to the basics. It humbled me. I knew what it was going to have to take, and I was going to have to change as a basketball player, and I was going to have to change as a person to ultimately get what I wanted. “

"It took me to go all the way to the top and then hit rock bottom, basically, to realize what I needed to do as a professional athlete and as a person," James said. “I had to get back to being myself."

Coming to grips with all of this has been one of the great challenges of LeBron’s life. Here’s a superior player. One of the world’s most recognizable faces and wealthiest athletes yet LeBron took it upon himself during the summer of 2011 to strip every part of his living being and face the “demons” head-on that occupied his mind for much too long. He was on a personal mission to reclaim his confidence and joy about playing basketball. He asked for the help of other professionals. He worked on his game and moves around the basket. He sought out other leaders in the sports profession to develop an understanding on what does it take to be a leader? He found out that it’s more than just scoring a lot of points and making a fiery speech before a big game. It took humility, self-evaluation and soul-searching to re-focus LeBron James.

"I was very immature two years ago," said James. "I played to prove people wrong instead of just playing my game, instead of just going out and having fun and playing a game that I grew up loving. One thing that I learned, and someone taught me this, the greatest teacher you can have in life is experience and then confidence to go out and perform in your sport."

The LeBron who'd been skewered with so much hatred for the past two years ... that wasn't him, he said. He absorbed the hate and tried to fight it -- tried to dish it right back, with every move he made. It didn't work -- in fact, it failed epically -- and he wouldn't have gotten his first NBA title without letting it all go and reshaping his mindset.


ALL THE BEST MY FRIEND!


Jim Loria

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“You have got to Win in your Mind before you can Win in Life” – stated by an unknown author

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“Our mistakes don’t make or break us. If we are lucky, they simply reveal who we really are, what we’re really made of. Challenges will come, but if you treat them simply as tests of who you are, you’ll come out of it not bitter and victimized, but smarter and stronger” – stated by Donn Moomaw, Pro Football Player

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“We are all here for some special reason. Stop being a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future” – stated by Robin Sharma, Author


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“No matter where you are in life right now, no matter who you are, no matter how old you are – it is never too late to be who you are meant to be” – stated by Esther & Jerry Hicks

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“The first step toward success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself” – stated by Mark Caine


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Jim Loria
E-Mail: loria@sfstampede.com