Recently, during a busy period of commentary on IPL 2024 and the launch of his second book 'The Winner's Mindset' by HarperCollins Publishers India, Watson, in an exclusive interview with IANS, talked about overcoming small childhood fears and a life-changing meeting. Talked about. Author and performance coach de Jacques Dallaire, and how he used his mental skills to score a memorable 117 in the IPL 2018 final for Chennai Super Kings.
Q. You talk in the book about spending two completely life-changing days with de Jacques Delaire. Can you tell in detail what happened in those two days?
A. I was at one of those moments in my life when I connected with Dr. Jacques through an Australian IndyCar driver. Will-Power.Dr. Jacques' background is over 5 years of working with high performance people on the mental side primarily in Formula One, IndyCar and NASCAR, Special Forces. I was going through a challenging time in my life where I was neither performing nor anywhere near my best. It felt like I was going to retire because I knew I wouldn't be able to play the way I used to.
Initially after a half-hour conversation with him, I was like, 'Okay, I think this guy will give me some information that I haven't heard before, but I think will really help me.' I was desperate because I was thinking about retiring and drove to Charlotte, North Carolina, to spend two days with her.The information he gave me was something I had not heard before, even though I have been around sports psychologists and mental skills coaches since I was about 13 years old. How simply he explained the information to me, it was just like, light bulbs were going off everywhere, like, 'Oh my God, didn't I know this?' After that, I flew back to Sydney and I felt , ranging from 'Oh, I've got this, I can change it' to 'Oh no, I can't'. It took a lot of work day after day to understand and control my thoughts. But within six weeks, the issues I had disappeared as if they were out of control and over the next four years of my sporting career, I had some of the best performances of my life.
From that moment of applying those mental skills and information that have a huge impact on my performance, I said to Dr. Jacques, 'Okay, I need to get this information out to as many people as possible because this information can be easily Should be available from., but it's not like that'.
Wherever I've looked, I haven't been able to find information in a simple enough way that I can apply it to any performance. From that moment on, I started working with him and he taught me how to convey this information. Now I'm very fortunate to have access to his IP and am able to put it into my own words and get the information out to as many people as possible.> You can read the short ball coming after the tragic death of Phil Hughes. Let's also talk about the fear of facing.How did you overcome this?
A. It was one of the biggest, if not the biggest, tragedies in world cricket when one of our mates was hit by the ball. From there, began to believe and think that there is no reason why the next ball that comes my way can't have the same impact on my life and my family's life.
From that moment, the fear of the short ball came into my mind and game, which means that as a top order batsman you are spoiling your performance because of that fear which is creating a new mental environment.Dr. Meeting Jacques made me understand that I could change things through one of the Laws of the Mental Path – Rule Number Two, which is that your mind can actively process one thought at a time. Understanding deeply that if I put the right thing in my mind at the right time, the wrong thing cannot come in.As a batsman, the wrong thing that came with the fear of the short ball was that if you focus on the short ball in advance, you are slow on it anyway. If it is not a Noise Ball, you are out of position and exposed, which means you have a good chance of getting busted.
Having the right thing in my mind at the right time as the ball comes out and the word I used for me is aggressive because I'm ready to react and I have no idea what's going to happen. By executing this, I am tapping into all my instincts and the muscle memory that is so deeply ingrained in me. Realizing this, the thought immediately came to my mind, 'Oh, I can do this.''I was not confident in my technique of playing short ball and I worked hard for six weeks to retrain it. But by keeping the right thing in my mind, so that the wrong thing could not come in, that fear never existed in my sorrow again.
Q. In those last four years, he scored an unbeaten 117 runs for Chennai Super Kings against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL 2018 final. From zero on three balls to scoring a century in the IPL final, what did you have to do mentally?
A. It was really the culmination of putting all those mental skills together. Started learning these skills in late 2015 and took a few years to really absorb all the information and learn how to get the most out of it.Like, what were the right and wrong ideas before the game? What was the best way to maintain my mental energy before such a big game without wasting it? Even when I was on zero on 10 balls while chasing in the second innings, every ball remained in the present It was all about staying put, focusing completely on the present and smashing each ball. Technically, what happened mentally after I faced a ball, where was I? I just kept doing this.
I was just in the process, being completely present, working to bring the best version of myself when the ball came out. Even five years ago, when no one was playing a single ball, I was much more likely to panic and say, 'Oh my God, I really have to get on with it and play the shot in a hurry. will be.'
While I was dragging myself to the end zone you were chasing, I knew that every step along the way was getting me closer to the end point you are trying to bring to the performance – the zone. So it took a while to pull myself into it, about 15 or 20 balls.Once I got there, I stayed in that moment and that's when I had a great day in one of those high-pressure games. That innings was a culmination of the skills I had been training for since I was a kid and then applying the new mental skills I had been integrating into my performance as well, at the age of 36.
That really was a perfect storm – applying it to a pressure game confirmed once again that these mental skills are very powerful. I wish I had this information as a teenager because it would have meant that I would have been able to perform more consistently and significantly reduce the pressure, stress, anxiety that comes with being desperate to get the best results every time. Is associated with.
Q. Do you think that if you had encountered these mental skills early in your career, it would have helped you a lot mentally? A. There is no doubt that this would have helped a lot, especially from a Test cricket point of view.The biggest issue I see in society now is mental fatigue from working with a lot of different people. There is so much stimulation that we always have things available to us, whether it's messages on social media, or notifications, life is incredibly busy and overstimulating.
Also, our desire to be able to perform every time and being obsessed with the result, I am definitely one of them. I wanted to be the best I could possibly be and put a lot of pressure on myself to perform because of my desire to achieve the best results. I used to think too much about the conditions before a big series like the Ashes or the World Cup.Before match day, I would just say, 'Who am I going to be up against? Who am I playing?' I would have played in my mind before the game even started. When the actual game came, I was mentally very tired and exhausted. When you are mentally tired, your ability to access deeply rooted skills is reduced and decision making becomes much slower. It is as if you are stuck in the mud, whereas when you are mentally When you are refreshed, you have a lot of energy, and your ability to make decisions is accurate, clear and fast. At the time, I didn't know the concept of your brain being around like a muscle.Once I understood this information about preserving and reviving my mental energy I made sure to get the most out of it.
So I used a few different techniques to be able to conserve my mental energy even when I was playing games. Like, I put a song in my head to keep my mind neutral. Different people have different techniques for doing this, whether it's focusing on breathing, or chewing gum like Sir Viv Richards. When the ball is about to come out, they have all the mental energy to react to the ball to their full potential.Q. You just mentioned using music to keep your mind in a neutral state. How was it possible for you to implement this in your performance?A. Music has always been something I've enjoyed, even as a child. I learned to play guitar in my early 20s and being on tour, especially with Brett Lee, was also a way to relax. I didn't necessarily do it to relax, I was doing it because I had so much free time on tour and I wanted to learn a new skill.
But what I realize when I look back at many of my best performances, even before I knew this information, is that I had a catchy song in my mind that I was just singing - even if it was a song that I heard take you to the game or some song that was playing while I was batting.It was there in the background the whole time.
Glenn McGrath and Michael Clarke always had a song in mind that they used. Didn't completely understand why they used it, but it worked incredibly well for them. It wasn't until Dr. Jacques explained to me the power of something that you can do to shift your mind and put it in a neutral state. For me, songs were something that went past. I used to work, that it used to happen without even consciously putting a song in my head.From that moment on, I was like, 'Okay, no matter what, one, if I start thinking too much about a situation, even early in the game, in my mind one The song settles.
If I was thinking too much about a situation, shape or form, I put a song in my head, because it means I can trust my gut instincts, intuition, as well as my mental energy. So I can access my superhighway reactions. And be ready to react when the ball comes out.
Q. You talk in the book about spending two completely life-changing days with de Jacques Delaire. Can you tell in detail what happened in those two days?
A. I was at one of those moments in my life when I connected with Dr. Jacques through an Australian IndyCar driver. Will-Power.Dr. Jacques' background is over 5 years of working with high performance people on the mental side primarily in Formula One, IndyCar and NASCAR, Special Forces. I was going through a challenging time in my life where I was neither performing nor anywhere near my best. It felt like I was going to retire because I knew I wouldn't be able to play the way I used to.
Initially after a half-hour conversation with him, I was like, 'Okay, I think this guy will give me some information that I haven't heard before, but I think will really help me.' I was desperate because I was thinking about retiring and drove to Charlotte, North Carolina, to spend two days with her.The information he gave me was something I had not heard before, even though I have been around sports psychologists and mental skills coaches since I was about 13 years old. How simply he explained the information to me, it was just like, light bulbs were going off everywhere, like, 'Oh my God, didn't I know this?' After that, I flew back to Sydney and I felt , ranging from 'Oh, I've got this, I can change it' to 'Oh no, I can't'. It took a lot of work day after day to understand and control my thoughts. But within six weeks, the issues I had disappeared as if they were out of control and over the next four years of my sporting career, I had some of the best performances of my life.
From that moment of applying those mental skills and information that have a huge impact on my performance, I said to Dr. Jacques, 'Okay, I need to get this information out to as many people as possible because this information can be easily Should be available from., but it's not like that'.
Wherever I've looked, I haven't been able to find information in a simple enough way that I can apply it to any performance. From that moment on, I started working with him and he taught me how to convey this information. Now I'm very fortunate to have access to his IP and am able to put it into my own words and get the information out to as many people as possible.> You can read the short ball coming after the tragic death of Phil Hughes. Let's also talk about the fear of facing.How did you overcome this?
A. It was one of the biggest, if not the biggest, tragedies in world cricket when one of our mates was hit by the ball. From there, began to believe and think that there is no reason why the next ball that comes my way can't have the same impact on my life and my family's life.
From that moment, the fear of the short ball came into my mind and game, which means that as a top order batsman you are spoiling your performance because of that fear which is creating a new mental environment.Dr. Meeting Jacques made me understand that I could change things through one of the Laws of the Mental Path – Rule Number Two, which is that your mind can actively process one thought at a time. Understanding deeply that if I put the right thing in my mind at the right time, the wrong thing cannot come in.As a batsman, the wrong thing that came with the fear of the short ball was that if you focus on the short ball in advance, you are slow on it anyway. If it is not a Noise Ball, you are out of position and exposed, which means you have a good chance of getting busted.
Having the right thing in my mind at the right time as the ball comes out and the word I used for me is aggressive because I'm ready to react and I have no idea what's going to happen. By executing this, I am tapping into all my instincts and the muscle memory that is so deeply ingrained in me. Realizing this, the thought immediately came to my mind, 'Oh, I can do this.''I was not confident in my technique of playing short ball and I worked hard for six weeks to retrain it. But by keeping the right thing in my mind, so that the wrong thing could not come in, that fear never existed in my sorrow again.
Q. In those last four years, he scored an unbeaten 117 runs for Chennai Super Kings against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL 2018 final. From zero on three balls to scoring a century in the IPL final, what did you have to do mentally?
A. It was really the culmination of putting all those mental skills together. Started learning these skills in late 2015 and took a few years to really absorb all the information and learn how to get the most out of it.Like, what were the right and wrong ideas before the game? What was the best way to maintain my mental energy before such a big game without wasting it? Even when I was on zero on 10 balls while chasing in the second innings, every ball remained in the present It was all about staying put, focusing completely on the present and smashing each ball. Technically, what happened mentally after I faced a ball, where was I? I just kept doing this.
I was just in the process, being completely present, working to bring the best version of myself when the ball came out. Even five years ago, when no one was playing a single ball, I was much more likely to panic and say, 'Oh my God, I really have to get on with it and play the shot in a hurry. will be.'
While I was dragging myself to the end zone you were chasing, I knew that every step along the way was getting me closer to the end point you are trying to bring to the performance – the zone. So it took a while to pull myself into it, about 15 or 20 balls.Once I got there, I stayed in that moment and that's when I had a great day in one of those high-pressure games. That innings was a culmination of the skills I had been training for since I was a kid and then applying the new mental skills I had been integrating into my performance as well, at the age of 36.
That really was a perfect storm – applying it to a pressure game confirmed once again that these mental skills are very powerful. I wish I had this information as a teenager because it would have meant that I would have been able to perform more consistently and significantly reduce the pressure, stress, anxiety that comes with being desperate to get the best results every time. Is associated with.
Q. Do you think that if you had encountered these mental skills early in your career, it would have helped you a lot mentally? A. There is no doubt that this would have helped a lot, especially from a Test cricket point of view.The biggest issue I see in society now is mental fatigue from working with a lot of different people. There is so much stimulation that we always have things available to us, whether it's messages on social media, or notifications, life is incredibly busy and overstimulating.
Also, our desire to be able to perform every time and being obsessed with the result, I am definitely one of them. I wanted to be the best I could possibly be and put a lot of pressure on myself to perform because of my desire to achieve the best results. I used to think too much about the conditions before a big series like the Ashes or the World Cup.Before match day, I would just say, 'Who am I going to be up against? Who am I playing?' I would have played in my mind before the game even started. When the actual game came, I was mentally very tired and exhausted. When you are mentally tired, your ability to access deeply rooted skills is reduced and decision making becomes much slower. It is as if you are stuck in the mud, whereas when you are mentally When you are refreshed, you have a lot of energy, and your ability to make decisions is accurate, clear and fast. At the time, I didn't know the concept of your brain being around like a muscle.Once I understood this information about preserving and reviving my mental energy I made sure to get the most out of it.
So I used a few different techniques to be able to conserve my mental energy even when I was playing games. Like, I put a song in my head to keep my mind neutral. Different people have different techniques for doing this, whether it's focusing on breathing, or chewing gum like Sir Viv Richards. When the ball is about to come out, they have all the mental energy to react to the ball to their full potential.Q. You just mentioned using music to keep your mind in a neutral state. How was it possible for you to implement this in your performance?A. Music has always been something I've enjoyed, even as a child. I learned to play guitar in my early 20s and being on tour, especially with Brett Lee, was also a way to relax. I didn't necessarily do it to relax, I was doing it because I had so much free time on tour and I wanted to learn a new skill.
But what I realize when I look back at many of my best performances, even before I knew this information, is that I had a catchy song in my mind that I was just singing - even if it was a song that I heard take you to the game or some song that was playing while I was batting.It was there in the background the whole time.
Glenn McGrath and Michael Clarke always had a song in mind that they used. Didn't completely understand why they used it, but it worked incredibly well for them. It wasn't until Dr. Jacques explained to me the power of something that you can do to shift your mind and put it in a neutral state. For me, songs were something that went past. I used to work, that it used to happen without even consciously putting a song in my head.From that moment on, I was like, 'Okay, no matter what, one, if I start thinking too much about a situation, even early in the game, in my mind one The song settles.
If I was thinking too much about a situation, shape or form, I put a song in my head, because it means I can trust my gut instincts, intuition, as well as my mental energy. So I can access my superhighway reactions. And be ready to react when the ball comes out.
