[FASTLARRY]

PARALYSIS BY ANALYSIS

6 pages, 4-11-00, Rev 4-24-08, CR, Fast Larry Guninger, all rights reserved, published in numerous internet sites.

Your heads are filled with pool data. Some of that is good, most of it is bad. Many things you have been taught are dead wrong. Beginners pretending to be experts wrote a lot of the big instruction books and most of these guys could not run 5 balls. The main one, let’s call him BB, does not even play pool and is a 3-cushion player. The guys who can play fluked out of the 3rd grade and can’t link two coherent sentences together. You listen to them MC on these tapes and it sounds like Mickey in Rocky talking. The guys who review these books can’t run 3 fookin balls so there you go. They are the ones telling you these books are great.

Realize this could be true and not everything is not as it should be. You are now free to drop anything taught to you. Do not hang on to anything as sacred and true. Play any way you now want to. I now free you from these bozos and ding dongs.
Does your draw stink? Welcome to the crowd. You thought it was no talent you. It never occurred to you that the guy teaching it to you sucked and did not have a clue did it? My method works every time for everyone. Theirs does not. You have been sold flawed methods by bad teachers. Low and level with a long follow through. What a joke, try and draw that way and you are doomed.

Jack up, stab down into the ball with a very short follow through and now it cooks. Just the opposite of what you have been taught. You get fed bad data from your pals, the bums in the pool hall and the ding dongs on the net chat sites. None of this crap connects into any working system. You got it all free. You got what you paid for dude. You are now filled with paralysis by analysis. You are now SIAC, a NASA term meaning spam in a can, you just crashed and burned. You listen to morons.

l/4 of all the people around you in a pool hall are total morons. Most of those morons become the best players in the room simply because they have no job, no life, no future, so they just play pool all day long and get good at it. They learn how to play by monkey see, monkey do. They do not have a clue how it all works or happens. Most of them when they talk about their senior year that was the 3rd grade. That is what you are now letting teach you pool.

They did a survey recently and asked the question does the sun revolve around the Earth. 18% said yes, and those same 18% when asked the question who is buried in Grants tomb said they did not know. 25% of the people in pool halls flunked both questions. After midnight half of them don’t know their zip codes.

So you run to the best player for advice. This guy has a 9 IQ, a long rap sheet, can’t get hired by a decent company, flunked out of the 3rd grade and this is what you want teaching you pool. No wonder you are so screwed up. You have all this crap rattling around up there driving you bonkers doing nothing for you and your game. The mind is like your cpu, bad crap in, bad crap out. That is why you play bad. Too many images of crap that does not work. You are programmed to take off and SIAC. You are like a Kamikaze pilot, you only take off well and you never land in one piece. Landing was not in the lessons? You teacher never intended for you to actually get there in one piece.

So you watch instruction tapes by top pro players and Jim Rempe will tell you he is afraid to cut a ball with center ball no English because it will slide, so he uses running on every cut. El Wrongo, he does not know what cling is and how to adjust for it. You must have center ball, running and reverse English, 3 of them perfected on your cut shots. Rempe only has one way to cut, Efren correctly uses all three. When I see Rempe have to use reverse, or center, he misses these sometimes because he does not practice them, or understand them.

Mike Sigel writes in Billiards Digest there is no such thing as throw? All the teachers almost laughed their selves to death. So here are two of the greatest players of all time who do not have a clue what cling or throw is? How scary is that one. One said, think of how great that guy really could have been, if somebody had taught him what throw is?

And most pros will tell you on long straight in shots to always use a little reverse English. El Wrongo, they were never taught to find and hit the exact center of their cue ball. So all this bad crap, is everywhere, from the very top to the bottom of the game. You need a coach, somebody who knows, who will sort all of this out for you.

Just because some big name said does it this way, he is not Moses coming down off of the mountain with that pool law just burned into stone by the God of pool. What you were taught might be wrong. Always just realize that possibility exists. There might be a better way of doing it that works. Just wake up to this ugly fact of life, not everything is what it seems to be. You are now to be free to drop anything taught to you, there are now no pool laws you have to obey. You are now free to play any way you want to. FL SAY SO, FL LOVES YA BABY. HE SET YOU FREE.

If you are getting free lessons from the boys in your pool hall then you really have a bunch of phony baloney in La Cabeza. If you are trying to learn how to play getting free advice off of the internet chat boards, then you are having sl 3’s who can’t run 3 balls teach you how to play and your brain now for sure is Spam in a can. That is a NASA term, which means you must crashed and burned and your brain now looks like spam in a can. You have bad data, a bad flight plan and what you end up doing on every flight you now take is crashing and burning. Reason for crash, pilot error, paralysis by analysis.

When your cpu gets totally corrupted like most of your minds are then do a cpu fix, wipe your hard drive clean. Start over from scratch. Begin with a fresh mind and a new attitude. Begin to figure a lot of these things out for yourself. Learn again, how to play pool naturally. If it feels bad, dump it. If it feels good, run with it. Hold on to nothing from the past. Start by playing by feel. This is a feel game. People taught to play mechanically are always losers to feel players. Play now using common sense. The first thing to lose is that stupid stance they put you into, wiggle around until you feel one that feels good. Do what feels natural and just follow your instincts. Many thing you probably used to do before worked until some ding dong teacher took them away from you. Take them back now. If anything feels awkward or un-natural like your stance then keep changing it around until it falls in for you. Experiment on different ways to play,

When both players are exact equals and one becomes a Zen feel player he then will dominate the other one. See pool as nothing but mental war. The warrior who has the toughest and most discipline mine wins. The one who is a mental flake loses. Every pool match you go into you must see yourself as an ancient warrior. Your cue is your sword. You are a Roman gladiator in the coliseum. You must now win or die. You go in taking no prisoners. You give no quarter or mercy. The other guy has to go, there is no emotion about it, it is just business. You must win, he must lose. He must be destroyed.

There have been up to eight different personalities identified that lend themselves to choking. You are a born choker, or a born loser as the story goes. You just can’t help it or change it. After a while you accept your fate like some East Indian Karma placing you in some lower cast in life. If you could have escaped you would have long ago. But other parts of your personality work for you. Your wife loves you and you have a good job. You are successful in most of life’s pursuits and in business and are not a loser and choking dog there. Your personality that is great for running your business may not be great for your pool game. The two are probably conflicting badly. You might be Andy Griffin in Mayberry and mister nice guy in business but at pool I want you to be Genghis Kahn. A killer.

We want you to play pool like Mister Spock on star trek, using pure logic and no emotion. Playing pool like Captain Kirk will win some spectacular matches but the more consistent Spock will win more in the long run. Remember Kirk crashed and burned two Enterprises. A Kirk filled with emotion is a natural gambler and risk taker and most of them end up broke and busted flat.

KIRK WOULD MAKE A GREAT POOL GAMBLER BUT A POOR TIN CUP PLAYER. PSYCHOLOGISTS WILL TELL YOU THE KIRK TYPE WILL BE A SUCCESSFUL STOCK INVESTOR; THE SPOCK TYPE WILL GET TOO TIED UP ANALYZING EVERY SITUATION WITH THE DETAILS. AN IRRATIONAL BEHAVIOR CAN SUCCEED IN BUSINESS BUT FAIL IN POOL. KIRK IS A RIGHT BRAIN PERSON, SPOCK A LEFT BRAINER.

A lot of business decisions are made out of fear, fear of losing customers or profits. Fear of not taking the deal or buying the stock today and the price going up on you tomorrow. People are driven by fear. In pool we now want you to play without any emotion or fear. We are not asking you to change you or who you are. Hang on to what makes you this great guy. We are telling you if you want to stop choking, you need to make changes inside your head. You need to shut off and turn down the things in your head that are being destructive to your pool game and winning pool matches. There is no born loser or choker we cannot change and turn into a winner. You are about to become the icemon. We now set you free from your disease of chocking. Send your generous contributions to my retirement fund please.

There was a fine A player whose name was old Joe. He had a zillion years of experience. He was cool as a cucumber at $100 a rack pool. He was a super player who did not make many mistakes and did not miss many shots. You had to play a really fine game to beat him. I never could, he was always just a hair above me. Joe really played super for an older guy in his mid 50’s.

So ole Joe had my number for over a year. I kept running into him in tourneys and he kept taking me out. He seemed to get up to play me and went on an upper level when he faced me than I saw him play against others. When he played me he knew I was good and to win he had to put it into high gear, which he could do. I began to study what was going on and a pattern would take place. We would be playing along dead even and at crunch time, he would get real quiet and stop talking. You could also see his eyes glass over. Then he would run 2 or 3 racks and out on me. Once he won, his normal friendly self would return.

I then realized Joe was going deep into the zone on me and that was how he was producing these amazing performances that were taking me out. The next time we met in a match, it was a repeat of the last one; he drifts down into his trance and begins a run. I let him shoot 3 or 4 balls and I got up and said Joe, tell me why you potted the 7 ball in the corner, that did not make any sense, I would have shot the 1 ball in the side, we were playing 8 ball. He stops dead in his tracks, walks over to me and explains in great detail why what he did was the proper move.

Of course it was, I knew that, I just wanted to start talking to him to bust him out of the zone to break up his concentration. Joe walks back up to the table and of course misses the first shot he faces, I ran out on him this time and won for the first time ever.
Every time we faced each other I used the same technique and it worked on him every time. After about winning 6 times in a row, he began to think I was much better than him and fear of me took him over. He never won again and I dominated him for the next decade. He was always better than me, but I managed to convince him I was the superior player. After my first win against him, the 2nd time up I won and did not miss a ball during that match. That kind of freaked the guy out.

Every one now and then has a great match and I rarely played that good. A year later I did not even have to bust him up any more to beat him. When he played me he never went into the zone on me again. When he saw me, he just gave up winning before the match got under way. He ran around telling everyone I was better than him and I never tried to correct that.
I do not bring this up as a model for you to shark people out of the zone who go in it on you. Sharking like that with the intentional desire to interfere with the other mans run while he is at the table in my opinion is UN ethical even if you get by with it as I did, even if the opponent does not realize what you did to him as old Joe never did.

Opponents are going to see you go in the zone and begin to go on a running balls rampage. They are going to panic and do something drastic. Soon after that experience with Joe I was in a tourney in a race to 6 at 8 ball. I won the lag and broke and ran 5 racks in a row as dead perfect as can be done. Every rack total textbook, every shot in line. I was deep in the zone from the get go. On the hill I broke and made 2 balls and the table was a perfect spread and a simple run out. Everyone in the room knew I was a 6-0 run out and win, the mayor knew it, even the Pope knew it, and the hooker standing next to me knew it. My opponent got up and began screaming at me, waving his arms around and went into a George of the Jungle act.

He accused me of fouling which was a damn made up lie. He stopped and shut down the run; because that was the only way he could see to stop me from winning. It was such a low down dirty trick I became furious over that and I was furious being dragged out of the zone and having my pure perfect run and performance stopped. When the yelling and screaming at each other stopped and I won the argument, I did not foul, I walked up and of course missed an easy shot and he runs out to win the game. He did to me what I did to old Joe, only the way he did it was really low class, I was at least slick about it.

I got so mad at the guy and upset I could not any longer play and I could not get back in the zone. I actually let the guy win 5 games in a row and get on the hill and broke for the match. He did not make a ball on the break and I ran out to win. If he had pulled that one out I might have gone bonkers. They may have had to tape a stick in my mouth and chain me to a tree for the night.

A few months later I was gambling and got on another roll and ran 8 racks in a row at 8 ball and the opponent went ape on me also to stop the run. I guess he got tired of just paying and racking and not getting to shoot. I was so deep in the zone I might not have ever missed. I got so upset with this guy, I just walked out the door with his money and said if you got a problem with that, meet me in the parking lot. They talk and G2 gets out on you that you’re playing in the zone. If one guy is able to bust you up, that gets around too and the rest of the gamblers are going to use that against you. The only way to prevent this is to shut down successfully the first guy who tries this ploy on you and handle it real cool.

I vowed right then and there to never ever allow anyone to do that to me again. If they go ape and begin to go off on me, I will just calmly look at them and respond if they make me. I will never allow any emotion to get involved or let adrenalin drop which crippled my playing the last time. I will stay cool and see this as nothing but a big act on the other guy’s part. He’s playing a part, like a wrestler in the ring, just acting the fool and he hopes he might get lucky with the act. I just laugh at the fool. I give him big smiles and say nothing for a while, then order a beer.

A lot of experienced players and especially the low rent roadies and gamblers with zero honor or scruples will pull this on you. They will do this even if they don’t see you in the zone. They just want to see if they can upset you to cause you to get mad and then tighten up and play worse that you can. There are a lot of roadie slime buckets that pull this on damn near every one they play for money. Expect to be attacked when you are in the zone and do not be surprised if they do pull your out. Do not experience anger when they do, for that anger will prevent your re entry. Stay nice and calm. Once the rumble is over and you shut the jerk up, leave the table and go sit down, tell him you are taking a little break for 5 minutes so he can calm down and put a sock in his pie hole. Close your eyes, Use your zone door opener technique, drift back down into the zone, then get up, open your eyes and resume play.

If he tries to talk to you during your run which he will simply ignore him and refuse to answer him no matter what he is saying or protesting to. Just keep shooting balls in. Don’t stop until the game is over. Make him get up and do something to stop the game like lay his cue down on the table if he has a protest. If he does not do that, ignore him. When you miss and go to your chair, wait for him to begin play and then answer him with the questions he was giving you when you were at the table. Only talk to him or answer him when he is shooting. When you are playing, do not look at him or respond to him, totally ignore him. If he keeps messing with you quit, leave, do not put up with this behavior.

If you can dream it, see it, believe it, you can do it and you can be it. You can perform totally out of the box. Then you are a person with no limits who can achieve anything he can imagine that a human body is capable of producing. “FL” Go tattoo this one under your eyelids: Winning is everything. Winning is the only thing. Winning is something you have to do because you worked hard for the win and you deserve it. You win because you put yourself in a position to win. When you get there and you know you should win and are capable of winning so you do. You put it away and don’t let them slip away. You are a closer. You expect to win, you have been there many times before, you know how to and you want to. You can see no reason why it won’t happen again right now.

Show me a guy who does not mind losing and I will show you a sausage. Show me a good loser and I will show you a loser. “FL”
“Nice guys finish last” quote from Lou Durocher, hall of fame player and manager of the baseball Brooklyn Dodgers. They were called bums until they defeated the UN beatable Yankees which all felt they had no chance to do. His aggressive teaching turned losers into winners and world champions.
You need to shut off and turn down the things in your head that are being destructive to your pool game and winning pool matches. There is no born loser or choker we cannot change and turn into a winner. You are about to become the icemon. You have found the ones who can make you that.

"Do, or do not. There is no 'try'." – Yoda
It is all about visualization, focus, concentration and playing in the zone. You just see it, feel it, do it: It does not get any deeper than this? Play pool with an empty mind. “FL”
“Flow with whatever may happen and let your mind be free: Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing and whatever comes your way.” Chuang-Tzu.
Opportunities multiply as they are seized." - Sun Tzu
Our greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.
Author: Confucius.
It ain’t over till it’s over. “Yogi Berra.” Keep playing with all your heart until the Fat Lady sings.