Mindfulness and autopilot

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rara
Posts: 255
Location: Huddersfield, UK

Mon May 13, 2013 9:50 am  

Question...

By now, practicing mindfulness is pretty standard practice throughout the day. I'm always reminding myself if my mind wanders to bring it back and continue mindfully at the task at hand. But what happens when there are things we have trained ourselves to do very well? When do you feel it's "ok" to let autopilot take over?

For example, a good footballer will train mindfully for years. As things get easier (as they get better) is he or she still thinking about exact placement of the foot with that pass? Or as they are jogging? (I mean, how many of us are really that mindful of what our legs are doing when jogging?) Surely mindfulness will eventually train ourselves to be subconsciously mindful (and quicker reacting too) to the point when eventually, we could "master" everything....
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JonW
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Mon May 13, 2013 9:58 am  

Having interviewed quite a few footballers in my time (including George Best, Stan "The Man" Bowles and Ryan Giggs), my guess would be that their athleticism transcends the mind. That's to say, they are creatures of pure instinct. In the case of Giggs I got the impression that very little goes on in his mind. In fact I asked him how often he thought about the meaning of life whilst out on the pitch and he had no answer to that. He simply gave me a funny look. The interview was curtailed by his PA shortly afterwards.
I interviewed Usain Bolt last year. The way he describes getting "into the zone" moments before the starting gun goes off would suggest that he applies a customised version of mindfulness to his pre-sprint preparations.
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piedwagtail91
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Mon May 13, 2013 10:22 am  

i thought about this when watching the IOM tt races. the riders there have got to be 'mindful', going round that circuit at those speeds, no use thinking about eating chips afterwards when you're going into a corner at 100mph.
i have a different opinion on jogging though, i haven't done a lot because of bad knees, but when i did go out i saw it as a development of mindful walking and was mindful of foot contact and what was going on in my legs, especially around my knees.

i do the same walking and to a certain extent bike riding.

it's good to learn how gifted sportsmen 'work', i can't help wondering if those who struggle to reach the top have the same thought patterns.

JonW
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Mon May 13, 2013 10:29 am  

I've discussed this with Jenson Button, asking him what goes on in his mind when he's zooming around that F1 circuit. The way he explained it is that he is pretty much one with his machine. He's not actually thinking consciously about anything. All his actions (accelerate, time for a pit stop etc) are all automatic.
I did ask whether he ever stops to wonder what's for tea later and he laughed. He replied, "The machine doesn't get hungry. The machine is not thinking about food. The machine is there to race."
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piedwagtail91
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Mon May 13, 2013 10:56 am  

nice reply from jenson!!!

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Gareth
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Mon May 13, 2013 7:41 pm  

This was constantly on my mind while watching the Olympics last year, watching all the athletes getting in 'the zone' before events, often with their headphones on. I reckon that most athletes are mindfulness practitioners whether they know it or not. They spend a lot of time training, and they must be paying close attention to their bodies whilst training. This could easily be considered as mindfulness practice. Most athletes seem like pretty peaceful people, which is the undeniable hallmark of a practitioner.

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rara
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Location: Huddersfield, UK

Tue May 14, 2013 9:43 am  

@Gareth Yeah, looks to be the case as they have to start somewhere. Just identifying early that they have a natural talent probably means they don't need to train themselves to be mindful...they just "are"

@Jon Hence they Ryan gigs reaction. I guess it's like comparing to when I perform, I don't think about a thing on stage, but it always goes very well. But I spend hours writing and rehearsing...again, I'm not telling myself to concentrate on what I'm doing, because I'm doing it anyway. I guess because I love it so much!

I always wondered what Jose Mourinho's secret was. A closet meditation practitioner? Maybe. But I think he is driven more by passion and is naturally a good tactician.
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JonW
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Tue May 14, 2013 10:03 am  

I can easily imagine Jose taking to the cushion in a way that seems unimaginable for, say, Steve Bruce.
Landon Donovan meditates before matches and, more famously, Roberto "The Divine Ponytail" Baggio was and presumably still is a Buddhist. He got a lot of flak from Christians after missing that decisive penalty in the '94 World Cup Final. They argued that, had he been God-fearing, the ball would have ended up in the onion bag.
Tiger Woods, of course, blamed the fact that he'd quit Buddhism after he was caught with his trousers down. He would later say that his many affairs were part of his tantric practice. Somehow I doubt his wife was too impressed with that line of reasoning.
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rara
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Tue May 14, 2013 5:56 pm  

That was too funny to read. Baggio, what a dude!
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Enigma
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Thu May 23, 2013 3:14 pm  

Autopilot has its utility. While engaging in familiar activities, resorting to this "hands-off-the-wheel" mentality frees up other mental faculties, thereby functioning in ways that can be amazingly resource efficient and cognitively economic. At the same time, it is prone to error, particularly errors that go undetected and uncorrected. For instance, we may not notice a mistake in our writing or typing when we let go of the reins and autopilot takes over. Similarly, an athlete may not notice a lapse in their form unless it is brought to their attention by a coach. The same goes for other professions, hobbies, and often social interactions in which one may surrender to autopilot, being so confident in one's abilities that one hardly notices minor or major blunders.

While I'm mining data, autopilot has a tendency to take over. Yet as soon as I notice this (sometimes a few minutes in) I bring conscious attention back to the task as a means of ensuring that I am performing to the best of my ability and not letting even minor errors in through an unguarded gate. This redirecting of cognitive resources away from the default network of mind-wandering and back to the present is a product of formal meditation practice spilling over into everyday mindfulness. It remains a work in progress, to say the least.
"[W]hen walking, standing, sitting, falling asleep, waking up, talking, & remaining silent, [s]he makes [her]self fully alert." — Satipatthana Sutta

Daily Meditation Journal: http://lotusbloomingfrommud.wordpress.com/

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