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Geeta in Sport: Buckling Under Pressure

August 13, 2011

Did you miss Tiger Woods' recent debacle at the US PGA? The golfing legend and former golf world no. 1, Tiger Woods did not even make the qualifying cut for the US PGA championship in Atlanta today. This picture by AP photographer Charles Riedel says it all.

For me this is a logical segue into Geeta 3-30.
मयि सर्वाणि कर्माणि संन्यस्याध्यात्मचेतसा |
निराशीर्निर्ममो भूत्वा युध्यस्व विगतज्वरः ||३-३०||
mayi sarvaaNi karmaaNi sa.nnyasyaadhyaatmachetasaa .
niraashiirnirmamo bhuutvaa yudhyasva vigatajvaraH .. 3\-30..
Renouncing all actions in Me, with the mind centered on the Self, free from expectation and egoism (ownership) , free from (mental) fever, fight!

This came to mind especially when I saw this interesting post by Cari Nierenberger on NBC News. The writer quotes research by Marci DeCaro at the University of Louisville in Kentucky.
DeCaro and a team of researchers recently published a study in the Journal of Experimental Psychology that found not all high-pressure situations are the same, and they looked at how different types of pressure influenced performance.
They compared "monitoring pressure" -- being watched by others, whether it's a teacher, audience, or video camera -- to "outcome pressure" -- seeking a high test score, prize money, scholarship, or title -- to lower-key situations.

"Pressure hurts performance if it leads you to pay attention in a way that is bad for the particular task you're doing," says DeCaro. Some skills are better performed when you devote a lot of attention to them, like solving math problems, she explains, while others (a well-learned sports skill like your golf putt) are performed better without thinking too closely about the steps you're taking.
Knowing what kinds of pressure situations lead you to focus too much or not enough, might help you find ways to overcome the problem.
Following Krishna's pithy discussion on the "science of action" (Gurudev's words), we come to understand the traps to avoid when under pressure. There are three challenges we need to overcome:
  1. The anxieties and worries of the future [referred here as outcome pressures in the research] 

  2. Jwara or excitement in the present [monitoring pressure seems to be a an approximation of this] and

  3. Regrets and memories of the past [often failures of the past intrude as self-doubt].

Krishna urges Arjuna to overcome these challenges through the Yoga of Action to win the crucial war.

Hari Om and Namaskaar until the next post
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