My Experiences May Not be Good Advice - Project Hunger Games

Katniss (of the Project Hunger Game Series section of my blog) shared with me she played a tournament match on a stream table a few months ago.  Being the person I am who asks questions because I'm inquisitive, I asked her if she watched the match afterwards.  Well, and in order to write about her pool journey I need to ask questions, right?  haha

This is one of those situations, though, I have realized I think I share too much of my own experiences, that are not helpful to others.

You all know I have written several times about how listening to streams affected my play. Back when I was playing competitively often, if I listened to streams and if what they said wasn't positive (unlike Billy Guy who I wrote about who was not only effective, but never negative), I discovered it affected my future play on stream tables.  Sometimes they would say negative, hurtful, unattractive things about people's games.

But not only that, people in the chat hide behind keyboards and they would say pretty crappy things in the comments. It's almost like they don't even realize what they're saying is rude.

However, no matter how much they're hiding, usually what they are saying is true. But, it just happens to not be stated in a very nice way at all, right?

So, that's why towards the end of my pool journey I didn't want to watch streams. Not ust because of what the commentators said oftentimes, but also because what I read from the peanut gallery might be in the back of mind for my next stream matches.

Does that make sense?

In other words, when I was on a stream I would get nervous because I would think about the people that might be on there that would be judging me. That's the bottom line. I wasn't mentally strong enough to look at it the way Tina Malm does (which I wish I could have, which I wish I did! lol).

So, it kinda freaked me out to be on the stream. Don't get me wrong, I became mentally strong in the last couple of years of my successful pool journey, and so I won many more matches than lost on the streams, but I am not shy to admit I was internally tormented trying to not think about people watching/commentating if I made a gross mistake, and just focus on the match in front of me.  Luckily I learned and instilled many tips to keep me focused on the game in front of me, but it was still tough at times not to be distracted by my own negative thoughts of the "what ifs" about the people watching me on the stream.

Back to Katniss....

I had shared with Katniss (after she told me she hadn't yet watched her recorded match) that she should watch it with the sound off. And I also told her to not read the comments.

Now, she's a big girl she can listen to the commentators and she can read the comments - it was just my suggestion.

But, honestly, I'm not sure it was a good suggestion on my part.

I can tell that Katniss is more mentally strong and mentally tougher than I was at her spot in her pool journey, so I really don't think that she would have the same negative effects that I did.

And I need to really be careful about my advice.  I need to remember that my lack of mental toughness was my experience.  And therefore, I should not give such pinpointed advice.  Instead of suggesting to her not to turn the sound on or read comments, I should state it in another way or maybe not be so specific with my advice. Just because I was deeply affected along the way in my pool journey with this topic doesn't mean others will be.

Don't get me wrong - Katniss is her own person and she listens to advice and then decides on her own what to do and not do, so it's not like she HAS to do what I suggested. But I can help be better in these situations and be more general about things like this.