Lesson: The Mamba Mentality
One of the Foundational Pillars of the Fight ON! Mentality
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The main difference between ELITE ATHLETES and normal ones is their MENTAL GAME. All athletes want to find a way to gain an edge but only a few spend time in developing their mental game.
An athlete's mental toughness is what determines whether or not he can STEP UP to the challenge or SHY AWAY from it. Everyone has a natural in-born physiological reaction that occurs in response to a perceived harmful event, attack, or threat to survival, called the FIGHT or FLIGHT response. It’s mental performance that’s responsible for developing the habits and routines needed for consistent peak performance, every minute, every hour, every day and in every high pressure game situations. With Fight ON! Mentality, we teach everyone how to develop their mental mindset into to an unbreakable level to withstand the UPS and DOWNS of high level competition. |
“To sum up what Mamba Mentality is, it means to be able to constantly try to be the best version of yourself.”
-Kobe Bryant
The late, great Kobe Bryant created the Mamba Mentality. In his auto documentary, he discussed how he created the Black Mamba mentality while going through significant struggles on and off the court (Bryant). The irony with the Black Mamba mentality is that by the age of 6 Kobe was already practicing pillars of the Mamba Mentality; he just didn’t have a name for it until 2003. Let’s think about that for a moment, he was 6 years old, a little boy. This is great information for the skeptics out there. Furthermore, some of you have been practicing the beliefs associated with the Black Mamba mentality as well and you may not even know it.
There are five principles that define the Mamba Mentality (Bullard, 2017). They are listed below:
1. Be Passionate
2. Be Obsessive
3. Be Relentless
4. Be Resilient
5. Be Fearless
Be Passionate
Kobe Bryant advises parents to encourage kids to find their passion, by exposing them to different things. “If they have that passion, they will go off and do it” (Bryant, 2017). This not only applies to kids but also young adults and adults as well. Try new things, if you’re in school try different courses. Your parents may have struggled in math, but you may have a totally different experience in it and you could end up tutoring people in math. If you’re in college, try taking acting courses, you may be a natural. There are athletes who grew up playing basketball and switch to football during their sophomore year of high school. Ironically, they go on to earn a full scholarship in the new sport, football after being groomed as a basketball player their entire life.
Be Obsessive
Whatever you commit to in life, do so with 100% effort without question. If you have ever heard someone say “eat, drink, and sleep it,” this is what they were talking about. Think of that football player that carries a football with them everywhere. The basketball player that knows all the stats about every NBA player along with all the different kinds of slam dunks. They are obsessive, their sport is everything. This could be applied to success. That person that wants to be successful in life, they don’t take no for an answer. They continue to come back, to try again, and to make revisions as needed. One last thing to think about when being obsessive, is everything counts. When you are on the court, the pace you run your sprints at; in your office building how you greet everyone in your building; when you are teaching, how you respect your students and colleagues, it all counts and works toward you becoming the best you!
Be Relentless
Be relentless in your pursuit of perfection or greatness. If you want to be important, take extra time in making sure you look important. If you score 2 touchdowns in 1 game, up the ante and go for 3 in the next game. If you close out 7 deals in a day, up the ante and try to double that number. To be relentless applies to so much including getting out of debt. If you paid your minimum payment on a credit card this month, next month double or even triple the payment. One thing to keep in mind with being relentless is it involves reflection and sacrifice. You just keep going and going, with no plans of stopping or letting up.
Be Resilient
Being resilient as defined by Webster is “the ability of something to return to its original shape after it has been pulled, stretched, pressed, bent, etc. (2020).” In life, you have to be able to bounce back. For example, if you allow an experience to put you in a bad mood, you have to be able to recover and get back to your original state before the experience happened. If your boss gives you a hard time, you have to be able to dismiss that and get back to the condition you were in before you spoke with your boss. When you have a bad game, you have to bounce back or else you do what some coaches refer to as “letting our opponents beat us twice.” If you fall down, get back up. Keep getting back up every time. The power of being resilient is exemplified when we overcome challenges; and overcoming challenges helps us strengthen our ability to be resilient.
Be Fearless
When you are on the court, be fearless. Don’t be afraid to take the final shot. Go for a steal or a block without having fear of being called for a foul. Equally important, be smart when you are in “foul trouble” or have 4 fouls and are at risk of fouling out. Be fearless in life when you go to a job interview. A gentleman once left work an hour early before his job interview at another job. Instead of going to change, he decided to wear his polo shirt and Khakis. When he was informed he didn’t get the job, they also said it was because he didn’t dress up. He was not fearless, he was arrogant. There's a thin line between being fearless and being arrogant. Look at failure as an opportunity to improve, this will help you avoid the fear of failure be become fearless. When you don’t fail, you miss an opportunity to identify where you need to grow.
In closing, the Mamba Mentality is more mental than anything. It consists of bringing your mind to a higher level before you take any action. Don’t mistake the Mamba Mentality as something you use in the moment. It is equally important well before the moment to aide in the conditioning of your mind to help you be the best version of yourself.
The Mamba Mentality is a critical part of the Fight ON! Mentality, serving as one of the three foundational pillars, along with Mindfulness and The Growth Mindset.
References
Bryant, K. (2015). Kobe Bryant’s Muse. A legend unguarded.
Bryant, K. (2017). Power of mind. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AroRiJGcPR0
Bullard, A. (2017). The five pillars of the mamba mentality.
https://coachadambullardbasketball.com/2017/07/14/the-five-pillars-of-the-mamba-mentality/
-Kobe Bryant
The late, great Kobe Bryant created the Mamba Mentality. In his auto documentary, he discussed how he created the Black Mamba mentality while going through significant struggles on and off the court (Bryant). The irony with the Black Mamba mentality is that by the age of 6 Kobe was already practicing pillars of the Mamba Mentality; he just didn’t have a name for it until 2003. Let’s think about that for a moment, he was 6 years old, a little boy. This is great information for the skeptics out there. Furthermore, some of you have been practicing the beliefs associated with the Black Mamba mentality as well and you may not even know it.
There are five principles that define the Mamba Mentality (Bullard, 2017). They are listed below:
1. Be Passionate
2. Be Obsessive
3. Be Relentless
4. Be Resilient
5. Be Fearless
Be Passionate
Kobe Bryant advises parents to encourage kids to find their passion, by exposing them to different things. “If they have that passion, they will go off and do it” (Bryant, 2017). This not only applies to kids but also young adults and adults as well. Try new things, if you’re in school try different courses. Your parents may have struggled in math, but you may have a totally different experience in it and you could end up tutoring people in math. If you’re in college, try taking acting courses, you may be a natural. There are athletes who grew up playing basketball and switch to football during their sophomore year of high school. Ironically, they go on to earn a full scholarship in the new sport, football after being groomed as a basketball player their entire life.
Be Obsessive
Whatever you commit to in life, do so with 100% effort without question. If you have ever heard someone say “eat, drink, and sleep it,” this is what they were talking about. Think of that football player that carries a football with them everywhere. The basketball player that knows all the stats about every NBA player along with all the different kinds of slam dunks. They are obsessive, their sport is everything. This could be applied to success. That person that wants to be successful in life, they don’t take no for an answer. They continue to come back, to try again, and to make revisions as needed. One last thing to think about when being obsessive, is everything counts. When you are on the court, the pace you run your sprints at; in your office building how you greet everyone in your building; when you are teaching, how you respect your students and colleagues, it all counts and works toward you becoming the best you!
Be Relentless
Be relentless in your pursuit of perfection or greatness. If you want to be important, take extra time in making sure you look important. If you score 2 touchdowns in 1 game, up the ante and go for 3 in the next game. If you close out 7 deals in a day, up the ante and try to double that number. To be relentless applies to so much including getting out of debt. If you paid your minimum payment on a credit card this month, next month double or even triple the payment. One thing to keep in mind with being relentless is it involves reflection and sacrifice. You just keep going and going, with no plans of stopping or letting up.
Be Resilient
Being resilient as defined by Webster is “the ability of something to return to its original shape after it has been pulled, stretched, pressed, bent, etc. (2020).” In life, you have to be able to bounce back. For example, if you allow an experience to put you in a bad mood, you have to be able to recover and get back to your original state before the experience happened. If your boss gives you a hard time, you have to be able to dismiss that and get back to the condition you were in before you spoke with your boss. When you have a bad game, you have to bounce back or else you do what some coaches refer to as “letting our opponents beat us twice.” If you fall down, get back up. Keep getting back up every time. The power of being resilient is exemplified when we overcome challenges; and overcoming challenges helps us strengthen our ability to be resilient.
Be Fearless
When you are on the court, be fearless. Don’t be afraid to take the final shot. Go for a steal or a block without having fear of being called for a foul. Equally important, be smart when you are in “foul trouble” or have 4 fouls and are at risk of fouling out. Be fearless in life when you go to a job interview. A gentleman once left work an hour early before his job interview at another job. Instead of going to change, he decided to wear his polo shirt and Khakis. When he was informed he didn’t get the job, they also said it was because he didn’t dress up. He was not fearless, he was arrogant. There's a thin line between being fearless and being arrogant. Look at failure as an opportunity to improve, this will help you avoid the fear of failure be become fearless. When you don’t fail, you miss an opportunity to identify where you need to grow.
In closing, the Mamba Mentality is more mental than anything. It consists of bringing your mind to a higher level before you take any action. Don’t mistake the Mamba Mentality as something you use in the moment. It is equally important well before the moment to aide in the conditioning of your mind to help you be the best version of yourself.
The Mamba Mentality is a critical part of the Fight ON! Mentality, serving as one of the three foundational pillars, along with Mindfulness and The Growth Mindset.
References
Bryant, K. (2015). Kobe Bryant’s Muse. A legend unguarded.
Bryant, K. (2017). Power of mind. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AroRiJGcPR0
Bullard, A. (2017). The five pillars of the mamba mentality.
https://coachadambullardbasketball.com/2017/07/14/the-five-pillars-of-the-mamba-mentality/