Why Coach Saban Got His Players To Focus On Neutral

Negative to Neutral One of the smartest moves Coach Saban did (in my opinion) was to bring in Trevor Moawad, a Mental Conditioning expert. Pretty awesome job title by the way.

Trevor Moawad has been dubbed the "Sports World's Best Brain Trainer" by Sports Illustrated, so I was pretty intrigued. Moawad has a ton of great coaching points, but I really love one in particular.

Mainly the power of speaking your thoughts out loud.

If you say something out loud it is 10 times more powerful. Negativity is 4-7 times more powerful than positivity.

So if you say something negative out loud, it is 40-70 times more likely that something bad/you don't want to happen will occur!

Moawad found that it was too much of a jump to take the athletes he worked with from negativity to positivity. So he decided to try something different when he was working with Coach Saban.

What if he could take them from negative to neutral?

He compared it to driving a car. You don't go from reverse to drive, you have to go to neutral first.

So he decided to get his athletes to quit voicing "dumb stuff".

Things like the heat, if they were tired, the coaches, etc. Eventually, the players quit voicing that type of stuff, and the coaches were blown away by the results!

I coach football at a middle school, so I decided to try it too. And it actually works!

It's so much easier to go from neutral to positive, as opposed to making that huge jump from negative to positive.

“If you say stupid stuff out loud, you’re predicting and perpetuating exactly what you don’t want to have happen” -Trevor Moawad

What does that mean for you?

Start by seeing how many times a day you say things out loud that could negatively impact your day. Go through a whole day and keep track.

I think you will be blown away with how many times you say things like:

-today is going to be terrible

-I don't think I can do it

-I'm dreading my workout today

-I'm too tired to workout

Next, start catching yourself before you say them out loud. It's ok to have negative thoughts! We all have negative thoughts, but you don't have to say them out loud.

You have complete control over that. You also have control over what you watch on TV, what you read online, and what you listen to when you are driving.

Are you consuming positivity or negativity?

Focus on what you can control and start moving the negativity to neutral. It makes that positive jump so much shorter.

Test it, I promise you this works.