On Deck’s Quote of the Week: “The first half of life is devoted to forming a healthy ego, the second half is going inward and letting go of it.”

-Carl Jung

Jung is speaking about how to master a life, but this wisdom applies equally well toward the cultivation of any skill or technique (like hitting, for example).

Collect confidence from outside oneself (with a coach) and, with that outside help, repeat the correct movement patterns over and over, until you can React with Learned Movement; until you’re able to internalize all the cues and patterns, and they become part of you; until you are able to enter the zone by using only the keys of your own inner fortitude.

In life and in athletics, Jung and I are forwarding ideals—most lives do not achieve everlasting egoless-ness, nor do athletes enter the zone and never leave—but, ideals are things worth a lifetime of striving.