On another level, I always tried to give each player the freedom to carve out a role for himself within the team structure. I’ve seen dozens of players flame out and disappear not because they lacked talent but because they couldn’t figure out how to fit into the cookie-cutter model of basketball that pervades the NBA. My approach was always to relate to each player as a whole person, not just as a cog in the basketball machine. That meant pushing him to discover what distinct qualities he could bring to the game beyond taking shots and making passes. How much courage did he have? Or resilience? What about character under fire? Many players I’ve coached didn’t look special on paper, but in the process of creating a role for themselves they grew into formidable champions. Derek Fisher is a prime example. He began as a backup point guard for the Lakers with average foot speed and shooting skills. But he worked tirelessly and transformed himself into an invaluable clutch performer and one of the best leaders I’ve ever coached. — 17: 225-232
Shunryu Suzuki’s instructions on how to meditate are simple: — 51: 720-721
Pema Chodron contends that meditation practice blurs the traditional boundaries between self and others. “What you do for yourself—any gesture of kindness, any gesture of gentleness, any gesture of honesty and clear seeing toward yourself—will affect how you experience the world,” she writes. “What you do for yourself, you’re doing for others, and what you do for others, you’re doing for yourself.” This idea would later become a key building block in my work as a coach. — — 53: 751-755
For the Sioux, freedom was not about being absent but about being present, adds Linden. It meant “freedom for, freedom for the realization of greater relationships.” — 77: 1089-1090
My favorite poem about the power of inclusion is Edwin Markham’s “Outwitted”: He drew the circle that shut me out— Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. But love and I had the wit to win: We drew a circle that took him in! — 82: 1173-1176
I don’t pretend to be a therapist. But the process Rogers describes is not unlike what I’ve tried to do as a coach. Rather than squeeze everybody into preordained roles, my goal has always been to foster an environment where the players can grow as individuals and express themselves creatively within a team structure. I wasn’t interested in becoming best friends with the players; in fact, I think it’s important to maintain a certain distance. But I tried to develop genuine, caring relationships with each player, based on mutual respect, compassion, and trust. — 87: 1238-1242
There’s a story I love to tell about how Napoléon Bonaparte picked his generals. After one of his great generals died, Napoléon reputedly sent one of his staff officers to search for a replacement. The officer returned several weeks later and described a man he thought would be the perfect candidate because of his knowledge of military tactics and brilliance as a manager. When the officer finished, Napoléon looked at him and said, “That’s all very good, but is he lucky?” — 96: 1371-1374
UCLA head coach John Wooden used to say that “winning takes talent, to repeat takes character.” I didn’t really understand what he meant until we started our second run for the ring. — 103: 1480-1481
Maslow describes the key steps to attaining self-actualization: experiencing life “vividly, selflessly, with full concentration and total absorption”; making choices from moment to moment that foster growth rather than fear; becoming more attuned to your inner nature and acting in concert with who you are; being honest with yourself and taking responsibility for what you say and do instead of playing games or posing; identifying your ego defenses and finding the courage to give them up; developing the ability to determine your own destiny and daring to be different and non-conformist; creating an ongoing process for reaching your potential and doing the work needed to realize your vision. fostering the conditions for having peak experiences, or what Maslow calls “moments of ecstasy” in which we think, act, and feel more clearly and are more loving and accepting of others. — 116: 1655-1663
“Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing,” writes Chodron. “We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.” — 184: 2646-2649
Horry said the game reminded him of The Wizard of Oz because the team played with “no heart, no brain, no courage.” To which coach Del Harris added, “And no wizard.” — 191: 2752-2753
Martin Luther King Jr. spoke eloquently about this phenomenon. “In a real sense, all of life is interrelated,” he said. “All persons are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.” — 193: 2776-2779
Greatness is a spiritual condition. MATTHEW ARNOLD — 194: 2798-2799
I told Shaq he needed to find his own way to inspire the Lakers. He needed to express his confidence and natural joy for the game in such a way that his teammates—Kobe especially—felt that if they joined forces with him, nothing would be impossible. A team leader’s number one job, I explained, was to build up his teammates, not tear them down. Shaq had probably heard this kind of spiel before, but this time I think it clicked. With Kobe I — 199: 2870-2873
In a nutshell, the Buddha taught that life is suffering and that the primary cause of our suffering is our desire for things to be different from the way they actually are. One moment, things may be going our way, and in the next moment they’re not. When we try to prolong pleasure or reject pain, we suffer. On the bright side, the Buddha also prescribed a practical way for eliminating craving and unhappiness by following what he called the Noble Eightfold Path. The steps were right view, right thinking, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration. I thought the teachings might help explain what we were trying to do as a basketball team. RIGHT VIEW—involves looking at the game as a whole and working together as a team, like five fingers on a hand. RIGHT THINKING—means seeing yourself as part of a system rather than as your own one-man band. It also implies going into each game with the intention of being intimately involved with what’s happening to the whole team because you’re integrally connected to everyone on it. RIGHT SPEECH—has two components. One is about talking positively to yourself throughout the game and not getting lost in aimless back talk (“I hate that ref,” “I’m going to get back at that bastard”). The second is about controlling what you say when you’re talking with others, especially your teammates, and focusing on giving them positive feedback. RIGHT ACTION—suggests making moves that are appropriate to what’s happening on the floor instead of repeatedly showboating or acting in ways that disrupt team harmony. RIGHT LIVELIHOOD—is about having respect for the work you do and using it to heal the community rather than simply to polish your ego. Be humble. You’re getting paid a ridiculous amount of money to do something that’s really simple. And fun. RIGHT EFFORT—means being unselfish and exerting the right amount of energy to get the job done. Tex Winter says that there’s no substitute for hustle, and my addendum is, if you don’t hustle, you’ll get benched. RIGHT MINDFULNESS—involves coming to every game with a clear understanding of our plan of attack, including what to expect from our opponents. It also implies playing with precision, making the right moves at the right times, and maintaining constant awareness throughout the game, whether you’re on the floor or on the bench. RIGHT CONCENTRATION—is about staying focused on what you’re doing at any given moment and not obsessing about mistakes you’ve made in the past or bad things that might happen in the future. What — 200: 2888-2910
My biggest concern about recruiting players right out of high school has always been the temptations of the NBA life. Many young players get so seduced by the money and fame that they never develop into mature young men or live up to their promise as athletes. In my view, the key to becoming a successful NBA player is not learning the coolest highlight-reel moves. It’s learning how to control your emotions and keep your mind focused on the game, how to play through pain, how to carve out your role on the team and perform it consistently, how to stay cool under pressure and maintain your equanimity after crushing losses or ecstatic wins. In Chicago we had a phrase for this: going from a basketball player to a “professional” NBA player. — 256: 3698-3703
In the past Kobe had led mostly by example. He’d worked harder than anyone else, rarely missed a game, and expected his teammates to play at his level. But he hadn’t been the sort of leader who could communicate effectively and get everyone on the same page. If he talked to his teammates, it was usually, “Give me the damn ball. I don’t care if I’m being double-teamed.” That approach usually backfired. As Luke describes it, “I’ve got Kobe on the floor yelling at me to give him the ball. And I’ve got Phil on the bench telling me to make the right pass no matter what. So instead of just seeing what’s happening on the court, I’m trying to take in Kobe yelling and Coach telling me not to pass to him. And it made my job a lot harder.” But then Kobe started to shift. He embraced the team and his teammates, calling them up when we were on the road and inviting them out to dinner. It was as if the other players were now his partners, not his personal spear-carriers. Luke noticed the change. Suddenly, Kobe was reaching out to him in a much more positive way than before. If Luke was bummed about missing three straight shots, Kobe would say, “C’mon, man, don’t worry about that shit. I miss three straight shots every fucking game. Just keep shooting. The next one’s going to go in.” Says Luke, “When your leader is telling you that, instead of giving you a death stare, it makes the next shot a lot easier to take.” — 277: 3996-4006
Of course, when you’re a coach, you don’t have the same kind of apprehension you do as a player. When you’re a player, you obsess about not screwing up and making a mistake that will blow the game. But when you’re the coach, you think, how can I get these guys keyed up and on their game? What kind of insight can I offer them so that they can play more spontaneously? And what kind of coaching change can I make to give them an edge? My concern in game — 301: 4346-4349
As a rule, players usually have an easier time dealing with loss than coaches. They can go in and take a shower, then come out and say, “I’m tired and hungry. Let’s go get something to eat.” But coaches don’t have the same kind of release that comes from playing a grueling physical game. Our nervous systems tend to keep firing long after the arena has cleared. For me, the nerves usually kick into high gear in the middle of the night. I’ll sleep for a few hours, then—bang!—my brain is up and spinning. “Should I have done this, should I have done that? God, what a terrible call in the fourth quarter. Maybe I should have called a different play?” And so on. Sometimes I have to sit and meditate for a long time before the noise settles down and I can go back to sleep. — 303: 4377-4382
This calling is not unlike the traditional Christian concept of living in grace. In October I went to a panel discussion on the ascetic life at Loyola Marymount College led by a friend, author Kathleen Norris. She told a story about a monk in the Middle Ages who traveled to a nearby city to visit a famous ascetic who turned out to be a merchant living in a busy market district. That night, while they were praying, the monk was rattled by the noise some drunks and prostitutes were making in the street and asked the merchant “How on earth can you stand this every night?” The merchant replied, “I just say to myself, ‘They’re all going to the kingdom.’” Kathleen, who is a devout Christian, told this story because she often uses it in her own practice. Once when she was staying in a private club in Chicago, the man next door came back to his room with a call girl and they started making an unholy racket. “I had to make a choice between being disturbed or not disturbed,” she said. “Then I remembered this story and just said to myself, ‘We’re all going to the kingdom.’” — 315: 4554-4562