I am utilizing a cutting-edge method for understanding the mind, a method developed from my experience as a psychiatrist and forensic profiler. Again we have discovered how the unconscious mind really works—how it quick-reads ourselves and situations in the blink of an eye, and then tells us about it through stories and key images. I call this the “right-brain” language of the mind, symbolic language. Think “speaking figuratively” instead of literally which I refer to as “left-brain.”

Often someone will appear to be talking about others but is really talking (“right-brain”) about themselves. We are all familiar with this common human tendency. Freud called it projection. Jesus put it more poetically with his idea that the speck we see in our neighbor’s eye can be the log in our own—the pot calling the kettle black.

We have discovered that the quick-read unconscious mind really is a super intelligence. I refer you to Malcolm Gladwell’s best-seller Blink which provides a sterling example of the deeper mind in action—although he missed the specific “right-brain” language, he grasped where intuition comes into play. My earlier book, The Deeper Intelligence, clarifies how the mind speaks and reveals its secrets.

So we listen when Chizik speaks for key stories and images. This takes us back to some fascinating comments and secret predictions he made between the lines at the time his decline was just beginning.  We saw that downward spiral start unwinding through the 2011 season before accelerating through the 2012 season. We will pick up next with one of the most striking messages in his entire confession.

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While we have been focusing on Coach Gene Chizik’s precipitous decline from the top of the football world another success story presents itself from his former chief rival Nick Saban. The situation calls for a brief diversion before completing the Chizik story.

Seven days ago Saban won his third national title in four years and his fourth overall in nine years. It brings to mind a recent conversation I had about him this past October with FSU Coach Jimbo Fisher (previously the offensive coordinator on Saban’s 2003 LSU national title team).

Following a speech by Fisher, who sees sports psychology as an important part of his program, we discussed the unappreciated difficulties in climbing the heights of success — and staying there.  Fisher and I talked over how there was another level to managing success in light of our new understanding of the mind – the discovery of the brilliant quick-read super intelligence which sheds new light on the pressures of success (see article 1). Looking for every advantage he listened intently.

At the time on October 29, 2012, it was virtually a foregone conclusion that Gene Chizik would lose his job at the end of the season – and Fisher was already being mentioned as a possible successor. I pointed out to Jimbo that Chizik would be the third Auburn coach in a row over the last 20 years to follow an undefeated season with an extremely poor season not long down the road and lose his job. (Jimbo had been the quarterback coach at Auburn when Terry Bowden – the first of the three coaches — quit before he was fired in 1998.) Each coach had become dysfunctional and had major blind spots when it came to handling success.

Fisher then asked, “What about the guy on the other side of the state?” He was of course referring to Saban.  He wondered how Saban had protected himself from a major success retreat. At the time I had not really studied Saban and suggested we think about it. Then we discussed how John Wooden—the great UCLA basketball coaching legend (10 NCAA basketball national titles in 12 years) — had avoided success sabotage.

By the end of the season Saban was at the peak of his career having experienced a rare level of success with another national championship in hand. Only one of 5 coaches to win 4 national titles (Bryant, Hayes, Stagg, and Warner).

Now there was one clear way Nick Saban could avoid any further real success, history-making success. He could go to the NFL and coach. Many people would see that as a success but it would be a secret retreat. Under the circumstances it would be a step down not a step up.

Saban has a chance to be the only college coach to win three national titles in a row.  (For the record only one NFL team has won 3 championships in a row—the 1965-67 Green Bay Packers.) In addition he has a chance to surpass Bear Bryant’s all time record of six which would put him ahead of the whole pack.

Going to the NFL Saban wouldn’t have to worry about any of those records—and the unbelievable pressure that goes with them. Far more pressure than any coach appreciates consciously. The newly discovered super intelligence (see article 1) has taught us there is 90% more pressure to success than we realize because there is 90% more to our minds.

But shortly after winning his 2012 title Saban has seemingly passed the test of an NFL retreat. He declared that he has forever “closed the door” on returning to the NFL as a head coach.

It’s not like Saban hasn’t unconsciously retreated to the NFL before. Following his 2003 national title at LSU he became the Miami Dolphin’s head coach for two years. There he learned that he lacked the control he had in the college ranks – not only was parity a problem but so were drafting and salary caps. He could have foreseen these difficulties and perhaps had similar success at LSU that he’s had at Alabama without the interruption. Maybe by now he would have a fifth national title.

Saban himself can see now that building a college football dynasty has certain advantages versus the NFL. He has a better “draft position” every year with his extraordinary recruiting skills at a magnet school for attracting talent with Alabama’s long tradition, and he now has a special connection to the next league up (the NFL) which appeals to players. And he’s not handicapped by money to upgrade facilities and staffing.

Parenthetically, it’s not like great coaches can’t unconsciously retreat as they approach breaking a longstanding record. An NFL and Dallas Cowboy insider told me about former Dallas Cowboy coach Jimmy Johnson’s silly fight and split with owner Jerry Jones. Johnson had a chance to go where no NFL coach had gone—three Super Bowl titles in a row — when he allowed Jones to force him into a retreat and resigned as coach in 1994 after winning it all in 1992 and 1993.

Stay tuned. Nick Saban has passed the first hurdle of success retreat —he’s not going to the NFL. But there will be greater pressures of success to come – beyond anything he now knows.

Already he has provided one clue about success pressure: he tells us that Alabama will be the unique target of each opponent next year. In so doing he has pointed us to the Auburn-Alabama rivalry. Nobody will target Alabama more than arch-rival Auburn.

While Auburn appears down and done for a while don’t count them out when it comes to playing Alabama. Unexpectedly they came completely out of the blue in 2010 to win it all, the last team to break the Tide’s streak.

Before we return to the rest of the story on Gene Chizik’s self-induced decline, we will take a look at the special competition between Auburn and Alabama in a game that’s known as the Iron Bowl. Chizik’s 2010 victory there helped usher him rapidly down the slippery slope of success.

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Daily we are surrounded by prominent people who provide rich object lessons in just how difficult success can be to manage.

Defined simply, success means achieving our best and helping those around us to achieve their best as well. Indeed there are secret rules of success that apply to careers, marriages, raising children, education, athletics, government, hobbies, and our spiritual lives. While we must develop our conscious thinking to enhance success, our conscious mind also presents major blind spots when it comes to maximizing success.

People have overlooked the pressures of success including the temptation to stop short or give it back. But we have an entirely new lens for looking at success. We all possess an “inner success coach” which guides us toward our best.

The Discovery–our inner genius
The key to this genius is to understand we simultaneously read situations including success in two ways — with our limited conscious mind and with our far more brilliant unconscious mind (the so called “other 90%” of the mind). This deeper mind quick-reads situations in the blink of an eye.

Author Malcolm Gladwell portrayed this well in his best-selling book “Blink.” In one sterling example a fire chief had the sudden instinct to clear the room where his men were putting out a fire.  He ordered them out of the room just before the floor fell in revealing the deeper fire was in the floor below. Only later did he realize clues that he was unconsciously quick-reading.

Gladwell described the discovery of a “dazzling new unconscious mind” but mistakenly believed instincts were the ultimate in quick-reading. Yet clinical research in which Hodges participated (before Gladwell) revealed this new unconscious possessed a super intelligence which spoke clearly albeit between the lines in its own unique language — a narrative language, a symbolic story language.

Unknowingly our super-intel uses stories (often about others) or key images to reveal how it is quick-reading a situation. It is truly an inner success coach which guides us toward maximum achievement — just as the fire chief’s deeper mind did.

Right and Left-Brain Listening
By analogy think of the conscious mind as “left brain”– literal, on the surface. Think of the super-intel unconscious as right-brain — symbolic and intuitive. A major key to grasp the hidden pressures of success — obstacles to overcome — is to listen to “right-brain” super-intel messages, listen to stories in a deeper way.

For example a therapy patient consciously [left brain] felt he was ready to stop therapy, but his unconscious [right brain] then patterned stories of “unfinished business” (e.g. his remodeling project was not completed, his son shouldn’t drop out of college). His “right-brain” super intelligence saw success for him meant more self-understanding in therapy, that he had unfinished business.

In football terms we can think of our conscious “left-brain” mind as the “blind side”– where our blind spots are. Our unconscious “right-brain” mind helps us see past them through the stories we tell.

The facts are we have discovered deep down a new super intelligence in every one. We now know precisely how it quick-reads and how it speaks. We now have a whole new understanding of the mind and of motivation.

We have significantly new knowledge about success.

Sports Stories and Success Psychology
The competitive environment of sports offers excellent opportunities to observe how coaches and athletes deal with success issues. They play their games in public as they pursue their clear-cut goals. These events transpire in an observable fashion in a time-limited environment. So we can observe the “success arena” and hear people communicating about key issues in a rich and memorable manner. We have a new psychological lens through which to view success and self-sabotage. Sports stories present a valuable learning opportunity which can be directly applied to all of our daily lives.

But success stories are all around us. In big stories and “little” every day stories. Success — or the lack of success — lies at the very heart of our being.

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