Confidence

[elmoputney]

1 minute ago, emmcee said:

And as hard as it to admit sometimes that's the truth.  I've been there, we've probably all been there at some point.  Its bait, it's this, it's that, when its us. 

I still can't help looking at bait companies websites to see what I am missing lol but I've learnt to just look 😁

Its funny though but nowadays I think it is relatively simple, you get a decent bait in the right spot, with the right rig to suit your baiting approach/conditions and hopefully you will catch one at some point, if you get the timing right and they want to feed and happen to slip up while your there great 😁

I am not often that right and it rarely goes the way I think it will, but I'm focusing on the more important stuff like Location and accuracy and creating the right feeding situation rather than what rig, bait, set up will work best, I know my hooks are sharp and my rigs present well enough and should reset, that takes a lot of the headaches away and I can actually sit back and relax and enjoy my hobby even if I am blanking 👍

[framey]

If you get them feeding in a competitive manner in an area they are happy to feed in you can catch 99% of them on anything rig wise and bait wise.

the 3f’s come to mind 

find em 

feed em 

 catch em lol

 

[elmoputney]

23 hours ago, yonny said:

 

If it were me I'd be chucking a lead clip out there with a very sharp hook knowing full well it'll empty the place if put in the right spot.

I started thinking about this a bit and how you said it, and it seems this is what most people when they are asking questions like the above are missing, myself included, I wasn't blessed with a natural self assured nature, and it can be quite easy to look at small things in fishing and turn them into big things and issues, what us people that ask these questions are missing is CONFIDENCE, the way you phrased that yonny and I don't mean it in a disrespectful way is almost arrogant, like you WILL empty the place, and quite frankly that is probably the difference between some anglers that do regularly catch and those that don't, it's the belief that what you are doing will work, but I've started to understand this also a bit, you don't need fancy rigs and bait etc more determination and consistency, it's more belief and being on the journey that will lead to the success, we get it wrong, sometimes we need to change things, but one day it clicks and then like you, I will also empty the place, for now I am happy being on the journey that is what we all have to go through to get to this point

tight lines all 👍

 

[Simon KG]

19 minutes ago, elmoputney said:

I started thinking about this a bit and how you said it, and it seems this is what most people when they are asking questions like the above are missing, myself included, I wasn't blessed with a natural self assured nature, and it can be quite easy to look at small things in fishing and turn them into big things and issues, what us people that ask these questions are missing is CONFIDENCE, the way you phrased that yonny and I don't mean it in a disrespectful way is almost arrogant, like you WILL empty the place, and quite frankly that is probably the difference between some anglers that do regularly catch and those that don't, it's the belief that what you are doing will work, but I've started to understand this also a bit, you don't need fancy rigs and bait etc more determination and consistency, it's more belief and being on the journey that will lead to the success, we get it wrong, sometimes we need to change things, but one day it clicks and then like you, I will also empty the place, for now I am happy being on the journey that is what we all have to go through to get to this point

tight lines all 👍

 

To me, confidence comes from results. As an example I've had a lot of confidence last year and the year before especially. I caught good and pretty much couldn't imagine to do better than I did. This year however has been blank galore and something completely different. When that happens, and it has before as well. You (or maybe I) need to change stuff. Doing the same thing all over again expecting different results is being an idiot, a smart dude once supposedly said. This year it was a friend of mine who actually got me to realize I was trapped into my once successful habit. After blanking 9 sessions in a row, stretching over 2 months, I changed rig, hooks, hookbait and the next session I landed 3 fish in 12 hours out of nowhere. If I had caught 1 I would have left it to circumstances but the change was so apparent it was ridiculous. 

What I´m saying is that changing stuff when things aren't working, is better than not doing so. How deep you want to take that is obviously personal but I personally don't like to keep things as it is, when I truly believe its not optimized even if it still "will work". 

I kind of feel now that this discussion went a bit out of control xD 

[elmoputney]

10 minutes ago, Simon KG said:

To me, confidence comes from results. As an example I've had a lot of confidence last year and the year before especially. I caught good and pretty much couldn't imagine to do better than I did. This year however has been blank galore and something completely different. When that happens, and it has before as well. You (or maybe I) need to change stuff. Doing the same thing all over again expecting different results is being an idiot, a smart dude once supposedly said. This year it was a friend of mine who actually got me to realize I was trapped into my once successful habit. After blanking 9 sessions in a row, stretching over 2 months, I changed rig, hooks, hookbait and the next session I landed 3 fish in 12 hours out of nowhere. If I had caught 1 I would have left it to circumstances but the change was so apparent it was ridiculous. 

What I´m saying is that changing stuff when things aren't working, is better than not doing so. How deep you want to take that is obviously personal but I personally don't like to keep things as it is, when I truly believe its not optimized even if it still "will work". 

I kind of feel now that this discussion went a bit out of control xD 

I didn't say don't change things, I merely said that the difference is probably confidence in what you are doing, and probably less so in what you are changing 👍

[carpepecheur]

I totally agree that confidence is everything. I never go fishing without knowing I am going to catch a fish. Of course, sometimes I am wrong in my convictions and then I learn something new.

 

 

I like the challenge of solving problems and have learnt some new things by participating on this thread. I do not understand the thinking behind the need to make a swivel tighter in a semi fixed lead but I can offer an alternative solution. Instead of changing anything about the lead, before threading your line, put some conventional float stops on the line then when the lead is tied on, simply push them up against the back of the lead. The more stops you put on the larger the force required to slide the lead.

 

My Fox COG leads turned up in the post today so I am going to be in my element experimenting with them.

[yonny]

1 minute ago, carpepecheur said:

I never go fishing without knowing I am going to catch a fish. Of course, sometimes I am wrong

🤣😂😂Exactly this ^^^^^^

[salokcinnodrog]

I am humming and haa'ing about splitting this topic up as Elmo and Yonny have put in a very important view, that I follow. 

 

I go onto almost every water, even every session, knowing I will catch.

My confidence is in my bait, which I know works, I know my rigs are effective. That does not mean that I am using the most up to date super fashionable rig, but that I can find the fish, put my rig in front of them and create a feeding situation that works to get them to take my hookbait. 

 

Strangely at Nazeing, on The Central and South, at times I think I was not confident in what I was doing. I was beaten before I arrived. Yet the times I caught I had had a good walk round, seen fish and set up on them. I wasn't able to spend time there when I wasn't fishing, so may have missed out. 

On Alton, I didn't necessarily see them, but somehow knew I had got it right, possibly because I had spent so much time round there. It is 5miles from my home compared to 70.

 

 

[carpepecheur]

9 hours ago, salokcinnodrog said:

I am humming and haa'ing about splitting this topic up as Elmo and Yonny have put in a very important view, that I follow. 

I go onto almost every water, even every session, knowing I will catch.

I agree very important.

This is a HUGE subject and one that is difficult to comprehend if you have not experienced it. For my sins, I qualified as a hypnotherapist. The power of the mind is phenomenal. This not just some mumbo jumbo, pseudo-science speak.  It actually works.

For example, if you think you are in control of your own actions, try getting on a bike and forgetting how to ride it or try jumping into a lake and forgetting how to swim.

[emmcee]

On 06/08/2020 at 22:11, framey said:

If you get them feeding in a competitive manner in an area they are happy to feed in you can catch 99% of them on anything rig wise and bait wise.

the 3f’s come to mind 

find em 

feed em 

 catch em lol

 

It's that simple. 👍

 

[emmcee]

I go into every session confident I'll catch. I go onto every new lake confident that I will catch,  Be that a syndicate lake, club water or day ticket. Of course you don't catch everytime and the reason for that 99% of the time is down to the fact you're not on fish. Be that because the lake is rammed and you can't move, the fish are too far out etc or you can't be bothered to move onto them.

I know my bait works, I know my rigs work and most importantly I know my watercraft and if on a syndicate lake the knowledge I have of it  will put me on fish. If they want to feed I will catch. 

I know we are all in varying stages of carp angling but when I see threads like " I'm trying this or trying that this week " I just roll my eyes. Ive got news, There is no wonder rig, there is no wonder bait. Keep things simple, spend more time finding fish and less time chopping and changing rigs and bait and your catch rate will go up. 

Rigs -  multi rig, ronnie rig, chod rig and a wafter/bottom bait rig. That's it on rigs, I use 4. 

Bait - anything premier baits for me, 100% confident. My spod mix, hemp,  corn , *********, and ********* ****. 🤣

Put the rigs with the bait and if I give 100% to a lake  I'm going to rip apart. Big headed no, confident,  you bet. 

[elmoputney]

1 hour ago, carpepecheur said:

I agree very important.

This is a HUGE subject and one that is difficult to comprehend if you have not experienced it. For my sins, I qualified as a hypnotherapist. The power of the mind is phenomenal. This not just some mumbo jumbo, pseudo-science speak.  It actually works.

For example, if you think you are in control of your own actions, try getting on a bike and forgetting how to ride it or try jumping into a lake and forgetting how to swim.

I've dabbled with using hypnotherapy before you can get loads of apps now, that you can just listen to, I went through a phase of using them to send me to sleep, funny though I do believe they helped, I was trying to become a better gambler(outcome investor) at the time and not make so many mistakes, if anyone is ever trying to get rich from gambling btw, stop thinking of it as gambling,just the word gambling has negative connotations as we are all programmed to believe this from an early age, so you may self sabotage yourself, I read loads of things abiut it also, one of the most interesting was Dr Howard Sartin, where he made some prisoners who were gambling addicts become less addicted and more successful, he did this by sharing a more successful method to follow, which helped them win more but also changed there mindset and reprogrammed there thoughts, rather than just making them stop, which is usually quite unsuccessful, 

I went through all this myself, I had to ask anyone that I cared about who was concerned, and people were concerned about it, but I asked them for permission to become a winner, sounds mad I know but for a while it really worked, and before you all say we'll why aren't you rich now 🤔I got sent off track trying to chase easy money by becoming a tipster, then I got into trading and other grey areas, and in the end I decided my family and work took up too much time to really focus on this and it became too much and had to go 👍

Bit this doesn't mean you can't apply things to your fishing, I've read about Terry Hearn staring at pictures of the fish he wants to catch so he can visualise them and get them in his head

Sports people use methods to visualise things, like the rugby kicker that goes into a trance when he gets a penalty, he is visualising the ball going between the posts, 

So confidence in fishing is probably  the only edge you need to be successful at it or you know as good as you can be with your skill set 🤔

(I never found a hypnotherapist that wanted to help me become a successful outcome investor only plenty that wanted to try and stop me gambling ) 😁

[emmcee]

23 hours ago, elmoputney said:

I've dabbled with using hypnotherapy before you can get loads of apps now, that you can just listen to, I went through a phase of using them to send me to sleep, funny though I do believe they helped, I was trying to become a better gambler(outcome investor) at the time and not make so many mistakes, if anyone is ever trying to get rich from gambling btw, stop thinking of it as gambling,just the word gambling has negative connotations as we are all programmed to believe this from an early age, so you may self sabotage yourself, I read loads of things abiut it also, one of the most interesting was Dr Howard Sartin, where he made some prisoners who were gambling addicts become less addicted and more successful, he did this by sharing a more successful method to follow, which helped them win more but also changed there mindset and reprogrammed there thoughts, rather than just making them stop, which is usually quite unsuccessful, 

I went through all this myself, I had to ask anyone that I cared about who was concerned, and people were concerned about it, but I asked them for permission to become a winner, sounds mad I know but for a while it really worked, and before you all say we'll why aren't you rich now 🤔I 

 

(I never found a hypnotherapist that wanted to help me become a successful outcome investor only plenty that wanted to try and stop me gambling )

I've found being confident when gambling can bite you on the butt. I was super confident for a horse on friday and one yesterday,  oh dear how wrong was I. Don't get me wrong , I never bet more than I can afford to lose but seeing that I've not worked since March 23rd and my boss still has no work for me , i need to be more careful. 

[carpepecheur]

1 hour ago, elmoputney said:

(I never found a hypnotherapist that wanted to help me become a successful outcome investor only plenty that wanted to try and stop me gambling ) 😁

Interesting points in your post Elmo. Your hypnotherapist is probably more skilled than you give credit for. Every client turns up with what is known as a “presenting problem” e.g. “I want to be a good gambler”. The therapist's job then is to work out what the real problem is.

I think it is easy to miss the point about the significance of confidence.

It is not really about what technique you are using when fishing, it is more about your own mind set. Confident people have more success than unconfident people.

Read David Coulthard’s book  “The Winning Formulae”. He confesses he was not the fastest or most talented driver in F1 but achieved considerable success by applying his mind. He would sit at home for hours mentally going through the next F1 start, anticipating every conceivable eventuality and methods to avoid or mitigate any problems. During the start of an F1 race, you have milliseconds to respond to a rapidly changing situation. If your subconscious mind is already programmed to react in an appropriate way you are likely to be more successful.

Imagine two people on the start line of a 100 metre race. One is mentally rehearsing the start and visualising the race and seeing himself crossing the line first. The other one starts worrying about whether his shoelaces a going to come undone and trip him up. Which one is most likely to win?

You can start to build confidence in carp fishing by applying your own experiences or that of others (reading their exploits etc). You can study fish movements, baiting strategies, clever rigs that are in fashion or one designed yourself. It doesn’t matter how you achieve that confidence. Put simply, if you are confident you will do better.

When I am waiting for my next fish I do a Coulthard. I think what will happen if it takes off towards the snags to my left or heads for the tree roots on the opposite bank. What if I have to go in the water after it? Do I know where it is shallow enough to go in? Is the landing net ready to go? If I am drinking a cup of coffee, do I know where I am going to put it when I get a toner?

Even if nothing happens I am planning my next strategy, change location, change rig or change bait?

Who said fishing was a relaxing sport? Effort =reward.

 

[elmoputney]

3 hours ago, emmcee said:

I've found being confident when gambling can bite you on the butt.

 I was super confident for a horse on friday and one yesterday,  oh dear how wrong was I. Don't get me wrong , I never bet more than I can afford to lose but seeing that I've not worked since March 23rd and my boss still has no work for me , i need to be more careful. 

I do agree there, it can definately send you up the wrong path sometimes, and it's very easy to make mistakes, there are things you can do though to improve your chances, though I will pm you some bits, so we don't take this off track too much 😁

[elmoputney]

11 minutes ago, carpepecheur said:

Interesting points in your post Elmo. Your hypnotherapist is probably more skilled than you give credit for. Every client turns up with what is known as a “presenting problem” e.g. “I want to be a good gambler”. The therapist's job then is to work out what the real problem is.

I think it is easy to miss the point about the significance of confidence.

It is not really about what technique you are using when fishing, it is more about your own mind set. Confident people have more success than unconfident people.

Read David Coulthard’s book  “The Winning Formulae”. He confesses he was not the fastest or most talented driver in F1 but achieved considerable success by applying his mind. He would sit at home for hours mentally going through the next F1 start, anticipating every conceivable eventuality and methods to avoid or mitigate any problems. During the start of an F1 race, you have milliseconds to respond to a rapidly changing situation. If your subconscious mind is already programmed to react in an appropriate way you are likely to be more successful.

Imagine two people on the start line of a 100 metre race. One is mentally rehearsing the start and visualising the race and seeing himself crossing the line first. The other one starts worrying about whether his shoelaces a going to come undone and trip him up. Which one is most likely to win?

You can start to build confidence in carp fishing by applying your own experiences or that of others (reading their exploits etc). You can study fish movements, baiting strategies, clever rigs that are in fashion or one designed yourself. It doesn’t matter how you achieve that confidence. Put simply, if you are confident you will do better.

When I am waiting for my next fish I do a Coulthard. I think what will happen if it takes off towards the snags to my left or heads for the tree roots on the opposite bank. What if I have to go in the water after it? Do I know where it is shallow enough to go in? Is the landing net ready to go? If I am drinking a cup of coffee, do I know where I am going to put it when I get a toner?

Even if nothing happens I am planning my next strategy, change location, change rig or change bait?

Who said fishing was a relaxing sport? Effort =reward.

 

I only ever messaged a few tbh they never seemed to get back to me,😁 what I needed was self belief and a method of knowing when and when to not pull the trigger the issue I believe was self doubt, I had the tools I just subcontiously self sabotaged my good work with some bad 👍

I'm totally with you on the mindset thing though and mental preperation is probably the greatest tool you can get on your side, 

[carpepecheur]

3 hours ago, emmcee said:

I've found being confident when gambling can bite you on the butt.

 I was super confident for a horse on friday and one yesterday,  oh dear how wrong was I. Don't get me wrong , I never bet more than I can afford to lose but seeing that I've not worked since March 23rd and my boss still has no work for me , i need to be more careful. 

There's a difference between what I think of as confidence and recklessness. To be confident you need to try and anticipate every possible outcome and what the consequences are. I know nothing about horse racing but perhaps hard or soft going, form of your horse compared to others, what it had for breakfast etc. If you do this thoroughly you can nudge the odds in your favour but you will only see this over a period of time not on one race. Alternatively you could stick a pin in a list and live with the consequences.

After a session of hypnotherapy to quit smoking a client went outside and lit up straight away out of habit. He immediately demanded his money back because it had obviously failed. He was asked to come back in 1 months time when he would get double his fee. He never returned.  

 

[carpepecheur]

A little off the topic of confidence but a true story regarding hypnotherapy.

Client phones up and asked how much he would be charged to quit smoking.

"Right", I said, "work out how much you smoke in just one month and that's what I'll charge."

"Well I smoke around 30 cigarettes a day and each packet costs me  .......... blooming hell", he said "I can't possibly afford that", and he slammed the phone down.

[elmoputney]

3 hours ago, carpepecheur said:

There's a difference between what I think of as confidence and recklessness. To be confident you need to try and anticipate every possible outcome and what the consequences are. I know nothing about horse racing but perhaps hard or soft going, form of your horse compared to others, what it had for breakfast etc. If you do this thoroughly you can nudge the odds in your favour but you will only see this over a period of time not on one race. Alternatively you could stick a pin in a list and live with the consequences.

After a session of hypnotherapy to quit smoking a client went outside and lit up straight away out of habit. He immediately demanded his money back because it had obviously failed. He was asked to come back in 1 months time when he would get double his fee. He never returned.  

 

That is a good way to look at it tbh, it's all about thinking long term, we are never going to win everytime and if you set yourself up to win over a season rather than 1 race, you will be better off, I also agree with the reckless and confidence, I used to spend 2-3 hours studying 1 race and even then I might not find something worth betting on, discipline is probably the thing you also need for this, confidence, discipline and being able to detach your emotion from the event, 

With smoking I daresay it comes down to the desire to really want/need to do it, I gave up because I wanted to get better at bmx racing and it was my breathing that was suffering for smoking so I did it, but I think hypnotherapy done well would be a great way to actually stop as you are reprogramming your brain to stop not just stopping and hoping you can break a negative cycle 

[framey]

Confidence is king 

go back to when mike Tyson was at his prime 

most people were beaten before he even punched them as they were beaten in their own heads by his ring of confidence he just knew he couldn’t be beaten 

and then came Don King lol

[carpepecheur]

13 hours ago, framey said:

... they were beaten in their own heads ...

You have just highlighted the opposite of confidence. How many times have you heard people talking about fishing a “hard water”? I do not think there is such a thing. Different waters require different tactics. By describing a water as “hard” you are preparing yourself for failure.

[yonny]

22 hours ago, elmoputney said:

I've read about Terry Hearn staring at pictures of the fish he wants to catch so he can visualise them and get them in his head

Yeah I do that. My "little black book" is my phone nowadays. I have a file of carp I'd like to catch and sit there psyching them out. Doesn't seem to work as well as it does for Tel though lol.

[salokcinnodrog]

27 minutes ago, yonny said:

Yeah I do that. My "little black book" is my phone nowadays. I have a file of carp I'd like to catch and sit there psyching them out. Doesn't seem to work as well as it does for Tel though lol.

Same here.

While fishing Nazeing I would sit looking at pictures of 16.11, going through the times of year she came out and what swims she was caught from. Never got close. Other people caught her fairly quickly, I fished the lagoons for 5 years and avoided her and the other 40's. I caught other fish, but nothing over 32. I fished the same as them, no big fish. I did my own thing, same result.

I think I posted it on here before, I fished Bromeswell one day, was chuffed to bits with a carp going just into double figures. I fished Nazeing for a couple of nights, and I caught a 10lb mirror, which was a let down.

 

The other thing that may be relevant is that I don't often fish waters for specific fish, Nazeing was an exception, but even there almost any fish was a good fish. My best session on there was a winter session, where I had walked around before I started. 3 20's and a double after the lagoons thawed, I was pretty sure I had found fish when I set up. 

 

 

[yonny]

7 minutes ago, salokcinnodrog said:

The other thing that may be relevant is that I don't often fish waters for specific fish

I try not to. If you target one fish then almost every session is a fail.

But I normally end up focusing on one anyway doh!

Edited August 10, 2020 by yonny

[...]

I think now, I've got what tackle I want, bait I want, feel g good about where/when I'm fishing. 

My Confidence has now gone up as I'm sticking with what I've got, what I'm using, knowing it will/i will catch and the weekend proved that. 

Found the fish fizzing, used the sticks to wrap the rods upto them, fed them, caught them. 

Now just a case of repeating the process on every visit. 

My Confidence went even higher as by lunch time yesterday I walked round the lake with the dog, the same question to all "Had out?" most same reply, "Nothing mate", so I was doing some thing right as it looked like I was the only 1 at the weekend who caught on the lake? 

Edited August 10, 2020 by Highy