Thread: Ever Get the Yips?

"Yips" - you know - like when a professional baseball player suddenly can't perform the most mundane task on the field and spends weeks trying to work it all out. It's usually purely psychological but that's no comfort to the guy going through it all at the time.

Got in a Wonderedge yesterday that I've been patiently waiting for for years yesterday. It needed very little cleanup and it honed up quickly into an exceptionally smooth shaver (it fulfills it's name). All of it's beauty is still intact except the scales are a tad warped and needed to come off and be straightened. Thinking the extra set of Wonderedge scales I've been hanging onto might look even better, I looked at both sets, removed the set that came with this blade, and before I could even start thinking about what I wanted to do next, I lost my nerve and froze. I got the damned "yips"!

After spending over 36 years in some of the most complex air traffic control facilities in the country I shouldn't freeze about anything. But this locked me up tighter than a possum confronting a tiger (no idea if that happens but it sets the right picture in my head). Suddenly all the restorations, scale designing and making, metal cleaning, grinding and polishing, and everything else I've done means nothing. I feel like a newb with a single speed Dremmel holding a NOS Filly Barbas Duras thinking about making it more shiny - but knowing there's high probability that the blade is destined for the garbage about 20 seconds after I turn it on - and I'll be bleeding.

Hell it's just a straightening of the stock scales and reattaching them back to the blade! I've done it countless times and haven't screwed anything up since about the first 6 months I started this hobby and that was a few hundred blades and about 6 years ago. Contacted our beloved Duck Whisperer (10Pups) and may just have him do it for me just to be safe - but man this stinks!

Anyone else ever get a bad case of the yips out of the blue for no reason? I really hope this passes quickly - there are dozens of blades sitting on my bench that need a lot more work than this one does, and many of them are nicer and more expensive. Geez.

Your In Pondering Stage :<0) I did this with my Reaper. I just left it handy on the bench and when I felt like working on it, I still didn't. One day I picked up a not so cherished razor and went to work. When I finished that I just turned on the cam and went to town. When it didn't feel right I clicked off the cam and walked away. I know you can do it, you know you can do it, and when the time comes.........you'll be relaxed enough to go for it. Just don't turn on the cam. It makes it all the more nerve racking :<0)

Nope,If a job is to be done,I just do it.

You can do it bro.
Just remember it is only a razor...
They make more! (or more are available..LOL)

Thanks for the vote of confidence guys - yeah I know it's a temporary thing but it still stinks. Anyway, I'm concentrating on tying flies and my son's baseball team for now. I'm sure in a few day's I'll be past all this and wrap up the Wonderedge i a few hours. I'll post some pics once I'm done.

Originally Posted by AirColorado

I'll post some pics once I'm done.

Looking forward to it!

Yeah it happens all the time. Its your minds way of forcing you to think it through a bit more. Many times ah ha moments follow. Sometimes a deeper understanding... More often than not, you'll never figure it out.

Go with the flow. It'll pass.

Take a break from it. Breaks are always good unless they occur to a bone.