What caused you to stop learning new tricks?

General Yo-Yo
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That’s a good point. I guess I’m coming at it more like someone who owns a bunch of luxury cars. Doesn’t mean they need to race, maybe they just are passionate about driving and enjoy having the best cars to drive. For example, my dad’s old boss had a Corvette, a couple Porsches, an old restored classic muscle car, and never went above the speed limit. It could be argued he was wasting those cars’ potential, but he just enjoyed the nice ride and had the money to pay for it.

(I don’t even have money to pay for it, lol the vast majority of my yoyos have been free or heavily discounted from making strings for the companies or being friends with people who make yoyos.)

I guess I jumped to thinking you meant “expert level” because you said something about people stagnating at a beginner or intermediate stage, so to me expert is a step or two above intermediate. I don’t think most people actually only know four beginner tricks, even if we joke like it. I know I learned quite a few tricks before stagnating, some of which are considered intermediate or advanced (Brent Stole, for example, is one that a lot of people struggle with that I’m proficient with).

I get where you’re coming from, why not try going a step further? I just really think some of us do try and don’t find it worth it, and others might just not want to, and I consider that a perfectly good reason not to. I don’t think it’s reasonable to say “you have to get to a certain level before deciding it’s not worth it.” And I think I’m just not understanding where the goal post is, as in one post you said people are content with being intermediate, which to me implies advanced/expert would be the next step you’re advocating for, but now you’re saying “decent” is the goal. And I’d argue most people who have gotten into this hobby and stagnated are at least decent. I’m not advocating for the same beginner tricks every day, although if people want to do that that’s fine. I do the same dozen or so intermediate/decent tricks every day. I could do Brent Stole all day and never get bored lol. It’s just fun.

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122

Yoyo forums stopped me from learning new tricks. If I’m typing I’m not yoyoing. Once I stepped back from the forums a bit I yoyoed much more and learned more tricks. It’s odd how much time we spend discussing yoyoing when we could actually be yoyoing. Think I’ll go yoyo!!

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123

When I was younger once I got to plastic whip with andre on yye and my dv888 would rocket back into my hand. That thing hit like a truck when I was a kid lol

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I’ve read the discussion between @BadWolfeCo and @nightshadow and I enjoyed it. Good points were made.
Robin, I appreciate your posts on becoming better and working on your skill. This board focuses a lot on yoyo products and little on playing and getting creative with yoyos and you’re trying to promote the playing part of this hobby. But after having read this discussion several times on this board I now believe that this discussion is useless. You try to promote the playing part of this hobby but ultimately the motivation to go play and improve must come from the player themself and not from you. If someone isn’t interested in improving then you can post all you want about it, they’re not gonna start working on their skills because of your posts.
I think if we want promote the playing part more on this forum then we should start with us first. We can start to post more tricks on here and we can discuss doing tricks and combos more. In the “let’s start posting tricks thread” the only people who post there regularly are @ExYoyoAddict @Theycallmecotton , @EOS44 and me (sorry if I forgot someone). If it wasn’t for us then almost no one would be posting tricks here on this board and the “product talk vs playing” situation here would be much worse. Come join us, post more tricks. If we post lofs of tricks together we can motivate others to join us.

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125

By now, most of you guys that have been around for awhile, know I joke around a lot.

I used to Clown around so much in school, my Homeroom in both middle school and high school was Counselors Office. Both Vice Principals decided the best way to ‘contain me’ was to give me a pep talk every morning before 1st period began, lol. (Tone down da Clown and minimize generating any laughter to allow continuity of instruction in the classroom.)

In the 8th grade, the Drama Teacher(Mrs French) urged the Counselors to talk me into taking the Theatre Arts classes. She tried to convince me that I had a gift of some sort. An ability to construct something from simple cues(improve). She said it is something that can be developed over time but I was born with it, lol.

I didn’t buy into the Drama class thing…. I considered myself to be spontaneous and not ‘an actor’…

There is actually a point to what I have said so far… I’m getting to it.

Before I was out of High School, I was painting bikes in my Dads back yard. Somebody brought over a motorcycle and I painted that. Then this guy brings over his girlfriends VW and I painted my first car. Then I started painting cars and Harley motorcycles. Then Porsches and Ferrari’s. The full list would put you to sleep. I spent 5 years in 3 different Welding Schools. I taught people how to Paint just about anything that would sit still. I was known as a very creative and inventive kinda guy. When I go to a function, people almost always introduce me to the people i haven’t met. They Always say something like, ‘This is my friend Mo…. One of the most creative guys you will ever meet’.

I started modding yo-yos around 24 years ago. I was told I was ‘pretty handy’ at it. Creative Mo, lol

Now, here is my point >> As skilled as people have made me out to be in the last half century. I am probably at the very bottom of the scale in learning yo-yo tricks.

I not only don’t invent tricks, I have trouble learning other peoples tricks. I try to ‘slo-mo’ tricks so I can get a better idea of what is being done. My yo-yo trick forming abilities are pretty non-existent. I can throw a yo around for a few hours and come up with nothing, lol.

My Brain is like an IPad without the Yo-yo Trick Learning App installed.

I don’t know whether it is a mental block. Or maybe my head is just the same density as a ‘block’?

Does it bother me? Not really. Does it inspire me to quit since I’m not a trick generating machine? Not really.

Here is the moral of the story> Everyone on this Forum can run off a list of all the stuff they may excel at(like I did). We all have natural skills or learned skills(over time).

I am very good at what I do. But learning yo-yo tricks or inventing yo-yo tricks is way outside my ‘skill-set’.

Maybe I am just missing a Chromosome or something?

What got me to post up in this thread was the title, ‘What caused you to stop learning new tricks’.

All these years later, I still Love throwing yo-yos. My lack of actual amazing skills will not make me ever quit. I don’t let it get to me. I throw a little every day.

Maybe someday something will click and I will make up a trick I have never seen before?

And maybe someday an Alien Hovercraft will land on my house and give me a Ray Gun for my Birthday?

Yo-yos are fun……….

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126

Great post! Yoyos are most definitely fun. I’m sure you got a pretty nice bag of tricks and are smooth with the yoyo haha

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127

Honestly I wouldn’t mind sharing my tricks. But the idea of setting up a camera in a good filming location, have the lighting not suck, AND groove the combo I had just got inspired to create? I know that showmanship is at the heart of yoyo, but video cameras/phones, video editing, etc really make me hesitate.

Im betting that some of these ‘casuals’ on this forum are mad good, but kind of feel the same as me about videos. Posting pics of yoyos is easy though.

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128

i know a lot of people got the skills. We dont care about good light, good angles, etc… we just wanna see the skillsssss. prop phone, press record, and just go about yoyoing normally

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129

Uploading a video really is an obstacle… I didn’t think of that before but now I understand how it can turn many people off.

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130

Yeah, but like Mr. Cotton said, all you gotta do is press record on your phone. You don’t need to edit it! We want to see the tricks, not the editing skills, haha.

You got this!

Yes! Very easy. In fact, you don’t even need to YoYo to do it. Yoyos are photogenic, and posting pics is fun.
But I’ll be your motivational speaker for today, encouraging the pic posters to reach a little higher, and record a quick trick.

131

You will need to edit it when you record yourself trying and failing over and over again. No one wants to upload a 5 minute video where only the last 20 seconds matter.

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What I do for posting to yye is simply prop my phone up, press record, go about my yoyo session. Open clip on phone, click edit, scrub to good take, cut out that section and upload from phone. Takes about 2 minutes

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Wow that’s fast

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Well im a filmmaker so I guess I’m just use to it. I always stop recording when I hit something that I want to “clip” so I know all I have to do is cut off the end of the video to find my trick so it doesnt take long for yye clips

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135

Lol, fair enough. I guess cropping out the last 20 seconds does technically count as editing.

But you don’t need to do any more than that is what I meant haha

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136

Any time I post something there’s usually about 20 minutes of dead footage and maybe 20 seconds of usable material. That’s why I don’t do it as often unless I’m feeling especially inspired to do a certain trick or something.

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137

This reminds me of when I (as a PC user since the early days) have tried to teach my mom (boomer) modern technology. Seems easy to you, intimidating for me. Ive only used my camera to video record my dog. I don’t know the angle, view size, lighting (don’t lie, this is a big issue), or know which editing software to use to clip the vid (Im guessing most phones make it easy?) Thanks for making me feel old.

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Recording video is easy. Making good quality videos worth watching is hard work. Anyone creating digital content has a choice to make. For my own part, I’m not willing to put in the work, so I very rarely ever create videos. You’re welcome.

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139

I’m fairly certain that Adam is the one that let me know that the stock Pro Z is a good option for 0A. I haven’t played with a Butterfly XT yet but I have also heard that its great for that style play from more than a few people on these forums.

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pressing record on a phone camera is easy.

Coming up with a trick clip that you’re happy about enough to share it with strangers on the internet that are better than you is difficult :man_shrugging:

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