Whether it’s losing or winning, streak mentality is always difficult to perfect. Amidst a losing streak, one is obviously very prone to tilt or get the idea that they have plateaued or simply cannot win again. During a winning streak, one can get cocky for fear losing their streak so much that they end up altering the level of play that got them the streak in the first place. In this article, I aim to negate the effects of the curse of streaks by discussing what has helped me to remedy this issue in myself. I will begin by saying, streaks happen. Whether it’s bad or good it’s going to happen and you will eventually break it.

Losing Streaks:

I will begin with the streak that most players are worried about; the losing streak. It happens to everyone, pros and casuals alike. Even in the LCS teams encounter losing streaks, and yes, even the good teams. So how do you stop your losing streak from becoming never ending?

My first piece of advice is to treat every game as its own. This means you should try to look at each game as if the last one didn’t happen. If you just got slaughtered by an AP Vayne in your promos to Diamond, try not to think about it. Go into the game telling yourself that you can win, no matter how embarrassing and soul-crushing your last defeat had been.

Second, remember to keep a positive attitude. This means that you shouldn’t flame your teammates in chat or ping them passive aggressively. What you should do is focus on the goal: crushing your enemies. You and your team all have this goal in common, so try to work with them and not hate them for trying to do this in their own way, regardless if that way does involve them turret diving a Zilean with his ultimate up.

Finally, take a break if you think your mentality is bad. Sometimes it’s better to just wait a while, calm down, then (after at least an hour) give it another shot. If you still feel like your mentality is broken, give it another day, or even maybe a week if you’re really having that much trouble. Coming back on a refreshed mentality is in my opinion one of the best ways to break a losing streak.

Winning Streaks:

Personally, I consider winning streaks both a blessing and a curse. Yes, you gain a lot of LP, but I know that I also tend to feel a lot of pressure in keeping up the streak, or the feel that I need to carry games harder in order to win. Either of these mindsets can lead to the streak breaking, and it’s not easy to avoid them.

To avoid the pressure of keeping up the streak, you need to keep it in your brain that streaks come and go. Just because you lose a game or two doesn’t mean it’s going to turn into a losing streak, just keep playing each game as its own game and again, you can take a break if you’re too worried.

I have found that avoiding the latter of the mentalities that I mentioned has proven to be significantly more challenging than avoiding the prior. The only way that I have found to help me fight this mentality shift is by forcing myself to play passively and taking frequent breaks. This helps me to refresh on the basics of winning games and not playing over-aggressively and possibly throwing games.

I hope that this article can help you to keep your winning streaks long and your losing streaks short, and remember to take breaks! If you noticed that is one piece of advice that is repeated throughout the article. I really do think that that is the core of keeping your mindset intact and I think that taking these breaks will help you to keep gaining LP.

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