Psychology of suggestion (stupidest thing in this movie)
"No pain"?
SERIOUSLY?
Whoever wrote THAT in the script has absolutely no understanding how psychology works, or how suggestions work, or how sub-conscious works!
First, there's 'NO', which is translates to "bad feeling", "rejection", "denial", "going against what you want", etc., because we've heard this word so much in such situations in our lives, it's programmed deep into us to feel bad when we hear that word. Obviously we don't sink into deep depression, but it has a psychological effect.
Second, sub-conscious doesn't understand logic or complicated things, thus it can't comprehend 'negations'. When you say 'NO' something, it doesn't mean the sub-conscious is going to understand it AS 'not that thing', it only hears the word 'no' as a 'bad feeling' that hinders whatever you are trying to do, and then it hears the word itself.
An example; if I shout to you, "NO Polar Bears!!", are you NOT going to think about polar bears, are polar bears completely out of your thoughts, mind, feeling, etc? Of course you are GOING to think about polar bears, no matter WHAT words I put in front, because that's how psychology and especially the sub-conscious works!
Because sub-conscious hears 'direct and simple' things, and can't do math like 'no (something)', when you scream 'NO PAIN', what the sub-conscious hears is:
1) BAD FEELING!! FEEL BAD and hindered!
2) PAIN!! PAIN PAIN PAIN PAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNN!!!
This is what this supposed excellent coach is screaming to Rambo's.. sorry, Rocky's sub-conscious! What?
How can an EXPERIENCED, HIGH-CLASS COACH not know these _BASIC_ things about human psychology and sub-conscious?
Rocky is hearing 'Hinder your training process and combine it with PAIN'.
That is what the coach is screaming.
He SHOULD be saying something UPlifting and encouraging, not using two BAD WORDS to put down Rocky, who knows how amazing feats Rocky could achieve if the coach actually knew what he's doing!
How about 'JOY and PLEASURE'? Then that would be ASSOCIATED with the training, so every time he trains, he feels joy and pleasure. How about excitement? How about even the cliché of 'getting stronger'? How about learning ACTUAL hypnosis and suggestions to boost Rocky's abilities and even muscles?
But no, he HINDERS and puts him down, and ADDS pain into the mix.
What a stupid, stupid, incompetent coach that should've been fired the first day.
If he MUST include 'pain' into it, how about turning it into a useful asset - as they say in some Martial Arts training, 'pain is just a feeling'. Changing PERSPECTIVE to your pain can alter how well you can ENDURE it... just trying to DENY something that clearly exists just creates disharmony - discord, dissonance, etc. - and incongruency. There is no pain but I am feeling pain, therefore.. what? This is tearing the psychology apart, trying to go to two opposite directions at once AT BEST.
This is the stupidest thing you can do .. he could be focusing Rocky in the pain and then making him become FRIENDS with the pain, instead of trying to deny and escape it!
Hasn't this coach ever read even one Zen koan in his life? The only way to escape something is to embrace it and become friends with it. You don't run AWAY from your fears (or pain), that only makes the fear )and pain) stronger and harder to endure! YOU CONFRONT YOUR FEARS (and pain) and thus dissipate, eliminate or at least become able to endure it!
This even works with anxiety, when you welcome it as your friend in your meditation instead of trying to suppress or run away from it.
But no, this coach just ADDS anxiety and pain to Rocky.. THIS IS SO UNBELIEVABLY STUPID, I can't believe NO ONE corrected the scriptwriters..
..but does anyone ever? Scriptwriters must be the stupidest people on this planet, and that's saying something.