Mindfulness
Another reason why Phil Jackson managed to find continued success in the NBA was to apply something called mindfulness. Jackson has always been a proponent of mindfulness and taught it to his players. The OWN network ran a special on Jackson and mindfulness, which you can watch here.
In short, mindfulness revolves around meditation and shutting off outside chatter that goes through your mind. In a way, it is supposed to create peace of mind that would translate to on the court and, hopefully, lead to success.
Even though it’s almost possible to prove that mindfulness had a huge hand in the success that Jackson had with the Lakers or Bulls, it’s almost as if his teams were mentally tougher than their opponents.
Jackson was notoriously calm and “zen” on the sideline and mindfulness is probably a big reason why. I mean, they don’t call him the “zen master” for nothing.