Practice Makes Perfect Of course with anything that you do, you want to make sure that you do it enough times so that it become easy the next time you do it. Shooting a basketball works in the exact same manner, it takes time and dedication to ensure a strong muscle memory of the movements you've done. Learning to shoot also requires a bit of patience because it is a skill that takes some time to learn and not everyone will be amazing at it once they start. Even for experienced players, if they haven't touched a basketball in a while, it will be difficult to start right up. But after a couple days, it will come back to them because of the muscle memory. So in order to ensure that muscle memory, you're going to want to practice often. And once you have the movements down, you'll be able to pick it up without ever feeling like you left.