Hi , this is Carolyn and I'm here with Erin , and this is part three of our episode with Christine from the Tennis Mind about the mental game . If you haven't listened to part one or part two , we hope you go back and listen . But here is part three .
Speaker 2The other thing that Christine said when we were talking about doubles and doubles partners that I thought was just so beneficial because I do play with a lot of different partners is that you should ask your partner what they need , Like when they're doing bad . Do they want encouragement ? Do they want you to be quiet ? Do they want coaching ? I'm not very sure . Very many people want coaching , but what do they need ? And I had never really thought about that before .
Speaker 3Yeah , we all tend to do what we think , we what we like , and so I'll have partners who you know . If I miss one ball , they're like oh , that's okay , you got it . You got it , and I'm like I know , I'm fine , I know , that sounds really air-kidding .
Speaker 4I mean I'm a mental coach , I'm good and I don't go out and say that so people a lot of people don't know that . I'm kidding .
Speaker 3Yeah , I think , yeah , I'm fine , you know , and I appreciate their concern . But then I can tell that sometimes I feel like they're getting in a panic if I miss several shots and it's like , hey , I'm going to be okay . You know , I appreciate it , but stop . And then there's other times when you know like a lot of people like to apologize oh , I'm so sorry , I'm so sorry , I'm so sorry . I'm like you don't need to apologize , you're going to make mistakes , I'm going to make mistakes , bummer , it's over . You know .
Speaker 3So , understanding what people like . Like I have partners who are just like hey , get your act together , what's the matter with you ? I can say that to them and we'll have a good laugh . If I say that to another partner , they're going to cry , you know . So , just understanding . You don't necessarily need to say well , what do you like , because sometimes people don't know what they like , but just feeling , you know , as you get to know them , what are they responding to , what do they appreciate in a doubles team and what do they need when they're on the court . So , yeah , I think that's helpful to understand each other .
Speaker 4Sometimes it makes me nervous to make a plan with my partner , though , because , like I've heard from people , there's this woman that we've had on before . She's hilarious . I remember she had a partner that said , hey , that lady doesn't like a slice , you know , over the net or whatever . And she was literally like I don't think you understand , I can't slice , you know . Like whatever it was . It was like her partner was giving advice in a very nice way , but her thought was like I don't have that skill and so I worry about because she said that to me one time .
Speaker 4I'm like , yeah , I worry about talking . You know , telling my partner , you know , try , hit to the backhand Probably what I do , and , carolyn , you've played with me enough to know this I'll usually say like we'll try a strategy , like let's you know you're gonna poach or I'm gonna serve here or whatever . And literally I always say , because we know our skill set , we're not pros we always say the keyword is try . We're gonna try to do this If it doesn't work out . You know it's not like I'm saying you have to make this move in order for us to win this point . It's like let's make a plan and see if it works out or not , if it does great , you know .
Speaker 3Well , and part of that that's , and that's great . I think that's awesome because you never know , and a strategy could work for the first part of a match and then they adjust and now all of a sudden you need to find something else . So it's about being flexible . But part of the fun of tennis is the challenge of the mental game of figuring out what works . And , you know , the matches that we feel most fulfilled with are the ones that we , we really fight for . You know , the ones that you win easily are fun , but they're not very memorable .
Speaker 3I had that experience earlier this spring . You know , since I'm new here , I was playing with someone new every single match and I didn't know my opponent , so I really didn't know much of anything about the , the community . And she , she said , hey , you know , a slice might be good here , and I'm like , oh , I don't slice . And so I just told her that and I said , you know it's , my slices are more accidental than not and I can slice , but it's not my go to . And I wasn't comfortable in that moment and so I just said , you know , and it was fine , it was . I didn't take anything to mean like , oh no , I don't have a slice on terrible . I can't do it . It was like , oh no , we're going to have to do something else because that's not . That's not . We're comfortable right now in this match and it was totally fine . We , you know , I don't remember what we did , but we ended up winning .
Speaker 4She beat me . That's what she did . It was our match and she didn't have a slice and she didn't need it . No , but that was such a fun match . I did love that match .
Speaker 3It's always fun to play .
Speaker 2Yeah , I have one more thing that Christine said that I thought was really beneficial , and maybe beneficial to the audience too , is that I told you that I had played a match and I was really tired . So I walked on to the court thinking I'm really tired and I even got up in that match too , but the entire time I was thinking , please let this match be over .
Speaker 2I'm really really tired because I hadn't slept the night before , and I thought it was really good that you said to me , like go in , accept it , don't try to fight it the entire match . That you're tired ? Yes , you are tired . What strategy am I going to use because I know that I'm tired . I thought that was really helpful and it happened again where I walked into a match with that kind of mentality because I hadn't slept the night before , and it was very helpful .
Speaker 3That's wonderful . I was curious to see what I'd said because I had no idea , I couldn't remember
. And yeah , it's sometimes you're going to show up and you know that you're not your best . You know I've been sick recently and so I had to play a match and I knew I , you know I've been physically weak and fatigued and I knew I was going in and I was going to feel fatigue and I did , and I just tried to show up and play with him myself and wasn't trying to do killer first serves or go for all these crazy shots .
Speaker 3It was just play within yourself when you can , when you know that there's some sort of struggle whether you know you maybe going through a hard time personally and that's heavy on your mind , or you know you didn't get a lot of sleep or you're feeling fatigued or you've been ill or whatever Having grace and compassion for yourself . That goes a long way instead of beating yourself up for oh , I'm so tired and I should be playing better . It's never helpful for you or your partner , you know , whether you're yelling at them or yelling at yourself , no one ever likes that , so so I'm glad that was helpful for you , carolyn .
Speaker 4It was .
Speaker 4It was . I've met so many players that I feel like , well , first of all , a lot of us are Type A , a lot of us are , we are in an adult competitive situation , right so but I also feel like so many people put their self worth in their game and I just , I just can't even think that way because there's so many other things to worry about . It really for me , I know I'm like sunshine and rainbows , but it really is my outlet and sometimes and you and I talked about this I feel like sometimes I am so happy to be out there and understand where I am in my life and I look up at the sky and there's blue sky and I'm outside playing tennis and I feel so lucky and privileged to be doing that . But then sometimes I'm like I have to get a killer instinct Now . I have to , like , you know , enjoy all that but then still , like , win , you know , a match .
Speaker 4But so many people , I think , quit tennis . You know , really do quit tennis because they aren't finding joy in it anymore , because they've put so much of their own self worth in it , which I don't want to say . That's silly , because a lot of people do feel that way and that's justified . But I think people would benefit from coaching from you to realize that it's not like it does not make your life one way or the other . It is simply in that moment of playing a sport that hopefully you enjoy .
Speaker 3That was probably the biggest hurdle that I had to overcome is , growing up with a very , very athletic father , I always felt like , okay , I've got to be the best athlete and then I'll be loved . And it was just the pressure I put on myself as a kid and so even though I excelled , even if I was the best , it was still never quite good enough . And so I and that carried into tennis and I didn't even start tennis till my mid 30s and so I had already kind of done all my competitive sports and this was going to be the fun sport that I did and started off and was pretty successful early on because I started as a two five and grew to a four O pretty quickly . And then suddenly I wasn't winning like I was used to and I put all this pressure on myself and it was like I'm not worthy . And you know , one big thing that I felt so much heaviness about in my tennis was if I don't win , people aren't going to like me , and and it's I really had to battle that that was one of my biggest coaching hurdles that I had to get over of . Hey , you know what , if people don't like me because I'm not winning , that first of all , they're not worth it , don't worry . But it's hard to get out of that . You still want . You want people to like you . You wanna be invited to teams and enjoy the experience , and I think for me , overcoming that has been the number one thing of why I enjoy all my tennis matches now , even when I'm getting beaten up , you know , and I'm not saying they're all super pleasant , but I can enjoy every experience , no matter what , because I know it doesn't mean anything about me . I truly , absolutely know that now and I did have a little dip .
Speaker 3When I first moved here and I started playing in January , february , a whole different group I'd been with my group of four ladies in Austin , texas , for you know , however long , 10 , 15 years . I knew everybody and we all kind of , you know , knew where we fit . Well , here I am , coming to this new community . I have no idea where I fit in . I don't know , you know how the experience is gonna go for me . And then I have new partners . Every single time I'm playing , new opponents . I don't know anything about any of them and so I started to feel like , oh no , if I don't win , are people gonna be interested in getting to know me . Are they gonna like me ? Are the ?
Speaker 3And I started to fall into that trap again and I thought that's silly . You know I can go out there and be a pleasant person and make friends , and I'll tell you what . This has been the easiest transition moving here . I have made more friends so fast just because of tennis and it's just because I have chosen to go out there . Not make it mean anything about me . Enjoy my experience , try and be a reasonably pleasant person on the court and laugh and have fun and wow , I mean I am just loving it . Now I'm almost playing too much because I am getting old and so I've gotta kind of temper it a little bit . So but not taking yourself so seriously and not depending on the win or the loss to determine your self-worth is huge , and that I know so well because I fought so many years and battling that in my brain .
Speaker 1We really appreciate Christine coming on the podcast and we've included her contact information and her show notes . Thanks so much for listening and hope to see you on the courts soon . Music playing .