I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “winning isn’t everything, it’s the ONLY thing”. I must admit that in the past I pretty much subscribed to that sentiment, being a naturally fierce competitor and having taken my tennis career very seriously. After all winning is the point of competition right? Why would you go out to play if you didn’t want to come off the court the victor?
Well I’ve matured over the years since college, and have started to change my attitude towards losing tennis matches, or paddle matches, or even at paper/scissors/rock.
Losing: better get used to it
We’re going to go ahead and get the biggest thing out of the way first here. Losing is just a natural part of competition, if somebody comes out a winner, then clearly there must be a loser as well. I don’t care how good you are, or what it is you’re the best at, eventually you’re going to lose. Please don’t misunderstand my point here, I’m not stating this to be negative or pessimistic in the least, I’m simply stating the realities of participating in a competitive sport. The sooner you accept this the better. Why? Because it gives you permission to play freely on the court, it relieves pressure when you no longer feel that if you lose you’re a bad person because it should never happen to you.
Does this mean that you should be satisfied and OK with losing a tennis match? No, certainly not, you should never be satisfied with a loss. The best players in the world continue to win because they absolutely hate to lose, and fight with everything they have to keep it from happening. But wait, didn’t I just get done telling you to get used to losing?
This is the most difficult part of being involved in anything competitive and striving for excellence, the balancing out of these two ideas. Once you accept that losing is just the way things go for you improvements will cease, after all why try if you just lose all the time? After a short while with this attitude you will begin to actually expect a loss every time you walk out on the court, and this attitude rarely results in a win. If you don’t feel like you should ever lose and it’s just unacceptable, when (not if) you do lose your attitude and emotions will be terribly negative, and you’ll probably learn nothing from the experience at all, you’ll just walk away saying “he got lucky” or make a long list of excuses.
So learn to balance these things in your head, the earlier you can do this the better. Fight with everything you have both physically and mentally each and every time you step out onto a tennis court to play a competitive match, leave everything on the court knowing that it’s always possible to come away the victor. On the other hand when the losses do come take it in stride, understand that it’s just part of the process and do your best to learn as much as possible from the experience. Putting your finger on a specific reason why you lost will give you something to work on the next time you hit the practice court.
Learning how to be a winner
Everybody knows at least one person in their club, community, or general tennis circle that just seems to win more than everybody else. When they do lose it’s generally a pretty big deal, and whoever caused them to fall did something exceptional, at least in the eyes of everybody else who usually loses to this player. It’s important to understand that this isn’t an accident, when somebody creates a pattern of winning over and over it’s because they’re a great competitor, they’ve learned how to win. Don’t put it in your head that you always lose to this player because “they’re just better” than you are. Clearly if you don’t ever beat them then they are, however don’t think that just because you haven’t beaten them before it means you can’t pay close attention to their tendencies, weaknesses, and strengths to create a battle plan.
Each time you lose you should be paying close attention to what’s happening all around you, both on your side of the net and the other. There are many specific reasons why you’re not ahead at any given point in time, learning to identify them is the first step to winning more matches. If you figure the reason out but you don’t have the skills or abilities to counter the cause of you being behind then make sure this is the first thing you work on improving next time you go out to practice. This process of self awareness, analysis, and subsequent work on your weaknesses is how you can build yourself up and learn to be a winning tennis player.
Fuel Your Motivation
Lastly, when you do lose, not only should you be taking away technical and strategical elements to work on and improve, but you should be taking that healthy disappointment of not coming out on top and funneling it right into your practice sessions. Let that sour taste in your mouth motivate you and use it to ramp up your effort level and focus. When you lose a match don’t dwell on the fact that you lost, but rather quickly shift your focus to what you’re going to do that will cause you to win next time, and then take that fire in your belly out on the court and give it everything you’ve got.
Lots of great things can come from losing if you’re just paying attention and have a healthy attitude about it. Don’t be satisfied with it, let it drive you and motivate you, then get out and work on improving your game!
