Why do we seem to get those little voices going off inside our heads that seem to be only talking about negative stuff?

You know what I mean, “Don’t double fault”; “If you lose this point you idiot you’re going to be down 2-5″; “I hope those guys over there don’t think I’m a lousy player”; and on and on.

I’m not smart enough to know why we seem to get so many of those voices yakking at us during tense times in a match.

I’m sure we’ve got someone here who can tell us from an educational point of view what might be going on.

However, I do believe that one of the reasons tennis can be such a mental struggle is because our opponent is facing us.

Our opponent is across from us and it’s sort of like a boxing match.

We look right into their face and get locked in emotionally.

We are confronted with another personality that can bring up fears, anger, doubt, etc. when we play.

When I had my first significant tournament win back in the 70s against the #1 seed in a minor “B” tournament in Berkeley CA, I told myself the night before that I wasn’t going to visually make contact (look at) my opponent’s face the entire match.

I don’t recall why I decided to try it, but at that time I was a nervous wreck in matches, and I was really searching for ways to stay calm in my matches.

Obviously, not looking at your opponent’s face is easy to do during the point, but I wanted to make sure I didn’t look into his face between points, even if he asked me the score or some other question.

All I focused on was the ball. Rather than looking into his face when he was about to serve, I just found the ball in his hand and forced myself to stay visually locked on the ball.

Same when I was about to serve, right before starting my tossing motion I’d look anywhere but his face (without of course giving away the intended direction of my serve).

It was a real challenge to not look into his eyes, his face, etc, during the match, but I eventually got comfortable with it at the end of the 1st set.

I played the best tennis of my then short tournament career that day and learned an incredibly valuable lesson about psychology and the value of not engaging emotionally with my opponent.

Since then, when I’m playing my best tennis in either singles or doubles, I don’t look at my opponent’s face, I don’t get emotionally engaged with them, and I simply focus on the ball which is clearly the most important object to look at during your match.

The biggest challenge for me is when I’m playing someone who is loud, attracting a lot of attention to themselves, is giving the old fist pump and “come on” whenever they win a point, making a derogatory remark when they make an unforced error, you know how it goes, that’s when I have to be extra disciplined to not look at them.

I want you to try this – get out there in a practice situation and try to not look into your opponent’s face. If you’re at your baseline and they’re at their baseline, ask them a question but look past their face so you don’t see them other than out of your peripheral vision. They won’t know you’re not looking at them and you’ll begin to take yourself out of the emotional engagement that I believe can cause those little voices to go off on a filibuster.

Does this post bring up anything for you?  Would love to have you weight in below in the Comments area.

Brent

The Must Have Mental Skills For Competitive Tennis Players

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Here’s a great method to help you overcome your fears when you play a competitive match.

I just finished reading a great article over at one of my favorite marketing blogs, CopyBlogger.com, where the subject of the article focuses on conquering your entrepreneurial fears.

And the more I read, the more I was able to relate to the same fears we have when we play matches.

When I started playing a lot of tournaments in my mid 20s, I was a complete mess in matches.  Tighter than a drum, it was as if I could lose to anybody.

In my practice matches, I was pretty good with my nerves, but once I got into the real deal where the matches counted, I was just a basket case.  I’d be cramping all the way even after matches that weren’t very close.

And one of the things in the article over at CopyBlogger that reminded me of what it was like back then for me as a tournament player is that I finally got good and disgusted with myself.

I was sick and tried of being a mental midget out there and it motivated me to figure this thing out.

So I began to watch the top players and see how they behaved in their matches, how they dealt with close matches, and basically just tried to feel what they were feeling.

And I guess it was just a stroke a luck, but I then tried to act in my matches they way the did in their matches.

I simply got out of myself and into someone else – I became an actor.

And for me it worked.  And it still works to this day.  If I’m really struggling in a match and those little voices are going off in my head about this and that (mostly saying “you idiot, how can you play like crap against this guy?”), I’ll force myself to try to act like someone else.

No, I’m not trying to play like someone else, but I’m trying to act the way let’s say Borg would be between points, or Pete, or Roger, or even one of my contemporaries like Brian Cheney.

I try to do what I think they would do in this situation between points.

And it’s not a guarantee, but it is the only hope I have for turning around this match that isn’t going the way I want it to…

It’s definitely helped me get through & win matches where I was fearful of losing big time, especially against the top players.

So, how about you?

Can you become an actor out there and side step your fears temporarily and act the way someone else you admire might conduct themselves?

Let me know below in the Comments area.  Thanks in advance.

Brent

CopyBlogger article – “The Cowardly Lion’s Guide To Conquering Your Entrepreneurial Fears “