How do professionals stay so calm under pressure? What are your secrets to facing intense competition and practicing week after week, year after year? Recreational players certainly have a lot to learn from professional athletes, but many of these take-home lessons are more subtle and have to do with the way professionals psychologically approach competition. With a Ph.D. in sports science and a career coaching tennis athletes of all levels, the author has some unique credentials to help answer these questions.

It is easy to see that recreational individual sports players are often passionate and independent individuals. Sometimes too passionate! Those who approach an individual sport such as tennis, table tennis or racquetball often react too “black/white” to the outcome of discrete points. They show too much elation and too much disappointment before the end of the competition. Animating after a good shot or key situation is fine, but it’s often overused in recreational play.

The only point that is critical in individual sports is the last point. Until then, other points must be addressed as part of the contest “negotiation” process. Finding the thousands of shades of gray between “black and white”, the good and bad perspective of performance, is actually a practice in the Zen of competition and the “Business Like” approach of professionals.

In poker, when a player displays body language or posture that says, “I don’t think I can win anymore,” it’s called a “Tell.” At a poker table, he tells you to convert to money. In individual sports, calls help adjust the strategy of watching players from point to point, perhaps for the rest of the game. For example, if he feels that his opponent’s perspective on the contest is wavering or turning negative, unforced errors on his part can reverse that trend. A professional poker player is a great example of the proper approach to one-on-one competition. Let’s look at how thought patterns commonly progress during a game.

First, keep in mind that almost every player walks onto the court thinking they’re going to win that day. In general, the players have similar physical abilities, but on that day, one will convince the other that they are not likely to win at some point in the contest. Note that sports psychologists say “only that day” because statistics show that it is rare for one player to dominate the other in wins and losses throughout their careers.

If you don’t currently play sports for a living, you’re a recreational player and have the “luxury” of thinking you don’t stand a chance against a particular person. A pro can’t afford to think that way because most play for meals and expenses. Some professional athletes may NOT start out treating competition like a business, but quickly learn or are coached to make that adjustment.

A “business” approach also includes respecting the ability of all opponents in various ways. First, your opponent’s excellence, or simply effort, is responsible for your improvement. The better they play, the better you should win. It is a fact of human psychology that losses motivate your practice effort, and therefore improvement, more than wins.

Second, it is critical in a “business type” approach to resist the urge to find excuses for your loss. Remember that almost everyone comes to compete physically “grinded” in some way. Players rarely feel perfect. Therefore, accepting defeat from another flawed but worthy opponent, without hiding behind excuses, shows strength of character. That is the Zen of accepting the very nature of competition. This requires mental practice to realize that you are going off track.

Again, if you lose even just one point, PRACTICE giving your opponent credit at all times for playing a role in that. Tennis students often ask, “but my double fault isn’t YOUR fault, is it?” The answer is actually that it is. Their existence puts competitive pressure on your service. In football now they count what is called “Pressures”. It’s the perception that the quarterback sensed a tackler approaching that caused him to miss. It’s the same in individual sports.

Utmost respect for the opponent is a core element of the martial arts, as the training of the Shaolin Temple monks demonstrates. For thousands of years a great ritual and honor is given to the opponent, which represents our own internal struggle. That is the Zen of battle.

Professionals also know that giving your opponent credit takes the pressure off your own performance. Self-loathing, displays of anger at one’s own performance, essentially make the competition two players against none! The business approach is to make your opponent play very well in order to win as often as possible. If they can do that, they deserve to win.

It’s also “like a business” to mentally PRACTICE treating your opponent as just another witness who is watching to see how the drama will unfold in this match alone. In other words, a “short memory” allows you to leave past results where they belong so they don’t influence future events. Can you do this for the next point and the next?

Between points is the time to plan strategy, assess how your opponent is playing/feeling, what trends are developing and how you will build the next point BUT, it takes practice to avoid generalizing about how you will play that day or how often your opponent has played you. defeated. The Zen of this is to simply observe these negative thoughts and let them go. With practice they will subside as will distracting thoughts and meditation becomes more skillful.

The truth is that the human performance between two very similar talents in a complex sport actually “splashes” like a modern artist throwing paint on a canvas. It’s different every day like a kaleidoscope, with only predictability tendencies. This perspective will help you be less judgmental of his own performance, be a better competitor, and more appreciate his good fortune in having such a recreation. Gratitude for the incredible opportunity to “play” is also Zen.