Hello and welcome to Pickleball Therapy, the podcast dedicated to
your pickleball improvement.
It's the podcast that focuses on your pickleball mind.
Hope you're having a great week.
This week's podcast, we're going to be talking about a couple of different topics
that I think you'll find really helpful to you, particularly if you're
on a journey of improvement.
You're trying to get better, you're trying to learn more,
you're trying hit the right shots, not miss as often, all those types of things.
The first part of the podcast, we're going to talk about that.
Then in the Rift today, I want to talk about gratitude.
That's a concept that will help you regardless of where you're at on your
pickleball journey or what your objectives are.
Gratitude is always present, and I was reminded of it playing this
week with some friends here. I want to talk about that during the Rift.
As we dive into the podcast, a couple of housekeeping notes.
One, CJ, myself, and the Better Pickleball coaching team are all at Nationals
these next couple of weeks.
Actually, we've been there by the time this episode drops for about a week
doing some camps and intensives.
And then we have our Just be at Nationals on playing hybrid, which is one
wheelchair player, one standing player.
So looking forward to that with my friend Ken Dumont.
And then other than that, we're going to be up there with the team doing some
team building and things like that.
So if you're at Nationals, please look for us and say hi to us.
Let us know in an email, too, if you're going to be there.
I think we have a text chain, and we have an event on Thursday,
like a meet and greet.
So if you're in the Arizona area, whether you're at the Nationals or not, and you
just want to come out and say hi to us, please drop us a line.
Just the easiest thing, probably send an email to support@betterpickleball.
Com.
Ask them to let you know when the meet and greet is in Arizona.
And then the second piece of housekeeping is that we have our subscription academy
model coming out soon, so just be on the look out for that.
All right, let's dive into the first concept that I want to talk about
today, which is the concept of clicking.
When things click, when things click when you're playing pickleball.
And so what happens is, I was reminded of this.
I've been doing some teaching on court over the last week or so,
and obviously getting ready for our intensive that I mentioned, and our camps.
So I'm thinking a lot about knowledge acquisition.
How do we acquire knowledge?
And not just how do we acquire it, but how do we know that we've acquired it?
And then the frustrations of perhaps not acquiring it as quickly as we
would want it to, so the things clicking for us.
And what I wanted to do is explore that idea of things clicking so that we can
have just a better perspective on it when we're perhaps struggling with it or feel a
little frustrated or feel like we're not getting things as fast as
we would like to get them.
And the easiest place to start is that things have already clicked for you.
In other words, How do we acquire knowledge?
And not just how do we acquire it, but how do we know that we've acquired it?
And then the frustrations of perhaps not acquiring it as quickly as we would want
it to, so the things clicking for us.
Something as simple as listening to the podcast, that's a click,
because you didn't do that before, and now you listen to the podcast.
That's a new thing.
Within the podcast, you learn new things.
Another thing is just the most basic stuff, meaning
the day before you started playing pickleball, you had no idea how to score,
no idea where to serve, no idea how to hit the ball, all those types of things.
Then you started playing pickleball, you learned how to score, you learned how
You take your position on the court, you learn how to play games.
I'm assuming that right now, however it is that you're playing, whatever level you're
playing at, that you enjoy some success on the pickleball court.
In other words, that you go out there and that you can compete, win some games
on Sometimes, things like that.
So a lot of the game has already clicked for you.
What I believe creates perhaps frustration or disappointment
with us is that there's more to learn.
There's something that we're missing right now.
So We know...
Let's just use numbers.
Let's say there's 10,000 things to learn in pickleball, and you've learned 1,500 of
them, but now you're trying to get the next 10 things, and you're having...
Maybe it's just not clicking for you.
It's just not falling into place.
So we get a little bit frustrated about it.
Well, first of all, it's looking back to the 1,500 that we have already acquired,
that have already clicked for us. That's awesome.
Celebrating that is a positive thing for your mind.
And the other thing is looking back and knowing, Okay,
I've already learned a lot in the past.
I reasonably expect to learn more in the future.
So the next 10 will probably click at some point, knowing that they've
clicked in the past.
So That gives you a sense of comfort and a sense of confidence that
you will be able to learn this new thing that you're working on.
And then the other piece of this is understanding or embracing the fact that
You will never learn everything that pickleball has to teach.
It's just not possible.
You've heard me say this before, I'm sure, but that's a gift.
If that's not the best part of our sport, I don't know what is.
The fact that that as long as you remain curious,
as long as you remain interested in growing as a pickleball player,
there will always be something that pickleball is able to teach you.
I like to think of pickleball as a canvas, as a way for me to work on myself,
work on the physical part of my being, and the mental and spiritual part of my
being, emotional, spiritual, mental, because we get the social interaction.
I got to play, as I said, these days, I don't get to play as often as I used to
back in the day because most of my pickleball all time is devoted to coaching
and developing content, which is my choice.
That's what I want to do.
But I got to play with some friends I hadn't seen in a while.
We were laughing, and we trash talk each other, but
friendly because we're all buddies.
We were trash talking, joking, enjoying the moments, celebrating the crazy shots,
commiserating over the silly shots or the misses that you go.
And this is a group of four or five plus players.
Not even.
At all levels, that happens.
But at four or five plus, we're missing easy shots, and we're just sitting there
going like, Okay, I don't know how I missed that shot.
So you get the social, you get the outlet, you get some exercise, which is amazing,
and you get to continue to grow as a player and learn as long as you're
curious, as long as you want to continue.
Because even the best players, even the pro players, the top pro
players, are always learning.
They're always adding.
You can look at the top male players, the top female players,
look at their games and how they evolve over time.
Even though they're the best, they're still more to go.
And if you embrace that beautiful gift that pickleball gives you,
then it doesn't really make sense to get frustrated when things aren't
clicking right away, right?
I mean, why would you be upset that not You don't know everything there has to do
with pickleball, there is to know the pickleball?
Because you can't know everything there is to know about pickleball.
There's always going to be something next.
And so what that does is it changes your focus away from,
Man, I just can't get this, or frustration with, How come I can't pick this up?
To, You know what? This is awesome.
I'm on a journey to learn this thing, whatever it is that you're trying to
master now, whatever you're trying to get to click now.
And I'm working on that.
I know, based on my history, that this will eventually fall into place for me.
I'm going to keep at it.
I'm going to keep the old saying about, Keep my head down and keep doing the work,
which is basically keep doing my thing.
I'm going to keep doing my thing, keep moving forward, keep working at it.
I know that eventually it's going to click because it's happened how many times in
the past for me in pickable and outside of pickable, in life and work and things.
Things click for you at some point.
I know it's going to click.
I know that even when this one clicks, I'm immediately going to load
something in in the slot again.
So the slot will empty because that's clicked.
And now I'm going to load something else in the slot.
And if I know that there's always something to load into the slot,
living frustrated because the thing that's currently in the slot hasn't clicked,
it just It'll be eternal.
It'll be forever.
And when you look at it that way, you go, Well, that doesn't make a lot of sense.
So just enjoy the current thing that's in the slot that you're working on.
Enjoy the journey to get there.
Enjoy the struggle, if you will, the process.
And I've said this in prior podcast, but for example, I play games.
I play crosswords, and I do puzzles, and things like that.
I enjoy those activities.
But at the end of the day, it's not really about solving the crossword.
It's not like, Oh, I finished a crossword, and what did I...
What does that mean? I finished a crossword.
The joy is in the struggle.
The joy is in looking at the clues and going like, I have no idea what that is,
and then just fighting through it, and then finally, you
have that aham, where you're like, Oh, yeah, yeah.
Okay, I see it now.
Or you work on another one and get another word and get a clue of a letter, and
then you work through the whole puzzle.
Pickleball is the same way, and your growth as a pickleball
player is the same way.
Embrace the growth part of your journey, and you'll feel better
about the growth process.
You'll avoid the frustration or the disappointment and things like that.
It'll be more productive for you, more It'll be constructive for you, and it'll
just be an overall better experience, the entire growth journey process.
Hopefully, that'll help you on your journey.
Now, if you're feeling a little bit stuck or a little bit,
again, frustrated, disappointed with yourself because things aren't advancing
as quickly as you'd like them to, remember, there's nowhere
to get to on this.
It's just the next thing that's in the slot.
Enjoy that process, and then rinse and repeat.
Put something else. Enjoy the process.
Then you'll look back in the Sure, you'll look back at your
current self as, Okay, I was there, and now I'm in a different place.
The same way that if you looked back now at your prior self.
If you look back, say, if you were playing three years and you look back at the
player you were three years ago, probably didn't even recognize as a player
anymore, given where you're at now.
Same thing will happen next year, and the year and the year after and the year
after, as long as you keep at it, as long as you're curious and want
to keep growing as a player.
All right, so that's the main segment of today's podcast.
I am going to Dive right into the RIF.
I mentioned this in the last podcast, but another piece of
housekeeping in the future.
It's going to sound a little bit differently.
There'll be some ads interruptions and things like that between
these major segments.
That's just part of the growth of the podcast, and it's a way for us to get the
podcast to reach as many players as can benefit from the podcast.
But today, we're going to roll right into the RIF.
What I want to talk about on the RIF is this idea of gratitude and just
remembering to be grateful about the sport.
I was reminded of it with one of the players who I was playing with,
I think it was two days ago now.
He reminded me afterwards.
I've known David probably, I got to be five plus years.
For him, just like for me, for me, it's been a journey, the mental part, and for
him, it's been a journey, the mental part.
We tend to be hard on ourselves when we miss shots, hard on ourselves when we make
the wrong decisions and things like that.
Perhaps sometimes we forget the good things that we do, and even from time to
time, maybe lose sight of the wonderful experience that we're having on
the pickleball court, or at least the wonderful opportunity that we
have to have a great experience.
He reminded me that something he's been focusing on is just
being grateful for the ability to just be on the pickleball court, have fun, hit
some balls around, have some camaraderie.
As I mentioned earlier, we trash talk with each other and joke and things like that.
It's just part of our when we play and we enjoy it.
Just being grateful for the experience.
So next time you're playing, if you're feeling a little bit out of sorts or
you're getting a little down on yourself, take a moment, and particularly if you
have a gap between games, you're open play and you're waiting to put your
paddle down, be intentional about it.
Go off a little ways.
Look around you a little bit. Look back at the court.
Look at your friends who are there.
Look at the trees.
Sometimes just looking around the trees or the beautiful, the sun's out or whatever
the situation is look around and find something to be
grateful for in the moment.
It'll calm you.
It'll make you feel better.
Frankly, at the end of the day, it's a matter of big picture perspective.
It's a matter of, yes, we want to hit the ball well, and we want to move well and
make right decisions when we're playing.
But pickleball is really part of a bigger thing.
The bigger thing is for you, it's your life.
For me, it's my life. For all of us, it's our experience.
It's our trip through the universe.
Don't lose sight of that just because you hit a ball into the net or hit the ball
to the wrong spot or whatever it is.
Learn from that, move on, find a moment of gratitude, and you'll frame yourselves out
better for the experience that you're currently taking,
and perhaps even recognize that it's a wonderful opportunity you have
to enjoy and to experience a positive moment, a positive
day with your friends out on the pickleball court.
That's this week's podcast. I hope you enjoyed it.
As always, if you enjoyed it, consider rating and reviewing it.
It helps us reach other players just like you who might benefit from this content,
and share with your friends, because remember, if you enjoyed the
podcast, they probably will, too.
I look forward to seeing you in the next episode of Pickleball Therapy,
with you now and then.
Be well.