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The podcast dedicated to your pickleball improvement. We are here to help you achieve your pickleball goals, with a focus on the mental part of your game. Our mission is to share with you a positive and more healthy way of engaging with pickleball. Together let’s forge a stronger relationship with the sport we all love. With the added benefit of playing better pickleball too. No matter what you are trying to accomplish in your pickleball journey, Pickleball Therapy is here to encourage and support you.
Hello and welcome to Pickleball Therapy, the podcast dedicated to your Pickleball improvement. My name is Tony Roig. I am your weekly host of this podcast. This podcast is designed to help Pickleball players navigate the journey of Pickleball and give you a, a better perspective when you're out there playing on the mental aspect of Pickleball. On the mental side of Pickleball this week we're gonna talk about something that happens while we play.
So we're gonna focus on the play part of our relationship with this game and the mental part of that aspect of it, and we're gonna focus on is scraping away some plaque that builds up sometimes in our minds and, and scraping away. This plaque will help us more clearly see what's going on when we're playing out there, because we won't be bogged down with the plaque that builds up in our minds and giving us the be a better ability to navigate a Pickleball game when we're playing.
So that's our focus. This week we're gonna focus on, on, on looking for signs that that plaque has built up in our minds and trying to remove that as we play, because again, the, the cleaner that our, our minds are from this plaque that builds up the better we're gonna play. Before we dive into the podcast, if you listen to the po,
if you're a regular listener, you already know this. If you're not a regular listener, and this may be news to you, but we have a Winmore series coming up in about a week after you, from the time you hear this podcast. If you're listening to it when it drops, do you want to check that out at, I'll put a link down below.
You can register for the, for our workshop. If you listening to those podcasts any other time, make sure you're a part of our email list. When you're a part of our email list, you get notified of all these awesome things that we do, including our workshops, and it'll help you not just learn the mental part of the game like we do on the podcast,
but also learn better strategies and better shots that'll help you play your best Pickleball. Alright, what are we talking about here? What, what plaque? What's going on here? So recently I went to the dentist, right, for my regular cleaning. And if you know anything about, you know, the oral healthcare, what happens is over time plaque builds up on your teeth.
That's why you go to the dentist and they use those, those metal instruments to scrape that stuff off. And don't worry, you can still eat your lunch or have your breakfast or whatever. I'm not gonna get too into detail on that stuff, but, but, you know, you need to remove the plaque. And the plaque is like a hardened substance,
right? That gets on your, on your teeth, and when you remove it, your teeth are much healthier, right? It's just you, you're not under attack anymore. You're teton under attack. And what I've been thinking about this for about two weeks now, not about the plaque, but about this other thing. And so the, when I,
when I went to the dentist and the plaque thing happened, and we were talking about all that stuff, it really clicked for me because what had happened was, I wanna say about a week or two ago, Jill and I had gone to Jill, my wife and I had gone to drill at our local courts. The courts are full, which is fantastic.
We're, we're always happy when courts are full because that means that players Are enjoying this awesome sport. So we went over to the tennis court, next to the, the Pickleball courts that are there, and one of the courts that was playing next to us, the players were probably ranging the beginning to 2.0, you know, very early in the journey,
right? Very early in their process. And it was awesome. They're out there all about the same level. They're batting the ball around, playing the game and having a good time. That's great. But one of the games finished and we happened to be taking a break from our drilling and having water. And I, and I was able to hear the conversation and they went up to tap paddles and one of the players said that game sucked,
right? And now the player didn't, I don't think meant anything really heavy by it, right? But I wanna address that because I think it's, it's important to be, it's important to be careful with our minds. And what I mean by this is, you know, okay, let's, like, you don't wanna miss a shot, right? You're out there and you want to focus on the ball.
I get that right? We wanna focus on the ball, we wanna avoid popups, we wanna make sure we're in the right place on the court, all these things, right? So we wanna focus on the mechanics of our, our engagement with the sport. That's fantastic. And I, I second that, that's great. But you know, you also wanna take care of your mind,
right? You want to, you wanna spend some of your me mental bandwidth on protecting yourself from potentially negative mental habits. And this is one, and it's very common. That's why I bring it up. I'm not trying to pick on this player. You know, this is very common where, you know, a game ends and a player thinks, you know,
we should have won that game. That game sucked. I made a mistake. Whatever it is, right? It's some negative, some negative reaction to the event that just occurred. And there's a lot to get into here, a lot to unpack. And that's why we have a, the book coming out that's gonna have a lot of this in detail.
But here's what I wanna talk about in this podcast. Think about that as plaque that's building up on your teeth or on your arteries, however you want to think about it. Not good, right? That plaque, any, anywhere, unless there's a plaque that's hanging on your wall, I guess, but you know, any other kind of plaque that builds up in your,
in your system, generally not something you're looking for. You also wanna not have plaque in your mind, right? And your mental processes. And when a game finishes and your reaction or the reaction of a player on the court is that game sucked. You know, first of all, the player saying it, not good for them, right? Not good for them because,
you know, it's, it's just not healthy, right? For them to, to feel that way. They just played Pickleball, right? It's an awesome sport. You got your bowl of ice cream, you got to play Pickleball. I mean, what could be wrong? So that's not great for that player, right? To, to have that framing.
But it's also not great for the whole, the environment, right? For the, I mean the environmental, the environment of the game, right? Of the other players. Because usually the, the player who's saying that game sucked is the losing player, right? You don't have the winning player go like, well, that game sucked and we won,
right? I mean, they do. That's, that's a different level of a wholeness. But usually it's the players saying like, that game sucked and it's the losing player, right? So what does that say to the other players on the court? Right? You know, the other three players who are playing not great, right? I mean, it's just not a good feeling.
And I'll share a story here that, you know, personal story that happened to me many years ago. I was playing, again, I won't name names, but I was playing against a very good player, very good athletes, two very good athletes. We were playing in a tournament, me and a, and a good friend of mine. Now,
if we played that same team today, my, I would put my money on the other team. 'cause they, they have developed that much more in Pickleball, but at the time, they were still fairly new to our sport, to Pickleball. And so we played 'em in a tournament, and it was objectively, I thought it was a good match.
Like, no, it was back and forth. And they, they battled, we battled, we ended up winning. So we get done. And I, you know, I felt, you know, I thought it was a good match. So I come up and we tap paddles. I say, good game guys. Appreciate it. And one of the guys who we're friends now,
but one of the guys and I, this first time I played him, first time I met him, he goes, no, I wasn't. And I was like, really? And so we had a conversation, I was like, you know, I, I said, I'm sorry you feel that way. You know, I thought it was a good match.
You know, I thought it was, it was a good match, you guys, we battled, right? But in, from, from this player's perspective, it was not a good match, right? The, and, and, and not just not a good match in their mind, right? Which shouldn't be the case anyway, but let me know that it,
they didn't think it was a good match, right? So what does that do to me and my partner, right? In terms of our game, right? Our, you know, we had won the match, right? Well, I guess we didn't deserve it. I'm not sure, right? It's like, what, what signal are you sending me and my partner,
right? And, and so, you know, I think it's really important when you're playing to be on the watch for those kinds of things, they seem silly, right? Like, well, they just said the game sucked and they wanted a different result. It's, it's a little more nefarious and a little bit more pernicious than that, right? Because that'll start that,
that, that builds in your brain, right? This idea that that game sucked, or, or, you know, the result should have been different. And again, the same way that you focus on improving your shots, the same way that you focus on, you know, taking, keep tracking the ball, paying attention to what's going on when you're playing,
trying to find the right strategy to play. Do the same thing with your mind, right? And so when you head out to the courts today, tomorrow, the next time you play, be aware of this kind of framing, right? Where, and I'll give it to you again. It's things like that game sucked. We should have won that game.
You know, I messed that up. You know, sorrys. Now there's a, sorry, let's talk about sorrys for a second. I, I sorrys are a kind of thing in Pickleball. I think that, I think it's okay to say you're sorry, right? As like, it's almost like I, I don't know, like a knee jerk kind of a thing sometimes.
That's okay, right? What you gotta be careful with is to say You're sorry, not carefully, but just it's not necessary right? For you to say, I'm sorry I missed that shot, right? Or I'm sorry, that like to mean it like, like heavily. Well, I'm really sorry, that was my fault, not the case, right?
You play as a team, you're gonna do good things as a team. You're gonna do crappy things as a team. It, it happens both ways. And so, you know, let's move away from the negative. Let's move away from the framing that's going to undermine us, undermine our ability to play, undermine our, our friends, right? Our opponents on the court and our partners.
And let's focus on the fact that a Pickleball is an amazing sport that we love. And we, we just want to get out there and play. I got, I was lucky to play this morning, so good day, right? I got to play Pickleball with some good friends and we, you know, we battled and won some, lost some.
That's the way it's supposed to be. I hit some great shots, I hit some crappy shots, you know, I, I I hit some great defensive shots. They hit some great defensive shots. That's what you want. You want an all around, you know, battle where everybody gets to play a role in the activity that you're, that you're engaging in.
So, you know, let's, let's be mindful of, of keeping it positive in terms of we play Pickleball. Let's also keep it positive in terms of understanding that it's a game. It's, it's a game where of, of, of ebbs and flows, right? You're gonna play great. Sometimes you're gonna play crappy sometimes. And so are your opponents and so is your partner.
And so just, you know, keep that kind of framing in mind that there's all sorts of things that happen in Pickleball. We did a prior episode, I'll put a link in the show notes, but it's, Pickleball is messy. It is a messy game. You know, there's a lot of things that happen that you're like, you, you win points that you shouldn't have won.
You lose points you should have won, you know, and you should have in quotes, right? But it's like these things that you're like, okay, I was, I was favored in that one 'cause I had the advantage. Lost it. I was in trouble over here, won this one. Sometimes you win when you should have won lose one,
you should have won, et cetera. It's just part of the game. And so let's try and keep a positive perspective out there when we're playing. And I, I'm telling you this, not just for the feel good stuff, even though that's super valuable, right? To have a a, a good feeling when you're playing. I mean, why else play Pickleball?
Why, you know, I go out there and feel like crap. That's just, you know, so, you know, have a good feel. It helps you with the feeling better. It also helps you play better. So be mindful of those types of things. If you, if you're playing with a partner or someone you know, well, and they make those kind of statements,
I'm, again, I'm not gonna name names, but there's, there's if, if my local players are listening to this, they know who I'm talking about in terms of there's players here who I'll, I'll, you know, we'll finish a game and we lose the game and, and I'll have a conversation with 'em about, you know, 'cause the,
that the negative, there's a negative immediate reaction to it, which, which, you know, it, it, it diminishes the effort and the, the success that our opponents have had in that because we make it about ourselves. So be mindful of that the next couple times you play and see if it's out there. And if you see it, see if you can scrape off a little bit of it,
right? Like that plaque kind of scrape off a little bit of it as you go. It'll free the mind, It'll, the mind will be able to feel better and also to play better Pickleball. All right, before we wrap this podcast, two quick notes. One, if you're looking for shoes, we'll put a code down in the, put a code down in the show notes.
But I'll give it to you now. It's bp like Better Pickleball BP 10. You can use that code to get some awesome tie roll shoes. You can go to better Pickleball dot com. We have a link to their shoes there. Check those out. If you're in in need of shoes, they have really good shoes. The shoes that, that CJ and I both wear out on the Pickleball court and shoe designed for Pickleball.
And then secondly, sign up for our win more series. If you're not on our email list, make sure you're on that. You'll get invited to it. But you can go straight right now and sign up. Anyway, I'll put a link down in the show notes. It's like better Pickleball dot com slash win dash more, I'm pretty sure. And you're gonna wanna join this workshop.
It'll give you a, a, a more productive, more fuller way of looking at Pickleball. And if you haven't, if you've been to one of our workshops before, we, we, we always improve our, our workshops. We're always make 'em better. We don't just sit on our laurels and, and continue to repeat the same thing over and over again.
So you're gonna see a different presentation, a more polished presentation as always. 'cause we're always moving forward with our coaching. And if you have never been to one of our workshops before, definitely don't wanna miss this one. So make sure you sign up for that. As always, if you enjoyed the podcast, please consider rating, reviewing it and share it with your friends.
Remember, if you enjoy the podcast, they probably will too. I'll be, have a great week. I'll see you next time and I hope to see if not all of you, most of you at our Winmore workshop. Have a great week.