Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Jannik Sinner, Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi, Usain Bolt, Magnus Carlton, Max Verstappen.
What comes to mind when you hear these names?
Your mind goes to Greatness, fighting ability, resilience, athletic and mental beasts, and many other words that can be used to describe these amazing athletes.
But what separates them from the rest?
What makes them so tough to beat?
It’s their acceptance of the situation which separates them and allows them to focus on what comes next.
Novak Djokovic once said “I don’t like this kind of mindset… just think positive thoughts. It’s impossible. You are a human being. The difference… is the ability to not stay in those emotions for too long. As soon as I experience it, I acknowledge it… then I’m able to bounce back and reset.”
He often advocates for the need to reset and get back into the state of focus and consistently discusses how it is of the utmost importance. He discusses how it is crucial to accept that things and certain factors will not always be perfect and the best you can do as a player is to control what’s in your control such as your mindset. In this quote he looks at how everyone feels anger, disappointment and other emotions, but how the best players acknowledge it and the “difference” is to acknowledge and accept it and reset.
In a similar fashion Roger Federer has stated “In tennis, as in life, you will lose points, matches, and even entire seasons. The key is to not let these speedbumps bring you down. Accept and learn from your losses, and look forward.” Federer previously emphasised how even the best players lose 50% of the points they play but what separates them from the rest is how quickly they come back and how they can put those lost points out of their minds and focus on the next point. This allows them to move well, hit better, and be more confident and focused in the important moments that could define the direction a match is heading.
Even current star Jannik Sinner has said, “I’ve always believed that if you want to improve, you have to accept what you’ve done wrong.” “You have to enjoy the pressure… We just win or lose, and next week you have another chance. In similar manners, other stars in all sports have emphasized these points as crucial.
Personally, I have experienced these setbacks and have had people stress the importance of accepting and moving forward.
Just this december I had injury setbacks in tournaments, this particular tournament in Dubai I was comfortably leading 6-2 2-0 in the second round, and was cruising to a win when I pulled a muscle in my left leg, I asked for a physio, and I got the response “There is no physio”, when I pushed and asked “The tournament is mandated to have a physio” I got the response “What can we do, there is no physio”. I was frustrated and lost the match, partly because of my injury but partly because of refusal to accept that I needed to push without help from the physio. Throughout the rest of the tournament, even through I won the doubles I kept thinking, “what if?”, I was told by at least 10 people that if I did not get injured, they thought I would have won the singles tournament as well. And I knew that if I got a physio timeout I would have been fine, what I failed to realise in that week, is that I could have still won the match with the injury as I was a much better player, but the failure to accept the situation let me down.
On the contrary, the very next week I had another tournament in India with much tougher competition, in the first round in the second game of the match, I felt a huge pain in my thigh on the same leg, the injury from the last week had created another injury which was much worse and harder to play through, unlike the previous week, I accepted the situation and realised that there was no point of feeling bad about myself. Although I accepted the situation eventually, when the pain first started my mind went to “Oh no, not again”, and “Come on, what kind of luck is this?”, the difference this week was that I was able to recover from these thoughts and focus on every single point individually, I accepted that I would not be able to play my usual way as I couldn’t even jump properly on the serve, I changed my tactics and accepted that I would have trouble breaking his serve in the first set, so had to focus on mine. I found myself 5-3 down in the first set tiebreak and then missed a sitter of a volley to give my opponent 3 set points, I focused back on each point individually and managed to win the set and then the match with a final score of 7-6, 6-2.
This taught me the importance of my mindset and acceptance. Even though the match in the second tournament was harder and the injury was much more severe, I accepted the situation and fought to the end and managed to win. What we can learn from these stars and try to implement in our daily life, for us to reach their level in sport or just in any thing we do is immense. For me, the second week match really helped me learn the lesson of importance and though I still need to improve mindset wise and acceptance wise, I took a big step that day.
