ETI 032 Attitude - the Space between Stimulus and ResponseDownload this podcast – You may need to right-click and select Save Link As to download the file to your computer)
An excellent book, Man’s Search for Meaning, written by Victor Frankl, serves as a useful guidepost in living but equally when playing on court.
When Andy Murray hooked up with Ivan Lendl to capture his two grand slam titles, he was working at the same time with a sports psychologist (the same one who had worked with Lendl years before) to improve his attitude – to improve his emotional responses to the challenges he faced (and still faces) on court.
To quote Frankl, “Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
But take a moment with this – it is not psychobable or some automatic quick fix – but really something truthful and very very meaningful.
Monitor your emotional state – how you feel between your ears when on court. You will make errors, your will lose some matches, you will make some crazy mistakes (all stimulus) but you can manage and even choose your reaction to these events.
At the end of the day, our game of tennis is a difficult mental game.
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