Bad Mentality Kills Your Potential

Playing one of my favourite sports taught me that a lot of it comes down to one's mentality. The famous tennis coach Patrick Mouratoglou would agree with me on this one.

I noticed myself having a hard time winning against even those with a lower NTRP if I am not in my motivated self. What happens with this unmotivated mentality is that it translates directly to my physical performance, where I get loose, sluggish, and unsynchronized. For a sport thst is so detail-oriented, this sort of physical state will make it impossible to hit consistently and win games.

For a long time, I thought there was flaw in my technique itself such as my swing and indeed part of it has to do with the swing speed and swing height, but a lot more was attributable to not being able to play at the same intensity in games as in my ralleys. And obviously this was linked to my mentality where I was more nervous than focused and more overthinking than strategizing.

What I want to challenge everyone, including myself, is to keep a healthy mindset - reasonably intense, focused, and motivated before you engage in your activity of interest. And you have to train this mindset over and over again to make it into a habit. So long as you've been working hard on honing your actual skills, your healthy mindset will help complete the package. You are already there, you are already skilled, you are already good, so believe in yourself and doubt yourself less.