{"id":32287,"date":"2021-04-10T22:32:51","date_gmt":"2021-04-11T02:32:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=32287"},"modified":"2021-04-24T17:23:17","modified_gmt":"2021-04-24T21:23:17","slug":"inner-self-meaning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/inner-self-meaning\/","title":{"rendered":"Inner Self: Meaning and Application to Tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>What is the inner self meaning? What does this mean for you as a tennis player? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The inner self in tennis is your mental space where you work on evaluating your game without being judgmental. The inner self meaning is important in tennis and can elevate you as an athlete. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Read more about the inner self, its meaning, and how it can improve your game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Working on <\/strong>the Inner Self<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The biggest obstacle to success on the court and off is \u201cself-judgment.\u201d Letting that judgment go and turning it into something more productive will improve your tennis game and your life.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The greatest successes on the court and off come from quieting <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/self-1-and-self-2\/\">Self 1<\/a>, or the \u201cego-mind,\u201d the part of your mind in charge of praising and chastising yourself. Great music, art, and tennis playing all come from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/the-unconscious-mind\/\">unconscious mind<\/a>, Self 2. So how can you quiet Self 1 so Self 2 takes control?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Nonjudgmental Observation<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Tennis matches involve second-by-second positive or negative judgments: frowns after poor shots, satisfaction after good ones, sometimes literally yelling at oneself. But your inner self doesn&#8217;t always respond to this. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Judgment provokes a thinking process:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>First, something is judged as good or bad: \u201cThat serve stunk.\u201d The player then starts thinking about how to recreate the shot if it was good or how to not do it again if it was bad.<\/li><li>After this, generalizations begin: After a few bad shots, \u201cThat was one bad serve\u201d turns into \u201cI have a bad serve,\u201d which turns into \u201cI\u2019m bad at tennis,\u201d which turns into \u201cI\u2019m bad in general.\u201d These judgments are self-fulfilling.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>(Shortform note: This can sometimes happen <em>even if you\u2019re playing well. <\/em>If you\u2019re too results conscious and you happen to get unlucky or play a more talented player than you, you can start generalizing and getting angry with yourself without reason.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Considering your own moments of peak performance\u2014when you did great on a test or performed an impressive athletic feat\u2014you\u2019ll probably notice that your mind actually wasn\u2019t working too hard and was one with your body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This focus without an attempt to concentrate is \u201cchildlike\u201d: Success on the court shares a lot of similarities with the way a child picks up speech or walking from simply observing and not worrying about mistakes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We can see this often when players are volleying at the net\u2014the ball is coming so quickly back and forth that base instincts <em>have to kick in<\/em>. This is more difficult to achieve when players have more time to think and Self 1 has more time to take over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Making the Mind a Mirror<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s a difference between letting go of judgment and ignoring mistakes. If you have control over your mind, you will notice a mistake but not assign a negative value to it. You can still fix actual mechanical issues this way if you have any\u2014notice the reason a shot is going out without <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/negative-labels\/\">labeling<\/a> it \u201cbad.\u201d You can use this to work on your inner self.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Rather than bad, errors are part of development. A player\u2019s tennis game improves a lot from making errors. If you notice your stroke without judgment, you can make quick adjustments to it without pressure.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The key is to have your <strong>mind act like a mirror. <\/strong>Reflect what happened accurately without passing judgment on what\u2019s in front.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Example: Jack\u2019s Backhand<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jack says he has an erratic backhand. His coach asks him what\u2019s so bad about it. He says he brings his racket too high on the backswing and that five pros have told him this, he just can\u2019t manage to fix it. This is slightly absurd on its face, because theoretically if he knows the problem he should be able to just bring his hands down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jack takes some practice swings and his swing starts down but then his hands rise right before he connects with the ball. He asks if he\u2019s doing better, and his coach tells him his backhand is fine, it\u2019s just changing a bit. His coach then brings him over to a mirror and asks him to practice there. For the first time, looking in the mirror, he\u2019s able to see for himself rather than have someone tell him that he is in fact bringing his hands too high. He\u2019s surprised and amazed by this\u2014he had to see it for himself. He begins to change and rather than congratulate himself, he\u2019s just surprised by how it felt.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He\u2019s very appreciative of his coach, and his coach asks, \u201cWhat did I teach you?\u201d Jack gets confused, but he finally answers that his coach got him observing his backhand more closely than before.As soon as Jack stopped actively trying to change his swing and just watched it, he was finally able to change it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Awareness of Positioning<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>This leads us to the concept of awareness, where your inner self and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/outer-self\/\">outer self<\/a> come together. A good player should always be aware of where the ball is and where the racket head is. They should see and feel what they\u2019re doing.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Instruction should be based around this as well: not \u201cbring your racket lower\u201d but \u201cconsider where your racket is right now.\u201d If you ask where your racket should be, the coach should simply decline to answer, still asking the player to just be aware of where it is. Once again, this will lead to observing with detachment and then better results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Note: The positive thinking that\u2019s often found in self-help books is also often harmful because it can easily be criticism in disguise. A tennis player will compliment herself for hitting a shot well, and then she\u2019ll feel the need to hit every shot like that one. The same problems arise.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is the inner self meaning? What does this mean for you as a tennis player? The inner self in tennis is your mental space where you work on evaluating your game without being judgmental. The inner self meaning is important in tennis and can elevate you as an athlete. Read more about the inner self, its meaning, and how it can improve your game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":32399,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,9,48],"tags":[263],"class_list":["post-32287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-motivation","category-psychology","category-sports","tag-the-inner-game-of-tennis","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Inner Self: Meaning and Application to Tennis - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In tennis you have an inner self, meaning that you have an awareness of how you&#039;re handling your mental state during matches. Read more.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/inner-self-meaning\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Inner Self: Meaning and Application to Tennis\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In tennis you have an inner self, meaning that you have an awareness of how you&#039;re handling your mental state during matches. 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