Secret #1: Mental Rituals

Mental rituals are the cognitive counterparts to physical rituals. Just as you probably do the same thing every morning upon waking (get up, go the bathroom, brush your teeth, etc) to start your day out right, it is equally important that you understand the power of mental rituals.

Mental rituals are important for one central reason: They soothe and pacify us emotionally. In sports, and in tennis, we play our best when we are in a relaxed state of mind, avoiding undue muscle tension that results from a case of the nerves.

A mental ritual could be any of the following:

• fixing the strings on your racket while waiting for your opponent to serve
• reciting cue words to yourself to keep you focused on the point at hand
• going to your towel behind the baseline after tough points to gather yourself and prepare anew
• tracking thoughts between games and sets in a notebook for use at a later time in evaluating your game

Secret #2: Selective Amnesia. Do I need to see my doctor to diagnose this?

First off, no, you don't need a doctor to diagnose selective amnesia. Just ask any person that has been in a long-term relationship about their significant other's recall abilities, and you will discover that this "disorder" is quite common and highly useful situationally. Selective amnesia is merely taking conscious control over those experiences that you allow to affect you. Top tennis players have developed this ability, and use it to put bad points, games, or sets behind them. The fact that they don't allow much room in their memory banks for painful playing experiences allows them to free up room for the storage of positive experiences.

Keys to self-induced selective amnesia:

• ask yourself "Is this something that is beneficial to mentally beat myself up over?" after tough or difficult points/games/matches. Your answer should always be a resounding no.
• make a point to find the positives each time you compete, and store them for recall at a later point when you are feeling less-than-confident.
• remember that memory is a reconstructive process. The mind remembers what it wants to remember, down to the detail. It then goes about filling in the gaps between these "flashbulb" memories. Make sure your flashbulb memories are positive ones, even if you have to do some "mental editing."

Secret #3: Focus Control

There is only one thing you truly need to focus on in tennis: the ball. Otherwise, you can easily become distracted by other details, such as your opponent, the weather, the crowd, the fact that you are behind by three games, etc. When I attend tennis tournaments or matches, I can quickly predict with accurate results which players are true competitors, as they have a single-minded focus on getting to each and every ball hit their way. They become oblivious to the world outside of their game.

Keys to improving your tennis focus:

• make a list of all the potential distractions to your tennis play, in order to better avoid them
• remember that sets are won through winning games, which are won through winning points. Take each point individually and separately. "One point at a time" is a great mental affirmation to utilize.
• Deliberately tell parents, siblings, friends, and others who may serve as distractions to lay low during your matches. Though they usually mean well, they can become just another distraction.
• Practice playing with distractions in order to learn how to ignore them. Loud music, people on the court next to you, outdoors, etc. The more distractions you can throw at yourself during practice and learn how to ignore, the tougher you'll be to "crack" when the pressure is on.

Secret #4: Emotion Management

Tennis is a game in which emotion plays a crucial role. Ideally, it should also play a limited role. In my work with dozens of collegiate tennis players, I have come to the conclusion that emotion can become an acid that eats away at your performance. Not that there isnt a place for a barbaric yelp after winning a tough point or match, but emotional players wear themselves out. The constant up and down of the emotional roller coaster takes a heavy toll on the psyche of tennis players, leaving them drained and unable to gather the strength needed later in the match.

Therefore, emotion management is crucial to your success as a tennis player. Learn to take the emotion out of each point. Depersonalize the competition-your job is to merely win points, not pass judgement on them or yourself for doing so. Top surgeons and airline pilots learn to focus strictly on the tasks at hand rather than the emotion of the situation, allowing them to work more effectively. You should do the same.

Keys to improving your emotion management skills:

• stick to the task at hand (hitting the ball, winning the point, etc) rather than the emotion of the situation ("If I lose this point, I'm in deep trouble!").
• If you must be emotional, do so during stoppages. Make it short and sweet, and move on. Almost like a mental sneeze, if you will!
• realize that tennis can be a game of momentum swings. Allow your opponents emotion to get in their way, and take advantage of those opportunities by staying level-headed.

Secret #5: Acting

What does acting have to do with tennis? Everything! To play a part convincingly, professional actors and actresses need to "be" their roles. They become the person they are being paid to portray (I heard that Tom Hanks had a hard time losing his drawl after filming Forrest Gump in 1994). So, too, must you play a character in competition. The role you must play is the role of the always- confident tennis player.

Tennis is usually a zero-sum game with regards to confidence. This means that the more confident you are, the less confident your opponent feels. It makes them doubt themselves, and they start thinking about everything but the task at hand. On occasion you will find two competitors that understand the importance of acting confident at all times on the court, but this seldom occurs outside of professional tennis. You must learn to "act" confident, even if you are not feeling so confident on the inside. Don't give your opponent any more confidence than they already have-make them earn it through their play.

Keys to improving your acting abilities:

• Think of yourself as someone who is out there to play a role, and then do it.
• Exude confidence in every aspect of your behavior-your voice, your posture, your behavior between points and on changeovers, etc.
• Take a mental inventory of your unique individual strengths (quickness, soft hands, strong serve, conditioning, etc) prior to playing. This will allow you to base your confidence in reality, and is a great stepping stone to acting more confident.