Before I lived in New York, I happened to be in New York when Trump got elected for the first time. I was in London when Brexit happened. And now, I’m in Rome. I had been in Rome for a few hours when bells started ringing and white smoke rose from Vatican City. I, of course, was at the tennis and the only white smoke I saw was the cloud players leave behind when they sprint after a drop shot. I’m not saying where I go history happens. But where history goes I happen to be.
I didn’t grow up in a religious household but I did end up in a Catholic course in school solely because I was away on a tennis tournament when my class got divided into “katholisch” and “evangelisch” as they used to do in Germany (not sure how it is now). Catholic and Protestant. The Protestant course was full, I was not there to have agency and so I ended up with the Catholics. All I retained from it is Catholic guilt. I felt guilty all the time.
For example:
When my practice day was finished and I could still walk to the fridge to get a snack, I hadn’t done enough, I felt guilty. When I was away from home and left my family behind, I felt guilty for not being at home. When I stayed back to be with family and canceled tournaments, I felt guilty for not attending tournaments. No matter what decision I made, the guilt remained. If you want to be a tennis player, you either have to be completely numb or get used to the fact that you’re going to feel guilty most of the time.
Most tennis players lose every week. The guilt after a loss is the most palpable. You lie awake at night going through all the mistakes you made. I played cross-court when I should’ve gone down-the-line. I held back when I should’ve gone all out. I took too much risk when I should have played it safe. In reality, the absolution of decisions made is the win at the end of a match. Playing it safe may have been the wrong choice but if your opponent chokes and gifts you the match, you’ve done everything right. In tennis, where no game ends in a tie, the outcome dictates the ethics. And that’s a dangerous ground to be on. Just because something got you the right result doesn’t mean it was the right thing to do in the first place.
The best lesson I learned when it comes to losing was from Petra Kvitova. She had just won Wimbledon. She was physically exhausted from the effort and mentally exhausted from the amount of emotions she had been through. In her first match back since her triumph she lost to a random German in two straight sets. The random German was me who ended up in the Top 10 at the end of the year and stopped being so random. What I learned that day, though, was how to lose properly. 5 Minutes after our match, Petra was on the bicycle, smiling and talking to her coach, analysing what went wrong, what went right, and she even stretched and ate a meal.
You don’t understand how foreign this concept was to me at that time. That you could behave exactly the same way after a loss and a win. I would usually go straight to the hotel, no shower, no cool-down, just into my room, pull the curtains, see nobody and sit in the dark. Turn off the phone, turn off reality, just replay every single mistake I made and punish myself by not eating, not sleeping. The next day I would continue in the same manner until the guilt kicked in for not practicing and then I would go back to practise and work until complete exhaustion. That was my cycle of trust. The more tired I was the less energy I had left to feel guilty.
I realised it could be done differently when I saw Petra after she had lost to me (of all people). If I had lost to me, I wouldn’t have eaten for days but she seemed okay. I understood a very important lesson. I was punishing myself, yes, but it had a creepy vibe of self-absorption to it. Petra respected me and respected the loss and went on in her routine like nothing happened. I saw only me. Not my opponent and what they had done well, not the occasional stroke of fate where things are just not meant to be that day. I slowly started to change and eventually I started to handle losses better. Never well, I did stay loyal to my self-ordained Catholic guilt in that regard. But a lot better and I remained thankful to Petra forever. She was and still is the person I look up to when it comes to losing gracefully.
If you can keep a certain routine after you have failed, if you can continue in your life as if nothing out of the ordinary has happened, you will signal to your system that you can indeed treat triumph and disaster just the same and that things will be okay. And eventually, they hopefully will.
Here is a video of people gathering around screens at the tennis when the new pope was about to come out on the balcony. Pope Leo XIV is a tennis player by the way.
Things that make me happy:
I had the pleasure of interviewing the basketball legend Dirk Nowitzki at the OMR festival, a huge marketing festival in Germany, and the mental strength and presence of mind that oozed off of him was fascinating to watch. A lot of people describe him as very humble and down to earth and he definitely is all that but underneath it is an incredible strength and will power. I really enjoyed that.
Things that make me unhappy:
While I appreciated the entrepreneurship and start-up energy at the festival, as an author the vocabulary that was thrown around was somewhat off-putting. A lot of KPIs and revenue streams, user generated content and learnings. Of course, longevity was a big one and the possibilities and danger of AI - and white sneakers. The white sneakers were not part of the vocabulary, they were just worn by everybody. If you really want a start-up but for the life of you can’t think of an idea, buying white sneakers is the first step to inspiration. Good luck with the revenue streams!
Being in Rome when the new pope was announced was a strangely emotional experience. While I’m off to Vatican City to see if I can catch a glimpse I hope you are having the blackest coffee in the world to get ready for the weekend. May it be a clay court-filled one!
Yours truly, Andrea
Could you put a note at the end of your posts that lists matches (and platforms) that you recently served as a broadcast commentator? With luck, I'll be able to hunt it down on ESPN or the Tennis Channel. Always educational when you call the play.
Lovely beginning "I’m not saying where I go history happens. But where history goes I happen to be.". And great until the very last word. A true winner.