Synopsis: A book about tennis but like all great books it about allot more than that.
Key Takeaways
Page 28 – Getting it together mentally in tennis involves the learning of several internal skills:
· Learning to program your computer Self 2 with images rather than instructing yourself with words; · Learning to “trust thyself” (Self 2) to do what you (Self 1) ask of it. This means letting Self 2 hit the ball;
· Learning to see “nonjudgmentally” – that is, to see what is happening rather than merely noticing how well or how badly it is happening.
This overcomes “trying too hard’ as these skills are subsidiary to the master skill, without which nothing of value is ever achieved: the art of concentration. The Inner Game of Tennis will next explore a way to learn these skills, using tennis as a medium.
Page 31 – As soon as we reflect, deliberate, and conceptualize, the original unconsciousness is lost, and a thought interferes. . . The arrow is off the string but does not fly straight to the target, nor does the target stand where it is. Calculation, which is miscalculation, sets in… Man is a thinking reed but his great works are done when he is not calculating and thinking. “Childlikeness” has to be restored with long years of training in self-forgetfulness.
Page 34 – Judgements are our personal, ego reactions to the sights, sounds, feelings and thoughts within our experience
Page 39 – He directly experienced high backswing. Without thinking or analysing, he increased his awareness of that part of his swing. When the mind is free of any thought or judgement, it is still and acts like a perfect mirror. Then and only then can we know things as they are.
Page 44 – The third man, who is driving, is in the process of letting go of value judgements altogether. He plays the Inner Game, enjoying things as they are and doing what seems sensible at the moment
Page 55 – Almost all tennis players have experienced playing over their heads after watching championship tennis on television. The benefits to your game come not from analysing the strokes of top players, but from concentrating without thinking and simply letting yourself absorb the images before you.
Page 56 – No, the native tongue of Self 2 is imagery: sensory images. Movements are learned through visual and feeling images. So the three methods of programming I will discuss all involve communicating goal-oriented messages to Self 2 by images and “feelmages”.
Page 57 – Let it happen
Page 59 – It is important not only to understand intellectually the difference between letting it happen and making it happen, but to experience the difference. To experience the difference is to know the difference.
Page 60 – Don’t analyze it, just observe it carefully
Page 60 – Feel exactly what it’s like to move your racket in this new manner
Page 60 – Now focus your eyes and mind on the seam of the ball and let it happen
Page 68 – Simplicity is the key to consistency
Page 83
Step 1 – Observe Existing Behaviour, Non Judgmentally
Step 2 – Ask yourself to change, programming with and image and feel
Step 3 – Let it Happen!
Step 4 – Non-judgemental, Calm Observation of the Results Leading to Continuing Observation of Process until Behaviour Is in Automatic
Page 85 – I realized that there was a distinctly different kind of satisfaction gained in the two methods of hitting the ball. When you try hard to hit the ball correctly, and it goes well, you get a certain kind of ego satisfaction. You feel that you are in control, that you are master of the situation. But when you simply allow the serve to serve itself, it doesn’t seem as if you deserve the credit. It doesn’t feel as if it were you who hit the ball. You tend to feel good about the ability of your body, and possibly even amazed by the results, but the credit and sense of personal accomplishment are replaced by another kind of satisfaction. If a person is out on the court mainly to satisfy the desires and doubts of ego, it is likely that in spite of the lesser results, he will choose to let Self 1 play the major role. When a player experiences what it means to “let go” of Self 1 and allows Self 2 to play the game, not only do his shots tend to gain accuracy and power, but he feels an exhilarating sense of relaxation even during rapid movements
Page 92 – Watching the Ball – When there is love present, the mind is drawn irresistibly toward the object of love. It is effortless and relaxed, not tense and purposeful. When watching the seams of the ball, allow yourself to fall into relaxed concentration. Awareness of the flight of each ball as it moves toward you
Page 94 – Listening to the Ball – Reproduce that ‘crack’
Page 95 – Feeling – Increase one’s awareness of muscle feel. One is to take each of your strokes in slow motion. Each can be performed as an exercise, in which all attention is placed on the feel of the moving parts of the body. Get to know the feel of every inch of your stroke, every muscle in your body. Then when you increase your stroke speed to normal and begin hitting, you may be particularly aware of certain muscles
Page 98 – Awareness – Attention – Concentration – One-Pointed Concentration
Page 99 – He focuses his awareness in two dimensions, the here and the now – that is, in space and in time
Page 101 – My own device, for concentration during match, and one that has been effective for many of my students, is to focus attention on breathing. It does not mean intentionally controlling my breath
Page 103 – Match your stroke with your breathing, not your breathing with your strokes
Page 103 – To begin to understand my own lapses of concentration I had to know what I was really desiring, and it soon became clear to me that there were more desires operating in me on the court than simply to play tennis. In other words, tennis was not the only game I was playing on the court
Page 107 – People play different games then the game of tennis from Perfect to Compete to Image to Status to Togetherness to Husband to Health to Fun and to Higher Consciousness
Page 111 – In the New World, excellence is valued in all things. We live in an achievement-oriented society where a man is measured by his competence in various endeavours. Even before we received praise or blame for our first report card, we were loved or ignored for how well we performed our very first actions. From this pattern, one basic message came across loud, clear and often: you are a good person and worthy of respect only if you do things successfully.
It then follows that the intelligent, beautiful, and competent tend to regard themselves as better people
But who said that I am to be measured by how well I do things? In fact, who said that I should be measured at all? Who indeed?
Page 123 – Winning is overcoming obstacles to reach a goal, but the value in winning is only as great as the value of the goal reached. Reaching the goal itself may not be as valuable as the experience that can come in making a supreme effort to overcome the obstacles involved. The process can be more rewarding than the victory itself
So we arrive at the startling conclusion that true competition is identical with true cooperation. Each player tries his hardest to defeat the other, but in this use of competition it isn’t the other person we are defeating; it is simply a matter of overcoming the obstacles he presents. In true competition no person is defeated. Both players benefit by their efforts to overcome the obstacles presented by the other. Like two bulls butting their heads against one another, both grow stronger and each participates in the development of the other.
Page 124 – Today I play every point to win. It’s simple and it’s good. I don’t worry about winning or losing the match, but whether or not I am making the maximum effort during every point because I realize that that is where the true value lies. Maximum effort does not mean the super-exertion of Self 1. It means concentration, determination and trusting your body to “let it happen/’ It means maximum physical and mental effort.
Page 124 – Competition and cooperation become one
Page 125 – But one can control the effort he puts into winning. One can always do the best he can at any given moment. Since it is impossible to feel anxiety about an event that one can control, the mere awareness that you are using maximum effort to win each point will carry you past the problem of anxiety.
Page 129 – When a player comes to recognize, for instance, that learning to concentrate may be more valuable to him than a backhand, he shifts from being primarily a player of the outer game to being a player of the Inner Game. Then, instead of learning concentration to improve his tennis, he practices tennis to improve his concentration.
Page 130 – Concentration in tennis is fundamentally no different from the concentration needed to perform any task or even to enjoy a symphony; learning to let go of the habit of judging yourself on the basis of your backhand is no different from forgetting the habit of judging your child or boss; and learning to welcome obstacles in competition automatically increases one’s ability to find advantage in all the difficulties one meets in the course of one’s life. Hence, every inner gain applies immediately and automatically to the full range of one’s activities.
Page 131 – “Unfreakability” refers not to man’s propensity for burying his head in the sand at the sight of danger, but to the ability to see the true nature of what is happening around him and to be able to respond appropriately. This requires a mind which is clear because it is calm.
Page 133 – To repeat, calmness does not mean lack of concern; it means the ability to separate the real from the unreal and thereby to take sensible action.
Page 135 – The most important word in the English language I let. Let it be and let it happen
Page 136 – what is needed is not so much the effort to improve ourselves, as the effort to become more aware of the beauty of what we already are. As we begin to see and appreciate our essential selves, we manifest automatically that beauty and our true capacities, simply by letting them happen.
Page 136 – In respect to my own growth, whether in tennis or any other aspect of development, I have found it helpful to look at myself as the seed of a tree, with my entire potential already within me. as opposed to a building, which must have stories added to it to achieve a greater height.
Page 137 – I can understand that I need only use all the rain and sunshine that come my way, and cooperate fully with the seed’s impulse to develop and manifest what it already uniquely is.
Page 138 – Apparently, letting go of my grip on life released an energy which paradoxically made it possible for me to run with utter abandon toward life. “Abandon” is a good word to describe what happens to a tennis player who feels he has nothing to lose. He stops caring about the outcome and plays all out.
Page 138 – The essential art to be learned was shown to be that of becoming increasingly aware of things as they are. The ghosts of the past and the monsters of the future disappear when all one’s conscious energy is employed in understanding the present. Understanding the present moment, the only time when any action can occur, requires concentration of mind: the ability to keep the mind focused in the here and now.
Page 139 – When the light is dim because some of our energy is leaking into regrets over the past or fears of the future.
Page 139 – Concentration is said to be the master art because all other arts depend on it
Page 139 – Another man may own nothing beautiful but if his consciousness is attuned to beauty, he is rich because he will always be surrounded by beauty
Page 141 – My own experience is that the true goal of the Inner Game is to be found within
Page 141 – When the lighthouse of the home port is in sight, the ship’s radar can be turned off and navigation aids set aside. What remains is to keep the lighthouse in sight and simply sail toward it. The biggest surprise in my search for the inner self was finding that it could be experienced by any human being whenever his desire for it was sufficiently sincere. This sincere desire alone will lead one to the discovery of a practical method for uncovering what could be called Self 3. Then the only instrument required is the human body itself in which consciousness is able to be aware of itself. The search is within, and the lighthouse can be seen no matter how near or far from home port one actually appears to be in terms of his own physical, emotional or spiritual development. Realizing this goal is within the capabilities of all of us and not the special privilege of any elite.
Final Thoughts: Great book that teaches you more about life then it does tennis. I really like the concept of tennis is game to make the rest of your life better, using it to live in the moment. This is a book that I will keep coming back to 8.5/10
Stranger in Sydney 