[00:00:04.940] - Speaker 1
Hello and welcome to Pickleball Therapy, the podcast dedicated to your pickleball improvement. I'll be having a great week. We are getting here to the end of June 2025. Kind of weird to think about, right? Halfway through 2025. We have an exciting second half of the year planned at Better Pickleball. We have some new coaching programs that we're going to be unveiling. We're always trying to find ways to connect with players who are interested in improving. Our whole thing is to transfer knowledge to the best of our ability in the world of pickleball. We do it here on the podcast, we do it on our YouTube channels, and we also do it through coaching. So if you're interested in any of that, if you're on our email list, you will receive those opportunities as they become available to you. I wanted to do a shout out, and then we are going to dive into the podcast today. What I'm going to talk about today is I'm going to talk about remembering the fourth player on the court, and you'll understand more in a second. Basically, it's understanding our place within the sport. I'm going to be reading from our upcoming Pickleball Therapy book that'll be coming out towards the end of September is the plan.

[00:01:20.080] - Speaker 1
So be on the look out for that. We have the pieces in place. Things are moving ahead with it. So we're very excited about that opportunity. And then if you are interested in becoming Being a pickleball therapist, you can send me an email, put therapist in the byline, and I will send you information about what that means. In a nutshell, it basically means you're committing to your mental improvement, your mental journey. You'll be involved with the podcast because that's what being a therapist is in terms of listening to it and engaging with it when you can, and then sharing it. That's a really important piece of it, is helping others, not just ourselves with this. Anyway, so if you want to do that, send me an email and I'll send you some information on being a therapist. Then in the RIF, I'm going to be talking about something that occurred not too long ago that actually ties into the book. I wanted to talk about this in the podcast, and I happened to be doing some book editing, and this was the section that came up as well. Serendipity, if you believe in that stuff, is what happened here.

[00:02:20.180] - Speaker 1
Before we get into that, I'm going to do a shout out here to Tim. Thank you very much for the comment on the YouTube's. If you don't know, we're on YouTube as well. If you care to visualize the podcast, you're welcome to watch it on YouTube at pickleball Therapy. You can see my hands flying around and mannerisms as I go. This is from Tim, and that was a day ago. It was in response to episode 248, Don't Don't diminish you. And then what Tim says is, I've been listening to pickleball Therapy for just over a year now, and I can tell you that this podcast is the gold standard for preparing yourself to be mentally bulletproof on the court. Each week, the information keeps my mental game grounded and keeps me on track and/or sometimes excels my growth in the sport. Give it a listen, Tim. Thank you, Tim, very much for leaving that review. As I mentioned, I'll mention it now, and I mentioned again at the end of the podcast, these reviews are important, not just because they're nice to receive, though they are very nice to receive. They're important because they allow other players to decide whether they want to interact with this content.

[00:03:22.890] - Speaker 1
So if the content helps you, leaving a review helps us reach other players. And it'll help those players is the idea. So if you a minute to do that, that'd be great. All right, I'm going to dive into the book, and then I'm going to give you in the rift the story that I want to share with you, which plays perfectly with the topic for this week. So let me set up the chapter for you that I'm going to be reading. So in the book, it's basically follows a progression of understanding ourselves better, understanding the sport better. Then we start linking us and the sport. It's built, as you know by now, pretty modular is how we do things step by step. Now we're in this is a chapter out of part four, which is our place within pickleball. It's a little bit different than just how we interact with the sport. It's actually our place inside of it. This chapter is entitled Don't Forget the Fourth Player. Now, we've already talked about ourselves ad nauseam in this book because we're talking about our perspective and how we see things. We've already talked about our opponents before this chapter in the book, and now we're talking about the fourth player, who is our partner.

[00:04:23.880] - Speaker 1
I'm going to read from the book now, and then I'll come back to the RIF and we'll talk about how this manifested itself not too long ago in a rec game that I was playing at. All right, don't forget the fourth player. There is one actor we have not yet focused on, our partner. Just as we needed Gary and Nadine to join us that day, we also needed each other to play. No partner, equal. No play for you. Now, Gary and Nadine, just to give you context, you've read this in the book, Gary and Nadine are our opponents that day. So there's four of us playing you, your partner, Gary and Nadine. Back to the book. Spoiler. There is a 100% chance that your partner will make mistakes. They will miss shots and make bad decisions. That is part of the game. But your partner will also do things right. If nothing else, just joining you on the court is enough. Remember, without them, you are not playing pickleball right now. Just as with your opponents, remember that there are other actors in this play. They each come to the game with their own doubts, desires, thoughts, etc.

[00:05:25.420] - Speaker 1
Whatever theirs are, they are no more or less valuable than yours. As we'll explore a little bit more in the next chapter, pickleball does not belong to me or you. Every player is entitled to enjoy their relationship with pickleball to its fullest. There are three steps you can take to become a better partner and player. The first step is to remember that your partner is there. This step may seem obvious, but we can sometimes become so hyper-focused on ourselves that we lose sight of our partner. We can also forget that our actions impact them. An easy example is the unconscious shoulder slump or head tilt, eye roll even, when our partner misses a shot. An easy technique to avoid potential miscommunication with your partner is something my co-head coach, C. J. Johnson, teaches our students. After every rally, turn towards your partner and make eye contact. A pattle tab of smile is also good, but no matter what, turn towards your partner and reestablish a connection with them. The second step is to apply some empathy. Our partner is a person, flawed just like us. Just as we make mistakes, so will they. Just as we have other things going on in our lives, so do they.

[00:06:40.520] - Speaker 1
When they invariably make a mistake, let them know it's fine. You can remind them that you will miss two, or you can let them know that you're just happy to be playing and the score doesn't matter to you. You did, after all, read this book. Smiley face, of course. The third step is to see if there's something you can do to create a more positive experience for your partner, and by extension, you. Perhaps your partner does not like it when you poach. Then, for that game, you will do your best not to poach, even if it is the best strategic shot. Each of these steps are progressive. You start with recognition, then expand it to understanding, and finally, complete it with positive involvement. Some specific instances of this process at work. Your partner popped the ball up and thinks you're upset with them. Is there something you might say to make them feel better or to let them know you are not upset? Your partner missed a return of serve, perhaps the second one of this game. Are there things going on in their life that have their attention? Maybe your partner got some difficult news that morning on their way to the courts.

[00:07:54.240] - Speaker 1
Your partner didn't hit the ball where you thought it should have been hit, a strategy error in your mind. Is it possible that they have just not had time or guidance to progress as far in the game as you have? In each of these situations, rather than going direct to, What in the world is my partner doing? You take a breath and allow for the possibility that there's more going on than just an idiot or crappy partner. They are out there doing their thing, giving their best. Celebrate them in the game that you're playing. So that's a section from the book, and then we go back into something has to win, someone has to win, and things like that. So it gives you an idea of how we approach perspective here at the podcast, and we will in the book, or are in the book, which is basically the idea that we need to keep a balance in terms of what we're doing, which is playing pickleball, and who else is involved around us. And the better we understand these other actors in the play that we're involved in, this pickleball play that we're involved in, the better we're going to treat them, the better experience we're going to have, and ultimately, the better it's going to be for us as well.

[00:09:07.050] - Speaker 1
So it's a selfish act if you want to think about it that way. So that's from the book. Hope you enjoyed it. In the RIF, what I want to talk about now is I want to talk about an experience that I had recently. It was a conversation with another player that I just met in a rec play while I was traveling. So to Let me lay it out for you, and then I'll tell you what happened, and then talk a little bit about how that process of that player, from my position, from my view of things, diminished their partner, diminished the game that we had just finished playing, diminished the whole experience, and ultimately, diminished the player. I'm not going to use names or things like that, but I'll just tell you. It was a player who, again, total wreck, didn't know these players, just met them. And so I go out to play. I got to play on the court with a very good player. Well, it's Jill, my wife. She's a very good player. And the two other players wanted to play together, which is fine. So we played against them. And just to give you some idea, we don't go out there and play our normal game in these situations.

[00:10:24.360] - Speaker 1
That just wouldn't be fun for anybody, right? It wouldn't be fun for us. It wouldn't be fun for them. Now, we're not We're just playing. We're basically keeping the balls in play. If I get a high ball, I'm just angling it a little bit or pushing it back into a position. I'm not blowing it up. I'm not hitting anybody in their bodies. I'm not driving balls off the bounce, which I tend to do in my competitive matches. I'm not lobbying, right? A lot of weapons I'm not using. So I'm playing, but I'm playing just very conservatively, I guess, if you want to look at it that way. So we end up winning the game. It was pretty convincing victory, 11 less than five, let's say, right? And we made a couple of errors and whatever. So we get off the court and one of the players comes up to me. Now, this is unsolicited, right? I didn't engage in this conversation. The The letter comes up to me and says something to the effect of that the player needs a better partner next time they play against us. And then I said something along the lines of, I thought the game was fine.

[00:11:28.880] - Speaker 1
We went out there and it was a good game and all that, to which the response was that it was not a good game, and basically that they needed a better partner and that. So my response The sense of that was, well, I said, you're entitled to your opinion on how you feel about things. I can tell you that from my perspective, there's no such thing as a bad pickleball game. And I told him that I basically work full-time in pickleball. I have a podcast. I thought a lot about it, and I don't believe there's a bad pickleball game, but you're certainly entitled to your position on it. And then kept talking about something or the other, and it always came back to the partner not being as good as this player, which objectively was not accurate. As a coach, I can tell you that. I mean, these two players, they were both fine. They played fine, but they were both about the same level. One player had certain type of flaws in their game that I could identify, and the other player, the one talking to me, had other flaws in their game that I could identify.

[00:12:39.820] - Speaker 1
And there wasn't a huge difference in these two players. But I'm just giving you context. That doesn't excuse it, even if there was a difference in the level. I want to be clear about that. But this idea that I needed a new player just kept coming up. So I don't remember what else I said. And then the player got upset and said something like, Well, I'm entitled to my opinion. You're Mr. Pickleball, but I'm entitled to my opinion, which I said, I haven't said otherwise, have I? You certainly are entitled to your opinion. But I will tell you this, if you're going to come to me and you're going to start chatting in my ear, I don't know what players expect. I'm just going to go like, Oh, yeah, definitely. You have another partner. No, I'm not going to engage in that content, in that type of conversation. And I would submit to you, if you're on your journey, and You listen to this podcast and you subscribe to some of the concepts that we have here, including not bad-bounding other players, that perhaps it's worth making a note or having a action like the one that I had.

[00:13:46.780] - Speaker 1
Because I think it's important for this player, the one I was speaking with, to perhaps be exposed to a different approach, to be made aware that the comment about the partner isn't necessary, appropriate, helpful, productive. You pick your positive objective, and it's none of those things. Just to go along with it, right? Would just be continuing to encourage or at least not chastise that behavior, which ultimately is to the detriment of our game, not just to the player. It's to the detriment of our game because this player plays in a community. This is a rec play community. They're playing regularly together. And so you have these negative conversations happening inside that community. That's going to bring everybody down, as we've been talking about with this concept of diminishing ourselves. So I just wanted to share with you what had happened to me, how I'd reacted to it. I'll make a suggestion to you that if you're, again, subscribed to the concepts here, it doesn't mean that you have to go out there and preach the gospel. I'm not saying you have to unsolicited, announce yourselves to everybody as to what's right and what's wrong. But certainly, if a player initiates the conversation with you, as this player did with me, I don't think there's anything wrong with...

[00:15:10.880] - Speaker 1
Not just nothing wrong with. I would suggest you that it's the correct thing to frame it in the way that you understand your relationship with the sport, the sport itself, the other actors in the sport, depending on the conversation, and share about how you view things so that the other player talking with who maybe has an unfortunate view of the game and the other actors in it can maybe open their eyes to a different way of thinking about it. That's part of just growth my personal growth as a player. And it's not that I ever felt... I will tell you that personally, it's not like I ever felt that my opponents or my partners weren't important. I never thought about it. And so my My lack of context, my lack of perspective, was not driven by an intentional dislike for them or anything like that. It was just an ignorance of the idea that I should consider my partner, like with the three steps that I just mentioned, or that I should take into account my opponents as just human beings out there who are trying to do their best on the court. The part of this journey for me, and I'm going to call out my friend and mentor, Coach Peter Scales, who wrote that book, Mental and Emotional Training for Tennis, Compete, Learn, Honor.

[00:16:36.360] - Speaker 1
Those principles got me going in this arena, and it's really opened up my mind to a different way of thinking about sport in general, and in particular, the sport that I engage in with any frequency, which is the sport of pickleball. Anyway, if you feel like it, it's probably It's worth having the conversation with someone who opens up the door. Another door that I'm going to mention real quickly is the door, because it just came to mind as a door of at the end of a game when you have a tough fought match or tough fought game and you have somebody on the court say something like, I messed that up, or basically putting it on themselves or some condition that's not recognizing the work done by the winning team. I think there's ways to approach That's that as well. One way I would approach, I have approached it in the past, is to say, Yeah, you certainly... I guess you could have made that shot, but I also remember that Tom or Mary or whoever, I also remember that great save that they made. Remember that great save? Or do you remember the... When they were in a tell spot they were in and they got out of it, that was really good.

[00:17:52.780] - Speaker 1
And so it retakes the framing of the situation away from the negative self-centered idea into more of a constructive big-picture idea. And I think if you start from the premise, going back to what I'm sharing in the RIF, if you start from the premise that just playing pickleball in and of itself is a positive experience that should be celebrated, then everything else works out, doesn't it? Because then I needed a better partner, or there's Windy, or whatever dissolves in that. It dissolves in that, right? It's an acid. Acid dissolution by a proper frame claiming of... Weren't we just playing pickleball? Pickleball is pretty fun. So I think I'm going to go with that. Anyway, so I hope you enjoyed this week's podcast. One subject that I'm going to be talking about in the future that I'm developing to thinking about now, which is, I think, really fascinating, is this concept of insecurity. And I see insecurity. By the way, do you ever have one of those moments where you've been looking for something forever and all of a sudden you see it? That just happened to me. That's why I had a distraction there. I looked across.

[00:18:57.660] - Speaker 1
I've been looking for this little tripod stand. I don't know. I looked everywhere. And all of a sudden I look over here and it's right next to me right here. Anyway, but it's the idea of how insecurity ripples through how we behave sometimes on the pickleball court or around the pickleball court. And when we see players acting in ways that we perhaps think are not the best way to act, that a lot of times you can trace it back just to insecurity. And if you trace it back to that, then I think it gives you a better way of empathizing with it. So we'll talk about that in a subsequent podcast. I'll be out of the office next next week because I'm going up to the New York for a couple of days just hanging out, getting some food. And then I'm going up to the MLP in New York and look forward to seeing the pros up there, giving it their all, and hopefully with a sound mind. So next week, we'll have a I'm not sure exactly what we'll do next week. It'll probably be an archive episode. We'll find one of the best.

[00:19:51.160] - Speaker 1
If you have one that you really like, that you think we should share with somebody else, with other players, let us know, because what happens is if we take an old episode and republish it, then it'll get more exposure to new players. So if there's one that really resonates with you, you can send us an email at support@betterpickleball. Com. Put in the subject line, recommend this episode or pull this archive episode, something like that. A podcast episode is fine. And then I'll tell the team to be on the look out for that. And if you do send me an email on becoming a therapist, you can send that one to therapy@betterpickleball. Com. And then put in the subject line, please, therapist. That really helps me identify. I give it more priority. I'll tell you that. If it says therapist on it, I'm like, I got to read that one because I'm going to respond to that one, and I'm not going to respond to solicitation ones until I've responded to the Therapist ones. As always, if you enjoyed the podcast, have a minute to rate and review. I really appreciate it and share it with your friends.

[00:20:43.910] - Speaker 1
Remember, if you enjoyed the podcast, they probably will, too. I will not see you next week, but I will see you the week after that. Hope you're well, and I'll see you next time.