[00:00:05.040] - Tony Roig
Hello and welcome to Pickleball Therapy, the podcast dedicated to your pickleball improvement. Hope you're having a great week. My name is Tony Roig. I'm the host of your weekly podcast. Sound may be a little bit different this week. I'm trying something new. I'm basically, I don't know, almost have the microphone in my mouth a little bit, but I guess the sound quality will go up. We shall see. If you like the sound quality of this one, let us know. It's a little bit different for me. I'm not used to basically having a microphone in my mouth, but it is only me on the microphone, so I guess that's okay. This week, it's actually going to be a lot of fun. We're going to go on a climb together. We're going to climb. I'm calling it the Mount of Mudita. I hope I'm pronouncing that correctly, but the pronunciation of the word is less important than the meaning that it has. We're going to climb this mount today and explore different progressions of our, you want to call it, Pickleball Enlightenment. I'm good with that. We can do that one. Our Pickleball Enlightenment. As we dive into the podcast, we have our Pickleball System course opening for the fall, our September course.

[00:01:11.620] - Tony Roig
If you've been thinking about improving your Pickleball, I get asked all the time, what's the best thing to do? Camp, lessons, whatever, YouTube, stuff like that. It's the pickable system. To me, there's no thinking about it. There's no debate about it. It's a one-of-a-kind program. If you want to find out more about it, come to our... We'll have a free training in September. You can get a feel for how we train. Then check out the testimonials of fellow players who've been in it, and they'll tell you. I'll tell you how good it is. Anyway, that's coming up soon here. We also have a couple of camps that we've opened up recently. If you're interested in a pickleball camp, it's a great way to learn as well. It makes it sound like I just said, Don't come to camp. Camp is good. It's a more compressed version of the system. That's how we teach our camps. And I would tell you that if you want a camp that's really going to help you understand pickleball better, this is the camp to come to. So check those out as well at betterpickleball.com. All right, let's dive into this idea.

[00:02:19.260] - Tony Roig
So here's my personal progression as a player and as a thinker about sport as evolved over time. And Hopefully, it helped you as well if you've been listening for a bit. If you haven't, you listen for a little bit longer and it'll help you. But I'm thinking about this idea of progressing through different stages of our pickle ball. I'm going to keep using the word enlightenment. I like that idea. It's really our understanding of those around us, those players that are other than us inside the sport. I came across this term in Mutita recently, which made me think of it as perhaps, at least right now, it's going to be the highest echelon or the highest tier that we can achieve along this climb that we're undertaking. What we're going to do is we're going to start a little bit simpler on the climb and then make it a little bit... We'll keep on going up, and then we'll end up at Mudita at the end. So the progression is like this. A lot of times as pickleball players, and A lot of this is unintentional, guys. It's not like we're out there intentionally thinking this way.

[00:03:37.260] - Tony Roig
But the way we end up engaging with the sport of pickleball is as though we were at the center of the whole thing. That was like, we're the most important thing on the pickleball court. Now, there's a side branch here that we could explore, but I don't want to spend too much time on this. There is an idea, obviously, that in terms of your experience, you are the primary actor in your own life, so that would make sense for you personally. But in terms of the game of pickleball itself, you are clearly not at the center of the game of pickleball. Neither am I, neither is anybody else. And so the first step along this journey is understanding that. Is understanding that there are other actors, our opponents, our partner. If you're playing in a tournament, the referee, the volunteers. There's even, you want to go a little bit deeper on it. You can talk about who made the course that you're playing on. That's important. It could be someone at the county, it could be a private facility, whatever. You need those folks. You need the game organizers. How are you playing on a Wednesday morning?

[00:04:50.300] - Tony Roig
Who organized that? Was that you or somebody else? So there's a lot of actors in this game that we end up playing on the court called Pickleball. And so the first The next step along the progress is understanding that there are, in fact, other actors out there. And what that does is it takes away or it disarms us from sometimes acting too narcissistically, too selfishly, and making everything about us. You can imagine a situation where you go to a facility and they have six courts, but they're busy. There's a lot of that want to play and things like that, and we make it all about us. It's all about, well, I'm having to wait. It's inconveniencing me. If the word I or me is in there too much, maybe you got to think about that a little bit and progress up to the first level on this mount that we're climbing, which is, again, just understanding that we are not the center of the pickleball universe in terms of the pickleball itself and in terms of the overall game. Beyond the other actors, by the way, there's also just the game itself. The game itself has its own existence, if you will, its own thing.

[00:06:08.340] - Tony Roig
You think about it this way, right? When you play pickleball at your local courts, yes, there's your opponents, your partner, the organizer, the facility, whoever is in charge of the facility or in charge of making the facility, things like that. But beyond that, there's players playing pick-a-ball in the adjoining state. There's players playing pickleball in other of the world. There's going to be players playing pickleball after you and I are no longer around to play pick-a-ball. So the game itself has its own existence. And understanding that also is also a way to think, get beyond ourselves, extend our thinking beyond just ourselves. And the story that I like to share here, I've probably shared it recently, but I'm going to share it again, is the story of Rafael Nadal, one of the greatest tennis players of all time, brushing his own courts after practice, the clay courts. By himself, by hand. The reason he does that is because he's not bigger than the game, and it keeps him humble. It keeps him connected, grounded, if you will. Anyway, so level one of the mount that we're climbing, the Mount of Mudita, is this understanding that we're not at the center.

[00:07:20.680] - Tony Roig
The next here, the next level that we can get to along this climb, is the idea of Sonder. I've talked about it before in in a prior podcast, but basically Sonder is the idea that it's the realization that others around you are living their own lives. So it's a certain amount of empathy, but it's really just It's more like a respect of others. It's the idea that you want to live your life the best you can, and that's perfectly fine. No one's going to judge you for that because you have Sondra as well. You're entitled to it. But so do they. So does your partner. So does your opponent. So does the other players waiting, things like that. An example here would be your partner. Maybe this isn't you directly, but you've probably witnessed it, where you have a player misses a shot, even an easy one, and their partner gets all over them. It makes them feel less than as a player. Obviously, that's not cool. That's not something we should do. But And Sondra, I think, helps us really, crystallizes that idea. And the idea, again, is that the player who missed the shot, they're entitled to live the life that they're leading the way they're leading it.

[00:08:43.000] - Tony Roig
And we are not allowed is, and we're going to probably end up with a loud anyway, but we don't have the authority or the right to negatively impact the life of another human being. The the same way that they don't have the ability to... They should not negatively impact her life. It's the old do unto others idea. But the beautiful thing about Sonder is, do unto others is a fine rule, the golden rule, right? But I would submit the limitation with do unto others is that the reason you're not doing unto others is because of this rule, right? That, okay, I'm not supposed to do unto you, except as you would do unto me. Sondra takes it a little bit further, which is you actually realize that this other person has their own path, their own right to their existence and the way that they're choosing to experience that existence. So that's level two. So level one, again, is we're not the center of the universe. We remove that obstacle to ourselves. Level two, now we're in saunder, which is where we're respecting others' ability to lead their lives. Now, Now we get to mudita.

[00:10:00.960] - Tony Roig
We get to the height of enlightenment. And I guess it's appropriate that it's a Hindu word, I believe. But it's a... Mudita is the idea, is the When you have mudita, it's having feelings of happiness for the success of others. Now we've gone next level, right? And I'm going to tie it into a game in a second, the different pieces. But just think about that for a second, right? It's you actually being happy because somebody else succeeded. Your opponents, in some cases, or in all cases, if you're in mudita land, if you're up at that higher echelon of awareness and enlightenment. When you think about it applied to our game, specifically, work through it a little bit. You start from the premise that, and let's use a common example that we use on this podcast because I think it gives us a good playground to have this conversation, which is the game that we're up, 10-8, and we lose 12-10. So the first level would be we come off the court and we tell our partner, If I had played better, we would have won that. There, what we're doing is we're making it about ourselves.

[00:11:30.000] - Tony Roig
Else. If I had played better, we would have won that. So I guess in that scenario, I am completely in charge of everything that happens in the universe because all I have to do is just play better. And I win. In other words, my opponents have no role to play. My partner has no role. I need to play better and I win. Very self-centered, very narcissistic. And I'm not trying to be critical of anybody. If you've I thought that recently, but I think if you process it a little bit, you'll understand that that's not a... First of all, it's not accurate. And second of all, it could hold you back because you're assigning yourself way too much power in the universe. So that's the first level. Then the next level would be understanding, just understanding, not being happy about it, but understanding that the fact that you were able to get to 10-8, good on you. You're entitled to play as hard as you can and score points and stuff. But that does not preclude your opponents then from also getting to 10, just like you. Why are you entitled to 10 and they're not entitled to 10?

[00:12:48.840] - Tony Roig
And then from there, it just became a game to two, to win by two. Think about it for a second. You were up 10-8. The only way they can beat you 12-10 is first, they need to get to 10 first. They need to get to 10 and tie you. That's the first step. Then someone's going to get to 11 and maybe 12 or keep on going, whatever. But the point is, you got to 10. Why can't they get to 10? What is it about them that doesn't allow them to get to 10? That's a Sonder concept. The realization that others are entitled to walk their paths, just like you're entitled to walk your path. If you can get to 10, why can't they? So that's the second tier. And then the third tier, the enlightenment tier, the mudita level, if you will, is, you know what? That's awesome. That's so good that they were able to persevere, that they were able to be down 8, 10 and just keep fighting, keep battling, not make a silly mistake. Because if you think it through, if they had missed a return to serve, game over. If they had missed an easy fourth, game over.

[00:13:57.360] - Tony Roig
You would have won because that would have been a point for So they had to play well on the return side, and then they had to keep battling until they got to 12. They had 10 first and then 12, ahead of you. So the next stage of, again, enlightening is not just acknowledging their right to do so, which is the Sondra concept. It's actually looking across the net and just being happy for your opponents. And I'll tell you guys a quick side story, personal story. Where I apply this concept, and have been applied it for a little bit now. Think of one of those rallies where there's a really good hustle by your opponent. And let's think of a really clear one is where the ball trickles over the net, or it's a really weird shot or a lob they go after or something. And they just hustle back there or hustle up, and they get it, and they extend the rally. What I've been doing in those situations in my mind is I'm rooting for them. Now, I want to be absolutely clear. I am not giving them the point. I'm not just dumping the ball into the net and going, Oh, nice shot.

[00:15:05.870] - Tony Roig
We're good hustle. I'm fighting. I'm scrapping. I'm scraping. I'm doing the best that I can, just like it would normally. But I will tell you that I've gotten to a place where maybe it's a little Mudita and me now, where I'm actually rooting for them to win that rally because of the work they put in. So maybe try and find those moments, right? Where maybe you're smashing balls at your opponents and they're just digging everything. And maybe there's a part of you that can go, wow, that's so cool. They're working so hard. They're doing such a good job. And part of me wishes or hopes that they prevail in this rally here. Again, I'm not going to give it to them, but I hope they prevail. Anyway, so that's Mudita. That's the idea. It's going to be difficult if you haven't started climbing this mount yet to go base to Mudita. Think of it like Mount Everest. They have those base camps and stuff like that. It's similar. First, get to the base camp of you're not the center of the universe. Then, get to the base camp of they're entitled to whatever they got.

[00:16:08.240] - Tony Roig
They're entitled to their 10, they're entitled to their 12. You don't have to be happy about it at the next base camp. Then, if you want to go all the way up into the cloud level and see really what's going on in the valley, you can keep climbing and get to Mutita. Anyway, hope you enjoyed that. I enjoyed this podcast. If you probably hear it, my voice really liked the way that the concepts fit together. It's a really good concept and hopefully something that you can bring into your game when you're ready for it. I hope you enjoyed this week's podcast. As always, if you have a minute to rate and review it, really appreciate you doing that. If you enjoyed the podcast, please share it with your friends. Remember, if you enjoyed this podcast, reasonable chance they might as well. I hope you have a great week, and I'll see you in the next episode of Pickleball Therapy. Be well.