The following post is an excerpt from Emotional Aptitude In Sports NOW available through most online retailers! Click Here to Order
Managing Thoughts and Emotions 
Let’s take a deep look into how our emotional aptitude shapes how we prioritize and structure our training as well as our performances. Here is a true story of how poor emotional aptitude destroys logic.
Pre-Game Personal Sabotage
My student, Julia, is a highly intelligent Ivy League tennis star. She was set to warm up and spar a set with a higher ranked rival at the finals of the ITA Summer Circuit.
As we arrived at the tournament site, Julia asked me to stay in the car instead of doing what I was being paid to do, which was to be on-court coaching. Julia was worried that she’d look “uncool” having her coach with her, since her drilling partner was coming alone. Already, I saw that Julia’s poor emotional aptitude was destroying a real learning opportunity.
So not to add further stress, I simply reminded her to warm up quickly and get right into playing a set. After all, the practice session was scheduled to play sets and not to practice stroke production. (Julia and I had already drilled for a few hours in the morning.)
Julia’s game is built around attacking the net and shortening the points, so I wanted her to rehearse her winning style of play. They hit the court for their one hour time slot and quickly got right into a back court rallying groove. Five minutes, 10 minutes, 20 minutes, 35 minutes of simply playing catch, back and forth. (Remember- competitive tennis is a game of keep away … not catch!) Now 45 minutes into their one hour session they then began to take warm up serves, and then played one 7point tie-breaker and walked off the court.
As Julia got back into the car, I questioned her: What happened? You knew you were supposed to practice in the manner you are expected to perform, not just rally back and forth.
Julia replied: “That’s what she does in college, it’s normal for her, that’s her game. She likes to stay back and groove, so I did what she wanted instead.” I of course replied, but that is not your game. Practice matches and sparing should be used to practice and reinforce your strengths to increase your game day confidence.
Because of poor emotional aptitude, Julia wasted the session warming up the system that she’s not even going to be applying in her upcoming matches. Now fast forward to the next morning. Julia lost a close match missing several approach shots and key volleys. Why? Julia’s fear of confrontation over-rides her improvement and performance needs. Due to her poor emotional management, Julia chose to train without her hired coach to please her practice partner, instead of improving and building her own skills.
Emotional Aptitude impacts everything… It’s more important than you think …
In high performance sports, our thoughts, decisions and actions are first subjected to the athlete’s emotions. Each athlete’s “head space” influences a variety of opposing decisions based on feelings, not intelligence.
