Jorge Capestany - TennisDrills TV

Inner Coach vs. Inner Critic

"You are really never playing an opponent. You are playing yourself, your own highest standards, and when you reach your limits, that is real joy." Arthur Ashe, tennis legend

From: Mental Toughness – Workbook for Tennis Jorge Capestany and Steve Hamming

Available at: www.tennis-workbook.com

This article/video is about developing your inner coach. This is the inner part of you that will assist and motivate you throughout the rest of your life – as long as you develop it!

Achieving a major lifestyle change is like a good old-fashioned rope tug. While a piece of rope does not hold much interest for most of us, rock climbers would certainly disagree, as it is their lifeline and yours as well. The rope is an excellent metaphor for the work you are doing here and I am sure you will agree that it takes a lot of personal power to pull lifestyle change permanently into your life.

One of the first steps to developing that inner coach is to begin listening to how you talk to yourself. If you cannot do that, then your inner coach will not be developed. Instead in its place will develop an inner critic. Most of us are already aware that we have a running dialogue with ourselves, but very few of us pay attention to that dialogue. Failing to monitor this dialogue can be very damaging to you mental toughness.

Our inner coach is best defined as that voice you hear while you are playing that responds to your aces, unforced errors, victories, defeats, etc.

Our inner critic is best defined as the collection of all the negative messages you have heard over the years from people speaking outside of you and from your own internal dialogue.

Your inner dialogue can be described as the running conversation you have with yourself. We all have an inner dialogue running in our heads all day long. As we compete, this dialogue can become very negative as we struggle through a tough match. As a teaching pro, my experience has been that about 70 percent of players that do not pay attention to their inner dialogue will slip into a negative dialogue that can best be described as having an inner critic.
A simple test is this; if a stranger was on the sidelines watching your match and he said the same things to you that you say to yourself and you would not tolerate it, then you have a problem. We should never speak to ourselves in a manner or tone that we would not tolerate from someone else. That just makes sense.

As we get more and more frustrated in a match, our inner dialogue often becomes our outer dialogue and others can hear what we are saying to ourselves.

So now that you know the difference between your inner coach and inner critic, how can you learn to silence your inner critic? Below are several tips that can be useful.

1. Be aware of “polarized thinking.” This is the type of thinking where everything is black and white, good or bad, success or failure, all or none. Instead, you should use “percentage thinking.” This type of thinking is more realistic and is a better reflection of reality and how things are in our lives. For example you might say that in your last match, you played 80 percent bad and 20 percent good, instead of saying that it was the worst match you ever played.

2. Avoid over-generalizing. This is when we tend to look at only one piece of evidence and assume it explains everything. If you tend to use words like never, always, everybody, nobody, every, and all, you may be a person that tends to over-generalize. Instead, we should replace that kind of inner dialogue with words like some, most, might, and sometimes.

3. Avoid “magnifying.” This is when we take something small and blow it out of proportion. We may exaggerate the problem and use dialogue like “this is the worst I’ve ever played,” or “I’ll never be able to learn this new grip,” or “I always choke in the third set.” Instead, we should take an honest look at the reality we are facing. Things are rarely as bad as we make them out to be.
   
   Another effective technique for developing your inner coach and silencing your inner critic is to use the ACE (Aware - Challenge - Expand) method.

1. Be aware of what your inner critic style is, what he sounds like and his tone of voice. In short, start thinking about what you’re thinking about.

2. Challenge the limiting beliefs that come from your inner critic. Don’t just believe them or buy into them.

3. Expand your limited thinking through positive self-talk. It is important that these positive self-talk statements are things that you truly believe about yourself and not just a wish list. These statements are most effective when they are based on your actual experiences.
   

Conclusion

Developing your inner coach involves developing an internal support system, a positive inner coach, positive self-talk habits, and an attitude toward yourself that brings out the best in you. If you are having trouble silencing the internal critic and developing your internal coach, then consider getting help from Dr. Steve Hamming at www.op-sports.com. There may be some obstacles in your way that are preventing you from seeing yourself positively, which keeps the internal critic's voice loud and influential. By visiting the website listed above, you can take a free online self-test and Dr. Hamming will respond to you with your results.

Jorge Capestany - TennisDrills TV

Jorge is the Founder of www.tennisdrills.tv - a video based website that shows more than 700 videos of tennis drills and tips. Jorge is one of only nine people world-wide that is a Master Professional with both the USPTA and PTR. Jorge is a 6-time Michigan Pro of the Year a 2-time Midwest Pro of the Year. Jorge has coached hundreds of ranked juniors including 3 national champions.