The following post is an excerpt from Frank’s newest book, The Soft Science of Tennis.
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Managing Fear and Risk
I’ve been a high-performance tennis coach for over 30 years. I thrived comfortably in relative obscurity, enjoying the Southern California sun working with nationally ranked junior tennis players and coaching coaches. For 20 of those years, I secretly dreamt of writing my own tennis instructional books to positively impact the coaching industry while traveling the world.
Procrastination dominated those 20 years. I wasn’t willing to take the chance. I lacked the courage to risk leaving my base and losing my successful coaching business if I were to begin traveling. It seemed too dangerous. What if I failed? What if the books bombed? What if I wasn’t as smart as I thought?
My internal dialog was telling me that even though I had something special to share, I shouldn’t risk a good thing. I didn’t have professional speaking experience. Why did I think I could write books?
I intuitively knew that I had to risk leaving relative comfort behind and put my old career in jeopardy in order to attract a larger audience and share my experiences and tennis developmental theories. I researched the fear and risk management process and began writing The Tennis Parents Bible. My goal was simply to complete it and if it helped a single parent or coach along their journey that would be a bonus.
Back then, no one could have told me I would go on to write four, #1 bestsellers, coach the ITF coaches and speak at the largest conferences and grand slams around the world.
A great place to start when managing an athlete’s attitude is establishing a baseline of their thoughts and behaviors concerning the following common stumbling blocks. Begin by answering the following question:
- Do they have adversity towards fear and risk? Is it extreme or mild?
- Are they tolerant towards fear and risk?
- Do they seek out fearful or risky endeavors? Is it extreme or mild?
Athletes respond to risk and fear differently. In my experience, while most athletes are initially overly cautious, some are overly adventurous. Success and failure in competition greatly depend on how the athlete responds to fear and risk. Results, both positive and negative, stem from repeated behavior. An athlete’s behavior is created by their attitude. Therefore, understanding and managing our athlete’s attitude toward fear and risk is worth exploring.
