Halfway Up the Mountain

You've Got to Remember Where You're Looking

I went out onto the court two days ago with Rich, a pal and teaching pro I hadn’t hit with for months. He confirmed what I’ve been telling myself: After about three months of daily practice, my serve is now a different animal. It’s crisper, and it has more bite and action off the ground. “You’re throwing the ball more forward and your wrist and elbow are playing better together,” he observed.

The next day, I went out solo, continuing my compulsive quest to carve the perfect serve out of the block of marble — or, in my case, maybe mud — that I choose to believe awaits me. From my very first serve, I was performing at my exciting new level. The inner theme of my first couple dozen efforts was: “Wow! I can’t believe how good my serve has gotten!”

At which point my Inner Engineer braked my mind to a halt. “Hold on a moment there, buster,” said he unto me. “You’re overdoing it on the self-congratulation. You’ve got a way to go yet. You’re only halfway up the mountain.”

He was, of course, correct. An image popped into my head: Me on a long trek, and looking back at where I’d come from and admiring the view. With good reason! For it was indeed spectacular. In my delight, though, I’d gotten hung up on where I’d come from and had forgotten the forward-looking piece of the action: Up the mountain, toward the apex, into the heart of the marble — or the mud.

“Carl,” sez I to myself, “you’re nowhere close to the end of this journey. You’ve got a lot more ‘better’ in you.”

It felt like an important self-correction. Applause is a fine thing, but it’s very easy to get stuck in it, and so I found myself immediately setting a new set of targets: More pop! More certainty! More progress up the mountain! More discovery! More embedding in the muscle memory so I can do it without thinking!

“Carl,” I told myself, “keep at it. There will come a time when you remember this moment and you’ll think to yourself, ‘Do you remember when you believed that that was progress? You can be such a silly sausage!”

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I’m heading over to the indoor-tennis facility in a half-hour to hit with a friend, a session that will be preceded by a private hit-a-hopper-of-serves session by yours truly, pursuant to my new commitment.

Meanwhile I am reminding myself: Keep climbing, Carl, for it’s there, not in self-congratulation, where the real joy lies. Keep your eye on the climb ahead — and don’t forget, from time to time, to take a break, and take a breath, and take in the view.