The Inner Game of Tennis: The Classic Guide to the Mental Side of Peak Performance

Tennis has been one of my favorite sports for many years, although I've never been that good at it (3.5 USTA rating, which is sorta intermediate). I had never heard about this book until it caught my eye at the library, and it intrigued me. I'm not that big on instructional books, because sports are so visual it's almost impossible to describe (for example) all the things your body needs to do to hit a decent serve. In my own game, my serve has actually deteriorated quite a bit over the years, and all my attempts at "fixing" it only seemed to make it worse.

Then, I happened to watch Andy Roddick play on TV at the 2003 US Open. As you probably know, Mr. Roddick has hit the fastest serve ever recorded (150+MPH), and is one of the best tennis players in the world. What really amazed me about his serve is that his motion isn't very complicated (like Pete Sampras or John McEnroe, to date myself). What I noticed is that his main focus when serving is simply to make perfect, solid contact with the ball and send it on its way over the net. Somehow, I was able to lock in on a mental image of Roddick getting his racket, arm and shoulder into perfect position to hit a killer serve. Then, just goofing around really, I took some balls to my local park and started whacking serves the way I thought Roddick would if he was in my body. The results were immediate and impressive. My velocity went up dramatically, and I just felt so much more comfortable than I had for years.

In this book, the author says he noticed that if he watched Frankie Albert play QB for the SF 49ers and then played street football with his friends (pretending he was Albert), he could throw much better than usual. I totally agree with what he's saying, and my Roddick experience above is another example. In fact, what got me started playing tennis was the total style, class, and enjoyment that was Bjorn Borg's game in the 70's-80's.

So, I agree with most if not all of the author's lessons, especially finding someone to "be like" and then "being like" that person. I also agree with the importance of getting your analytical, critical mind (Self 1) to focus on things like the spin of the ball or the sound it makes when your opponent hits a shot. Where I think the author sells the reader short is by not making two points:
1. TENNIS IS NOT EASY. While keeping your Self 1 under control will definitely help, everyone has physical limitations, and tennis is a difficult hand-eye coordination exercise. In my opinion, the main reason tennis has fizzled in popularity in recent years is because it's basically a hard game to learn. The author probably skips this point to avoid scaring people off, but he could counter by mentioning that the Inner Game will make tennis less difficult and more enjoyable.
2. TENNIS REQUIRES LOTS OF PRACTICE. This book is somewhat Zen-like in its approach, but any Zen book will tell you that the most important part of your practice is, well, practice. By this I don't mean hours of boring drills and instruction, I just mean playing on a consistent basis with a variety of levels, watching matches on TV or in person, and spending some time hitting by yourself or with a friend.

I still gave the book 5 stars, because I think it can help anyone's game and other aspects of life as well. I'm also reading his books on work and golf, but to me the author's forte is tennis so I'm glad I started with this one.

When I began reading this, I was somewhat dubious due to Mr. Galwey's long time involvement with Prem Rawat the notorious cult leader who once was known as Guru Maharaj Ji of Malibu, CA. However, as a long time tennis player and golfer, I could not deny some of the basic views he put forward. Read it but note cult thinking as well.

This is one of the pioneering books that brought about the field known as sports psychology.

A great self-help book, in my opinion, because it has an action plan you can follow. Basically, it will help you achieve total self-confidence if you don't already have it. The author talks about each person having a self1 and a self2. The former is your conscious ego and the latter is your potential. Self-confidence comes when we suppress self1 and allow the excellence in self2 to come out. We should trust ourselves to do what we want to do because everything we need is in self2. It is when we allow self1 to judge, we doubt ourselves. An important concept in getting rid of self1 is the art of being able to focus. If we focus on the here and now, this place and time, self2 will have a better chance to perform. How many times have we start to wonder about our cat or our past mistakes or day-dream how nice it is for something to happen when what we should be doing is to focus on the task at hand. In a way, self1 and self2 are similar to the conscious and subconscious mind. Whichever way you choose to believe is not what's important. What is important is that by conceptualizing this way, the complexity is reduced, and results can be produced quickly. How else can humans conceptualize confidence? Confidence without doubt, is nothing. Just like you cannot have hot without cold or fast without slow.

Lastly, we should cherish competition and our opponents. Our opponents are not our enemies but can be viewed as obstacles that allow us to grow and become better at what we do. Humans love to accomplish great things because they like to test their limits. Although this is fine, those who set out to overcome an obstacle should find out if the result they get is what they really want before they go about trying to overcome the obstacle.

I read this book four years ago on the recommendation of a World Champion in the sport in which I compete - Fast Draw. I had often ranked high at major contests, but had never been able to make it to the winners circle at major competitions during 18 years of shooting. I was pretty sure that the only thing holding me back was the mental game.

While reading this book I was amazed at Gallwey's description of mental aspects of competition, and how I had experienced the exact same things. His explanations of how a competitor sabotages his own outcomes showed me what I had been doing wrong. His tips for getting into the correct mindframe made perfect sense, although were probably not the sort of things I would have come up with on my own.

After putting these tips into action I really saw a big improvement in my shooting. I won my first major championship within four months, and have been the overall world champion in my sport for three of the last four years. It was the things I learned from this book that allowed me to perform at my top level when the pressure was on.

This is really a nice book that enables you to approach pretty much everything (not just tennis) with a Zenlike approach. It reminds us all of the importance of being mindful in everything we do, every moment of our lives. It helps us remember that our ability to trust ourselves is the most important ability of all. When we trust ourselves, we can stay in the moment and we naturally maximize our present abilities. We all know this somewhere inside but tend to lose perspective and perform below our potential many times. Whether you are a tennis player or not, I think there is something in this book for everybody. If you'd like a book that explains how and why these experiences occur, read "The Ever-Transcending Spirit" by Toru Sato. It is just a superb book discussing many of our important inner experiences in life in a way that everyone can understand!