Start Where You Are

When you are trying to get better at pickleball, the whole process can be more than overwhelming. There are millions of websites and videos - many of them offering confusing and conflicting information. And if you go looking for help, then everyone is a coach. Again, with various levels of insight and expertise.

Tennis champion Arthur Ashe probably wasn't thinking about pickleball when he famously suggested that we "Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.", but maybe we can apply this to our pickleball journey.

Getting better is almost always going to involve change of some sort. So we have to stop looking for miracle solutions that take no effort on our part. They really don't exist.

So if we don't do "change" very well, what are we to do?

One alternative is to look for relatively small but beneficial changes to what we are doing now. Little tweaks and adjustments can often have a huge effect. Maybe you need to adjust your stroke a bit so it is a little less like tennis. Or maybe you need to follow through to the "ready" position more often. Or maybe you need to dance around a bit less at the NVZ line. Or any of dozens of other things.

Tackle these changes one at a time if you need to, and you will slowly see your game get better. Eat the elephant one bite at a time.

"Without change there can be no change" is one of my favorite expressions, and it might be easier if you work on a lot of small changes over time.

See you on the courts.

Michael Gauthier

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