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Why a sports mentor ?


"Belief is everything !" Wendy Turnbull ( 9 x Grand Slam Champion, 26 times Runner up in 3 major category events: Singles, Doubles & Mixed )

The greatest gift someone important in your life can do is to believe in you. One great thing is we are right where we should be in our life. To build belief in our journey, one must start at the beginning and build from the start of their first experience of belief.


From external to internal motivators we take those steps in understanding ourselves more. To grow we must at times "fake it till we make it " for a period of time until we actively make a growth change and draw from the internal reasons we do things.

To grow we must change.


For example I used to say " I play tennis for fun, I'm not worried about money and making a living from my profession because I'm following my passion " but actually that was just my way of avoiding the fear of failure if it didn't work out.

Another example is I used to hear from others " I'm very comfortable playing ITF pro tour events" and yet this same person had goals of making a career from tennis and it won't happen on the ITF tour from just playing comfortable tennis matches at this level. This is another way to avoid growth because their are no guarantees except knowing you worked for it. The feeling of being uncomfortable and experience constant perturbation of unsettling forces around you rocking your world is key to growth. Procrastination of not making good use of time, maybe even so far as stop you competing altogether and give up on becoming a professional practice player is a result of not being accountable. All this leads to is getting stuck , feeling frustrated and just not improving which is why so many then just give up the game and get a "real job" before discovering and optimizing their talents.


You need to track and measure, be accountable, have a greater purpose and know the benefit of making a living and what that will do for your life. I was lucky someone called me on my failure to measure myself and from then on it wasn't a hobby it was my profession and I began behaving like a professional tennis player. It's okay to say " I am going to be number 1! " it's your dream, your belief and you are going to do the work to make that happen.


When I played umber 1 in the world, I didn't believe I belonged, I didn't believe I could win, I was happy to just compete. It isn't enough. It wasn't enough. What I realised was the only way you feel you belong is when you embrace you, work on you and then master how to action being you. It was a big eye opening lesson especially on live TV, opening round against defending champion Martina Navratilova. Navratilova was transforming women's sport as she became a female athlete like no others had explored yet in tennis and it resulted in a combined total of 59 major titles and a professional career that spanned over decades, just shy of her 50th birthday. I modelled my game around her style as a junior and now it was my time to face her. In that match I managed to face my fear, maybe not a winning strategy but one that I could do consistently on that day and later I will train to do better. I was beaten by a more experienced person that was pushing her limits daily. I needed to change my approach and stop putting others on pedestals. Another lesson learnt.


I first met Martina Navratilova in the dressing room at the US Open. I was a 2 x Grand Slam Junior Champion and was going for my third title in the semi of the singles in the junior event and also qualifying at the same time for the Open event. At this time I was part of the Australian National Team. Wendy Turnbull was asked to help guide me as my team left me on my own while the others went to play in Canada and I didn't even know who Wendy was at that point. Then in my junior semi final, sadly I badly rolled my ankle and had to retire. I was devastated, it was my first time in New York and I sat crying pondering Why ? Martina, currently number 1 in the world saw me and said " Michelle, you need to keep going as you have a good future and it will be okay."

I started training with Martina and others in the Top 10 after this and then realised I needed to embrace my future, learn from others more experienced to know what it took to improve and then start to apply what I had learnt from this.

Last year I met up with Wendy Turnbull again over a coffee and she said it again when we talked about why she made a career from tennis and she admitted.

" BELIEF IS EVERYTHING !" Wendy explained.


My tips

1. Making an agreement with yourself to be you.

2. Developing you as a person and growing you is a crucial step to making belief steps happen.

3. Surround yourself with a team that get the best out of you, keeps you accountable and are investing in you.



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