Life Lessons Can Be Learned From Pickleball
Day 227 of Photo Inspirations — Life Lessons Can Be Learned From Pickleball
These photos are of some of our residents who play pickleball every Tuesday, Thursday and many other times besides that. By now, I’m sure you’ve heard about pickleball and have even seen people playing or perhaps you’ve played. It’s one of America’s fastest growing sports for all ages because it’s fun, easy to learn and gives you a good work-out. It’s a combination of tennis, badminton and ping-pong. The court is about ⅓ of the size of a tennis court, with a lower net. The official ball used is just like a wiffle ball, only smaller. The paddles are between the size of a ping-pong paddle and a tennis racquet. You can play singles and doubles. Scoring is somewhat similar to volleyball or tennis. Only the serving team can score – and you play to 11 – but must win by two points. And, we love playing here at Hyde Park.
I, not EVER being athletic in any sense of the word – well, except for running, have, at last found my sport. Initially, it was a bit intimidating because we have several in our community who already played it competitively and there were those who were tennis enthusiasts, and they picked up on it the quickest. But more than the fun of the sport, I’ve learned a lot of Life Lessons from the game:
1) Never give up. It would have been easy for me to “throw in the towel” on the game because others were so much better than me. But, by my attitude of “never giving up”, I’ve become more proficient and my confidence in my game has gotten so much better.
2) Never say “SORRY”! I love that about the game. We’re all doing our best and if we make an inadvertent mistake, you don’t say “SORRY”. And, if you do, you’ll quickly be corrected. The definition of SORRY is feeling distress, feeling upset, downcast, in a poor or pitiful state or condition and we are none of those. I did that a lot in the beginning of learning. I felt really SORRY for those who had me as a partner, but now I hold my head up high and think “I’ll do better next time!”
3) Cheer and congratulate when someone does well. I love it when I make a really good play (most often, it’s been by accident – I’m still learning), but my friends make me feel like a rock star – rather, a pickleball star when I’ve conquered a shot.
4) Those who are the best…..mentor those of us who are still learning. And they do it with such a sense of TLC. I’m looking forward to the day when I’m qualified to mentor, In the meantime, I’m so thankful for their willingness to help us learn.
5) No name calling or trash talk allowed. I know that’s common in many sports, but I love the genuine sportsmanship and comradery in pickleball. Even if we call ourselves names or trash talk ourselves because of a dumb error, others are quick to steer us the other direction.
6) Making friends — Pickleball is a great social sport and it gives us a chance to make new friends or bond more closely with old ones. It doesn’t take too much motivation for us to want to play, but just in case we were
in a little lazy mode, our friends motivate us to “get our game on”. And that we do.
6) And, here is the best part – pickleball has great health benefits:
— It helps lower our blood pressure — moving our legs and swinging at the ball raises our heart rate which creates a great cardiovascular workout that strengthens our heart.
— It burns body fat — we burn 250 calories for every 30 minutes we play (we usually play for two hours at a time).
— It improves balance — Navigating the pickleball court to intercept shots and deliver winning volleys takes all kinds of movements. In pickleball, we move forward, backward, sideways and we shift our weight in so many directions which trains our bodies to have better balance.
As I’ve said many times before, I don’t plan on giving up until I’m taken up…..and if that day comes while I’m playing pickleball, I just hope and pray my shot was the winning shot that shot me to heaven. I’ll arrive shouting…
WHAT A GAME!! WHAT A RIDE!!