Hello and welcome to this episode of the Tennis IQ Podcast on Brian Lomax. And I'm Josh Berger and on today's episode we have Marius Bernard. Marius Bernard is a former ATP pro who spent 13 years on the tour winning six titles, reaching the men's doubles quarterfinals at both Wimbledon and the Australian Open. During his playing career he also had doubles wins over six world number ones, including Roger Federer. While playing on the tour, Marius studied psychology and business management.
After his career was over he used his expertise in performance psychology and business to become a coach at mentor. Today, Marius is an executive coach helping CEOs, directors and managers improve their performance with tailored development programs and managing their work pressures with self belief optimism and resilience. One of the cornerstones of his coaching work is the clear links model of self belief, which he uses to help his clients enhance their personal performance.
The model builds self belief to generate a sustained virtuous cycle of confident future performance. The reason why we asked Marius to be on the Tennis IQ Podcast to talk about the clear links model and the importance of self belief for tennis performance as well as in our daily lives. Self belief is a topic that we have touched on in the past, and this conversation will definitely deepen your understanding of self belief as a key ingredient in high performance.
Please enjoy this conversation with Marius Bernard. So Marius, welcome to the Tennis IQ Podcast. Thank you very much, Brian. I'm happy to be here. Well, we're happy to have you here because I think we're going to talk about a topic that Josh and I have discussed in the past as being quite important to the mental toughness of tennis players,
which is self belief. But before we get into that, we'd love to have you tell our audience about your career in tennis, how you've gotten to where you are today, what you're doing today, and yeah, let's just begin with that. Yeah, I mean, I grew up in near Cape Town in South Africa, and I had quite a few siblings and we were all into sport, and I played a lot of rugby as a kid. That was kind of my dream to play for my country when I was young. And I just played rugby until about the age of 16,
and I really started focusing on tennis. I happened to have some good results at that point in time. But before that, I had some mental issues, I struggled with the convertum at points,
which we can talk about later. But that's when I started reading the inner game of tennis, because I thought I really need to do something about it, and then I started working on my mentality, being more non-judgmental, and focusing on one point at a time, etc. And that kind of changed my career because shortly after that, I won the National Cross-Court Championships, and that gave me an entry into Junior Womalden, and an air ticket to Junior Womalden.
So that's when things started changing for me, and after that, I thought, maybe I can do this. So I had Junior Womalden bumped into people like Junior Korea, and it was that era. So that was a tough learning school, because these guys had a lot of confidence. And from there on, I sort of, in those days, you pretty much did your own thing. There wasn't these big entourage, as you know, stringers and psychologists and everything.
We weren't a squad of players from South Africa, but slowly but surely, I sort of caught my way out as a top doubles player. I had some good singles wins, but most of my wins came from doubles. So I won six career titles, I was eight times finalist. I guess the interesting thing is, I beat six world number ones, singles players in doubles, including Roger Federer and Roddy, and players like that, or that caliber. So that was kind of highlights looking back.
And, you know, made the quarterfathers of the Australian Open, quarterfathers of Womalden. And when I finished my career, I played for 13 years on the tour. When I finished my career, I started coaching and also did some teacher training, etc. And been doing that for about 18 years, I'm, you know, coaching a lot of players. But I've recently, in the last three years, started doing executive coaching, coaching, business people.
And just finding a lot of similarities between the mindset that you need in business, to succeed compared to what you need on the sporting arena. So that's what I am right now. Yeah, well, it's a great, you know, great story and a great sort of career arc to getting to where you are today. And you mentioned, you know, you've got perhaps some anecdotes from your own career with respect to confidence and self-belief. And I think it'd be great to hear some of that.
So, you know, how do you, and maybe through your own stories, can get into this? But how critical do you think self-belief and confidence are for tennis players, especially towards their mental toughness? Yeah, I think, I think it's really important. And I think that's when after my career, I look back, I kind of formulated a clear links model, which is, you know, model of sort of four things that I think is really critical. And I'll just briefly explain it to you, the perception that you have
of what is happening to you is obviously critical. You know, the way we experience things isn't the same for everybody. So, what is your reality? And you can shape that. And the important thing there is your memories, you know, which of the memories are you, you know, focusing on? Because your memories aren't the recording of your life. You can pick the ones you, you favor. And I've learned to do that. And I've also seen people who have performed at a really high level,
how they do pick out the best memories rather than those bad moments. They don't tell you that they serve a double fault on break point. But they might tell you about the winning parts of shot down the line. That's the one they tend to remember. And so then that becomes your narrative. And the story that you tell yourself, you know, which is really important. And the story that you think other people believe about you, these are two really critical elements. And then that
shapes your belief. And then eventually your self belief. Now, the interesting thing you talked about confidence and self belief. I think when we talk about confidence in tennis, that can go up and down. But self belief tends to be there, you know, all throughout, you know, okay, you can go over years, you can go up and down. But people have a sort of a base level of self belief. And I always try to improve mine, especially when I later on, Mike, to read, and this is where experience
comes in. But there's another concept, self efficacy that I think is really important. And that's the belief that you have that you can complete a task or a job. And I think if you look back at the Australian Open, you know, Nova Jockewitch nine times in the final nine wins, I mean, that's going to do a lot for your self-efficacy. You know, you can go out and win it. You know, people saying that the gap is so big between the other players in the top three. And I think
this experience is a major factor in that. And people sometimes overlook the fact that a grand slam is a very different animal from a normal tournament. And, you know, especially in that last weekend, where some players have two days off and another player's got a day off. How to prepare. Personally, I used to love playing day after day. I didn't like the long breaks that you would face in a slam. You know, you sometimes play on the Monday first round, hoping and in your opponents
are playing on the Wednesday. So you play next match on Thursday. It just upsets that natural rhythm that you get into. And grand slams are very different from your normal tournament where you play, you know, five days in a row. And people should not underestimate that. And these guys have done it for so many years now that they are just know exactly how to, you know, when to practice, when to take a day off, you know, when you're going for a massage, when you when you need to hit
some more balls, you know, they're getting to a rhythm of that. So yeah, I think Novak Djokovic is one of the best examples now of somebody with a lot of self-belief. And they, at the moment, him and Adal, they don't seem to be dropping over very much. And Adal's had a few injury issues. And I think when it comes to play, he'll probably be right up there again. But the time will come when these guys will lose, but they're not yet ready to to hand over to the next
generation. And I don't think the next generation is playing badly or they've got a confidence problem or anything like that. I think it's just a matter of time. And I think I met the dev looked a bit tired. And then after that first set where he really gave it everything. And then, you know, then it just seems like he thought Djokovic is going to be too good on the day. And you know, then you start trying too hard and making errors, unforced errors. So I think the time will come,
but not yet. Yeah. Well, no, you referenced the clear links model that you developed. I like to have a little deeper into that. Yes. Particularly, you know, as it relates to self-belief. And I guess any specific interventions that you've used or that you have found helpful in terms of, you know, in terms of maintaining self-belief in terms of reinforcing the different links of that. Yeah. No, that's a great question.
How do you do it? One of my things that I started from an early age was visualizing. And so visualizing before and event, but also visualizing after an event. And again, you you pick the things you want to visualize. So for instance, before a match, I try to visualize myself playing great tennis, but I also visualize myself when there's a major obstacle. So I've played against players who have really tried everything in the book. And you know
the kind of play you're going to play. So you visualize certain things that could happen. I mean, I can give you an example, though, a guy jumping into your service box, making noise with his feet just before you serve on on on break point. That's happened to me. Players playing mind games, turning up with the courts with their bads packed, you know, in Tokyo. And you think, my partner said to me, I think, you know, they're not that into this match. I want to get on the
flight tonight. And I said, you know, just don't pay any attention to that. And sure enough, you know, they tended around in the third set and started playing really well. So when you, you try and predict, and this is where experience comes in. And I mean, you've seen Jockovic sometimes, you know, acting on the court like he's injured and it's just managing the ebb and flow of a match and the intensity and the rhythm. And so with experience, you learn
what the things are that you can expect from different players. So yeah, I think, you know, really visualizing, you know, beforehand is really important. The other, the other really important bit of this and you'll understand what I'm talking about is the timing of the emotions when you're in the middle of it. So when you're under pressure in a match and this really unexpected occurrence happens and you, your emotional brain is going to take over. And you know,
if you're not prepared for it, that is the first thing that goes into my mind. You need that space before you react. If you visualize before the match, how are you going to react in a certain situation and you prepared, then your brain kicks into that sort of what they call the computer, which, you know, you've rehearsed, you're ready for it. So you've maybe got a thing like, I know this guy, you know, he's going to misbehave when he's down a break and you prepare for it. When it
happens, you're not going to get upset or you're not going to get distracted. And that's important because in the heat of the moment, if you let your emotions take over and it always goes to the emotional brain first, if you let that run, then sometimes you're going to, you know, behave in the wrong way and you're going to react in the wrong way. It's interesting to use the computer model there because actually I often will talk about that in a computer science model called
if this then that. And it's, you know, it's really basically having a plan for every sort of contingency that could happen. Yeah. So if you have somebody's jumping around into the service box while you're serving at 3040, if you've already planned, if this happens, then I do that, you are not going to be distracted, right? You'll be able to maintain your mental toughness throughout that. Yes. That's an hour. Yeah. And because your emotions will always give you a message
first, it's like what the hell is he doing? Doesn't he know the, the any could have tense? But, you know, you, if you, if you pre, prepare for that and you know how you're going to react, then it's a lot easier because the emotions also very quick, you know, they, they, they, they, they jump in straightaway. So yeah, that's what I used to do before matches, after matches, you know, you, you want to learn from your mistakes. So also when you play, you know, is there
something technically I've done wrong in that point? You make a quick decision, yes, I can maybe do this differently or no, that was just and then you move on. And so, so then after the match, when you visualize, you try to pick up the, the best moments, you know, there's no, no point in going over and over and over, you know, you know, double faulting on, on break point or, or match point.
In fact, that, this was an interesting story. It leads me back to this time when I started reading the Inigo and Vita, so it was actually a big catalyst for that because I played in a, inter-reventual, which is like a, you know, sort of inter-state competition, I guess in America. And I played one of our rivals and I had a few match points in the tie break out, a few more match points. I walked off the court and I had 17 match points and lost the match. In fact,
I called him, it's a guy called David Adams. I called him a few years ago because I was doing a few talks in the area and I needed to get my facts right. And I said, are you sure it was 17 match points? Yeah, it was 17 match points. And then after that match, I decided that, you know, I need to change. There's something in my mind that needs to change. So, I started reading the Inigo of tennis and I think, go away. I tied a little book and just great information on being
non-judgmental, playing one point at a time. And I think that was the real key for me is changing my mindset to one point at a time. I think if there's one thing that I thought made a massive difference to my career is that because what I did is I really started saying what I'm going to do is play every single point. And what I'm thinking about is the strategy that I'm going to try and execute on the very next point. So, I became really focused on my strategy and my process
and try to get the significance of the point score out of my mind. And so, I did that when I won that grass called tournament. But these things take a practice and I, you know, practiced it and practiced it and got better and better at it. And I said to a guy the other day, I think if you can do that, if you can really apply that philosophy of just what I want to do the very next point.
And that's all you're focusing on. It gets rid of almost 70% of all problems in tennis because, you know, mentally that is, you know, looking back, looking forward, those are the big problem set that people, you know, when they mentally, when they start raking down is due to that. Anyway, so I worked on that for years and then I played in the finals of the Kremlin Cup in Moscow. There was about six years after that occurrence. And I was playing David Adams,
the same guy at 17 match points as junior, played him in the finals. And I remember ripping this return, we're in the tiebreaker in the third set in the finals. And I ripped this ball returned down at the feet. Next ball ball, dipping down, they missed the volume. And I turned to my partner and I said, come on, next point like this. And he runs over to me, he jumps into my arms, and he says, we won, we won. And I didn't realize it was match point because I was so zoned in on
what I had to do. And so yeah, that really served me well because I clearly had a problem with the nerves of getting close to match point. And it sort of just, and it didn't happen every match, but I can, it happened about three times like a real one. I didn't realize it was match point. But also it in general, it just made me a lot calmer because all I tried to do was execute that process of what my strategy is. And the other thing that I did was it's a strategy I'm trying
to execute, but I'm not saying you must do it. It's like, this is what I'm going to try and do because there's a slight difference in the pressure. And that's what I tell my players a lot. You know, if it doesn't work, don't worry. You know, it's just this is your focus. This is what you're trying to do. But yeah, the visualizing is an interesting thing. Josh, you were asking about what I did. I worked with players and they've actually struggled to visualize
their good moments from the past. And then we sort of had to tell them that when you play that match, when you walk off, try and remember how you served out. Try and remember, you know, those good returns you've played on match point because that is sort of fuel for your future confidence. You need to keep refueling that. And some players do have a better ability to visualize another's and they have to work at it. So I used to be quite good at visualizing. As a young
star, used to visualize myself playing rugby for my country and all sorts of things. So you practice it from a young age, I guess you get better at it. But some people have to work a little bit harder at visualizing. Obviously, they have different ways of learning as well. Maybe it's sound, maybe it's more the vision. I was quite I was into art as a kid as well. So I think that's what visualizing has been quite easy for me. Quite natural as well. I think the post match visualizations
really great because and you're right, people have a hard time doing. I was talking to a player yesterday and asking him to remember that type of thing. And the exercise I put him through was, so ESPN is obviously it's a global name, but it's very big here in the United States. Pretend you work for ESPN and you're putting together the highlights of the match. Yeah. Which points would you put in there? And it gets them to at least begin to think about,
oh yeah, all right, I can kind of look back and and do that. And I usually tell the story because that actually was an internship job I had. I used to work for a sports network and I would watch games and take notes and then I would take the tape and actually make those highlights.
Yes. And a really good way to think of your matches. Yeah, very good. In fact, I've just reminded me when I was a kid, my brother and my sister, they were sitting outside the bathroom listening to me because I used to commentate on my favorite match and they used to take the mickey out of me for doing that. I didn't know they were listening in. So I was going for about three or five minutes,
you know, all my players are performing and so on. So yeah, it's great to cultivate that, but it was quite interesting if I think to go back to that book, which was my mom kind of threw it in my bag when I went on the road. And I don't know if she thought I would read it or not and they actually made a big impact. Yeah, we've, uh, energy of tennis is definitely something we've
we've referenced a number of times in in previous episodes. We actually had Sean Brawley on a previous episode who, you know, worked worked with Tim Galloway for many years and we've talked a lot about the importance of having that that present moment focus rather than constantly thinking looking back towards, you know, previous points or previous matches or thinking about the future, the what if what if I lose this this game here, what if I lose this match, what if I win, but trying
to, you know, constantly come back to the present moment and focusing on that next point. And I like that you said that that, you know, by doing that one thing that fixed what 70% of the problems
right there just by let's let's stay presently. Let's focus on that next point. I guess as it relates to tennis players and I guess other other sorts of athletes, how can we, you know, as coaches as, you know, sports psychology professionals as executive coaches too, how can we help individuals to better achieve that sort of focus and that sort of present present minded mentality time and time again. Yes. That's a great question. I'm on a course at a moment, business executive course and
it's all about the command muscle of your brain. So we are doing things like obviously connected to breathing and when you were saying visualizing, I used to sort of sit in a very comfortable position or even lie down and breathe deeply before I visualise so to get it myself into the right frame of mind. And this is sort of the more senses you can use the better. So we were doing a lot of breathing at first and then another way, I don't know if you
familiar with anchoring some of your memories. So we were doing things like just rubbing our fingers to get you really in the right frame of mind and then when you visualise with that. Now repetition is obviously a key. So the idea is eventually when you're taking real note of a feeling here, your fingers, you visualising it, you know, you can almost hear the sounds, then you anchoring all these good memories with your touch, your vision, your hearing, you know, even if you can bring in a
smell or anything even better. And that way the memories are a lot more vivid. And if you visualise like that, your visualisations will be a lot more vivid as well. So we're actually using that command muscle, it's called the PQ, it's Shersat Shemin, he's a professor at California, come back to you, I don't want to get a wrong stand for it, I think it was. And the idea is about taking command of your brain and making sure that your focus is on positive, on positive thoughts.
So if you have a negative thought that comes into your mind, you'll go like this and you'll go, no, I'm going to see the opportunity in that situation, I'm going to see the gift of that situation rather than the negative side of things. And so these are things you can use to improve your, the command of your brain. And so you think about the right things. And also you need to have that self awareness because sometimes people walk around and they have thoughts going in the
around in their mind, negative or positive and then they don't know. Johnny and Mary who won Wilmeldon doubles, I think it's 2012, he worked with psychologists in that year and he said he actually played less tennis in that year but every morning after breakfast he visualised for 10 minutes and he was thinking about what he was saying to himself. And then if there was a negative
thought then he would change it into a positive. So one of the things you used to say is when he got to a big tournament like, you know, the sort of Indian Wells and slams, he would think that maybe I don't belong in the last, last eight or last, you know, semi-final. When I get to semi-final, I'm a mid, I'm maybe a little bit on my league and he changed that in that year and he had the best run at Wilmeldon. And the other thing he also said was that he was just in the finals, he was just
having fun. He was just him and his partner were just having fun. Unfortunately his partner then decided to pursue his career in singles and so they didn't play again. But it was interesting that he didn't play more that year. He actually played less but he had this real regime of every day doing his visualisation after breakfast and at night and that really turned his mind set around. I mean I think as point-side professionals, one of the things that Josh and I work on all the time
is helping athletes develop awareness. And I think we even had this conversation with Sean Brawley, Josh, about mindfulness and meditation as being another means of doing exactly what you're talking about in terms of locking something in and what you were describing that all of us made me think or did make me think of how we appraise things. Yes, I understand I am having this thought. Now I'm going to reappraise my situation maybe as an opportunity rather than a threat.
But as we help athletes as you said develop awareness then these possibilities open up.
Yeah, no definitely. I saw a documentary, I think he's professor David Eagleman from California and he was saying what is your reality and he sort of looked at that constant and it takes me back to that time when I arrived at junior Womaldon and I was running shoulders with Jim Courier and some other top American players and just listening to them in the locker room and even my the player I mentioned you earlier that we won some tournaments with Pete and all the South African
guy who played with Wayne Ferreira and the Olympics. They had an amazing amount of confidence in their ability and just listening to them after a match you can tell they which areas of the match they've picked out as these are the things that we're going to remember. And it's so important. If you think about day after day what's that message you keep reinforcing? After five years how that can grow or how that can shrink if it's a wrong message.
Then I realized to myself you better start making these thoughts going around in your mind, make them beneficial and start believing in what you have otherwise. Nobody else will believe in you if you don't believe in yourself. So you mentioned confidence. I guess a question that I have is how do you draw the line between confidence and self-belief? Obviously they're very linked but do you see a difference between the two and how would you differentiate the two of those terms of those concepts?
Yeah it's a tough one to do exactly draw a line. As I say I think confidence can go up and down. Like for instance as tennis players we speak about it and we say oh this week I feel confident yeah because I'm hitting the ball well and I won my first round. But I think the more important thing is that the players who perform year after year like for instance your players people like that at that level. They have self-belief that is there all the time.
They'll take six months off because of injury and they'll come back they'll train and they'll get to the same level again. So they obviously have that belief and that confidence that this is where they belong and they normally can get their playing level up to that level. It's very interesting if you look at players when they get injured and they can't play for a year or two and they got the
protected ranking and they come back. But how often and this sort of intrigues me. They can get they work their way up and attack them a long time they get up to that level they that they work before and then they settle there again. You know you you have thought because of the injury because of the lack of play they'll struggle to get up to that level or if they do get up
they're quickly why don't they go beyond that level. And I think mostly when people make a jump leap in there is normally when there was a sort of a mental shift that you know that that's often when people say if you were a top 50 player and then after a number of years suddenly the player goes into the top 20. I would say players often attribute that to a mental shift that they've had.
I can think of one example when I was playing I fractured my hand and I was out for six weeks and I remember the first day I started playing I was really holding the racket loosely just hitting softly against the wall it was aching. First time I obviously didn't go very well. And then because mentally over that six week period I really started focusing until you're probably doing
more visualization because that's all I could do. Two weeks later I won a tournament it was a sort of smaller tournament and then three weeks after that two weeks after that I actually teamed up with David Adams the guy who I lost all the match points against and we won the tournament and I'm thinking this is the biggest winner of my career you know this is literally eight ten weeks after I fractured
my hand. Why did I but it's that sort of mental shift that I made it's like well I can't play and I really want to play and when I came back I was playing with more it's always like the shackles were off like right you've got a chance now just go for it and suddenly I have better results
you know less practice but slightly different mindset. Yeah which I think you know if we bring that back to your clear links model right you know you because the clear you could look at the clear links model as being rather neutral on self-belief it's all what is the content of your perceptions
memories narratives beliefs right because they can yes easily lead to a decrease depending on how how one thinks but you just had a nice story there of how you know having you know how having a shift there and some perceptions and beliefs of what was going on really drove drove performance and
I think that's really key as we begin to work with players on on building each of these four boxes you know in productive ways to to build that self-belief which is probably like you said more of a stable trait over time than the ebbs and flows of confidence which is often related to the moment
or I mean because even I could say hey I'm confident I'm playing great this week but then it's break point at four five and I get a little shaky and I'm like I'm not so sure about my kick serve right now yeah you know so it can even go in you know I think maybe goes with trust when we're on
the court or a little bit where self-belief is more that that piece of what you're talking about and I think it's highly related to self-efficacy you know that I can do it I have done it and I've got that sort of experience in the bank but I'm curious Marius if you have found I think it's in your your model but optimism and how that relates to self-belief in any of your links model.
No definitely right I mean I think that I sort of developed that model and I don't know if you saw the bottom there it was like these are beneficial beliefs to help my improvement that's the whole goal is to so with my perceptions with my memories with my narrative these are all there
to fuel this beneficial belief system that I'm trying to get into place you know so it's like a virtuous cycle right I'm trying to improve all of this because I realize the other guys but listen to them they've got supreme confidence and they've got self-belief and and you know if I want to
compete with them I'm gonna have to because I wouldn't say I think I as a young player I had an inner belief up to a certain level but I wasn't majorly confident in the sense that you know some people just use confidence I mean sometimes you've got to ask is it is it real confidence or is it
just a front you know you've seen those as well but yeah it was it's more of a quiet self-belief in my abilities I mean certainly my abilities is a rugby player as a tennis player you know because I used to do this as a kid all the time so they are different ways of you know sort of showing
how much belief you have and I mean that's that's also very important I mean especially in my executive coaching but even on the tennis court you can sometimes see through a player's you know shirad of you know the the the body language that they have or the facial expressions and if you
play for years and years you sometimes can can tell you know what might be underneath and that is just a fast-hard you know they might not really be as confident as as I look from from the outside so yeah I think it was a definite decision by me at some point that this whole cycle should be
a virtuous cycle and that I'm keep building it and keep improving it because it was really made it was sort of created for my benefit rather than but as you say if if it goes down the wrong track and it becomes negative then then obviously that can have a really bad effect if you
if you lose self belief and that's why the stories you tell yourself about yourself and how how you experience things they are so important yeah and so could you talk a little bit about optimism and how that might fit into your your model
yeah that that's often noted as an important piece of self belief yeah definitely um actually done uh recently uh think called strength scope um and and and optimism came up quite high so yeah that's like the expectation that things are going to turn out well and again for resilience is
something that we've talked in the business world a lot about at the moment um especially after last year and optimism you know really helps resilience you know it um if you if you look at resilience there's one thing of the reality accepting the reality then you have to find meaning
in your life and then you have to find a an innovative way of you know change in taking action so and I think um that's really connected to that part the the optimism to meaning you know uh what's the meaning why am I doing this am optimistic that tomorrow is going to be a better day
or do I think that this is it and you know tomorrow is going to be terrible so yeah I think optimism is really important that that feeling there's always a feeling that yeah it's going to be better all I can fix it I can do something about this or they will be opportunity uh talking about that
um there were three big um moments in my career that sort of was pivotal in me starting from juniors and they occurred within a week or two of a really bad result moments when I when I was 18 I was in the army I was played I played a tournament and I I wanted to quit I I lost this match
yeah it was under the flood lights and I played really terribly and then two weeks later I won the national championships the national closed championships which was at that time was a massive result for me um I can think of at least three where I had really for me major results and it
just followed on a real low point about two weeks before and again it might have something to do with the fact of you know now I'm just going to go for it I don't care losing my inhibitions here I'm just going to put it all on the court um but uh the other thing about it is I think as a as a
player you you never know when that moment is going to come when everything just clicks into place and you need to be ready for it so the main thing is after those low points I didn't give up I I just I put more into practice I focus more and I came back so um yeah there's always that
expectation that that things are going to get better absolutely and you mentioned your work um as it as an executive coach currently um could you talk a little bit about some of the parallels um between life as a professional tennis player and what you're doing today as an executive coach
yeah it's it's it every day I just realized more and more how important it is you know and how tennis has shaped me um you know in my mindset and and you know with optimism or resilience all those things I read a piece a few weeks ago where they looked at resilience and it says that
if you are put through tough times as a kid and you come through it it has almost got a inoculating effect on your resilience and and I think that's what um young sports stars doesn't matter what sport you play in you're in sporting arena and you being put on a pressure you know
when you lose I mean as tennis players we know we lose every player loses except the winner that week so you're always going to lose um and obviously if it means a lot to you then you go through a little bit of trauma you know dealing with these losses you know chances you had that
that that that went by the buy for whatever reason you got nervous or you you at that example your your second serve left you I had a moment like that to uh in one match um and but you build up this resilience yeah come through this I can do it again I'm going to try again and um you know
and it's for every sport you know you will get that you know whether it's football NFL or soccer or whatever it is um basketball that these things really shape your you as a person and your mindset and so um taking it on to the um as I said resilience is the thing that that we talk about a lot
uh in executive coaching um goal setting you know as a interesting thing about goal setting is when I started out as 18 at 18 years old I sort of said myself right because I wanted to go and saw your architecture and I said well I'm going to give this a tennis go and uh if I don't hit
the top 15 two years and I'm going to go back and study our architecture and that was my um my goal and it took me six years to reach that goal uh so the thing is when you set your goals you don't know the you know what's the market like you know what are the opposition like how lucky I'm
going to be you know if I look back at my career I probably have one trip that I never should have gone on to to play on play because it didn't suit my style with the tennis union center set you know squad of six players you know so you can look back and you go and regret that
but um you set your goals and um you know I was fully committed to doing that but it took me so much longer I guess you can say I didn't give up but um you know you you don't know and then that's the beauty of sport isn't it because you give it your all you give a hundred percent
uh but there's no guarantees that you're gonna you're gonna do it and I think that's what really prepares you for life you know if you're in situations in a business where you know you're gonna do X, Y and Z uh and you know that you know maybe there are the forces out there and we might not
hit our goals then you just reset your goals and you try again that that's what life's about isn't it just resetting and drawing again and you've probably had you know more challenges than ever with you know businesses during a global pandemic um certainly not anything most of us would have
predicted uh perhaps right and uh so how how are you seeing people handle that and you know being able to adapt and and shift you know Josh and I have talked about that I think on some episodes because really the pandemic is what why we got introduced to each other we would never have met
ever not for this and so yeah so so this is um yeah I mean even this conversation um I think that that's another you know one of those it opportunity or a gift you know we we we're all sitting at home now what do we do okay so we we have a podcast um and uh so you know this
it really you just got to look for those opportunities and and and be ready you know um be as I say creative and try and find a way of doing something and doing it better and so it is amazing actually how well I think companies are done in this period because you know my first thoughts were
well a lot of businesses are not able to operate you know the economy is going to you know just wipe 40% off the economy you know but actually it is not people have found a way and I think that's the thing about human beings because they they have the mental side you know they can think outside
the box and come up with a you know I'm not saying that it's been a unbelievable effects it's ripple through to every part of society and you know and I'm not even talking about you know all the lives have been lost and everything but um you know people have found ways of doing things differently
and and and they will have to continue doing that you know I don't know what the status is in your uh bottle of the world but uh we've not hit a tennis ball here since the first January so we looking at um 29th of March first time anybody can play tennis so um my boys are hitting against the
wall the the the balls bouncing on grass which is not ideal but uh this time yeah but I'll get the roller off well I feel I feel fortunate to continue to be able to uh coach doing this time um as well as you know working with players virtually on on the sports psychology but uh
I also look forward to some grass court tennis but with the weather is a little bit nicer over over the summer months um but I think you I think you bring up a great point about uh you know constantly having to adapt and and having to deal with that adversity and ultimately that
adversity does you know make make you stronger and turn you into you know it leads to that growth um and I think uh you know as as Brian mentioned uh without without the pandemic and without um you know having to make adjustments to our businesses and everything we never would have met and
and ultimately started this this podcast I guess I guess the question is um when you when you work with athlete or sorry when you work with executives um how how do you help them you know get over maybe some of those frustrations that they're going through during these challenging times and try to
help them turn turn those frustrations and those challenging moments into into growth and and ultimately into um into them achieving what what they're set out to you know what they're they're aiming for in terms of their businesses yeah no I think that's something we've looked at
a few times over the last year and um the first thing is you you have to reset because if you think about the goals you might have had in January last year and you know it's just that script goes right out the window and um so I think it's important to have different sets of goals
um which I guess you you you can have in a normal conditions as well you know you've got your goals that you think oh things going well we can do this you know then you have goal well if if if if things don't go great we'll have a and then then you've got the goals during the pandemic
you know had to be really lowered um and uh you have to reset that because I think if you don't then then you know you'd go crazy because um a lot of things that you would try and do just just are out of question and so the the sort of scales of effort reward you know those totally changed
last year and um and so I think you you need to step back and just see what's the backdrop and then let's reassess what we're doing um and you know so that that would be my my main advice is to you know have a look at that reality and and and reassess everything and um then
you can project you know we didn't know how long it was going to last here we are um you know we sort of over 12 months now since we had locked down first in the UK and um as I say we still not um open with them gyms and tennis is gonna have to wait another three weeks or so so um and that's
just outdoor tennis um so yeah it's a whole new way of looking at things but as you say people have come up with some great ideas you know it's it's made certain things like this virtual conversations um I belong to a speaking um uh society and and we've we've had meetings with
people all over the country all over the world which normally you go to a spot in your in Yorkshire and you know there'll be 30 people there um but uh so yeah it has opened up loads of opportunities and I think for you it's probably being uh very good hasn't it because people have no choice but
to you know do that uh sports psychology um you know virtually at the moment yeah I think for Josh and I the the pandemic certainly it probably it affected our businesses greatly but we didn't have much activity going on and I think we were both searching for for projects
and Josh correct me from wrong but it was really around that time that you began transitioning to the the Hall of Fame in Newport maybe a little bit after that but then you probably started that search um and so it's been good in a way that we've done such things because I think it's actually
given us a little bit more um in a way marketing by putting our names out there and being more present with what's what's going on um and and I think businesses have now begun to really get back on their feet especially you know um I think we're both busier than ever which is great um
and so yeah I think we we've as being sort of agents of change we had to kind of apply our own you know we had to really start you know eating our own dog food per se I guess and uh and and really turning that lens inward but that's been a really good good thing for us and um so I think
I don't know if you want to speak to that Josh but it feels like um in in in many ways we've been able to adapt and grow grow what we've done yeah I think uh I mean I can talk personally yeah that I mean it was you know certainly challenging time between uh the the University Sacred
Heart University that I was at you know our our season wrapping up abruptly as all other teams did at the same time um but also you know with my business things that it certainly took a big hit um but I think laying on some of the foundation during that time whether it be uh whether it was
participating in uh conversations like the like the virtual coffee hour were we connected and connected with Christina um or you know starting this podcast or starting the USPTA New England Sports Psychology Committee or sort of laying some of these foundations for projects and
for um you know new opportunities has definitely um you know has definitely ripped ripped the rewards in later months and I think yeah as you said in a more societal level I think a lot of businesses and individuals have adapted to you know to to doing things virtually to um yeah to to being able to
to think on their feet and to almost finding a new normal in terms of not just going back to the status quo in terms of okay this is how things have always been done this is how we do things here but okay let's let's adapt let's you know be forward thinking let's um let's be ready for I don't
want to say the next pandemic but the next um situation where we have to adapt and change and think on our feet so I I think and I'd like to think that um you know one of the positives of this time is that now we're ready for anything now you know if when disasters strikes when um when when
challenges arise that um society is a little bit more prepared um so that's what I'd add there yeah I think but if we're talking you know even the clear links model Marius so we could look at this as um you know how do we find the silver lining how do we find the benefit of what we've been through
it's not all terrible right yeah how can we use some of that then to move forward and adjust and and and and be more adaptable and more resilient yeah definitely like Josh is saying you know hopefully we'll never have to deal with something like this again but um there will be other
things you know we've had the financial disaster 2008 and you know who knows you know what will come and we we've had a different I think the one thing that that we're sure of is that things are changing very quickly globally um and um we we have to adapt you know as as things
moved on move on I um I was scheduled to do um some coaching at a company on the 23rd of March is the day Britain locked out and the company didn't want to go virtually with the coaching and so I resumed it in October so it was literally from March until October and now all those
clients have gone virtually so um you know it's just making that that that mental shift um and and what's acceptable and um and they're you know a lot of new ways of interacting uh will become the norm yeah I I've been having a virtual coffee with my brother in South Africa
which I've never had before you know it was normally just a quick phone call or something but uh you know they they are some good things that have that have come out of this um and and I think yeah we just have to keep being open to new ideas and new ways of doing things
absolutely yeah so well marios i want to thank you for joining us today on the tennis iq podcast i think this is a great conversation about self-belief resilience confidence a lot of great topics especially for tennis players and and and how we apply those things into our everyday lives so
thanks thanks again for joining us today no it's been my pleasure um i felt the uh questions very insightful so uh it uh it was a pleasure for me to uh to have an hour with you yeah thank you this was this was great i mean i think i know our our listeners and viewers will get
a lot of value out of um learning from your experiences um as a professional tennis player and also the insights from those experiences and how you apply them um today in the work that you do so thanks for joining us well that was a great conversation um i would say that one of the biggest
takeaways that i had was the importance and the need to constantly be readjusting our goals um marios talked about how during this pandemic uh people have had to make a lot of adjustments um people are not often where they've thought that they'd be a year ago um and we as we set goals as athletes
as coaches as sports psychology professionals as we set goals and we help um individual set goals we constantly need to be um willing to adjust them we can't just set a goal and say okay this is my goal period um until the end of time we need to be willing to make adjustments especially when
something extreme like this pandemic hits so i really like that point that that he made how about you brine what what was uh one of your biggest takeaways from that conversation well just to pick up where you were touching on Josh i think um even us sharing our own story about how we both had to
adjust um was it was a you know an example of that and i'm sure all of our listeners have had some sort of similar story to what they have had to do over the last year or so the thing i i liked uh i'm gonna go to the clear links model and and you know really since we've had this conversation
i've i've actually worked on this with several of the players i work with is the idea of after you practice or after a match taking the time to visualize the positive images from the match really locking that in i think as tennis players we're often very self-critical and we know what that is but we don't want to that that we don't want that to be the lasting memory of a particular match or a practice we want to really lock in that good stuff and this is where when we talk about imagery
a really good post-match use of imagery again sort of creating your own video highlight in your mind so that when you think of this match later you have built this library of positive images that you can go to and i think that's what's gonna help that virtuous cycle of self-belief
so that's something i've really been emphasizing with players um that i think it's very very useful so great conversation i agree with you joss it was it was fantastic to talk to marios and um so that's our show for today once again many thanks to marios Bernard for appearing
on the podcast today and thank you for listening for moron today's show please check out the show notes if you have any feedback or questions please email us at teniceikube podcast at gmail.com you can also use the twitter hashtag teniceikube additionally please subscribe to the show on your podcast
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