Billy Jean King is a tennis legend and champion of gender equality
Below is an except from an NPR interview.
"Visualization I really used a lot. I use - I use to think about everything that could go wrong and then try to picture myself how I would react to it or how I'd respond to it. For instance, with the wind blowing, like last week at the U.S. Open it was really windy, and it was so hard on the players. So I always thought about the wind. I thought about the sun. I thought about bad line calls. I thought about rain if we had to wait, things that were probably out of my control, and how would I respond to them.
And I would think about how I wanted to act. Like they teach in acting, act as if, it's the same thing in sports. Do you stand up straight? Do you have your body language speaking in a confident way? Physically do you - how do you think - because 75 percent of the time when you're on the court, you're actually not hitting a ball, and I think that's where the champions come through. So I would visualize all these different possibilities."
Her words struck a cord in many ways... in my life as a physician, as an athlete, and in my family. The first thing I thought of was my life in the emergency department. Each day is something new and I never know what will come through the sliding doors next. Visualization is one of the most important ways we as emergency medicine physicians learn and prepare. As resident physicians we constantly had algorithms drilled into our heads to help visualize real situations in the ER.
Attending: "Ventricular tachycardia!"
Resident: Stable or unstable?
Attending: "Unstable!"
Resident: "Shock!"
The list of split second decision drills goes on indefinitely and their importance cannot be stressed enough. Being a ER doctor is not just memorizing algorithms but we use them because quite simply they save lives.
In triathlon goggles get knocked off, tires go flat, and thighs chaff. Make no mistake shit happens. The phrase "don't worry about things you cannot control" goes out the window. How we prepare for what we cannot control allows us to succeed when things go wrong or are unexpected. Just as I cannot control what illness or injury my next patient might suffer from I can control how I treat them through hard work, constant learning, and diligent preparation.
My wife often talks about how her mother did her best to teach her children the importance of body language. My wife every once in a while shares this with me. "Stand up Straight" my mother in law would often say. "Look your best at all times because you never know who you will run into" is one of my favorites. My usual reply is "who cares who I run into", but this is short sighted and misses the point. The point is true excellence is a habit and must be practiced with each movement and each decision.
Yes there are things we cannot control but it's how we respond to what happens that make us who we are.
The entire King interview is powerful in ways well beyond what I have discussed above touching on topics I don't dare dive into in a triathlon blog. Well worth a listen if you are so inclined.
