I love/hate being a beginner. I love learning. I ❤️ starting from scratch. I ❤️ seeing progress.
I hate not being good at something. I really hate when other people are better than I am. Even more so when it’s a physical skill. #ego
🎾 Starting tennis lessons was sure to be an exhilarating and humbling experience.
I have never been a hand-eye sport kind of gal, but my son started taking lessons when he turned 6 and by the time he was six-and-a-half, he had surpassed anything I could do on the court.
When I closed the gym, one of the first things I did was set up tennis lessons with a couple of other moms.
When I started, I was bad. Like really bad. Embarrassingly bad. Our coach gave me a little training tool one day (looked like an Indian club) and asked me to swing that. When I did, he exclaimed, “Yes! NOW you look like an athlete.” I read the subtext… you don’t look like an athlete when you’re playing tennis.
I wasn’t mad. It was true. He was 💯 right. I didn’t FEEL like an athlete playing tennis.
But I’ve been working on the basics, learning the skills, listening to our coach, & I’m making progress. I’m not ready to play a game, but I feel way less awkward.
I did a little search about what that “thing” is when you start something new. That challenging & invigorating thing. & I found this excerpt from an article:
“On a physiological level, learning new things is good for your brain. According to CCSU Business & Development, practicing a new skill increases the density of your myelin, or the white matter in your brain that helps improve performance on a number of tasks. Additionally, learning new skills stimulates neurons in the brain, which forms more neural pathways and allows electrical impulses to travel faster across them. The combination of these two things helps you learn better. It can even help you stave off dementia.”
In the article, it challenges readers to try something new every year. If there’s even a small chance it fights off dementia, I’m in.
So… When was the last time you tried something new? How did it go? Comment below👇
#pacstrength #strongforlife #trysomethingnew #beabeginner #strengthenyourbrain
