HAWAII-PACIFIC TENNIS FOUNDATION

Tips, Lessons & Programs

Executive Director's Corner

While returning to Oahu from a tournament I came across Tom Chapman’s essay in Aloha Magazine about “Our Sweet Sporting Life”. In the article Chapman reveals our society’s obsession with sport and competition. He also brings forth two seemingly opposing points of view. “One is from writer George Orwell, occasionally an angry man, who wrote: ‘Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence. In other words, it is war minus the shooting.’ And the other from basketball coaching legend John Wooden, a more quiet man, who simply stated that ‘sports do not build character, they reveal it.’

Do the views really oppose? It all depends on how you look at it. Rather than contradict, the views may actually complement and, when put together, reveal truths to us about the allure and intensity of sport, including tennis. What is it that gets us all wound up about hitting a little yellow ball back and forth across a net? Yes, many of us want healthful, fun exercise to minimize those unwanted pounds. Yet, for most of us, there is nothing like the thrill and intensity of the competition of a point, a game, a set and a match.

We keep score. We form teams. We play tournaments. Many of us travel, all to hit a little yellow ball back and forth across the net.

Competition is primordial. It inheres in each of us, albeit in different degrees.

Sport is war sublimated. Like it or not, war has remained a part of human existence from time immemorial, in spite of attempts to eradicate. Sometimes I think that sport and organized competition is a happy and healthy replacement for war. Sport allows us to release, in a socially acceptable way, those competitive juices which we all have.

I have often mentioned that one of tennis’ beauties is that it serves as a microcosm of life. Play someone in tennis and you learn about the real person on the court. Often the emotions, the motivations, and the character are laid bare. Yes, Coach Wooden you are correct, sport reveals character.

But, Coach Wooden, I beg to differ in that tennis as a sport not only reveals, but also can develop character, at least for some. Play someone in tennis and you learn not only about your opponent, but also about yourself. You learn about success, failure, joy, frustration, glory and pain. Yes, it reveals. But also from learning, one can develop what we call character. One learns not only the bare emotions, but also how to cope with those emotions. In learning how to cope and manage, one develops as a competitor and, more importantly, as a person.

Does everyone develop? Perhaps not, and at the very least, some develop more than others. Some players out there see sport strictly from the Orwellian perspective and play to “win at all costs”. For them, sport is truly war and that the rules do not exist unless enforced. However, others use the on court experience as a time for joy, intensity and for self-learning.

Tennis as sport provides an opportunity to develop character in each of us. How many sports have you officiate your opponent’s shots against you? Play tennis in its true spirit and you will develop positively as a person. Play tennis in its true spirit against an Orwellian who plays without regard to spirit and who takes advantage of you, and you will really develop!

Tennis as sport allows one to compete, to fight and to battle. But played in the spirit with which it is imbued, tennis played right is fought with honor, is battled with character and with respect for one’s adversary.

Played in this light and in this spirit, tennis not only reveals but develops character for our youth and our adults.