Welcome And Book Announcement

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hi, I'm Shelly Miller. And I'm Cher Emmerich. And welcome to Life Lessons from Pickleball, where we engage with pickleball players from around the world about life on and off the court.

SPEAKER_03 0:12

Thanks for joining us.

Meet Coach B And Her Work

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Before we get started, we have something really exciting to share. Our book, Life Lessons from Pickleball, is now available on Amazon, and a portion of every sale is donated to Operation Paddle Lift. Your purchase helps deliver paddles, nets, and resources to underserved communities around the world. Thank you for being a part of Growing the Game We All Love. Now let's jump into today's episode. Welcome everyone to Life Lessons from Pickleball. We are absolutely privileged to have with us today Dottie Berry, better known and beloved as Coach B. Coach B, you are a mental and peak performance coach and the creator of Mental Edge, the X Factor, a system designed to help pickleball players build the kind of mental health habits that actually hold up under pressure.

SPEAKER_04 1:08

And what we love is that your work is just not for elite players. You help everyone from everyday pickleball players to top competitors, including Anna Bright. And your focus is on helping people retain their brains through daily habits so they can perform more steadily on and off the court.

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Coach B, we are really excited to talk with you about the mental game, what players so often get wrong about it, and how we can all learn to master our minds a little bit better.

How Coach B Found Pickleball

SPEAKER_04 1:42

I can't wait to learn. But first, let's start with what was going on in your life when you first discovered pickleball.

SPEAKER_00 1:52

Well, that's a great question. But before I answer that, let me just say I agree with everything you said, except for one thing. You said beloved. Now, there might be some people that disagree with you on that. You know, I mean, we can't all be beloved. But what we can be is ourselves, our true and authentic selves. And I think that's what I do bring to the table. And sometimes, you know, that works for people, and sometimes that doesn't. And I'm okay with that. But anyway, what was happening when I discovered pickleball? Well, actually, I was looking for something that provided um movement, community, and joy, but I was trying to go to Canada to see if I could find some really good badminton players. When I was in college working on my master's, I would play with these guys from Japan. And it was amazing. I first took up some badminton when I was in college, and then when I was at Georgia State, I started playing with these people. And I thought, well, maybe I can find some badminton. And about that time, actually, uh a friend of mine, Mimi Porter from Kentucky, who was our trainer when I coached there, women's basketball, she mentioned pickleball. And I was like, Mimi, what is pickleball? So she tried to explain it. Then I talked to a client and she kind of, you know, said some things to me because I was working with a device that I use with elite and everyday players again for recovery called Beamer. And she said, Wow, that's really helped my pickleball elbow. And I was like, Well, what is pickleball? You know. So she tells me, third time was the charm. I was in Arizona at a conference, a beamer conference, actually, and my friend said, Let's go up to my friend's home over the weekend in Surprise, Arizona, which I didn't even realize was the pickleball capital of the world at the time. So we go up there for the weekend. I walk in, and David says, Okay, we're playing pickleball tomorrow. I said, Good grief, what is this pickleball? So he gets an iPad and puts on the counter and says, Watch this video. So I watch it and then I go, I didn't embarrass myself too much because I said, Well, I don't have a paddle. I didn't call it a racket. I said, I don't have one of those paddles and I don't have any court shoes. So he went out and he got a paddle and he put it in my hand. And his wife said, Well, what size do you wear? I said a 10, thinking nobody's gonna have a 10 sitting in their garage. No, she has a brand new pair, brings it out. So I go play the next day, and the rest is history. Only I come back home and I'm thinking, well, in in Blaine, Washington, we're so small, they don't have pickleball. Not only did they have it, they had been playing it since I think 2012 or 13, and this was like 2018 at the time. So I I couldn't believe it. I started going up to Birch Bay Activity Center just five minutes from me, and we were like little kids in kindergarten. We sat on this bench and we moved down this bench, and the next paddle you went out there, and everybody just played together. Those were some of the most fun times I've ever had. But I have to tell you, I was scared to death when I walked in there. I ordered the paddle that I played with that a Z on it. Y'all remember those? Oh, yeah. And I walked in, and this lady named Jan just welcomed me so warmly. And I felt at ease because I was walking in there, you know, scared like all of us are. Who walks on the court first time by yourself and doesn't feel that way? It's just the common denominator, I think. Yeah anyway, it's been uh just something amazing for me.

SPEAKER_01 5:28

Well, you talked about having nerves when you first walked on the court. I still have nerves. I mean, every time I'm playing, and sometimes I have to keep score, like in a tournament or something, not a tournament, but in flights we call them. And my hand is shaking. It's like, okay, I need to talk to Coach B. So when did uh this mind shift uh become your calling?

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Well, I actually started using the word mind shift back in 2000 to 2002 a lot in the work that I was doing, because I thought, you know, mindset, that's just a myth. We need to debunk it because a mindset is static, a mind shift is dynamic. So what I recognized early on, and by the way, when you have nerves, that's okay, that's normal, and that tells you that something matters to you. The problem comes in when we can't manage those nerves to our benefit. And the reason we can't do that if they derail us is because we haven't trained them. See, we know we have to train on the on the court. We go out there, we drill, but we have to train our minds in the same way, and we have to do it daily. And so I've just been talking about mind shifts for a long time until finally the word is known to people and people listen. And you know, that's the way it is. It's sort of like using AI right now. People are like scared to death of it. Some are, and then others realize that it's here to stay. And I say to people, look, when GPS first came out, people were going, no, I want my AAA map, and I'm not changing. Who uses a triple A map anymore? But I've always been an early adopter of things. So I think sometimes things just come to me before others. I'm not saying that's good or bad. I'm just saying that something in my DNA works that way. And so what I noticed early on, though, was that this uh lack of ability to have emotional regulation on the court tripped up people. And the better we got, the more it tripped us up because we got really attached to a specific outcome that we wanted. We wanted to be better, and so-and-so was getting better quicker than us, and we began to lose our joy. And people would come to me and they would say, I'm thinking about quitting. I said, Well, you can, that's your choice, but what if it's a both and? What if you can have nerves and learn to use them to your benefit, and you can retain your joy. So I don't think it's uh you have to give up one or the other. I think it's a both and situation. But here's what I will say you don't rise uh at the point of pressure, you fall to your level of training. See, people think if they if they just get in a pressure situation, if they have confidence and think I can do it and all like this, that they'll overcome it. And then when they don't, they really are hard on themselves. They judge themselves. Well, I had confidence and I really thought I could do it, and I still failed. And I'd say, well, it's not your fault. Nobody taught you that you have to train it. Even coaches say, oh, they talk about the mental game. But I ask coaches all the time, how do you train the mental game? And they're not doing it. So if they're not training their players on how this works with the mental game, then they're all gonna continue to fail because coaches are playing too. They're also players. So this is just like my passion about the mental game.

SPEAKER_04 9:27

So I I want to just say, how do you train the mental game? I was I was I'm assuming is that the mental edge your X factor?

SPEAKER_00 9:38

Is that yes, yes. And you know, but within within that program, that's my coaching, I utilized uh the framework of being a coach in positive intelligence. And what we have there is an app, and we we work with that because it gives us every day a daily focus, recharges, the mental gym. There's a whole section in my phone. And I do this every day. I've done this every day for three years with that, but I've been doing the mind shift work all my life. I mean, I think it really started when I was 15 years old and I coached a 10 and under team in basketball. And I I knew that I was born to coach. I just knew it. That was and so I ride a different vehicle at different times after I left the University of Kentucky. It was with entrepreneurs and you know, and so now it's with pickleball and with with you know corporate people. Um, because I think corporate leadership and pickleball and AI all have a lot in common. And you might say, you are out of your mind. But the common thread is that you have to put yourself out there, you have to try new things without being afraid of failing. Fail fast and fail quickly, gather the data and move on. That's what really creates uh, you know, you getting better, whether it's in leadership or utilizing AI or pickleball or anything.

Training Nerves With Body Anchors

SPEAKER_01 11:09

Is that why we unravel? Because we aren't letting it go, or I mean we're what because we just unravel on the court sometimes. So I'm saying the royal we. I get that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:22

Yeah, and part of what we can do, um, we we do this all the I do this all the time with my clients. We start every session with what we call PQ reps, positive intelligence reps, and it's based on four senses, and it's breathing, it's touch, uh, it's sight, looking at something. So lots of time if I'm on the court and I've become unraveled, I'll just deliberately pick out something, a tree, a light, or something to focus on for just a few seconds. I'll do this, like this.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

With your fingers. For those who are just listening, I'm sure I'm mentioning that you are kind of rubbing your thumb with your other fingers.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Yeah. And what that does, see, that brings us back into our bodies. If I'm breathing, I'll do like a double inhale.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

And hold it and then slow out.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

Eight, yeah. A double inhale and then a count of eight exhale. Or you can do what's called the box inhale, and that is uh breathing in to the count of four, like two, three, four, hold it to the count of four, breathe out to the count of four, and hold it. So it kind of goes in a box that's called box breathing.

SPEAKER_01 12:35

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 12:36

And so anytime, like at the end of a point where you had an unforced era, that's what really trips us up. Yes. Then we can go back to the line and we can just do this. We can breathe, we can come back into our body, take a big deep breath before serving, have a ritual, a ritual you do every time. And that way, when you miss, you don't worry about it. I tell people, look, if you miss your serve into the net, you you really want to notice that.

unknown 13:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 13:11

Yeah. And so part of it is noticing it, naming it, and neutralizing it. And that's how you tame that inner critic, that saboteur that just seems to, you know, be the judge or some other kind of uh saboteur, like a hyperachiever, a controller, or whatever it is. So if you can use the three ends, you know, and do that, notice it, name it, neutralize. You can do that really quickly on the pickleball court in between points. You know, there's actually when you go back to serve, if you're serving, you have 10 seconds. Yeah. I tell people, relax. Take seven seconds and just stand there and breathe. It's for one thing, it's gonna drive your opponents crazy because they want you just to give them the ball. And so they're gonna wonder what you're doing.

SPEAKER_02 14:03

Yeah.

Daily Microhabits That Rewire Your Brain

SPEAKER_00 14:04

But to have 10 seconds, whether it's in rec play or tournament play, you have 10 seconds. Why not use it? So if you need to breathe, if you need to rub your hands, I like take uh my paddle and I'll rub the back of my hand, you know, with my paddle hand. So there's all these little things. But here's the thing: those help, those can help in the moment, but they're still not training your brain, retraining it, I should say. The reason I say retrain, your brain is already trained. Okay, it's just not working optimally for you. So it if we recognize that, we go, well, okay, I want to retrain it. And so when we when I'm taking them through and we're using the app and we're doing these things daily, we lie, we lay down new neural pathways. And not overnight. It's just like, you know, a skill that you're drilling. You don't, you don't go and drill one day, say, I'm good for life. I tell people, look, it's kind of like brushing your teeth. You don't go, oh, I brushed my teeth this morning, good for life. You know, most of our daily habits, in order to have an impact, we have to do them daily. They're micro habits. And so what I do is I do what's called habit stacking. I think James Clear was probably the first person who kind of talked about this. Uh, he's a great guy. But anyway, so it sounds crazy, but if you're going to the bathroom, yeah, feel the toilet paper. You know, pay attention. You're brushing your teeth, feel the water uh uh uh on your gums, you know. When you get out of bed in the morning, the first time your feet hit the floor, just notice your feet. All of these things are bringing us back into our body because most of the time we're out there living in our head. And so we have to recalibrate. We have to self-command our mind to come back to us. You know, it's not bad if I'm doing my my mental gym in the morning, like tense and release. Uh, that's one of them I do for 12 minutes. It's okay that my mind wanders, it's going to, that's normal. But guess what? When I notice it and I come back into my body, I'm retraining my brain. And that's a practice, you know, I've been doing like that for almost four years. Wow. And so I can definitely notice a difference in my own life. And a lot of these things are just because I've always been fascinated by my mind. And my wife and I used to say, we'd look at each other and we'd say, what scares you the most? And we'd go, Ah, my mind. You know, I mean, seriously. And we don't say that anymore because we feel like we have better self-command of our mind. And that is really encouraging. Yeah. It doesn't mean we're perfect. And people come to me and they'll say, Oh, Coach B, I just gotta get rid of these thoughts. I gotta get rid of these, you know, saboteurs that are derailing my life forever. And I go, Well, you know, here's the you want the good news or the bad news first. The good news, of course, is that we can shorten the recovery time from being in our saboteur to moving into our inner wisdom, our sage. The bad news, if you look at it this way, is they're never going away. You know, and they they're not bad. What they are is ways that we learn to respond, usually in childhood.

unknown 17:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:33

And that helped us survive. And this is if you had a good parents or bad parenting. It's just what kids do to survive. They're not doing it deliberately, but they do it. And so once you realize, oh my gosh, I'm an adult. I don't need to just be surviving, I need to be thriving, then life gets really exciting. Like, doesn't that sound like a lot more fun than just surviving life? I mean, for Pete's sake, everybody survives life until they don't, and then we die. But but I want to do something a little more with my life. And I think that's what really motivates me and propels me to want to work with people who want to be worked with. You know, I have no desire to arm twist people and say, you know, you really need to be working on this. Good grief, no. But for those who really are excited about elevating themselves, both in life and in their game, I mean, I think uh, you know, from Anna Bright's uh feedback that I shared with you all, I think what she was most shocked at was how it was impacting her off the court. And then, you know, when you grow off the court, you grow on the court in ways that you might not expect to happen. And that's pretty much how it's happened with everybody that I've worked with. So it doesn't matter that she was an elite player and they were not.

Elite And Everyday Players Need This

SPEAKER_01 18:59

That fascinates me that an elite player, um maybe it doesn't surprise me that they might need help with their the mental game, but are there similarities between like Anna Bright and her, what she was struggling with, and what maybe Shelly, who's a tournament player, also might be struggling with?

SPEAKER_00 19:21

Well, I didn't start working with Anna because she needed it. In fact, she wasn't even sure if she needed it. Oh she was just curious, see? She was curious about working together, and that curiosity led her to think, wait a minute, I'm an elite player, you know, what is a 4.0 player, you know, what what could they really help me with?

SPEAKER_01 19:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:47

And that's where we have a little bit of a misunderstanding that uh between coaching and and playing, you know, et cetera. But she was curious enough to know and say to herself, well, what if there's something I don't know? And so it wasn't that she needed it. You do you understand what I'm saying? Uh and it doesn't need mean that Shelly would need it.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

But if Shelly, if you wanted to just say, uh I want to move to a new level. And I don't think that just drilling and and this kind of thing, because it is a separator. It is a separator between the good, the great, and the elite. Okay. That's a separator, it's a mental game. Even within the levels, you can all you, you know, we're gonna be at whatever level we're at. Uh there's a good chance that I'm not gonna be a 6.0 player in my lifetime, you know. Uh who knows? I'm not saying it can't be done if I wanted to, you know, really put myself out there that way. But I mean, let's just look at it. Probably not.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

You probably would. If you really wanted it. If you put your mind to it. My dear, I don't think anything is gonna stop it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

Well, I'm just saying that within levels, though, Shelly, uh, you tell me it's usually the mental that separates the people within the level. Okay. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 21:17

And and yeah. And as you're talking about, just recently, I just did my second tournament 3.5 to 4.0. So moved up. You know, I got so used to meddling in my 3.0 tournaments. And you go to your first one uh at a higher level, like you talked earlier, you're nervous, you become derailed, you you know, lose your confidence. And I definitely am wishing I had a mental infrastructure like you were talking about, where I was rubbing my fingers together or doing my box breathing, or focusing on an object, or just I can see how just having routines like that would help settle you down.

Building Mental Infrastructure With Coaching

SPEAKER_00 22:00

Yeah, I mean the routines will help. The next level is building that mental infrastructure. And so what I've created is I say people come to me with intentions, their hopes, their dreams. Okay. And they at the end of that, they they want results and impact. Here's the problem. There's no infrastructure. There's no mental infrastructure to connect the two. And so the mental infrastructure that we build is the part that is the bridge. And let me just emphasize they build it. I don't. See, whatever Anna Bright has gotten out of it, it's hers. It's not mine. I'm a coach who says my coaching style is I'm a mirror for what you already know. And sometimes I can mirror back something somebody's not ready for. And I have to realize that and I have to pull back, you know, or change course. I have to let them sit with it, have to pause. Because when I do, I enable them to really pull that in. And then when they get that shift, oh my God, it's like goosebumps. They realize I'm the one who can do this. And that's, you know, Hannah said, not even makes you feel like is if you could almost coach yourself. Oh, that was golden to me. I was like, you're absolutely right. That's what I want you to know that you can do. I mean, you don't need to have me in order to feel like you can accomplish something. That's the that's the not good kind of coaching, in in my opinion. Um so Shelly, there's a lot of things, and these little things, yes, will help. If people and that's like putting the first little um building block in your bridge. Now, do you think that bridge with just a couple little hand rubs and box breathing will build a bridge? No, it won't. Not immediately. It's better than doing nothing, I can tell you that. It's better than being feeling feeling like you're being overrun by these emotions and these nerves. And so they real help with those kind of so you kind of start building these little pieces. For people who really want to build a whole bridge, a mental infrastructure, that's why they come to me.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

So give us just a little glimpse into what you mean by infrastructure. So for instance, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:33

So when I'm talking about infrastructure, I'm talking about how all of my clients have the Positive Intelligence app. And I tell them when they first start with me, I say, Look, I can get you the app and you can just do it on your own. And they said, No, no, no, that's why I'm coming to you. And I say, Well, it'll be the same price as that that's on the Positive Intelligence website, you know. But but I'll I'll get you set up on that. And they go, No, no, that's not what I want. I said, Well, if you're wanting me as the coach, then that's different. That's a different pricing. You you see what I'm saying? But but we take that and it's like a seven-week program, and I I put in uh a week on the front end and the back end to work with them. So it's about an eight to nine-week program, and I work with people in really building that infrastructure. After that, they decide if they want to keep working with me, which Anna did, you know. So, you know, they just make those kind of decisions. The app they have for a whole year, whether they keep working with me, you know, if they want to go once they go through the basic program, I'm I'm okay with that. You know, use your app. Uh, we can do it once a month. We can do bi-monthly then, you know, whatever is w is helpful to you. But that's how you begin to build that mental infrastructure because that really creates microhabits that you're building every day. Like if you have a daily focus, you know, and then you have recharges where it's kind of like um if you have a uh a car and it's got gas in it and you gas up at the end of the day, but then you run, run it, run it, and run it out of gas, well, then you you gotta put some more in it. That's like our our system. We have to recharge our mental capacity throughout the day. But the good news is this whole thing only takes 15 minutes a day.

SPEAKER_01 26:26

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

Literally 15 minutes a day, and then they work with me for an hour.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

Wow.

Identity Beyond Results And Winning

SPEAKER_00 26:31

And you know, there's so many things I think that are even more important than what we're talking about, and that's like I'll I'll just share a quick story with you. Back in the day, I did a thing called Pickleball Happy Hour, and it was private, you know, uh, because I wanted women to feel really safe. I guess if I'd really wanted to, I'd have done it at a podcast and had some huge podcast now. But it was just a private thing. But a lady came to one of my pickleball escapades event in Santa Barbara, and she came up to me. She said, I gotta tell you something. She said, I realize you don't know who I am, but I was on your pickleball happy hour all the time. I said, You were. I said, I'm I'm so sorry I don't recognize you. She said, Well, you wouldn't because I didn't say anything. But but you you you all were my friend. She had just gone through a divorce, and she said, I don't know how I would have made it without you. Now that's worth everything to me. Yeah, I mean, it really brings tears to my eyes just to think about, you know, um what it meant to her, and then it meant so much to me. Yeah, and this is the pickleball connection. This is, you know, we have joy in both sorrow and excitement of winning gold medals. Yeah, and and you know, Shelly, back to you about that gold medal stuff. Oh my gosh. People that just keep winning gold medals at one level I go, for Pete's sake, give it up, move up. And then the hard thing though is that most of the time you kind of get crushed in the beginning. Yeah, not always. Some people go and they just start winning gold, but that's not usually it. You know, and and so that's hard to take because we don't know what to do with it. Because we've without knowing it, we've built our identity on how well we did in pickleball, and we don't want to do that. That's part of the the mental edge that I teach too. Okay, your identity is not pickleball. Pickleball is what you play, it's not who you are, and that's why I say who do you want to be on the court versus what do you want to do? That's the real thing people have to answer for themselves. Otherwise, pickleball, which brought so much joy, begins to drive people crazy, and they're embarrassed to share that with people. They're embarrassed to say what's going on in their mind about this game that they dearly love that is using up so much energy, uh, telling them they're bad and wrong and not enough when they lose. It's just not the truth, it's just a lie that the judge tells us. See, the judge, there's all these accomplices under the judge, but that judge is mean and nasty. The judge tried to convince us that I'm your best friend, we've been together all our life. Come on now. And it just tells us lies. And guess what? We've believed some of those lies for a long time.

unknown 29:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

It's time to, you know, like put those shackles, take those shackles off. We don't realize they're not really shackles, they just appear to be. That we really have the key to open them up and get out of prison that we're creating in our mind off of this beautiful sport called pickleball. Yeah. You know, if somebody doesn't invite us, you know, we're not bad. We just didn't get an invitation. It's almost like junior high again when you didn't get invited to the party or something. I mean, not everybody likes each other the same. It's okay. Find somebody who really adores your company. There you go. I mean, that's so important, I think, to really uh adopt groups around you that appreciate the essence of who you are.

SPEAKER_01 30:33

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 30:33

And if they don't, they're they don't have to be bad or wrong.

Pickleball Community And Global Impact

SPEAKER_01 30:36

No. Let them go. Let them go. Let them go. You even mentioned that what you train is for on and off the court. And and that's absolutely the impact it has in people's lives, even off the court. Is all of your training in person or do you do anything remotely? None of it's in person.

SPEAKER_00 30:59

None of it's in person, it's all remote. How could I have been with Anna Bright? I was just with her one time in person in Florida when I was down there and we got together at a coffee shop. So we had our coaching session sitting right outside the coffee shop.

SPEAKER_01 31:13

I'll be true.

SPEAKER_00 31:14

But yeah, because my clients are all over the place.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Cool.

SPEAKER_00 31:17

And you know, the common thread with everybody who's you know done this work with me and my coaches for our pickleball escapades, uh, Kay Qual and Angela Oaks, uh, they're both they both have gone through this. Uh but but yeah, you know, this is um available to people in a way that they can choose to embrace. Uh, I can't, I live in Blaine, Washington, a very tiny town. Uh, the great thing about Zoom is that I can meet my clients there wherever they are. Sometimes Anna was riding in the car, you know, and she and I say, okay, stop right now. And she's like, give me three minutes, I'll be there. Or, you know, she's sitting in the car after being on the court for two hours in the morning, drilling, because she knew that was important. Um, so yeah, you know, I I think the common thread in all the feedback that everybody's given me is they are shocked at what they learned about themselves. It helps them in their everyday life. They were not expecting that. They come to me for pickleball. And I always know that, and I I kind of giggle because I get excited about it. I know they're gonna have some aha, and it's gonna really impact their life. I don't know what it is. I have no idea what it's gonna be, but it's exciting to know that it's gonna be there, and that has been across working from every I think it's been mainly from 3.5 players and up, you know.

SPEAKER_01 32:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

Uh I think, you know, I I would definitely work with a 3.0 player, uh, but I haven't had any contact me because they don't realize it impacts them until they start playing at about 3.5 level. Between the 3.5 and the 4.5 is when people just, oh, they're so brutal to themselves. And that really uh inhibits them getting better on the court. Wow. You know? Wow.

SPEAKER_01 33:19

So my gosh, I just can't even imagine all of the adventures that you've had and the way you've impacted so many people's lives. But what are what is a or what are some life lessons that you've gleaned that you're oh man, there's I think the the main thing is just bring your passion, bring your authentic self, bring your essence to the table, and just be okay with whatever shows up.

SPEAKER_00 33:55

And so that's kind of been a guiding thing for things I've done with my pickleball unites. I went last year and coached in South Africa, Mimal, South Africa. What an amazing community of 500 people with the first dedicated pickleball court in all of South Africa and coached there and then coached in Ghana. Right now I'm working with uh 13 young people in Malawi and I'll go see them next year and take a group back to South Africa and do uh a safari in Kruger National Park. You know, these kids in Malawi they just inspire me because they all have degrees in different things, but they had no job opportunities. So we've worked together to help them create the Malawi Story Lab. I got them the domain name, they put together their website, and I review things, and and we get on Zoom and we have our meetings and we work on the mental game because you know what? I know I it breaks my heart that they don't have what I have. But I say to them, there's one thing that you have that we all have, and that is your mind. And you have to learn to self-command your mind so that you can do what you can where you're at with what you've got. And they are being remarkable. The other day, one of them had gone to South Africa to work in his sister's business, and he made enough money to buy them two new nets, and he was showing me the nets that had just arrived. They were so excited, and they they they they combined a pickleball event with a mental health day. Oh, and they created all of this themselves. Perfect. So rather than me inspiring other people, let me tell you, they're inspiring me. You all inspire me with what you're doing. Uh, because these life lessons and pickleball, you've been at it. It takes a lot of tenacity and resilience to keep doing this all the time. Yeah. I mean, I really admire that in you all. I hope you really recognize how rare and special that is, that people can just stick with something and do it.

SPEAKER_01 36:05

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 36:06

Uh it's amazing.

Retreats Three Pillars And On Court Support

SPEAKER_01 36:07

Yeah, you're welcome. And speaking of another thing that you stuck with this book, Empower. Pickleball stories that inspire, I'll say they do. And this is by Dottie and by Jody Belsher and Coach B, Dottie, known as Coach B. Yeah. And it's available on Amazon, and it's a beautiful book, for one thing. Great cover, gorgeous, every all different stories about people, and there are beautiful photos in it. And then you have all these other projects and ways that you're training people, and you said you have one website that will lead people to and then list off all the things that might be on that website.

SPEAKER_00 36:53

Yeah, I know that y'all are going to make sure that this one link kind of goes in the show notes. Yes. And the reason I have that is because rather than saying, oh, here's the site for Empowering Women in Pickleball, get the book there. Here's the site for pickleball unites, here's here's for you know, pickleball escapades, here's for a mental edge to X Factor, this one link you can get all that. And then in there are some of the you know podcasts and different things that I've been on. Uh, but it's really uh it's sort of like the container that holds everything. So in in this link, uh that you know, rather than saying it out loud, we'll just have it where people can click on it in the show notes. And the exciting part too for me is that we did a pickleball escapades by women for women retreat last year in Santa Barbara, and then we did one in Vermont. Uh, we're gonna do one in Costa Rica in next May, 2027, but we're actually bringing it home to the Pacific Northwest. And the Armory uh Ferndale that has a facility, several facilities around the state. One, their main one started in Bellingham. They're opening one up in Ferndale, and so we're gonna have our pickleball escapades retreat there uh July 13th, 14th, 15th, and 16th. What we do is we do three-day events, we start with an evening dinner together, and that's where our mental training starts. In fact, this gal, I'll just share this quick story. This gal who told me about what um being on the you know show had meant to her. Yeah, tickle ball happy hour, she came up to me afterwards. Now, this woman is a CFO of a large hospital uh in in California, uh the Bay Area. And she looked at me, she said, You've blown my socks. I said, What? What are you talking about? She says, I go to a lot of stuff. She said, if I didn't get any more than this evening, I would be thrilled, you know, basically is what she said. And she says, we haven't even stepped on the court. I said, that's what we hope you get. What the possibility is. And so then we do three days on the court. We have three pillars. I think this is how we're different than just a clinic. Uh, we do skills, drills, and techniques, and Angela handles that. We do Dynamite Doubles, which is a system, you know. They're both also certified in Dynamite Doubles. Hellaspar created this. We got certified with her. Kay and I work with that, and we all work on the mental part, bringing it into the practice. Like we might see somebody get really upset at the end of a shot, they had an unforced error. We'll just kind of say, hey, everybody come together right now. We might say, we need to support Shelly right now. And so I might say, Shelly and everybody here on the court, I want to do some some breathing right now. Okay. I want us just to really take several minutes. I'm going to take you through some exercises. I might do, uh, I'll do things, you know, some of the touch ones like this. Anyway, just a variety of things for several minutes. And that's how I teach people on the court to incorporate it, okay, in the moment. We recognize it in the moment. We handle it right then and there.

SPEAKER_01 40:16

You know, you notice it, you name it, and you neutralize it. Neutralize.

SPEAKER_00 40:24

You neutralize it by noticing and naming it, and that's what allows you to tame it, you know?

SPEAKER_01 40:29

Oh, brilliant. Yeah, yeah. My gosh, well, that's exciting news that you're in the Pacific Northwest neck of the woods, plus you're all over the world, plus you're online, and I talk about Chocabal full episode. We can't thank you enough for taking the time. You are one busy gal, and you've taken the time to talk with us and share all of this wisdom with our audience. Thank you. And with us.

unknown 40:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:59

We feel especially lucky. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 41:06

Well, Shelly and Cher, I can't thank you enough. I mean, that we can help women rise by just connecting, playing, rising. We're all in this together. Yes. And so I I feel lifted up. I feel energized.

SPEAKER_01 41:22

I do too.

Habits Beat Insight Closing And CTA

SPEAKER_00 41:23

I mean, the energy, you know, that's what's great. We have basically two channels. We have the data channel and the energy channel.

SPEAKER_01 41:30

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 41:31

And most people try to operate in the data channel.

SPEAKER_01 41:33

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 41:34

But the energy channel is the real key for connection. That's where it happens.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

And the key for the connection.

SPEAKER_00 41:40

And I'll I'll leave one nugget with you.

SPEAKER_01 41:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:42

You know, we think we read books, and all of that's good. We go to conferences, but insight is 20% of your success. And you can, this has been said for ages, but 80% comes from the daily habits that you build and implement and do consistently. That's how you become successful. It doesn't matter what it is. Pickleball, business, you know, you name it. If if you really want to achieve and be successful, you know, a kind of success that makes you go, Yes, I got this. This feels good. That's how you do it. And most people stay too much in the insight part. And that's why they end up feeling disappointed with themselves. And I'm saying you don't have to do it that way.

SPEAKER_01 42:33

There's another way. There's another way, and it's better, and it's with Coach B. And we can't thank you enough. And everybody, come on, sign up. Go, we will put the website in the show notes. Over there, you will see an amazing array of opportunities. And July is the Pacific Northwest um clinic, three-pillar clinic. And yeah, we'll see you there. And thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 43:04

Thank you again, Sharon Shelley. So fun.

SPEAKER_01 43:07

So fun. And we look forward to a new conversation next week. Bye-bye, everyone.

SPEAKER_03 43:13

Bye-bye. If you love our podcast, we'd be so grateful if you take a few seconds to follow or subscribe to Life Lessons from Pickleball. This ensures you'll never miss an episode and helps us continue these wonderful conversations.

SPEAKER_01 43:27

On Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen, go to the show page and tap the follow button in the top right corner. And on YouTube, click the subscribe button under any of the episodes. Thanks so much. Hope to see you on the court.