Playing a Person You Hate

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Playing a Person You Hate

Hey Tomas!

I was wondering what to do when you play someone with the worst attitude. I feel like I have to beat him to make him shut up, but I always end up losing.

These players always get on my nerves, and that somehow affects my tennis. I become tight, and I make more errors. Whenever he hits a winner, I get frustrated. What should I do?

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Playing a Person You Hate

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Jun 21, 2009
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Save emotions for later
by: Tomaz

I'd approach this from 2 angles:

a) Save emotions for later. Tell yourself that you can hate this person after the match, but during the match being too emotional will hurt your game.

Therefore you need to play the BALL - playing tactically correct - and not trying to beat your opponent. If you do win, you can enjoy this feeling after the match.

b) Figure out why you hate him. In most cases, hatred is caused by projections.

Mental projection is a situation when you deny some of your own weaknesses (like arrogance, lying, cheating, ...) and actually think that you are not like that, but then your mind projects these weaknesses on other people and you feel very righteous and above them.

Here are some more resources on projections:

http://psychology.suite101.com/article.cfm/what_is_projection

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection

There are also a couple of books on Amazon with the title "Why We Hate"...

Jul 06, 2009
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look within
by: Richard

Even the statement " I hate my opponent" holds the answer for you. "You" are the one doing the hating not the opponent, so its you, you have to fix or work around at the least.........! :)

Richard

Jun 24, 2010
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Ditto here
by: Anonymous

I can definitely identify with your problem. I have been in a similar situation. This guy would just go on saying ugly and false things about me, ruining my image, and even people I have not met start thinking wrong about me. And when we are playing he again keeps jeering during that time. I try to control myself and my emotions understanding that he is not going to achieve anything in life with this attitude, plus I tell myself to focus on my own game rather than think about him. But you know still somewhere in the back of my mind, it is playing havoc with my game. Something keeps nagging me in the back of my mind.

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Playing a Person You Hate

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Playing a Person You Hate