I cannot do this has been the thought every time I have failed.

I can do this has been the thought every time I have not failed.

Success is never guaranteed but failure is much more strongly held in our reigns. We cannot control either, of course, but we can manifest them depending upon our belief structure. A contestant who believes they will lose before the contest starts will most invariably end up losing.

The reasoning is simple. Every time we believe in our inability to succeed, we pit extra enemies against our own selves. Instead of fighting against the problem, as we should be doing, we end up expending our energies against self-doubt, self-hatred, erroneous recollections, and a million other creations of our mind, leaving us weak and debilitated for the real enemy. A divided house cannot stand, of course, and we invariably get dished a crushing defeat which not only stings but also enhances the strength of negative self-talk inside our heads making future defeats much more likely.

Self-belief, bordering on arrogance but not quite, tends to bolster our own skills against the problems we go up against which, obviously, tends to be a lot easier to deal with. After all, fighting against a bully is never easy but it is much easier when your hands are free and not tied by the bully’s goons. You may not win but you won’t lose either. At worst, you will learn. That is, until you become so arrogant that you intentionally blind yourself to learning lessons and end up getting thoroughly gobsmacked. There’s a healthy balance.

Mental attitudes transcend our individuality in that they apply to everyone. Think Novak Djokovic for example. As big of a Federer fan I have been all my life, no one can deny the absolute mental mastery the former possesses, having won after being at the brink of defeat tens of times. The correct mental attitude can make you the G.O.A.T. while the wrong mental attitude can make you lose the same crown. Not even legends are exempt from the overwhelming sway held by Attitude.

Of particular annoyance is the fact that mental attitudes, much like a living being, require constant nurture.

Having failed to practice the optimal mental attitude I developed in my teen years, I ended up living a rather sub-optimal next half of a decade. Long overdue, my re-awakening came through table tennis and its elder brother, lawn tennis. Every time I doubted my win, I lost 90% of the time (the only reason it wasn’t 100% is because the human at the other end also decided to doubt himself) whereas every time I believed I could win, I won 90% of the time (even when I was down 8 match points once). In full disclosure, the latter number is now 70% since my friend has improved his mental game considerably.

Never giving up is the only way we have a shot at success. Survival, after all, is of the fittest and those who give up will be taken down by life. Once again, you aren’t guaranteed success if you persevere; life is inherently unfair, illogical and messed up at times. You get a shot, though. And once you get a shot, give it your all and every morning, tell yourself the following words. I know I will.

I can and will… Everything I want.