She bounces the ball severally to the ground with her racquet, her face the image of calmness. She raises the ball high with her left hand and prepares to serve. But not before she has stared down her opponent across the net. 99% of human communication is non-verbal, they said. She doesn’t have to speak. The message has been passed across loud and clear. This is war. Her opponent, who is small in size compared to her, shrinks even further. Her shoulders sag in defeat: and the first shot hasn’t even been fired. She goes ahead and serves. It’s a 122mph. it’s an ace. Her opponent didn’t even see it coming. She stands there shaken, wondering when this will be over.
She completely slays the match. She is the queen, Getting better with age. Burning them with no apologies. Make way for Serena Williams.
Whatever it is you do in this world, be a Serena Williams. She’s 33 years now. Yes, you heard that right. She is 33. In this new era in sports (and life generally) where thirty is the new sixteen; Li na is 32, Venus is 34, Martina Hingis at 32 is playing doubles (she just got to the Us open 2014 finals) Roberta Vinci is 31, flavia Panetta is 32, sharapova is 28, heck kimiko date-krumm is 43 years old and still humiliating the younger players. She is in the top 80 currently. In this era where thirty is the new sixteen, Serena Williams is still as formidable a player as she ever was.
Don’t ever give up in whatever difficult situations you are in. personally whenever I come upon a difficult situation I usually tell me, this is a tennis match and you are Serena’s opponent. What do you do? Do you hung your shoulders and cede defeat even before you‘ve begun? Because if you do that, she’ll massacre you. No, you stand tall and act tough as nails and give her your meanest look too. But you’ll probably choke along the way anyway, and exit with your head held high knowing that you gave it your best shot. Or you might just be the next Sybille Bammer, one of two players who have a winning head to head against Serena Williams. Yes they are only two. That is, against players she played more than twice.
Serena played Sybille twice; and lost twice. Gasp. I can’t even begin to fathom that. You probably don’t even know who she is but knowing Serena well, I’m sure that’s a name that haunts her. The other player is hall of famer Aranxta Sanchez- Vicario (4-3).
How do you fare against your boss at the work place? Against your competitors? The big boys and girls who are rolling deep in the money? Do you choke? Do you give up before you’ve even begun? Are you a Serena Williams or a Maria sharapova, who chokes every time she plays Serena? Do you cede defeat even before the first shot is fired? Do your hardships at work stare you down menacingly and you wag your tail away in defeat? Do your competitors ace you every bloody time? Do not be that person. Whatever life brings on, kindly “Serena” it.
Do not give up!!
Just look at this woman’s accomplishment. Thirty two major titles. Thirty two grand slams! Singles doubles and mixed doubles. The most recent player, male or female, to have held all four grand slam single titles simultaneously (‘02-‘03) and only the fifth female player to do so. Most recent player together with her sister, to hold all four double titles simultaneously (’09-010).
With 17 grand slam singles, she is just a final away from reaching Evert’s and Navratilova’s record of eighteen grand slams. If she does that she will tie on second on the all time list in the open era after only Steffi Graf (22 titles). She and her sister are unbeaten in grand slam finals in doubles. She has four Olympic gold medals; one in singles and three in doubles, an all time record she shares with her sister Venus. Do you know that at the 2012 Wimbledon champions, she hit a women’s tournament record of 102 aces. This was more than any of the men hit during the whole tournament. Damn!
Anytime you feel like you are done, like you can’t move on or feel like you want to commit suicide, think about this following statistic. Serena has won three grand slam single titles after saving match points (2003 Australian open Kim clijsters, 2005 Australian open versus Maria sharapova and 2009 Wimbledon versus Elena dementieva). This is more than any other player in history, male or female. In footballs terms, it is like coming from down 8-2 with ten minutes to go in the world cup finals and going ahead to win the world cup. In the 2012 us open final against Victoria azarenka she was 5-3 in the third set and found herself two points away from losing the match. She then proceeded to win the next 4 games and lift the us open trophy. So go ahead, that rope you bought to hang yourself with, burn it. You never know what is in store for you.
Ohh and something else, on top of all those records she has broken, she is also the oldest number one female player ever. Plus she is the all time leading female earner in the game, having won more than $50 million.
Those big shot competitors of yours, they are not unbeatable. Just look at Serena’s record against some of the best players the game ever had. It’s worth noting that she has a winning record against all of them.
- Venus Williams (11-14)
- Jennifer Capriati (10-7)
- Justine henin (8-6)
- Martina Hingis (7-6)
- Elena dementieva (7-5)
- Jelena jankovic (10-4)
- Lindsay Davenport (10-4)
- Kim clijsters (7-2)
- Amelie mauresmo (10-2)
- Maria sharapova (16-2)
- Steffi Graf (1-1)
- Monica Seles (4-1)
- Mary pierce (5-1)
- Dinara safina (6-1)
- Ana ivanovic (7-1)
- Caroline wozniacki (8-1)
- Li na (11-1)
- Victoria azarenka (14-3)
Which brings us to this surprising stat. almost all the players who have a winning head to head statistic over serena are not the big names but the, literally, no-names.
- Annie miller (0-1)
- Jana cepelova (0-1)
- Paola Suarez (0-1)
- Titian sun (0-1)
- Virginie razzano (0-1) French open 1st round, serena’s only 1st round loss at a grand slam.
And a couple of other unknown players. Which teaches us something? Do not underestimate your opponent, no matter how weak they look. Or your problems no matter how inconsequential they seem at the moment.
I could go on and on about this woman. There is so much to be written about her but I’ll stop there for now. God knows I love me some Serena Williams. She has gotten me through so many difficult situations than she’ll ever care to know. Probably a ton of other women too.
Whatever it is you do, be a Serena Williams.
