What I do on court is great, but what really matters is what happens off court, the people who you affect.
Coco GauffRead
Everyone asks me how I stay calm on court and I think it's because I accepted who I am after overcoming low points in my life.
Interpretation
Embracing oneβs true self helps maintain composure during challenges.
Coco Gauff's quote reflects the importance of self-acceptance and resilience. By acknowledging and overcoming personal struggles, one can find a sense of inner peace and calmness, especially in high-pressure situations like sports. This self-awareness fosters confidence and enables individuals to handle adversity with grace.
In practice
During motivational talks for athletes discussing mental health.
What I do on court is great, but what really matters is what happens off court, the people who you affect.
The amount of people - and kids especially - that come up to me saying I inspire them is honestly better than any match I could win, just to know that I inspire another kid maybe to pick up a racquet or go through something they're facing at school.
There's so many people going through so many, like, uncomfortable situations. For me to be - I mean, obviously being nervous is natural - but for me to think that winning a tennis match or losing a tennis match is the end of the world, I think just kind of shows what kind of privilege I have.
Throughout my life, I was always the youngest to do things, which added hype that I didn't want. It added this pressure that I needed to do well fast.
It's important for us to know that our worth isn't defined by how well we do in our sport.
If you are choosing silence, you're choosing the side of the oppressor.
One tiny Hobbit against all the evil the world could muster. A sane being would have given up, but Samwise burned with a magnificent madness, a glowing obsession to surmount every obstacle, to find Frodo, destroy the Ring, and cleanse Middle Earth of its festering malignancy. He knew he would try again. Fail, perhaps. And try once more. A thousand, thousand times if need be, but he would not give up the quest.
I do not wish to remove from my present prison to a prison a little larger. I wish to break all prisons.
I was always afraid of dying. Always. It was my fear that made me learn everything I could about my airplane and my emergency equipment, and kept me flying respectful of my machine and always alert in the cockpit.
The willow which bends to the tempest often escapes better than the oak which resists it.
When we advocate for violence against women to be eliminated on campuses, we say, 'Well, actually, it's not just on campuses we have to worry about.' We might have to worry about high schools. We might have to worry about police precincts and cars. We might have to worry about public housing.
He had never known such gallantry as the gallantry of Scarlett O'Hara going forth to conquer the world in her mother's velvet curtains and the tail feathers of a rooster.
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