To meet my goals, I couldn't let up when I was playing tennis.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
There was never anything I wanted to do more than play tennis. Never once walked out there and thought, 'I wish I was doing something else.' Not once.
It was very hard for me to practice and enjoy my tennis, and I didn't know the why, so I worked with psychologists to try and see what was happening. They pushed me really hard.
Later, I discovered there was a lot of work to being good in tennis.
When you do something best in life, you don't really want to give that up - and for me it's tennis.
One day my dad would say, 'OK, if you want to play tennis I can help you out.' And that's how it started. And I had a goal. I wanted to beat my mom first. And my parents and my brother. And that was the ultimate goal.
When I retired from tennis I wanted to do other things with my life.
When I committed to playing a little tennis in some exhibitions, it was the best thing for me. It got me in shape. It got me out of the house. It got me doing something I love to do.
As soon as I step on the court I just try to play tennis and don't find excuses. You know, I just lost because I lost, not because my arm was sore.
Tennis was always there for me, which was lucky. I would go play baseball, basketball, football, hang with my brother, do whatever, and at the end of the day I'd come back and say, 'Hey, Mom, would you hit 15 minutes worth of balls with me?'
I was so horrifically bad at tennis.