February 14, 2025 • 12 mins
At first glance, pickleball might seem simple—just a paddle, a plastic ball, and a court. But as you play more, you'll realize the sport's complexity. It's a puzzle that challenges you, both as a player and as a person, and that's what keeps us coming back.
Think of pickleball as an onion, used for many purposes, it's delicious, complex, deep, but can also lead to crying. The onion layers represent various aspects of the sport and personal growth, and each layer you peel back reveals another, deeper layer.
Let's explore how this analogy can help you engage with the game more effectively and avoid frustration;
i) In Play: Concentrate on specific skills and mastering the current layer of your game during play. This helps you avoid being overwhelmed by every aspect of the game at once.
ii) In Improvement: Understand that you can't skip layers, master the basics before moving to more complex strategies. All that requires patience. Work on your current skills and trust that you'll get to those layers in time.
iii) In Personal Development and Objective Progress: Recognize that there are layers you can't see yet. This awareness helps you stay positive and motivated, knowing that with time and effort, you'll uncover new aspects of the game. Continually peel back layers of understanding about yourself, your mindset, and how you interact for personal growth.
Be part of our email list; https://betterpickleball.com/
See you on the next episode!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello and welcome to Pickable Therapy, thepodcast dedicated to your
pickleball improvement.Hope you're having a great week.
My name is Tony Roig.
I am the host of this weekly podcast.
It's a pleasure to be with you.
This week, we're going deepinto the idea of peeling back the onion.
We're going to talk about pickle as anonion because that is exactly what it is.
(00:23):
And the onion is a great analogy/metaphorethat allows us to take a look at how we to
engage with this sport in different areas.
We're going to explore different areas: play, improvement, yourself as (00:33):
undefined
an athlete and as a human being.
And I think you're going to find a lot ofvalue out of this idea
of pickle being an onion.
So if you're a long time listening to thepodcast, you're right in there going like,
I like a bowl of ice cream, butit's a different application.
You'll see.
So the onion, I think, isgoing to work well for you.
Before we dive into the podcast,a couple of housekeeping notes.
(00:56):
I've been talking the last few weeks abouthow pickleball therapy is but one piece of
a bigger puzzle, of a biggercoaching service that we provide,
which is called Better Pickleball.
If you're already a part of the BetterPickleball community, then
you know what's coming up.
And so I don't need to boreyou with that here because you'll get the
emails and you can makedecisions about that there.
(01:17):
But if you're not on the Better Pickleballemail list,
make sure you join that because thenyou'll be notified of events coming up.
We have a State of the Unionaround the time of this podcast.
We're going to have a really nice bootCamp in March and things like that.
So betterpickleball.com and subscribe to the email list.
Taking a sip of water.
I'll be right back.
All right, I'm hydrated.We're ready to go.
(01:39):
So let's dive into this ideaof pickleball being an onion.
And let's start from this premise.
It is 100 % normal, 100 % naturalfor you and any other pickleball player
to want to know it all.
We want everything.
We want to know everything there is toknow about pickleball, and we
want to know it yesterday, right?
(02:00):
Not possible.
Not possible becausepickleball is a very complex sport.
And it's interesting.
I wrote a little piece about this recentlyabout the idea is that
at first Gosh, when you first startedplaying pickleball, it's
just so simple, right?
Use a little plastic ball, a littlepaddle, got to the court, bop, bop, bop,
paid the ball around, super cool,and you're good to go.
(02:23):
And then you play for a little while andyou're like, There's more to this game.
Then you play a little longer and you findout there's more, and the more you When
you play, the deeper it goes, and youjust keep going deeper and deeper.
And really, you find out that pickleballis a very complex sport,
and that's what keeps us coming back,because it's this really complex puzzle,
both in terms of play as well asourselves and how we interact with it.
(02:45):
And it challenges us, and it keepsus young, keeps us engaged, keeps us
active, keeps us doing this thing,pursuing this
next step along our pickleball journey.
And that's something that we shouldembrace and not allow to
overwhelm us or get us frustrated.
And thinking about pickleball like anonion is something that
(03:07):
can help with that.
Because when you think about an onion,I like to think about an onion this way.
I don't know about you, but I love onions.
Onions are delicious.
Cooked, they're so powerful.You can do anything you want with them.
Almost every recipe outthere has onion in it.
It's the Trinity, right?
The onion goes into just everything.
And so I had this this thing, this onion.
(03:31):
I think it's a bachelor's,but it's a root.
It's a root.
And so I can use it for all thesepurposes, but it also can cause me to cry.
So it's delicious, complex, deep,but can also lead to crying.
So it's perfect for a big of allif you think about it that way.
(03:52):
But the layers of it are reallyinteresting because when you think about
an onion, you peel back a layer andthere's another layer of onion, you peel
layer and it just keeps going, keepsgoing, keeps going, keeps going,
not infinitely, but for a long time.
And so when you think about your pickleball that way, you think about it like,
okay, I am currently onwhatever layer I am at.
(04:12):
I know that once I peel this layer back,I will see something else in this sport.
And then I will, if I want to, keep going.
I keep peeling that layer back.
And then, oh my God, there's another layerand peel it back and
there's another layer.
And that's awesome because you'renever going to exhaust the layers.
But when you think about it that way interms of layers, you're
going to think about it.
You think about yourselfas being more patient.
(04:33):
You think about yourself as being morerelaxed because you know that
you're working on a layer.
You're not working onthe onion at that stage.
You're focused on a layer.
And you can be patient.
You work on this layer knowing thatI'll get through the layer eventually.
And then once I get to that layer,I'll start working on the next layer.
And also allows you to focusbecause you get away from,
(04:56):
I need to know everything right now.
I need to knowI need to know everything there's going to
pick a pickleball immediately, or elsesomething bad is going to happen or else
I'm failing or whatever it is,that goes away.
Because the only thing Ineed to worry about is what?
The layer.
The layer that I'm currently working on.
Knowing that once I'm done with thatlayer, then another layer, and then
(05:17):
I can worry about that layer then.
And then after that, there'll be anotherlayer and another layer and another layer.
But in the meantime, I can focus on whatI'm doing now because the reality is I
can't get to layer number fourinside the onion and Until I've
mastered or I've pealed backlayers one, layer two, and layer three.
(05:38):
The first three layersbefore I get to layer four.
So if we understand that, we sitback and say, Okay, wait a minute.
This thing that I'm thinkingabout is layer four.
Let me focus right now on layer two.Let's say I'm on layer two.
I can focus on layer two, knowing that Ineed to get through that, to get to layer
three, to get through that, then to get tolayer four, and not jump ahead to layer
(05:59):
four, which is one of the reasons why asporadic approach to pickleball
can be so frustrating.
Sporadic might be the right term.
I mean, basically like ashotgun, where you're just picking YouTube
videos or friends at the courttelling you things, things like that.
That can be very frustratingbecause what's happening is oftentimes,
(06:21):
let's say you get a video on YouTubethat says five tips or something.
You'll find tips in there that all thetips It could be layers you're not at yet.
One tip might be layer two where you're atright now, and then two tips might be
layer three, and onetip might be layer six.
So you sit there andthere's no differentiation.
(06:42):
In YouTube, it's just tips.
And So you sit there and you're like,Okay, I'm going to work on tip four.
Well, tip four is layer six or layer four.
And you're just like, That'snot where you're at right now.
So you're trying to tackle something that,frankly, isn't going to work because you
don't the other layers peel back yet.
And it's just, frankly, a waste of timeif you think about it because you're on
(07:07):
layer, trying to masterlayer four is on layer two.
So try and think about your progress inthe game as an onion as
being different layers.
And I think you'll find that it's muchmore productive for you
because of the focus and becauseof the patience that you'll have.
You can also think about it in terms ofyour play, and I'm going to
(07:27):
talk about you in a second.
But in terms of your play,you can think about it like,
when I'm out playing,right now I'm focused on, let's say
you're focused on your four-shot.
You're on the return side.
I'm focusing on my four-shot.
And so that's what I'm going to spend myenergy on, my bandwidth to deal with
(07:50):
or to think about as I'm playing.
That allows me to focus on that layer andnot worry about the potential pop-up on
shot number 23 during the rally andthen I'm upset about that.
It got nothing to do with anythingbecause it's not the layer
of the onion that I'm on.
And I understand that there's additionallayers, threat identification, weakness
(08:10):
assessment,be able to exploit different opportunities
that are presented by my opponentsand all those sorts of things.
All that stuff is happening on the court.
It's a layer that perhaps is notyet for you.
In other words, you're notat that layer yet.
And there's nothing wrong with that.Just like, again, go back to the onion.
(08:30):
The layer inside theonion, you know it's there.
You can't see it because you haven't peelback the layers on the outside, but
you know there's a layer on the inside.
And so the fact that I can't yet see thatlayer doesn't mean it's not there, doesn't
mean there's anything wrong with me,doesn't mean anything other than
I still got to peel back some layersto get to that particular layer.
It basically makes thingsnot as negative for the player, for us or
(08:58):
for you, because it's more objective.
You know there's morelayers inside the onion.
You know you can't see them right now, butyou don't need to be upset about it
because there's a reason you can't seethem right now is because you're still
working on the layer that you're on rightnow, and you got to peel that one-off
before you can see the other layer.
While you're playing, it alsogives you some comfort there.
(09:19):
In your progress and your improvement,right, work, it gives you comfort,
focus, and patience on what you're doing.
When you're playing,stop worrying about things that are
layers that even though youknow they're there, right?
I know that there's a thing there.
I can't see it right nowbecause I'm not working on that.
So I don't worry about it.
I worry about it when Igot to worry about it.
I keep working on thelayer I'm working on now.
(09:40):
And then think aboutit for yourself, okay?
Last week's podcast, I talked about thispodcast some, and I talked about
the effect of this podcast on mepersonally and on other players.
And that's been a processjust like an onion, right?
Just layer after layer after layer,both in terms of uncovering
(10:01):
parts of the mental side of pickleballthat are helpful to me and helpful
to you, helpful to other listeners.
That's a process over time, layer afterlayer after layer,
and also applying it to yourself.
Applying it, for me personally, to me,has been a layering process of one layer
(10:21):
at a time, one layer at a time, untilI am where I am today.
And knowing that I'm notwhere I'm going to be in
a week, in a month, and in a year, becauseI will continue to peel back layers of the
game, peel back layers of myself and myunderstanding of myself,
peel back layers of my understanding oflife and psychology and sports and the
(10:47):
mind and the body and all these thingsthat work together
to continue to work on improving myself,both as a pickleball player and as a
human So that's this whole week's podcast.
It was a deep podcast.
We're not going to do a rift this timebecause that was a lot of content right
(11:08):
there to chew on, literally,I guess, like an onion.
So think about that asyou work on yourself.
Just consider the layers, allow the layersto be what they are so that it's not
frustrating to you that you can't seelayer number 32 on the inside of the onion
yet because you're working on layer seven,layer eight, layer nine, whatever
(11:28):
layer you're on right now.
Focus on that, get the most outof that, and enjoy the process.
Enjoy the peeling of that one layer.
Just enjoy the little peelingit back a little bit of time.
Maybe you see a little bit on the insideof the next layer, layer 10 is there
looking at you, and you startseeing it a little bit at a time.
And next thing you know, layer 9 is gone,and you're on layer 10,
and you just keep going.
(11:49):
All right, so hopefully that framing willhelp you out with your progress, your
play, as well as yourpersonal development.
If you enjoyed the podcast, pleaseconsider rating and reviewing it.
Let's get up to that 4.9.
Just kidding.
You'll understand if youheard last week's podcast.
And always share it with your friends.
Remember, if you enjoy thepodcast, they probably will, too.
Hope you have a great week andI'll see you on the next episode.
(12:10):
Be well.
Hello and welcome to Pickable Therapy, thepodcast dedicated to your
pickleball improvement.Hope you're having a great week.
My name is Tony Roig.
I am the host of this weekly podcast.
It's a pleasure to be with you.
This week, we're going deepinto the idea of peeling back the onion.
We're going to talk about pickle as anonion because that is exactly what it is.
(00:23):
And the onion is a great analogy/metaphorethat allows us to take a look at how we to
engage with this sport in different areas.
We're going to explore different areas: play, improvement, yourself as (00:33):
undefined
an athlete and as a human being.
And I think you're going to find a lot ofvalue out of this idea
of pickle being an onion.
So if you're a long time listening to thepodcast, you're right in there going like,
I like a bowl of ice cream, butit's a different application.
You'll see.
So the onion, I think, isgoing to work well for you.
Before we dive into the podcast,a couple of housekeeping notes.
(00:56):
I've been talking the last few weeks abouthow pickleball therapy is but one piece of
a bigger puzzle, of a biggercoaching service that we provide,
which is called Better Pickleball.
If you're already a part of the BetterPickleball community, then
you know what's coming up.
And so I don't need to boreyou with that here because you'll get the
emails and you can makedecisions about that there.
(01:17):
But if you're not on the Better Pickleballemail list,
make sure you join that because thenyou'll be notified of events coming up.
We have a State of the Unionaround the time of this podcast.
We're going to have a really nice bootCamp in March and things like that.
So betterpickleball.com and subscribe to the email list.
Taking a sip of water.
I'll be right back.
All right, I'm hydrated.We're ready to go.
(01:39):
So let's dive into this ideaof pickleball being an onion.
And let's start from this premise.
It is 100 % normal, 100 % naturalfor you and any other pickleball player
to want to know it all.
We want everything.
We want to know everything there is toknow about pickleball, and we
want to know it yesterday, right?
(02:00):
Not possible.
Not possible becausepickleball is a very complex sport.
And it's interesting.
I wrote a little piece about this recentlyabout the idea is that
at first Gosh, when you first startedplaying pickleball, it's
just so simple, right?
Use a little plastic ball, a littlepaddle, got to the court, bop, bop, bop,
paid the ball around, super cool,and you're good to go.
(02:23):
And then you play for a little while andyou're like, There's more to this game.
Then you play a little longer and you findout there's more, and the more you When
you play, the deeper it goes, and youjust keep going deeper and deeper.
And really, you find out that pickleballis a very complex sport,
and that's what keeps us coming back,because it's this really complex puzzle,
both in terms of play as well asourselves and how we interact with it.
(02:45):
And it challenges us, and it keepsus young, keeps us engaged, keeps us
active, keeps us doing this thing,pursuing this
next step along our pickleball journey.
And that's something that we shouldembrace and not allow to
overwhelm us or get us frustrated.
And thinking about pickleball like anonion is something that
(03:07):
can help with that.
Because when you think about an onion,I like to think about an onion this way.
I don't know about you, but I love onions.
Onions are delicious.
Cooked, they're so powerful.You can do anything you want with them.
Almost every recipe outthere has onion in it.
It's the Trinity, right?
The onion goes into just everything.
And so I had this this thing, this onion.
(03:31):
I think it's a bachelor's,but it's a root.
It's a root.
And so I can use it for all thesepurposes, but it also can cause me to cry.
So it's delicious, complex, deep,but can also lead to crying.
So it's perfect for a big of allif you think about it that way.
(03:52):
But the layers of it are reallyinteresting because when you think about
an onion, you peel back a layer andthere's another layer of onion, you peel
layer and it just keeps going, keepsgoing, keeps going, keeps going,
not infinitely, but for a long time.
And so when you think about your pickleball that way, you think about it like,
okay, I am currently onwhatever layer I am at.
(04:12):
I know that once I peel this layer back,I will see something else in this sport.
And then I will, if I want to, keep going.
I keep peeling that layer back.
And then, oh my God, there's another layerand peel it back and
there's another layer.
And that's awesome because you'renever going to exhaust the layers.
But when you think about it that way interms of layers, you're
going to think about it.
You think about yourselfas being more patient.
(04:33):
You think about yourself as being morerelaxed because you know that
you're working on a layer.
You're not working onthe onion at that stage.
You're focused on a layer.
And you can be patient.
You work on this layer knowing thatI'll get through the layer eventually.
And then once I get to that layer,I'll start working on the next layer.
And also allows you to focusbecause you get away from,
(04:56):
I need to know everything right now.
I need to knowI need to know everything there's going to
pick a pickleball immediately, or elsesomething bad is going to happen or else
I'm failing or whatever it is,that goes away.
Because the only thing Ineed to worry about is what?
The layer.
The layer that I'm currently working on.
Knowing that once I'm done with thatlayer, then another layer, and then
(05:17):
I can worry about that layer then.
And then after that, there'll be anotherlayer and another layer and another layer.
But in the meantime, I can focus on whatI'm doing now because the reality is I
can't get to layer number fourinside the onion and Until I've
mastered or I've pealed backlayers one, layer two, and layer three.
(05:38):
The first three layersbefore I get to layer four.
So if we understand that, we sitback and say, Okay, wait a minute.
This thing that I'm thinkingabout is layer four.
Let me focus right now on layer two.Let's say I'm on layer two.
I can focus on layer two, knowing that Ineed to get through that, to get to layer
three, to get through that, then to get tolayer four, and not jump ahead to layer
(05:59):
four, which is one of the reasons why asporadic approach to pickleball
can be so frustrating.
Sporadic might be the right term.
I mean, basically like ashotgun, where you're just picking YouTube
videos or friends at the courttelling you things, things like that.
That can be very frustratingbecause what's happening is oftentimes,
(06:21):
let's say you get a video on YouTubethat says five tips or something.
You'll find tips in there that all thetips It could be layers you're not at yet.
One tip might be layer two where you're atright now, and then two tips might be
layer three, and onetip might be layer six.
So you sit there andthere's no differentiation.
(06:42):
In YouTube, it's just tips.
And So you sit there and you're like,Okay, I'm going to work on tip four.
Well, tip four is layer six or layer four.
And you're just like, That'snot where you're at right now.
So you're trying to tackle something that,frankly, isn't going to work because you
don't the other layers peel back yet.
And it's just, frankly, a waste of timeif you think about it because you're on
(07:07):
layer, trying to masterlayer four is on layer two.
So try and think about your progress inthe game as an onion as
being different layers.
And I think you'll find that it's muchmore productive for you
because of the focus and becauseof the patience that you'll have.
You can also think about it in terms ofyour play, and I'm going to
(07:27):
talk about you in a second.
But in terms of your play,you can think about it like,
when I'm out playing,right now I'm focused on, let's say
you're focused on your four-shot.
You're on the return side.
I'm focusing on my four-shot.
And so that's what I'm going to spend myenergy on, my bandwidth to deal with
(07:50):
or to think about as I'm playing.
That allows me to focus on that layer andnot worry about the potential pop-up on
shot number 23 during the rally andthen I'm upset about that.
It got nothing to do with anythingbecause it's not the layer
of the onion that I'm on.
And I understand that there's additionallayers, threat identification, weakness
(08:10):
assessment,be able to exploit different opportunities
that are presented by my opponentsand all those sorts of things.
All that stuff is happening on the court.
It's a layer that perhaps is notyet for you.
In other words, you're notat that layer yet.
And there's nothing wrong with that.Just like, again, go back to the onion.
(08:30):
The layer inside theonion, you know it's there.
You can't see it because you haven't peelback the layers on the outside, but
you know there's a layer on the inside.
And so the fact that I can't yet see thatlayer doesn't mean it's not there, doesn't
mean there's anything wrong with me,doesn't mean anything other than
I still got to peel back some layersto get to that particular layer.
It basically makes thingsnot as negative for the player, for us or
(08:58):
for you, because it's more objective.
You know there's morelayers inside the onion.
You know you can't see them right now, butyou don't need to be upset about it
because there's a reason you can't seethem right now is because you're still
working on the layer that you're on rightnow, and you got to peel that one-off
before you can see the other layer.
While you're playing, it alsogives you some comfort there.
(09:19):
In your progress and your improvement,right, work, it gives you comfort,
focus, and patience on what you're doing.
When you're playing,stop worrying about things that are
layers that even though youknow they're there, right?
I know that there's a thing there.
I can't see it right nowbecause I'm not working on that.
So I don't worry about it.
I worry about it when Igot to worry about it.
I keep working on thelayer I'm working on now.
(09:40):
And then think aboutit for yourself, okay?
Last week's podcast, I talked about thispodcast some, and I talked about
the effect of this podcast on mepersonally and on other players.
And that's been a processjust like an onion, right?
Just layer after layer after layer,both in terms of uncovering
(10:01):
parts of the mental side of pickleballthat are helpful to me and helpful
to you, helpful to other listeners.
That's a process over time, layer afterlayer after layer,
and also applying it to yourself.
Applying it, for me personally, to me,has been a layering process of one layer
(10:21):
at a time, one layer at a time, untilI am where I am today.
And knowing that I'm notwhere I'm going to be in
a week, in a month, and in a year, becauseI will continue to peel back layers of the
game, peel back layers of myself and myunderstanding of myself,
peel back layers of my understanding oflife and psychology and sports and the
(10:47):
mind and the body and all these thingsthat work together
to continue to work on improving myself,both as a pickleball player and as a
human So that's this whole week's podcast.
It was a deep podcast.
We're not going to do a rift this timebecause that was a lot of content right
(11:08):
there to chew on, literally,I guess, like an onion.
So think about that asyou work on yourself.
Just consider the layers, allow the layersto be what they are so that it's not
frustrating to you that you can't seelayer number 32 on the inside of the onion
yet because you're working on layer seven,layer eight, layer nine, whatever
(11:28):
layer you're on right now.
Focus on that, get the most outof that, and enjoy the process.
Enjoy the peeling of that one layer.
Just enjoy the little peelingit back a little bit of time.
Maybe you see a little bit on the insideof the next layer, layer 10 is there
looking at you, and you startseeing it a little bit at a time.
And next thing you know, layer 9 is gone,and you're on layer 10,
and you just keep going.
(11:49):
All right, so hopefully that framing willhelp you out with your progress, your
play, as well as yourpersonal development.
If you enjoyed the podcast, pleaseconsider rating and reviewing it.
Let's get up to that 4.9.
Just kidding.
You'll understand if youheard last week's podcast.
And always share it with your friends.
Remember, if you enjoy thepodcast, they probably will, too.
Hope you have a great week andI'll see you on the next episode.
(12:10):
Be well.
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