my South African tennis coach was flirting with my Mum and then...

“I hate tennis” - Andre Agassi

Being a private-school-prick, I had a little fiery jaunt into playing tennis.

At my first lesson on a sun-spangled court in Surrey.

At 6 years old, I dreamed of dressing in sparkling-tooth-paste-pearly white clobber, gliding across the court with angelic marble-smooth guile, smashing lime moonballs with baroque spin across the net.

Sadly, my hand-eye coordination is a galaxy of gangly and gloopy.

My ruffian shots through the air, a highly risible affair.

I’d explode in Little Timmy Tennis Tantrums.

“why won’t the FUCKING ball go over the FUCKING net?”

One balmy June eve, after “practice”, I held an emergency board meeting with my rents — the memo - Spag Bol, Garlic Bread and Serious Tennis Talk.

“Mummy, I think it’s the raquet… how can I hit the fucking ball over the fucking net? Without a bloody great racket?”

“It’s my strong suggestion we allocate some serious budget to buying me Roger Federer’s racquet”. (melting eyes in tow, as I stuffed the 6th slice of G-bread down my gullet)

My Racquet Racket seemed to work.

10.21am, the next day, I’m in local sports shop, Adrenaline, Cobham eating a KitKat Chunky and snorting an UMUNGO- all smily and wily and happy and giddy with my new Federer racquet.

At practice the next day, I was excited to get out on court,

My coach was a tall stallion, adonis muscled, South African Gap-Yah student named, Pieter.

(Pieter would flirt with the 4×4 Mum’s - telling them his name, PIeter, translated to “Joy” in Spanish).

Disgruntled I said,

“Piet mate, please stop flirting with my Mother, listen mate, I know you ain’t no Pete Samprus, but WTF is this? I still can’t hit the fucking ball over the fucking net?

I was the square root of absolutely pony at tennis.

But, I’ve’ recently become obsessed with studying tennis.

Being a founder is analogous to being a tennis player.

The writer David Foster Wallace has a fab quote about tennis

“I submit that tennis is the most beautiful sport there is and also the most demanding. It requires body control, hand-eye coordination, quickness, flat-out speed, endurance, and that weird mix of caution and abandon we call courage. It also requires smarts. Just one single shot in one exchange in one point of a high-level match is a nightmare of mechanical variables.”

Sounds a little like running a brand, right?
Study Tennis, Understand Founder Mode.

Agassi is Anthony Bourdain of Strawberries and Cream Dreams.

Agassi’s life was riddle with Agg, his father was a total bellend, but, Andre Aggy-si was a demon on the court, and possessed a ferociously bonkers back hand.

Agassi opens his autobiography with “I hate tennis”.

This one line served up and smashed home a serious lesson.

Following your passion is advice that is both amazing and totally fucking pony.

The silent issue when people tell you to “follow your passion” is they don’t tell you about the pain of passion.

If you’re doing something you love, there will invariably be an element of “hate” baked into that.

Most people give up on their passion, brand, side-hustle, because they’re not prepared for the pain of passion.

For me,

“I love podcasting”
“I hate podcasting”

I love podcasting. I love meeting interesting people and endlessly stoking my curiousity.

I hate podcasting. There’s about 43% of it that I properly, properly hate (editing, outreach, sponsorship deals, creating clips, thumbnails titles, intros, sales calls).

If you’re building a brand, two questions to meld together:

If you get the balance on that, you’ll under stand Passion, Pain and The Pain of Passion.

You’ll keep going. And by endurance you always conquer.

Check out this Founder’s podcast all about Aggy-ssi

I slowly trawled through Infinite Jest many moons ago on Vacay in Portugal. A mammoth mountain, marathon book. If you don’t wanna read the book - I deeply implore you to check out Dave’s This Is Water Speech - to really understand the bloke. I talk about him a lot on the poddy

“Life Is Like Tennis, Those Who Serve Best, Usually Win” - David Foster Wallace

Building a Brand, Those Who Serve Best, Usually Win

Serve your team, Serve your customers, Serve your brand, Serve your investors

You’ll usually win.

Check this wonderful poddy out all about Roger Federer.

Have a top weekend

Popey xxxx

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