Serena Williams' Impressive Example of Perseverance and Graciousness

Serena Williams’ Impressive Example of 

Perseverance and Graciousness

One of the highlights of a recent vacation was my ability and leisure to watch the women’s singles final at this Wimbledon tournament.  Since September 1999 when she won her first major tournament, the U. S. Open, as an enthusiastic, tireless, relenting and hungry seventeen year old competitor with tremendous potential to become one of greatest tennis players, Serena Williams has been one of my athletic and personal heroes.  Commencing her climb to the summits of professional tennis on warped, neglected and seriously deficient courts in Compton, California which the average player and fan of her sport would avoid like the plague, Serena most definitely has pulled herself up by her own bootstraps.  Blending the broad brush strokes of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, the Horatio Algiers’ motif of rags to riches, the myth of the American dream and the self-made person with the particularities of the historical dilemmas of race, class and gender, Williams’ compelling story of triumph encourages and empowers anyone with heartfelt dreams and goals.  As a consequence, it was with great joy that I watched her play this year and win the Wimbledon singles titles two years after a blood clot in her lungs almost took her life.  Although she previously won this most prestigious title of international professional tennis four times, this win held extraordinary meaning with particular gratitude for the ability to achieve it.

Interestingly, Williams played superlatively throughout Wimbledon 2012.  She set a record for aces.  Her renowned and feared service was as phenomenal as ever exceeding previous speeds and accuracy.  Her opponents rarely broke her serve.  In fact, they had to contemplate seriously how they would return the ball considering its force, velocity and precision.  Continually, I marvel at her ability to put the ball just inside the line.  When an opponent requests a review of a call, Williams wins the decision in most instances.  The aces are just inside line.  Her opponents barely have a chance to decide how to return the serve.  Her finesses and maturity demonstrates an important lesson of hard-hitting athletics, specifically, and other forms of competition, generally.  One competes fundamentally with one’s self.  You know internally whether you are competing at your highest level of potential and capability.  Beyond the internationally ranked and superlative opponents she faced, Williams challenges herself to exceed yesterday’s victories.  Perhaps, as she played this year’s tournament, she fought against the danger of ignominiously ending her career via an unexpected, unimaginable and debilitating health threat two years ago.  She competed to defeat the understandable depression, self-pity and despair that potentially combined to write “Finis” on the canvass of her storied tennis career.

During the ceremonies in which a member of the British royal family presented the Ladies Singles Trophy from the All England Lawn Club where tennis began, Williams spoke of ordeal.  Her voice cracked and salty tears equitably flowed as Williams contrasted the summits of winning Wimbledon again with the unpromising isolation and mental paralysis of her recuperation two years ago.  First, she thanked Jehovah, the god of her understanding, upbringing and experience for divine grace and permission in allowing her to recover, play and win.  She then expressed heartfelt and touching gratitude to her parents, siblings and other well-wishers and supporters who watched the match in her box.  Their love and support fueled her determination to play again.  Especially, she offered personal gratitude to her older sister who stayed by Serena’s bedside during the long days and even bleaker nights of her hospitalization.  The compassion of faithful presence defies description as its worth is incalculable in the mind and heart of its recipient. 

As it relates to her sister and fellow tennis professional, Venus, Serena jokingly noted that she tied her older sister’s record with five Wimbledon championships of her own.  “I have always wanted to follow Venus in whatever she does.”  In thanking her parents, she gave them tremendous credit as they continually believe in her and her ability to return to the sport she loves.  Essentially, Williams utilized a period for congratulations to demonstrate the powerful love of family and friends as it relates to cultivating perseverance.

Seminal honors rarely emerge in anyone’s life without affection, affirmation and assistance from people who comprise a team of family and friends.  A pitcher in Major League Baseball cannot attain a “no hitter” game without the professional play and assistance of his teammates.  Quarterbacks who obtain “MVP” designations in the Super Bowl do so because of the hard work of their teammates on the offensive line.  Winners of the best actor and best actress Oscars are integral members of a cast.  Whether on a baseball diamond, football field, set of a block buster movies or the most exalted tennis court in the world, Centre Court at Wimbledon, perseverance depends greatly on this significant relational network.  Whereas a person must learn to encourage and empower himself or herself as he or she doggedly pursues heartfelt dreams and personal ambitions, the affection and affirmation of family and friends essential to achievement, success and excellence.  Williams’ victory remarks reflect the invaluable collective contribution of a support network within personal perseverance.

Still, I admire her individual determination to recuperate and return to tennis.  Her illness and subsequent isolation must have felt like a precipitous drop from the summit of her profession.  One day, she is ranked number one in the world; has won all of the four major tournaments; and begun a fashion and jewelry line in addition to buying shares of ownership in a professional football team as she embraces irreversibly her burgeoning celebrity.  Another day, she wakes up in a post-operative recovery room to learn she nearly lost her death and has a long road to recovery before her.  Will she play tennis again professionally?  Will she be able to compete to the superlative degree she had heretofore? Many of these questions occupied her mind as she lay on the couch during a glacial recuperative period. 

Fighting on a mental court, Serena relentlessly countered the crippling mental, emotional and psychological adversity that would have assuredly terminated her career.  She faithfully undertook the hard regimen of physical therapy and training necessary to restore her competitive excellence.  Within two years, she leaves the valley of the shadow of death and ascends back to the pinnacle of victory where the view is fascinating and limitless.  Her remarkable journey from a near death experience to a fifth Wimbledon title reminds me of a paraphrase of quote by President Richard M. Nixon about defeat, resilience and victory.  “Unless you have traveled the valleys of darkness and defeat and disappointment and sorrow, you can never really appreciate the joys and happiness of the vistas of victory.”