The Happiness Equation: Want Nothing + Do Anything = Have Everything

10

What does a message secretly hidden under Wimbledon’s Centre Court show us?

There are two lines of a poem above the player entrance to Centre Court at Wimbledon:

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same.

Picture walking down the tunnel and under that sign on your way to play in the Wimbledon final.

Sunlight beams through the entryway and you catch a glimpse of thousands filling the stands. The Royal Family is in their private box, and cameras capture your every action. Smile at your girlfriend, miss a shot and scream, sweat through your T-shirt—it’s all beamed to hundreds of millions around the world.

You have played tennis every single day for fifteen years. You picked up an old racquet as a kid and everyone said you were a natural, so you made it your life. Your parents mortgaged their house to get you private lessons. You skipped graduation and prom because of tournaments. You managed to avoid major injuries by designing your off-court life to complement tennis: no skiing, no boozing, no building decks with your hands.

It all led to this. Right here. Right now. This is the big one.

If you win this match, you walk away with 3 million dollars. Lose and you don’t. And the 3 million dollars doesn’t include the notoriety, sponsorships, and legacy you’ll create. Everybody remembers who wins Wimbledon. Nobody remembers who finishes second.

Who are you up against in this game?

Only the best tennis player in the entire world.

Now, right before you walk onto the court, onto the biggest tennis match of your life, your eye catches this quote.

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same.

It jolts you. You pause and digest it.

No matter what happens right now, Triumph or Disaster, it’s an impostor. You should treat them the same. Winning or losing is the same. Place the game in the context of your entire life. The world will go on. You will have more highs and lows no matter what. “If you can meet with Triumph or Disaster, And treat those two impostors just the same.”

You are competing only with yourself.

You relax, take a deep breath, and walk on the court smiling.

Although there’s no attribution on that wall, these two lines are from a poem called “If—,” written by Rudyard Kipling in 1895. Kipling was an English short-story writer and poet born in India who went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature and was declared England’s favorite poet in national polls.

“If—” is thirty-two beautiful lines written by Rudyard Kipling to his son John as parental advice on how to be confident, accept yourself, and do it for you.

“If—” by Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Remember Secret #2. What do you do so criticism can’t touch you?

Remember to do it for you.