Tennis is Art

There’s something about tennis that refuses to be boxed in. It’s a sport, but it’s also a dance, a dialogue, a mirror of who you are when everything else fades away. I’ve been on this journey for most of my life, and the longer I coach, the more I realize that tennis can’t be forced. You can’t make someone love it, and you can’t manufacture the depth it requires. You either feel it in your bones, or you don’t.

Tennis isn’t for everyone. It’s for the scattered minds searching for structure, for the restless souls looking to find calm through motion. It’s for those who crave mastery not for the sake of control, but for the beauty of understanding. There’s an art to it that goes beyond hitting a ball. Every stroke, every movement, every breath carries intent. You learn to play not just against your opponent, but against time itself. A strange dimension where seconds stretch and collapse depending on your state of mind.

In tennis, a split second can hold the weight of a lifetime. A moment of hesitation, a flicker of belief changes the game. The rhythm of the game bends your sense of speed and time, and before long, you’re living in this strange, heightened world where the outside noise disappears.
What fascinates me most about tennis is the kind of people it attracts. True tennis players (I’m not talking about those who simply play) are different. They are thinkers, builders, artists. They are born with a curiosity that won’t let them rest until they understand something deeply. They’ll spend hours chasing the smallest detail, the perfect contact, the precise angle. And when they fail, which they often do, they return again and again not because someone told them to, but because their soul demands it.

They compete not out of arrogance, but out of respect, respect for the game, for their opponent, and for themselves. They know that losing doesn’t define them, because every loss is just a marker on the road to mastery. The true player believes, deep down, that they are better than the version of themselves who walked off the court today. That belief is what keeps them coming back.

Some people call tennis players selfish. I think they’re misunderstood. To spend that much time alone, to wrestle with your thoughts, your fears, your limits, that’s not selfishness. That’s courage. That’s what it means to chase excellence.
And yes, there are pretenders, players who mimic the look, the talk, the lifestyle. But the real ones? They’re as rare as diamonds. You can spot them instantly. There’s a calm in their eyes, a respect in their silence, and a fire that only burns brighter with time.

Tennis has a long history of being a sport of class, intellect, and grace... there’s a reason for that. It demands the highest form of human discipline: the ability to lose yourself completely in the pursuit of something greater, something that can never quite be perfected.
That’s why I coach. Not just to teach technique or tactics, but to help others understand why we play to connect them to the deeper rhythm of this beautiful, impossible sport. Because once you feel it, truly feel it, you realize tennis isn’t just a game. It’s a reflection of life itself.

JP van Antwerpen
Tennis Coach, Writer, and Student of the Game