A couple of weeks ago, I was bowling at one of my favorite events. The Striking Against Breast Cancer Mixed Doubles in Houston. And to get right to the point: I struggled. I didn’t match up, and I had a very rough go. And that’s a side of bowling I want to talk a bit about here. How to manage those bad games, especially when you’re on a team or playing with a partner.

Your attitude is always important but it’s especially the case when the game is not just your own. When you’re bowling with someone else on a team, whatever way you act, you affect them.

At that mixed double event, I was struggling. S T R U G G L I N G! But I was bowling with one of my favorite professional bowlers ever: Marshall Kent. As I was bowling, my immediate feelings were of frustration and disappointment. But I never let him see me down because that would have directly affected him. And I like to think that he continued to bowl well because of that. I kept the atmosphere positive and kept my emotions private. If I would’ve been visibly sulking, and showing my frustrations, I knew it could bring him down.

My mindset is not just to remain strong for me, it’s for those around me too. My attitude on the lanes when bowling directly affects others.

How we act affects those around us.

In those moments of frustration, it was important that I remind myself, “it is not all about me.” When I’m bowling with a partner, it’s about us. He was doing his job. So let me try to figure out how to do mine.

And that day, I really made sure that every game I was saying, “okay, I got it, I got this. I’m going to figure this out.”

But sometimes you just don’t figure it out. And that was me that day. I just didn’t figure it out and then the block was over. I just could not strike. I got a lot of spares. I got a lot of splits. But I couldn’t get any strikes together. So I was super frustrated and upset inside. I really felt like I let him down. Later that day Marshall told me that he was impressed with my resilience. The fact that I never gave up, not even in the end.

My son Madden was watching me the whole time too. I’m constantly telling him how to behave when things aren’t going well. But it’s one thing to tell him and another for him to show him. It was also a really good lesson for him, seeing me struggle and how I reacted to it. I never felt sorry for myself. I was glad he was able to see that. And even though my score was low that day, that was a win, giving Madden the chance to see my struggle and how I handled it. He saw me swallow my pride and despite the struggle, each game kept showing up. He saw that I never gave up. Those are all the things, and the kind of mindset, that I want him to carry with him throughout the rest of his life. So in that event, I didn’t win the trophy, but the win I brought home was a very important lesson for my son.

After the tournament was over for Marshall and I, we bowled a Pro-Am. I felt all the feelings at the tournament and was upset inside, but then I had to go right into that other event. So that was another good reminder to myself, to keep my mental game in check because my attitude affects others. The Pro-Am is where people are just excited to be there, bowling with us. They deserved for me to be fully present with them.

So I told myself to shake off the earlier part of the day and reminded myself, these people’s excitement is what matters at this moment. Not how I bowled earlier that day or how I felt earlier. They are excited to meet us. To be with us.

And I did have the best time at the Pro-Am program.

Sometimes separating your emotions from one event to another can be really hard to do. I did it because that’s what I do, but that’s not to say it wasn’t difficult.

I think that it’s another good lesson in life though, to compartmentalize emotions in your life from one event to another, or from one day to the next. As hard as that can sometimes be to do, it’s essential. Here’s this bowling event and this is how it went. And this is how it’s making me feel at this moment. But now I have to put it in its corner and focus on the next event.

At the Pro-Am event, I compartmentalized the earlier part of my day, left that alone even though it had just happened, and faced the Pro-Am as something completely separate and with a refreshed mind. It was hard, but I did it. Had I merged my feelings about the earlier tournament into how I was feeling at the Pro-Am, I wouldn’t have been my best self. I wouldn’t have been fully present, showing my fun side. And I wouldn’t have had a good time. The people who came out would have been disappointed. They were excited to be there and see us.

You can always go back and revisit that compartment later and address it too. It’s not about putting the feelings aside and ignoring them entirely. It’s just about separating them out, giving them their own place, so they don’t affect more people or more areas of your life. I definitely think it’s important to reflect back on the experience and get a little closure on whatever happened. You do need to be able to manage your emotions so that they don’t fester and blow up, causing more damage emotionally. 

In my case, at the end of that event, I took some notes the next day. I recapped the day in my head, the parts that were frustrating and I tried to look at what happened in those moments. What could have been better? For the next Striking Against Breast Cancer Mixed Doubles, I will have a different arsenal plan. I reached out to my ball reps and talked through the ball reaction and possible better choices and made notes for next year. 

I’m always going from event to event, always surrounded by a lot of people, whether it’s tournaments or the EYT events. And not every event or every day goes perfectly. I always remind myself that how I show up is not just for me.

How do you manage from one event to the next? Are you good at separating out your emotions from one thing to the next?