There’s no skipping to the good part.
I wish there were. Every young bowler I’ve ever met wishes there were.
Everyone wants a shortcut. The better ball. The quicker fix. The win without the losses that come before it.
But you get out what you put in. And that means going through alllll the bad parts.
Here’s what most bowlers miss about those bad parts.
The moments you feel your worst are the most important moments.
Not because losing feels good. It doesn’t. But a loss is telling you something. And if your eyes are open to what it’s saying, that lesson is what propels you to win.
That’s the part of training most young bowlers neglect. Not a skill. A willingness. To sit in the hard part long enough to learn from it.
And it’s the heart of what I mean by the whole athlete.
The whole athlete isn’t just how you throw the ball. It’s how you show up in the world.
How you compete. How you treat others. How you win. How you fail. What drives you.
That’s what it takes to stand out. To excel more than others.
You can’t just be good on the lanes. You have to truly be good in life.
The scoresheet shows the physical. The shot you made, the pins that fell. What it doesn’t show is everything underneath. The mental. The emotional. Who you are when the frame goes wrong.
Those parts have to move together. When one gets left behind, the whole athlete does too.
So how do you train the parts that don’t show up on a scoresheet?
You start with self awareness and identity.
This work is imperative. It’s why, when I take bowlers through my 12 Frames to a Stronger Mental Game curriculum, we start with Frame 1: Identity.
Because if you don’t know who you are, you won’t be able to show up authentically. Not on the lanes. Not anywhere.
If I were building a complete training program for a young athlete, it wouldn’t stop at practice sessions and spare shooting.
It would include self awareness.
Helping others.
Knowing how to lose. And how to win.
How to be a gracious athlete.
And how to take the lessons you learn through all of it and pass them on to others.
That last one matters more than people think. The whole athlete doesn’t just collect lessons. They carry them forward.
So the next time you have a bad day on the lanes, don’t rush past it.
Ask it what it’s trying to teach you.
What is your last loss telling you?
Ready to train the parts the scoresheet can’t see? 12 Frames to a Stronger Mental Game is private 1:1 mental game coaching, and it starts where every whole athlete starts: with who you are. Learn more at beyondthelanes.com/12-frames.