Winning is an Inner Decision

It was February, 2004. I was lying in bed in a hotel room in the Washington Athletic Club,  literally sleepless in Seattle. My body was dead tired and screaming out for rest but my brain  wouldn’t let me switch off. 

In the corner of the room, beside my gear bag, was one of those over-sized cardboard cheques  and the figure printed on it - $50,000, the largest purse in handball history – would soon be  hitting my bank account. It was a life-changing sum for a 24-year-old not long out of college  but it wasn’t about the money – it was about validation, about keeping a promise I’d made to  myself many years before. 

Four months previously, I had won my first World Open Singles Championship title in Croke  Park, and yet something had gnawed at me that whole winter. I had been ranked no 2 on the  US circuit for a year or two by then and the no 1-ranked player was viewed as untouchable.  He was being spoken about as one of the greatest of all time and he was in his prime. My goal had been to beat him in the Worlds, to send him back across the Atlantic empty handed. I wanted that crown and I targeted it for months; I thought about him when I was  lifting weights, during sprint sessions, when I was in the court. The flame was lit – until it  wasn’t. 

About a month before the tournament, the word leaked out that he wasn’t attending. Unlike in  the US, there was no prizemoney in Ireland due to GAA rules and that was his excuse. In an  instant, everything changed. 

On one level, I was delighted – the field was weakened and the path to my coronation was  clearer – but, in my quiet moments, I felt sick. I had been hunting him, gaining ground by the  day, and now he had vanished into the ether. Gone – just like that. 

What was I training for now? I’d hold the title of world champion and yet everyone would  know that he, not me, was the best player. To be the man, you must beat the man – and the  man wasn’t stepping into the ring. 

I put it out of my mind as best I could; the way I looked at it, it was out of my control and I  still had a job to do. And I did it – I won the World Championships. I had made it, or so it  appeared. 

But in the weeks that followed the tournament, when the elation dimmed, I felt like a fraud.  Here I was, attending all these functions and homecomings and award nights and being told  how great I was when, inside, I felt hollow. How could I be the greatest when there was a  player out there whom I hadn’t beaten, ever? 

Around then, as it turned out, there was an injection of cash into pro handball in the States  and a major event was announced for Seattle, with 50 grand for the winner, which was more  than treble the usual prize money. The Americans, with typical bombast, called it the  Ultimate Handball Showdown and in my mind, that’s exactly what it was. I targeted that weekend and went after it – and him - with everything I had. I wasn’t just  going to win that tournament and the money, I was finally going to take the no 1 spot and I  was going to validate my world title, to prove to everyone – not least myself – that I was the  best player in the sport. 

Defeat was not an option. I had invested too much by that stage; being the second best was  not something that interested nor motivated me. Being a paper world champion? I couldn’t  even stomach thinking about it. I had already tasted that dish; to me, it was foul. The details of the Showdown aren’t important now, save for the key points – I played my best, beat him in the final and won the tournament. I had scaled the peak. The celebrations after the final, the interviews, all that stuff has evaporated from my memory  but I clearly recall looking at that cartoonish, three-foot long cardboard cheque and thinking  it was like something they’d hand to someone who had won the Lotto – and a part of me felt  like a Lotto winner, too, of course. The sudden windfall, the excitement, the novelty... The difference was that I had earned it – there was no luck involved, no random hand of  destiny pulling the strings. I made it happen and it’s only in the recent past, many years on,  that it clicked with me just how I did it, how I earned it. 

Of course, I won that day in my head by conquering my self-talk, by conquering myself, by  conquering all those doubts and fears and negatives. Every serious sportsperson probably  knows about these things. 

But, lying in that hotel room in the restless small hours and thinking back over the previous  months, I came to a deeper realisation: To win, or be successful, or do something really great  in sport or in life, is ultimately a decision. I had decided to be successful. Winning is not luck, it’s not a lottery ticket randomly showing the correct combination of  numbers and it’s absolutely not something someone else can do for you. At its essence,  winning is a decision you make at a very specific point in time. You choose to do this. When I look back, it’s the same thread running through every success I ever had in my career  and in my life. After a short time, it became so woven into the fabric of my day-to-day  routine that I no longer recognised it. It just was. 

But when I look back over my career, I can pinpoint those exact moments when I made that  decision first and when I re-affirmed it, over and over. 

I remember being 13 or 14, sitting in my kitchen in rural Cavan watching an old VCR tape of  a professional handball match. 

I remember running through the hills of Cavan, no-one around, questioning life and  questioning my ability. 

I remember moments of doubt before big tournaments - or moments within matches where  everything was on the line. 

And in all of those moments of battling my self-talk with myself, I made a deep decision. Not, “I hope I win.” Not, “I’ll try my best.” But something far deeper, far more powerful: “I  am going to do this.” 

I believe that in order to be successful, you must decide to be successful and not just on a  whim, not just idly mouthing the words or writing it on your phone. When I made that  decision, I made it in my gut. I felt it in my soul. I was going to commit absolutely to the  pursuit of this goal. Only then did it move up into my mind, where the psychology could take over. 

This might sound strange coming from a performance psychology viewpoint. You won’t read  this in a sports psychology textbook; you won’t learn it in a Masters programme and most  sports psychologists will never stand in front of you and say it - because you have to live it  before you can understand it. 

But if you read between the lines of some of the great books, some of the great athletes’  stories, it’s there, it’s just not articulated clearly. 

Because what we’re really talking about is energy. A deep, internal conviction - a decision  that shifts your entire system into alignment. 

Truly great things - the biggest moments in your career, your sport, your life - are not won in  your head alone. They’re won in that deeper place, the place where conviction lives. And once you make that decision deep within yourself, everything else falls into place: Your  mindset, your training, your behaviours, your preparation, your actions. All of it begins to align behind that deeper decision you felt in your gut.

When someone asks me for one tip, just one piece of advice, on how to be successful in  achieving their goals, this is what I tell them. I tell them to make that decision and do it today  – or at least be alert and alive to having to make it and be ready when that moment arrives, which it will. 

Think it, say it, but most importantly close your eyes and feel it! Choose it and commit to it  fully and let everything you do from this moment on move in line with that choice. Once you  decide to be unstoppable, you will be. 

Decide - with all you have - to be great and nothing will stop you.