The nation was glued to their screens, excitement spilling over the edges of their seats as Dylan Alcott – seven times Australian Open quad wheelchair champion and reigning grand slam hero the world over, on the day after being announced the Australian of the Year 2022, took to the court. Since the morning’s TV program there was talk of a fairytale ending to his sporting career, as Dylan had announced his retirement from the sport late last year, well before hitting the 2022 Australian Open grand final.
The match was top class tennis of its league – no doubt. Dylan did not come out on top, but rather lost to Dutch player Sam Schroeder. While the disappointment to viewers from court-side to tv screens was palpable, when Dylan spoke at the ceremony and later the press conference, something became clear to me
Here was Dylan speaking of how he hated himself growing up. How he did not like himself, nor could see beyond his disability and beyond his own dilemma. Yet, today, when he, tears-in-eyes, shared just how he could have never thought it possible that wheelchair tennis would be centre court at a global grand slam, realised that his real win was – that it is.
And, largely to his credit. People with disabilities of all types have visions of competitive sport, of integrated lives, of playing in competitions that are held side by side with able-bodied events – and not in their shadow. And, yet, here he was, rows of wheelchairs lining the stadium, the cheers celebrating him far beyond the smashing cross court top spin he just served past his opponent for a point; he has won far more for people with disabilities than winning yet another game and title would have meant.
In a way, albeit fairytale-like and ego-stroking it would have been if he had won – not winning did not mean he had lost. Actually, his decision to leave the sport was based on his desire to do more important work off the court. To advocate for more integration of differently abled people into the mainstream, to forge more pathways for people with disabilities to lead lives not just worth living, but to lead the lives they deserve to live, beyond even their own wildest dreams.
Dylan himself says that having received the support he has, has allowed him to create such a successful sporting career, not only helping him to live with his disability, but to embrace it.
With a croaky emotional voice he spoke so humbly of the much bigger win he has won for everyone living with a disability, than the title he would have liked to/could have won at AO 2022. It made me think…
We let ourselves be held back… by the smallest things. For most of us, we have it all, all the doors are open, well a lot more than for many people living with a disability anyway, yet we often create these barriers.
I saw this three-legged dog running, yes, pelting down the beach the other week. Up into the dunes it went – just like that. I had to look trice to make sure it was really just running on three legs, but it was. Chasing after the stick, bolting through the waves as they crashed onto the sand, and hurling itself up the three-meter steep dunes as if it was nothing.
I get it – we all have things that affect us, I have my issues, you yours, others theirs… but when we focus on these things they become more impeding and we allow them to hold us back even more. But, when we rise, not despite of these, but because of them, we create magic. You see, when we make it about others, we go and grow beyond ourselves and make a massive impact in the lives of others and that then lets us rise above our own challenges, our shortcomings (perceived or real), our disabilities or different abilities.
Hearing Dylan speak was so much more than any Grand Slam acceptance speech could have been. I was witnessing a truly humble leader, the voice of a servant for the voiceless, a deeply touching wake-up call to ‘normal people’ get the f*%k over themselves, because if he can play centre court in a wheelchair, side by side with the biggest names in tennis, then who are we to think how hard we have it, to let ourselves be stopped by, in comparison, minor inner or outer hurdles.
I have often seen this. That when people get it, and rise above themselves or their ‘thing’ and focus on making a difference for others, inadvertently they make a difference for themselves and it changes everything.
Go Dylan! Thank you and I know you are just getting started. And, go YOU, because when you really get started, you too will be unstoppable.
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Also published at www.preneurmag.com – with permission from Erik Bigalk & Beyond Your Success.
