We were having an off practice when my coach pulled us together and dropped it on us...
My club team for our last couple years was full of ballers.
More than half of the team was going to college to play volleyball and we were working harder than ever to reach our goals.
We were rarely ever a team that didn't give 110% everyday and work to beat the guy next to us.
Until one practice we were all just off.
Not really working as hard as possible, not really talking to each other, making stupid errors, overall not being the team we know we could be.
My coach stopped practice and took us to the whiteboard.
We gathered around the board and he wrote one word on the board:
"A.C.E"
He asked us what it meant. And us, as volleyball players, answered that it is a point off a serve. Wrong.
He said ACE is the only three things we can control as athletes and as people.
Attitude. Communication. Effort.
These were the only three.
There is so much going on in the world and especially in sports there is so much we truly can't control.
But what he said made everything so clear. That everything stems from our attitude our communication and our effort.
Our Attitude towards the circumstances around us, how we are playing, how we are living. How we act and feel, which is our attitude, is by choice
Our Communication with others, our teammates, our coworkers, our relationships, and even with ourselves. How we speak and think is by choice.
Our Effort towards our dreams, our goals, our practice days, our training days, our big days, and our small incremental days. How we show up and put in what we got is by choice.
If something is lacking or we maybe don't feel the most motivated as former athletes in this new path...
Remember that all we need to do is fix our attitude, communicate better, and increase our effort, and everything will take care of itself.
It was almost annoying how simple it was.
Not new gear.
Not a different rotation.
Not some hype speech.
Just Attitude. Communication. Effort.
And the second he broke it down, everything we were missing showed up on that board.
Attitude isn’t fake positivity. It’s posture. It’s the choice to meet hard reps with clean energy. It’s deciding that today counts, even when your legs are heavy and the scoreboard isn’t kind.
Communication isn’t noise. It’s clarity. It’s calling seams, naming assignments, asking for the set you need and outside the gym, it’s telling a teammate the truth and telling yourself the truth.
Effort isn’t chaos. It’s directed intensity. It’s the rep done on purpose, the dive you commit to, the extra 1% when your head wants out.
After the jersey, A.C.E. matters more, not less.
Work gets messy. Life gets loud. The “coach’s whistle” is gone. If you wait for perfect conditions, you’ll wait forever. But A.C.E. is portable. You carry it into the next arena and it still works.
Here’s how I run A.C.E. in real life now:
Attitude (reset in 60 seconds): before a hard block, one slow inhale, one longer exhale, one line: “Today counts.” Shoulders down, eyes up. Start.
Communication (make the room smarter): state your aim for the next hour in one sentence. Ask for one piece of feedback that would make the work cleaner. End by saying what’s next.
Effort (proof over feelings): one DBN, Do-Before-Noon, rep you cannot dodge. If motivation goes missing, do it anyway. Mark it with a pen.
If you’re feeling stuck, it usually isn’t a talent problem.
It’s an A.C.E. problem. One of the three is slipping. Find it. Fix it.
This week’s micro-practice:
Morning: write A / C / E at the top of a sticky note. Under each, one line: Attitude I’m choosing, One person I’ll communicate with clearly, One rep I’ll do no matter what.
Midday check: ask, Which letter is dropping? Re-choose it.
Evening: circle the strongest letter. Arrow the weakest one. Tomorrow, lead with the weak link.
The whiteboard is different now. Laptop screens, calendar blocks, group chats.
The rule is the same.
Control what you can control, and suddenly there’s a lot more in your hands than you thought.
Master your A.C.E.
Master Your Next Season.