Serena Williams says winning 23 Grand Slams has been 'amazing' — but it's not the best thing that's happened to her

    Elena Sheppard
    Wellness Editor

    Serena Williams is one of the greatest athletes of all time, but in an interview with fashion designer Zac Posen (a board member of Yahoo Lifestyle’s parent company, Oath) for Yahoo Lifestyle’s “Loud and Clear” video series, Williams shares that there’s something better than winning 23 Grand Slams. “Twenty-three Grand Slams has been amazing,” Williams says. “But I think having my daughter, Olympia, is the best thing that’s happened to me.

    “It’s been an incredible experience,” Williams says of being a mom. “I started playing tennis when I was 3, and it’s been my whole life. I’ve always been a person that’s never really been a kids kind of person — I’ve always been career-oriented — so I never thought I would say that.”


    As for what Williams (who is also a board member at Oath) is teaching her baby girl, there are a lot of lessons that Williams’s mom passed on to her that she’s now bestowing on Olympia. “My mom, she just always wanted to make me feel positive and love who I was,” Williams says. Later she adds that she’s dedicated to teaching her daughter “to always be a positive voice.”

    Three months after giving birth to Olympia, Williams was back on the court competing in matches. “When you win, you’re instantly addicted to it and you want to do it again, and again, and again, and again,” she says.

    “I never give up,” Williams adds. “I never stop, and I feel like nothing’s going to stop me when I want to do something.”

    Serena Williams (Photo: Courtesy of Oath)

    Williams has been playing tennis professionally for decades now, and her routine has changed since her first professional match back in 1995. “When I first started, I had a lot of routines, I had to have on these brand-new socks (actually I still have that), I had to use the same locker, I had to use the same bathroom — it was like I would go through all this list of stuff, and I felt like, this is too much,” she remembers. “Now my routine is to be different, to do something different so I don’t get this repetition in my brain. That way I can play more free, I can think more free, and I can just be more free.”

    As for the message she wants to make sure that all her fans, followers, and family hear: “I really believe it’s very important to speak to other people and be a mentor to other people and be positive,” she says. “No matter who you are, uplift someone today.”

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