Two weeks before our Baja camp, Mariko Wakefield circled back to a quiet problem: we’d been carefully designing the camp’s goal-setting architecture while remaining oddly unresolved about our own goals.
Among Mariko’s many roles at lululemon, she leads goal setting and people development workshops. We cherry-picked what was most resonant, considered the unique players joining us in Mexico, then synthesized a distinctly El Camino approach to the pickleball camp. In November, we ran a half-day goal setting workshop for almost 50 players. The participants ranged from 16 to 80—from newer players to 4.5s, across every cultural background you can imagine.
It was a very good day. It opened important conversations, which carried into our different groups. It went mostly as we hoped it would. And yet, deep down, we both sensed something hadn’t quite landed—though we couldn’t yet name what.
We reminded ourselves that goal-setting—tracking, revising, editing is not something one “does” in a day.
So much of the mindset work I find online is underwhelming—elaborate pageantry about the importance, with almost no practical detail about the thing itself. The thing always remained abstract and vague, feeding a loop of mindfulness slop—amplified by social media and, increasingly, AI.
From time to time, I’d underline a lovely phrase or screen grab a pretty photo or think about thinking about it later.
Nothing ever stopped me in my tracks.
We challenged ourselves to build a workbook with fewer than six questions, capable—at least in theory—of triggering something transformative. We experimented with gentle and jarring frameworks, simple and elaborate. I liked where we had landed. It didn’t blow my mind—but it felt sincere. In the end, for the camp, we decided it would really just come down to moderating a great live discussion. In the pressure of the moment, we’d find the thing itself.
And then the Shohei Ohtani grid arrived.
The media likes to celebrate—and reduce—Shohei to dualities. I often grapple with what Shohei actually represents—because he’s more than what we see. Like all of us, Shohei contains multitudes. But it’s how neatly—how effortlessly—he contains those multitudes.
The Shotime grid was not just another one of those Shohei layers that forced you to stop everything you were doing to contemplate. It was the blueprint of how he did it. It was the thing.
I found myself nodding at each of the eight anchor squares: “Karma” was nudged between “Pitch Variance” and “Personality,” which fit neatly under “Mental Toughness” and “Body,” which turned right into “Control” and “Sharpness” and then “Speed MPH.” (Shohei’s ninth square—the North Star at the centre—was the thing that tied it all together like a set of haikus.)
We dutifully copied the 9x9 grid and then erased all the letters from each square.
And so, here you go.
Get to work.
Staring into a blank set of 81 squares creates…anxiety.
How do you begin to fill it in yourself?
My suggestions for you right now, today: the process IS the point of this. Enjoy the puzzle.
Print off a few blank copies. As soon as you paint yourself into a corner, don’t be afraid to dramatically crumple one up, toss it backwards over your shoulder and start again with a blank grid.
Use a pencil.
Resist the urge to fill in EVERYTHING today.
Don’t compromise on the centre square. It should feel bold, specific, and just scary enough that writing it down makes your pulse jump.
Mariko, of course, suggests you lean into it a little harder:
Figure out your big North Star goal.
What are you practicing for?
Why do you get up at dawn to play?
Don’t worry, you can rewrite the middle with something bigger and better.
But any good road trip starts with some sort of direction.
If the blank white squares still feel heavy, try this one.
Camino 9×9 is eight compelling anchors and one unapologetically bold centre square. Start anywhere. Use a pencil. If your pulse doesn’t race, you’re cheating the middle square.
If that’s still a little daunting, here’s the version with some anchors we eventually used to facilitate our Baja camp discussion—plus a bonus quadrant to add what’s missing.
You’ll see the centre square is incomplete.
Consider the words on Shohei’s centre square: get drafted first overall. His North Star. His Camino. It might take all of 2026 to figure out your own Camino—the square that ties together your pickleball multitudes. This is the fun of it. This is your quest.
Through the rest of the year, we’ll dedicate some space in this newsletter to really brining this puzzle to life, and tracking your goals.
We’ll also show you how Mariko’s grid has evolved around a rather terrifying centre square, which has changed since her first draft in November. “It’s coming along. The more I think about it, the more I will rewrite all of it in a few months. Or parts anyway.”
Whatever attempt you make—even a small one—reply to this email and show us what you came up with or tell us where you made it to today.
You can subscribe to the newsletter here. (After you subscribe, wait a couple of minutes, check your spam and reply back to let us know you got it.)
Until next time.
-The Pickleball Jamboree