Balancing the demands of difficult physical skills

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I'm not going to go into specifics as want to keep a level of anonymity. For a long time I saw people at the highest level doing what looked impossible for someone like me. However, the more I watched, and listened to people talking about it, I eventually realized there was a pathway to develop these skills which is possible for anyone with reasonable physical ability to start learning. I never believed I would reach the top level of course, and quite rightly for over the years of practising have not progressed anywhere near as well as I hoped to.

I seem to find it much more difficult than other people I see on social media. It seems to have taken me literally, ten times longer to get to the level I am at, than it's taken most other people I see on social media to become a good degree more skilled than I.

There's a lot of different skills to master, most of which good balance control is essential. I don't have good balance compared to most people who practise this sport. I'm a little wooden and twitchy. I stiffen up too easily when risk is present, when that is the last thing you want to be doing.

It's meant to be fun of course, but my social skills mean I have nobody to practice alongside with, compounded by the fact it's a fairly niche sport of which the skills required create a high barrier to entry for most people - so there's nobody local to me anyway. I don't have the desire to travel far, it takes too long out of my free time.

I used to practise the skills without any plan, but recently laid out a plan for myself which would force me to practise different skills more regularly, particularly those I put off due to difficulty. It seemed to help, but now is starting to feel like a demand. I sometimes start feeling a little anxious before I even start a practice session. I regularly regress in my ability and really have to push myself over and over again to get back to where I was.

I'm grateful to have good physical fitness, but I've never been sporty, especially at school where sports day was never enjoyable, always one of the last to be picked for a team in the playground etc. Was quite clumsy, cack handed, and uncoordinated growing up.

Anyone have any experience with this? At what point do you give up? Do you give up? Do you just accept limited ability but continue anyway? How did you manage to balance the desire to be better without punishing yourself for failure!

I'm kind of in the accept-limited-ability-but-continue-anyway camp, but sometimes question if I should stop or not, or at least, question how I can mange the demands better so it's less frustrating and more enjoyable.

What sport

If I've missed something I apologise but I can't find what you're talking about

I have deliberately not mentioned the specific sport. I thought it would cast a wider net by asking more generally about sports which are demanding in terms of skill and risk. In particular managing the skill and risk demands as an autistic person, how did you get on, did you give up, how did you manage, were you able to continue etc.

Especially as an older person! I'm 50 so even most of the general population have given up on physical sport by this age. Typical of me! Something not difficult enough? Let's make it more difficult by waiting until I'm past my prime to do it! Sometimes I wonder what the hell is wrong with me! Oh yeah, autistic.

Yeah sorry

I realised that after I posted and then I forgot to amend my post

Apologies again

I play golf which is a very difficult sport. I learned social customs as a kid but I had an awful swing.
I started all over with my swing four years ago. I still don't get much distance but I can play from the forward tees.
I've never been athletic so my goal is to play quickly with an average score.

The interesting thing about "limited ability" is that your limits change as you practice and improve.

I started taking kung fu about a year ago, and when I started, I was stiff, uncoordinated, no flexibility, etc...

One year later, I'm far more flexible and agile and coordinated than I would have imagined I could have gotten, compared to when I started. I still have a lot more I can improve, but I've improved this far, so I'm gonna keep pushing at it, and see how far I can go.

Side note - social media isn't real life. When people seem like they're improving "really fast", it's usually cos they compressed 6 moths of effort into a 90 second video, so it looks like it took days or weeks instead of months or years - or they have previous experience that allowed them to improve faster, and they didn't mention that fact in the video.

Don't worry about how fast other people are improving. Everyone is different. Just keep at it.

This is the fourth year of playing golf as an adult. There is the inevitable decline over the winter when I don't practice but it is quite evident that I'm getting better every year. At the beginning I was just worried about making contact with the ball. Then I was able to work on quality ball first contact. Now I'm learning different swings to work the ball!