thinkbettergolf.co.uk

 I’ve just read an article in the June/July 2011 edition of Sky Sports magazine with Stuart Pearce,  former England football international and manager of the England national under-21 team.  Known as “Psycho” for his determination and combative attitude, he was a vocal and uncompromising left back who played hard but fair.  Yet he is described as much more reserved in person and quiet off the pitch.  Pearce explains that when he steps over the white line,  a different personality takes over.  “You lead your life in a certain way, but as soon as the game kicks off you can be your alter ego for an hour and a half…”

All our legends have a part of their personality which performs, be it sport or music, and they all have a part that is them.  They have a separation between what they do and what they are. 

I initially thought I would pitch this post at a teenage audience.  To those kids who have developed through junior coaching,  who are breaking through into the adult competitions with scores to note,  whose handicaps are tumbling dramatically and who plan to play all through the school holidays to reach a higher level.  Those same kids that could get frustrated with their game and lose perspective.

But then I thought about us adults.   Does it equally apply?  Surely we wouldn’t let our weekend game become all consuming, or  let how we score  dictate our mood for the rest of the day or even the week ahead would we..?

In short the message is to keep your CORE self and your SPORTING self SEPERATE.  Separate what you DO on the course from what you ARE as a person.  Your value as a human being does not increase as result of your ability to hit a golf ball.  Tiger Woods is a superior golfer but that does not make him a superior person.  When we have too much us involved in golf and we lose sense of our true identity as a human being first and foremost, then we inadvertently put ourselves under more pressure than most people can ever cope with. 

“The problem is that the more the ego becomes identified with symbols outside the self,  the more vulnerable it becomes.”  Csikszentmihalyi (best known as the architect of the notion of flow). 

Or as Timothy Galway put it in his book The Inner Game of Golf, “If golf has the ability to make you a somebody then it will also in a heartbeat have the ability to make you a nobody.” 

 Your real self is built on 3 qualities: 

Gratitude/Appreciation.   A large body of recent work has suggested that people who are more grateful have higher levels of well-being.  Grateful people are happier, less depressed, less stressed, and more satisfied with their lives and social relationships.  Grateful people also have higher levels of control of their environments, personal growth, purpose in life, and self acceptance.  

Acceptance.  E. Tolle (Power of Now) defines acceptance as a “this is it” response to anything occurring in any moment of life. There, strength, peace and serenity are available when one stops struggling to resist, or hang on tightly to what is so in any given moment.  Self acceptance is being loving and happy with who you are now. It’s an agreement with yourself to appreciate, validate, accept and support who you are at this moment. 

Values.   Values can be defined as broad preferences concerning appropriate courses of action or outcomes. As such, values reflect a person’s sense of right and wrong or what “ought” to be.   Values tend to influence attitudes and behaviour. 

Your value as a human being is not determined by the direction that a golf ball takes.  To understand and distinguish between your REAL SELF and your PERFORMER SELF provides the liberation to play sport from, as Chuck Hogan put it, a “safe place“.  We need to set that example to the kids. 

Look how Rory prepares for the US Open next weekend…

http://www.rorymcilroy.com/golf-players-news-detail/id/1496/c/2.html

Reference Karl Morris : The Mind factor

In my post about the problem of positive thinking I explained how the mind jumps between future and past states.  Where  is your focus during this busy thinking?  On your SCORE I bet,  and the perceived lack of control just causes more agitation.  You have to accept you CANNOT CONTROL the  score.  But don’t fear.  You can INFLUENCE it.

There is a game you can play that promotes NEUTRAL thinking.  It will keep you in the PRESENT.  It will give you 100% control. 

Its all based around your SHOT ROUTINE.  Decide on 3 or 4 component parts.  Perhaps a clear image of the shot,  a deep breath,  a practice swing,  a go trigger, or holding the finish.  Its your choice, whatever gives you the best possible chance of hitting the ball as desired.  Make this YOUR routine.  If it helps, write your shot routine on your score card.  But you must COMMIT to them on every single shot. 

Its called the circle game.  For EVERY shot on EACH hole you have to commit and complete your routine.  It does not matter where the ball goes (e.g. OOB) or where you play from (e.g. bunker).  If you can honestly say you committed to your routine on every shot as you walk off each green then award yourself a CIRCLE for that hole.  If on ANY shot you DIDN’T go through the process then you mark your card with a CROSS.

What does a CIRCLE tell you?  REGARDLESS of the outcome you did ALL that YOU could to INFLUENCE the score on that hole.

What does 18 circles tell you?  You’ve done the BEST you could regardless of the numeric score.

There is NOTHING to stop you getting 18 circles.  Try it though and you will find it hard to achieve.  You won’t score 18 straight away.  Old habits, distractions and emotions will take over.  But you will get VALUABLE feedback.  You will know when you lost focus and concentration.  Do you take time to get started (warm up?), do you fade at the end (dehydrated?) or do you follow a good hole with bad one (chasing a score?).  Set your target to the beat your last circle score.

Its the simplicity of the approach that is the key factor.  Its a way out of the maze of frustration.  When you have played your best golf is it down to MORE or LESS thinking?  Tournament winners repeat a pattern.  They had a QUIET or CALM mind.  It is POSSIBLE to win the circle game.  How relaxing a thought is that? 

Listen to this interview with Tiger describing being in the zone. http://youtu.be/QEaWv0SBp3A?t=2m

Reference Karl Morris : The Mind factor

A regular playing partner shot 38 points in the monthly stableford competition the other weekend, playing from a 15 handcap.   Nothing amazing about that but a closer inspection of his card showed that 16 points came from just 4 holes.  An erratic round with enough blobs on the card to indicate that his score could have been much worse.  It was interesting to hear him comment that “after my first blob I just said to myself that I’d make up the points later on”.  He described that as positive thinking.  I tried to explain to him that it wasn’t positive thinking that saved his round – instead he was remaining open to “possible”. 

You see there is a PROBLEM with positive thinking.  I suspect you drive to the course telling yourself that you’re going to rip your tee shots down the middle of every fairway, you will hit greens in regulation, you will take no more than two putts, you’re going to break 80?  You try to convince yourself that its all in the mind, that if you are positive then you can WILL it to become true.  The problem is that its just more and more thinking and the mind becomes BUSY with all these thoughts. 

Consider where your mind is fixed during this POSITIVE thinking.  Its a projection of what we anticipate the FUTURE to be.  But the future doesn’t turn out as planned.  You pull your tee shots left, you land in a few bunkers, you struggle with the pace of the green and make some three putts.  Your self talk turns to something along the lines of “I hate this hole, I always muck it up” or “I’ve missed 3 short putts so far, I can’t hole anything”.  You’ve jumped to NEGATIVE thinking and gone to the PAST. 

So positive self talk has little or no real impact.  Its just a short span of false confidence.  Its more likely that this hyped up positivity will become self destructive.  The results won’t match the visions and delusions and you create a downward spiral of negativity.  You become negative about trying to be postitive.  You jump between future and past time zones.  Your mind becomes busier.

No doubt you’ve heard sports commentators say that a player needs to “stay in the present, he must not get ahead of himself”.  But they don’t tell you how.  It is a skill as we are preconditioned from young to predict.  You have to recognise the destructive triggers of predictions and forecasts mentioned above.  You need to deal with truth and deal with the here and now.  To do this you have to de-label and be non judgemental.  You mustn’t react.  You must remain NEUTRAL and accept that the past does not have to influence the future.  Results are not predetermined or decided.  You ACCEPT any outcome.  Tell yourself “it just is”.  Its not a good lie or a bad lie.  Its just a lie.  The ball is in this position and focus on what you are going to do.  Move into the task of the shot. 

Neutral thinking requires the elimination of certain words and phases.  The most common one I hear on the course is SHOULD.  “I should have made that putt.”  “I should get a par on this hole.”  Should exists in both the past and the future.  Think POSSIBLE instead.  It is not positive.  It is not negative.  It is neutral.  It grounds you in the PRESENT moment.  Is it possible that I can hit this down the fairway?  Yes.  I’ve missed 3 short putts and now I am faced with a 6 ft left to right breaker and I ask, is it possible to roll this in?  Yes.  You are 5 under your handicap, instead of playing mental tricks and wondering if you can hang on to your score, instead is it possible to hit this fairway, hit this green, hole this putt?  Yes.

The mind becomes still as you deal with the current situation in front of you.  Neutral thinking is contrary to the schools of “positive thinking”, “affirmations” or “anchoring”.  You have  to re-train your brain from forecasting and predicting and using “should” and “must”.  Adopt a habitual behaviour and use a preshot routine.  This gives the conscious mind an activity.  As you get better at it the mind stays quiet, focused on the task in hand and allows the unconscious wisdom of the body to take over.

It doesn’t guarantee you will play great golf but it allows you to get the very best out of yourself.  It increases the chances to find your true potential.  You cannot control but you can influence your score.

Listen to this clip of Martin Kaymer following a good round in the Open de France near Paris in June 2007. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=932jtCJX4Dk

Let it go and see what happens.  Thats what my playing partner did on his way to a very respectable 38 pts.  He just didn’t realise it at the time.

For further help on remaining in the present then look out for my article on the circle game.

Reference Karl Morris : The Mind Factor