Mental Game Training Program Oct 16

In between shots, most golfers allow their minds to drift into the past
or future - what has happened or might happen later in the round. In
other words, the focus is on uncertainty. The human mind doesn’t like
uncertainty, and the response is anxiety. This anxiety manifests itself in
the stress response which I described in the previous section - a
higher heart rate, tension in the muscles and a lower ability to think
clearly.

Think about your last round and what you thought about in between
shots. If you thought about any of these things, you were not fully
switched off and running the risk of increasing your stress levels.

 A poor shot or a bad hole you just played
 How you were playing relative to their playing partners
 Why you play so much better in practice than you do on the

course
 How bad your luck is with bad bounces, lies in the rough and

not being able to find a ball
 Bad weather
 Slow play
 What score you are on and what you might shoot

Tour players are able to do a great job “switching off the golf-brain”
and stay relaxed and free from anxiety. So how do we do a better job
of clearing the mind and staying present in between shots?

Techniques For In between shots

“Staying in the present is the key to any golfer’s game. Once you start
thinking about a shot you just messed up or what you have to do on the
next nine to catch somebody, you’re lost.” – Paul Azinger

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Staying Present

The best place to be in between shots, is “The Present”. This means
that you’re observing everything, without letting your mind wander
and start judging or contemplating things. As we discussed earlier,
when you’re not in the past or future, you’re typically thinking about
things that are going to cause you stress. The present, is a very calm,
emotion-less place.

When you notice your focus drifting into the past or future, remind
yourself of the importance of staying in the present and use some of
the following techniques.

Meditation

More and more players at the highest level of the game (and in many
other walks of life) are finding meditation as a valuable tool in
lowering stress. Meditation is essentially a way to train your mind to
be conscious, but completely clear of any thoughts. With this practice
you will be more “mindful” meaning you can notice things happening,
but not judge them (this is key when you’re on the golf course).

At first meditation is difficult, but it’s one of those things (like
anything), that gets easier with practice. The brain is like a muscle
after all and can be trained. It’s far from easy to sit for 10 minutes and
without having thoughts about things that are on your plate. Here’s
some steps to help you.

1. Sit in a chair or on the floor (with a cushion) and get into a
comfortable position

2. Notice and feel your breath as it goes in through your nostrils
and out through your mouth. Pick something to focus on like the
sensation in your nose as the breath goes in, or the expanding of
your chest cavity as your lungs fill up.

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3. When your attention wanders away from your breath, don’t
worry, just gently bring your focus back to it. This will happen a
lot at first, but with practice it will get easier.

4. Start with a 5 minute session and increase by one minute each
day until you can do 10 mins per day and make this part of your
daily ritual.

By continuing this practice, you’ll get better about being able to stay
present on the course and keep your mind calm. Instead of having a
“monkey mind” and focusing on whatever thought pops you’re your
head, you’ll get better at choosing what you focus on and you’ll be a
lot less stressed as a result.

Focus on you and your environment

“You're only here for a short visit. Don't hurry, don't worry. And be sure to
smell the flowers along the way.” – Walter Hagan

The best way to access the now is through your senses. Use them to
take in your surroundings. We’re pretty lucky in golf that the
surroundings are usually beautiful. Pay attention to the smells, sights,
sounds, feeling of your clothes and the grass beneath your feet.

Focus on your breathing

"When I learned how to breathe, I learned how to win" – Tom Watson

In the same way that breathing is a great tool to help lower stress,
focusing on your breaths (a sort of on-course meditation) can help
you stay present and keep your mind quiet.

Try this technique, called Deep Belly Breathing:
1. Breathe deeply through the nose to the count of 3
Feel the Diaphragm, Chest, and Lungs expand.
2. Hold for another count of 3.

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3. Exhale through the mouth to the count of 6. On exhale,
release any tension and negative thoughts.

When you focus on your breathing, your attention (thinking) isn’t on
what’s happened or what will happen (consequences), only on what’s
happening now.

Engage with your playing partners

When you’re talking to someone it’s hard not to be in the present
moment. Meeting people and sharing in the experience of a round is
one of the joys of golf, so don’t waste this valuable opportunity. It will
also help your scores too!

Your personal highlight reel

One way to do this is with a virtual “image reel”. After Jordan Spieth’s
win at The Masters, his coach Cameron McCormick revealed the use
of a “virtual highlight reel” of Jordan’s best shots, which he could
recall during play. Imaging past successful shots is actually easier than
imagining new shots as you already have them in your memory. This
would help him stay confident and moving with flow. I’d like you to do
the same and keep a journal of your best shots and be able to recall
your “Top 10”.

Use your imagination (thought substitution)

Going to a “happy place” in your mind is another good technique for
staying calm and not getting distracted by analyzing your performance.
What you decide to visualize is a personal preference, but it could be
a favorite vacation spot or spending time with friends, anything that is
going to make you feel relaxed.

E.g. if you think about something that is stressful to you, it’s likely that
your heart will race and your muscles will become tense. Conversely,

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if you imagine walking down a sandy beach, you’ll most likely see a
drop in your heart rate and feel more relaxed.

Other techniques:

 Have a “go-to” subject where you can take your mind after a
shot you consider “bad”. This could be anything such as the
number of trees you can name, the different types of birds you
can hear, another hobby outside of golf, whatever it is, take your
mind away from the game for a little while

 Nick Faldo and Rory McIlroy hum a favorite song
 Fuzzy Zoeller used to whistle
 Jesper Parnevik used to solve math puzzles in his head

“Bounce-back”

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our
power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our
freedom.” - Victor Frankl, Nazi death camp survivor and
psychotherapist

Most of us have experienced that feeling - you're playing well and in
contention for a win or your best score, and out of nowhere, a wild
shot appears which awakens self-doubt and loss of confidence. After
that, you start to doubt your swing…and instead of seeing the target,
you begin to see only the trouble. You doubt your swing and start to
play to avoid mistakes instead of swinging aggressively.

So how do we overcome that self-doubt that can rear its ugly head at
any time during a round and quickly restore confidence?

Golf is not supposed to be easy. If it was, you probably wouldn’t enjoy
it as much. It’s the challenge that makes it such a great game. To

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succeed and play well we need to win the mental, emotional and
physical game. And overcoming adversity is a big part of that.

You can choose your responses

There’s a saying that golf is 10% what you do and 90% about how you
respond to what you do. Your reactions to your shots can make or
break your round.

You won’t hear a Tour player talking badly or thinking negatively
about shots they’ve hit while they’re on the course. But you will hear
plenty from amateurs. And most people listening don’t care or find it
annoying.

I recently went to a PGA Tour event and I had forgotten how many
misses even the very best players make (they miss 1 in 3 fairways and
1 in 3 greens on average). But their reactions are very different and
it’s part of the reason we’re watching them on the TV at the weekend.

Dwelling for even for a few minutes can increase your heart rate and
tighten your muscles which will cause more of those shots you don’t
want. Fred Shoemaker, The Author of “Extraordinary Golf” says that
“the few seconds after a shot is when you need to be the most aware
of your emotions.”

Acceptance techniques

Ideally you need to get to a point where you are completely non-
judgmental to your shots. But because you’re probably used to being
very self-critical during your round, this will probably take some effort
to change the pattern. This is something I have my students measure
themselves on their “Mental game scorecard”, so we bring attention
to it and work on getting better.

Like most of your mental training, it’s about breaking bad habits and
forming good ones. Make good reactions to all shots a goal for any
round and you’ll will see improvement.

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Try these techniques to reframe your mind if you’re disappointed with
a shot:

 Do a quick (10 second) review of the shot. What was it that
caused the miss-hit? Not committing to the shot? Lack of trust in
your swing? Poor follow-through? Whatever it was, replay the
shot in the way you would have liked and quickly move on (hit
the reset button).

 Ask yourself this simple question “What can be done about it
now?” The answer can only be “nothing”.

 Try to immediately focus on what you did well. Did you stick to
your routine? Was your club-selection and strategy good, even if
the ball was off line?

 Try laughing! A good way to have less than perfect shots roll off
is to just laugh about it. Zach Johnson says “Realizing bad shots
happen is the best way to deal with them. Take the drama out of the
shank or top. Use humor or laughter to make it go away, and then
move on.”

 In your pre-shot routine: Tell yourself: “although I have a very
positive intention for this shot, I will accept the result, good or
bad and not have a negative reaction.”

 Look up to the sky: the sheer magnitude of the open space
above will quickly make you realize the insignificance of what just
happened

 A word or phrase such as “Well that was interesting” and moving
on

 Tiger Woods has a “ten pace rule”, where after he hits a shot
that he did not intend, he gives himself ten paces in which to get
over it.

 Have the shot be forgotten by a physical action that signals it,
like putting the club back in the bag or taking off your glove

It’s definitely true that if you can learn from your mistakes, you will
become a better player. But make sure you do this reflection of your
weaknesses after the round, not during. We’ll look at this in the Post-

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round Review module. The worst thing you can do is beat yourself up
and try to give yourself a lesson on the course. Pay close attention to
your reactions and choose to respond well.

Power Breathing

Sport psychologist Dr. Leah Lagos trained a college team on
breathing techniques for a 10-week period (this exercise is from
Golf Digest January 2013), requiring the players to perform two 20
min breathing sessions per day.

"This isn't a relaxation exercise," says Lagos, who works with PGA Tour pros
as well as other top athletes. "It's a scientific and evidence-based method for
controlling your body's braking system. It allows golfers to put a stop to their
stress response and reduce distractions in their mind."

Here’s how the exercise goes:

1. Clear your mind after a bad hole with a "Power 10."
Inhale, slowly counting to four, then breathe out for
six seconds. Repeat this nine times. This helps
deliver oxygen to the brain to improve your focus.
Counting uses the same part of the brain that we
use to worry. It's difficult to do both at the same
time.

2. Whenever you feel tense, recall two of the best
moments of your life. Focus on the joy you felt as
you inhale, and feel as if any negative thoughts are
being forced out as you exhale.

Give this a try. The results of it were surprisingly positive with the
group tested. All the students improved their driving and putting after
the experiment.

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Honor the great game and don’t give up

Keep trying right to the last putt, no matter how you are playing –
honor the game and maintain a positive attitude even when the chips
are down.

Building Confidence and Mental Toughness

“Confidence is the most important single factor in this game” – Jack
Nicklaus

Being confident and mentally tough means being able to access your
best (or close to) whatever the situation. It’s being able handle the
stress of competition and not let it take your focus away from the
task at hand.

Before I give you simple ways to build confidence and mental
toughness, let’s dispel a few myths about it.

Myths about mental toughness:

 You’re born with mental toughness, it can’t be learned
 If you’re mentally tough you act cocky
 You can’t be mentally tough if you don’t feel good about your

game that day

Now we’ve got that out way, let’s determine how you can become
mentally tougher and take your game to a higher level.

Check out this simple process:

Thinking /Self-talk/Body Language => Emotions =>
Muscle Response

What we think, say to ourselves, and our body language, becomes our
emotions, and our emotions trigger a response in our bodies.

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E.g. If your inner voice is telling you that you can’t do something, you
will have more negative emotions (fear, doubt etc), which leads to
negative physiological reactions (tension, tightness, shaking etc). And
we all know what tension does to the golf swing!

The good news, is if we can get control our thoughts, talk to
ourselves in the right way and adopt positive body language, we can
produce positive emotions (confidence, determination, persistence
etc), which will lead to positive physical reactions (fluid motion,
seamless action etc).

Separating you the person from you the player (Quit
playing Ego Golf)

When you start to equate your self-importance from how well you hit
a golf ball, you start playing what’s called “Ego Golf”.

Your self-esteem is somehow becomes tied to your golf scores.

Not surprisingly, this creates a lot of interference in how well you
access your skills on the golf course.

To be able to access your best skills, you need to be emotionally
neutral on the golf course. If you place too much importance on
success and failure (the results), it’s impossible to swing freely. The
result will be greater inconsistency in your performance.

The opposite of ego golf is mastery golf. A mastery golfer is one who is
interested in skills development and enjoys the process of getting
better. They are less interested in the instant gratification of results,
and hence they play with less pressure and generally score better.

Ego golfers are more likely to take on riskier shots, and lose focus on
the game plan (which is part of the process).

One of the first places to start in building mental toughness and
unshakable confidence is being able to separate “you the player”, from
“you the person”.

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One way to do this, is to “act yourself” into the persona of a
champion.

All great athletes do this. They are able to reach within themselves
and access their “player-self” regardless of how they feel about their
“real-self”. Great competitors can in some ways be thought of as great
actors.

Act like a Champion

Actors are able to use their body language and facial expressions to
trigger a specific mood from within. Let’s use these skills to adopt a
mood of confidence.

When you’re feeling confident, you have more of the hormone
Testosterone. When you are feeling stressed and anxious, you have
less Testosterone and more Cortisol. Thanks to James Clear of
www.jamesclear.com for this one.

A study was done between Harvard and Columbia Universities which
had 42 subjects adopt different body postures and afterwards, their
hormone levels were tested.

The results showed that those with the more “high-power” postures
(standing up, back straight, shoulders back), had much higher levels of
testosterone and lower levels of cortisone i.e. they felt more
confident and powerful and less stressed. Conversely, those that
adopted “low-power” postures (slumped posture, low shoulders,
looking down etc), experienced greater stress levels.

The same goes for facial expressions.

Actors use facial expressions to create feelings within and make a
performance more authentic. Frowning can make you feel concerned
and worried by itself. This is could be thought of as NLP - the
subconscious perceives the facial expression and body language to be

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a bad thing. On the contrary, a smile can retrieve more positive
emotions from your subconscious.

As part of your “mental game scorecard” I’d like you to be aware of
your body language and facial expressions and grade yourself on how
well you did with it.

Act as if you’re a Tour Player, with a confident walk in between shots
– shoulders back and eyes looking up at flag level, not slumped over
looking down at the grass. Try smiling and laughing as much as you
can!

Improving Your Self-image

A big factor in whether you are able to hit the shots you need to and
reach your potential, is how you much you actually believe you can do
it. You’ll need to develop a strong self-image of yourself as a player,
on and off the course.

Here are a few ways you can improve your self-image:

Keep a success log

Whenever you finish a round or a practice session, focus on those
things that went well. The more you can focus on what’s positive
about your game, the more you reinforce them and the more likely
you are to repeat those things. The more you think and talk about the
negative, the more you’re likely to make them a pattern.

Keep a ratio of 3:1 of things that are good/positive to things that need
improving and include what you are going to do about those things
you want to improve.

Smaller performance goals

Keep your improvement on track with small, 3 month goals. These
are more achievable pieces of your long-term goal. Achieving these

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“milestones” will increase your confidence, layer by layer. More on
this is in the goal setting module.

Choose to be confident

Is confidence solely based on past performance? No, I don’t believe it
is. Yes, when we play well we have more positive memories to recall
in pressure situations (external confidence), but what most amateurs
don’t understand is that you have control over whether to be
confident regardless of past performance. If you believe that
confidence is based only on past performance, then you're basically
saying that you’re only as good as your last round, which puts an awful
lot of pressure on your game.

Enduring confidence is built from the inside out, it’s process based,
not results based. It’s called “internal confidence” and it’s all about
deciding to believe that you can do something.

To continually develop internal confidence and bounce back from the
knocks that the game of golf brings (to us all), try the techniques
below. All have been proven to work by players of all levels, but try
each of them and decide what is best for you.

Become totally absorbed in your routine

The routine you’ll develop as a result of this program, will be your fall
back at any point during your round. You’ll know what to do at any
time. One important place is your pre-shot routine is great for
restoring calmness to your game. If you practice a good routine, it
should be a meticulous sequence of positive steps. Concentrating on
these steps will distract you from any fears and doubts, keep you in
the present and thinking positively.

Positive self-talk

You’ll be very surprised at the power of self-talk and how it can affect
your mood. Next time you hit a bad shot, think about what your best

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friend or spouse would say to you instead of beating yourself up over
it. Always tell yourself you are a good player, even if you aren’t feeling
like it at the time. Remind yourself that we all make mistakes, which if
you learn from them (after the round), will take you to the next level
in your game.

Recall positive experiences

When you need to turn it around, recall times that you were playing
really well and picture the shots you hit. The idea here is that you lift
your mood with positive imagery. Just like Jordan Spieth does
sometimes in between shots, Fred Couples says that before every
shot, he pictures the best shot he ever hit with whatever club he’s
holding.

Play your “go-to” shot

If you’ve practiced correctly, you should know your “go-to” shot
which you can comfortably pull off no matter what the situation. E.g.
this could be a high fade. So when you’re feeling under pressure, “go-
to” this shot.

Adjust your risk appetite

There will be times on the golf course when you feel more confident
than others. But this doesn’t necessarily have to mean you will score
any differently. Good players can score well even if they aren’t hitting
the ball very well. This is all down to knowing your game and playing
smart. Part of playing smart is being able to choose the right shot with
regards to how confident you’re feeling about your current ability to
pull it off.

When you’re deciding on the shot to play, think about the riskiness of
your options in terms of a red, amber, and green. If you’re not feeling
so confident, it might be a “red” shot, in which case, you’ll make your
target a little more conservative than you would on a “green” shot
when your confidence is high.

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Aligning how you feel with the shot you decide will definitely result in
fewer mistakes.

Using NLP Triggers

Here’s how an example of how to use anchors and improve your
mental game:

1. Find a quiet place where you can be alone for 15-
20 minutes. After a recent round, pick out those
shots that you were particularly proud of. They
could be great drives, wedges you hit close, or
clutch putts you holed.

2. Close your eyes and really get a vivid picture of
those experiences. I want you to see the colors,
feel the weather, hear the birds – really try to
recreate the experience as if it is happening now.

3. Replay the shot in your head and see everything
about it. Remember the feeling of the ball being
struck purely and how it looked in the air.

4. Remember exactly how you felt after you hit that
shot.

5. As you feel that positive emotion, we want you to
“fire” the anchor.” This means that you say your
keyword, do your waggle, snap the velcro on your
glove or press your thumb and forefinger together.
As the experience begins to fade, release the
anchor.

6. Try reinforcing this several times and introduce
that trigger into your pre-shot routine on the golf
course.

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Here’s another example of it in practice:

When you’re practicing your putting, “anchor” the feeling of the ball
going in with a single word. Words that I like (but pick whatever you
want) are “beautiful” or “gorgeous”. Reinforce it by doing it several
times, each time the ball goes in.

Then, during your pre-putt routine on the course, right before you
take the putter back, say that word in your head and it should evoke
that same feeling of confidence.

Another time, you could experiment with sound and see if that works
better. E.g. try holding onto the sound the ball makes when it goes in
the hole, and recreate that in your pre-putt routine.

For a touch anchor, you could try tugging your shirt like Freddie
Couples, clicking your fingers twice, or touching the knuckle on your
left hand.

Give these a try and find the type of anchor that works for you. I’m
confident you’ll find this will equip you with a confidence booster and
relaxation technique, especially in pressure situations.

Focus and Concentration

The ability to focus or concentrate on what you want to achieve is a
skill that transcends golf - we need it to do any activity to the best of
our ability. Concentration in today’s world of social media and
constant message notifications is becoming harder and harder, so it’s
important to take the time to work on it. And in golf, you will see
huge return for the extra effort.

During a round of golf, you spend about 4.5 hours on the golf course.
But if you’re an average golfer shooting 88, you’re really only playing
for about 44 minutes. To play your best, you’re going to have to get

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really good at focusing for that 44 minutes, and relaxing your golf-
brain for the rest of the time.

Right before each shot, you’ll be entering a zone of high concentration
which doesn’t finish until after your post-shot routine (which we’ll
cover in the next module). You’ll be in a bubble with all distractions
blocked out.

The more pressure we experience, the harder this focus becomes,
which diminishes confidence over the ball. Therefore, you’re going to
need to make sure you’re working on ways to keep your focus sharp
in the intensity of a big competition.

Techniques to improve concentration:

1. Practice focusing. Focus is something that gets better with
practice. On a daily basis, set aside 10-15 minutes to
practice. Try holding your focus on an object such as a golf
ball. Start with doing this for just a minute and each time
try to go for longer. When you notice your focus has
moved to something else, gently bring your focus back and
start over. After a while, you’ll notice your ability to do
this will improve.

2. Relax your golf-brain in between shots. The more you can
relax your brain in between shots, the better your focus
will be during the shot.

3. Do more cardio. Daily physical activity increases blood
flow to your brain and provides it with more focus-fueling
oxygen.

4. Drink water and healthy snacks. Even mild dehydration can
cause loss of focus and memory. If you’re not drinking at
least 80 ounces a day, your focus will be affected.

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5. Sleep well. If you’re tired and got less than 6-7 hours sleep,
your concentration will be affected.

Patience

You’ll often hear when Tour players are interviewed before a round:
“I’m just need to try and stay patient today…” But what does this
mean?

Patience is a big part of the mental game and key to improving.

We live in a time where we’re becoming used to getting everything
instantly. It’s easy to get frustrated by waiting in a queue, waiting in
traffic or waiting on something to download.

Patience in golf means a few things.

For the Tour player in a final round it’s about being able to wait for
the right opportunities to go for birdie and not try to rush success by
attacking and making costly mistakes.

The same applies to the weekend player. When we’re playing ego golf,
we can easily lose patience when things aren’t going well and start
attacking, which will inevitably lead to mistakes.

Obviously there are times where you’ll have no choice how to play
E.g. In a match-play situation a lot is determined by what your
opponent is doing and you sometimes you have no choice but to be
aggressive to stay in the match. Or in a tournament if you’re a stroke
back on the last hole it wouldn’t make sense to lay up.

But 99% of the time it’s going to be best to stick to the routine and
your strategy, and resist the temptation to speed up success.

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Patience is also required when you’re waiting behind a slow group or
people within your own group.

That feeling you get when you sit in traffic, not knowing when you’re
going to move, increases your heart rate and increases tension in your
muscles.

Getting impatient on the golf course does exactly the same thing. And
as you’ll know from the previous lessons, that tension is going to
cause kinks in your golf swing.

The next time you experience that feeling of impatience, remember
this.

Another place that you need patience is your overall game
improvement. The golf industry sells us on quick fixes all the time and
massive transformations in our games in a short period of time.

Unfortunately, there’s no magic pill or short cut in golf (as with
everything in life). But your improvement will happen if you put in the
effort. I’m a big believer in “kaizen” which means “gradual
improvement”. If after every round and practice session you can get
just 1% better, you’re on a good path. But this requires a good plan,
and being patient about the results ;-)

Just like all these skills, there’s a mirror with our daily lives. If we can
learn to be more patient on the golf course, we can learn to be more
patient with every else we do and be a lot better off. Patience can be
practiced and developed each time you play.

Be Prepared to Scramble

Scrambling is making par when you miss the green. Being able to play
recovery shots and develop a highly functional short game will take
pressure off your long game, and you’ll find you swing more freely.

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Scrambling skills are one of the biggest differences between the pros
and amateurs. When a pro misses a green, there’s a very good chance
they’ll get up and down. Before you go out on the golf course,
embrace the reality that you will need to scramble and set yourself up
for the challenge.

Tour pros scramble to save par 58 percent of the time when they
miss a green in regulation. For higher handicappers, the up-and-down
rate falls as low as 10 percent.

The fact is that even tour pros miss one in three greens and have
roughly half their shots within 40 yards (more for the amateur).

This statistic is a huge reason to spend more time practicing the short
game and putting and learning how to become a good scrambler.
When you’re practicing, throw balls into the rough – resist the
temptation of sitting them up in a nice lie - which is how you’ll rarely
find them on the course. Play out of as many different lies as possible.

Do the same in the bunker, literally throw some balls hard into the
sand as they would land from a full shot.

When you start to see improvement in your short game, you’ll be
surprised at how this reduces pressure on your long game, which will
also improve as a result.

Don’t Get Technical (on the golf course)

“The golf swing is too complex a movement to be consciously controlled". -
Bobby Jones

During practice it’s perfectly acceptable to be spend some time being
focused on your swing mechanics to learn a particular movement. But
on the golf course, trust is the key and being reactive.

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If you lose confidence in your swing during a round, you have to resist
the temptation to try and fix it. Trusting a flawed swing is better than
trying to analyze and correct it.

As I said in the Acceptance section, simply do a quick review of the
shot and make a swing how you would have liked. Don’t dwell on the
whys.

Keep Going

There will be times where you get to the 13th or 14th hole (or even
earlier) knowing that you’re going to score a bad round. Try these
ideas to re-inspire you to keep going.

 Imagine that the next hole is the beginning of a new round.
 See if you can hit at least one more great shot. You never know,

you could make a hole in one or an eagle and take a really nice
memory away from the day.
 Turn the struggle into a challenge and perhaps something will
“click” and give you a confidence booster for your next round.

Staying Neutral

“Golf is the closest game to the game we call life. You get bad breaks from
good shots; you get good breaks from bad shots, but you have to play the
ball where it lies.” – Bobby Jones

Golf can be a very tough game if you think about it negatively.
Thoughts about NOT doing something often produce the very results
you fear.

If you don’t have a good mental approach, the game can become an
internal battle.

One thing that contributes to this optimal mental approach is being
able to “re-frame” our minds from what we don’t want, or fear, into
what is possible. Notice I say focus on what is “possible” and not what

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you want. Your thinking is neither negative, nor positive, it’s neutral, in
the present.

The idea is that too many of us set ourselves up for disappointment by
trying to “think positively”.

Let’s use an example: You’re on the first green, faced with a 6ft putt
for a birdie. What a great start this would be! Your positive thinking
tells you “I’m going to make this putt”, which is all very well until you
miss it. What you’ve actually done is set yourself up for
disappointment if you miss it (and you are going to miss plenty, that’s
for certain). Experiencing that disappointment over and over again
during a round, will start to damage your confidence and keep moving
your mind from the future to the past.

However, if we adopt a “neutral” mindset, there is no let down at all
if we miss a shot. By neutral, I mean that instead of saying “I’m going
to make this” (a positive mindset), you ask yourself “Is this possible”?
The only answer you can give yourself is “Yes, it is possible”. This way
there is no disappointment if you don’t make it and your mind stays
firmly in the present, where it needs to be to play your best golf.

You’re still going to go through your process of visualizing holing a
putt or hitting a fairway or green, it’s just that your attitude is one
that is not “expecting” to pull it off. You stay neutral and open to the
possibilities, which over the course of a round will keep you up-beat
and optimistic.

The key point here is that you DO have control over how you think
about a particular situation and if you find yourself thinking negatively
or positively, you can get it back to neutral.

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MODULE 5: PRE-ROUND
PREPARATION

Goals For Your Round

When you’re in the car on the way to the course, what do you think
about? Did you know that this time before you go out to play can
have a powerful effect on your scores and enjoyment? Let’s talk about
some of the things you can focus on.

In golf there are controllable goals and uncontrollable goals. As you’ll
know from Module 2, the more you can focus on things that that you
have control over, the less stress you will experience. Before every
round, we need to set goals that are within our realm of control.

If your goal for each round is to shoot your best score, this can
negatively affect your experience by putting additional pressure on
every shot. You become attached to the outcome, which is not 100%
your control. However, you can massively “influence” your score by
sticking to your (controllable) “process”. If you need a refresher of
why you should be focusing on Process vs Outcome, then please re-
read Module 2.

Process Goals:

I’d like you to set 3-4 process goals, which you currently associate
with playing good golf shots. These could be any parts of the process
I’ve talked about so far in this program, such as:

 Strong visualization of the shot shape and target
 Feeling centered and balanced before pulling the trigger
 A deep breath before walking into the ball
 Taking a positive after every shot
 Staying in the present neither thinking about what is ahead of the

current shot or behind me

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 Choosing to react well to poorly hit shots
 Making tension-free swings
 Aligning properly to every shot
 Choosing a conservative-aggressive target and committing to it
 Trusting your swing, not analyzing it

It’s important to have some accountability and know how well you are
executing your process goals. After each shot, you can do a quick
review and determine whether you achieved your goals or not. If you
achieved your process goals, it was a success, no matter where the
ball went. I’m going to discuss how you can keep a “Mental Game
Scorecard” in the post-round evaluation module.

When you set process goals for a each shot:

1. Your focus is on the 3-4 most important things you know you
will increase your chance of executing the shot.

2. You lower your performance anxiety by displacing thoughts
about the what ifs and what you don’t want to happen.

3. Your focus is now on those things that you know you can
control, instead of what you can’t control. Think about how
relaxing this will be next time you hit the course and you
starting thinking about your success being tied to this very
achievable goal instead of being at the mercy of how bad
shots will affect your score. This change of attitude makes a
big difference.

Goals For Your Attitude

The 2 things that are going to give you the best chance of playing well
is how well you do at achieving your process goals, and having a
positive attitude.

Of course, shooting good scores and winning your match or
tournament is what you ultimately want, whether you are a weekend

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golfer or a competitive player. Score is only part of the equation. In
fact, it’s the product of several components, one of them is setting
yourself up for enjoyment no matter how well you think you’re
playing.

If we can find a way to enjoy the experience irrespective of the
number that’s going on the scorecard, we can free ourselves and get
better access to our best skills.

Having an “attitude of gratitude”

A lot of the elite players I’ve worked with (those that are playing
under a lot of pressure) have found it helpful to “be thankful” and
have an “attitude of gratitude” while playing. When you put the game
of golf in perspective, there are far worse things you could be doing
than being outside in beautiful surroundings, with good people, being
healthy enough to play etc. As an exercise, I’d like you to write down
everything that you are grateful about in the game and “be thankful”
for that!

Make having fun the goal

From my experience, the more a player is having fun on the course,
the better they play. Sure, you could argue that better play is the
reason that the player is having more fun, but just deciding that you
are going to try to have fun (no matter what) is a great first step!

Preventing score-centric thinking

Instead of driving to the course, thinking about what score you’d like
to shoot, let’s try a different approach. Try telling yourself:

 I am excited about the possibilities for this round today.
 I know I will hit shots I don’t like (that’s part of the game), but

something I love about golf is the challenge of recovery.

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 My intention is to play well but it is not required for me to have
fun.

 I could be choosing to do something else with this valuable free
time, but I have the opportunity to play the game I love.

 The only thing I can expect of myself is to remain calm, have fun,
stick to my routine and be a good playing partner. If I can
achieve these things, I’m going to get the most from the
experience.

On the course, if you notice yourself thinking about your score,
choose to snap out of it quickly. This is a habit that you can break, and
over time, you’ll get better at ignoring this negative thought.

Your 10 Minute Mental Game Workout

Practicing your mental game of golf daily will increase your mental
toughness and help you develop the skills necessary for controlling
your arousal state and thinking clearly in the heat of competition.

The aim here is to elevate your confidence and get you in the mood
for better performance.

I recommend doing this before you go out to practice or play,
although some students like to do it before going to sleep.

Step 1: Breathing (5 mins)

Firstly, I’d like you to spend 5 minutes focusing on nothing else but
your breathing. This is great practice for the course. The best way to
remain calm and maintain your focus when you’re nervous is using
your breathing. This exercise will help you stay in the present and
lower your heart rate, so your thinking is not affected when the
pressure is on.

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1. Find a comfortable place where you won’t be bothered for 5
minutes.

2. Either close your eyes or keep them open with soft focus.
3. Start paying attention to your breathing. It’s not important how

many seconds it takes to inhale vs exhale, it’s more important
more how rhythmical your breathing is. So if it’s 5 seconds to inhale,
hold for 3 and 7 seconds to exhale, repeat that pattern for 5
minutes (don’t worry, the time goes pretty quickly). It’s been
proven that it’s the rhythm of the breathing that is most effective in
controlling the stress response, not the ratio of inhale to exhale
time.
What you’re doing here, is your training your mind to focus – like
taking your mind to the gym. If you find yourself distracted by other
thoughts, don’t worry, just bring your focus back to your breathing (it
will get easier to focus for longer the more you practice it). On the
golf course, this breathing exercise is going to help you remain
present and connected to the moment i.e. exactly what you need to
do. It will help reduce tension and calm you down. The more you
practice this, the easier it becomes to do when you’re on the course.

Step 2: Your personal highlight reel (2 mins)

Getting in the right mood and having a high self-image is key to playing
your best. One of the easiest ways to do this is to take a look at your
“personal highlight reel”.

I’d like you to think of your 3 best performances in golf. Spend1
minute thinking about each round.

Take yourself back there and relive the experiences as best you can.
See the colors, feel the shots and most importantly, relive how you
FELT.

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Using past experiences to create a mood for success is a common
sports psychology technique. Remembering how successful you’ve
been in the past and how good you can play, can trigger a more
confident mind-set before and during a round.

Step 3: Your inner vision or vision of success in your
round (2 mins)

Where do you want to go? If you’re doing a daily workout, I’d like you
to start visualizing achieving your long term goals (more detail in
module 7), whatever they maybe. If you’re doing a pre-round mental
workout, I’d like to you have a vision of what success looks like in the
upcoming round. See yourself birdie-ing every hole. See what you look
like as if you were on TV and/or as if you are hitting every shot.

Step 4: Process goals reminder (1 min)

Remind yourself what the keys to success are and what your
objectives are for the day. These have nothing to do with your score.
You can write them down and take them with you as a reminder on
the course.

This whole workout takes no more than 10 mins and will get you
ready for performing your best on the course. Get into the habit of
doing it daily and you’ll be able to more easily access these mental
skills when you’re under pressure, before or during a tournament.

Have a strategy

Before any tournament round you play, you should at least have a
chance to walk the course. If you get to play a practice round take
notes, so you know which holes you can take more risk and those
where you need to play safe. Get a yardage book and study it, so you
know where the good miss is for every tee and approach. Have a

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clear idea of what clubs you’ll hit for every tee and approach shot.
This will help with your visualization and choice of clubs for that day.
E.g. If you’re like me, you probably have a few different options when
it comes to the long irons and hybrids. Make sure you don’t get to a
225yd par 3, for example and not have a club that goes that distance.

You will ideally have a chance to putt on the greens and if you can,
make some notes on the contours and speed.

Pre-round visualization

Jack Nicklaus has said that 50% of a golfer's success is down to how
well they imagined that success before it happened.

Before a round, it’s a good exercise to have a little quiet time where
you imagine birdie-ing every hole. Seeing yourself doing it before you
play will increase your chances of that happening when you play.

Using visualization when you set your goals can help you live into
those things you desire in the future. Along with writing your goals
down, actually imagine them happening. When you see yourself in a
specific situation and achieving success, it can provide motivation and
give you more confidence to actually make those visions a reality.

Once you can see the whole shot in your mind’s eye, the closer you
will get to hitting it. See the shape, trajectory and even how it will
behave on landing. Really imprint it in your mind and believe you can
hit the shot. If it works for you, go one step further than just outcome
visualization and use process visualization where you actually see
yourself hit the shot.

As you’ll know from the visualization section, mental rehearsal is just
as important as physical rehearsal. Having a really positive image of
how the round could go, does have an effect on your mood and your
performance.

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I would suggest spending 15 minutes (either in the car or during your
warm-up) trying to focus your mind on the round ahead and
visualizing success.

Johnny Miller would visualize EVERY shot before a round while he was
sitting in the locker room before a round. He would see himself hit
the shot, see it land and then make the putt for birdie on every hole.
As I mentioned in the Visualization section, there is a direct link
between the imagining a physical action and the muscles that perform
it. This exercise would give Johnny a sense of déjà vu and made him
feel more confident over each shot.

Get your mind and body synchronized by visualizing and hitting a
variety of shots and mix up your clubs like you would on the course.
Be sure to throw in some good golf stretching exercises.

During a pre-round warm up, we are not just warming up our
muscles; we are getting our mind and body synchronized. A good
warm-up should take about 45 minutes - 15 minutes on the putting
green, 15 minutes on the chipping area and 15 on the driving range.

The most important thing to remember about the pre-round warm up
is that it does not pre-determine how you are going to play today.

Pre-round Relaxation

Start your warm-up with some stretches and breathing exercises for
about 10 minutes. Really try to remain calm and pay attention to your
breathing. If you have your iPod with you, pick some relaxing music
and spend 10 minutes.

Eat and drink well

Don’t underestimate the importance of eating and drinking, before
and during the round. Not doing this right will affect your mental game

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and your performance. The evening before your round, it’s important
to eat a healthy mean, with no sweets, caffeine or alcohol. Get a good
night’s sleep.

Before a round, keep it light and eat 2-3 hours before playing (avoid
the clubhouse fried breakfast just before heading out). Have snack
such as fruit and nuts about 30 mins before your tee time. Tiger’s pre-
round meal of choice is an egg-white omelet with vegetables. A small
sandwich with fruit would be another good option. To keep your
blood sugar stable, eat slowly with small bites. Make sure you drink
plenty of water, not coffee.

During the round, avoid the half-way hot dog and drinks that give you
high blood sugar like soda or beer. The surge in insulin will make you
sluggish. Go for the healthy option of bananas, mixed nuts and health
bars and sip plenty of water.

Be prepared

Being prepared with everything you will need for your round the
evening before will mean you’ll feel more relaxed in the morning. You
don’t want to be running around ironing a shirt and pants and getting
your equipment ready shortly before you have to leave for the
course. Count your clubs in case any extras have made their way in
there to take you over the 14 club limit. Have your clothes,
shoes and clubs ready the evening before. Make sure your bags
contains 2 gloves, plenty of balls, tees and a pitch-mark repairer.

Have your snacks and water ready to pop in the bag in the morning.

Putting Warm-up (15 mins)

The first thing to warm up is your putting. The subtle movement in
the roll of the ball will get your visualization and feel working and
warm up your senses. You’ll notice during these 3 drills, you won’t

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actually “miss” any putts. I think it’s important to avoid that feeling
before going out.

1. Putt to the fringe. Take 5 balls and place them various distances
10-15-20-25-30ft from the fringe and putt to it, trying to get it as
close as possible. The idea behind this drill is to warm up your
distance control without a hole.

2. Put a tee in the ground and practice 6, 10-15ft putts (3 left to
right and 3 right to left). The idea here is that aiming at a tee
means that you are not judging whether you are making them or
not, anything around the tee has a chance to go in. But it also
narrows your focus and tricks your mind into thinking the hole
is bigger than it is on the course.

3. Hit 10 consecutive 2ft putts (ones you can’t miss) and really
absorb the sound, sight and feel of hitting them firmly into the
hole.

Short Game Warm-up (15 mins)

1. Pick 4-5 spots round the green and play 3 balls from each spot.
Pick various types of lies (tight, fluffy and rough). Hit as many
shots as it takes to put one close and move on to the next spot.
The idea here is to get a feel for the grasses and get your
visualization and feel working.

2. Play 3 long bunker shots and 3 short ones.

3. Go through your routine on several shots and focus tightly on
your landing spot and visualize the ball rolling out.

Driving Range Warm-up (15 mins)

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The reason for finishing your warm-up on the driving range is to carry
the momentum of hitting full shots to the golf course. Try to make
your driving range routine as similar as possible each time to make
you feel comfortable. You might have heard of Jack Nicklaus hitting
clubs in a specific order:

1. SW
2. 8i
3. 4i
4. 3 wood
5. Driver
6. 8i
7. 56 or 60 degree wedge
8. First tee club

I like this because a) it starts a routine, b) it’s more like an order you
would play on the course, instead of just going down the clubs from
SW to Driver.

Whatever the order you decide, hit just enough shots until you hit
one perfectly (each club should have a different target) and then move
on to the next club. You want that to be your last shot with that club
before you head out.

Notice your shot shape and don’t try to fix it. Some days you might
feel more comfortable with a fade vs a draw and vice versa. Become
aware of how you feel on that particular day. You shouldn’t need to
hit more than 30 balls.

Concentrate on your rhythm and tempo and pay attention to your
grip pressure. Finish by imagining the 1st tee shot and don’t leave till
you hit it exactly how you should on the first. Finish on that shot.
Make sure you have plenty of time to get to the first tee from the
driving range, so you don’t feel rushed.

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MODULE 6: POST-ROUND
EVALUATION

The time after a round is a good time to assess, while it’s all fresh in
your mind. Many of my students call me straight after a round and we
spend 10-15 mins going over the following.

Post-round review questions

After a round, the first questions we need to ask ourselves are:

“What did I do well and what do I attribute to that success?”
Find 3 things that are working and write them down in your
performance journal.

“What did I not do so well and how do I improve that?”
Pick one thing that didn’t go well and write it down. Then figure out
how you’re going to work on improving that during the next week.

It’s important that you try to find patterns in your play – if it was a
great round, what did you do that day that contributed to that? Was it
that you had a swing cue that worked? Was it a particular thought in
between shots? Was it an attitude that you had before the round?
Was it focusing on your breathing? Was it that everything was slow? If
you can identify it, let’s repeat it!

If it was a bad round, what was it in the process or your mood that
could have caused it? Was it a lack of patience? Was it tension in your
swing? Was it a failure to accept the bad shots?

By being aware of both the things you are doing and feeling when
you’re playing poorly can help you avoid them in future rounds.

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How good was my course strategy?

Did I make good misses? How good was my club selection and choice
of shot? Could I have chosen different shots around the greens?

How good was my visualization?

Did I really get a clear picture of each shot in my mind before
swinging? Did I see the shape and trajectory of it and how it would
bounce?

Was I rehearsing a particular shot during my practice
swings or tinkering with my swing?

How good was my green reading? Did I give it enough
attention?

How good was my alignment?

Did I stand behind the ball and pick my spot in-between the ball the
target?

How well did I accept bad shots and put them behind
me?

Did you feel tired at any point in the round?

How well did I talk to myself?

Did I offer words of encouragement or disapproval?

How did I handle the pressure and challenges the
round threw at me?

Did I embrace it or resist it?

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Did I give up when I started to play poorly and a good
score was out of reach?

Did I stay in the present?

Was I able to “switch off” in between shots and turn off my golf brain?

Did I start to analyze my swing when I hit off target
shots?

What was my attitude like at before the round? Was I
full of optimism about the possibilities or putting
pressure on myself to shoot a good score?

How often did I think about my score during the
round?

How good was my warm-up today?

How good was my food and drink consumption before
and during my round?

Did I think about how I was playing in relation to my
playing partners and what they thought of me?

Was I a fun playing partner today?

Did I sabotage my round?

Here’s a link to a printable pdf of these questions, so you can give
yourself a mark out of 10 and total up your score:

To download your post-round evaluation questions, please click here

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Your mental game scorecard

One of the challenges of improving your mental game is actually see
something objective, that you can measure.

The best way you can do this is with a mental game scorecard.

The aim of this scorecard is to keep you focused on your process
goals during a round and become more aware of your thoughts and
emotions. Getting a good score on your mental game scorecard is the
best way to score well on your actual scorecard.

There are a couple of ways to do this. You can rate your process on
every shot you hit, or by the hole.
I.e. if you have 4 process goals for a shot, such as:

CLEAR TARGET
VISUALIZATION
STAY CENTERED
ACCEPT

You would measure the success of every shot by whether you did
these steps. If you did, put a mark in a notepad or on the yardage
book. The higher the number of marks, the better your score. I also
suggest my students give themselves a mark out of 10 for how well
they did on the “in between shot” time.

At first you might want to measure your success of hitting your
process goals by the hole. If you achieved your process goals for every
shot you hit on the hole, circle the number on the scorecard.

The aim of this game is to get as close to 18 circles on your scorecard
as possible.

Other stats you should keep to analyze your round and shape your
practice sessions. Not only can you improve how you divide your

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practice time, but understanding more about your shot pattern can
really help with your course strategy.

 Fairways hit (how good is my driving?)
 If fairway missed, which side was it?
 Greens hit with 2nd shot on par 4 or tee-shot on par 3 (how

good is my iron play)
 Scrambling (how many up and downs did I make?)
 Putts per round and 3 putts (how good is my putting?)
 Bogey or worse on a par 5 (how good is my strategy)
 Bogey from the fairway with <8 iron (am I trying too hard to

make a birdie?)
 Double bogeys (am I taking bad shots with me?)
 Routine (how good is my focus/concentration)
 How far did you hit each approach shot that hit the green?
 Total distance of putts holed

Take a look at these indicators and you’ll know exactly what it is you
need to work on to score better.

Post round visualization

Right after a round is a great time to “anchor” your best shots. As
described when we discussed NLP, you can use the following
anchoring technique, and use it to trigger a feeling of success in the
future.

Find a quiet place and a comfortable chair, where you can be alone for
10-15 mins. Close your eyes and start to re-live those shots you were
particularly proud of and make the image as vivid as possible. See the
colors, feel the wind, even imagine the smell of the grass if you can.
See yourself hit the shot and replay the outcome. When you get back
to that place in your mind, we need to find an anchor, which you can
use in the future, to help recreate that same mood.

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You could associate that feeling with a word, a color, a touch (like
pinching your thumb and index finger together) or a sound (some
players use the snap of the velcro on their glove. Repeat the exercise
and try different anchors. Next time you’re on the course, you can
use this anchor as a “trigger” before your pre-shot routine and
hopefully, you can recreate that same mood or mindset you were in
when you hit those great shots.

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MODULE 7: PLANNING FOR
SUCCESS

"In order to be successful you have to develop your inner vision. If you have
no vision for the future, you are destined to fail in the long run." - Greg
Norman

In the book “What They Don’t Teach You In The The Havard
Business School”, Mark McMormack tells us that the 1979 class of
MBA Students were asked the question:

"Have you set clear, written goals for your future and made
plans to accomplish them?"

The results were:

3% Yes
13% Yes, but not written
84% had no goals at all

Ten years later, the same class was interviewed again and the results
were very compelling.

The 13% that had goals (but not written) were earning about twice as
much as the group that no goals. But…the 3% of the class that had
clear, written goals were earning about ten times more than the other
97% combined.

What goal setting does

Reaching your potential is not just about skills development, it’s about
your motivation and the strength of your plan. Without a destination
in mind, and the journey mapped out, you’ll struggle to motivate
yourself to get there.

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What do you ultimately want to achieve? What level of play do you
realistically think you can reach by the end of next year? What
tournament do you think you can win? What handicap would you like
to have? This is called your vision or outcome goal.

Incremental goals and marginal gains

The mistake that most people make with goal setting, is that they
don’t break this down further into smaller, more achievable pieces.
They try to do too much at once or they don’t know enough about
their game to know what needs to be done. A goal that is too distant
quickly gets put off or just forgotten about. The human brain is
continually looking for focus and direction and long-term goals don’t
really provide that.

To reach your best, you need to focus on incremental goals. It’s the
aggregation of all these small goals that will take you to your bigger,
outcome goal.

This philosophy of continual improvement is also known as “Kaizen”,
a Japanese word meaning “good change”. Dave Brailsford the coach of
the Tour de France winning British cycling team, calls long-term
success “The Aggregation of Marginal Gains”.

The idea is that making small incremental changes, compound into
longer-term changes in your behavior i.e. better golf. From achieving
these smaller goals, you’ll be a lot more focused and your small
accomplishments, will build layers of confidence. You’ll know that
you’re getting closer to your ultimate goal.

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The first step (after determining your outcome goal), is to understand
where you are now. Where is your game in relation to where you
want to go? E.g. If you want to win the club championship, what score
do you think you will need to shoot and what is the area of your game
that is furthest away from that score?

Let’s say your outcome goal is to become a scratch handicap but your
current driving accuracy is 50%. On average a scratch golfer has a
driving accuracy of 65%. In this scenario, you might want to set an
incremental or performance goal of reaching 60% accuracy in 90
days. Performance goals must be measurable and 90 days is a good
time-frame.
The next part of the plan is to figure out exactly what you need to do
reach your performance goal. i.e. what specific practice drills and
challenges will you fill your time with? This is your action list
or process goals. The things you will actually “do” to reach your
goal. This would be a combination of block, random and competitive
skills practice. Practice challenges will keep you motivated and aware
of your progress.
Here are the steps again:

1. Identify your long term “vision”, which is where you ultimately
want to get to.

2. Now determine what you can do in the next 12 weeks to get
you closer to your vision.

3. For example, if you’re goal is to win a certain tournament, you’ll
probably have a good idea of what score you need to shoot. So
what do you need to improve most, to reach that goal? Is it
driving? Long irons? Short irons? Short game? Or putting? Set an
achievable 3-month goal around that area of the game. This
could be something like “hit at least 10 fairways per round.” This
is your performance goal.

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4. Now you need to work out how you’re going to do it. Work
out how much time you can spend per week for the next 12
weeks on your goal. What drills and challenges are you going to
do during this time? These are process goals. For the better
driving performance goal, you might pick drills from my practice
drills eBook.

5. Share your goal with your coach or people who support you.
Perhaps do weekly check-ins to share your progress. If you’re
not getting closer to your goal, perhaps change how you are
going about your improvement.

Daily reminders of your goals

Every day, write your outcome and performance goals down. Start
with your vision and write them in the present tense:

“I am a PGA Tour player”.

“I hit 70% of fairways.”

“I am the Club Champion.”

The importance of imagery in setting goals

In order to reach your potential, you have to believe and visualize
yourself becoming so. Whether it be visualizing the success of a
round, your season, or your career, internal imagery of future
performance has been proven to improve a player’s performance.
Jack Nicklaus said that he attributes at least 50% of his success to the
fact that he saw it happening in his mind before it actually happened.
The more you can remind yourself of what you want by consciously
thinking about it, the more you ingrain it in your subconscious mind to
help you move towards it.

This is called the law of attraction and it’s been proven to work by
cases like the Harvard students. When you create the image, the
subconscious creates the feeling and the belief.

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Spend some quiet time thinking about your goals

Find a quiet place and close your eyes for 5-10 minutes and imagine
some scenes that would occur upon you achieving your goal. Make
the images as vivid as possible.

Put together a vision board

For your long-term vision, it’s important that you have a strong visual
image to get it deep into your subconscious. Tiger had a poster of Jack
Nicklaus on his wall to remind him of his life goal, which is/was to beat
Jack’s record of 18 majors. That image would have been a big
motivator for the success he achieved.

A vision board is a good way to do this. You can create this using a
large piece of paper or cork board and pinning pictures which remind
you of your goals and trigger that feeling of success.

E.g. If you are a good amateur player, you might want to imagine
yourself playing in your national Amateur championship so you could
put a picture of the US Amateur trophy.

If you’re an aspiring PGA Tour Player you might want to make playing
in The Masters your goal and have an image of the green jacket.

GOLF AND LIFE MIRROR

“As you walk down the fairway of life you must smell the roses, for you only
get to play one round.” - Ben Hogan

Golf is a game that you choose to play with your valuable free time, so
establishing why you do it instead of doing something else is important
in the process of improving.

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What is it that you enjoy about the game and what do you want to
get out of it? Is it simply about shooting your best score?

Or is there something deeper you can take from it, however you play?
We need to discover what it is we are committing to.

The typical golfer falls in love with the unexpected and the mental and
physical challenges ahead. But as time progresses, this can get
diminished by expectations and trying to have control over the game.
Whatever it was that attracted you to the game, it is important to
remember what those things are.

Instead of focusing on the outcome of shots or score, we must start
to appreciate the game for what it can teach us about ourselves.
Unless we are playing for a living, there really isn't much of an
incentive to think about it in any other way.

Whether we shoot 70 or 100, it will be forgotten quickly, so we need
to take something of greater value away from it. We have to
understand that the mental attitude we develop through playing
sports, whether we win or lose, is what we ultimately gain, not the
short-lived glory of a great score.

Golf is a game which allow us to simulate reality and develop life skills.
It provides us with the opportunity to practice and enjoy the
satisfaction of overcoming adversity and challenges. The success of the
human race has been dependent on this very thing and we are
biologically designed to feel good about doing so. Remember this the
next time you hit the ball into trouble.

Life is simply too short to over-emphasize a poorly hit golf shot. If
we let it, golf teaches us patience, integrity and mental toughness.

Don't lose focus on the big picture and never let the game bring out
your bad side. Focusing on the relative insignificance of a golf shot

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amidst the real value of the game will help you remain calm, which is
the best thing we can do for lower scores.

From the first tee to the eighteenth green, think of the joys of the
game that you have been afforded and what you can take away from
it, however you play. Enjoy the freedom and the deserved break from
your daily life!

Being able to concentrate and have a positive attitude is more
important than being able to play good golf. But good golf requires the
successful application of both these skills.

If you are not completely focused and living in the present moment,
you cannot give what you are doing 100% effort and you will not get
100% of the rewards. You are, essentially, wasting time. In the same
way that relentlessly beating balls on the driving range, gives us false
confidence, it also wastes time.

We need to learn how to concentrate and be meticulous with
everything that we do. You have to do this to play the golf of your
potential and you have to do it to get the most out of life.

In golf, you are not going to execute a shot as well as you could if you
are concerned about what has preceded. The exact same
mentality needs to be adopted in our daily lives. We are not bound to
our past. Golf teaches us the benefit of being in the present moment.

In golf, like in life, we become what we think or see for ourselves in
the future. Extend the visualization in your golf game to your daily life.
We need to have a positive visualization and imagine the best thing
happening in golf and in life.

Learn from your mistakes, but do not let them negatively impact what
you do today. Everything, no matter how bad, can be seen in a
positive light and this is what we have to train our minds to do. Every

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time we play golf, we have an opportunity to practice our
concentration and work towards having this positive vision of
ourselves.

Golf gives us a practice ground for self-development. Without
developing a positive attitude, we will not make the best of
opportunities that present themselves in our day to day lives. If our
energy is not entirely focused on the positive outcome we will more
than likely fall short of achieving it. We can get better at this every
time we play and we can do the same in our personal and professional
lives.

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That concludes the Golf State of Mind Ultimate Mental Game Training
System eBook.

Please feel free to contact me at [email protected] or
phone +1 (571) 641-9687 if you have any questions about the
coaching or if you would like a one-on-one session.

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© 2016 Golf State of Mind