If
you’ve done much video editing, you’ll know your laptop works near maximum
capacity running that one program. The onboard fans crank into overdrive, the
keyboard gets hot, and the mouse cursor lags. Unless you have some seriously expensive
gear, you’ll need to dedicate the majority of your computing power to get any
work done.
We should
think along the same lines about our minds while playing golf.
If your
computer is running slowly, you can hit CTRL+ALT+DEL to see a list of active applications
in the Task Manager. There you can see where your computer’s processing power
is being allocated. Often, you’ll notice unwanted programs running in the
background gumming up the works. These unwanted tasks can be manually ended, increasing
the computer’s performance immediately.
Since we’re
not robots, we can’t terminate unwanted thoughts out on the course, but we can notice
where our consciousness is being allocated.
If my experience
during a terrible round is any indication of the average golfer’s mental “Task
Manager”, it would look something like this:
30% - Fear
of bad things happening
20% -
Doubt about the soundness of the process
20% - Awareness
of score implications +/-
20% -
Swing thoughts
10% - Formulate
honest plan, wait for honest comfort
My “Task
Manager” when playing my best golf looks like this:
90% -
Formulate honest plan, wait for honest comfort
05% -
Swing thoughts
02% -
Awareness of score implications +/-
02% -
Doubt about the soundness of the process
01% -
Fear of bad things happening
Why is
my mind adrift in a sea of fear, doubt, awareness, and swing thoughts when playing
poorly?
The
answer is clear when considering the other side of the coin.
When I
play my best, the vast majority of my consciousness is dedicated to forming an
honest plan and waiting for honest comfort. My mind is thoroughly occupied figuring
out how to best play the game. There’s just not enough processing power left
over to consider fear, doubt, swing thoughts, or misdirected awareness.
Moral
of the story?
Have
the discipline to tie up your mind with one task at a time…
Task 1: Plan
Creates Comfort:
Make an
awesome plan for the upcoming shot
(The process of creating a truly
awesome plan alleviates doubt as you know you’ve done your best, fear becomes an
inaudible whisper, and there’s just not enough awareness to spare to consider unnecessary
swing thoughts or score implications +/-)
As far as definitions go, a
golfer with minimal doubt, fear, or distraction seems comfortable to me…
Task 2: Comfort
Creates Plan:
The moment we feel we’ve achieved
this bona-fide, honest, earned comfort, swing the club.
We don’t think about swinging the
club, we swing the club.
We betray and sabotage the integrity
of Task 1 when we think about swinging the club at this stage. Your body has
all the instructions it needs to swing the club. Have the guts to trust what
feels comfortable.
Forming the plan packs the powder/ball
into the cannon, now our job is to light the fuse and see where the ball flies.
It is perfectly acceptable to hit
a terrible shot from a place of honest comfort, but it is unacceptable to hit a
bad shot because we didn’t have the discipline to wait for honest comfort before
swinging.
Just a
warning, we must constantly remind ourselves of the true source of our best
golf. You’ll be tempted to be lazy, you'll step into shots without a plan, you’ll
swing without an ounce of comfort.
I write
this in hopes that the next time you notice a pop-up in your consciousness advertising
an exciting new swing thought, you’ll just smile, hit CTRL+ALT+DEL, and get
back to making one hell of a plan for your next shot.
