ROADBLOCKS ON YOUR MENTAL HIGHWAY
Yoda
Do any of these phrases sound familiar? “Try not to bend your left arm,” “try to keep your head down,” “try not to think too much”.Trying is synonymous with more conscious effort – the polar opposite of subconscious golf. Have you ever been told that you’re trying too hard? Most of us have. But how can you try less?
Mmm…confusing isn’t it?
Let’s see if the following scenario rings a bell.
After weeks (maybe even years) of fruitless experimenting, you finally decide to take a golf lesson. Maybe you’ve been watching golf on television or your friends have told you the importance of keeping a straight left elbow. No matter how hard you try, the elbow seems to have a mind of its own.
You take a couple of swings for the instructor and, sure enough, your left elbow is bending like a pretzel. The teacher asks you to try and keep it straight.
Attempting to diligently follow instruction, you lock the elbow. It’s straight now alright-ramrod stiff. Okay then. You definitely make better contact, but you’ve lost 20 yards in distance.
Maybe you should try not to keep it quite so rigid. That works for the shorter clubs but not so much with the woods. Let’s try something else. And so the cycle continues.
Do you know the most deadly phrase in golf instruction? The try not to command. If you want to bring a golfer to a complete standstill, tell him to try not to think too much. How in heaven’s name can you try not to do something?
Here is a classic example from basic psychology: “try not to think of pink elephants.” Come on now. Really try. Give it your best shot. You’re not trying hard enough. I can tell the image of pink elephants is still clear in your mind.
Give up? Okay. Just forget about pink elephants – if you can. Here’s an easier exercise. Try not to think about the water on the second hole or try to forget the last round where you hit two balls out of bounds on the ninth hole.
What’s the point of this silly exercise you ask?
There is a fundamental principle that just might be the turning point for your game. It might be worth jotting down in a notebook and keeping it in your golf bag for future reference. Ready?
You get what you focus on.
That’s it. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Yet this innocent sounding axiom is critical to understanding why you progress to a certain level and then keep hitting a wall.
Are you beginning to see why certain holes always rise up and bite you?
Our brains cannot process negative commands. You have to eliminate the negative and decipher what’s left. Take away the try not to and what’s left? Try not to bend your left elbow becomes, you guessed it, bend your left elbow!
Positive directives have a much better chance of being absorbed. A command like “keep your elbow straight” is fairly straightforward. That doesn’t mean you can fix the problem instantly, but at least you don’t have to consciously decode the meaning.
THE POWER OF DON’T
“Don’t swing too fast,” don’t leave your weight on your back foot,” “don’t even think about your left knee.”
The quickest way to throw a monkey wrench into a fellow golfer’s game (even unintentionally) is to use a don’t command. “Don’t pay any attention to the sand in front of the green.”
Take away the don’t and what do you have left?
As you can see, don’t and try are fraternal twins. How many times have you been the victim of a don’t command?
Here is an abbreviated form of a suggestion I overhear constantly on the practice range. A fellow golfer is trying (whoops, nearly forgot) suggesting to his partner that the solution to his slice is “don’t swing the club so much from outside to in on the downswing.”
Yikes! Is it any wonder so many golfers look and feel like robots on the first tee?
Enough linguistics already; I don’t want to be responsible for creating a mild addiction to Tylenol.
THE BIG BUT
“You’re on the right track, but not quite there yet.” “Your backswing is better, but you’re still swinging too fast.”
The word but wipes out whatever came before it.
In effect, you’re right back where you started from. The above phrases activate your analytical mind as you try and figure out the underlying meaning.
Our goal is to slip under the radar of conscious thought. At this point, you might be wondering why a golf instructor is devoting an entire chapter to linguistics and semantics.
The golf swing is not a difficult concept to understand. The swing is basically a circle or pendulum. As the club swings through its arc, the ball simply gets in the way. Our skill level is based on how well we can create this motion. The concept is simple, yet only ten percent of golfers score in the eighties or lower consistently. It’s certainly not a lack of knowledge.
You know what to do.
There always seems to be something that prevents you from using your knowledge effectively. Apart from physical limitations, the only remaining variable is the language you use.
Finally, you’ve finished with all the mental gymnastics. I would recommend reviewing the key concepts of triggers and anchors, until you have a clear grasp of their value. If the record player analogy works for you then use it. If not, design your own metaphor.
You’ve reached a critical stage in learning.
Simply agreeing with the ideas intellectually will have no effect. You must start to put the ideas into practice. Set up your own blockades to ward off the fallout from the poor shots. Recall your best shots every day. Write down (in positive terms of course) everything you can recall: the more vivid the memory, the better your results on the golf course. Be aware of the language you use on yourself and others.
Congratulations! You only have two more chapters to go. Have a number seven iron handy and be prepared to use it as you learn…