The problem with my golf game improvement is I’ve been focusing on “one thing” to fix, when in reality there are a variety of mostly mental flaws I’m not addressing.  There are layers of problems and issues, the onion, and focusing on just one thing, neglects the next issue you have that can cause a wayward drive.  It’s not just one thing, it’s the entirety of your golf game, and you can’t avoid mental focus and how NOT to think when on the course.

I’ve read a couple of golf books recently, played in a scramble, & realized I’m paralyzed in “practice mode”.  Let me briefly explain.  I started my improvement journey figuring out “how to play” shots I did not know how to do, like green-side bunkers.  Then I carefully analyzed each aspect of my golf game from putting and chipping to drives.  What happened is I got stuck in practice mode.  I’d be out on the course, and be trying to consciously think or “steer” the ball or club.  I reread Zen golf, and recently  Golf’s Three Noble Truths and realized I was skipping the fun enjoyment of golf, and was way too focused on outcomes and results and “forcing” the ball to go where I wanted to go, which obviously is futile.

In the Randy Jones charity scramble a few weeks ago, I suddenly realized there was no “score focus”.  I could seriously just swing and our four-some was using a LOT of my shots.  On one particular hole, we used all three of mine for one of our birdies.  The point is, it’s like walking across your bedroom at 3am.  If you want to see the cat or your shoes you didn’t put in the closet, you have to use the corners of your eyes to activate the rods in your eye that see black & white better than the center of your eye.  If you stare straight at your score or your desired outcome, you lose focus on what you need to see:

• the smooth & powerful swing
• keeping your eye on the ball ( not lifting your head!)
• a clear visualization of the desired outcome to direct your “non-conscious” memory

The thing is, the golf swing is way too fast to actively control and direct the golf club.  You need to use your non-conscious golfing ability to create a great swing, then whatever happens to the ball after that is out of your control.  Maybe it rolls off the back of the green, maybe comes up short in a trap, but the point is, there’s nothing you can do but make the best swing you can.  I was trying to “steer” the ball.

The other key point I realized, was that there are multiple problems in my golf shots.  It’s not just my elbow, or my backswing speed, or keeping my head down, or not watching the ball.  Trying to fix one thing and not focusing on everything non-consciously was just causing a lot of frustration.  Great tempo, but “looked up” before impact causing a mishit.  Kept head down, but was trying to steer or force the ball with disastrous results.  I’ve hit all the shots perfectly.  I’ve hit par on every hole on various rounds, and birdied most of them at my local course, but never in the same round.  So what’s in the way?  It’s not “one thing” that gets fixed with a new driver, it’s peeling the onion of your golf game.  It’s layers of “how”, swing tempo, attitude, visualization, and consistency.  I’ve been beating my head on the “one thing”, only to have some other layer of the onion cause a poor shot outcome.

The problem with Zen Golf and similar books, is you can’t “turn on Zen” on the course.  It’s kind of a life philosophy, AND if you don’t practice being calm & enjoying life off the course, how can you conjure that up just for the golf course?  You can’t.

My focus now is to play my round like a scramble, nothing on the line, think “the score is NOT mine”, and I can’t force the results during the shot.  I’m going to play “free” scramble golf on the course, and leave analysis and improvement at the range.  Let’s see how that goes….