One of the myths surrounding the mental game
of golf is that great players are unemotional
on the golf course. The truth is that the
great players are far from unemotional.
Great players learn how to play the game
within the parameters of their natural
personality tendencies. Some great players
show a lot of emotion, while others feel a
lot of emotion and don’t show it outwardly.
The point is not to concern oneself about
being “too emotional”, the point is to make
sure that what is particularly emotionalized
are the positive incidents in a round. Far
too many players allow themselves to get very
frustrated or angry if something happens that
they don’t like, while not really giving much
attention or energy to those things that
happen that are OK or good.
Over the course of a round of golf, most
competitive golfers hit a handful of shots
that are not very good, a handful of shots
that are great, and a whole LOT of shots that
are OK or acceptable. The “bad” and “good”
shots get a lot of emotional energy. The
challenge is to give emotional attachment to
those shots that are “OK” and/or acceptable
so that over the course of the round, the
emotions that are primarily emphasized are
positive and encouraging and motivating.
In your next several rounds of golf, see how
much of your emotional energy you would
consider positive and how much you would
consider negative. Make an effort to
increase the number of shots that you
emotionalize in a positive way, and get the
benefits of an internal environment that is a
lot more optimistic and accepting- which has
the potential to lead to even better and more
enjoyable rounds of golf!
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