Poor thought patterns in golf are like a 'shank' in your mind; creating havoc in your game!

Golfers want to create change in their game and as any golfer knows it will take time.  No matter how old you are or how long you have been playing golf, to move from where you currently are in your golf game to where you want to go is going to take time.  It will take persistence and it will take determination.

There are no short cuts to golf improvement, BUT there are more efficient methods to implement to improve your game to reach your next higher level of Peak Performance.  

Although the golf season is slowing down and football is upon us, golf coaching is always moving along, it never slows and even if the weather will be colder soon where you are, you can still work at improving your golf game.

To begin to change your game you must first understand how you are reacting to your current game you take to the course each weekend.

Every time you hit a shot on the range or the course your mind has a mental reaction to it...good or bad, like the shot or dislike, you are reacting.  These reactions are causing you to have thoughts which have electrical charges in your mind and with each thought you have an emotional reaction to the thought.  The emotional reaction is like a magnetic charge.

Every time you have these reactions they become more and more subconscious thoughts or reactions and these will repeat themselves until you arrive at a spot where you can purposely and deliberately change them.  These thoughts would be conscious thoughts and then create your ability to change your past habits and actions with your golf game.

An overall example of these thoughts you have would be "I can't make this swing change" ; " I will never improve my game"; " I suck and I want to quit golf".  Here is where I have many students who are not even aware of the subconscious limiting thoughts they have when they play.

An example of this was last Tuesday on the course with a student on a par three course where he missed a few greens and kept thinking and saying "I am missing the green and I cannot par all these holes".  I quickly told him a story of my days playing golf with Lou Holtz (at that time the Head Coach for Notre Dame football) and Lou would NEVER count himself out of a golf hole.  No matter where his ball was, he ALWAYS tried to find a way to salvage the par or the hole with no big numbers.  Winning minds win National Championships.

The negative thoughts become subconscious thoughts that are hard wired in your brain and they become habits which keep getting stronger each time you react to unwanted situations. These situations are like a mental shank on the course, and as we all know, getting rid of the shanks in golf is very emotional, challenging and frustrating.

The key here is to know when these reactions show up and know how to identify these 'mental shank thoughts'.  Once you identify them you can then begin to work to consciously overcome them.  The conscious wiring of your mind takes specific methods and techniques to implement (most are done away from the course or range).  This is what my Alchemy of Golf is.  Alchemy of the mind in golf is learning to turn the situation around and break poor past habits of thought patterns.  You change those with powerful assertive thought patterns which change your game dramatically.

How dramatically?  Recently one of my students was shooting between 74-80 regularly and by changing how his mind reacted to situations we began to stop the downhill slide.  From there I mentally coached him how to create the more powerful thought patterns that are associated with success.  Success you would find from people like Lou Holtz, Michael Jordan and various business people you could think of who over power there situations with better thought patterns.

What improvement did that create?  He went from a 5 handicap to a plus 2 handicap in 5 months!  That is right, his average score now is about 69-71 and he has shot low round of 66, 64 and last week 63 (which has not updated his handicap yet....it will be lower).

Overall the more conscious you become of your subconscious limiting beliefs, thoughts and emotions then you at least begin to look at the fork in the road.  Do you continue down the old path that has lead you to where you are....or do you take the new path to where you want to go on the golf course?

Golf coaching is not all about the swing and even if you think your swing is good and a simple swing tip of this or that will help you get back on track you are limiting your potential.

Pure potential of improvement is a blend of the swing and the mind....the two must work in tandem.  Both always need attention and expanding to reach higher levels of Peak Performance.

If you want help in these areas, reach out to me here and we can examine where you stand.  Even if the golf season is slowing down, there is plenty to do mentally in the off season if you cannot hit many golf balls.