Not long ago, the human brain was thought of as a `black box’, unchanging, fixed.  But recent research on this `three pounds of electrical flesh’ comes to a different conclusion; the brain can change, and dramatically.  It is plastic, malleable.  And we have the tools to direct our brain to its full potential.

In golf, that could mean getting rid of fear of water, or the first tee jitters.  It might mean becoming a better putter, making a much needed swing change, or becoming more confident.  You can do these things, but in order to do so, three requirements must be met.

1) You have to find a way to settle the mind, to calm down emotional upheavals and general thinking too much. This is called mindfulness.

2) You have to know some basics on what great technique feels like. Not what it looks like on the surface, but deeper, to a secret level. I call this overcoming illusions, or awareness.

3) You need to practice. And there is a right way and a wrong way to practice.

Did you ever have the thought; `If only I had a great golf swing. I would be a terrific player’.  Or, `If only I could get my mind right, I would be a contender’.  How about, `I just need to practice more’.  I just don’t believe you can separate out any one of these three factors. In future articles on this page, I would like to go into these in more depth.

Point 1, the Mind

Quiet Mind

`Mr. Duffy lived a short distance from his body’.  This James Joyce line sums up the best way to mess up a golf shot.  Flicker your attention to the last shot, or the water hole coming up, and you won’t hit the ball in front of you very well.

The Past

We tend to carry around caskets full of dead moments- events that already have happened.  Let go of these and breathe a sigh of relief.  Birds can fly because they don’t carry suitcases.  Any thought that pulls you away from the ball in front of you, will result in a miss.

The Future

`Whatever you think it will be, it will always be different’, the Buddha.  It is a great waste of time to anticipate and worry about what might happen next.  Doing the best you can in this moment will take care of the next one.  There is only one ball in front of you. Just hit that one.

The Present

There are many techniques and ways to learn to stay in the present moment.  One is to make sure you are in your body; as they say `come to your senses!’.

Can you feel your skin, the blood in your veins…without thinking
Can you look at what is in front of you…without thinking?
Can you hear the sounds around you…without thinking?

It’s not that easy.  The thinking mind wants to run the show, but it doesn’t do a good job of it, especially when it comes to golf.

New Research

Check this out; new research on the brain shows that 20% of mental activity is data received from the 5 senses.  The other 80%? It’s our 3 lbs of electrical flesh just thinking; how we spin the information we have gotten.

Emotions

Do you fear water?  Are you self-conscious on the first tee?  Do you go ballistic with anger over a bad shot?

If so, your emotions are controlling you.  They are yanking you away from the present moment.  The next shot in this state will be a poor one.  The trick to controlling fear, anger, and the others is to stand back and watch them fr om a distance.  Notice them.

`To get rid of your feelings, feel them’ Sigmund Freud. `Awareness per-se is curative’ Fritz Perls.  These great therapists are telling us that negative emotions can be controlled, not by running away from them, but by facing them head on.