The journey to reaching goals is full of challenges, failures and obstacles that stand in the way of success. A player must break through mental barriers, bad breaks, unexpected conditions and learn from their past mistakes all while remaining cool and collected on the golf course. It is a part of learning and completely natural to react to a frustration or what feels like a failure, especially when you’ve been training so hard. However, how you respond can positively or negatively affect how you play the rest of your game and the experience you walk away with. Take for instance how you may react to a plugged lie in a bunker. Elite level golfers are able to manage themselves and respond by shifting their attention to the area that will give them the most success. Instead of blaming the course about the bunker and their result, they acknowledge it as their challenge and accept the outcome. Taking this approach results in more consistent success, higher commitment, and boosted confidence.
To harness a productive response when facing challenges or frustrations, consider these 3 things:
- Accept obstacles as challenges. Visualize the success of your next step and keep going, use this as an opportunity to strategize and improve.
- Ask yourself, “is what I’m doing helping or distracting?” Take a deep breath and refocus, if you get yourself frazzled you’ll likely make another mistake and create a domino effect throughout the rest of your game.
- Be your own biggest fan and best caddy, golf is already challenging enough!!
