Zen Golf

The mental skills necessary to play your best golf need to be learned and groomed, just as good swing techniques do. The tendency to “focus on the negative” needs to be replaced with the habit of accentuating the positive. A conversation with a touring professional provides a good illustration of this point. After the first round of a tournament, I asked Andy how the day went. “I played okay, more or less. I had one hole where I chose the wrong club and made double­bogey.” It sounded to me like he’d come in at one or two over par. Later that day, I was looking at the scoreboard and was completely surprised when I saw his hole-by-hole score. He’d neglected to mention that he’d made an eagle and four birdies.