I am not a golfer, but from what I can tell getting that little dimpled ball to go into that hole in the ground is a big deal for a lot of people. Being that my entire business is based on helping people get what they want, it wasn’t long before putting enthusiasts started calling me. The golfers who called seemed to know that I could help them, even before I knew.
After a few conversations, I realized that most of these people, who reached out to me, got the idea to use the subconscious after being frustrated with their game. Most wanted help with the yips or they just wanted to lower their handicap. It seemed to me that the callers just put two and two together after hearing again and again that “golf is a mental game”.
What coaches and golfers don’t understand is that working on your technique is more a physical fix than a mental one. To truly get to the mental part of your golf game you need to find someone who specializes in finding and removing the mental thing that is getting in your way. Then, the coaches and the techniques really have fertile ground to take hold.
One of my earliest clients taught me this. He came to see me because his wife said he had a bad temper. She was so tired of his sharp tongue that she told him she was going to divorce him if he didn’t stop his nasty tirades.
In our sessions together, it became clear that he had a lot of stress at work. Having seen how easy it is for a stressed out person to blow their top, I set out to find what was causing this career related tension. Very quickly, my client’s inner mind reminded him of his childhood. Several moments from the past rose up from his subconscious that showed how badly he felt when his Dad was disappointed in him. As he became more and more aware of this theme that ran through his young life, he also suddenly remembered a decision he had made. At around age 7 he decided he had to be perfect.
It may be obvious, but this perfectionism carried over to his work life once he grew up, and since no one is perfect, he was frustrated and angry at himself a lot. His perfectionism didn’t stop there though. It made him judgmental of others, which caused him all too often to be disappointed with the efforts of his employees and also with his own son. This resulted in his employees feeling uneasy around him, which kept him out of some important information loops and his son staying as far away from him as possible.
I knew that he had achieved a lot in his life precisely because of pushing himself to be perfect over the years, but I also knew he could be far happier as a relaxed high achiever, so we focused on making that happen. His wife started noticing a difference pretty quickly and stopped talking about divorce. He began to lay off of his employees and his business improved. He also found he was able to cut way back on his alcohol intake, which made him feel healthier and more in control. In addition, he noticed that he was, in general, in a better mood, which helped with how he related to both his wife and his son.
We had to skip a week because he had to go out of town. I didn’t pay much attention to where he was going or what he was doing, but I took note of a gigantic smile when he walked into my office the following week. When I inquired about his smile, he said that over the weekend he was so at ease that his mind had become very quiet. He said it stayed that way even when he was playing in a golf tournament.
“I didn’t’ know you played golf” I said,
He responded excitedly, ignoring me, “and guess what? I actually won the the golf tournament!”
I stared at him bewildered, not sure I had ever seen a man so giddy.
He went on to say, he had held no expectation of winning. He just wanted to get out in the nice weather and enjoy the game.
So, my expert advice for golfers, is to consider doing this one thing; work on the mind with someone who specializes in the subconscious. Make sure you choose someone who can clear out subconscious causes of problems that directly relate to the problem/s you are working on in your game. Keep in mind there are a lot of people who think they are good at subconscious work, but few actually are. So, do your research. If you choose wisely, and persevere, with just a few sessions, you will likely see profound changes, whether it be overcoming the yips, lowering your handicap, or anything else you want to improve on.
I would be remiss if I didn’t also include a word of advice for golfing coaches. Consider partnering up with a professional, who specializes in the type of aforementioned subconscious changes. These are changes that occur at the most fundamental and automatic level of the mind (and they often cause automatic and problematic movements in the body). If you do this, your coaching efforts will radically and rapidly bare fruit. So, find someone and team up. Again, do your research and choose this partner wisely. Success in any business endeavor is so often about finding the right people. But, once you find your person, just watch what happens.
Another former client of mine, Randy Moon, is a great example of this whole thing that I am talking about. You can find his interview with my testimonials. After years of playing golf from the time he was a boy, Randy was in love with the game. Once he became a grown man, one day he realized he just wasn’t recovering from challenges that had crept up over the years. He was a very positive and proactive person, but he had to admit that coaches and new techniques were not helping as much as he had hoped. His game was really suffering and he was frustrated about it. So, when we worked together, we addressed the subconscious causes of his challenges. Just a few sessions later he saw measurable improvements, in just about every area he wanted to address.
In fact, near the end of our last session, one of Randy’s life long golfing dreams came true. He hit his very first hole in one. When he called to tell me, we were both thrilled. We talked for quite awhile, because I just had to hear every detail. I thought he was pretty blessed to have reached a place most golfers only wish they could go, and I rested in what I thought was the end of the story, but boy was I wrong. Shortly after that, he blew my mind again, when a few months later, he actually, hit two more!