Stop trying to “Get out of your own way” – it doesn’t work.

One of the greatest myths about golf psychology is the assumption that we are naturally “in our own way” and need to go against our nature in order to play well. Rubbish! I don’t know about you, but hitting the ball over 100mph whilst distracting yourself in order to not think about thinking, isn’t going to make it any easier!

The reason why it doesn’t work is your body needs a clear instruction of what you DO want it to do. “Using the force” is great, but even the force needs direction. “Getting out of your own way” simply leaves you to battle yourself and end up leaving your body to it. This is rather like a Captain saying to a crew of a ship, I’m just going to get out of your way, you do what you like! The Captain does need to trust the crew sure, but the Captain needs to give the crew direction so they know where to point the ship.

The best golfers don’t think “Get out of your own way” – they think “LEAD THE WAY”. It doesn’t mean giving yourself technical instruction about how to swing – that leads to loss of rhythm, feel, confidence and self belief, and results in unclear direction. No crew likes a Captain telling them how to do their job! Also it is not talking to yourself over your shots – called verbal overshadowing, this leads you to use parts of your brain not used in physical movement and so again distracts rather than helps.

Your body doesn’t speak English – it speaks pictures and feelings. The one thing you need to know about mental golf is to lead the way in the RIGHT WAY:

Before, during and after each shot, only focus on SEEING AND FEELING the shot going to a clear target.

This is clear direction that your crew will always respond to. All other thoughts over the shot are a distraction.

Mental golf tips taken from old models of golf psychology can be incomplete and so misleading. Simply treating yourself like a naughty child that needs distracting is not a very empowering view. Your task in golf is to learn how to lead yourself so you can love every shot. If you can learn how to do this in golf, what would happen if you did in other areas of life too?

To integrate this “see it feel it” mentality into your own golf psychology, read my other mental golf tips on different parts of the game. To help embed this, if you sign up for my newsletter you will receive 6 free audio tipcasts, coaching you to simplify and improve the most important aspects of your game.

Love every shot!

Adam Sprackling