Executing the Shot

WEBVTT

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Okay, golfers, the moment of truth, executing the shot.

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So we talked about the process of hitting a shot, which is basically a good

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shot, comes

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from a good process, which includes hopefully a good execution, and then maybe

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if the cards

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are in our favor, a good outcome.

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But the part that we can really hone in and control is the good process.

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So our goal is to plan the shot, kind of take all the factors and commit to one

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single shot,

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then we're going to take our time and aim the shot, and then we're going to

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execute

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the shot.

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In this program, or in this video, we're going to talk about that step of

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executing the

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shot, what are the mental factors for giving us the best chance of executing

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the shot over

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the golf ball on the course.

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After we hit it, then it's out of our hands, we're just going to react to the

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shot where

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we either learn from where we messed up, or we're going to ingrain that it was

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a good

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process and a good shot.

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Okay, so golf is simple, but it's not easy.

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When we're executing the swing, one of the big takeaways is to stay sensory.

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What I mean by that is no words, okay.

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The verbal part of your brain is far away from the movement parts of your brain

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, or the

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motor control parts of your brain.

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The motor control parts of your brain do much better with feels and pictures

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and rhythms,

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so imagining the shot, feeling tension, feeling positions, feeling the rhythm,

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but I don't

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want to have a mental checklist as far as like, okay, do the Jackson 5, get the

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elbow

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in front.

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Now, if I want to turn that into a feel of the Jackson 5 with the wipe or the

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elbow in

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front, that can be really good.

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So we have to make sure and be very disciplined to train it so that we are not

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talking to

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ourselves as we're getting ready to hit.

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That's for when we're planning, not for when we're executing.

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The phrase I use is taste the pasta.

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So we got a video where we'll dig into what I mean by that, but basically how

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can you sense

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something like thinking about what a good food would taste like as opposed to

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trying

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to describe it.

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There's some reasons why, but we basically want to be a lot more sensory when

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we're executing

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the shot.

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Now, people always tell me that, well, what do I do if I have multiple swing

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thoughts?

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Like, what if I'm working on my rhythm and I'm working on my release or my

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impact or

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et cetera.

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And I think that's quite common.

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Jack Nicholas, he had five swing thoughts when he won his first major, Ben

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Hogan practiced

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these slow motion swings where he was basically deliberately taking the club

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through each

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phase.

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So I think it can be quite common to have multiple swing thoughts.

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If you have multiple swing thoughts, one thing is to reframe it that it's

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awareness of different

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parts of your body, not a thought.

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Again, staying sensory versus staying verbal.

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I don't want to be reciting a checklist.

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If you hear chatter and talking, then we have to do one of the tricks to kind

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of get your

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mind to quiet so you can just feel what it's going to be like.

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And when you have multiple swing thoughts, not all of them are going to require

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the same

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amount of attention, especially day to day.

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So let's say, going back to that example, maybe you are thinking about your hip

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turn

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and you're thinking about the wipe.

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One day you might have to put 80% of your focus on the arms and the next day it

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might

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be 80% focus on the hips, but you can distribute your attention to give

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yourself the best chance.

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Or the order of the thoughts can matter.

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So one of the things you can practice when you're on the range and working

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through it

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is, okay, when I walk up and I start getting set and I've done my alignment and

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all my

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setup and I'm getting ready, is it better for me to think about the hips first

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and then

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the arm second?

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Or is it better to think about the arms first and then the hip second?

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Probably the last thing you think about will be the strongest memory when you

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're actually

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executing and one of those will be way more dominant than the other.

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Also we want to avoid adding layers of stress to the shot.

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So this goes back to that tiger quote, the shot is the shot.

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We don't want to take away from it.

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We don't want to add extra pressure to it.

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Some of the common thoughts that distract you from just thinking the shot is

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the shot would

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be if during planning you start saying anything similar to these like, oh, this

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is the number

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one handicap hole.

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Well, it doesn't really matter.

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All I have to do is tell me what club I'm going to hit, where am I going to,

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which swing

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am I going to take and where am I going to aim.

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This putt is for birdie, again, it doesn't really matter.

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All I have to do is roll the ball on the line I want at the line I, or on the

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line I want

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at the speed I want.

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If I miss this green, I'll have a hard chip shot.

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Thinking about missing the green is going to give you less likely of a chance

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of success

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or less likely a chance of actually hitting the green.

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Don't hit it in the water.

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I don't mind don't thoughts.

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I know some people hate like, okay, your brain doesn't know don't, and so

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therefore it's

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going to focus on the water.

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But if you use that to refine, don't hit it in the water.

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So I'm going to buffer my aim.

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Now I'm fully committed to this aim that is giving me the best chance of not

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hitting

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it in the water.

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And when I get up to it, I'm not still looking and having distractions about

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the water.

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Then I could use that to my advantage.

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That's the right shot to hit here.

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Many golfers will gravitate towards hitting the right shot versus hitting the

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shot that

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they are most comfortable with.

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And that usually leads to indecision and lack of full commitment.

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Again similar to the number one handicap hole, oh no, these next three holes

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are hard.

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Again, that doesn't really matter.

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I just have one shot in front of me that I'm trying to hit at a time.

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And I'm going to get through these holes one shot at a time.

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I don't have to think about them in a whole group.

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Because OB down the right, that's just going to affect my aim.

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Everyone is watching.

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Yeah, humans don't like to be watched, so that's definitely going to add an

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element

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to it.

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I might have to do an extra breath or contract relax or something to help

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remove the distraction

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and bring my energy level down to baseline.

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But ultimately they don't care.

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Some of them are rooting for me.

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My goal is to block that out and just focus on the shot.

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Don't mess this up again.

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That's a past thinking.

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And not in the present moment thinking about the sensory actions are all

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present moment.

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The verbal actions are usually either forward thinking or past thinking.

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Don't mess this up again.

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Would be thinking about something in the past.

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That's more of a verbal rather than a feel or an image of what I want to do

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right now.

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Some golfers change their swing thought every shot.

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It's really hard to build a repeating pattern when that happens.

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So that would be more like a statement of, oh no, six months ago I was hitting

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it really

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well.

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What did my instructor want me to work on?

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These kind of thoughts pop up in the middle of the round.

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I need to be able to block those out and just get committed to this shot that I

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'm about

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to hit.

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Similar to playing your average shot.

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Well if I hit this perfect I can get there.

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If I'm playing a shot that I have a chance of pulling off one out of 20 times

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then it's

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less than once around that I'm actually going to pull that off.

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I'm probably going to give myself a lot of unneeded stress, unneeded hard

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recovery shots

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and unneeded bogeez doubles or triples.

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And then I really want to do well at this tournament.

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That's one of the tricky ones especially for my high school and college

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students who

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tend to, I remember whenever I had that thought I usually played poorly because

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I was putting

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more effort and more attention and that was taking away from my normal process.

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So if you really want to do well at the tournament then you can try to strateg

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ize and try to

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prepare but ultimately the shot is the shot I don't want to be thinking about

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how important

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the shot is when I'm executing it.

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I just want to use that as a reminder of fully committing to my process.

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Okay so adding to the shot what we just talked about there usually boils down

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to some kind

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of more some mental things that you want to try to confront or work through.

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They usually fall into categories of either a fear of failure, a fear of

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success like

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if I maybe I don't actually believe I'm worthy of getting to that next handicap

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level or

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if I get to that next handicap level I'm not comfortable that I'm going to have

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to give

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up my shots and give people strokes and all those things I've seen that before.

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The fear of embarrassment that usually comes from tying your identity to the

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outcome versus

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just loving the game of golf, loving testing yourself and seeing what it

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reveals when you're

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in the heat of battle.

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So adding to the shot is something that you can investigate either on your own

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or with

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the help of somebody but if you consistently have some of those it might be

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something worth

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exploring.

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Ultimately you want to control what you can control or control the controll

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ables which

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isn't actually a word but it's a great reminder that the process is more of the

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things that

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I can control and the outcome is somewhat out of my hands.

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Once I hit the shot that's it.

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All I can do is learn did I really do a good job with my process and was I

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fully invested

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and committed when I pulled the trigger or did it break down did I lose my

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commitment

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to the shot somewhere during the process that tells me how I can refine.

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So training your focus ability can boil down to a few kind of key factors.

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One is the ability to let feelings come and go.

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So yeah you're going to be over the wall and you're going to have bad thoughts

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or bad

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feelings feeling uncomfortable.

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You don't want to run from them you want to sit with them.

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We got a video on kind of some rough ideas on how to handle emotions if it's if

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you get

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any success with that then I highly recommend looking at people in that

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specialty it can

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be very helpful.

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This is one of the most common I think causes of panic which is if you haven't

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practiced

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which is avoiding revisiting steps.

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So if you've really practiced your routine then you can be committed or you can

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be confident

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in if I go through the steps in the routine it's going to get me to the funnel

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it's going

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to get me to the shot that I want to hit.

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But often times what will happen is people will have to go through it and then

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as they're

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walking up to the ball they second guess if it was the right shot or not.

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Well if I've fully committed to my funnel and to my process then there's really

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no room

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for going backward and so practicing going forward through the process will

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keep you

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in more of a committed state.

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If you allow yourself to jump backward it usually shows a lack of commitment to

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the shot

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or a lack of clarity on the shot and that's a big recipe for extra tension and

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a poor

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swing.

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Flow follows focus that's column where cow is coaches phrase.

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So being very clear on where I want the ball to go versus thinking about all

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the other

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distractions where I might not want it to go that can help with your ability to

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recruit

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the shots especially in those trick or tough moments.

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And then lastly breath training tension training Tom Watson said that I didn't

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learn to win

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until I learned to breathe basically that falls under more of the emotional

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management.

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So those are some of the little like nuances as far as how can I stay in that

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great mental

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space when I'm executing the shot even if people are watching and it does

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happen to

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be on the number one handicap hole in the middle of a tournament something like

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that.

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So real quick primer there as far as how to kind of stay in the flow and get

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the best

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chance of executing a good shot ultimately we want it to be very sensory and

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fully committed.

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If you get those two right you'll usually give yourself the best chance of

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playing one

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of your average shots for that day in the next video we're going to talk about

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the moment

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after you hit the ball or how are you going to react to the shot.