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Zen practice can either be done on the course or on the range, but the essence of this game is scoring based on your commitment to the process instead of your results. Focus on how well you manage your attention, how well you avoid distractions, and how well you manage your emotions before, during, and after a shot. The most common way to score this game is to give yourself a percentage out of 100, where 100 is a perfect process!
Tags: Practice Strategies, Intermediate
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This game is Zen scoring. So in Zen scoring, instead of counting strokes, you're going
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to count the quality of the process or instead of looking at the quality of shot,
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you're going to look at the quality of the process. So in order to get a hundred percent,
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I have to stay in the moment the entire shot. I can't have any distractions or I can't pay
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attention to any distractions. In Zen philosophy, they'll look at thoughts as almost like clouds
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that enter into your mind or into your consciousness. If you pay attention to them,
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it's almost like having that cloud sit over you until it becomes a thunderstorm. That's kind of
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when you're sitting over the ball and you're like, I'm going to hit this in the water, I'm going
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to hit this in the water, I'm going to hit this in the water and then you probably hit it in the water.
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So what you can practice on the range is if a thought comes, you let it go. If you stay in the moment or
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if you feel like you did a great job with this mental process, then you give yourself a five out of five.
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If you got a little distracted and you kind of, oh, you had to, you know, back off a little bit,
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give yourself a four out of five. If you got up there and you were worried the whole time,
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that's probably a one or maybe even a zero. You can also use this for gaging your pre shot and
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your post shot routine. So sometimes it can be fun to see how good you are at reacting to bad shots.
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So you may get up there intentionally top of ball just to see if you can let the energy go or
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if you can let the anger go right away. Now it's obviously going to be a little bit easier when I
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know I'm going to top of the ball to then react to it different than how it would be on the course.
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But it's still a great way for you to start training, staying positive, staying in the moment
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and kind of committing to one feeling or swing thought. So try Zen practice either on the range
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on the course. It's a great way for you to work on your mental game.
