Are you building yourself up or down through golf?
Becoming a great golfer requires a constant leveling up of your mindset to be able to handle the higher levels of competition. As you begin your journey with golf you first just play because it is a fun thing to do, or maybe you enjoy playing with your friends or family. At some point though that journey becomes competitive and this is a beautiful thing if you handle it right. Many don’t and the purpose of this article is to help you along this journey to see things differently and enhance your mindset. You will fail… you will think you have this game completely figured out and then you will be taken back a notch. This is life and this is golf and how you handle these moments is important. You should want to fail because you know that failure eventually leads to success. I don’t want all my players to start competing and win everything. You will not learn as much unless you learn how to handle both the ups and the downs of golf and life. So as you go down this journey please have a mentor who understands the process of becoming a great player and/ or someone that understands the journey towards success at anything in life. If you are constantly feeling judged by those in your circle you likely could be setting yourself up for more failure and an inability to perform because of all these extra comments and pressures. Your circle should include the people that build you up and understand that you are on a journey that they are not on. Some days you will not have your best game and it may be at the time you needed it the most. Did you learn from this day of failure? Who did you talk to after your round? Do you feel better the next day? Do you know how to look at this experience in a positive way?
Try this: The next time you have a bad experience or feel you didn’t perform your best. Wait until later that night or the next day and write down everything about the day. From how you woke up, to what you ate, to the interactions you had with other people that day, to your outlook of the course and conditions. Write it all down and see what you could have improved on. Then talk it out with someone who understands what going down this journey is like. I promise the right one’s will have a lot of positive things to say about the experience and then there should be some very specific things you need to tackle before your next experience. This is how you learn and this is how you build yourself up through golf. Golf is hard sometimes and even the best players fail.
I hope your junior golf journey is the most positive and uplifting life experience as a youth. I hope you become a stronger person via golf to handle other challenges in life. I hope you love the game, your friends, and your family and your coaches along the way. If we all become stronger together we will all succeed. Opportunity is abundant and let’s get after it in 2023!
Thank you for reading!
Chris Smeal, PGA
Founder of Future Champions Golf
chrissmeal@gmail.com
619.339.2377
