Saturday, 19 September 2015

7 Golf Tips to Solidify Your Mental Game

Do you let negativity get to you when playing? If you’re like some of the golfers in our golf instructions sessions, you can remember times when you let your negativity get to you… and it cost you. Many golfers can. That’s because we’ve all done it. Letting negativity prevail is costly in golf. If only we could play better, we could eliminate the negativity.

But eliminating the negativity associated with golf isn’t possible. Golf is hard. That means there’s going to be a lot of negativity involved. When you miss an easy shot, you’re going get frustrated, you’re going to feel disgusted with yourself, maybe even angry. It’s only natural. It’s the agony and the ecstasy of the sport. It’s something we have to live with if we want to play golf.

To play your best, then, you must control both the physical AND the mental sides of your game. Below are 7 ways to solidify your mental game.

1.    Play instinctively—Thinking about your mechanics during your swing is bad. But we all do it. Some of us, however, do it more than others. Here’s a proven golf tip for you: Forget about your grip, your arms, your shoulders, and so on. You can’t think about your swing and swing correctly at the same time. Instead, play instinctively.

2.    Manage negative emotions—you need to manage your negative emotions as much as you need to manage the course—maybe more. It would be nice if we could eliminate all our negative emotions but we can’t. So instead we need to control them as best we can. In other words, you need to forget about the two-footer you missed on the last hole and hone in on the shot you have now.

3.    Control your focus—Thinking about the outcomes of shots only gets you in trouble. It promotes anxiety and anxiety causes tension. Tension can cause you to mis-hit shots. Instead, focus on the things you can control, like your pre-shot routine. It will keep you relaxed.

4.    Trust your body—you want to approach each shot with the belief that your body will correct itself for any mistakes you make. To build self-trust, you need to increase your awareness by working on staying in the moment and by deciding on your mental focus for each shot before swinging.

5.    Manage your attitude—don’t expect to be positive and confident all the time. No one is—at least not in golf. It's too hard a sport. So when you find your confidence slipping away, work hard to get it back. Wallowing in negativity can cost you dozens of strokes and turn good rounds into bad ones.

6.    Stop fighting yourself emotionally —when we try to resist something emotionally, it only makes it worse. In other words, what you resist only persists. When you try to resist negative emotions, which are a form of energy, they only intensify. Instead, accept the fact that you will feel things like fear some of the time while playing golf.

7.    Rehearse success in advance—Use emotional visualization techniques to build confidence. Visualization is the technical term for mentally rehearsing success in advance. See yourself making that tough putt before actually making it. Doing so not only boosts confidence, it banishes negativity—the greatest barrier to playing better golf.

These 7 golf tips are just some of the mental strategies out there. Dozens more exist. While some may work better for you than others, they are all designed to help you combat the negativity that comes along with playing golf.

Since you can’t eliminate negativity completely in golf, your best option is to work hard at controlling it. It’s called managing the mental game. Savvy golfers know that they need to manage both the course AND the mental game to play their best. Managing both well can help you cut strokes from both your average score per round and your golf handicap. For more information about “swing plane best aids” and “golf swing for beginners with drills” please visit our site no1golfresource.com

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