Stop telling stories and deal with reality |
Making excuses for any mistakes or outcomes is not a good thing. It’s rare that the excuse is the actual cause of the problem – but some other factor that is beyond our understanding.
Storytelling is the golf equivalent of making excuses. When you start making up reasons why you hit poor shots then you are “storytelling”. “I’m swinging too quickly” or “I lifted my head” are two of the most common ones. Golfers have no shortage of stories they can make up to explain the poor shot.
The problem is they are just stories. They’re not true and have no positive impact on your game. You’ll play better and recover from bad shots if you can accept them for what they are – a bad shot. This is dealing with reality. Dealing with reality can be difficult for some golfers. The idea of a good story lessens the emotional impact of a bad shot a little. It’s like, “I’ve hit a bad shot here, but I know the reason why and that makes it ok”.
Example: I know a golfer that has a story for every shot he hits. The second he plays a poor shot he’ll shout, “Too quick, that one was too quick”. When he finally plays a good one he’ll remark, “Worked it out. That’s better, I swung slower that time and took my time”.
This goes on for hours. It actually gets boring and he’s hard work to play with. Sometimes he wants to get into in-depth discussions about his swing and give a hundred reasons why he can’t play better.
Sadly he hasn’t improved in years, he still tells stories and I don’t think he’s likely to play remarkably anytime soon.
Storytelling distracts us from reality.
We tell ourselves little lies about what happened. It makes us feel better but the long-term results are not good. Dealing with reality is the quickest way to accept what happens and then move on.
Until you can accept reality you’ll struggle with learning and enjoyment and continue to go around in circles. That bloody merry-go-round again!
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