What Are They Thinking?!

Recently, a fairly well known sports psychologist wrote:
"The key to managing these moments [when pressure mounts] is making friends with them
instead of dreading them.

The easiest way to make friends with pressure is to accept your mental anxiety. You say, 'It's quite natural to feel a bit of performance anxiety right now. Of course I'm a little stressed.'

Then, you turn your focus toward the shot. The next shot is the focus, not your anxiety.

By making friends with pressure, and refusing to fight it, you disarm it and bring yourself back to the game."

There is a problem here. This pro is clearly absorbed with only that which goes on mentally in the conscious mind, and unfortunately what is being offered in that regard is hapless, if not hopeless.

Anxiety does not go away because it is noticed or "recognized." Recognition may afford the opportunity to address the matter, but it will not - repeat, will not - make it go away or change the manner in which it affects what is done. And that, it is suggested, "disarms it." We think not.

Recognizing the presence of anxiety is, of course, better than denying its presence, but one will still need to implement a management strategy to deal with it. We especially love the part about focusing on the shot and not on the anxiety. That's like when you are bleeding from a wound, just ignore it and it will go away.

Since you are reading this blog, it should not surprise you to hear us say that management of anxiety in golf, is best done through using a clear key to block the invariable signal produced by the anxiety (recognized or not) which, in turn, effectively postpones any aggravation from it, long enough to hit any golf shot.

That is a lot better than whatever is meant by "mental toughness," which we take as an inference that you can develop enough "scar tissue" by living with anxiety till it won't matter so much. And if you believe that, we have a piece of ocean property in Arizona we want to sell you.