All good golfers have short term memories. Do you?

A recent client told me he was having trouble regaining his confidence after hitting a bad shot.

The way to regain your confidence and move on with your game is to have Short Term Memory loss. This means that you can’t remember what just happened. You let go thinking about the miss-hit and approach the next shot with a clear mind. You do this by developing a strategy for recovering from missed shots. Any negative thought about your last bad shot will affect your next shot if you don’t let it go.

Let go of negative judgment  

Judging a shot as good or bad will trigger emotions that go with it. Your subconscious mind will remember emotionally charged situations more than unemotional ones. That is why it is so easy to recall the where, when and how you made a hole-in-one. There is much celebration and emotion. In the same way if you keep thinking about a bad shot with a negative emotion it will be easily triggered to repeat by your subconscious mind that takes everything literally.

Jack Nicklaus was famous for his Short Term Memory loss. When asked about a missed shot in a round, he was not able to remember it.

Tiger Woods released the negative emotions by getting angry and sometimes banging his club on the ground. By doing that he was able to get past the bad shot and move on.

The way you think has an enormous effect on the way you live and the way you play golf. Positive thinking leads to positive playing. 

Develop a short term memory strategy 

1. Get out of your judgmental mind and into the golf game.
2. Clear your mind. The bad shot is in the past.
3. Clear your emotions. Release the frustration with a physical gesture such as exhaling forcibly, or shaking it off by shaking your hand.
4. Believe that no one can be perfect at the game of golf.
5. Have short term memory for any poor shots.
6. Use your long term memory to store the good shots. Get excited and praise yourself for every good shot.
7. Instead of trying to “fix” your swing, take practice swings until you regain your rhythm so you are ready for the next shot.

“Happiness depends more on the inward disposition of mind than on outward circumstances.”   Benjamin Franklin

Play “in the zone” with Joan

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