10 Rules for Sustaining Excellence in Golf

I recently shared this post with the Davidson golf team, and I decided to send it to my other students and friends in the game.  The foundation for this post is an article titled 10 Rules for Sustaining Excellence.  https://thegrowtheq.com/10-rules-for-sustaining-excellence/ It is a great piece by Brad Stulberg, the co-author of Peak Performance.  He is one of the best writers today on performance. 

He defines excellence as:

“Excellence is not perfection or winning at all costs. It is a deeply satisfying process of becoming the best performer — and person — you can be. You pursue goals that challenge you, put forth an honest effort, endure highs, lows, and everything in between, and gain respect for yourself and others.  This sort of excellence isn’t just for world-class athletes; it is for all of us. We can certainly find it in sports, but also in the creative arts, medicine, teaching, coaching, science and more.” 

Stulberg’s post originated from a talk he gave to the Detroit Tigers organization about ten core mindsets, skills, and practices for sustaining excellence.  I have taken those principles and applied them to golf.  You will see concepts that have been a focus of our mental skills work, although Stulberg frames them in a unique way.  Here they are: 

1.  Be the best at getting better:

Many players focus on external goals, like winning tournaments or rankings, rather than the path to excellence.  Often, players say: “If I just achieve _____, then I will be happy.”  This is called the arrival fallacy.  The human brain is not designed to arrive, it is designed to strive.  As J. Cole said, “There is beauty in the struggle, ugliness in the success.”

If you focus on the things that you need to do to improve – and try to get just 1% better every day at those things – you will be happier and more likely to achieve those “trophy goals.”

2.  Adopt a process over outcomes mindset:

Keep focused on the process, not the outcome.  In competition, this includes executing what I call the performance funnel for every shot.  The funnel works from broad to narrow.

The elements of the funnel are:  a.  Gather information about the shot – distance, elevation, pin location, etc.;  b.  Find your final target based on that information;  c.  Pick a start line to send your ball to that final target, taking into consideration your shot shape and weather conditions;  d.  Create a picture of the shot you intend to hit;  e.  Feel the swing you must make to match your intention;  f.  Fully trust and fully commit to that intention;  and g.  Fire.

If you keep yourself focused on this performance funnel, you will perform better when it matters.

3.  Focus on consistency over intensity:

I once asked a player whether he would rather shoot 67 – 77 or 72 – 72.  He quickly answered “67 – 77, because tour players shoot low numbers.” 

Most of the time, if you hit it well and putt well, a good score follows.  The challenge is to shoot a quality round when you do not have your best swing or putting stroke.  This is what I call optimal performance.

Small steps taken regularly over time compound for big gains.  The goal is not to shoot 65 every day.  The goal is to shoot 65 on those days when everything lines up right, and to shoot 72 (or whatever your “best” is) on those days when things are a bit off. 

4.  Use behavioral activation:

You do not need to feel good to play well.  Motivation follows action. 

Ken Ravizza, a sports psychologist who worked in MLB for many years, said “Feeling good is overrated.  You have to be comfortable being uncomfortable.” 

On those days when you are tired, or feeling bad, or scared, just go out there and get started.  Do the work.  And if you do that day after day, you will look back and see plenty of good results on those crappy days.

5.  Respond not react:

Many things are out of your control during a round, including the weather, what a competitor shoots, and bad breaks.  Your golf swing is not truly controllable – if you think it is, tell me when you are ready to hit a 7 iron within 10 feet, on demand, in one attempt.    

Viktor Frankl, author of Man’s Search for Meaning, was a holocaust survivor and a psychiatrist.  He wrote:  “Between stimulus and response, there is a space.  In that space, is our power to choose our response.” 

When you hit a tee shot out of bounds or lay the sod over a pitch and it lands in a bunker, you can react with negative emotions or you can create space to respond by taking several box breaths, turning the page, and focusing on the next shot.  You can choose to respond and not react.  Make it a habit to move quickly from that inevitable negative emotional jolt and focus on what you must do to hit the next shot as well as you can.

6.  If you are going to compare, then compare yourself to prior versions of yourself:

Many players rely excessively on validation from other people, like coaches, parents, or their peers.  These players also look to social media to see how others view them and pay close attention to rankings.  These players are suffering from FOPO, or the “fear of other people’s opinions.”

Michael Gervais, who worked as the sports psychologist for the Seattle Seahawks for many years, believes that the fear of other people’s opinion is the number one impediment to human performance.  And, that fear can increase, not decrease, over time.  Gervais said:  “The higher we rise on the career ladder, the more susceptible we are to scrutiny and public opinion—which is why the lives of high performers are rife with fear of people’s opinions.”

The best performers find motivation internally.  Measure your accomplishments by comparing your skills today with your skills last week or last year.  Focus on your own goals and not goals other set for you.  If you do that, you will improve more rapidly, and more important, you will be happier.

7.  Simple does not mean easy (be wary of online gurus):

Most of you do not spend time searching for fixes on Instagram or YouTube.  There is no “best” way to execute a golf shot.  Certainly, there are no secrets.  And there is a lot of bad advice on social media.

Billy Bob Thornton’s character on Landman, Tommy Norris, said:  “She chose the shortcut, and that’s always the longest road.”  Enough said.

8. Diversify your sense of self:

Golf often becomes the centerpiece of a player’s life.  If your game is going well, life is good.  If you are playing poorly, everything else can suffer.

It is great to keep a laser focus on improving your game.  If you merge your self-worth and identity with golf, however, you are jumping on an emotional roller coaster. 

Be intentional about cultivating areas of your life other than golf and recognize that golf is important, but you are not your game or your last score.  You are much more than that.

9.  Remember that fierce self-discipline requires fierce self-kindness:

​Stulberg says:  “If you are going to step into the arena and risk failure, it is important that you ​learn to have your own back​.” 

The game is damn hard.  It is relentless and will beat you down.  Be easy on yourself.    

10. The people around you shape you:

You are playing on a team.  It may be the last time you get to play on a golf team.  Yes, this is an individual sport, but the joy of succeeding as a team is immeasurable.

One of my players struggled with his golf during his last two years of college.  He thought about quitting the team.  Over lunch on Christmas break during his senior year, I told him that in time, he would forget the bad rounds.  I told him what he would remember are the great times he spent with his teammates in practice, at tournaments, and on campus.  He recently told me I was right. 

A huge part of sustaining all the mindsets, skills, and practices outline above is maintaining a good relationship with your teammates and others in your support group.  It is best not to walk the golf road alone.