Golf Flow

already a legend in the world of golf. Jack sat down with me in the locker room of my first Australian Open and encouraged me. When I was anxious at my first Masters, he put his arm around me, and mentioned that he was nervous too. When I was leading the 1986 British Open going into the final day, he pulled up a chair at dinner the night before and offered me some advice. The next day, when I won, he went out of his way to congratulate me. And I’ll never forget standing together in his driveway in the rain talking about golf.
    As did Nicklaus and Norman, Tiger routinely surrounds himself with people who are the best at their craft, and he picks their brains. Not coincidentally, his close friends include Peyton Manning, Michael Jordan, and Wayne Gretzky, some of the best winners in their respective sports of our generation.
    Although trial and error is a large part of learning in golf, some lessons about being a winner are more efficiently learned vicariously. If you study successful people in any area of life, including sport, you will find, as I have, that rather than guarding their secrets, they tend to be remarkably candid about how they reached the top.
    I’m often bewildered when competitive golfers come to me proclaiming that they love the game, that they want to become great, and that they are working hard to accomplish the goal of being great. Then in the next breath they tell me that they’ve never read Jack Nicklaus’ autobiographical book
My Story
(Nicklaus 1997). Here is a book in which Jack Nicklaus takes you through his preparation, thinking, experiences, and strategies as he won the bulk of his major championships. The book offers an opportunity to learn from one of the best to play the game. Would you ignore him if he were to sit next to you and start offering tips? Of course not—he’s Jack Nicklaus!

Emulate the habits of legendary golfers like Jack Nicklaus and those who have achieved great success in other walks of life.

    Leo Mason/Action Plus/Icon SMI
    Even a laid-back player like Bubba Watson spent his rookie year on tour arriving at the golf course at 5 a.m. on Tuesdays on the off chance that Tiger Woods might ask to play a practice round with him. “Hey, he’s the best player in the world,” Watson said. “If I can learn from him, why shouldn’t I try to play with him?” Two years later, he and Tiger had become good friends. They regularly play practice rounds together, and Bubba has indeed learned a lot from the world number 1. Bubba is a student of success. Similarly, Rory McIlroy and Jack Nicklaus have fashioned a friendship, and each time they talk it’s about how to win majors, according to Rory.

Improving Your Skills
    Because being great is a process rather than an isolated event, you should think of your development as a winner as a process. Among the many ways that you are actively pursuing to become a winner, seek out role models of success and study them. Specifically, study their beliefs and attitudes, their strategy, their motivation, and their thoughts on winning.
    First, expand your personal network. Bring as many successful people into your own life as possible and find out what you can learn from them. Observe them. Listen to them. Ask questions. Think about their actions and their words. Greg Norman spent 331 weeks as the number one player in the world and garnered 88 professional wins. Perhaps just as impressive is the business career that he has developed since his days as a competitive golfer (CNBC reported that his net worth is in excess of $250 million). Of the keys to his success, he advised, “And when I reflect on it in later years, I realize how important it is to surround yourself with intelligent, decent people” (Norman 2006, p. 28).
    Second, read books about winning written by and about winners. Those who have been successful in their field are bound to have had a lot of material written about them.
    As a student of competitive excellence and winning, I’ve always enjoyed autobiographies. I believe that we have much to learn from the voices of the champions. Toward that end, I suggest that you either develop a library of your own or develop an organized system of keeping important ideas easily accessible (not a terribly difficult task in this era of digital devices). The fact that you are reading this book tells me that you have some interest in learning how to be successful, at least at golf, but don’t limit your journey to this book or this