Golf Flow

be such failures at the game of golf. In the interest of good taste, I will avoid including the many creative but harsh expletives that I have heard golfers use in criticizing themselves and their game.
    After you have made a list of 10 or so negative statements, pull out a photograph of a loved one. Lay the photograph next to the list and imagine what it would do to his or her feelings of confidence, self-worth, motivation, and value to hear those things. Would those statements lead your loved one to being his or her best or to becoming fragile and tentative? You should abandon the exercise if it becomes too difficult or painful to get through. Know that you are not alone. None of the golfers I know has ever been able to get through even the second statement. But the point of the exercise is not completion so much as it is to learn the valuable lesson that words matter. I ask my clients, “If these words would have an effect on your loved one, and you wouldn’t say them to him or her, what makes you think they don’t have the same effect on you?”
    They immediately get the lesson.
    The next thing that I do with my golfers is to reframe the experience by having them make a list of positive statements. That is what I want you to do next. Develop a list of energizing, positive, enhancing statements that you can use as go-to touchstones during times of adversity. Rehearse them regularly so that you develop the habit of using positive self-talk in responding to negative whispers.
    As a child, my dad frequently recited the following quotation, which was framed on the wall of our garage:
Watch your thoughts, for they become words. Watch your words, for they become actions. Watch your actions, for they become habits. Watch your habits, for they become character. Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.
    The original source of that famous quote is uncertain, but it speaks to the power that words and language have in shaping our perceptions that ultimately become the lens through which we view the world.
    If you play golf, you will be faced with situations that can reasonably be interpreted as unfortunate. You will sometimes have lapses in concentration, miss the occasional short putt, and have your weaknesses revealed. The way you react in these situations and the things you tell yourself will largely determine how you experience the game going forward.

Chapter 23
Control Your Body
    Regardless of how effectively you might shape your environment on and off the course, you can’t anticipate or control everything that happens around you. And when you are exposed to these sometimes-unpleasant situations, your emotional response and corresponding body reaction can be as significant as or more significant than your cognitions. As far back as 1898, researchers documented that children ran significantly faster when in pairs than when they were alone because of a hypothesized increase in energy that occurs with the presence of others (termed
dynamogism
). Later research has documented that, independent of mastery or ego orientation, the mere presence of an audience, called the audience effect, can change such physiological factors as electrical conductance of the skin, the sharpness of motor skills, muscle tension, and coordination (Jowett and Lavallee 2007). Because many physiological changes are automated, golfers need to learn to manage their bodies in a way that gives them maximum control at all times.
    Research in behavioral laboratories across the nation suggests that the pairing of any stimuli—for example, the presence of a harmless mouse—with something alarming like a siren or a shock of electricity serves to connect the two stimuli. If it happens enough times, simply seeing a mouse is enough to produce the rapid heart rate, elevated blood pressure, and rapid breathing associated with pain and fear.
    What we experience as the emotion of fear is often the aggregate of various chemicals located in particular brain regions that combine with other factors such as heart rate, tension levels, and rapid breathing. At this point distinguishing between physiological arousal and somatic anxiety is important. Arousal refers to the objective changes in the body’s physiology; somatic anxiety has to do with a person’s interpretation of those physiological changes.
    My main point in this chapter is that performing at an elite level requires that you develop the tools to manage both. As we discussed in our section on