Instruction
The Mental Game: Go Beyond SMART Goals
In my last article, I discussed how to kick-start your focus and create positive actions through the use of goal setting. Due to the positive reception and requests for more details about SMART goals, I would like to follow it up.
SMART is an acronym that stands for:
Specific — Measurable — Attainable — Realistic — Timely
It’s a fantastic guide for how to write powerful goals that we use daily with all of our students at The Gary Gilchrist Golf Academy.
Goals should be written in a specific manner, as opposed to general. For instance, it’s better to write the goal, “I want to practice my short game” rather than something general such as, “I want to improve.” Saying you want to “improve” gives no specific direction, but focusing on short game provides more detail.
The conscious and unconscious mind is like a missile. If the mind is launched with no parameters, then your thoughts can end up going in any direction, just like a stray missile. If you provide a specific target, however, the launch is all but assured to hit its target. Giving a specific direction for your mind and body to focus on is critical to setting goals.
The goal of “I want to practice my short game” can be taken further by adding a measurable component. Writing “I want to practice an hour a day,” provides even more detail and is a great way to measure your progress. At the end of every day, you can ask yourself, “Did I or did I not practice for an hour today?” You will be able to easily tell if you accomplished your task. On top of this, you can have a calendar at home and check off every day that you practice your short game for an hour, making it easier to track your progress.
Goals can be made both attainable and realistic with two simple questions: Can I? and Will I?
- Can I accomplish this goal? If yes, the goal is attainable.
- Will I accomplish this goal? If yes, the goal is realistic.
If you can answer: “Yes! I will practice my short game an hour a day.” Then your goal is both attainable and realistic.
The final and perhaps most important component to SMART goals is making sure the goal is timely and/or having a timeframe, also known as a deadline. To add a dimension of time to this goal, write something like: “I will practice my short game an hour a day each day this week.” You can also add another time frame and actually schedule a specific time to complete your goal, which I highly recommend! Simply saying from 5:30 p.m. t0 6:30 p.m. will provide a complete direction so your mind knows exactly what you need to do!
- Specific: “I want to practice my short game.”
- Measurable: “I want to practice my short game an hour a day.”
- Attainable: “I can practice my short game an hour a day.”
- Realistic: “I will practice my short game an hour a day.”
- Timely: “I will practice my short game every day this week from 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.”
While SMART guidelines are a great concept for structuring your goals, you can do even more.
Two tips I tell our juniors and pros are:
- Make sure your goals are written and stated positively.
- Make sure your goals are moderately difficult.
Writing a goal like, “I don’t want to get angry during today’s round” is not a positive goal. It keeps the mind focused on what to avoid. When the mind is focused on what to avoid, it makes that idea more likely to happen. Saying or thinking, “Don’t get angry” tells the brain, “get angry, get angry, get angry.” Therefore, the goal must have a different focus, such as: “stay focused” or “keep calm.” This simple shift in language is very powerful for your goals, mindset and success.
Writing a goal, which is easily attainable, does not motivate a golfer. A scratch golfer may write a SMART goal like, “I will shoot 80 or better today.” But, it likely doesn’t make that golfer excited and passionate. As we discussed in one of my previous articles, “Goals are the fuel of greatness,” goals should not only keep you focused, they should also drive you. Therefore, golfers will benefit by making goals that are attainable and realistic and also challenging.
Consistently writing SMART, positive, challenging goals is one of the most sure ways to continue to progress in golf. Get into the habit of doing this weekly, and you will be on your way to personal greatness.
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Instruction
Clement: Laid-off or perfect fade? Across-the-line or perfect draw?
Some call the image on the left laid off, but if you are hitting a fade, this could be a perfect backswing for it! Same for across the line for a draw! Stop racking your brain with perceived mistakes and simply match backswing to shot shape!
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Instruction
The Wedge Guy: The easiest-to-learn golf basic
My golf learning began with this simple fact – if you don’t have a fundamentally sound hold on the golf club, it is practically impossible for your body to execute a fundamentally sound golf swing. I’m still a big believer that the golf swing is much easier to execute if you begin with the proper hold on the club.
As you might imagine, I come into contact with hundreds of golfers of all skill levels. And it is very rare to see a good player with a bad hold on the golf club. There are some exceptions, for sure, but they are very few and very far between, and they typically have beat so many balls with their poor grip that they’ve found a way to work around it.
The reality of biophysics is that the body moves only in certain ways – and the particulars of the way you hold the golf club can totally prevent a sound swing motion that allows the club to release properly through the impact zone. The wonderful thing is that anyone can learn how to put a fundamentally sound hold on the golf club, and you can practice it anywhere your hands are not otherwise engaged, like watching TV or just sitting and relaxing.
Whether you prefer an overlap, interlock or full-finger (not baseball!) grip on the club, the same fundamentals apply. Here are the major grip faults I see most often, in the order of the frequency:
Mis-aligned hands
By this I mean that the palms of the two hands are not parallel to each other. Too many golfers have a weak left hand and strong right, or vice versa. The easiest way to learn how to hold the club with your palms aligned properly is to grip a plain wooden ruler or yardstick. It forces the hands to align properly and shows you how that feels. If you grip and re-grip a yardstick several times, then grip a club, you’ll see that the learning curve is almost immediate.
The position of the grip in the upper/left hand
I also observe many golfers who have the butt of the grip too far into the heel pad of the upper hand (the left hand for right-handed players). It’s amazing how much easier it is to release the club through the ball if even 1/4-1/2″ of the butt is beyond the left heel pad. Try this yourself to see what I mean. Swing the club freely with just your left hand and notice the difference in its release from when you hold it at the end of the grip, versus gripping down even a half inch.
To help you really understand how this works, go to the range and hit shots with your five-iron gripped down a full inch to make the club the same length as your seven-iron. You will probably see an amazing shot shape difference, and likely not see as much distance loss as you would expect.
Too much lower (right) hand on the club
It seems like almost all golfers of 8-10 handicap or higher have the club too far into the palm of the lower hand, because that feels “good” if you are trying to control the path of the clubhead to the ball. But the golf swing is not an effort to hit at the ball – it is a swing of the club. The proper hold on the club has the grip underneath the pad at the base of the fingers. This will likely feel “weak” to you — like you cannot control the club like that. EXACTLY. You should not be trying to control the club with your lower/master hand.
Gripping too tightly
Nearly all golfers hold the club too tightly, which tenses up the forearms and prevents a proper release of the club through impact. In order for the club to move back and through properly, you must feel that the club is controlled by the last three fingers of the upper hand, and the middle two fingers of the lower hand. If you engage your thumbs and forefingers in “holding” the club, the result will almost always be a grip that is too tight. Try this for yourself. Hold the club in your upper hand only, and squeeze firmly with just the last three fingers, with the forefinger and thumb off the club entirely. You have good control, but your forearms are not tense. Then begin to squeeze down with your thumb and forefinger and observe the tensing of the entire forearm. This is the way we are made, so the key to preventing tenseness in the arms is to hold the club very lightly with the “pinchers” — the thumbs and forefingers.
So, those are what I believe are the four fundamentals of a good grip. Anyone can learn them in their home or office very quickly. There is no easier way to improve your ball striking consistency and add distance than giving more attention to the way you hold the golf club.
More from the Wedge Guy
- The Wedge Guy: Golf mastery begins with your wedge game
- The Wedge Guy: Why golf is 20 times harder than brain surgery
- The Wedge Guy: Musings on the golf ball rollback
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Instruction
Clement: Stop ripping off your swing with this drill!
Not the dreaded headcover under the armpit drill! As if your body is defective and can’t function by itself! Have you seen how incredible the human machine is with all the incredible feats of agility all kinds of athletes are accomplishing? You think your body is so defective (the good Lord is laughing his head off at you) that it needs a headcover tucked under the armpit so you can swing like T-Rex?
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Bill Schmedes
Jul 4, 2014 at 2:03 pm
Another great article by Dr. Dan!
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