Producing what you fear

The Mental Side of Things
#1

I find it peculiar when I see someone step up to the tee and they already know where their ball is going to go. It might be the course that they play week in and week out, pull out their driver and say to me- Every time I play this hole I hit it in the woods over there pointing down the right side. He addresses the ball gives it a mighty swing and sure enough the ball trails off to the right and you hear a loud hollow thud from the trunk of a maple tree.

I have read that we often produce what we fear which is not a great way to think when we are playing golf. You fear the water on the right, the OB on the left, or even just topping the ball and often times it will be what you end up doing. There could be many reasons that you are doing these things but I think that if you give yourself a chance by not thinking about the negative result it could help.

Try to think about where you WANT to hit the ball. You want to hit the fairway, you do not want to “not hit it in the water”. It can take a while to train your brain to think of the positive outcome especially if you play the hole the same way each time. Stay positive in your mind and your results can follow!

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#2

There was a psychologist on the chasing scratch podcast that basically said our brain doesn’t process “don’t”… so if you think don’t hit it into the woods, your brain hears “hit it into the woods”.

As you said, the positive target is the better one. Pick a target and aim at it.

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#3

A good thing for everyone to track in there “stats” is the negative self-talk. Count how many times you tell yourself “don’t” do something or “why didn’t” after the shot and then make an intentional effort to reduce that number.

#4

I bet there are a ton of people that would have a higher score than their strokes in a round if they did this! haha.

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#5

The phenomenon is called “ideomotor effect”. There’s a lot of great information in a book by Derren Brown called “Tricks of the mind”.

He’s a stage hypnotist and talks about how hypnotism isn’t real, but more an effect of things like these.

I wrote an article about how it relates to golf specifically HERE

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#6

Thanks for the article and sending me down a google black hole on the ideometer effect =)
Very interesting!

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#7

My buddies and I have a running joke where we step on the tee, and we tell each other “whatever you do, DON’T smash your drive down the middle”

That’s one way to get over it. Stare at the spot you want to hit your ball to, then tell yourself “don’t” hit it there

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#8

Brilliant. Your brain doesn’t know don’t. I’m trying this, thanks for this. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it!!!

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#9

Great reverse psychology there! :laughing:

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