Mental Game
Relentless
At the end of the summer, all of the coaches at GPC gather to choose a word or phrase that will serve as inspiration for the upcoming academic year. This year, we chose ‘relentless’ to lead us on our journey. As defined by Merriam-Webster.com, relentless is “the showing or promising no abatement of severity, intensity, strength, or pace : determined, dogged, grim, implacable, unappeasable, u...
Bouncing Back
Of the innumerable statistics kept by the PGA tour, “bounce back” is one that has always piqued my interest as a psychologist. The “bounce back” statistic is a measure of the percentage of holes a golfer scores over par (bogey or worse) and then, on the very next hole, scores under par (birdie or better). Essentially, it is a measure of a golfer’s resilience and ability to rebound fr...
Confidence is King!
You can have the most technically sound swing in the world, but if your mind isn’t right, you’ve got no chance. Being a Clinical Psychologist, I’m clearly biased in my assessment that mental skills override technical ones. Which do you think matters more? Regardless of your personal beliefs, in the field of Sports Psychology, there is one psychological skill that seems to rise above all othe...
The Developmental Power of a Question
One of my favorite things about working at GPC this past year and a half has been the willingness of the people I work with to constantly be asking themselves, “how can I get better?” Not better as a golfer per se, but better as a colleague, a coach, an employee, and even as a person. I have had some amazing conversations about commitment to personal growth and professional development. As a r...
Love and Hate
Why do you play golf? What’s your motive? One of my mentors used to say, “if you truly want to understand a person’s behavior, don’t focus on what they do, rather, pay attention to why they do it”. So I ask you again, why do you play? For fun? To compete? To socialize? For the challenge? To be in nature? For the love of the game? For the approval of others? Regardless of your persona...
