"Oh, You Idiot!"

By Jennifer Scott, Certified Clinical Hypnotherapist

Ever say that to yourself after a particularly bad golf shot?

Turns out there are three things really wrong with doing that.

To quote sports psychologist Dr. Bob Rotella, "golf is not a game of perfect." From Tiger Woods on down to you, all golfers make mistakes. The game is too hard to avoid them.

Cursing at yourself has a terrible effect on your confidence, and you need all the confidence you can muster to recover from the mess you just got into. How well you hit the ball has nothing at all to do with your intelligence. In fact, the more you use your brain during your swing -- the more you think --- the worse you will perform. Bobby Jones said, "If I have no swing thoughts at all, then I can play like Bobby Jones."

If you were my client, you'd learn - through undetectable Self-Hypnosis - to substitute calming, neutral thoughts for the tension-causing, lunge-promoting, yip-creating ideas that were popping into your head at the worst possible time: the 1.6 seconds of your golf swing.

Instead of all that, you'd learn to look at the target and burn that image into your consciousness. You'd "see" the target even when looking down at the ball you're about to hit. Just like Bobby Jones, you wouldn't have any swing thoughts at all. So your body could swing as well as possible. The results? Lower scores.

And no more self-flagellation.