In my opinion, the biggest obstacle to playing extraordinary golf is self-criticism. Repeatedly, I witness friends and strangers beat themselves up over bad shots and watch their rounds deteriorate as frustration mounts. As any golfer knows, it's easy to do.

It's interesting to watch as others in the foursome try to encourage this golfer to help him remain positive and constructive. However, it rarely works. The only remedy for this golfer is to encourage himself and be the friend to himself that others are being to him.

Being your own best friend is a choice. Decide to be constructive and be gentle with yourself. If you will not be your own unconditional friend, who will be?

As Dan Millman points out in Body Mind Mastery, "if you are playing an opponent and you are also opposing yourself - you are going to be outnumbered."

Millman suggests that we "maintain an attitude of unconditional self-worth, free from self-criticism. You can agree that it is cruel and unnecessary to tell someone else they are stupid, a klutz, to give up, you'll never be any good. If you would never say those things to anyone else, why not pay yourself the same courtesy?... If babies carried around the same tendency towards self-criticism that adults do, they would never learn to walk."

This very advice changed me over a decade ago when I was playing softball. I was always encouraging other teammates after they made a mistake, but continually berated myself for the most minor physical and mental errors. Only after treating myself with the same compassion and respect that I treated others, did my game and enjoyment improve.

Although, being human, I still have bouts of frustration playing this most frustrating game of golf, I've found that my best rounds occur only when I allow myself to make mistakes and remain positive.

Expecting perfection is simply immature. I recently played with a golfer who shot a round of 64 once, but left the course pissed off because he felt he could have played better.

My weekend golf partner set me straight once after I lost my temper after a bad shot by reminding me that I'm not good enough to get that pissed off.

I remembered that wise remark yesterday after getting a little frustrated after ending my round with five 3-putts. That quickly helped me realize that in reality I'd just shot an extraordinary round, coming in with a very respectable 77, despite my 36 putts.

Although we all need to allow ourselves to make mistakes and expect a few of poor shots, I've found that the frequency of those poor shots decreases significantly when you cut yourself some slack and remain open to the possibility of following it up with your best shot. The experience I shared recently about hitting my second shot within 2 feet of the pin from the worst of lies after one of my worst-ever tee shots is a great example.

Labels: Body Mind Mastery, Books, Dan Millman, Disciplines, Self Criticism