We all say it from time to time, but somehow forget it in the course of a round. A while back, I injured a muscle on my left side, which made my golf swing difficult to complete and painful to do. I would stop playing for a while, feel better, then go out to play only to hurt it again, and again.
Finally, I recognized in myself what I would observe and comment upon while watching professional players on television: I was over-swinging! It was easy to see the beauty of their games from a distance, but also how some extra effort might lead to wayward shots. When Tiger left his driver in the bag to win the 2006 British Open, his approach at Royal Liverpool was that of an artist, sculpting shots, playing for positions, and avoiding the demons that urge us to swing harder, to go for the amazing shot, rather than the one we can strike with confidence.
It doesn't matter at what level one plays, or what the stakes, we all experience similar emotional ups and downs. For me, this injury forced me to slow my swing down and, when the course required it of my now reduced length, to move up a tee box. It was the moment in the mirror where I acknowledged that it was not a young man looking back at me.
So, many of us indeed do say it, but my mantra truly has become "fairways and greens" and my scores have been trending downward as a result. In fact, I find myself saying it to myself behind the wheel of my truck, whenever I feel that surge of emotion or adrenalin that would push me to drive faster or to react to someone's bad driving.
We all know the golf game is a reflection of our characters and have always suspected that the work in one arena would benefit us in another. I finally got it. Fairways and greens means to me, slow down, play within myself, stay in play, and especially take the blow-ups out of my life and out of my game! With that philosophy, par happens often, birdie chances increase, bogies are just a shrug of the shoulders, but the big numbers that can ruin a day and beat down one's spirit become as rare as eagles.
