I’m currently quarantining in my home state of Maryland. While on a long walk earlier this afternoon, I passed my home golf course and noticed a similarity between golf and fitness.
I should also note that both fitness and golf have massively impacted my life for the better. Fitness is my career, and golf was a teenage obsession that instilled invaluable lessons, all of which I still benefit from to this day.
In golf, people often refer to the “mental game” which simply means how well somebody can keep the shit in their mind in check.
Golf, although requiring your body to hit the ball across the course, is largely a mental game. Every round and every shot can be made or broken by your thoughts and ability to regulate your emotions.
In fitness, we often overlook the mental component. Yes, fitness is largely about our physical strength, health, and appearance. But without a significant foundation of mental resiliency, we will be sprinting in the wrong direction.
Golf and Fitness are similar in that…
They both involve constant highs and lows on the way to success.
Golf: You can hit one shot so beautifully, with such laser-like precision, that you feel like Tiger Woods in his prime. The very next shot can be so gut-wrenchingly horrifying that you question your existence altogether.
Fitness: One day you look in the mirror and see a leaner, sexier you while managing to hit a personal record on your deadlift later that afternoon. The very next day you may see nothing but a bloated belly staring back at you while feeling unusually fragile on the gym floor.
Golf, fitness, and frankly life, share these constant highs and lows.
An incredibly important lesson that I have learned over the past 10 years in both golf and fitness is this: We must be in control of our emotions and not the other way around.
Have an amazing day? Be grateful. Enjoy it. Journal about it if you’d like. And then keep going.
Have a seemingly terrible day? Acknowledge it. Embrace it. Learn from it. And then keep going.
In golf.
In fitness.
In life.
Our mental game is being tested every day. Every moment.
Build the mental game.
Stay calm, cool, and collected as often as you can and let the difficult moments be fuel for the better ones.
Comments? Questions? Jokes?
Leave em’ below. I’d love to read them. Thanks for stopping by!
