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Golf, pressure and self doubt

What does a professional golf player have in common with a trader, a programmer, a lawyer in a large firm, a nurse or a teacher? These are occupations where it takes a lot of poise and self confidence to withstand pressure and to be successful. Conversely, when pressure affects your self confidence, your performance can deteriorate quite dramatically.

So, even though you’re not a professional golfer, you may relate to how pressure affects golfers. The following is based on a New York Times article about golf.

In 2004, Thomas Bjorn walked off the course in the middle of his round at the K Club on the European Tour. Bjorn felt suffocated and felt physically unable to continue. He said: “I just saw trouble everywhere. The fairway looked tiny. The green seemed to be the size of the hole. There was nothing but fear.”

This is not an unusual occurrence. The same New York Times article quotes Bob Tway, the 1986 P.G.A. champion as saying: “All of us go through it. There are tons of stories like that.”

Another player, Sean O’Hair, describes the situation as follows: “I think self-doubt, positive self-talk, all those things we try and work on, it’s not so much (that) we forget how to do stuff. It’s just about believing in ourselves.”

The problem does not stem from technical skills (“how to do stuff”). It’s about facing such crippling self-criticism that it is no longer possible to focus on what needs to get done. Thomas Bjorn called it “fighting demons in his head”.

The image is very powerful: if you are a “house divided”, with part of your energy trying to ward off the onslaught of self-criticism, you’re not going to have much energy left to tackle the tasks at hand. Dr. John F. Murray, a sports-performance psychologist quoted in the NY Times article, says: “The pressure is often more painful than somebody punching you in the face.”

Why is that? Tiger Woods, who seems to handle the pressure with effortless grace, says golfers are more affected than pros in other sports because of the pressure inherent in waiting, stewing in your won juices, without being able to react. He said: “If you look at reactionary sports, they really don’t lose it as fast as someone in this sport. It’s very rare that you see somebody like Steve Sax or Chuck Knoblauch get the throwing yips. But in our sport, you see quite a few guys get the yips, not only in the golf swing but a ton of guys with putting and chipping.”

It’s not just that golf doesn’t allow for the physical release of, say, running or throwing or hitting a ball. It’s also that what makes golfers good at what they do also makes them more susceptible to be affected by the pressure. Golfers tend to be introverts.

According to Ted Purdy, the winner of the 2005 Byron Nelson Championship: “I’d say we’re all a little shy, Even Tiger’s introverted. He’s to himself. With every golfer, there is a lot going on in their brains, but you just can’t see it. Inside, we’re churning and burning.”

If you identify with this, I want to remind you of what I said a bit earlier: What makes golfers good at what they do also makes them more susceptible to be affected by the pressure.

“Hitting a golf ball is less than one percent of the time in a round,” Murray said in a telephone interview reported in the article. “Because of that, so much of their time is getting ready for a shot, and there are more mental factors that can distract you or also help you and be a positive. There is more potential for being stressed, but also for being prepared.”

When you see things this way, you know that something is not working, but at least you’re not beating yourself up about it. You’re removing one layer of pressure. You give yourself a break. And you make it a little easier to deal with the situation.

The article describes how, “after walking off the course in Dublin, Bjorn was back competing days later, finishing tied for 16th at the Scottish Open. The next year, he won a European Tour event and carded seven top-10 finishes, including at the 2005 P.G.A. Championship”. At the P.G.A., Bjorn reflected on why he walked off the K Club on the European Tour: “I got out there on a very, very difficult golf course and it just got away from me. I didn’t believe in anything. I didn’t have a shot that I could go to when I was under pressure, and it just ran away from me. I remember a couple of times in my career where I say: ‘This is it. I’m going to take a break away from the game and get myself ready to play again.’ I’ve been very successful doing that.”

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