For those who love playing golf and have been playing it for a while, this article is likely to share a few tricks and tips on how to improve your game.
If you are a beginning golfer or a golfer that needs a bit more practice, you will find that this article will help you improve your game!
Stevie Wilson
Meta: Wondering how to get ahead of other golfers when you’re a newbie? Here are the 5 most important mental skills for novice golfers to learn.
5 Most Important Mental Skills for Novice Golfers
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If you’ve recently started playing golf, you should understand that it’s one of the games where the mental aspect matters just as much as the physical. This is why hitting the driving range, working on your golf fitness in the gym, and eating right is only part of being a successful golfer. The other part is all in your head. You should be working on your mental game just as much as you’re working on your physical game. To save you time and energy, we’ve listed the top 5 mental skills for novice golfers that you should be working on. Pay attention to these skills and you should see your game improve noticeably!
What Counts As a Novice Golfer?
The easiest way to tell if you count as a novice golfer is if you’re playing off of the novice tees—those closest to the hole. You may progress so quickly that you move up a tee after a few months. Or you may still be playing off the novice tees a few years after starting. There’s nothing wrong with either of these situations, as everyone progresses differently according to their goals and the amount of practice they’re able to get in. But every novice golfer who wants to move up to the next tee needs to work consistently… Not only on their golfing skills but on their mental skills as well.
The Top 5 Most Important Mental Skills for Novice Golfers
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If your goal is to move up from those novice tees to the next, slightly further away tees, these are the top 5 most important mental skills you need to master.
Discipline
You’ll never improve significantly if you don’t practice consistently. That means you need to be playing at least a few times a week—preferably splitting your time equally between the putting green, the chipping green, the driving range, and the full course. Consistency requires discipline. You can’t practice haphazardly and expect to improve. If you want to get from the novice tee to the next one, you need to put in some concerted effort. There will be days when you don’t want to go to the range. Some days you’ll struggle through every shot of your practice. The key is pushing through and staying disciplined—showing up is half the battle won!
Adaptability
Golf may seem relaxed, but it’s never predictable! If you want to be successful on the golf course, you need to be able to adapt to changing conditions on the go. How will you react if the calm day suddenly turns windy or you lose a golf ball? You can’t let it unsettle you if you weren’t prepared, or you’ll be in for a bad round! What happens if you discover that you left your favorite driver at home? You can’t just give up your whole round—you need to make a plan and get through it. That’s what adaptability is all about. Learning to make new plans when things aren’t quite going your way. Master this skill, and you’ll never let external issues ruin your game.
Focus
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Let’s be honest. Golf courses are beautiful! But you can’t allow yourself to get so distracted by the spectacular views of new courses that you forget your game. Focus is key if you want to find success in the course. You can marvel at the scenery, but when you’re sizing up to take a shot, your focus needs to be right there—on your grip, your stance, your club placement, and your movement. Distractions can prove fatal to a novice golfer, so learning to focus on what’s important in the moment can help you improve faster.
Willingness to Learn
Nothing trips up a novice golfer quite as much as thinking they know it all! There’s always more to learn, even if you think you’ve got all the shots down. As a novice, you need to be open-minded enough to understand that there’s always a way to improve from where you are right now. Learning things is how progress happens. You learn one thing, get good at it, and then learn something new or better. Want to move from novice to intermediate? Being open to learning from a coach, other golfers, and even YouTube is a must.
Positive Self-Talk
Self-encouragement is an underrated mental skill. Unless you have extremely supportive friends who are with you every time you practice, nobody’s going to talk you through things but yourself! Giving yourself a pep talk when your name isn’t going well could be the one thing that inspires you to do better. Reminding yourself of how far you’ve come can be a huge motivation. This is also the time to remind yourself that every time things aren’t going great, it’s a chance to work on your mental skills!
How Do You Practice Mental Skills?
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The best way to practice your mental skills is to be aware of them while you’re actually on the course or range. Some of these skills, like adapting to conditions and talking yourself through a bit of poor form, can only be practiced at the moment. Whether you’re on the driving range, the putting green, or the full course, be conscious of these skills and practice them where you can. Other things you can do to boost your mental skills include playing chess, doing brain exercises (you can find these online), and learning new skills (like a new language).
Conclusion
How many of the most important mental skills for novice golfers are you good at? We all have some areas that could do with improvement, so I challenge you to work on your mental skills as much as you can. You’ll be surprised at how much a strong mental game can impact your overall golfing skill. You can do all the drills you want and spend hours on the driving range, but if your mind isn’t in the game, you’ll struggle. Get your mental game right, though, and there’ll be no stopping you!
About the Author:
Jordan Fuller is a retired golfer and businessman. When he’s not working on his own game, he’s mentoring young golfers in both their physical and mental games. He also researches and writes golf-related content for his own website, Golf Influence. LA-Story.com would like to thank Jordan Fuller for his very interesting article on Golf. While I am not a golfer at all, I do see the value of Jordan’s tips and tricks on how to improve your game!I know several people who are dying to see this article because Jordan’s experience is really meaningful and his tips will improve YOUR GAME!
Stevie Wilson, LA-Story.com If you have a question, you can email me at stevie.wilson@LA-Story.com
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