If you have a hundred percent conviction that you know you're going to pull off
that shot, you have the green light by all means, go ahead and
pull that trigger. But if there is any ounce of endecision whatsoever, you
need to fall back to what your true shot pattern is and plan accordingly based
on that. And again we talk about green light, yello light, red
light as well, and so those are our factors too when it comes to,
okay, what club choice or club selection or shot or type of shot
that you should play. You know, one of the things we also talk
about in the book is what are the true things that you can control as
far as internal versus external, And those are all factors too. You have
to take in consideration all the things that are internally driven as well. We
detail that all in the chapter the Moment of Truth playing around and it's super
super helpful when it comes to actually choosing the right shot. This is their
tea box from northwardtoin Hills, Texas. I play at wins Star Golf Club,
Zachervilla, Oklahoma. This is FLF water number nine, How to Get
in the Zone at the Flip of a Switch with authors Bo Watson and Shannon
Shusky. This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights from great
golf minds to help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ. Here's
your host, Fred Green. Oh, we got a two for today,
so I'm gonna start by saying, welcome back to the Golf Swarter podcast.
Shannon, Hey, it's great to be on. Thanks for having me,
Sure and your partner in crime and writing, Bau Watson School of Lifetime Low
Rounds. Bo, It's great to talk to you again. How are you
same here? Fred? Looking forward to it. So, you guys wrote
a book together that is fascinating. I'm enjoying it. In the zone Secrets,
which is a great concept, and in all the podcast interviews that I've
done and really focus on the mental part of golf, you guys have figured
out how just it feels like you synthesized everything that I've ever read or talked
about or written for the podcast and made it accessible in ways that others have
tried but not succeeded. I'm really enjoying the book. Congratulations. Thank you
means yeah. So we're going to talk about various parts of this book,
but Bo, tell me what the motivation was and why you're taking this approach
on it. You know, I was thinking about that just the other day,
Fred, and you know, it's it's actually it's an amazing journey and
just really fast. Like when when I got into this game, I fell
in love. From the very beginning, I had a dream to play on
a PGA tour, had a lot of success in junior golf, and what
was so fascinating was in high school things went south. And the reason why
it went south was because I got so caught up in you know, the
perfect swing and the search for it and trying all the latest tips and all
these things, and unfortunately, none of it really helped because they weren't they
weren't pertaining to me, and I didn't have that filter, and so I
originally thought it was the mental side of the game. And so as a
result, I go down this path and I started consuming all the mental stuff
and none of that helped. And then, as you may have known from
the previous podcast that we've done, unfortunately I stepped away from the game back
in twenty sixteen, shut down my golf school, everything, and it wasn't
until I met Shannon when we finally discovered this process. We call psychodamuscatraining,
which is teaching golfers how to get into the zone out a flip of the
switch that everything changed for me personally. It literally brought me out of retirement,
so to speak. And you know, it's been a fun journey ever
since. But the reason why I was just thinking about this the other day,
really, the reason why we wrote this book is it's kind of like
I wish I had somebody when I was a junior golfer back in high school.
I wish they would have just given me this book because it really would
have changed things for me personally and also in my game. Hmmm, that's
a great question. I would say, if we're talking about are we talking
about in the game? Are we talking about outside the game? Life?
And John I want to talk about them? Oh wow, that's really broad.
No, let's let's keep it to the mental part of golf. You
know it when it comes to the mental side of the game. There are
a lot of authors in the space that I really respect, and I'll just
name a few of them, like doctor Brett McCabe. You know, one
of the classic Barbara Tella. I forget the author's name that wrote the Journey
and what was it called Links of Utopia Golf Sick Journey. That was a
fantastic read, and I mean there's several others, but when it came to
the writing of this book, I don't really know if there's really any inspiration
that we've got because if you really take a deep look at our book,
especially when you get into the heart of psych and musket training, and then
even in the later part of the book, there's nothing like it out there
right now when you really go through all the mental books and I've read,
I would imagine over ninety percent of all mental books into golf space, mainly
because of the search back in high school, but also over the last few
years. You know, we're always learning, always growing. And again,
if you ask any of our readers, especially when the ones that have gone
through the entire book, even our tour players, they are very well versed,
very well educated, and they will tell you this stuff is not in
print anywhere else. Interesting And Shannon, how much time have you spent fine
tuning the mental part of your game? Well, I mean that's where I
had a huge disconnect because of when I say disconnect, I grew up playing
soccer and then oh when I came out of college, I started speed skating.
So those two activities are a disconnect already. Yeah, soccer to speed
skating. Well yeah, well, I mean I always, you know,
as a kid growing up, I went to the rink and skated and stuff
like that. So then I want when I wanted to get into competing after
college, my disconnect was my start was not that fast. But on the
soccer field, I was pretty fast. I was one of the fastest guys
on the team, for example. But then when it comes to my speed
skating. Now, now granted we had twenty two national champions own our speed
skating team, so remember we're going starts. Now, that's perspective, age
levels, and you know, stuff like that too. So still that it
sounds like a lot, which it is a lot, and was. It
is a huge feed that had was a phenomenal team. But the reason why
I say that is because they were the who's who in their their you know,
their age group. But then when we're doing starts, I'm getting last
off the line all the time. And then even at METS, I'm I
just didn't have that great of a start. But then when we're playing around
and I got my shoes on, and where we were just doing sprints across
the floor. I'm beating everybody hands down, like it was fairly easy.
So there, I knew that there was a disconnect, so I had to
That's when I started doing research. I mean, this had been twenty years
ago on the mental side, and it's just growing and growing and growing.
And then you know, it just reminds me I have to practice what I
preach too. On top of that, yeah, right, exactly, I
still compete on the on the bike. I do criterion racing and stuff like
that as well, So I have to practice what I preached, because I
mean, everything's a mental game. If you know, you've heard all the
especially be on this podcast. You've heard so many things. You know,
is it ninety percent mental, ten percent physical? Is it seventy five percent
mental twenty five percent physical? Well, it really depends on the person,
on their level of anxiety, where they're at. But then you know,
on the other hand, you know, why are we spending one hundred percent
of the time on only ten percent twenty five percent of the game? You
know, And then but then the practical side of it, how do you
apply it? How do you do it? You know, and so that
was that was my biggest thing, is I That's why we called it secret
is because a lot of the books you know that we that we've read,
the practical application of it doesn't go into great depth. It's kind of like,
Okay, here's how you do it and stuff, and we wanted to
make it very simple for people to understand. I think you've achieved that.
Let me just say, though, twenty two national championships, that must be
an incredible coaching staff. Well at the time, it was, and we
only had one coach. But I will say this my background is because I
started getting into coaching, I've had one hundred and forty five national champions I've
had twenty World team members, eight World champions, and I've had I've coached
two Olympians and one girl she just retired, but she actually got a bronze
medal in the Olympics. So I mean, it's just congratulations. I've just
been fortunate where I've had. I've had phenomenal athletes and then on top of
that, elite elite athletes. Yeah, I mean the world's elite. That's
really a remarkable stretch. And by the way, it's ninety percent mental and
ten percent mental. I was it no way around all right, nine percent
mental, one percent mechanics. Oh may work, but we spend most of
the time on the mechanics, right, absolutely under Yeah, how did you
guys work together to decide what would be in the book and what wouldn't be
in the book? And actually that's a question that we're going to take after
this break. We'll get back to it with Shannon Shusky and Bo Watson right
after this. Yeah, let's pick that up again, and let's pick apart
the book what you included, because it's not a thin one. There's a
lot of content, a lot of dense content in there, but it's really
I've been reading it like word for word as opposed to glancing over it because
the content is so rich and so strong. Highly recommend this book. Congratulations.
But how did you guys approach this together on and how it worked out?
And you want to start? Yeah, we we actually had a course
that we did for our clients and we wanted to make a practical application for
everybody as well, and then so we basically broke down the course and then
we knew this too. We found because because of writing a book, we
had to make sure that our research was correct and everything, you know,
and then we're going back and we're going through all these different case studies,
and then we're like, oh my god, there's so much new stuff that's
out there as well. Top of it. Man, I need to become,
you know, And so we're learning in even more stuff of what we
were actually already teaching and then combining it together. So it's the way I
like to put it is like the mental game is a jigsaw puzzle, and
we've figured out a lot of ways to be able to put it together where
it creates a great picture for someone actually to perform at their their highest level.
And Bow, what is your perspective? Feel like this is a couple's
therapy, bo, what is your perspective on your approach to this? I
love it. Yeah, that's hilarious. Yeah, we're pretty much like a
couple in the business side of the Yeah. You know, it's so fun,
you know, because you know when it comes to like questions and answers,
I mean, it's verbatim about what I would say. But one thing
I would add to what Shannon shared is like, we're on a mission to
help one hundred thousand golfers or more to shoot their new lifetime low rounds over
the next few years. And one of the biggest ways that we're going to
unlock that is by the writing of this first book that we're going to publish.
We feel so strongly, like I told this possibly off air, but
I want to share here. We have four books that are going to be
coming in the series. It's In his Own Secrets, and then it's Consistent
Golf Secrets, and it's going to be College Golf Secrets and Rode to the
Tour Secrets. But we feel so strongly about this first book over the Consistent
Golf Secrets book, which is eighty percent written and completed, that we know
this is what's going to unlock it much faster for golfers. And we know
that this is going to be the key because we're a firm believer in really
when it comes to people getting better in their games, it's like Shannon shared,
people are going about it by focusing on technique, but the reality is
when you look at the best players in the world, and this is something
that has been so fascinating over the last few years when we've been doing this
research. If you go back to a guy named Alex Morrison. He was
the godfather of what's called mental imagery. And when you go back and you
look at what this guy accomplished, there are people that I'll just I'll bring
it full circle. But he was the first person that wrote the book Better
Golf Without Practice in nineteen forty. Now, he was also the first guy
that was able to study high speed pictures or video of the swing, so
to speak. But what's so fascinating about him is that Henry Pickard, who
also worked with Ben Hogan and Sam Snead, He was a direct disciple of
Alex Morrison. Now, isn't it interesting that Sam Snead and Ben Hogan are
two of the absolute best when people look at as a model for the swing
or just in general. Sam Snead who won all the He's right now title
with Tiger with the most PJA Tour wins in history. But let's let's take
it one step further. Jack Nicholas has been famous for saying a lot of
mental quotes over the years and stuff. But who was his first coach was
Jack Grout? Well? Who did Jack Grout learn his stuff from? It
was Alex Morrison. Now, let's go to the LPGA side of things.
Mickey Wright, who is Hall of Fame worthy, one of the top three
best all time. On the LPGA side of things, her coach Harry Presler.
Who did Harry learn under it was Alex Morrison. So what's happened over
the last few years is people have gone away from one of the biggest things
that most people do. And I'll share this because I'm a big fan of
Barbara Tella and I respect a lot of his work. But when you look
at his book The Golfer's Mind, in chapter two of that book, he
details a very interesting story of how he got to where he is today.
And it was because Sam Snead stood up at a conference that he was given
and Sam basically said, we need to listen to this young man, because
Barbara tell is young at the time. And the reason why he said that
it was because Sam said, I used to go to bed in my best
years of playing, I would go to bed and visualize the perfect round before
it even happened the next day, and I'd wake up feeling great and it
would unfold almost like I saw it before I went to sleep. And what's
so fascinating is Sam got that from Henry who also got that from Alex Morrison.
Wow. And a fast forward in another one of his books, Barbara
Teller and now I love Barbara Tella's Why he Tells Things is phenomenal. But
he shared another example of Sam Snead that one of the things that Sam used
to do, he would go back and fix the bad shots using mental imagery.
And so that's one of the things that we teach in the book about
you know, we get in these negative habit loops and a lot of times
it's a great example. Were working with one of our tour players and what
happened was, as we know, a lot of times, they'll practice for
three days, you know, and then they actually play in the tournament.
Well, come to find out she has a blow up pole in one of
the blow up poles and then turned and then after the round I was talking
to her it come to find out she had hit the same exact shot for
the past four or five days in a row. Oh my, And I
said, all right, I can let's fix that. We did the Sam
Snead approach. Let's go back and fix it you using mental imagery. And
she did, and the next day she birdied that ole, not just that
she actually had one of her best rounds and got back to eleven ounthers.
So that was that was phenomenal, great story bo you were going to keep
going, Yeah, to bring it full circle. When it comes to the
inspiration behind this book, what we're trying to do is go back to the
roots of what really made great players great. And what's been said over the
last few years is people have been going so into the full swing. And
I'm not kno going to full swing. I come from a background of some
amazing gifted coaches in the game, and you know when it comes to morad,
when it comes to stack and tilt, and you know when it comes
to the golf machine. All that I've come from some really great trees of
knowledge, so to speak, and it has its place. But what happens
is, or I should say, what has happened in this game has been
so many people have been called up in the search for the perfect swing that
they forget what's the most important thing, and that is your brain is what
controls your muscles, which actually makes the swing. And so one of the
things in our book that we actually show is how we can use what's called
kinesthetic mental imagery to actually accelerate swing changes. And that's first and foremost,
and there are studies that we we share in the book that actually back that
up. And we've actually seen case studies of our own players, Like we
got numerous case studies of players that have gone through a program that have gained
twenty to twenty five yards on their drives and even through every club in a
bag without us even seeing their really keep going, yeah, what's the you
know. So we talk about this a lot on the show, and it's
like the difference between swing mechanics, working on your swing and playing golf.
There's a huge gap there, absolutely, right. He has so much of
the focus on lessons and with teachers is swing mechanics and your grip and your
position, your you know, PGA position, grip and alignment, and then
the mechanics of your hands and where are they in this and that. But
that's not playing golf. There's a big difference, and so much of the
mental part that we're talking about what you're writing about, and there's stuff that
I want to go in depth in on with you, is that mental aspect
of the game of that that gets in the way that that holds back our
performance. I underfer said, you know, I'm gonna go back to Alex
morri Central for sure, you know again a guy that Henry Pickard said he
had. Henry Pickard said he had one of the absolute best wings he's ever
seen in person. Now saying something okay, but at the same time,
one of the things that Alex shared in his book that really got I guess
you would say one of the biggest success stories that he accomplished was he he
believed in sitting people down and having them rehearse what he called five swing keys
or five Morrison swing keys. And I'll give you a perfect example. It
was comedian lou Lare had never broken ninety before ever in his life, been
playing a game for a long time. And what was so fascinating is he
gave an example of how he sat him down for two weeks in his chair,
had him rehear the five Morrison swing keys. So he's doing nothing but
mental imagery. The next round he goes out and plays, he shoots I
think it was like eighty seven or something like that. And he did all
that without working on a swing physically. He did it all just through mental
imagery. Well taken and accepted. Shannon, you had a response to that.
Yeah, I mean, well, if you look at the the LPGA
or PGA, it's not the swing that wins the tournament, it's the player.
Good point, you know. And I'd even talk with a guy that's
on is on my cycling team that I raced with, who actually played golf
at the college that I went to and a small world. I didn't even
know that at the time, but he actually quit the game and it was
because of the mental aspect and I was like, oh my god, he
and he moved to a whole thing. And so the beautiful thing is about
these it's not just one system. There's a lot of different things that we
put together. Is it that's in the book that really will help the golfer?
Over and over again, Like we've heard people say, you know,
I may have shot my worst round, but I enjoyed it the most.
It was you know what I'm saying. It's like I've never heard that,
but okay, yeah, yeah, the mind But the whole point was that
the mindset is there's a big shift there where they're not carrying the weight of
every hole or a bad shot, and then what happens is you start watching
the score brought a little bit more, drop a little bit more, drop
a little bit more, because they're joined the game, and that's a huge
thing. That's why like what those said. You know, I'm on board
with him when it comes to one hundred thousand golfers. You know, let's
love the game. Well, listen, the person who said that you had
the highest score, shut the highest round of their life and had the best
time. My next question would be how much alcohol did you consume and who
were you with during that round. We're gonna find out that information in this
commercial break, and we'll be running back after this consistent with what's going on
in this book. One of the lines that really jumped off the page,
off the kindle for me was golf is about progress, not perfection. I
absolutely love that line, and we'll be repeating it for a long time.
Let's talk about where that came from, and then we're going to pick on
other parts of the book. I have a whole section that I just want
to focus on one area of this one section and for the rest of our
time together, hopefully, but give me, give me some background on that
one bo Golf is about progress not perfection. Absolutely. You know, Shannon
and I we have a big belief in you're never felling, like, there's
no such thing as felling. You're either learning or you're succeeding. That's really
what it comes down to. And so that's really the biggest thing that we
believe, and we're always learning and we're big, you know, believers in
like the Thomas Edison you know, he didn't find was it two thousand ways?
You know that he felt it was two thousand ways that it didn't work,
That's all it was. And then you just keep learning and keep learning
and keep building off of that, and it's these small incremental changes. You
know, I'm a big Carolina basketball fan, and so I loved Roy Williams.
You know, he won three national championships at Carolina, is one of
the best ever when it comes to the Hall of Fame. But he always
made a comment over the years that that really stuck out to me. He
said, the teams that won the national championships were the ones that played great
defense, the ones that made that extra play, that extra hustle, you
know, always given that extra effort, and those were the teams that made
the difference and so when it comes to the game, it's these small,
little incremental changes, even though they may look small in the surface, but
really when you start compounding and you're adding them up, it just makes a
major, major difference in the overall score but also overall enjoyment of the game.
Yeah, Shannon, you want to comment on that incredible quote. Yeah,
it was about progress. I love it. And a big inspiration as
far as for a lot of people is then the late Kobe Bryant, and
I was watching an interview with him and he was talking about losing and he
he said, what do you what do you get out of losing? And
Kobe looked with a smile of excitement and he goes, it's exciting And you're
like, why is because I learned? I learned more in that, But
he says, but when I win, guess what, I'm still going back
and analyzing it. And that's the thing is being able to going back and
analyzing. And one of the one we're big proponent of, well, first
being transparent with ourselves. Okay, when we're on the golf course, so
what's going and all mentally what's happening and stuff like that, but then journaling
it you know, and journaling can be huge when you're on the golf course
because number one, look, if you hit a bad shot, you can
you can actually journal that. And that's like a brain dump and you're like,
okay, let's start even think about that. Let's not carry it with
us. And so when when it comes about the progress here, here's an
example. We have a client that on the outside, when I first tell
you this, in tournaments, he plays lights out. Now what he's when
he's with his friends, he uh, he doesn't play as well with his
friends whoa but through and so on the outside, as a coach, I'm
going, man, he shows up when competition is going. You know,
he's going to perform and when the pressure is all that's what takes into another
level. But through his journaling, Okay, he made me the wrong person
for that. What I mean is he found out what he was playing with
his friends. He takes greater risks in his game, greater risks. Yeah,
you see what I'm saying. And so that's what I mean. Progress
is what takes it to another whole other level. How can you how can
you learn from you know, your experiences and I believe that you know Jarling
is one little key aspect that could be a golden nugget that could be your
your your ticket to uh to why you know we're not playing at our potential
in certain certain areas of golf. Yeah, when you talk about taking greater
risks around your friends, that sounds like ego gets in no way, right,
absolutely. I mean it's not that I would think that in tournament play
you're you're gonna keep your ego and check a bit more because you have to
play within yourself. But when you're with your buddies, it's like I can
pull this one off. Really. Yeah, absolutely help. Yeah, that's
definitely that. It's really interesting because I'm glad Sheannon brought up the journaling part
because you know, it's so funny. Like over the last few years,
I'm a big fan of Mark Brody, had him on the road to the
Towards Summit of a couple of years ago. Love, absolutely love the strokes
gained data kind of just being able to track and actually get a real answer
to Okay, which area of my game a m I really struggling in.
And I love Scott Falsett's work. He and I are good friends and I
really respect what he's doing in a decade. But you know what's funny because
when it comes to the mental side of game, this is where a lot
of times, when it comes to the mental side game, we're falling short.
There's really no way of actually tracking and measuring and seeing in real time
you know, what people are doing throughout the round. And one of the
cool things that we've done with our scorecard system when it comes to what Brian
Kaine has introduced what's called signal lights, and then we have what's called E
plus R equals O formula and mind mapping, which we talk about book as
well. When we put all that together, we can actually now track and
measure and see in real time where people are in their games and how to
make changes really quickly. It's like when we said earlier about hey, we're
giving you some tools, but also we're not just talking about theory. We're
going to show you how to actually apply this and give you practical tools that
you can take away immediately and go see immediate results in your game. And
that's one of the big things that we really wanted to hit home in the
book itself, where these key takeaways at the end of each chapter so that
people actually are doing the work and then they're almost going to see the work
be fulfilled. Yeah. Another thing that jumped out to me in the book
is the line about staying open to adjusting your game plan, staying open to
your club selection, to adjusting your club selection, staying open to your strategy,
all based on the circumstance, you know, which we had recent conversation
with with Jossander about is that it feels like lots of times people are making
their decisions based on what it says on their rangefinder, you know, and
not a whole lot else. And there's so many other things that you have
to be flexible to make to adjusting those things. Who was it that somebody
wants And it was a big name, one of the great putters. He
was on the show, and I'm blanking his name right now, and I'll
probably blurt it out in a second, but he says, I never take
one club when I walk up to the ball. I always have, you
know, choices, so I can once I get to where the ball is,
I can take everything into consideration before I decide which one I'm going to
hit it. Absolutely, that's so good because a lot of times people will
just take one clove and they're just going to go off of that one yards,
but they're not taking into account all the factors that are taking in place,
like when it comes to win to rain right, where's a whole position.
That's why I believe in tracking your shot patterns and knowing you know what's
your tendency is are, and these are all factors that you have to take
into consideration. But when it comes to the mental side, one of the
big things that we teach our players, and especially our tour players. You
know, one of the golden holes we apply is yes, we want to
know what our shot tendencies or shot patterns are, but we've always given our
tour players the green light if you have a hundred percent conviction going after a
pin, even though from a course strategy standpoint, Scott Fowset wouldn't probably appreciate
this, But even against what Scott would you know, say on the decade
app if you have that one hundred percent conviction that you know you're going to
pull off that shot, you have the green light by all means go ahead
and pull that trigger. But if there is any ounce of endecision whatsoever,
you need to fall back to what your true shot pattern is and plan accordingly
based on that. And so that's that's something else. And again we talk
about green light, yellow light, red light as well, and so those
are our factors too when it comes to, okay, what club choice or
club selection or shot or type of shot that you should play. And you
know, one of the things that we also talk about in the book is
you know, what are the what are the true things that you can control
as far as internal versus external, And those are all factors too. I
mean, you have to take in consideration all the things that are internally driven
as well. And and again we detail that all in the chapter the Moment
of Truth playing around and it's it's super super helpful when it comes to actually
choosing the right shot. Yeah, see anyone response, No by just knocked
it out. Yeah. When it comes to club selection, you know,
steered percent because of where Bo was in the golf world, I had to
learn a little bit different culture, okay. And what I mean is is
because of one of the things that I've learned over time is this, when
it comes down to what the number one reason why people miss putts is because
indecision and so That's why we say, hey, you know, it's about
confidence when it comes down to that shot and you're not really sure, say
it out loud. Let's let's like, let's take the you know, in
the US, we uh, when we're playing basketball, we're playing the game
called horse. And what do you have to do with horse? You call
your shot out, what you're gonna do, You're gonna make it, You're
gonna do this and do that. You know, it ups the level of
your confidence when you actually call your shot out. And my thing is,
who cares who's listening to you? Because a lot of the times it can
become a self fulfilling prophecy, so to speak, when you call your shot
out, because you're approaching that shot with a lot more confidence and stuff.
So that's that's Uh. I just wanted to kind of reiterate what bo was
talking about, you know, following those convictions, it is is one hundred
percent. I would love to be able to call out my shot. But
then my playing partners are like, oh, your ego is getting in the
way. You think you're going to pull that one off. No, I
want to pull that one off. All right, We're gonna take in one
more break fight out what's going on Golf Smarter Mulligans this week and we'll be
back after that. This week on Golf Smarter Mulligans is the first of two
episodes with legendary instructor Jim Hardy. Whenever I tell people that I've been podcasting
for eighteen years, inevitably there are two questions that come up. The first
is how do you make money? And secondly, have you had any famous
people on the show? Well, when it comes to high profile names,
this one could easily be on the mount Rushmore of Golf Smarter guests. Jim
has been listed as one of the top ten teachers in America because he has
developed a reputation for delivering clear, simple ways to understand this complex game,
and he's had some pretty impressive students. I would talk to Tiger about what
shots are natural for his swing to play that would also be repetitive, what
shots are not natural for his swing to play that aren't repetitive, And if
he were desirous of a different kind of ballflight or more repetitive kind of ballflight,
what he would need to do in his choices he would have in his
golf swing to produce those Because there's not only one path that you take,
and that's one of the things about the book is we offer a lot of
solutions for any problem he has in golf, because what one solution might work
for Tom Watson is a totally different solution that might work for Anthony gimm which
is a different solution that might work for Jim Perrik because we build our swings
a little differently. That's episode two hundred and thirty six of Golf Mulligans,
the first of two episodes with Jim Hardy after the release of his book Solid
Contact. Next week will be part two that lasts for more than an hour,
So don't miss this week's episode to get you started. So if you
believe that Golf Smarter provides valuable insights that helps improve your game, then don't
miss the chance to get two episodes each week with Golf Smarter and golf Smarter
Mulligans episodes from archives that revisit the best of Golf Smarter that you can find
on any podcast platform. They're both available for free from wherever you're listening right
now. One of the sections that really grabbed me, that unfortunately it really
grabbed me, was the dangers of negative self talk, and I just loved
how you broke it down. There's so many elements, in so many different
ways that you can have the dangers of self talk. And I'm going to
bounce it ping Polly back between the two of you, and we're going to
start with the first one. Bo, I'm going to throw this one at
you. Self doubt, self doubt. Yeah, you know it's it's really
interesting. In the very beginning of the chapter, we actually share a really
cool story with one of our college golfers who used to have a very very
strong negative self talk and then also a lot of doubt. But what's fascinating
is when we first met with him, we actually shared in real time.
We actually shared the whole story in the book. But well, so fascinating
is we shared with him some of the studies that came out of Harvard.
And what was interesting is that when we speak positively and Shanning you can correct
me on this if I say it wrong, but it was that it would
have a ten percent influence on affect in a certain situation or having an impact
on your game. However, when we speak negation negatively, it had a
forty to seventy times of an effect as far as influence or having an outcome
that we don't necessarily like. So what was interesting is that once we really
started building what we call power talk, which is, yes, it's a
form of positive self talk, but we take it up another level. And
again we detail that in a book and how it's a little bit different.
But what's really really cool is that when we started working with him and we
started showing him some of these things, improving the what we would call some
supports psychologists called the inner experience, and when we started improving what he was
saying to himself and more importantly, who he was listening to. We talked
great detail the chapter before the inner coach versus the inner critic, and really,
when we what happens for most players is they're giving too much credit to
the inner critic and they're not leaning into the inner coach. And when we
got him to start leaning into the under coach and really start paying attention to
what he's saying and more importantly, speaking power talk words over his game,
the results were amazing. As a result, in a few short months after
us working together, he became number two on his college team, and then
he also won the Carolina section Major that had some really really good players playing
in here. There were former PGA Tour players that are in this field,
some really really good high level amateurs, and then also people that have played
at some big, big D one programs like Wake Forest and we're on the
national championship teams for some of these schools, and that's the field that he
was playing up against. He ended up winning that tournament. So it's been
a fun, fun journey watching him and then many of our clients that we've
worked with when it comes to changing what they're seeing and then more importantly,
what they're thinking. Absolutely, yeah, I want to go on to that.
So here's the thing. Can wait control negative thoughts? The answer is
no, we can't control it because if we can control negative thoughts, we
wouldn't have any negative thoughts at all, right, you know, and you
know if you think about it that way. So the negative thought is an
event that goes on in your head and then but it's our response, it's
our ability to respond to that negative thought. It's how do we respond to
it that determines our outcome mentality. Like, for example, if you hit
a bad shot, what happens is I like to It's kind of like you
can carry a mental brick with you. You know, if you're holding a
brick in your hand and you hold it, you know, for you know,
five minutes, it gets kind of heavy. But when you're harder for
ten minutes, twenty minute, it gets heavier and heavier. So if you
keep thinking back to that shot, it's going on. Because remember, you
know, if you have the negative thought, it affects you some way,
somehow forty to seventy times more. So that's why you want to switch that
and to dump it and release it. You know, we talked, we've
heard about the think box, the playbox. Well what about the release box.
We got to get the release box in there to release it. You
know. Yeah, Tiger Woods, you know, his mom taught him.
He said, look, you got ten you got ten steps. You got
to release it. After your ten sets, you can't think about it no
more, and so on and so. But we have to have a release
mechanism to get that negative thought or that or the negative process out. This.
There another thing about words. Let's talk about words. There was a
Rice study that was done and in the Rice study, if you take,
uh, listen, you boil right, boil rice. You put one and
it contained in three different containers. On one level it negative, on the
other one that label it positive, and one put in the glect. And
then for one month on the positive all you do is you speak positive to
that that rice. I know it sounds crazy, but this is true.
You can google it, chirch it. I mean, I was pulllown away
by the story and it comes up everywhere and it's crazy, but it's also
it's actually been a case study that's done. It's not just something that's a
YouTube. Theenom so to speak. And so what happens is when you speak
positive to that rice for one month on the positive one, and then and
then you speak negative like for example, positive, you look great today.
Everybody loves you. You're you're a champion, you're a phenomenal. And then
you go to the negative one. Oh, you're disgusting and everybody hates you.
You're worthless. You know, you're in amount to nothing. Everybody you
know. And then the neglect, you don't even do anything with it.
You just leave it to the side, totally out of the room. When
you go back and you look at the positive rice at the end of the
month, and you open it up, it actually is still white and actually
has an aroma to it, like a sweet smelling aroma to it that I've
noticed. And then on the negative one, it actually has mold in it.
It's all the same rice, it has mold that's protruding all over it.
And then you look at the one that's neglect, and what happens in
neglect is it actually has slight little bits of mold in it, but not
as bad as the negative amazing, and so how much more so then when
you think about the effects of water and stuff that's on your body, then
you know your your body's made up of seventy percent water. So that would
make sense why the statement of the forty the negative words will affect you forty
to seventy percent more some likely somehow to affect you. So that's why we
just need to here's the thing, just eliminate the negative behavior. You know,
and behavior can change things. It's like, for example, I call
it the ABC ABC always behave confidently, take the negative house out of it,
and you know, always BEHAVEE confidently and that's how you win. And
win is a love acronym and is what's important. Now you know that keeps
us in our shoes. When you talk about the release box, it reminds
me of something that Doctor Joe Parents and Golf said on the show once,
and that was when you have a bad shot, when you have a situation
that didn't work for you on the golf course, what you need to do
is pull out your edge of sketch, turn it over and shake it so
it just erases it, and then move only if those of you who remember
the edge of sketch it's still around. One of the other things in the
book that it didn't make me question my faith, but it made me look
at my faith in a unique way. And I don't know why it went
to my faith, but you talked about and you brought it up bo the
three voices that we have in our heads. You have the inner critic,
the inner coach, and your own voice. And that's you know, not
just golf, but so many things in life that those voices control your control
you and I just I love the concept of paying attention to the inner coach
and less attention to the inner critic. Yeah, and Shannon feel free to
jump in here as well. But I will say the fascinating thing about those
three voices is that one. They all sound like it's coming from us,
because it does. It sounds like it's all originated from our own thoughts.
But the reality is, and psychologists have a name for the inner critic,
and they actually do talk a lot about that, and we list out the
different most common ones that the inner critic takes on this voice. But the
most important thing that I really want to hit home with all of that chapter,
and it's is a lot. But the beautiful thing is whether you come
up from it from a spiritual standpoint or you just come from it from you
know, non spiritual at all. The beautiful thing is we give you a
great way of looking at it through the lens of like when you're a kid
and you're watching cartoons. You know, you had the cartoon main character with
an angel on one shoulder, and then you had the little devil on the
other shoulder. And so the fascinating thing is we actually show you how you
can actually look and listen to each But more importantly, we give you ways
to discern which is which. And it really does when you go through that
chapter and we list out all the different comps, Like I guess you'd say
common things that the inner critic will say, but also what the inner coach
will say. You will very quickly start understanding which is your voice or thoughts,
and which is the inner critics voice, and then more importantly, which
is the inner coach's voice. And I'll tell you it is so so important
because I just got done shared just a few moments ago how one of our
college players won this section major and one of the biggest keys to that was
he was able to discern which voice he was listening to and which one he
started leaning to. Powerful. Yeah, really powerful. So I'm half I'm
not going to be able to cover all these points on this book, and
we're going to have to have you guys back on maybe individually, and do
each episode with you. But I'm halfway through the book and I'm about to
take be Gone for a couple of weeks, and so I'm going to be
reading a lot on my kindle, so I'm definitely looking forward to finishing it.
What should I look forward to in the back part of this book,
Well, I will say that there's two chapters I really want to highlight.
Number one is how to Overcome Competition Anxiety, and then the next one is
playing your round the moment of truth and when it comes to that competition anxiety.
I know for a fact you are not going to find another book in
the golf space that go to the level of detail that we actually break down.
And one of the things that I'll just kind of take it there is
that the first part we talk about mind mapping, and it was an amazing
book written by Unwinding Anxiety. I forgot. I think that doctor Judson Brewer,
I believe it was his name, and he introduces a fascinating concept.
But what we did is we took it and we actually applied it to golf
and it's a really powerful exercise that if you actually sit down and you go
through and you map out, like what are the common triggers that people are
experiencing. What happens is we play this game almost like mindlessly and we kind
of go through themotions and a lot of times, like let's say, for
example, you shank a shot, what will happened is very quickly people will
go and you know, beate themselves and they'll do negative self talk and they'll
say, like you know, it's kind of like saying bad dog, bad
dog. Well that's the old behavior and we sometimes feel like we're doing something
good in that situation, but the reality is not doing anything or than reinforcing
the bad behavior and more importantly undermining your confidence. And then even more so,
you're creating a domino effect of bad shots coming down the line and before
you know that, you're having a triple bow gear quite rou u vote on
the scorecard and you're looking back like what in the world just happened. And
what's fascinating is what we teach our players is number One, when we hit
a bad shot, it's not a big deal because we're able to release it
very quickly because we show you how to do this what's called a release trigger.
But even more so, which we haven't even talked about in the Moment
of Truth chapter, which is called the ball reset or ball acronym, and
that's going to be super fascinating, and if we have time, I can
share a few case studies there. But really going back to the anxiety piece,
a lot of times people come in this game and they want to play
it for enjoyment, they want to have fun. But the reality is people
still have life going on outside of golf, and this is a topic that
not many people really go deep on and it's something that we actually share a
few powerful stories in that chapter, like just real, real life, everyday
people and struggles that they're bringing in, but we show them how to overcome
that anxiety and then we actually show them how to not only do it in
their golf game, but also in their life. And so that's one thing
that's super important about that. But if we have time, I can kind
of expand on that ball acronym piece and go for it. All right,
this is something that I'll just kind of give a high level overview of,
But you know, we we Zach Sawnson. He was he's a mental coach
for the Atlanta Braves, and so he had a form of this that he
used and it's one of the big reasons why Atlanta Braves won a twenty twenty
two World Series and my opinion they probably will do it again this year.
They're a beast, yeah, And the big reason why they're so good is
because of what he has shared with them. And so this ball acronym,
we've taken parts of it and we put it on steroids and kind of give
you a high overview is is we have was called a ball acronym, which
is like breathe, affirm, look back, look forward, And all that
simply means is we're showing how to do a hard release trigger that has been
proven by science. I got to give a shout out to doctor Izzy Justice,
and he's one of the neuroscientists that have taken EG scans of golfers and
shown just through the first piece, how to take a golfer from a red
light to a green light within like ten seconds. An amazing thing about this,
why this is so important, is that when we hit like a shank
for an example, it's a surprise, big surprise factor, and it catches
a lot of people off guard, and so immediately they start having these you
know, million thoughts, you know, right after another, like oh my
goodness, what's going on? Why did that just happen? I can't believe
it, you know, my swing plane off? I mean, just everything
just right after another. And so from an EG scan, what happens is
they're in a red light state. And even on the EG scan it shows
they're in a red light state. Okay, but what's so fascinating about this
NERR hack? If they go through the ball acronym, what's going to happen
with the hard release trigger. They're going to get back to a green light
state as far brainwave activity in the brain. And the beautiful thing about this
it is the equivalent as if they had spent twenty minutes in meditation or twenty
minutes of yoga and they're achieving that as far as activity in the brain within
ten seconds. Yeah, the mental aspect, not necessarily the physical relaxation is
the mental aspect. It comes the traffic that's going down in your brain.
But then also to add to that, we actually added another portion of a
study that came out from Stanford with a breathing technique that's with it because you
know, it's always good to take a deep breath because it clears your mind,
but a certain type of breath that goes in there. So but yeah,
and then by the go ahead, sorry everyoneanted to put that one in
there. Thank you. No, that's a huge yeah, And that's the
first letter is to be it's that breathe with the hardly trigger. Followed by
the power talk, which we talked a little bit about, and it's super
important why people need to have what we call a power talk bank, so
to speak, of the posits that they have made ahead of time so they
can draw them out at the time that's appropriate for the situation. And then
what's called a look back is like a history search, and if they have
a note card of all these amazing shots, they can go back relive that
through mental imagery, which we show them in the book how to do this.
And then the beautiful thing is one a player does that when they follow
this ball acronym, going through the breathe, the hard release, doing the
power talk, and then a reliving of an amazing shot they've hit in the
pass, and then we bring them back look forward the last l the ball
acronym. They are pumped up, like we cannot tell you how many instances
within our community, people that are working with us one on one, are
in our semi private coaching programs where they have told us over and over and
I've experienced this personally my own game Shannon has with racing bikes. It's amazing
because we can go into a situation where we don't feel confident, like let's
just be real, like we have a shot that's coming up, we don't
feel good about it. Maybe we just hit a shaky shot in the last
one. But as soon as you do this ball acronym, you go from
a place of almost indecisive, almost like unsure, to now you're excited and
you can't wait to hit this shot. Yeah, big difference, And that
goes long ways when it comes back to what we shared earlier, which is
commitment level to the shot, because when we know there's any ounce of indecision,
there's no chance of playing a good shot. Yeah, absolutely amazing.
Tell us the name of the book, how we can get it, and
your website and social media, how we follow you, contact you a surly.
So the book is called In his Own Secrets, and we're going to
be releasing it on October twenty fourth, and so people will be able to
get that book through our website twenty twenty three. Yep, you got it.
It will be through directly through the website Endzone secrets dot com. Fred.
If you want to share it with your listeners, there will be actually
a specific link for all your listeners. So that's going to be end his
oonne Secrets dot com, slash golf Smarter, and then they'll be able to
go and get the book directly through our website if they want to get the
digital or to kindle version. The big benefit to that is there we're going
to also get as part of that a free mini course which will also unpack
and show them how to implement a lot of these things that we're teaching in
a book very quickly. And then if they're like, hey, I want
something that's physical, I want to be able to read something, no problem.
Will also have another link directly to Amazon where they can actually buy the
book directly through Amazon and social media and website other websites. That's enough.
Yeah, we have what's called our website for the book is amazone Mental Training
dot com. That's Shannon and I on there. And if anybody wants to
work with us directly and they want to see the case studies and you know
who we've worked with, amazing results we're seeing with our clients. You know,
with over three hundred clients we've worked with, we're averaging about six point
seven shots dropped in ninety days or less. And a big reason for that,
Wow, Yeah, it's been a fun journey. The big reason for
that is ultimately everything that we're teaching in a book. So you know,
the last few years, you know, to work with us one on one
or semi private. You know, it's it's about you know, two to
three grand, and we've gone up higher than that. But the beautiful thing
about that is now people are going to be able to have a tangible asset
that has only been available to people who have paid to work with us,
and they're going to have that in a form of book, you know,
under twenty bucks twenty five bucks. So yeah, we're super excited. We're
serious about our mission and so yeah, people want to learn more. In
his Own Mental Training dot Com is our website. The book will be in
his Own Secrets dot com and then slash Golf Smarter and then Instagram. Yeah,
Shan and I are both on Instagram and Facebook if you want to look
up school lifetimele rounds on Instagram, and then Shannon is just his own island.
Shannon is great having you back on the show. Thanks so much for
coming on in good luck with the book. Thanks so much. It's been
awesome love to connect with you. Thank you, and Bo I'm a sucker
for great voices in you. You have one of them. But it's great
to talk to you again. You're always a wealth of information. Thanks so
much, absolutely, thank you. Fred it was a pleasure. Now to
get more information about the book and their programs, go to in the Zone
Secrets dot com, slash golf Smarter. Usually when I have a book to
read for an upcoming interview, I'll read as much as I can. I'm
a slow reader until it's time for the interview. Then most of the time
I won't finish the book since I've had a full conversation with the author.
But I'm finding this book quite compelling and helpful. So even though we recorded
this interview a couple of weeks ago, I'm still absorbing its methods every night.
Again. The book is called In the Zone Secrets How to Get in
the Zone at the Flip of a Switch by Bo Watson and Shannon Sesky.
Get more at Indzone secrets dot com, slash golf Smarter. Now, this
week's ambassador, Eric Sebach, intrigued me because of all the ambassadors we have,
I find it rare that someone lives in one state here in the US
and plays in another, So I had to go to Google Maps to see
exactly where each of those places were. Now. Eric lives just outside of
Fort Worth, Texas, but travels more than seventy miles north to cross over
the border to play at Windstar Golf Club in Thackerville, Oklahoma. Not sure
how often Eric gets to play, but when you listen to his show opening,
it clearly sounds like he was in the car, so I hope he
was on his way to get in eighteen holes. It must be a fabulous
place to play if you're driving that far for your rounds. And I'm curious
how far do you usually drive for your regular course? For me, it's
about fifteen Rooster Run, but I'm going into the next county, which is
the famous winegrower's location of Sonoma County, and Rooster Run has vineyards on one
side and a small airport on the other. Well, beyond telling all your
golf buddies about what you've learned on the podcast, there's another simple way to
become a Golf Smarter Ambassador. Just do as Eric did and write to me
to follow our simple instructions on how to record an episode opening that takes less
than one minute. When you do, you'll have a choice of a free
gift. Eric chose to get a free glove and glove storage compartment from redroostergolf
dot com. Check out today's show notes to see more and links about each
gift you have to choose from, whether it's Tony Manzoni's video of the Lost
Fundamental, a box of Odin X one balls with the golf Smarter logo,
or the goodies from redroostergolf dot com. So write to me with your request
and I'll send you some simple directions and choice of gift. To see and
hear the highlights of our podcast interviews now for both Golf Smarter and golf Smarter
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