IMAGINE THIS: you have a 9:00 a.m. tee-time and a thunderstorm hits just as you're teeing it up at 8:59. Most people would probably be extremely disappointed. That’s a totally reasonable feeling. But, the Stoics of ancient Greece and Rome would tell us that it’s a waste of time to feel bad. Why? Because we can’t change the weather no matter how much we might want to play. So, why waste time feeling bad about it?
The Early Stoics of ancient Athens would tell us to maintain a tranquil mind. They believed that emotions like anger and fear and even passionate sexual attraction or love of anything arose from “false judgments” and that the “sage” (someone who had achieved moral and intellectual perfection) would choose to not feel these emotions.
The upside of “being stoic” is that it would eliminate a lot of negativity and stress from our lives. The downside is that it might deprive us from fully experiencing the human condition and what it means to be alive — and maybe even make us less human.
But, let’s go with it, and see how it might be applied to help us improve our performance and lower our score on the course.
Early Greek Stoics had a wide range of philosophical ideas, but they’re most famous for their views on mental control. The basic idea is that we should only worry about things we can control. We shouldn’t waste time worrying about anything else, like growing older or inclement weather or even terrible misfortunes, like an terminal illness or the loss of a loved one.
The ultimate goal: a tranquil mind. We can’t control certain events, as the Stoics would tell us, we can only control how we choose to feel about them. It’s our mental state that matters.
At the heart of Stoicism is the notion that we’re responsible for how we feel. We can choose how we respond to good and bad breaks in life — and we can choose how to respond to good and bad breaks on the course.
This idea is so simple you might dismiss it. But, for the Stoics, it was extremely important. What we feel about a situation is a matter of choice under our control. We don’t have to feel angry or disappointed when people hurt or betray us - and we don’t have to feel angry or disappointed when we shank a shot or miss an “easy” three-foot putt.
But, the Stoics go further and say that destructive emotions such as anger and fear damages our reasoning and judgment. And study after study shows that this is true. When we’re angry or frightened, we don’t reason well which damages our judgment and leads us to make to bad decisions.
This can also be applied on the course because if we can always maintain a tranquil mind, we will exercise good judgment and increase our chances of consistently hitting solid shots. A tranquil mind. That’s the Stoics’ key to success. But, how, exactly, is this done?
One way is to not worry about the end result of your swing. After winning the 2014 British Open, Rory McIllory told reporters that he focused on two words — process and spot.
“With my long shots,” he said, “I just wanted to stick to my process and stick to making good decisions, making good swings. The process of making a good swing, if I had any sort of little swing thoughts, just keeping that so I wasn't thinking about the end result, basically.”
And the "spot” was all about putting.
"I was just picking a spot on the green and trying to roll it over my spot," he explained. "I wasn't thinking about holing it. I wasn't thinking about what it would mean or how many further clear it would get me. I just wanted to roll that ball over that spot. If that went in, then great. If it didn't, then I'd try it the next hole.”
McIllory’s mental state that day represents stoicism at its highest and finest level of play. He didn’t worry or even think about the end result of his swing. In other words, he learned not to care — and that’s the whole point of Stoicism, both on and off the course.
So, how can this be applied to golf? Well, here’s a helpful exercise courtesy of the Stoics: The next time you feel frustrated or angry about how you’re playing, take steps to turn those emotions into their opposites.
Force yourself to relax your muscles and slow your rate of breathing. When you do this, your internal state will come to reflect your external state and your destructive emotions will dissipate.
Then, when you have achieved a calm, tranquil mind, tee it high and let it fly! Bottom line: by consistently practicing Stoic mental control techniques over a period of time, you can lower your scores and fundamentally transform how you perform on the course.
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