Course Correction

 

They say that how you do one thing is how you do everything. I'm not sure that's true. But I do know that how you play golf is a pretty good window into who you really are. Which means faithfully representing your most prominent traits, amplifying good and bad characteristics, and/or bring to the surface your true colors which you may try to hide during your more refined moments.

It is becoming a favorite ice breaker discussion of mine, when I am introduced to someone new by a friend on the golf course and then have the opportunity to meet them down the road and off the course. Which is to let them know what favorable first impressions they made on me when I observed them playing, and in turn to ask what they saw in me. 

I've tried this enough to hear a consensus about what about my playing tells me about me. Which I agree with, and if you know me you too would agree, which tends to be three things:

1. I'm methodical and data-oriented, which on the course means measuring a shot before swinging and recording my results after, and which off the course means keeping a detailed schedule and creating spreadsheets for everything I need to keep track of in my life.

2. Self-improvement is important to me, which golf is the kind of activity that I'll be chasing getting better for the rest of my life, and life is like that too in that there's always something to learn and always something we can get better at.

3. I'm hard on myself to a fault, which can be a positive trait for feeding self-improvement (see above) but is decidedly negative in impairing my ability to be in the moment (because I'm dwelling on past mistakes) and celebrate the good things that I've done.

What a wonderful and terrifying thought, that this thing called golf can be such a stark window into your true self. But, let me pivot now and say it is also a platform for practicing the kind of person you want to be, even if that is very different than the person you are by default.

For example, while I don't allow myself much of a temper, I know it's in there because when I first started playing golf I had a pretty bad attitude much of the time, and it still comes out on occasion. Which is to say that activities can be windows into our souls, but they can also be platforms to bend ourselves away from our worst traits and towards a better version of ourselves. Which is why I love golf so much, for my own self-awareness and also as a way to get to know those I care about in a setting that is conducive to going deeper.