Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Let's Talk GOLF MACHINE!

Hey Lag. If you need a caddie, I’ll come!

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Player Profiling

Hi,
I’m interested in hearing from Carey or perhaps from someone who has had their profile done, practical examples of the benefits of being ‘profiled’? I know i have some personality traits that are probably impairing my ability to relax and enjoy the game of golf as well as contributing to a stalled path to improvement (perfectionist and analysing come to mind). Does the adage of ‘know thyself’ enable a golfer to train and play in a more productive and enjoyable frame of mind? Forgive my naivity on this topic.

Thanks

Evan

1. Personality and Style are two different postures, both legit, but with different functions. We humans employ personality in order to gain the endorsement of other people. Style is what we employ when we need for the rubber to meet the road.Personality really does no more than provide us with sociability and that has very little to do with playing the game. Style is our playing platform whether we are aware of that or not.

2. Golf, because it is a self-initiated, self-managed, self-contained activity and is thoroughly at risk in the face of the normal flow of human non-discriminatory behavior, needs Style, (not personality), if it is to be played at one’s best and most effective level.

3. Most players are found to be trying to utilize personality, rather than style, simply because they either do not have access to confirmation of what their style looks like, or because they were not aware of the importance of that knowledge.

4. That means that most of us start out trying to “put new wine into old wineskins,” and that simply does not work very well. Confirming style “matches the skin with what we try to put into it” and gives a clear image for each person to follow.

5.Since we have done more than 40,000 profiles over a 30 year period, and have found less than one/half of one percent of those that were actually approaching the game through their styles, it is quite evident that anyone wishing to “go to max” with the game will need that kind of information.

6. This is no more than an entirely minimal overview, but you can add to that here, if you wish.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Player Profiling

Craig:
Let’s do this:
I’m posting a different form for the responses for you
here.

You will need to print it off , and complete it, uninterrupted, but do it early of a morning and without any conversation with anyone else. Also complete it even before you have time to eat, drink coffee, or shower and shave. Do it spontaneously and if you don’t understand any word therein, don’t look it up, just give it your best impression. Do not second-guess yourself. First impression on everything. You should be able to complete it in five minutes or less. (It’s not unlike standing over a tee shot too long).

Then put your responses through a scanner and send it off to me. Or, barring that, just make me a running list of the numbers of the choices you make, in order – “front” and then “back.”

That will help us either to confirm the original or make any adjustments that show a difference.

Cheers,
Carey

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Player Profiling

Craig:
I have to admit that I am bewildered. Your post has Analyzer written all over it, but the profile you did showed Driver. Drivers would not be so fired with precision, unless they were mismanaged all their lives. So I have to wonder if you think maybe the profile responses you provided originally are more what you thought they should be than what really belongs to you. Either way, it’s not bad, but we may need to make sure of that to which we are giving reference.

Drivers can be analytical, but not in that way you are speaking here. I, myself, have an analytical bent, which is learned, not part of my inborn equipment. But I can only use it for the processes of developing things like clear keys. I can’t use it as part of my equipment for actually playing the game. I have to do that like a Driver.

Golf is so involved in solo, self-initiated activity that the learned personality context just won’t get it to its best level. I will be glad to create a “do-over” for you if you like. I’d be pleased to know what we find there.

When you say, “When a mind requires precision and is fed generalities it switches off,” that is an Analyzer’s comment, not that of a Driver. A Driver would say “Hell that didn’t work, let’s try this,” and do something different. They go for the bottom line and don’t care how they get there.

Let me know. I would like to solve this mystery and I think you would too.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Player Profiling

Stebboko:
Styles got it right. You’ll find it easy on the website.
Cheers,
Carey

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Player Profiling

Carey i was profilled as a strong driver if that is the one and same then so be it.

Trouble i have found is that i can see no communication in my style as you put it…instructors who know your stuff still cannot “do ” my style so it leads me to ask whats the point ?

For all the knowledge i have of golf as an instructor and 30 plus years experience i cannot help me and i have yet to find he who can.

See i was asked a simple question some time ago and i cannot answer it ..a psycologist asked me whats the point why do you do it .

I cannot say for me as that is not me as i am not selfish but at the same time i know it cannot be for others as what i do has no effect on them. so i return to the question.

Whats the point is what i ask before i do anything if i see no point in doing it i dont. simple as that but at the same time i love this game .

If someone tells you you are a swinger and then proceeds to try and make you a hitter … run Quickly…

Craig:
I’m not sure I understand the following and will appreciate your help with that since I want to be as clear as possible:

“Trouble i have found is that i can see no communication in my style as you put it…instructors who know your stuff still cannot “do ” my style so it leads me to ask whats the point ?”

It will help if you can let me know what I said that you are referring to.

I think you may have in mind what I said about using style knowledge in communication. If so, elaborate a little for me if you will.
Thanks,
Carey

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Let's Talk GOLF MACHINE!

Stebboko:
The conventional word out there is that when we reach adolescence, we “rebel” and go our own way. (That’s perhaps an oversimplification, but enough for the point). What I have found is that those choldren whose styles find coopperation especially from parents as they are going through their developmental stages (see Erik Erikson), don’t really “rebel.” They simply make a transition from one stage to another. Those whose parents, usually unwittingly, try to get children to behave the way they want (the parents want, that is) wind up in adolesence, in effect, screaming inwardly, if not outwardly, “Leave me be and let me go back to the way I came in.” In other words, they are not rebelling, but calling for permission to be who they really are. So when the go from being bent out of shape by their environmental circumstances, to being “who they really are,” it appears that they chnage, when they only restore the original. (Where do you suppose Microsoft got the idea foir a “restore” function in the PC world?)

The profiling we do for golf deals primarily with the natural, normal continuum, but we omit, intentionally, the wider elements of the continuum that go from very sub-normal to abnormal in the sense of mentally ill. We leave out the lows and highs, since there is little or no way to deal with that for golf, and it is unnecsssary anyway. Further, if a player applies the automatic principle, even if he is very sick, he could still function with a club in his hand.

You used the expression “reacting to my traits.” I would like to suggest that it sounds more like you simply “responded” to your traits.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Let's Talk GOLF MACHINE!

possibly is but i can say positively that nothing is permanent to a person who seeks improvement continuosly …2 years ago is just that now is a totally different time in my life and priorities have changed …personality traits have a place but you need to realise people are not static and as they grow what was once important is but a flicker now.

If someone tells you you are a swinger and then proceeds to try and make you a hitter … run Quickly…

You are quite right in what you say and so is Styles. However, it is much more complex than short notes can convey, but I’ll try to compress here, subject to questions and needed clarifcations.

There have been persistent (not necessarily consistent) beliefs, studies, impressions, notions in the “Nature Vs. Nurture” issue as long as I can remember and I took my first clinical training in 1950. That discussion (sometimes boiling unnecessarily into argument) has more recently started to lean more toward a balance between the two, since both are in play all the time, unless we take appropriate steps otherwise.

Styles is correct, at least according to more recent research and the 40,000+ profiles, studies and research I have done myself, that we all start with a set of traits that stay with us for life and through which we express ourselves for a lifetime.

Craig is right in that we do alter the way we respond to our environments and appear to others (sometimes also to ourselves, depending on how sharp a grasp we had on self image to begin with). We do have two dimensions going in that respect.

When we profile, the left side of the chart shows, as nearly as possible, based on how well a person knows him/herself, the style traits one brought along from birth (which is the “style” issue that Styles is talking about). The right side shows a fairly current picture of what has happened to the external appearance of those style traits over time and experience (the “change” issue that CraigW refers to, which is cast in what we refer to as “personality.”) Add to that the confusion in a lot of conversation and literature that regularly distorts the meaning of both style and personality.

So there are always two concerns “in play” – Style and Personality. Style is the mainframe through which we actually carry out all sorts of performances. Personality is the face we put forth in order to gain the endorsement of other people. Styke is the engine and personality is ther smoke that comes out of a fired up stack.

Studies all show that we have four dimensions going. 1.There are things about “me” that I know and you don’t. 2. There are things about “me” that you know and I don’t. 3. There are things about “me” that both of us can see. 4.There are things about “me” that neither of us can see.

Profiling will, inevitably it appears, bring about an expansion of all four of those dimensions over time, accounting for what may cause us to sense that we are “different” today from what we were yesterday, and that would not be incorrect, though highly variable among people. What I have seen over the past 50 years or so is that the traits do not change, but the life-expression coming through them may change – for some, more or less than others.

Having been on the clincial staff of a children’s hospital many years ago, and observed many youngsters, I can now detect with reliability, the natural styles they bring with them from birth, as early as four or five days after birth, simply by hearing them cry. Each style has a rather distinctive sound, and later continued observation confirmed that. I doubt it’s necessary to make the point which says that is much too soon for “personality” to be formed, but certainly not too soon to indicate genetically influenced “style.”

The bottom line for golfers is simple. Personality can not bring what we need for the game, since it tends to be either an over-extension or a restriction of our styles, each of which carries negative consequencs in the game (i.e., over-extension tends to show up in over-swinging, coming up on the teos, swaying, loss of balance, chilly-dipping and the like. Restriction tends to come along in things like deceleration in swinging and putting, unfiinished back and forward swings, and excessive tension in body rotation).

Golf needs all that style delivers, since that frees up our naturally given tendencies, for learning, practicing and playing. That reality is what led to the process with the clear key core, that delivers three prominent benefits simultaneously – it opens the door to nothing but style and habit performance, keeps the personality, “over and under,” temporarilty out of the picture and defends against anxiety signals, thus freeing the player to be in his/her most reliable and essential position for each shot. And that only requires a maximum (usually less than) of about 12-13 seconds for each shot transaction.

So, as far as I have been able to see it, we need more nature in the game and be able to subdue (temporarily) the nurture for learning (habit development), practicing (matching style issues using the 32 ball drill method) and shot-making (execution).

Save the Personality for the pub, a few pints and “tales” of the game.

Cheers,
Carey

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Putting a Score Together...

This is good soul searching stuff. Sometimes its hard to be short.

Quite right, Mate, and on top of that it’s very, very hard to see the complete picture, so we lean a lot. This thread represents a theme that’s been “in play,” as long as I’ve been around the game, and if history tells us anything, it’s been there since the game began.

I have a hard time telling if players want to find a solution, or just like to talk about it. Either way is OK, though by themselves, neither will make the whole trip with nothing but consideration for conscious thinking.

I even hesitate to mention it, since it must be that the entire thinking program for us humans (the one that includes comprehension of the non conscious part, too) hasn’t found a place on the “want list.”

In any event, some good stuff here regarding self-talk, though it might help to separate between what we do in pre-shot and what we do over the ball, thought-wise.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Putting

yeah, I’ve tried it and found it works best with a pendulum type swing.

p.s. Carey, just thought I’d let you know that my Thai juniors are getting a bit better with their English. When they are good enough I’d still love you take you up on your offer to profile them.

Hi Spike.
(I’ve been around, but mostly lurking, since there are fewer posts that really give a clear indication of need for mental game stuff. The need is there, but anything I might say would sound like an interruption to the mechanical terms that are most often under discussion. I feel like all I would be doing is repeating over and over, “Don’t forget that there is a mental component or two needing recognition that goes with every mechanical action we can name.”)

Meanwhile, just let me know when you are ready for the next step with the juniors. I’m sure you must be having a blast with them.

Nice to hear from you as well.

clearkeygolf.com

Thanks Carey, I’m hoping around October time frame for the kids.

“Don’t forget that there is a mental component or two needing recognition that goes with every mechanical action we can name.”

Would that be the knowledge of the purpose of the action and how it works?

That’s part of it, though I was entertaining the connection between the body trying to follow whatever command we put in and the tendency to hold that thinking through the shot-making process. That would certainly need knowledge of the purpose and the working force of the action so we do not ask for something that isn’t there. That also begs having some sound habits to follow the command. Otherwise we are giving orders to “soldiers” in the field who are still shaving in the barracks.

The rest has to do with the balance between mind and body which is something we get to through the process, (by design) rather than something we start with as a natural reserve. Left to the latter, most players I know will try to go very heavy on manual, rational approaches.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Putting

yeah, I’ve tried it and found it works best with a pendulum type swing.

p.s. Carey, just thought I’d let you know that my Thai juniors are getting a bit better with their English. When they are good enough I’d still love you take you up on your offer to profile them.

Hi Spike.
(I’ve been around, but mostly lurking, since there are fewer posts that really give a clear indication of need for mental game stuff. The need is there, but anything I might say would sound like an interruption to the mechanical terms that are most often under discussion. I feel like all I would be doing is repeating over and over, “Don’t forget that there is a mental component or two needing recognition that goes with every mechanical action we can name.”)

Meanwhile, just let me know when you are ready for the next step with the juniors. I’m sure you must be having a blast with them.

Nice to hear from you as well.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Putting

Distance control comes form a number of different issues, so you may have to check a number of people and places to narrow the search and solution. Loren may have hit it, but if it does happen to be mechanical, the most likely place to look is at whether you use an “offensive” or “defensive” mental posture when putting.

If you over-extend yourself (“offensive” posture), you get the “broken spring” syndrome and the putt goes too far from over-acceleration. If you restrict yourself (“defensive” posture), you wind up with deceleration and leaving putts short. The remedy is in what I think Loren is referring to, and my approach with other players is to give them a clear key to shut down both offensive and defensive posturing.

You can also give attention to Reverse Pressure in Putting, which is described in my little free putting book, if you think it may be mostly mechanical.

Cheers,
clearkeygolf.com

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Accelerating with all clubs?

A note.
For what it’s worth, and not to take issue with the mechanics mentioned in this thread, but there is a direct correlation that we have found in studying more than five years worth of style profiles, between golfers who tend to restrict the traits in their styles and deceleration in swinging any club in the bag (including a putter). The same correlation exist when a player over-extends his traits, which leads to over swinging, finishing over the left side, coming “over the top,” and taking the club back too far.

That is also related to thinking about the swing while doing it, which is the mark of playing on manual with skills alone.

Those who find their way to the automatic process find a constant acceleration, which is the natural physical action that goes with a normal motion that is unforced.

Our conclusion is that it there is a far better result when matching what Butch says as indicated by “live4golf” – Butch Harmon calls this “effortless power, as opposed to powerless effort.” That’s the automatic way, assuming that you know how to get there.

P.S. Any pendulum picks up momentum of its own accord when in motion. Seems that is acceleration in the norm.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / What do you do?

No problem there! I had my clothes on!

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / What do you do?

Only thing I could conjure on this tread is that obi must either have been terribly bored when he (or she) started it, or recently released from some psychiatric ward for sexually obsessive types.

Although I did, several years ago, run into a couple
making out in a golf cart in the outback of a winding links course in the mountains of Tennessee. At least they said “Hello,” and let me play through.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / What Happened?

Righto, and now go build it in with the 32 ball drill.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / breathing

Interesting thread. Hard to know where to start. Jestset hit one major item with the breathing to dismiss tension. We recommend that as the last thing in pre-shot before starting your clear key, since it will relieve tension. Tension is physiological and needs a physiological release.

Guru got it right as far as I can see (twice). TT and I talked about it, but agreed that it was not really a clear key substitute. That pre-shot breathing function is where it helps most. And Guru was right that the discussion occurred in the early stages of developing the entire process.

Breathing is a normal instinctive function. If you try to use breathing as an artificial aid in a motion, what will happen generally is an over-extension of whatever you are trying to do. (We have satisfactorily demonstrated that if you “grunt at impact,” which is really a sharp exhale, or when you swing your club, you are trying to swing too hard, affecting balance, timing, pace, and rhythm.

If you hold your breath and then exhale in any motion, that motion will become forced. (Try it, it you want to “spit” farther, just suck in a deep breath and hold it, till you let go the spitting function suddenly).That is quite opposite of what the natural design is – which is to allow whatever normal pace and rhythm is for each one of us.

Things like lifting that require extra energy output will find you holding your breath without even thinking about that part. So it you believe you can get away with overswinging, then add that breathing function (said with tongue in cheek).

Ask any pro and they will tell you that swinging at 80% is a lot better than going full tilt. (In fact, if you think 80% what you will likely get is 100, instead of the 120 you’ve been trying to produce.

Thought of one other thing. If you are suddenly frightened, you will “catch” your breath. Perhaps that is an analogy that fits the terror that wanders into shot-making for some, and maybe all on occasion. Think about that one and ask yourself why you would want to grab a breath before swinging. Hope it’s not a terror-stricken deal.

Breathing a natural thing with it’s own rhythm for you and me. Leave it alone. Let it be what it is. Quit thinking about it and simply use your clear key and it will normalize.

Cheers

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Moe Norman

Dear Carey,

Thank you for that. Too many times our perceptions mis-guide our actions and thoughts. One day we will learn….I hope.

Met a guy, retired here in Thailand, who worked at the golf course where Moe Norman practised. He said he Moe had a grip like steel.

He did grip it firmly, as he said to minimize any wrist flip.
Used to say to me “Least number of moving parts…” His arms were not “tight” that I could ever tell. (It is, however, pretty hard to feel a players arms while he’s swinging…what? ho ho).

Sometime, we might productively pursue the issue of grip pressure and see if we can boil it down. When I did the reverse pressure with putting, I found it made no difference whether the grip was tight or loose, so I suspect that different players have different reasons for their way of gripping any club. As I see it, it depends on what the person is trying to accomplish with that pressure. (I do think it can be either too loose or too tight, though).

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Moe Norman

Stop Press “The Dart was last seen with a silly grin on his face humming some tune from the past asking for some more of what the nurse had given him earlier. The press was not exactly sure what the nurse had given him.” hehe.

Sitting here chuckling aloud. Wife wants to know what about.

Don’t know if Moe and Ben knew each other, but would not be surprised if they did. All Moe had to do was show up at the PGA show and he would be surrounded.

The pics above do look similar, but there are others, as well who have that look. As for “Natural Golf,” frankly I see each presentation having variations. I’ll stick with standing at Pine Needles watching Moe hit balls for hours for my impressions, but I really don’t know anyone other than Moe who could teach what he did.

BTW, I hope we will all start to get beyond the “eccentric” label. What Moe demonstrated is what happens to a person who gets a head injury at age 5 that damages his motor speech drive. That person will inevitably develop a symptom that, under pressure, causes a repetition of words and phrases. That symptom, in turn, is called “Perseveration.”

Under those circumstances, a youngster is very likely to be ostracized as being a bit “cracked.” Happened to Moe. Moe’s natural behavior style was “Persuader,” and they are very much people persons. What happens to a people person who is repeatedly made fun of and ostracized is that he either withdraws or exhibits a style that people will notice, as a compensatory move. Moe was actually a mental giant. He wrote very well and organized his thinking in superior fashion. While it is understandable that those who knew him, at whatever distance, may have gathered a peculiar perception. That was not Moe. That was in the eye of beholders.

Most unforgettable person I ever met, and we are the same age.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Best way to a repeatable swing.

Still waiting for someone to reply with an answer to the initial question. How to get a more repeatable swing?

It’s late on the input, but here’s a way.
First get a good instructor like Guru points out and build some effective, working skills under teaching and coaching.

Then create habits from those skills, using the 32 ball drill that maximizes learning that has the capacity to be stored in memory with minimum time and effort.

Then understand and utilize the automatic process (not the “pop” version, but the researched, reliable version).

Those three steps will bring you as close as humanly possible to a repeatable swing.

As the guy in the states who sells suits and trousers says about how he can “make” you look good, “I guarantee it.”

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Confidence problem

Guru and Spike have given you a pretty good start. I’ll add the following reality based “formula.”

Confidence comes from knowledge of what you are doing plus the skill (or preferably, habits) to do it.

Knowledge + skill = confidence.

If your confidence is lacking in experience, then decide which of those two needs the attention and that will jump-start your plan. It may be one or both. There is no alternative that I can come up with on that one.

Topic: Golf Talk / Anyone else fed up with the fairway Nazis?

Sarg, he mean’t that chrisal and his group were more than a hole behind the group in front.

Whilst I hate slow play, I also hate the naziis. The old saying that you should be behind the group in front, not in front of the group behind is solid advice.

One thing I will say is that it always tends to be the same groups that are slow. In our club there is a fourball that loses one and a half to two holes every single week. They never, ever let a group through either. The group in question is full of ‘older’ guys in their 60s and 70s (apologies to users if I am being ageist) who are not fit and run out of steam.

Chrisal I fully expect a competition round to take 4 1/2 hours and don’t mind that, but it is extremely frustrating to be stuck behind people who are not holding their place on the course.

Back in the “good old days” when I was still teaching for PGA, I also had training sessions around the country for course marshals, with a heavy emphasis on “pace of play.”

The problem lies in understanding the default nature of the problem first and then doing something to fix the default. In style language, of the four behavior styles, two are by nature (default) fast paced and two are slow. The rest of that is that the fast paced only make up 30% of the population, though at the time the PGA showed about 80% members of the slower paced two styles – Craftsman and Analyzer- (which is a huge difference – more than one would think – since the PGA only numbered about 26,000 total, and 80% represents a whopping big number in that total).

So the default, without training, has been a consistent application of slow pace, reinforced by example, and that is only ever threatened by the fewer fast paced folks who scream in opposition to the slow. So clubs began training programs and well placed promotionals that would help people move faster (Some clubs provided orientation sessions to new members with that included). Some even had well enough trained starters to be good at putting the faster paced players out first, which set a better pace. But it still boils down to sound training.

I know this is not what this thread is really about, but I continue to believe it to be important, since the % factors in behavior styles have not changed since way before my lifetime. So “slow” will likely continue to be the default until we change it.

BTW, Bobby Jones used to refer to “any 3 hour round” which he clearly took to be the standard. But then he was of the 30% fast paced group.

Topic: Golf Talk / Psyched Up: The Dark Side of Golf

Interesting article, though I’m not quite sure what the “Dark Side” is supposed to be as Grant sees it. To me it is no more or less than either the continuation of, or the return to, golf’s conventional wisdom, which is loaded with myths.

Mention of mental game issues goes, at least, as far back as Grantland Rice in the 1920s. I’ve a notion that there are earlier records than that, but I’m having trouble finding them.

If one believes what was presented in “The Greatest Game,” it is clear that at least Ouimet’s caddie understood what it was about, but it was not related to “conventional wisdom.” It was outside the box – then, and now.

What we do have today is a perpetuation of myths that have arisen about the mental game, with the only thing new being names changed to protect the present prominence of those who, as Grant puts it, have “found a niche.”

To me the mental game is about helping players, not find a niche.

Topic: Ask Golf Guru - Golf Instruction / Golf Books

Don’t mean to be contentious on the first day of the New Year (the second, for those of you Down Under), but maybe it’s time. Let’s get some balance going here. Are all “golf” books only about how to swing a club?

And no, I’m not advertising, just looking for a way to bring resources together.

Cheers, and Happy New Year. Don’t make any resolutions.

Make a Commitment.

Topic: Golf Talk / Treatment for golfers elbow

Hi,

Wife has bad case of golfers elbow inside of right arm (she’s right handed).

Cause is likely technique related, which she’s working on.

In the meantime, has anyone got any tips/recommendations for treatment/remedy?

Thanks, Peter.

You can do a web search either for “golfers elbow,” “tennis elbow” or “tendonitis.” Lots of info there, but you still would be wise to have a physician make an accurate diagnosis before treating it yourself.