The Stoic Golfer

Stoic philosophy sounds like an advanced college class, not a tool to ​help you perform better on the golf course.  But great coaches like Nick Saban and Pete Carroll use the principles of Stoicism.

And so does Rory McIlroy.  After the 2018 season, McIlroy decided to focus on his mental game, and he turned to The Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday.  In his book, Holiday describes Stoicism as “a tool in the pursuit of self-mastery, perseverance, and wisdom: something one uses to live a great life, rather than some esoteric field of academic inquiry.”

You can use Stoic principles to improve your performance.  I emphasize to my players “control the controllables,” which is a Stoic concept.  In a tournament, this means focus on the things you control, like your warm-up, decision making, anyour process for hitting each shot.  You also must control your response to each shot and prevent emotion from turning one shot into two bad shots.  But, you cannot control the ball after it leaves the clubhead, nor can you control bad bounces, weather, or the performance of your competition.  Those are externals outside of your control.  Focus on the controllables, ignore the externals, and you will play well. 

Holiday created a video titled Ten of the Most Stoic Moments in History to demonstrate the real-life applications of Stoicism.  There are two sport examples - Michael Jordan and Jackie Robinson.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69ZB61AbWHY

Take just one of these lessons to your next tournament and see what happens.