When am I going to start hitting the ball good? The definition of a Golfer – a person that goes out on the weekend to have some fun. The reality of the Golfer – “Why am I so inconsistent every time I come out here?” Borrowing the name of a movie that came out a couple of years ago – Reality Bites!

When is it all going to come together for you on the golf course? They key word being “it”. What is getting “it” mean? What is “it”? “Well Marc, ‘it’ is the swing. I want to get the swing so I can be consistent!”

So now we have 2-words to define – “it” and “consistent”. Let’s start with “consistent”. What does this word mean? Now someone says – “Let’s look it up in the dictionary, that’s the smart thing to do.” Yeah, if you want the definition of the word, that would be the place to start, but this is golf we’re speaking about. What is “consistent” golf? The best answer I can give you is – Consistent golf is different things for different people at different skill levels.

For example – What is inconsistent golf for a 4-handicap would be considered very consistent golf for a 14-handicap. How many times have you played with a low handicap golfer that was complaining about how bad they were playing on that particular day (even though they’re only 3 over par after 7-holes) and you said – “Gee, I’d take your bad golf over my good golf any day of the week.”

That said – Are you judging your level of consistency based on your skill level, or are you judging it on what you see the best Players’ in the world doing each week on television? Is your game that bad considering the amount of time you have to play and practice each week?

Let’s make an analogy between Golf and Typing. I picked typing to compare with golf because I doubt this analogy has ever been made before and we like to be ahead of our time with Golf Instruction. How good of a typist are you? Now we get emails all the time – “I didn’t receive a Golf Improvement Weekly this week, did you stop doing them?” So to answer everybody’s email at one time – No, we didn’t stop. I’m just slow on the keyboard. But my typing skills are getting more consistent!

Would it help me to go take a 3-day intensive class on how to type faster? Without a doubt! But if instead you only typed just 1-hour a week – how much improvement would you expect to see each week? Would your typing become much more consistent? Over time you might improve, but the improvement would be almost immeasurable each week if you kept score of how many words per minute you were able to type.

Now the Monkey wrench – imagine that you practiced typing once a week, but each time you practiced typing you tried a new style of typing – meaning 1-week you hovered your fingers over the middle row of keys, then the next week you hovered your fingers over the top row and the next week over the bottom row, etc., etc., etc. How much would your typing improve over that period of time? I’d bet that each week – your words per minute would have gotten worse than your first time! Can you see the analogy that I’m starting to paint?

So what will this Typist start to say to themselves – “When am I going to get it? My typing is so inconsistent – 1-week it’s good and then the next 2-weeks it’s bad. My words per minute is soooo inconsistent!”

In reality, your typing has probably gotten better the more you have done it because you probably stuck with one way of typing. And pretty soon you don’t even have to look at the keys. Your fingers know exactly what they have to do. And you know what? You’re going to make a mstkae (mistake) once in a while and you’ll catch yourself after you make that mistake and correct it (or spell check will remind you). Yet after each mistake you make – do you look at the person next to you and say “I can’t get it. Why am I so inconsistent?” And then the person next to you says – “Well maybe you should flex your wrists a little bit more and loosen up your fingers so that your fingers come down at a 90 degree angle on the home keys and a 45 degree angle on the upper row of keys.” So you say – “Yeah, let me try that.” And then you freeze over the keyboard as you think about it.

Good luck if you have to sit next to someone like that as you type. Yet the Monkeys are listening to that stuff every week at the golf course or driving range or reading Monkey Digest and watching the Monkey Channel.

So when are you going to get “it” on the golf course. “It” never will be there for long. I’m being serious. “It” may be there for only a couple of swings, but “it” will leave you before you even know “it”. How do I know this? Ask Tiger or Annika. Tiger and Annika practice trying to find “it” 7-days a week for over 300-days a year and they continue to do that year after year in the pursuit of trying to feel “it” more often. And that’s why they’re so good. Because they put more into finding “it” in a week than most Golfers put into finding “it” in a year. And the Monkey says – “Well Marc that’s not true. I practice at the range 3 or 4-times a week and while I’m there I hit 4 or 5-buckets of balls.” Can’t you picture someone saying that? What would your answer be to them?

So if there’s no “it” – what should you be practicing? We’ll save that one for another week. But, please don’t ever say “I can’t get it.” Because there’s nothing to get. Just have Fun out there!

Marc Solomon – Your Instructor For Life

Golf Made Simple!