Mind your Language When Playing Golf! - PART 2
If you were standing with a bucket of balls on the range and you were aware that they were all going off to the right of your target, would you not try to correct that by aiming further left, altering your grip or whatever else, so as to give the ball a chance of reaching the correct target? And this, in essence, is all you have to do with your thoughts, all you have to do with your suggestions to yourself - just be mindful of the language you use. This brings me to the fact that people are always happy to attempt to correct something physical, but where it is something mental, they often just give up and say "this is how I am". Our minds aren't static; they aren't unchangeable, any more than your swing is. You can CHOOSE TO CHANGE YOUR THOUGHTS.
And as I have said on many earlier occasions, your thoughts create your emotions and direct your actions. Witness your body language when you say "I can't...", the way your body tenses up and you get jerky; whereas when you say to yourself "I can do this", it is noticeable how fluid and rhythmic your body language is.
Which do you think would be the easier way of shaving 6 shots off your handicap? Spending an hour or so each day practicing you’re putting or choosing to believe that you can putt instead of suggesting to yourself that you can't?
And then, once you have chosen to suggest to yourself that you can putt, you could decide to take the natural power of suggestion one step further, and shave even more shots off your handicap...Studies have decisively shown that the use of visualization in putting is actually more effective than real practice. This is FACT. And you have no doubt read the following Jack Nicklaus quote.
"I never hit a shot, not even in practice, without having a very sharp, in focus picture of it in my head. It's like a color movie. First I see the ball where I want it to finish, nice and white and sitting up high on bright green grass. Then the scene quickly changes and I see the ball going there: its path, trajectory and shape, even its behavior on landing. Then there is a sort of fade out and the next scene shows me making the kind of swing that will turn the previous images into reality."
This is a perfect example of how you could choose to use suggestion on yourself. Jack clearly allows himself to see, hear and feel the shot he's going to play before he plays it. He suggests to himself what he's going to do, precisely and clearly, and then follows that suggestion. In effect, he allows himself the best opportunity to get the ball where he wants it to be. You'll have noticed as well that this routine is one Jack employs both in competitions AND in practice. He wants to give EVERY shot the best chance of success, and so isn't recording "misses" or "miss-hits" whilst in practice.
In the words of James Braid, "For practice to have full value make each swing with the care of a stroke from a tee on medal day". In this way you are giving yourself the best opportunity to hit an optimal number of great shots and thus your mind is recording these "optimal" shots, thereby reinforcing your belief that you can hit that shot the way you want to.
So next time you are tempted to go to the range and hit 100 balls in quick succession, ask yourself will this be productive? Remember that your mind gathers information via your senses, and the senses used in playing golf are those of hearing, seeing and feeling. As you mind your language, you are hearing what you want to hear - "I can" rather than "I can't". As you practice productively, taking "the care of a stroke from a tee on medal day" you will be seeing what you want to see more often - great shots, and you will be feeling more consistently what a great shot feels like. And feel is so very important in golf.
In addition to having greater feel in the mechanics of your shots, you will be feeling more positive in yourself and having more fun. This, of course, is the aim of the game of golf. Having fun. To quote Tiger, "If you are not having fun playing this great game, do something to change your perspective. Having fun leads to great golf and vice versa. And don't forget to take time to smell the roses along the way".
As I asked in PART 1 of this article, why not change the suggestions which you are giving to yourself? You can learn how to change your habitual internal language with the help of hypnosis downloads. Why do you think the professionals use golf hypnosis? They use golf hypnosis because it works; hypnosis downloads can be used to get you to focus, to stay in the now, to see what you really want to see. With hypnosis downloads you can learn to access the more creative part of your mind and visualize your shots better. You can use golf hypnosis downloads to stop generalizing and to enjoy your golf a whole lot more than before, to have fun and to smell the roses along the way.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis cds and hypnosis mp3 downloads.
Mind your Language When Playing Golf! - PART 1
How many times have you heard a particular tune and found yourself humming it the next day? Do you remember how at school you learnt lots of things by hearing or seeing them and then repeating them? How did you learn to walk? Did you see someone else walking and then copy them? If you set out to learn a second language now, today, would you see the words and try to say them, hear the phrases and try to imitate them? How did you learn to play golf? Why do you speak in the accent that you do?
We learn through our senses. We take in information via our senses and then our minds compute that information and make sense of it all. We are, all of us, inherently "suggestible". We learn through mimicking, copying and suggestion. Things seem to "rub off" onto us.
The ability we human beings have to learn in this way is amazing; it is fantastic...so long as we are mimicking, copying and responding to the right suggestions. If we hear something a few times, whether we like it or not, we will tend to find ourselves repeating it; hence sometimes hearing an "annoying" tune in your head. If we do something several times we tend to keep doing that thing, whether we really consciously want to or not; it becomes a habit, smoking, for example, or buying a snickers bar every time you fill up with gas.
Our minds work by generalizing patterns of thought and behavior over context. For example, as a child you learned to recognize a glass as a glass. And then every time you see any type of glass it is recognizable to you as a glass - it has been generalized in your mind over context. Where the generalization is accurate, this ability we have is supremely beneficial; when it is flawed, it can have an extremely debilitating effect...
How many times have you heard yourself say "I can't putt", "I can't get off the tee", or some variation of this theme? Is this generalization accurate? The reality of the situation is that on this particular putt, or this particular tee shot, you used your club to hit the ball and the ball went wherever it went. Full stop! That is what happened; nothing more, nothing less. Why should that mean that you CANT putt (ever) or get off the tee (ever)?
The problem here is that you aren't looking at the reality of the situation, you aren't focusing on the present, you have switched your awareness into a "generalization" mode, and you are creating a self-fulfilling prophesy. You end up not being able to putt or get off the tee because this is what you have suggested to yourself. In the words of Henry Ford "If you think you can you can; and if you think you can't you're right".
If someone else was as critical about your golf as you are, how would you react? If your "mates" stood there saying "you can't putt" would you just stand by and take it? Or would you get a bit defensive and feel that the comment was "unfair" or "unnecessary" to say the very least? It pays to remember that we humans respond to suggestions, be it consciously or subconsciously, and that we can choose to accept or to reject those suggestions. Would you be as critical about your playing partner's swing as you are about your own? Why be so hard on yourself? Why be so very negative and destructive? Why do you actually consciously choose to do something which will destroy your golf game? You know that you are telling yourself you can't do it, so why not change the language you use?
Why not change the suggestions which you are giving to yourself? You can learn how to change your habitual internal language with the help of hypnosis downloads. Why do you think the professionals use golf hypnosis? They use golf hypnosis because it works; hypnosis downloads can be used to get you to focus, to stay in the now, to see what you really want to see. You can use golf hypnosis downloads to stop generalizing and to enjoy your golf a whole lot more than before.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis cds and hypnosis mp3 downloads.
What is Your Golfing Personality?
You play golf from the platform of you, the person. To play golf well you have to learn to play from within certain elements which your own personality dictates
It is important to be "in the now" in order to be fully aware of what we should be aware of whilst on the golf course. Perception involves all the ways of becoming aware of things, people, happenings, or ideas. Once a person has perceived something they will make sense of that "reality" in their own way - they will make a judgment, come to their own conclusion about the "reality" of the situation. Judgment involves all the ways of coming to conclusions about what has been perceived. If people differ systematically in what they perceive and in how they reach conclusions, then it follows that they will differ in levels of motivation, acquisition of skills and in their reactions to situations.
There are many ways in which people differ. On a physical scale, we differ in height, shape, weight, fitness, flexibility, and so on. And our golf swing will differ from one individual to another because of these obvious physical differences. Golf is played from the platform of you, the person, and you are unique, and thus you will have your own unique swing. And yet so many golfers try to imitate someone else's swing which they perceive as perfect; and it probably is perfect...for that other person - it suits their individual characteristics, both physically and psychologically.
On the psychological side, some of us are more relaxed and easy going whilst others are more easily excitable. Some of us do things slowly and deliberately, whilst others do things at great speed. Some of us are very controlled, others not. Again, our golf will reflect such individual characteristics.
Awareness is the first step on the journey to mastery of anything in life. If you are aware of your individual methods of perception and the judgments that ensue, then you can change your reaction to situations, you can change your levels of motivation and also your ability to acquire skills. And golf is a game of reactions, motivation and skill.
If you are aware of reacting as "Mr. Angry", for example, you can do a little work on this and learn to respond in a different way. I can hear you saying "but this is how I am, I always get angry because I care" and so on. But the fact is you don't HAVE to get angry, you CAN learn to react in a different way, and you CAN take control, so long as you WANT to. And so, with a little effort on your part, and maybe a little help from a hypnotherapist or golf psychologist, you can change your reactions to all sorts of situations on the golf course. Wouldn't that be useful?
Not only can you change your reactions, you can raise your levels of motivation, overcome negative thoughts and feelings and take a more direct route along the road to mastery. Once you are aware of your own unique characteristics, you know what skills come naturally to you and what skills require a little attention, and as you attend to these mental skills you will find that you can acquire them in a relatively short space of time. Let's face it; if you are good at your long game but not so good at chipping, you know that if you work on the chipping it will get better. Taking the same approach to your mental skills will work just as effectively. They simply require a little attention on your part.
One particular aspect of personality, however, will always remain pretty constant and unchanged, and to fight this aspect would be a complete waste of time and effort. There is an individual tempo of the personality. There is a natural tempo with which we all perform any deliberately willed action. And if there is one thing which is vital in golf is to have a good rhythm, a good tempo. This does NOT mean that you have to have the same tempo as Tiger, or Ernie or Phil. Your best rhythm, your best tempo, is your OWN natural, instinctive tempo or rhythm. You don’t have to slow your golf swing down or speed it up; simply become AWARE of your natural tendencies and swing the club accordingly.
Ask yourself these two simple questions and you will easily work out your own best golfing tempo:
Do you speak quickly or slowly?
Do you walk quickly or slowly?
Next time you swing your golf club, become aware of what tempo feels best to you. As Gary Player says "There is a definite "feeling" and this feeling is to be developed and looked for". Instead of trying to swing at the speed you think you should, allow yourself to become aware of the feel of your golf swing and discover for yourself what feels best, and you will find that your own most comfortable swing speed, your most comfortable rhythm and tempo, will in fact simply reflect your personality type. By swinging your golf club with the rhythm and tempo of your own personality you will produce your best results on the golf course.
You will never become a master of someone else's golf game, but you can become a master of your own game. To quote Pia Nilsson, "Trust your swing; it is your signature".
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis cds and hypnosis downloads.
Making Golf Childs Play
I am sure that you have heard the following mantra for life - what the mind can perceive, the mind can believe, and the mind can achieve. Have you noticed how true this is? What is in your mind, your thoughts, your memories, and the things you know to be "right" are simply your own perceptions of reality.
You and I could be standing at a junction and you see the traffic light is red and I see it to be green. It all depends upon the angle from which you are observing the lights. It depends on your perspective. You could, of course, choose to walk to the other side and view it from a different angle.
I would like you to take one minute now to carry out a simple task. Wherever you are at this moment in time, take one minute to look around you and notice, really notice, what around you is the colour blue. Notice as many things that you can that contain the color blue. Spend a full minute really noticing everything that is blue...and then read on.
Now, without looking around again, can you list what is the color red? This simple exercise should demonstrate what happens in everybody's mind ALL of the time. Our observations and the judgments which we make of "reality" are shaped and colored by what we are focusing on, by what we expect to see or happen. Thus our perceptions are not only shaped by the angle of observation but also by our expectation, our underlying beliefs – we see what we expect to see. This is true of everything in life, not just golf. But in golf the effect is so very noticeable!
As Kendal McWade, the genius behind Instinctive Golf, states "Golf balls always do what they are told". Now, if you are telling yourself that you are a bad putter, what are you telling the ball to do? Putting can so ably demonstrate the doubt and fear that holds us back in everyday life – emotions which can literally stop us in our tracks.
A child is not born with fear. We learn fear. Sometimes fear is a useful emotion and protects us from danger, but let's face it, a putt shouldn't be fearful. Even Tiger says that when he was a teenager he would hit the first putt so solidly that if it missed it might go five feet past the hole, and would simply rap it back into the hole without worry or fear...but that as he has got older he isn't quite as fearless. Fears can creep into even the strongest of minds...if you allow them to do so.
So how do we remove fear when it's not needed? How can we change state easily and quickly? Awareness is all important. Most of us are not really aware of the thoughts that are running through our minds. And yet your thoughts create your emotions and direct your actions (and the club and the ball). Let us try another exercise. Stop reading and spend the next minute just observing your thoughts. Notice just how many thoughts pass through your mind in one minute.
How many did you have? I bet there were quite a few. How many thoughts do you have in the very short time in which you swing a golf club? Or, more precicely, how many thoughts do you try to have whilst swinging the club? And how many thoughts run through your mind as you are setting up to the ball, be it for a tee shot or for a putt? Five, ten, fifteen?
Once you become aware of these myriad thoughts, it is easy to understand why the outcome of the shot can be unpredictable to say the least. All of those thoughts can be likened to ants running through your mind, each competing for your attention and focus, thereby taking your awareness away from what really matters - the ball and the target. These two things never change; or, at least, they shouldn't change, assuming you have taken the time to select an exact target.
So the question is "how do we stop these ant-like thoughts from crawling all over our minds?" Cast your mind back to when you were a child and the answer should come to you quite easily. Children's emotions change quick as a flash, crying one moment and laughing the next. They change state easily, quickly, INSTANTANEOUSLY; you and I were born with this ability; it's an instinctive part of us. When a child falls over and scrapes their knees, they cry, and what does the parent do? The adult offers a sweet, they DISTRACT their attention away from the knees that are hurting.
The easiest way in which to displace a negative thought (or a selection of negative thoughts which are competing for your attention) is to give your mind something clear and precise to do. Give your mind something meaningful, interesting and relevant to do, something that is fascinating.
Fear is a function of either the past or the future. Fear does not exist if you are focusing on the now. Think about that for a moment. What are you afraid of on the golf course? The putt not rolling in? That's in the future. The memory of the last shot sailing into the trees? That's in the past. Making a fool of yourself? That's in the future.
So when you are approaching a shot on the golf course, allow the "child" in you to surface - the part of you that's fascinated, curious, the part of you that's "in the now". I was playing with a friend the other day and when we reached the green and saw where my ball was I said something to the effect of "oh, wow! This is an interesting one!" My playing partner's response was "is that a new reframe for "Oh Hell?"!
Try it...and notice the effect. Because if you are "in the now" you will be aware of what you need to be aware of - the ball and the target. And if you are sizing up the situation with child-like wonder and fascination, you will be thinking "how can I get this in" or something to that effect, rather than being a puppet manipulated by A-N-Ts (Automatic Negative Thoughts).
Being "in the now" is a wonderful place to be. It allows you to be aware of what is really happening around you, to appreciate each moment for what it is. It allows you to notice when a rhododendron leaf glistens in the sunshine, or water sparkling as if thousands of stars are twinkling on its surface, and so on. It allows you to notice the feel of the fairway beneath your feet, the feel of the club in your hands, to notice the feel of your swing. (And wouldn't greater feel come in handy?) Being in the now allows you to enjoy the time between shots, remaining relaxed and peaceful; it allows you to fully enjoy the game of golf, AND the game of life. If you aren't in the now, you aren't really living.
Another wonderful thing about being in the now is that you reap the rewards immediately - literally in the now. So many people say that it is impossible to change without hard work and effort. What can be hard about noticing what's happening now? What can be hard when you are interested and curious and fascinated? When you are in the now, past beliefs cannot hold you back.
Are you ready to control your golfing destiny? Are you ready to make a commitment to yourself to play golf "in the now"? Are you willing to allow the natural instinct for wonder and fascination to come to the forefront of your mind? Are you ready to enjoy your golf and play better golf than ever before? Because you are the only person who can choose your thoughts. All you have to do is to choose to do so.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis cds and hypnosis mp3 downloads.
Letting Go of Fear in Golf
Golfers experience fear in many different situations, be it when you are standing on the first tee, or holing out on the eighteenth green, or when you are thinking about driving the golf ball inside a line of trees or pitching a ball over water. The golfer's fears can relate to what other people think, or a lack of belief in your own golfing ability. Some of us find that the putter or the wedge takes on the feel of a snake or an octopus in our hands. Some of us freeze; some sweat and some move more quickly...Some stop playing golf.
Golfing fears range from global to specific. You play golf, or any sport, from the platform of you the person. You play your golf within the constraints of your physical body, your mind and your emotions. Mind works on body and body works on mind. How many times have you thought, or said out loud, "I have a mental block with..."? A negative thought creates a blockage in your physiology - this is FACT. Every thought you have has energy, and the neurotransmitters in your brain take the thought information to every cell in your body.
It has been shown that to repress anger for twenty minutes will suppress your immune system for up to eight hours. EIGHT HOURS. So when you are standing over the golf ball, it is worth remembering that just thinking "I'm going to duff this one" actually has the power to trigger off a PHYSIOLOGICAL response, whereby the neurotransmitters in your brain transport that information to your cells...and you know the outcome. It is inevitable - you have programmed your body to duff that shot. And saying "don't" doesn't work either. By this I mean "Don't duff this one" or "don't go in the bunker". In such a case the words are saying "don't go there" but the emotional energy is going DIRECTLY there.
Where there is a conflict between your will power and your imagination your imagination wins. Your mind is exquisitely talented. You can be standing on the tee with four hundred yards of fairway stretching in front of you, with a bunker that's just two by two, and actually manage to get the ball into that bunker just by THINKING "don't go there". Every thought has energy. The level of energy depends on the emotional value attached to the thought. The more intensely you experience the emotion, the more pronounced the result. Your thoughts create your emotions and direct your actions.
Everything starts with a thought. And you can choose your thoughts, although you may not have realized this. It always amazes me how many people acknowledge that they have a MENTAL block with putting, or chipping or their driver, and yet proceed to tackle the problem from a physical perspective - either buying a new club, consulting a different coach, or just standing hitting ball after ball on the practice range - rather than asking themselves how they could change their thinking. And as Einstein pointed out, if you keep on doing the same things over and over again, you can hardly expect the results to change. The fact is, if you have a mental block all you have to do is to explore your thoughts and choose to change them.
What I suggest to successful golfers, and what works for them, is to develop as many mental skills as you have shots. In your mind now, count the number of clubs in your golf bag and the different types of shot you can hit with each one...just make a quick calculation and you will realize how many mental skills in golf there are that you can choose to learn. As you practice your mental golf skills you get better at them.
If you are building strength in the gym, the number of repetitions and the weights you use will determine the result. If you are learning a new shot in golf the number of times you practice it will determine its effectiveness and consistency. The same applies with the acquisition of mental skills for golf. To go to a hypnotherapist or golf psychologist and then not practice the skills decided upon is like having your golf lesson and never practicing. And I'm sure you have met as many people as me who say "that didn't work", when the reality is they didn't give it a chance to work. The teacher can only ever be as good as the student. The teacher can only guide, the student learns.
So many people simply say "but I can't do it", or some equivalent negative. And if you think you can't, you can't. You don't even get past go. But if you are willing to approach the situation from a different perspective...a whole new golf game can emerge for you.
It is well known that children "have minds like sponges", that they find it easier to learn and that it gets increasingly more difficult to learn as you get older. This is because up until the age of 7, during the imprinting period of development, the subconscious mind is completely open to suggestion. And from then to the age of 12, the modeling period, the conscious mind is forming, and after that the conscious mind filters everything before it is assimilated into the subconscious.
Whatever beliefs you have, they are just beliefs, nothing more. There is no need to be held back by limiting beliefs. You can choose to change beliefs no matter how deep rooted they are. Just as you go for a mechanical lesson from your golf professional, you may need a little help or direction from a golf psychologist, but all beliefs can be changed.
You have a body and a mind that has a similar physiology and neurology as the best golfers in the world. Athletic literature is full of examples of athletes who have excelled because of their internal desire, rather than the physical attributes such as size, strength, power or speed. There are tall golfers and short golfers, male and female golfers, young and old golfers. It is not age or body shape that prescribes ability. It is your MIND that makes the difference. What the mind can perceive, the mind can believe and the mind can achieve.
You have the ability to play golf well. How good you get will depend on what you want to get out of the game. It is your choice - you can be as good as you want to be. The most important thing is to set your own goals, and enjoy your golf - it's a game and should be fun. Unfortunately many people overlook this fact, and allow worries and fears to get in their way. Fear is something that we learn through experience. Fear of embarrassment and fear of failure result in many adults not even attempting to learn a new task. Returning to the subject of children, we are not born with fear. Think about when a baby learns to walk. How many times does that baby teeter along and then fall, and then try again, and fall over again and try again, until eventually they can walk? If that child was worried about embarrassing him or herself, would they have learnt to walk? A baby will persevere time and time again, and has absolute trust that they will be able to learn that skill - otherwise they would not learn that skill.
The most important factor to grasp here is that what other people think doesn't matter...but what you think does. What the mind can perceive, the mind can believe and the mind can achieve.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis cds and hypnosis mp3 downloads.
It is Very Hard to Beat Someone Who Will Not Give Up
I have just returned from watching John McGuiness achieving yet another lap record in the TT race. Even though I have experienced many a TT race, it never fails to make my heart beat faster when I see and hear the riders as they gather speed down Bray Hill at the beginning of the course. The riders set off at ten second intervals and by the end of the second lap McGuiness had already closed that ten second gap. He is not the type of person who gives up, and it is very hard to beat someone who will not give up.
I think it was Babe Ruth, the baseball player from the twenties, who was the person given credit for first making this observation. Yet again sport demonstrates to us so clearly an important mental skill which is relevant to success in all of our lives. Whether it is riding in the TT race, playing baseball or starting your own business, you have to be determined to not give up or you will not stay the course.
An old Chinese proverb also states that the man who gives up will not be lucky. This also is very true. I have a successful friend who often hears people say "you're so lucky"; his reply is "the harder I work the luckier I become". I'm sure there is many a famous person who has made a similar comment. What makes some people keep on going when others would have given up? What do they see that the rest of us do not?
The answer is that these people have a vision; they really can see the end result which they want to achieve. They can see it, hear it, feel it...they can taste their success. Not only that, they have the ability to hold that focus, to keep that vision clear in their mind, no matter what set-backs may occur. This ability to imagine and visualize their success also creates a clear expectancy that they will win whatever winning means to them.
If you were to act in every way as if you knew you were going to win, or knew that you were going to succeed, can you imagine the increase in confidence, the increase in positive energy which you would experience? Imagine what it might feel like if you had twice as much energy and twice as much enthusiasm as you may otherwise have. How much easier would problem solving be? How much easier would it be to push past limits or barriers and place yourself in a position to be lucky?
Top sports people know that you have to "keep your eye on the ball", to keep your focus, and to keep on going. The ability to visualize is essential. You thoughts and the mental images which you create in turn create emotional energy which directs your actions. The more vivid your visualizations and the more confident your thoughts are then more positive energy there is to drive your actions.
You can make your own visualizations more vivid and therefore give them far more impact with the use of hypnosis. Hypnosis allows access to your subconscious mind and greater creativity. Hypnosis also gives you greater focus. With the help of hypnosis downloads you can train your mind to visualize your goals, to feel your own success and thereby give yourself more energy and greater vision, making sure that you do not give up.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in hypnosis mp3 downloads for sport, success and well-being.
Keeping Your Focus in Sport
Today it is senior race day on the Isle of Man. This is the last race of the TT (Tourist Trophy) 2009. I find myself, as I do every year, marveling at the focus which these riders must have for a sustained period of time. This course is just over 37 miles in length, and the competitors do up to six laps per race. This course is known as the mountain course as it does pass over the mountain, but it also winds its way through villages and glens, and the average lap time is less than 20 minutes - on a bike, on the open road.
There is inevitably an unpredictability factor when you are racing on an open road; animals, both domestic and wild can, and do, suddenly appear upon the road. The weather too is unpredictable as it always is in the North of the Irish Sea. There is no margin for error at all and this race poses the greatest risk of all to the competitor.
The atmosphere here is always amazing, with bike enthusiasts convening here from all over the world. There are motorbikes swarming along every road, and a kind of bonding and camaraderie between all of these people of different languages and cultures; their passion for biking, and for the sport of motor racing, forms a close bond which ties everyone together.
One of the biggest dangers for the rider is the potential to get a detached retina due to the constant vibration of riding the open road at such speeds. The stress placed upon ones physical body is incredible, but the mental demands are far greater. These riders choose to place themselves in a position of the greatest stress they can find, although they do not see it as stress or pressure; they see it as a challenge. All great sports people love a challenge. Challenges are what fire them up and keep them going.
To have a burning desire to achieve something is what keeps ones focus. Your focus "in the now", whilst racing, is driven by an overall NEED to succeed, a NEED to win. This desire is what enables you to overcome obstacles and to keep going. It has been known for a TT rider to have a detached retina repaired and then to race the following day. (Against medical advice, needless to say.) The intensity of desire is what drives a similar intensity of focus.
Just think about the emotional energy these racers experience. They create an enormous amount of emotional energy, or adrenalin. This adrenalin could be experienced in a negative manner, as fear, but this is not the case with TT riders. These competitors use their adrenalin to put them on a high, to place them "in the zone"; if this were not the case, in this sport...they would not survive. Their burning desire creates energy which they direct into a state of heightened awareness which in fact is a state of hypnosis. They race this course in a state of hypnotic focus; they really are in the zone.
What is amazing is that they are continually in this state for the entire race, which can be for an hour and a half. This is an incredible accomplishment. Compare this to golf, which takes four hours but you only actually have to be "in the zone" for a few minutes at a time, when you are executing each shot. In the TT these riders are taking blind corners at 80-120mph, and racing down the straights at close to 200mph; that requires attention during each and every second. You simply cannot afford a single fraction of a second of distraction.
A burning desire comes from within and also from the ability to see the end result which you want to achieve. The TT race highlights the massive accomplishments the human mind can attain, so long as you have the correct focus. The mental skills which are requisite in sport are the same skills which you need to be successful in everything in life; everything starts in your mind. Without focus, you go around in circles. Without passion you run on half steam.
Hypnosis is an incredibly empowering state as it is a state of relaxed focus. You are calm and yet have a heightened awareness. You can learn sports hypnosis with the help of hypnosis mp3 downloads or hypnosis cds, and then you too can play your sport "in the zone".
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in hypnosis mp3 downloads for sport and success in life.
Do You Want to Stop Getting Angry or to Stop Swearing?
I was watching a couple of episodes of "Fawlty Towers" last night and was struck as always by John Cleese's ability to portray extreme frustration in a really funny manner. Everyone these days seems to have a shorter fuse than in the past. Is this because we are less controlled or because the way in which we live our lives inevitably leads to more frustration, more anger and more swearing?
I wrote an article a few years ago about the number of people who do "Basil Fawlty impressions" whilst on the golf course. This is a clear case of your own thoughts and expectations leading to tension, frustration and anger. No-one else has caused this pressure; the golf course and the weather are not conspiring together to destroy your day. You created your own anger through your own thoughts, and so if you want to stop getting angry on the golf course you have to learn to control your thoughts.
Then there’s the number of "road rage" cases these days. I even noticed a couple of years ago a special hotline being advertised for people to call to complain about the number of traffic cones on the motorway; apparently this service was available to try to let drivers vent the anger and frustration which they were experiencing as a result of road works. Too many accidents were being caused by angry drivers either not paying attention to their driving or just becoming too angry to drive competently.
This is what happens when you become angry; you become incompetent because your anger stops you from thinking clearly. A red mist does quite literally take over your mind - the higher cortical regions of your brain are effectively bypassed as the primitive emotional regions take over. It is important to learn how to change state, to be able to step back from this emotional fog to then be able to once again think clearly and productively.
Not only is it noticeable how many people seem to get angry at the slightest thing, it is also noticeable how freely so many of us swear. I have even had client’s book hypnotherapy sessions to aid them in stopping swearing because swearing has become such an automatic habit. I'm glad that these people had the presence of mind to take steps to change their habit. It is not nice to be the person on the receiving end of anger, frustration or swearing, but neither is it comfortable or good for the health and well being of the person whose temper is bubbling over.
It has been shown that water subjected to swearing or angry tonality will form ice crystals which are uneven and jagged, whilst water subjected to calm words and tonality form beautiful, symmetrical and delicate crystals. Considering that the human body is made up of a rather large percentage of water, can you imagine the impact upon your own health and well being if you waste your time and energy on anger, tension, frustration and swearing?
If you want to stop swearing or to stop getting angry then you need to learn to control your mind and this can be done with the help of hypnosis downloads. Hypnosis is a state of relaxation and in learning hypnosis you learn how to change state in an instant. Hypnosis allows access to your subconscious mind and so you can change instinctive patterns of behavior, or habits, easily and effortlessly.
Allowing yourself to get angry is a learned habitual response. Allowing yourself to swear is also a habit which you have leaned. Hypnosis downloads can be used at home to quickly and easily change habits. It’s better for your health and well being to learn to control your anger, and also better for everyone around you.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in hypnosis downloads to stop swearing and to stop getting angry on the golf course.
The Empowering Effect of Visualization in Sport and Life
When you take into account some of the basic ways in which your mind works you will appreciate that a picture really is worth and thousand words.
A lot of people tell me that they just cannot visualize, but everyone can visualize. In fact, you probably visualize things many times a day, without even realizing it. Some people are more predominantly visual that others, it has to be said; but everyone can visualize and as you practice you get better at it, just like most other things in life. And it is well worth the effort involved in learning to visualize as it is one of the most empowering mental skills that you could possibly develop.
Think for a moment about a wine glass and then think about a beer glass...What's the difference? If you can answer this question you can visualize. You see, without being able to visualize you couldn't explain this difference. This is why I said before that you probably visualize many times a day without realizing that this is what is happening automatically in your mind. What color is your front door and what style is it? Once again, you simply have to visualize to be able to answer these questions.
Often you will find that you instinctively visualize things in a way that you perhaps did not intend. If, for instance, I ask you to NOT think about a giraffe, what happened? When you try not to do something you inadvertently put your will power at odds with your imagination. In order to comprehend what you are not meant to do, your mind instinctively creates a picture of whatever it is and your imagination wins the battle. A picture really is worth a thousand words - the picture which you inadvertently visualized holds more power than your will power which is telling you not to think about that thing - in this case, a giraffe.
Thus everyone has the ability to visualize, although because we are all unique and individual we will visualize in our own individual way and some of us will be better at it or more practiced than others. We all have a primary sense, be it seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting or feeling. As you visualize one or all of your senses may be utilized. You will visualize in your own way and as you practice visualization you will get better and better at it and will be able to involve and animate more of your senses.
Once you realize the magnetic power of visualizing, you can start to intentionally picture the things which you do want to picture as opposed to those that you do not. For instance, in golf many people think "don't go in the bunker" or "don't go in the water" or "don't go into the trees". These thoughts immediately trigger visualizations of those very things, and your ball will end up in the place that you are picturing - exactly where you do not want to be. A golfer who realizes how powerful visual images are will on the other hand stand on the tee, and intentionally picture the ball landing on the fairway, sitting up in a great position for your next shot onto the green...and this is where the ball will go. Whatever you imagine, whatever you visualize, you create.
Visualization has in fact been proven to have more powerful effect that physical practice. This has been proven time and again in many sports, not just in golf. Your brain does not know the difference between something which is vividly imagined and something which is real, and so as you imagine your ball going into the net in basketball, for instance, your brain is recording this as if it were a real event. The reason why it is more powerful than physical practice is that with mental rehearsal EVERY ball goes in, whilst in practice one or two inevitably miss.
I have mentioned here just a couple of applications of visualization in sport. But this mental skill, this instinctive talent we have of visualizing can be put to good use in a far wider sense as well. Imagine the power of visualization in preparing to take your driving test, or in a job interview, or anything at all which matters to you.
You can make your visualizations even more powerfully effective with the help of hypnosis. Hypnosis is a state of both relaxation and focus and your creative mind comes to the fore. Hypnosis therefore allows a greater intensity of focus and therapeutic effect. Your images and visualizations become more magnetic when in hypnosis. Not only that, with hypnosis you access your subconscious mind, the part which acts instinctively and automatically and so you can embed your visualizations deep within your psyche, creating a firm and powerful expectancy that what you are visualizing will indeed become your reality.
This is why golf hypnosis, and sports hypnosis in general is so widely used in this day and age. If you want a real edge in sport or life in general then you can empower yourself by learning to visualize effectively and deliberately, with the help of hypnosis downloads. Simply by listening to a hypnosis download you will learn to use hypnosis and discover how easy it is for you to visualize.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in hypnosis downloads for sport and success in life.
Best Golf Gifts to Present for Father's Day
If your dad or husband is a golfer, you probably know how addicted golfers are to the collection of equipment. He spends so much time in the pro shop, fondling the latest driver head, picking a putter up and putting it down again, you could fall asleep waiting for him to come back out of there! Most golfers could spend many happy hours in there and when they get home they switch on the golf channel...more golf! His eyes light up and he becomes so absorbed in the examination of each golfers swing and equipment that you can't get his attention for the rest of the evening.
Are you a golf widow or a golf orphan? What can you do that will really help him with his addiction? His interest in golf is both social and selfish; What I mean by this is that he does want to know what all those pros are doing, he's interested in it and fascinated by what happens in golf both as a matter of social interest and also to see if by watching he can glean a little more insight into his own game, into how he can improve his own game. He doesn't spend all that time in the pro shop just because he wants to SEE those golf clubs. He drifts off into a wonderful imaginary world whilst he's in the golf shop - as he holds that new driver he's imagining himself on the 18th hitting the ball like Tiger; as he clutches that putter, he's seeing himself sinking a 20 footer on the 18th and the crowd clapping!
I'm serious here. I'm a golfer as well. I have these thoughts too! Once a golfer realizes that they "could" or "might" be good at this great game, an addiction is triggered; an addiction to ANYTHING which might improve your golf. And golf is an easy addiction to feed. New clubs, new balls, new clothes, new golf trolleys, new tees, books, DVDs...there is an amazing array of golf "stuff" there…mugs, socks, ties, towels...But what is the very best thing to buy as a gift for a golfer? What could you get for him as a unique father's day present?
The irony here is that the one thing he probably has not bought, or thought to buy, is the very thing which is most likely to improve his golf game. You see, 90% of good golf is in your mind. Any good player or professional will agree with this. Those new putters, drivers and tees are never going to make a fraction of the impact on his golf game that a good mind training product will elicit. What every golfer needs is the ability to train their golf mind. You have to get your head around golf to play golf well. But most amateur golfers dismiss this area of the game - it's not as much fun as a new club, or hitting balls. Not only that, they do not know how to change the way in which they think.
Golf psychology is something which I love. Most of my friends would say that it is my addiction. This is not surprising as I am a hypnotherapist and a passionate golfer. It constantly amazes me how so many golfers do not pay heed to their mind. EVERYTHING in life starts with how you think about it. What you expect to happen does indeed happen, and golf highlights this in amazing ways.
If you think "don't go in the bunker", the ball WILL go into the bunker, because of the way in which your mind works. Where there is a conflict between your will power and your imagination, your imagination wins. As you are logically thinking "don't go in the bunker" you are at the same time picturing the bunker...so the ball goes there. A golfer needs to train their mind how to think properly and effectively on the golf course. There are many different mental skills to learn in relation to the game of golf and they can be learned quickly and easily with the help of golf hypnosis.
Golf hypnosis is the key here. Hypnosis allows access to the subconscious mind, the inner part of the mind where habits and instinctive reactions are stored. To change a habitual behavior or thought pattern you need to access your subconscious mind. Logical thinking and talking to yourself just will not do this. Hypnosis is also a state of relaxation and just by listening to a golf hypnosis cd or download you will learn to relax and change state at will, which is very useful on the golf course. Add to that the fact that hypnosis involves a state of focus, and you will appreciate how beneficial it is to use hypnosis to "play in the zone".
Golf hypnosis will help any golfer knock shots off their handicap. It will also help a golfer to control their emotions whilst playing. So if you want your husband or father to come home smiling and happy after his next round of golf, why not buy him some golf hypnosis cds as a great gift for father's day?
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis, and author of the GolferWithin "mental skills tool-kit", designed by a golfer for golfers.
http://www.GolferWithin.com
I Can Make You Play Great Golf
Hypnosis is the key to great golf. Hypnosis is the most wonderful, most incredible "rescue club" that will ever be available to a golfer. There is nothing that comes close to hypnosis. You may say "what about NLP?" NLP is absolutely fantastic; it is an application of hypnosis - it was developed from Ericksonian hypnosis and applies hypnotic principles. Many people "dumb down" the hypnotic aspect of NLP, but hypnosis is in reality what gives it its power. NLP without hypnosis would be like a car with no engine. They go hand in hand.
Why is golf hypnosis so valuable? If you agree that great golf is 90% in your mind (or even if you think it's only 50% mental) it follows that it is at least equally important to learn how to think well in golf as it is to be able to swing the club.
Golf is a tricky game to learn. The club is long when compared to those used in other sports, the ball is smaller and the distances covered greater. It's a difficult game to learn and requires diligence and practice as well as good hand-eye co-ordination. I think we will also agree that a few lessons with the pro are also essential to make for a better technique and more consistent application of the clubface onto the ball.
All this takes a great deal of time and effort. Once you have learned the basics you can hit that ball around the course adequately, you feel good, and then most of us start to try to get better. Once we get to a position where we realize that "I could be good at this" another element enters the equation. The game becomes more important, and more emotion goes into it. Your mind now holds greater importance in your golf game. Logic and emotions are like oil and water, and your emotions will always get the upper hand. Thus you need to know how to train your golf mind to contain and control your emotions.
Hypnosis is perfect for this. Hypnosis is a state of relaxation and so in learning hypnosis you learn how to change state in an instant. This is a valuable asset in golf. Hypnosis allows access to your subconscious mind, where instinctive patterns of thought and reactions are stored. Therefore you can use golf hypnosis to change those emotional reactions which tend to bubble to the surface and sit there, like an oily film, totally smothering your logical mind. It is very important to train your golf brain how to wash away that film of oil and think clearly and logically and you can do this with the help of golf hypnosis.
I'm sure you are beginning to see why hypnosis is indeed the key to playing great golf. How else can you control instinctive reactions? These reactions come from your subconscious mind, not your conscious mind. You have to access your subconscious mind to enable change…and hypnosis does exactly this.
Once you really get into your golf you discover how important it is to visualize your shot. Everyone can visualize, although some people think that they cannot. Whether you think you can visualize or think that you cannot, hypnosis will empower you to greater ability in this department. Hypnosis also allows your more creative mind to surface, making it easier to visualize those golf shots, adding intensity and therefore greater impact to your visualizations. Whatever you imagine you create and this can be seen very dramatically in golf; it pays to learn how to effectively visualize what you want to happen, and no what you don't!
Now, I could go on and on and on about the ways in which hypnosis is the key to great golf but I think I have already made my point. Golf hypnosis is essential to playing well. Hypnosis is a state of mind which enables you to train your conscious, your subconscious and your imagination to work together, to work in alignment when you play golf.
I know this to be true. I am a hypnotherapist, golf psychologist and passionate golfer. I developed the GolferWithin golf hypnosis cds back in 2006 and know the results which people have achieved as a result of using my "mental skills tool-kit". As I developed this program of golf hypnosis and NLP skills, I set out to provide golfers with an easy way in which to learn every mental skills there is in great golf. That was my intent and that is what I did. If you are serious about your golf and want to improve, golf hypnosis is the quickest and easiest way in which you will knock shots off your handicap.
Don't just trust what I am saying. This is what Eddie Birchenough, Golf Coach and Professional at Royal Lytham and St Annes Golf Club has to say about golf hypnosis:
"Roseanna Leaton is a very experienced psychologist and hypnotherapist who is making a serious contribution to the art of learning golf. Her simple yet flexible methods help golfers to learn the game easily rather than being issued with complex instruction. "We don't know what we are taught, we only know what we learn" might well be her banner statement.
As a coach of some 45 years experience myself, I have learned so much from Roseanna. How the mind must be cleared before more information can be taken in, how the subconscious does not recognize negatives and how important visualization is to the golfer. These are just a few of the subjects that I never understood the importance of over the years. Absorbing them into my coaching techniques has improved my success rate immeasurably. I cannot emphasize the value of Roseanna's work too much and would recommend it to any golfer who is serious about improving their game."
There are lots of golf hypnosis cds and downloads easily available to every golfer. They are a lot cheaper than a new set of clubs, and a lot more effective in improving your game quickly and painlessly. Hypnosis is the engine which powers a great golf mind.
Roseanna Leaton, specialist in golf hypnosis cds and hypnosis downloads.
Sand Traps and How to Escape Them
How many times have you stood on the tee or in the fairway and thought to yourself "stay out of that sand"? And then you settle in to take the shot, make contact with the ball, and you know immediately, instinctively that your ball is flying like an arrow towards that trap? It seems so unfair that you make all that effort, only to by stymied by a pile of beautifully raked sand! It's as if the ball is being pulled by a great big powerful magnet directly to the place that you did not want it to go.
And this is in fact exactly what did happen. I mean this figuratively, not literally, of course. It was your own thinking, and the associated emotion which drove that ball into the trap. You probably think that this just cannot be so, that you were thinking about the ball staying out of the trap, that you were begging the ball to stay out, willing it to not go into that trap. Your mind however sometimes works in ways which may seem to the uninitiated to be rather perverse.
If you want to play great golf, if you want to stay out of those traps, then you need to know how your mind works. It is readily accepted that 90% of great golf is in your mind, so it pays to know how your mind works and to train your mind in the ways of successful golfers. The first rule to remember is that where there is a conflict between your will power and your imagination, your imagination wins. This is fact.
Let's see if we can demonstrate this quickly. Try as hard as you can, right now, to NOT see a sand trap. What happened? What color was the sand? To expand on this point, when you last stood on the tee thinking "don't go in the trap" what do you think was the image which you saw in your mind's eye? Is it possible that you saw the ball in the trap, or simply an image of the trap? One thing I can guarantee is that this thought process will not elicit a picture of the ball sitting up in the middle of the lush green fairway.
Once you know a couple of the basic ways in which your mind can be so seemingly perverse, you can train your mind to play great golf. This can be expedited with the help of golf hypnosis. With hypnosis you have access to the inner workings of your mind so you can embed a great golf mind set easily and quickly. With golf hypnosis cds or golf hypnosis downloads you can train your brain to see what you want to happen as opposed to what you do not want to occur.
The second mental rule to consider is that the power of your emotions associated with your thought will directly affect the outcome. A thought without an emotion will have no effect. A thought which carries a great amount of emotion will have a great effect. Hence when you were "begging" your golf ball to stay out of the trap, you created a high emotional energy charge, and this was attached to what you were picturing (the trap), which combined to create a significant magnetic effect. Your emotion and visual image magnetized your golf ball right into the trap.
Your mind is amazingly powerful. You just need to know how it works and then you can train your mind to play great golf, with the help of golf hypnosis. You can learn to stay out of the traps and on the fairway with a little help from golf hypnosis.
Roseanna Leaton, golf psychologist, enthusiastic golfer and author of the GolferWithin golf mind training cds and hypnosis downloads.
Mental Skills For Golf and Life
There are many mental skills required in order to play great golf. These same skills underpin the ability to be successful in any area of life. The good news is that they can be learned with the help of hypnosis downloads.
You carry 14 clubs in your bag, and probably several more accumulating dust in your shed or garage. You are capable of hitting high and low shots, draws and fades, hooks and slices, half shots, three quarter shots and full shots. In order to do so, however, it is imperative you have a full range of empowering mental skills at your disposal so as to enable you to execute your chosen shot as and when it is required and in circumstances when it truly matters.
It is all too frequently the case that the way in which one hits shots upon the range is not reflected when out on the course, when it matters. Most people, including teaching and playing professionals alike, agree that 90% of golf is in the mind. You need as many mental skills as you have shots. And this is true of success in every other area of your life as well as in your game of golf.
I am a hypnotherapist and I am also a passionate golfer. This is why I decided to outline a whole set of mental skills for golfers and recorded a mental skills toolkit in the form of hypnosis cds and hypnosis downloads. This was back in 2006. The response was fantastic and I'm pleased to say that many great testimonials popped in via e-mail from golfers all over the world. This is what Paul Eales (European Tour Professional, BBC TV and Setanta TV Golf Reporter) had to say about the GolferWithin golf hypnosis cds:
"It took me many years of heart ache and hours of time hitting thousands and thousands of golf balls before I realized that, without the correct mindset, you can't get anywhere near maximizing your potential. A library full of books on the sporting mind as well as time spent with accredited golf psychologists still didn't quite get me into my ideal sporting performance state. Then I was asked to listen to some CD's produced by Roseanna.
For the first time in my search the impact was not only massive but immediate. The well presented, ordered course covered "stuff" I had heard before. But this time just by listening to Roseanna and following the GolferWithin program, my state changed and allowed me to play without the negative, destructive self-talk that had plagued me from an early age. I would strongly advice any golfer who's serious about improving their game to get involved in Roseanna's CD presentation and see the immediate results. You can't afford not to."
Paul also suggested that it would be fantastic to create a similar set of mental skills hypnosis downloads for life in general, which is exactly what I did. Whether you are a golfer or not, there are many mental skills which you can learn which will make life more comfortable, more enjoyable and more successful. The game of golf simply highlights the effect of your thinking. If you think "don't go in the trees" how often does it go in there? And on those days when you feel much focused and "in the zone" how many putts just seem to roll in without any effort at all? You can learn mental skills which will allow you to focus, to play "in the zone" at will. You can learn mental skills which will allow you to step back and relax, instead of getting tense.
There are many, many mental skills which can all be learned with the help of hypnosis cds or hypnosis downloads. It is amazing what you can do as you learn to harness the power of your own mind. You can retrain your mind to play great golf and also a great game of life.
You really can play the game of your dreams with the help of golf psychology, NLP and hypnosis downloads. Why not give yourself a head start and use your mind to make a difference. The fact is that great golfers know how to play the mental game; they have learned the necessary skills to be successful.
Roseanna Leaton, author of Golfer Within golf hypnosis cds and specialist in hypnosis downloads for success, health and well-being.
