We talk a lot on this site about mental preperation so I thought I would write an an article explaining really what I mean and what I am all about when I talk about visualising your shots.

So what does it mean to mentally prepare?  Well lets start right at the beginning.

I am a firm believer that golf is atleast 60 percent mental. I would say 60 percent mental, 5% raw talent, 25% hard work and 10% luck.(Yes they do add up to 100%, I triple checked)  What do I mean 10% luck?  I guess IL explain that another day.

So 60 percent of your game is inside your head.  A phrase I like is, “Whether you think you can or you cant, you are probably right.”  Think about any failure you have had, 9 times out of ten you will have failed before you have even tried.

Mental preperation is balancing the mind to lean in the favour of the positive.  If you can convince yourself that you can achieve something, you can believe that you can, you will be right and you will play better golf.

Imagine Tiget stepping up to the tee box.  Do you think the even for a second he thinks “I might stick this in the trees by accident here”  Not a chance.  He is completely positive and focussed, and normally produces the results.

So yeah yeah, this is all very good, but Stuart, how do we actually do this.  Well, seeing apparently is believing, so you need to see this shot.  You can see the shot in your head.

Try this next time you are about to hit an approach shot over water onto a green the size of a kitchen.  Run through a couple of times in your head, just what it would look like to land that shot on the green next to the pin.  Imagine how it would look, imagine how great it will feel.  Doing this enough you can easily convince yourself it is reality.  Do this consistently and I am willing to bet you are going to start hitting better shots and pulling shots off your round.

My other tip for mental preperation is never let any thoughts other than positive visualisations into your mind.  we constantly have a whole backlog of thoughts on our mind, washing, bills, ironing, children…  These must be put out your mind completely.

This can be difficult, but not impossible.  When you are out on the course, take a few deap breathes.  Smell the fresh grass, and the clean cool air.  When I do this I am taken away by nature. Admire the trees and feel yourself slip away from the stresses and toils of yesterday and today.

So now this backlog is away, we need to eliminate al thoughts of failure.  Again it is difficult not to think about something, because concentrating on not thinking of it, naturally makes you think of it.

The way round this is to go on the offensive, not defensive.  Actively think of other things, like how you are going to make this shot.  This is what we call focus.

By actively thinking how to play this shot as oppsoed to how not to play this shot you will surprise yourself how “in the zone” you become.  This ultimately leads to you playing better golf.

This stuff really is easy to start mastering, you can do it next time you are at the course, and believe me you will notice a difference.

I am interested to know, how much of the game do you think is mental?  What are your tips for mental mastery?