Here is an extract from the Introduction to my forthcoming book ‘Breathe GOLF; The Missing Link to a Winning Performance‘ which will be published by Panoma Press, end of March ’19
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“Ye see…merely shootin’ par is second best. Goin’ for results like that leads men and cultures and entire worlds astray. But if ye do it from the inside ye get the results eventually and everythin’ else along with it. So ye will na’ see me givin’ people many tips about the gowf swings lik’ they do in all the ‘how-to’ books. I will na’ do it. Ye must start from the inside…”
Michael Murphy, Golf in the Kingdom
INTRODUCTION
The keys to the effortless golf shot lie in the moments of stillness before movement occurs.
In fact, the perfect shot has less to do with your understanding of swing technique and more to do with how well you breathe, and the connection this awareness fosters between your mind and body by quietening the internal dialogue, reducing anxiety and allowing for fluidity of motion.
The innate intelligence of the mind~body connection, which manifests as ‘the zone’ or flow, can best be activated when the attention follows the breath but this condition cannot be forced, it can only be trained.
This book is about the training required; the practice of breath-centred Meditation, which alone can help us to access the unique experience of relaxed concentration, the coveted Zen-mind which parallels the zone.
Yet while observing the breath may sound like a simple thing it certainly isn’t easy, especially considering the restless nature of our attention and the dominant energies of the mind and ego, neither of which have anything to do with hitting the perfect golf shot. Truth is these things are more of a hindrance than a help.
Looking back over the many years of work and research into how the breath affects movement shows how my personal story and my quest for understanding are intimately entwined.
It all began 31 years ago when I started training, studying and then teaching the Chinese internal martial arts, of which Tai Chi is the most well-known; and during this whole time I have been captivated by the relationship between breathing, internal stillness and the manifestation of fluid motion.
It wasn’t always so.
When I was a child, teenager and young woman I was so shy, introverted, and painfully self-conscious that I would literally hide in my room behind a book day and night, and I couldn’t enjoy the wonderful opportunities like swimming, tennis, figure-skating, judo, horse-riding and guitar lessons that my parents gave to my sister and me when we were children.
There is a thin line between being self-conscious and becoming self-aware and crossing that line has been a lifetime’s journey. What I’ve discovered is how difficult (nigh on impossible) it is to function well in any endeavour while anxious or nervous but once the keys to mastering this have been trained (the components of which are revealed in this book) it allows for effortless performance in all situations where pressure is a factor.
But this is not just another book about ‘performing under pressure’ but is specifically about performing complex movement skills in the unique and intense high-pressure situation of competition.
In this case we’re looking at the golf swing although the principles apply equally well to the tennis-serve, the penalty-kick, the 100m sprint, the triple-salchow jump, the half-pipe routine, dancing and playing the violin – all when the individual is performing against opponents, in front of a crowd and/or a panel of judges.
In 1987 when I was in my early 20’s I saw an advert in London’s ‘Time Out’ magazine for a Tai Chi class and I instinctively knew that it would give me a centre-point for my life, something to anchor me and hold on to, something to make me stronger. I started training because I believed that if I could begin to feel at home in my body then I would be more confident.
From the first class I was introduced to a world of stillness, movement and the aesthetics of power from the slow relaxed grace of the Tai Chi form to the explosive dynamism of kung-fu. I remember being obsessed for two whole years trying to learn the beautiful yet devastating ‘Dragon Fist’ of Chinese boxing (Hsing Yi) which I would watch on VHS video on the TV in the house-share where I was living before going outside into the garden to practice for hours on end.
Since then, movement has been my passion, daily practice, way of life and now my career. I have been fascinated by athletic and artistic motion, devouring everything in the sporting calendar from the Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race, Wimbledon, the World Cup, the Open Championship, Athletics Diamond League, and the Winter Olympics. I’ve also watched countless classical music concerts, ballet and contemporary dance performances – all with an eye that’s been gradually trained over the decades to see the relationship between stillness and movement in the performer.
Of all sports, golf lends itself particularly well to the Eastern approach on offer here with myriad similarities between the game and Tai Chi, not least of which is the starting point from stillness into explosive movement, the use of ground-forces and lower-body stability, joint-stacking, torque/rotation, leverage, hitting through the target and above all, the necessity for a quiet mind.
When I first started to explore the game I was amazed at how closely aligned it is to martial arts principles but I also saw how it lacked some basic teachings which can serve as the foundation upon which a reliable and repeatable golf swing could be built; teachings about the biomechanics of structure and relaxed power, the use of the breath for controlling anxiety and reducing mental interference, and of course the imperative of training the mind~body connection that doesn’t yet feature in the mainstream approach which even in the early 21st Century is still for the most part divided into technical instruction or mental game coaching.
With countless drafts and re-writing of the material, it became apparent that the ancient principles around breathing needed to be examined and presented as the fundamental prerequisite, the basic training for all competitive golfers who want to enjoy more effortless shots and above all, know how to recreate the internal conditions that will allow for the perfect shot to manifest when they’re under pressure.
Yet the teachings about the breath, rooted as they are in the spiritual traditions of the Eastern world, must be approached with sincerity by teacher and student alike in acknowledgement of the timeless truths which were originally presented to humanity 2,500 years ago by Gautama Buddha.
The simple (but not easy) practice of breath-centred Meditation requires more effort that lifting weights in the gym or driving a hundred balls on the range; but if you can commit (and I hope this book will encourage you to do just that) you are virtually guaranteed, as of my students said, to be “curiously happier” on the golf course, to hit more sublime and effortless shots and win more games.
So let’s get to it.
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