Golf Exposed My Biggest Insecurity | Jared Tendler Psychoanalyses My Mental Game (Part 1)

“You’re hitting that golf shot looking to feel competent. If you don’t, you get to go into this hellscape of not really knowing who you are or what matters.” — Jared Tendler

What happens when one of the world’s leading mental game coaches starts analysing your golf game in real time?

In this special two-part conversation, renowned golf mental game coach Jared Tendler joins How Low Can You Go? and quickly takes the discussion somewhere neither of us expected.

Rather than talking about confidence, pressure and performance in the abstract, Jared turns his attention to Dave’s golf game and uncovers the hidden beliefs, fears and insecurities that may be driving his struggles on the course.

Why can someone who feels confident in most areas of life still feel embarrassment, frustration and even despair on the golf course?

This episode covers golf psychology, confidence, performance anxiety, fear of failure, self-worth, improvement mindset and the mental game.

Part Two, coming next week: Jared turns his attention to Chris and uncovers a very different challenge—perfectionism, high expectations and the hidden cost of chasing scratch golf.

Want to go deeper?

Check out Jared Tendler’s excellent golf psychology resources:

🌐 Website: https://jaredtendler.com/

📚 Books: https://jaredtendler.com/books/

🏌️ Everyday Golf Psychology: https://jaredtendler.com/books/everyday-golf-psychology/

Jared’s work provides practical frameworks for building confidence, handling pressure, overcoming fear of failure and performing more consistently on the golf course.

🎙️ ABOUT THE SHOW

How Low Can You Go explores how amateur golfers can improve their game, lower their scores, and actually understand what moves the needle — without wasting time on the wrong things.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

For you right now, this is what's happened. You're hitting that golf shot, like looking to feel competent because that's the basis of your confidence. And so if you hit a good golf shot, then you get to feel confident. If you don't, you get to kind of go into this like hellscape, like a void of where where you're not really sure like who you are. You just kind of get lost.

SPEAKER_02 0:19

Listen, we we've been brutally honest so far on this uh podcast. Like I talked about it in episode one, how I cried whenever I was a younger man, but I I did I did cry after around the golf once. Welcome back once again to Howlow Can You Go. When we invited renowned mental game coach Jared Tendler onto the podcast, we wanted to better understand pressure, confidence, and what really separates golfers who thrive under pressure from those who struggle. What followed was not what we were expecting at all. Rather than talking about these concepts in the abstract, Jared started putting both of us under the microscope, using our own experiences on the golf course to uncover some of the hidden beliefs and thought patterns that have been holding us back. In part 1, the focus is all on me. That's right. Why can someone who feels confident in most areas of life still experience fear, embarrassment, and even despair on a golf course? And what does that reveal about where confidence really comes from? I can honestly say that this conversation went to places I was not expecting. This is How Low Can You Go. Okay, welcome back everyone once again to How Low Can You Go, the golf improvement podcast, born in Scotland, the show where we talk to some of the brightest minds in the game to try and get better at golf. We've set ourselves ambitious targets and we really want to reach those. So what better way to try and do that, but to speak to people like Jared Tendler, author of Everyday Golf Psychology Practical Advice for Golfers at every level. Jared, welcome to Howlow. Can you go? It's great to have you with us. Thanks, guys. Great to be here. I feel like there's a really interesting backstory to your book because yes, you wanted to write it for the everyday golfer, which we love. You know, that's exactly the kind of golfers Chris and I are, the club golfers, and I think a lot of our listeners wanting to get better at golf. But am I right in saying you almost wrote it as a kind of collective in some ways? You got a lot of surveys completed by like a lot of golfers, and then you were able to really kind of, I guess, write in such a way that you felt would reach as many of those kind of everyday golfers as possible. Is that is that right? It is.

SPEAKER_03 3:18

The survey was uh in part to like kind of confirm that the work that I've been doing with PGA Tour players, high-level juniors, amateurs, um, you know, a couple on the LPGA tour, but then also with poker players and traders and entrepreneurs, trying to confirm that the work that I've been doing for, you know, at this point, kind of 18 years was going to be reflective in a broader audience. And, you know, I very quickly kind of found out that that was the case. So at the end of the day, we're we are people first. Um, and the best athletes, the best golfers in the world are functionally no different than we are. Uh now there are some small differences biologically, right, obviously. Um but you know, we're 99% the same as a chimp. So we're just not that different. And I just I so the the surveys were a chance to kind of confirm all that. Um but you are right in kind of describing the book as a bit of a collective. I would argue that it's the most simple content that I've ever created. I've written books for poker and trading. Uh my work has tended to be a bit more deep and we'll call it just harder. And in poker and trading, I could push people hard because even the amateurs, like they had lots of money on the line every single day. So they they had no wiggle room and they couldn't go by some clubs and pretend that their mental game wasn't a problem because in poker and trading, like it's just you and your opponent or the market. Um, you know, and in this case in golf, I've struggled at times to get golfers to truly do the work that I believed was necessary. Um, and well, somewhat of a sort of inside note. Um, I purposefully did not use the word work in any page in the book because I didn't want to scare golfers into like doing what was necessary here. So my my objective with the book was scaled down to try to just change how you think. Because I felt like there's lots of tactics out there. I'm not like the purveyor of all tactics. But I feel like if I could change how you think and approach either the game as a whole, the mental game, specific elements of it, then that alone is going to help you improve. And then you can start to figure out how to begin to kind of train yourself to operate a little bit differently.

SPEAKER_02 5:43

Yeah. And I think you've definitely said that you were well aware that there's quite a lot of golf psychology books out there. But you kind of wanted this to be a little bit different, right? You you wanted it to be much more accessible to the everyday golfer, right?

SPEAKER_03 6:02

Not just accessible, but like applicable. I mean, I think if I like I I read, you know, Golf's another game of perfect. Like it's a phenomenal book. Oh, yes. Um, right. The majority of the well, all of the stories really are about, you know, some of the best golfers to ever play the game. Right. So you get insights into, you know, what kind of what they're going through and conversations that you had with Rotella. And uh it's it's very entertaining stuff. Yeah. The application I think is difficult for everyday golfers, frankly, even for me when I was trying to crack through, you know, junior golf into college and amateurs and trying to, my goal was to play professionally. That's kind of what drove me through all this. But um, I feel like the book helped me, but it didn't solve some of the problems that I was experiencing dealing with fear. Because, you know, tour players like weren't dealing with the same thing I was, even though structurally they were, it was just wasn't being communicated in a way that I could relate to on a personal level or a golfing level. And like there's a lot of other good books out there, and I think they are uh kind of dealing with segments of golf psychology, but they're not dealing with the problems in a very specific manner like this book is trying to do. And and the reason that that's the case is because to me, golf is not a mental game. Golf is a physical game. If your physical capacity is impaired, I don't care how powerful your mind is, you are gonna suck. So golf is a physical game, first and foremost. The mind is a tool to help make the most of what you have. And so, if that's the case, well, then when your mind is malfunctioning to some respect, then a whole host of problems are gonna occur. And so to me, your worst golf is mostly mental. And so then we can be really, really targeted, and that's what the majority of the book is about, on trying to kind of clean up your crap, right? And to move that back end forward. Uh and as I said, right, kind of narrow the gap. Because the narrower the gap is, that's what's gonna make you more consistent. That's what's gonna allow you to achieve some of the goals you the two of you and many of your listens are after. You know, the top end obviously we want to keep improving too, but that's not mostly gonna come from a mental standpoint. It's mostly gonna come from uh being able to develop better technical abilities and develop different shots. And, you know, there's a lot of different technical skill-based things that are required in golf. Mental game is the only one facet of that.

SPEAKER_02 8:34

Yeah, and I really like what you're saying. Not, you know, I think to your point, not to, you know, discredit any previous really good golf psychology books, because there's a lot of really good ones out there. But I agree with you. And how many times have I said that, Chris? Uh it kind of almost led me to want to start a golf podcast, in that I felt like I don't see enough testimonies of someone like me who was a terrible golfer. I want to hear from that guy, the guy who was dreadful at golf, and then he set himself some goals or whatever he did, and he ended up being a good golfer or a better golfer. I want to hear about that guy. You know, I can't really relate to Arnold Palmer who was feeling a bit anxious on the 18th T-Box at the US Open. I can't relate to superhumans like that in golf. I do not have that level of genius that these guys have. So I think it's a really interesting point that you're making and that you've on then gone on to write about is that we need stuff that us everyday golfers who might duff one off the T you know, we we need we need to we need to hear it.

SPEAKER_03 9:47

Take away the word might say it again, take away the word might. Yeah, and then you've got me alright.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Yeah, no, I I definitely think that for so long I've looked at pros and thought, like, they are on a whole nother level when it comes to their ability and everything like that. But I'm I'm thinking they're just the same, they're just another human being, and I'm like, how are they so different in the mental side of it? Have they mastered something? And when I was hearing all these things about like like you're saying Arnold Parma on the 18th, I was very much like, I don't think I can ever relate to what they're going through. But then at the same time, if I'm coming down the 18th, I'm getting these same feelings where I need to feel like I need to shoot a good score to make the cut or something like that. Surely I'm feeling somewhat of the same feelings as that other human being, just at a different level.

SPEAKER_03 10:42

You you definitely are, but the advice is gonna tend to be slightly different. And I think like for the everyday golfer, you need to have some concepts that are gonna be immediately relatable. Because, like I talk about in um Joe chapter four, right? There's like changing your mindset is easy. I think that's one of the biggest sort of myths that has kind of uh made those other psychology books difficult, and in and myself included, is that like because there's not the concepts to kind of go along with the advice, then the advice sort of feels like you should just kind of get it. Like it's like a swing tip that you're like, oh, okay, like, you know, rotate your hips here, or you know, and then it just like works and you're like, great. Uh, but if it doesn't, well then then what? But if you have the concept, if you have a bit more of the sort of foundational understandings of kind of what underlies, for example, why certain people handle pressure better than others. And and and we can start to understand that pressure is not bad. That that's a fact. What makes pressure bad is when it gets excessive. But at the end of the day, like the excessive pressure comes down to more uncertainty. It's not about calming your nerves. That is playing a like a game of whack-a-mole, you know, where you're just like kind of trying to beat back those nerves versus learning to embrace them and learning to create more certainty. Like certainty is the antidote to fear, really. Certainty is the antidote to pressure. But how do you create certainty in a situation where you don't know what's gonna happen? Well, there's sort of layers of it, you know. Uh are you certain that you understand how your body reacts to high levels of adrenaline? No. Okay, well, you're gonna experience more pressure because you don't know what your body's gonna do here. Uh, are you certain that you've handled situations similar to this well in the past? No, actually, I've fallen short. Well, then you're going to have more. So the point is, you know, but if you have certainty on uh, well, at the end of the day, I'm gonna learn a lot from this. Okay, all of a sudden now pressure goes down a little bit. Uh I may not know how adrenaline works, but I have a pretty good idea of uh when my game gets off, these are my tendencies and I know how to fix them. Okay, great. Now pressure's gotten a little bit more manageable. So some people might use certainty and confidence interchangeably. I don't care about the words, I care about the structural integrity that you have some strength that you're leaning on. You're you're anchored to something, and ideally more things in the face of all of that uncertainty. And the more things that you're anchored to that you're solid about, and it could be related to your putting stroke, could be related to how well you know the golf course, how you how well you adapt to changing conditions of the golf course, right? They take away kind of layers of uncertainty. And the less things that are uncertain, you know, the easier you're gonna be able to handle the pressure.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

See, um I was playing up north recently and I was three under through four. And from we've always we've spoken to Dr. Ruben Pryor before, he'd said about like if you've not been in this situation before, it's a good learning experience for you. If it doesn't work out well, then the next time you're in it, you're like, Well, I was here before. But one of the things that I took from him was when I was three under, I tried to dampen it and be like, just don't worry. It's so you're playing well, this is a good, good lesson, and then all of a sudden the bogey comes and then the spiral came. And I was trying to, I was trying to be very controlling of the situation. And in that moment, I just felt like it was so far away from me. Although I was trying to tell my brain the right things, like I don't know in that moment again if I would just do the exact same thing because one bad thing happens, then I go on a negative kind of like like down the slide into playing bad. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_03 14:45

It does. Uh and I think part of the thing that you said was part of the answer, which is you're trying to gain control of the situation, which is fair. I mean, as human beings, we want as much control as we possibly can. The best players in the world have developed control of a majority of their game. They understand how to prepare themselves for moments like that and for, you know, uh major championship play, right? That's that's ultimately the goal. But your the method with which you were trying to gain control was control results. Yeah. And and you don't have full control, even just the just the luck factor that's involved in the game, right? The variation uh in the game, you don't have full control of the results. So you weren't wrong in trying to gain control, you were just wrong in what you were trying to gain control of. And I think downplaying the situation um is at best a distraction, and at worst is just pure denial. Um and generally speaking, generally speaking, that makes things worse and actually means that you're in less control of the situation, less control of your emotions uh than you'd want to be.

SPEAKER_00 15:54

Yeah, I think that's something that my game has a lot of at the moment is trying to control the situation. We've spoken about this before, Dave, where obviously with starting this podcast, it's you've almost got the curse of the content creator. I've started speaking about this a lot from after speaking to John Sherman. And it does feel like I have this kind of thing on my back where it's like, well, I need to get down to this level because then I'll I'll let down the people that listen to the podcast and that we're supporting. And I that I take that with me in my game when I'm going into a round.

SPEAKER_03 16:30

So so here's the reality. Um, any weakness that you have that's kind of coming out as a result of the podcast, you had before the podcast even started. Okay. Okay. So the situation, and I I talk about this in the Fear of Embarrassment chapter, right? Similar idea. Um, there's not a thing that I or anybody on this podcast or any of the listeners could ever say to you that would um that that like wasn't already a pre-existing weakness on your part. So if you fear embarrassing yourself, if you fear not living up to the standard that you've set and you know, other people, it's like it has nothing to do with anybody else. It's just that now you've put yourself on a bigger stage, and so the the pressure that you're putting yourself on is greater, has absolutely nothing to do with anybody else. And I'm sure you've seen that.

SPEAKER_02 17:23

Like, and I think you you've got like a whole chapter in your book about this, Jared, about fear of embarrassment or embarrassing yourself in public. Like that's the classic thing, I think, for golfers at any level. You know, for us, we talk about like if we're going on a big golf trip with a whole group of people, that moment when we're about to take our first T-shot in front of the whole group, you know, that's potentially a really, really anxiety-inducing moment to go through. Um and like what would you say to everyday golfers like Chris and I to try and train ourselves into a better way of dealing with that?

SPEAKER_03 18:09

So I think the the question is uh you're asking this sort of second part. So I think if you were to ask a swing instructor, hey, uh, I'm slicing the ball, um, and then the question is, well, I how do I train myself to not slice it? Well, that swing instructor is going to ask or want to first figure out, well, why is it, like what's going on with your golf swing that would even produce that outcome? And I think that that's the fundamental question. That's why I say like the main objective of the book is to change how you think. And one of the main objectives is to change how you think about problem solving with respect to the mental game. And I think that a lot of the content that's out there, right, is providing a lot of advice and a lot of perspective. And a lot of it is good, but it's not always being kind of put into the right place because we're not going through some kind of a diagnostic process to figure out why it is that you, Dave, or you, Chris, in these situations are responding the way that you are. And it's not a super complicated question, but a lot of people just steamroll it because they just think, oh, I shouldn't feel this way. Oh, I need to calm myself down. Oh, just don't worry about it. Ah, these are your buddies. They'll I know no one, no one really cares. And so you kind of like rationalize the situation, and that's the equivalent of coming up with some random swing tip that gets you to sort of hit this shot or maybe these round, you're not slicing it, but it doesn't actually fundamentally change how you swing the golf club. Right. So the the compensations that we have developed, you know, for the mental game, um, you know, are are quite significant. So the the the just the basis of your question can contains that compensation, right? It's it's it has to first be about taking that step back because look, it there's a whole chapter on it, but there's many chapters that precede it. And and so the reason that it's sequenced in the book as it is, is because look, if you um struggle with pressure, if you struggle with confidence, if you struggle with anger, well, all of those things are gonna make it more likely for you to be embarrassed because any one of those is gonna compromise your ability to perform and thus produce the things that you fear. And then you ultimately embarrass yourself. So it it point being, right, because some people um they fear embarrassment, but really it's about, well, if I hit a bad shot, I'm gonna be pissed off of myself. And as soon as I get down on myself, I can't get out of it. So it's not really about the embarrassment, it's about you not having an idea of why you get so upset and what to do about it. It's not really about the first T embarrassment and all the other players, or you know, you lose a lot of confidence in yourself, very quickly kind of get down and mopey. Um, you know, the pressure of the situation might be too much. So, yeah, that if you want to go through it, you know, throw you on the hot seat here for a second. Like, what why do you think you know in those moments the the embarrassment creeps up to a level that can become problematic?

SPEAKER_02 21:03

Um because I think based on what you've just said, I have quite significant fear of feeling the way anger and humiliation makes me feel. And I think sometimes in golf, you know, it's crazy to say this about a game, but there have been times where I've felt real senses of despair. And I think part of that, I think touching on a point that you made a moment ago, is possibly because there's this sense of helplessness, like despair in that this is all going horribly wrong. I'm feeling very angry, embarrassed, ashamed, all of the above, and I have no Way of trying to get out of this. I've just got to endure it. I appreciate the raw honesty. Oh, promise. Listen, we we've been brutally honest so far on this uh podcast. Like I talked about it in episode one, how I cried whenever I was a younger man, but I I did I did cry after around golf once. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 22:27

It's it's look it matters a lot, it matters a lot to us, so I get it.

SPEAKER_02 22:39

Quick favor before we continue. If you're enjoying the podcast, please hit follow, leave us a rating or review. It really helps us grow the show and keep bringing off fantastic guests like Jared Tendler. Now, back to the conversation.

SPEAKER_03 22:58

So the the despair that you kind of get into. Um would you say that you are somebody that would you describe yourself outside of golf as somebody who is weak?

SPEAKER_02 23:10

Uh no, I wouldn't actually. I'm sort of looking over to Chris to validate that. No, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

I don't think you're not going to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_02 23:18

No, I think I think this is the thing. This is what's always fascinated me about golf, Jared, is I'm way more naturally talented at a lot of other things in life. And golf is not one of those things. I'm not naturally very gifted at golf. And but yet I am a good musician, I'm a good singer, I'm a good public speaker, uh, I'm a good football soccer player, like reasonably athletic and everything. So I I've got like good things going for me, and I I have good levels of talent. I just have never had it in golf. And and I've you know, I've got a fantastic family, fantastic group of friends, uh, you know, a great upbringing. I'm blessed beyond measure on all of those fronts. So I I feel a great sense of security in my life, but golf is the one area where I have felt real deep insecurities and deep vulnerabilities. I would I would say. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 24:23

So I the the the answer to the question of am I weak was no, and you gave a lot of examples of things that you're good at. So what that tells me is that your definition of being strong is not about like character, it's more competency-based. Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 24:41

I think I think sorry, yeah, let me let me um clarify that. I think yeah, based on listing stuff that I'm good at, I think that has over time given me a foundation to be a confident individual. And you know, I'm not I guess you know you would know way more about this than me. I'm not saying that's good or bad that that people should base their entire confidence and security on their competencies or not, but I think that has led me to being in a situation where I am a pretty confident individual.

SPEAKER_03 25:20

It's not it's not good or bad. It's just um I don't mean this as a a denigrating term, it's just juvenile, right? Like because kids like as kids, like, like how do you learn about yourself? You learn about yourself by doing things. You get feedback. Now, ideally, you get good feedback. You don't have parents, teachers, coaches who are, you know, like politically motivated, you know, giving irrational feedback. Like if you got good feedback, like you're gonna learn about yourself through the things you do quite accurately. But again, I think at this point, you are using golf to confirm your personal character. And you've already done it in all these other places, but you're you're you're only focusing on the competence. You're only focusing on the things that you're good at, not the things that you've learned about yourself at a deeper level. One of those being that you probably are pretty resilient, probably are pretty tough-minded. You're capable of being this honest about your weaknesses, which means I I don't generally ask questions I don't know roughly the answer to. I you you you had to have a decent amount of strength to be able to say publicly some of the kind of intimate ideas in your mind. So you have a lot of strength in your character, a lot of experience that kind of confirms that in lots of different avenues. And yet that hasn't translated to golf because you're only viewing your like at a deep level, only viewing your character from a competence standpoint. And that's just too basic, again, too juvenile, too rudimentary. Like mature adults, right, are capable of understanding very quickly. If I wake you up at 3:30 in the morning and I say, Dave, give me 10 things that you're great at that have nothing to do with skills or competencies, just 10 aspects of yourself that you are very proud of. You know, could you do it? Could you do it right now on the spot?

SPEAKER_02 27:13

Um Yeah, I'm kind and compassionate. I try and put people at the reeze. I uh I am interested in others. I uh care about people I meet. Um there you go.

SPEAKER_03 27:35

So you so you're proving you're proving the point, right? So like you've got some, but I promise you, if you spend five minutes a day, you know, just like reviewing this idea, right? You're gonna come up with a list of 10 very quickly. And that 10 is gonna get refined into some very specifics, um, you know, resourceful. Uh and again, it can be part of like what has helped you to acquire competence. It doesn't just have to be kind of your social nature, um, but you know, being creative, being interested, being curious, a hard worker. I mean, there's like lots of different dimensions of our character. You know, then we've got like kind of values that can be added to this and other goals and motivations, just kind of like broadening the scope with which how how you understand yourself. Because what happens is on that first T, when you're, you know, with a bunch of buddies or people that you don't know, it doesn't matter, right? You are hitting that golf shot. And I don't want to get too psycho-babbly because not everybody is dealing with this situation, but I think for you right now, this is what's happening. Um, you're hitting that golf shot, like looking to feel competent because that's the basis of your confidence. And so if you hit a good golf shot, then you get to feel confident. If you don't, you get to kind of go into this like hellscape of like a void of where where you're not really sure like who you are or what matters, like you just kind of get lost. And that's I think evidenced by the despair. The despair is a feeling of loss of hope and direction. And you're you're like rudderless, directionless when you hit bad golf shots, because it's not really a golf issue. It's more of a not, it's not even a personal issue, it's just a a lack of strength and integrity in the core of how you see and understand yourselves, which is not real. It's just your own perception. You're kind of like a magician who's magically like washed away all this knowledge or taken it for granted. Either one is, you know, equally problematic.

SPEAKER_00 29:26

And would you say the the you're saying about you woke us up at three in the morning and said, give me 10 things. Would you say it's beneficial to take time, find what you actually think are the 10 things that make you into that person, and just maybe put it on the wall when you wake up in the morning and just read through them to build your character so you become more confident with who you are?

SPEAKER_03 29:53

Yes, but not in like a like a memorization kind of way. Okay. Um like you being able to kind of parrot back those words is less important than having kind of like a more intricate con intricate connection. Okay. So when you think about like being a hard worker, you're gonna connect to specific examples in your life that kind of are evidence to that. That kind of creates more strength and integrity behind that word, behind that phrase or whatever. So yeah, the five minutes a day is to come up with the list, then it's to review the list and think of examples and kind of um, yeah, like I said, build some strength behind it. And and the 3:30 in the morning is really like a test of pressure. Like and you have because there's different levels of competence. Again, one of the big misnomers in psychology, or at least the mental game stuff, is like, well, you, you just got to get this piece of advice and think it's now a part of your game. Like, you know, Tiger gave a great uh kind of analogy here that I think works quite well in this situation. Um in 2003, he went through his second swing change. And he said it took him about two full years to get to the point where he could take that swing change into major championships and not have to think about it. Right? Then he could just kind of hit shots. So the difference between like knowledge that's a that's been sort of uh recently acquired versus mastered so well that you don't even have to think about it. And frankly, if you think about it, you get worse. Right? You think about how you walk, you become a worse walker. If you think about aspects of your golf swing right now, that you are it's called unconscious competent, that you truly have mastered, you're gonna get worse at it, right? The the like our focus and attention and our thinking is designed to help massage like learning and creating that attention on the things that we're trying to acquire, whether it's in our mentality, whether it's with our swing, whether it's with our physicality, whether it's with our understanding of our equipment or this type of strategy and shot selection, right? There's a learning process that has to be, you know, you go through. So the 3:30 in the morning is a test to see how much is actually reaching that unconscious mastery level, because it has to be there. That's what's going to hold up under the stress and pressure of trying to make a puff to, you know, shoot four under, you know, tee off on that fifth hole when you're when you're three under through four, or you know, hit that first t shot against uh or uh around you know 11 of your your I would say asking someone to come up with that list on the spot on a podcast is probably as good as 3:30 in the morning.

SPEAKER_02 32:32

Chris, you can go in the moment, you can go next, Chris. Um Jared. So is the whole purpose behind something like the exercise that I've just been through with you, which was interesting, a little bit uncomfortable, let's not lie, but it was interesting. Um that we then end up with a stronger foundation by which our confidence is derived from. Because if you're saying like what I'd listed were like competencies, things that I'm good at in life, you know, and that helps me feel confident that that is not as strong a foundation as maybe something else, like trying to get us to dig into what is it that isn't involved in stuff that you're good at, that is maybe good attributes, good characteristics of you, uh, is that helping build a stronger foundation of confidence? Is that is that where we're leading to?

SPEAKER_03 33:28

Um, yes, but like you can still have confidence from your competencies, but right now, right, you're feeling artificially weak in golf because here you are, like, I don't know, I'm just gonna say like seven out of ten, you know, in the larger like world comparisons at these other things, and you're a three out of ten in golf. Yeah. And so because there's that sort of differential and you're lacking confidence in golf, you're but you're being measured up against this sort of standard that you have elsewhere. So then like it's like kind of an unwinnable situation, right? Like you're either gonna hit a good golf shot and you'll feel maybe like relief, or you'll hit a bad one and now you're you know you're sort of in despair. And and so, yes, you can derive your competencies from being good at things and and truly kind of owning your existing golf skill and ability, right? Good or bad. Uh, but for you specifically now, you're you're not like the the weakness, and that was the specific word I want to use here, because like you you clearly are strong enough to talk about things that are hard. You're strong enough to deal with things that are hard. So that means you're resourceful and you're resilient and you've got a little bit of grit, or like other of those dimensions that you've shown elsewhere. And so when you get dis in despair after that t-shot goes poorly, you're forgetting. You're you're amnesiac, right? About that skill that you have in every other area of your life that can easily be transported to golf. Has nothing to do with your ability to swing the golf club. It has everything to do with your ability to deal with topping that t-shot, looking like an idiot, but laughing it off, and going up to hit the next shot saying, all right, well, that sucked. Let's see what we can do here, right? And just kind of having a better attitude. There's a bit more kind of hardiness and strength, foundation to use to use your word, foundation kind of behind the base of your confidence that protects you from kind of getting into this void, which frankly is undeserved. That's the whole point. I'm not asking to have you invent anything that isn't real. I'm just asking you to remember your own, the reality that forms the basis of your confidence everywhere else, that has nothing to do with your skills or competencies in those areas that has kind of become generalized across the board. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_02 35:51

Yeah, no, it's it's deep and I like it a lot.

SPEAKER_00 35:56

Yeah, no, I definitely think and um unless this is going my way now, but it's one of these things where being at this low handicap, I have high standards myself of myself. I have high standard standards myself, myself, myself.

SPEAKER_02 36:19

We are gonna leave it there for part one. In part two, Jared Tandler turns his attention to Chris. On paper, Chris is a golfer most club golfers would love to be. A low-handicap player who bombs it off the tee and is capable of shooting underpar. But Jared quickly uncovers a different problem tarot. Perfectionism. High expectations, and a mindset that's quietly making improvement harder, not easier. So if you've ever felt that your high standards should be helping you improve, but instead seem to be making golf harder and less enjoyable, you won't want to miss heart tip. We'll see you next time on High Low Can You Go.

SPEAKER_01 37:18

How low can you go?