Hey Fellow Golfer - 

Thank you for reading this week’s More Pars Than Bogeys Newsletter.

You can click here to read the online version of this week’s newsletter.

Also, in case you missed it: I sat down with Mark Immleman for an episode of the On The Mark Podcast to discuss how to get unstuck from the proverbial bunker of poor performance and play better golf.

You can listen to the conversation here. 

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P.S. If you’re interested in learning more about how mindset coaching and hypnotherapy can help you get unstuck from the proverbial bunker of poor performance on the course and in your business, click here to schedule a coaching discovery call with me. 

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Imagine standing over the fourth tee at six over after pushing two drives OB and finding yourself in two green-side bunkers so far…

(been there).

At this point in the round, you’ve reached a fork in the fairway:

1. You can let your poor, underwhelming start set the tone for the remainder of the day and finish at least 10 strokes above your average score.

2. Or, you can practice acceptance and refocus on playing your best golf one hole and one shot at a time, ultimately giving yourself to play to your potential (or even set a new personal best).

Acceptance in this scenario means acknowledging the rough start without letting it dictate the rest of your round. 

It allows you to reset your mindset, focus on one shot at a time, and potentially recover with better play on subsequent holes.

In today’s newsletter, you’ll learn what it means to practice acceptance (and how this drastically differs from practicing avoidance). You’ll also learn how valuable developing a mindset of acceptance is to help you remain focused, calm, confident, and in control. 

Let’s tee off!

Want to listen and learn more about acceptance?

Listen in: #29. The Art and Science of Acceptance to Accelerate Progress

Acceptance Explained

Acceptance is acknowledging and allowing your thoughts, feelings, or outcomes - good or bad - without resisting or changing them.

It means facing reality and moving forward without judgment or emotional attachment to what just happened.

Achieving a state of acceptance allows you to stay calm, focused, and resilient regardless of outcomes.

In practical terms, acceptance means:

• Acknowledging reality: Whether you hit a bad shot or get a bad bounce, acceptance means recognizing it happened without dwelling on it.

• Letting go of control: You can’t control everything on the course (weather, course conditions, bad breaks), but you can control your response.*

• Staying present: Acceptance keeps your focus on the current shot, not the past mistakes or future outcomes.

• Building resilience: By accepting mistakes as part of the process, you build mental strength to recover faster.

Consider this example:

You hit a bad shot into the rough. 

Instead of getting frustrated, you accept the result, take a deep breath, and calmly focus on resetting and refocusing before your next shot. 

Acceptance lets you stay focused on what you can control.

Let me be clear: acceptance doesn’t mean lowering expectations or being passive.

Acceptance is about staying mentally engaged and confident in your ability to recover and perform, regardless of what the game throws at you. 

A state of acceptance allows you to focus on executing the best shot possible in any situation, leading to more consistency and better results over time.

Acceptance versus Avoidance

Avoidance is the opposite of acceptance. 

Avoidance occurs when you deny, suppress, or escape unpleasant feelings, thoughts, or situations. 

On the course, this often looks like pushing away negative emotions or ignoring a bad shot, which leads to tension, frustration, and poorer decisions. 

You and I both know that tension and tightness are the antithesis of the fluid swing we’ve poured so much time and money into creating…

In practical terms, avoidance looks like:

• Denying reality: Refusing to acknowledge mistakes, bad shots, or feelings of frustration often makes things worse.

• Suppressing emotions: Trying to bury frustration or anger usually leads to emotional build-up, resulting in a mental explosion later in the round. Hello, blow-up hole(s)...

• Avoiding discomfort: Avoidance prevents growth because it keeps golfers from learning to deal with adversity.

• Compounding mistakes: Avoiding emotions and mistakes can lead to rash decisions, poor shot selection, or mental breakdowns, causing more mistakes.

Consider this example:

You hit a bad shot and immediately feel angry. 

You tell yourself it’s not a big deal, but internally, you're suppressing the frustration. This tension builds up, and you make another poor decision on the next hole because you’re not fully focused.

Here’s what you need to know about the difference between acceptance and avoidance:

• Acceptance helps you face and deal with what happens on the course, good or bad, with a clear mind. Think of acceptance as flowing with the game, adapting to whatever happens, and moving forward smoothly.
  

• Avoidance leads to ignoring or denying the reality of mistakes or emotions, which often results in bigger mental blocks and performance declines. Avoidance is like hitting a wall - the harder you resist or try to push it away, the more you block your progress.

Cultivating the skill of practicing acceptance on demand empowers you to remain calm, mentally flexible, focused, and emotionally resilient.

Let’s look at the benefits of acceptance in further detail next. 

5 Benefits of Practicing Acceptance on the Course

1. Acceptance Reduces Stress and Overthinking

Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up or lowering expectations; it means acknowledging what happens at the moment without fighting it. Even more, it’s accepting the reality of the situation: you cannot go back in time and play the shot again (if only).

When you remain hung up on the shot, wondering and questioning why, cursing the golf Gods (or yourself), you waste energy and focus, quickly turning up the volume of your emotional brain. 

By practicing acceptance, you can reduce stress and avoid spiraling into frustration, helping them stay calm and focused.

2. Acceptance Improves Mental Resilience

Acceptance is a cornerstone of resilience because it teaches you (forces you) to handle disappointment without letting it affect your performance. 

By accepting the things you can’t control (like a bad bounce or missed putt), you can focus your energy on things you can control, like your attitude and next shot.

3. Acceptance Builds Emotional Control

Golf is an emotional game, and it’s easy to get frustrated after a poor shot or series of mistakes. When you learn to accept that mistakes are part of the game, you can learn to regulate your emotions better, staying calm under pressure. 

Emotional control leads to better decision-making, improved focus, and more enjoyment on the course.

4. Acceptance Increases Confidence

When you stop fighting elements beyond your control, you build confidence in your ability to handle challenges. 

Confidence comes not from perfection but from knowing that no matter what happens, you can recover and play the next shot to the best of your ability. 

Read that again…

This mindset shift helps you feel more in control of your game, which dramatically increases the chances of shooting a lower score. 

5.  Acceptance Enhances Enjoyment of the Game

If you’re stuck in your head ruminating over past mistakes and living in the past, the game's enjoyment quickly fades.

Acceptance lets you quickly find that enjoyment again, even when you’re not playing your best. This allows you to play more freely and instinctively, which often leads to better results and more enjoyment. 

You can learn more specifically about hypnosis (what it is not, what it is, how it works, and how I use it to help my clients unlock their potential) in either of these recent resources:

• “How Hypnosis Can Help You Improve Your Golf Game.”

• Episode #7 of the Scratch Golfer’s Mindset Podcast

Oh, and download my free hypnosis audio recording to help you play your best round. 

The Impact of Acceptance on Peak Performance

I dug into the peak performance research to learn what aspects of acceptance have been studied amongst high-performers (on and off the course) and was pleasantly surprised with what I found. 

I’ll share some key points with you below, but first, I want to introduce you to an entire branch of behavior change psychology known as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT).

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy emphasizes the importance of accepting thoughts, feelings, and experiences rather than fighting them. 

Yes, there’s literally an entire change framework rooted in the power of acceptance. 

In the context of golf, this means accepting mistakes, bad shots, or negative emotions without letting them derail performance. 

Research shows that athletes who practice acceptance perform better because they avoid getting stuck in unproductive thought patterns and emotional spirals. They stay focused on the present moment, which improves consistency and overall results.

Additional noteworthy points to know about the value of developing the skill of practicing acceptance include:

• Studies on mindfulness in sports suggest that acceptance is closely tied to achieving flow states, which are characterized by high levels of focus, enjoyment, and performance.
  
  By practicing acceptance, you can let go of distractions - whether from mistakes or external factors - and maintain your concentration on the current shot.
  

• Research indicates that mindfulness, which includes acceptance, leads to greater focus, better decision-making, and increased resilience, which translates into improved results.

• Acceptance helps high performers manage emotions like frustration, anger, and disappointment. By accepting these emotions as part of the process rather than suppressing or fighting them, you can stay calm, think clearly, and make better decisions.
  
  Emotional regulation through acceptance has been shown to increase consistency in performance, especially in high-pressure situations.

• Acceptance enhances cognitive flexibility and the ability to adapt to changing circumstances and recover from mistakes. You and I know that golf is a sport where things can go wrong unexpectedly: a bad bounce, poor weather conditions, or a mistake.
  
  Acceptance fosters cognitive flexibility by helping you let go of the need for perfection and adapt your strategy on the fly. This adaptability leads to better decision-making and more consistent results.

• Acceptance has been linked to resilience and grit. Research shows that individuals who accept setbacks and failures without internalizing them as reflections of their self-worth are more likely to persevere through challenges and stay committed to their goals.
  
  This means staying mentally tough and resilient even after a bad hole or poor performance for you and me.

• Self-compassion is an important psychological factor that accompanies acceptance. Research shows that athletes who practice self-compassion - accepting mistakes without harsh self-criticism - are more likely to improve and perform better over time.
  
  By accepting that mistakes are part of the learning process and treating themselves kindly, you can remain motivated and avoid the burnout that comes from constant self-criticism.

My clients had three more lifetime low rounds this week:

• A 55-year-old male client with a 10 - 12 handicap shot a 71 (par 72).

• A 58-year-old male client with an 18 - 20 handicap shot a 79.

• A 72-year-old  male client with a 20 - 22 handicap shot 86 - twice. 

As a Golf Hypnotherapist, I use hypnosis to get to the core of toxic emotions and destructive mindset programs holding you back from playing your best golf. 

Click here to schedule a free Mental Game Strategy session to learn how I can help you learn faster and shoot lower scores.

Start Practicing Acceptance Today

To begin cultivating a mindset of acceptance, you must accept that it’ll take work. 

The best advice I can share with you is to bring the intention of practicing acceptance into every round and every day so that, with time, it becomes further ingrained as a default.

Here are a few additional helpful reminders to cultivate an acceptance mindset to accelerate this process. 

• Focus on strengthening your “next shot mind” mentality: After each shot, mentally accept the result, good or bad, and focus only on the next shot.
  

• Speak positively to yourself: When things go wrong, replace negative self-talk with accepting statements like, “It is what it is,” or “I can only control what’s next.”
  

• Cultivate a mindfulness practice: To help you improve your ability to stay present in each moment, avoiding dwelling on the past or worrying about future holes, cultivate a journaling, meditation, or gratitude practice.
  

• Breathe: Use deep, controlled breaths after mistakes to center yourself and reset your focus.

Your Next Step

Every newsletter will conclude with a suggested action step and further resources on the topic we discussed.

After reading today’s newsletter, go back and read it again. Seriously, this is a crucial concept you must understand and begin to cultivate if you wish to take your game to the next level.

Thank you for reading today’s newsletter.

If you found it valuable, share it with a fellow golfer ready to take their game to the next level.

Until next time,

Paul

P.S. What did you think of today’s newsletter? Reply back / drop a comment below to let me know.

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Thank you for reading.

When you're ready, there are three ways I can help you:

1. Listen to The Scratch Golfer’s Mindset Podcast: Whether you’re an occasional amateur, a weekend regular, or a competitor seeking a tournament trophy or your pro card, this podcast will help you overcome the mental hazards of your mind to shoot more pars than bogeys. Start listening.
   

2. Download Your Free Hypnosis Recording: How Hypnosis Can Help You Shoot Lower Scores: Whether you spend two or ten hours at the range each week, if you don’t learn to address and overcome your mind's mental and emotional hazards, you’ll remain stuck in the proverbial bunker of poor performance playing well short of your potential. Shoot More Pars.
   

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