The mental game of golf is all about being in the right frame of mind to hit the ball as well as you can. Oh sure, there’s decision-making, staying in focus and all that.

But the essence of how you use your mind when you play golf is in what happens in the few seconds just before you take your address, set up, pause, then swing back and through the ball.

How do you set up mentally for that? What goes through your mind during that time?

I have found that the key mental approach is to have a firm thought about where I intend the ball to go, and not on how my swing is going to get it there.

I reduce the moment to a simple thought–I want to hit the ball from here to there. Then, retaining that thought, I step up to the ball and hit it there.

The thought is not hoping, or “would liking,” or any of that. It’s, “The ball is going from here to there.” Period. And with a mind that believes that nothing will keep that from happening.

When you think this way, you would be surprised at how the technical stuff falls into place by itself.

Try it.