Temptations, for better or worse?
I’ve been going out and playing courses from about 30-50 yards lately. It’s the newest step in the evolution of learning how to play golf from the hole out. This new experience is amazing, it’s getting me very excited about getting to actually PLAY one day! This excitement is good and bad, though. On one hand, it gives me a whole new energy and determination about my practicing, but on the other hand, it’s like telling a race-car driver that they have to stay in first gear for the next year and that they have to do this on the honor system because nobody will be at the track watching them, but it’s for “their own good”… There’s a lot of potential analogies, really, but what it boils down to is that I know I have to develop a HUGE inner patience in order to not get ahead of myself and my learning. If you know me, you’d know that this is not something that will come naturally, but it is probably one of the best things that I will learn from the entirety of The Dan Plan. I just need to remind myself to calm down, breath slowly and concentrate only on where my next foot will be landing. Within this project, it is very easy to lose oneself and I need to maintain faith in the path that has been chosen or risk breaking down and not reaching my true potential as a golfer.
So, regardless of how much fun it would be to hit a drive over a lake like this one:
A golfing buddy, Eric, tees off on the fourth hole of Heron Lakes’ Great Blue golf course
I know that rather than jumping ship, I need to wait for my time, which will definitely come.
Without a good transition paragraph, the winter weather has actually calmed down and been quite nice over the past few days. It’s been a bit on the warmer side (between 40 and 45 degrees) and we’ve had a few days of sun. All in all, I think Portland’s not as bad as it’s made out to be, but then again I remember last spring and the rains and am not exactly looking forward to another season of that, but I gotta pay my dues! Here’s a winter sunset picture I shot from my car when leaving the course on Friday:
The early afternoon sunset out at Heron Lakes
Now, it’s on to my day off, hopefully filled with some good relaxation because tomorrow I’m meeting the PT Shawn Dailey for a timed circuit workout and I hope to be able to beat my last time by at least three minutes. I have a feeling I’m going to be hurting a lot by this time tomorrow..