Love is the deepest and most complex of emotions. It can rage like a roiling ocean or purr like a contented cat. It’s born, it ages and lingers, subsides and swells. It lives and breathes and dies.
There are few things more painful than when love dies. It’s a feeling most of us strive to avoid and that’s why we work so hard at our relationships. Facing rough and tough times, offering support and understanding, patience and guidance. Love will endure testing situations if you’re prepared to put in the effort. It’s worth doing it as the greatest love affairs have peaks and troughs, and you wouldn’t want to miss out on the next peak by giving up at a troublesome trough.
Golfers know the analogy of peaks and troughs. We are the most optimistic and perseverant of people. No matter how many slings and arrows of outrageous fortune the game throws at us, we think of better things to come and return to the breach with hope and love for our favourite pastime.
But it’s understandable that if the troughs seem overly prevalent and the peaks just too distant, one might start to struggle to find the old love for golf. It might just subside to a point where you feel there’s no point in continuing the affair. But wait, the love is still in there, no matter how deeply it’s buried. Don’t give up, it means too much. Here are four reasons why you should climb every mountain and carry on to that next golfing peak.
Missed Opportunity
In Scotland, we tell departing visitors, “Haste ye back!” No matter how irritated we’ve been by them, we know we’ll miss them when they’re gone. Maybe because it’s Scotland’s game, golf always tries to beckon one back. Perhaps it will be a fine drive on the 18th, a closing par or a decent putt on the final green. Golf wants you to return to try, try and try again… That’s another Scottish reference. I’m being terribly patriotic here.
But the point is – Golf always offers you an opportunity. The opportunity to improve, to hit a few good shots, to make some pars, to return a good score. You don’t want to miss out on the opportunity by turning your back on the sport. If you’re not in it, you’re not going to win it. Defeatism is not an admirable strategy.
Don’t give up on golf, find a way to rectify the problems you’re having with the game. Get a lesson. Get new clubs. Practise your putting, change your grip. Mix things up. Variety is the spice of life and, for this thrilling and unpredictable love affair to continue to its next climactic height, you must try something new. Don’t be scared, don’t back out, take the plunge.
Social Life
Think about how much of your social life revolves around golf. It won’t just be your regular playing partners. You probably interact with all sorts of people because of golf – the club pro, the bar manager, the caterer. You probably have brief chats with people you know through golf when you meet them on the High Street.
You might well go to functions at the club that offer you a structured and fun social calendar. Are you prepared to turn your back on all these people? Would golf still give you the time of day if you said you were no longer in love with it? Maybe not. And all those people would undoubtedly choose golf over you if you made the split. Think about it.
Your Health
You might not know it, but golf is essential for your health, both physical and mental. Stop golf and you’ll miss out on thousands of steps a week. Are you prepared to just “go for a walk” to replace them? How else do you earn that hearty evening meal and a glass of Rioja?
You might have to start running or going to the gym. You can’t possibly want to do that. You won’t be swinging a club which is great for both muscle strength and flexibility, so you might also need to start going to a Pilates class… You really haven’t thought this through, have you?
And golf is proven to be excellent for your mental health. Social interaction, the fresh air, the challenge, the (possible) sense of achievement. Without all those things, you could quite possibly go into a dark, downward spiral of depression that will be nigh on impossible to break free of. You’ll turn to other addictive activities that are fairly likely to be even more destructive than golf. Cripes, maybe it’s time to book that series of lessons with the pro.
The Beauty
Golf is a beautiful game played in beautiful surroundings. Why are you thinking of spurning beauty? We may all age and lose our looks, but golf continues to radiate. There’s beauty in every golf hole, in every tree that surrounds it and deflects our ball towards the out of bounds. There’s beauty in that ProV1-filled pond, there’s beauty in that knee-high rough.
There’s beauty in the game itself, in the arc of a ball or the roll across a perfectly manicured green. There’s beauty in a sleek, forged 4-iron, or a crafted, shaped, shining putter. There’s beauty in the simplicity of the sport, the humble objective of getting a small ball into a distant hole.
There’s beauty in the camaraderie between participants, in the shared experience, in the struggle, in the success, even in the glorious failures. Golf is beautiful and, no matter how angry you are with the game, it’s worth another chance.
