My golly, I'm so screwed up ... and so is everyone else
And how Fred Shoemaker surprised me: He likes my book!
Thanks for all the messages of congratulations that my new book—Getting Unstuck: Seven Transformational Practices for Golf Nerds—is finally done and available for purchase.
If you live in the Guelph area, I’d love to see you at tonight’s book launch celebration at Blue Springs Golf Club in Acton from 7-9 p.m. My podcast partner, “Humble” Howard Glassman will be the MC, so it will be lots of fun. I’ll also have copies on hand to sign.
Although it was about 20 years ago, I distinctly remember standing in a circle with about 30 men, all of whom I had just met about three hours earlier. We were on a men’s retreat called a New Warrior Adventure Weekend.
As participants, we were invited to share things that we normally don’t: our fears, regrets, stories—all the stuff that we keep bottled up lest anyone sees that we are anything but calm, cool, collected, and “fine.”
At a certain point, I remember thinking: “I’m not the only person who is f***ed up. We’re all f***ed up.”
Instantly, I felt lighter, connected to these guys, and that I wasn’t nuts to be a teeming mass of anxiousness one minute and feeling good the next.
In the ensuing years, I learned a lot about how our thinking and behaviours cause us to self-sabotage—hell, that’s what my new book is largely about—but I think one of my major take-aways remains: We’re all f***ed up.
We want to portray ourselves as having it altogether and that we look good, but inside we may be afraid, sad, ashamed, or angry—the stuff that we usually try to hide.
In our culture, we’re told over and over that our highest level of being is to be … happy.
No wonder so many people are miserable. We’re humans. We’re messy. We’re f***ed up.
I was thinking about this while recently reading The Intimate Merton, a compilation from the journals of Thomas Merton, the celebrated monk who wrote more than 50 books and is considered a modern-day mystic by many Christians. The journals reveal his brilliance and deep spirituality, but also a highly conflicted man who was chronically dissatisfied, forever questioning himself, highly self-critical, and railed against perceived injustices inflicted upon him.
In a chat with a Jesuit priest friend, I said it was a revelation that people who were considered saints and mystics didn’t float around in pious perfection.
“Oh yeah,” Father Phil said. “The saints are more psychotic than the rest of us.”
I took some solace in the realization that Merton was just as screwed-up as I am.
It also helped me find some perspective in yet another episode when I thought that I must be a Class A neurotic.
In May, I sent the draft manuscript of Getting Unstuck to Fred Shoemaker. Throughout the book, I discussed Fred’s influence on my game and coaching, and I quoted him extensively. I thought it only fair to allow him to review the book.
In early June, near the end of a golf tournament dinner, my phone rang. “Holy crap, Fred Shoemaker.” I was excited. Fred had never called me before. I told him I’d call him back in about 10 minutes when the dinner was over.
I immediately started to spin: “Oh shit, did I mis-quote him? Did I not attribute enough to him? Did I get some of his principles wrong?” On and on and on.
After the dinner, I phoned him back from my car in the parking lot. Fred answered on the first ring. He sounded friendly and upbeat. A good start.
Fred enthusiastically congratulated me on the book, and then proceeded to tell me how much he enjoyed it and why. I wasn’t just relieved, I was ecstatic. I couldn’t scarcely believe what I was hearing. I was over the moon.
Fred is the greatest influence in my coaching and my own game, and he’s greatly influenced other parts of my life. I believe that Fred—through his writing, workshops and private coaching sessions—steered me toward a new approach to golf that has allowed me to play the best golf of my life (in my mid-60s), and I now have far more fun. I’ve put a lot of that learning and experience into the book.
I’m not going to share what Fred told me because it was a private conversation. But many of his sentiments are conveyed in this testimonial review for the book that he provided to me:
“Most books about a sport give out information. They increase the sum of what we know. Tim O’Connor’s new book provides the possibility of transformation; a shift in what we believe and how we view our world. Getting Unstuck offers wisdom that can reshape your entire golfing experience. Through his own authenticity, Tim shows that when you get through your blocks and blind spots, what emerges is an independent, resourceful, confident golfer. I see the book as a heartfelt intervention in what is almost a certain future for those of us who play the game.”
After the call, I drove out of the parking lot with my celebration song—La Grange—at volume 11, smiling my fool head off, and I laughed at myself for being such messy f***ed-up human.
Along with my upcoming Getting Unstuck book, I’m also the author of The Feeling of Greatness: The Moe Norman Story,and co-host of the Swing Thoughts podcast.
If you’re interested in golf coaching—including on the mental part of your game—please send an email to tim@oconnorgolf.ca. I invite you to check out www.oconnorgolf.ca.
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Glad to see that you received an Imprimatur from The Guru. Well earned!
DL
Thanks Tim. Another excellent article. I learned a long time ago everybody is screwed up and it really helped my overall wellbeing and happiness!