In 2010, my dad and I played in a 2-man golf tournament or Invitational, as they are called. After the first day of the two-day competition, we were in 2nd place. And, so we were paired with the 1st place team on the final day of the event. Sitting on the 1st tee waiting to hit our drives, I knew with every fiber of my being, that the next, roughly 4 hours of play with this other group was going to be disastrous, at best. At worst, there would be bloodshed.
While we were waiting to begin the day of golf, one of the players in the other twosome spent 20-30 minutes bragging about how rich he was, all of the country clubs he belonged to and the fleet of expensive cars he owned (neither my father nor I had ever met either of the other 2 golfers before today) and that is why his braggadocios sharing was shocking to say the least. For my dad, it was more of a personal affront because he would never, ever think about touting that type of stuff to anyone, let alone 2 people you just met. I looked over at him during this guy’s ravings, and I knew it wasn’t going to end well. Why, do you ask? Here is the best way to explain my father. He is an outspoken, old school, street educated, self-made guy, raised by a single mother who never forgot where he came from by making it his mission to give the underdog and less fortunate the opportunity to become financially successful.
And that is why, from the moment our competition opened his mouth, my dad was 1 ill-timed exchange away from exploding.
And, that exchange would actually happen 4 holes later.
On the 5th hole, my dad, as clear as day, hit his ball in the water. And, I told him he went in the water, but he still decided to go look for it. There in the sand, right at the point where my dad’s ball went in the water, was a white golf ball. Which was in fact, our competitor’s ball. My dad approached the ball, picked it up and after realizing it wasn’t his dropped it back in the sand. Well, in the game of golf, that maneuver is not allowed. You are supposed to identify the ball without ever disturbing it. The competitor, after observing what my dad did with his ball, asked him why he did that and what was he thinking?
My dad exploded in such a ferocious way that my two closest friends who were golfing 3 holes away would later comment that they heard my dad screaming and wanted to know what had happened. He said, and I quote “This isn’t the f*&king British Open you A&@hole!” and “Who do you think you are? Jack F*%king Nicklaus” and then a bunch of stuff none of us could make out. Understandably, the competitor was astonished and pleaded for me to calm my dad down, which I did. I ushered him to the cart and told the competitor to place the ball wherever he liked, we didn’t care.
At that point in the match, we were losing by 3 strokes. For the next 13 holes, the competitor emotionally, mentally and physically melted down and could not hit a shot. He was so, so flustered that he lost the ability to play golf. He never recovered and we ended up winning the tournament by a lot. In retrospect, despite this guy’s braggadocios and over-bearing personality, he did not deserve that fierce treatment.
But, there was a way for him to quickly recover and push forward, despite the unfortunate incident and the next 13 very tense, uncomfortable and stressful holes.
Next time you need a way out of a difficult situation, try this:
- Immediately begin to live in the present as much as possible – Try to become as aware as you can of sense-data. While you are in pain, concentrate upon all the sights, sounds, impressions in the immediate environment as well as the feelings of ease felt by other portions of the body.
- Refuse to worry – Tell yourself you can worry all you want tomorrow, or on some other occasion – but resolve not to worry in the present moment.
- When your thoughts do touch upon your particular problem in that present moment, imagine the best possible solution to the dilemma – Do not wonder how or why or when the ideal solution will come, but see it in your mind’s eye as accomplished.
(Jane Roberts, The Nature of Personal Reality Part Two: Chapter 17: Session 663, May 14, 1973)
I can’t tell you how many times, after learning about this technique, I have used it to navigate through and create favorable outcomes for very difficult and challenging situations and it works. I would like to elaborate on a concept that will help you to understand “why”this technique actually works.
Time doesn’t exist in the way that you might think it exists. Time is simultaneous, but we experience it in a non-simultaneous, linear format. Which means that events seem to be staged, one after the other, in succession. It only feels that way because processing our life as a simultaneous event would be true sensory overload. As such, we experience time as a dilation of sorts, in order to afford our senses the ability to process the millions of events we experience on a daily basis. In truth, there is no past or future, there is only the present. The place where you pattern your life. That is enough of that.
The technique works because it pulls your thoughts out of the past or future and grounds you in the present moment, which is where your thoughts are manifested.
By remaining in the present moment when you are living through a difficult time you effectively are deleting the thoughts that have created this situation and reprogramming your present.
Secondly, by refusing to worry we DO NOT ENERGIZE the situation and create the reality we fear. The emotion of fear or worry carries within it far more energy than you can imagine and accelerates the outcome that you are focused on – your worry, turns into reality. Finally, by imagining, in the present moment, that the situation has resolved with the “best possible solution” or in the best way, we begin to trigger that result.