totally relaxed and loose as you swing back and forth. Don't be in a hurry to start or finish the swing. When you get to the finish, allow your body to be lazy in returning the club to another backswing. No jerks!

Notice whether your hands and forearms tense when initiating the first swing of the series. If they are tense, then repeatedly practice starting your swing with a feathery grip pressure so that no tension runs through to your forearms and thereby to the rest of your body.

Tension can cause quite an array of problems such as reverse pivots; fast takeaways; forced swings; loss of club head speed; rolling on the outside of the right foot; incorrect swing plane; fat or topped shots; big and little muscle groups not working together; lack of balance; or a fast tempo that your swing cannot handle with any efficiency.

A major problem with even professional golfers is that it is so easy to let our minds take a wide sweeping view of what the next shot means:

·            "How will it affect my score?"

·            "What does it mean to me personally?"

·            "Is this the best round I have ever played? Is it the worse     round?"

·            "If I sink this putt it will put me one up on my opponent!"

·            "My dad is watching, I really want to do well."

All of these comments, questions and statements are possible, along with hundreds more, at the very time you need to be focused on the elements of planning and executing the shot. If you are doing this, you are not "boxing out" the shot.

"Boxing out" means that you mentally put up a fence around what you need to do, so that you are not distracted by the things and thoughts that have no real bearing on the shot or putt. By not "boxing out" you allow your mind to wander to distractions.

Remember: even pleasant thoughts of success are not relevant to making the shot. Sometimes this lack of limiting your thoughts is called "outcome thinking". In other words, you spend time and energy