58. The closer you can match your real swing to the practice swing, the better player you will be. Make it a goal to do it. You will have to forget about results for a while but if you can stick with it, then in the long term, this single idea can transform you game

Many years ago an old famous Scottish Professional called Tommy Armour once remarked that "You need to know the game in its complexity to be able to teach it in its simplicity". Years later, John Jacobs (who is one of the most respected coaches around) said that, "The ideal golf swing is simply Two Turns and a Swish". When one looks at the mass of written material devoted to the analysis of the technique, Jacobs’s statement comes as a welcome breath of fresh air and I am sure you will agree, he certainly fits Armour's ethic.

Everyone is able to perform this simple swing but most can only do it when the ball is not present. Yes, the practice swing is performed and paraded up and down the land every weekend as the heads of daisies are clipped off with remarkable ease at the side of the first tee. So why is it things go wrong when we tee the ball up and address it? Well, to what degree things go wrong is determined by which way, and by how much, the ball Arrests your Attention.

There are several ways you can be sidetracked but for today we will look at the player who is duped into seeing the ball as a ballistic missile and goes for distance. First though at this point, just bring to mind the wonderful feeling of your practice swing or should I say swish. Recall how full and “flowing” it feels with a sense of complete wholeness. Putting the ball into the equation changes the scenario because its introduction creates an event in the middle of the swing and we call this event Impact.
Picture of club and ball at impact in here
The word impact is a highly emotive word and this "Impact", in the middle of the swing effectively splits into two parts what is without the ball, a swing with a feeling of oneness. So now we have a two piece swing with a before impact and an after impact.

Here is the problem. We respond by putting more effort, into the before impact part of the swing believing this will give us more power at the ball. Unfortunately what actually happens is the swing loses its rhythm, balance, co-ordination and its timing and in the case of the lesser the player, he loses his composure, his confidence and his ball.

Every player on the planet is drawn, to some degree, into this confrontation with the ball but with the top players the error is within acceptable tolerances. To improve things, we need to back off from this confrontation. We need to see the ball with a healthier perspective and by that I mean regarding the ball as a smaller part of a greater thing. The greater thing being your swing or rather the swing we make when the ball is not there. We need to avoid the folly of attempting to overpower the ball and focus on the qualities in the technique that are lost as a consequence of this approach. Remember the swing is the cause and the ball is the effect. If the ball arrests your attention and gets you trying to force the desired effect, you end up in such a physical state that you cannot perform the necessary cause to achieve it hence the saying "The harder you try the worse we get." Resist trying harder; back off and with two turns and a Swish let the game come to you.