Happy Gilmore taking a swing at life

I texted several people today who weren’t on FB, or my email, or who I don’t see. I was about to stop and I heard to do one more group text. So I did. While most of my responses where the traditional,  thanks, you too, love to your family. There was one that defined why I was directed to do the text thing. A friend from High School was in need of some cheer. She was very happy to get my message and told me a lot about some of the things she has been going through. She fell down a flight of stairs and broke her heel and ankle and tor ligaments in her other leg. Was in an abusive relationship for 12 years and just not a very happy life to date.

She has no family, her mom, passed away a few years ago. So my “Be Happy this Thanksgiving”, message provided her with a little joy. Glad I listened. You never know why one is directed to do something. I was happy to have at least for a moment to have been the vehicle of a little Happiness in her life today.

Be Happy This Thanksgiving and Every Day.

Being Happy

In today’s climate of uncertainty, fear and doubt, it’s sometime difficult to just be happy. Being happy is not a feel good theory that only works when things are going well for you or there are no real issues. Learning to be Happy in the middle of a storm requires a great deal of understanding and purpose. Many people on the golf course are only happy when they are playing well, out driving the next person or getting pars. While I always want to do all of those things, there are other factors that I look for when I am playing. The main thing I look at me. What am I going through at the moment? If I am worrying about issues in my life, these issues invariably creep into my game.

The movie Happy Gilmore is deal with being Happy. Here is a guy, who wants to be a professional hockey player, but really is not that good at it, but he keeps trying and trying and eventually he gets pulled into golf. He fights it, but eventually becomes good at golf. He goes through some ups and downs and has to learn how to find his Happy Place.

Where is your Happy Place? Lately I’ve been searching for mine, and for the moment, I found it on the Westchester Driving ranges last night. My game, as I has mentioned in a previous post, has been more than sub-par, even on the driving range. Last night I was actually able to apply Practice transference (read more about this in September’s issue of Golf) and was able to free up my mind and just swing freely without worrying about where the club was, if my body was moving in the right directions, and a myriad of other issues. I left the range happy and felt more connected to my swing that I had in the past two weeks.

Being Happy on and off the course is a focus that I have and I sometimes forget. It is especially difficult for me as I try and chart out a new life course where there is no tee-guide or real direction of where I am going for the moment. I now realize that being Happy is my main focus for the moment.

Remember the golf coach Chubbs from Happy Gilmore trying to get Happy to relax by saying—“It’s all In the Hips, It’ all in the Hips”.
As a 54-year old golfer, “It’s all in the Hips” had a much different meaning. For me it was about pain. I would do stretches that my trainer gave me and it would help alleviate the pain, but the pain would come back.

The other day I was getting ready to do a strength training session with my trainer Pauliina and I said to her that I noticed that my hips haven’t been hurting over the past two months and I was wondering how much it had to do with the fact that I hadn’t trained in awhile.  She felt that while it was true I hadn’t trained in a while, that my hip issue wasn’t connected to me not lifting weights, but something else.

As we continued to discuss it, I had a big ah ha moment. I remembered watching the Lee Trevino/George Lopez special that was on the Golf Channel in January. It was there that Trevino, in giving George a golf lesson, talked about the take away and the shoulder turn. He said that most amateur golfers turn their shoulders incorrectly. Instead of turning their shoulders around their hips, they turn their shoulder with their hips. He suggested that Lopez should have a flatter shoulder turn and keep the club in front of his chest during the entire turning process.

Trevino comments made a lot of sense to me, so I proceeded to make the change. He also talked about keeping the club in front of your chest and not behind you. These two changes enabled me to make greater contact and more powerful drives. What I didn’t realize at the time was that the suggested change would also produce a change in the pain level in my hips.

I am now swinging more in alignment with my body.  I laughed out loud when I realized this.  Pauliina also went on to suggest that by swinging this way that I was also working on strengthening my core.  She said” I don’t know much about golf, but out of the two swings you are showing me, the newer swing looks less painful. I now find it easier to transfer weight and follow through more. As golfers get older in age one of the first thing that goes, is the follow through. Most of us cut the swing off because of flexibility issues, and various pains in the shoulder, back and hips. Trevino’s instruction changed a lot of that for me.

While Chubbs may be right about it “All being in the Hips”. I can truly say the pain is no longer all in my hips.