Unlock Your Golf Potential
Getting Unstuck: Seven Transformational Practices for Golf Nerds
A new book by Tim O’Connor on how to change your self-defeating behaviours and move your game forward
What keeps you—a golf nerd—stuck isn’t that you aren’t athletic, your dad yelled at you, or you can’t turn your hips properly; it’s your self-sabotaging patterns of thinking and behaving.
In Getting Unstuck: Seven Transformational Practices for Golf Nerds, coach and writer Tim O’Connor expertly guides you through previously unexplored territory, providing wisdom, and practices that will transform your golf and—possibly—your life.
The author of The Moe Norman Story: The Feeling of Greatness provides you with techniques used by elite performers to quiet their minds, break free of limiting beliefs, commit to genuine improvement, and self-coach themselves out of funks, slumps and underperformance.
O’Connor connects with your cravings and compulsions with stories drawn from his career as a fellow golf nerd, an award-winning golf writer and broadcaster, and golf and men’s life coach.
Praise for GETTING UNSTUCK
“Tim O’Connor’s new book provides the possibility of transformation 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.”
Fred Shoemaker
Founder of Extraordinary Golf
“In a world of influencers and quick-fix promises, I sense that golfers are craving a deeper relationship to the game. In Getting Unstuck, Tim O’Connor provides you with a wonderfully rich and personal path to self-mastery. The wisdom contained in his book can be profoundly beneficial to your relationship with golf and to your life.”
Karl Morris
Performance Coach, Founder of The Mind Factor
Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash
Why is this book aimed at "GOLF NERDS?"
I use the phrase “golf nerd” because I believe it’s much more viscerally appropriate and descriptive than “avid” for people like you and I, not as over-the-top as
LEARN MORE
An Excerpt: What This Book Can Do For You
As a golf nerd, you are forever searching and striving in your noble quest. Despite your heroic efforts, however, you always seem to be in a perpetual stall. You have not made the progress that you crave, and you wonder why.
This book is about getting you unstuck and moving forward. Moving from your old ways that are tied to the past to a new future as a golfer. This book provides you with seven key practices that will allow you to make the progress you are seeking if you apply them on a regular and dedicated basis. They don’t require much time, incense, fasting, or going on a retreat.
These practices, all of which are rooted in tradition, neuroscience, and social science, are practical; they are not particularly trendy or the stuff of internet influencers. If you engage in these practices, they will lead you to greater awareness, self-understanding and to taking action that transforms your golf.
The Seven Practices
THE FIRST PRACTICE
Don’t Be Scared, It Ain’t Weird—to Meditate
THE SECOND PRACTICE
Determining Where You’re Going … and How to Get There
THE THIRD PRACTICE
Why Do I Play Golf?
THE FOURTH PRACTICE
Coaching Yourself Through Journaling
THE FIFTH PRACTICE
Anchoring Your Best Experiences
THE SIXTH PRACTICE
A Little Gratitude Takes You a Long Way
THE SEVENTH PRACTICE
Transform Your Game by Changing Your Stories
Interludes: The Power of Stories
Each chapter is followed by a story—called an “Interlude”—from Tim’s experiences as a golf nerd, coach, writer, men’s work facilitator, and even a bass player in a punk band. These stories allow you to relate more fully to the practices and your own experiences so you gain greater insights into the actions that will transform your behaviours and your golf.
An Excerpt:
I told George McNamara, my coach, that my swing wasn’t the issue. I knew about the power of process and all that. I was distraught by my bratty behaviour. It was contrary to everything I learned as a caddie, and the cool, calm, and occasionally amusing demeanour that I attempted to project out to the world no matter what noxious poisons were roiling around inside my head.
I was angry and mystified that I had been yanked right back into my old stuff like an addict. I fell back into a pattern of alleviating my anxiety by grasping onto anything that I felt might instantly solve the problem.
My knee-jerk reaction had nothing to do with logic and being a grounded person worthy of your admiration. It was compulsion. I felt out of control, desperate. I wanted out of my misery. In seeking salvation, I was like an alcoholic under stress reaching for a drink.
George said I had a choice: I could certainly play golf focused on results. Or I could play golf so I could take something positive out of every round. It sounded so mature, extraordinarily wise, and devoted, like a monk getting up at 2 a.m. to chant.
George suggested that I play the “awareness game.”
More Praise for GETTING UNSTUCK
“Tim O’Connor’s Getting Unstuck is for curious golfers who are ready to find a new perspective about this beautiful game. Sharing from his heart, Tim presents wisdom, humour and insights that will resonate with all golfers. The practices presented here have allowed me to play with strong inner peace. Even his footnotes are amazing!”
Susie Meyers
PGA of America, Author of Golf From Point A
“If there’s a golfer anywhere who hasn’t been “stuck,” I’d like to meet that person. Tim O’Connor has been there himself and has developed practical strategies to find freedom and clarity. Reading his book Getting Unstuck and applying its ideas will help you play better—really “play”—and enjoy the game more.”
Lorne Rubenstein
Author, Ontario and Canadian Golf Halls of Fame Member
“Until I picked up this book, I was unconscious of what caused my golf-related suffering. Getting Unstuck has helped me break free of that old way of being. Discovering a pathway to freedom in golf has helped me recover joy not only in golf, but in my life as well.”
George Daranyi
Former Chairman of The ManKind Project International
GETTING UNSTUCK is your invitation to transforming your game
An Excerpt:
If your desire is to become the golfer that you envision, your work includes developing your swing, taking care of your body, and learning how to use your mind more skillfully.
It also requires observing, making better choices, healing, nurturing your spirit and engaging in practices that increase your self-awareness. This is the hardest work you’ll ever do. But it’s also the most enriching and fulfilling work you will ever do—for your golf, and for your life, the people in your life, and your influence on the world.
Can golf really be a portal to that kind of transformation?
With all my heart, I believe it is.
Tim O’Connor is a golf coach, award-winning writer of Up & Down on Substack, and co-host of the Swing Thoughts podcast. He is the author of The Feeling of Greatness: The Moe Norman Story, and three other books. Tim is former head coach of the University of Guelph golf team. He is enshrined in the Ontario Golf Hall of Fame as a writer. He plays bass in punk band C.I.D. He lives in Guelph, Ontario.
Order Your Copy Today!
Don’t miss out on the opportunity to transform your golf game and your life. To ORDER, visit amazon.ca. It is Cdn $19.99 and US $15.99. For a signed copy, please send a request to tim@oconnorgolf.ca.
Tim O’Connor Performance Coaching | Tel: 519.835.5939 | www.oconnorgolf.ca