Everyone says your swing is great, but you just can’t seem to get your scores down no matter what you do.

Spending a little time changing the way you think just might be your key to better scoring.

For the most part when your game starts to go bad, you tend to blame your swing mechanics for your bad play when, in reality, it is the way you are thinking that is actually hurting your swing and thus your scores.

Have any of the following thoughts ever come into your mind during a round? “I am playing so good. I hope I can get past that darn 13^th hole.” “If I can just keep it out of the water, I’ve got a chance at a good round.” “I have to be careful here so I don’t take too big of a swing.”

Golf has long been thought of a man’s sport.

Certainly, the cliché of the old male retiree who spends his time chipping away on hole 14 at the club still exists. If your only association with golf came from what you watched on national television, you would get the impression that only men played (though to be fair, all women’s sports receive little to no television exposure).

But the truth of the matter is that over the past few decades, women have been hitting the links in increasing numbers. Dynamic players such as Michelle Wie, Annika Sorenstam and Cristie Kerr have influenced many women across the country to pick up a driver. Sportswear companies are for the first time ever producing women’s golf shoes in mass even.

What the women who are new to the game have discovered in the past years, however, is something men have known all along: Golf is not as easy as it looks. There’s a learning curve to be sure, and it can a long, long time before you reach the level of just being adequate. Thankfully, there are a bevy of instructional books that can be phenomenally helpful towards improving your golf game. And many of these books have been marketed specifically to women. Here are a few of the best.

Six Steps to Unconscious Putting with Golf

Psychology Have you forgotten how good a putter you are? Well, the older they get, the more golfers tend to forget how easy putting really is. They also forget how good they used to putt when they were younger and more carefree. You often hear the golf pundits on television talking about how some or other up and coming young professional hasn't yet learned how difficult putting really is.

They sometimes go on to talk about how the accumulation of years of missed putts slowly frazzles the nerves and undermines the confidence of the older and more experienced golfers. Maybe that's how they justify their own inability to maintain their competitiveness on the tour. It's small wonder that they're now commentating rather than playing.

Let your mind go through the Four Stages of Learning as they apply to the golf swing

Many golfers spend time practicing but never seem to have enough confidence to let the body or system instead of the brain swing the club. Thus, they are left with two swings; the range swing and the course swing which are quite different. One is relaxed and free, the other tense, jerky and off balance not to mention inconsistent. The goal of practice is to develop a golf swing you have confidence in. One that is repeatable and automatic. I submit the golf swing, itself, is a ‘systematic’ not a ‘mental’ process.  

What to do

Next time you are practicing, let your mind go through the Four Stages of Learning as they apply to the golf swing. Consciously remind yourself of those stages while you practice instead of ‘thinking’ while you swing.  You will find that you ‘feel’ the different swing positions after the swing is completed. You do not have to ‘think’ about it while it is ‘happening’.