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One of the POW’s of the Vietnam era had an interesting story. After he was released and arrived back in the US, and was well enough, he played a game of golf. What was so unusual about this game of golf was that he had an almost perfect score, something he had never accomplished before!

This man perfected his golf game while sitting in a POW camp in North Vietnam for many years. Not exactly the place where there is enough time and a few golf pro’s giving you private lessons…. Many of the men taken prisoner where essentially in solitary confinement. Even if they could see one another, they were not allowed to talk, or otherwise communicate with each other.

They were given nothing to keep themselves occupied from one day to the next, hour after hour, month after month. This Airman to keep his sanity started thinking about his golf game on a local course by where he used to live.

Over the weeks, months and years, it became easier for him to visualize how he was going to play each individual hole on the course. He spent hours and hours imagining the weight of the club, how to perfect his swing, where the best place to put the ball on each shot around the course. Of course there was the putting. He would imagine himself on each and every green with a putter in his hand. Thinking about the slope of the ground and the position of the sun, and how hard to tap the ball depending on where he was on the green.

In this way he kept his sanity when at times there was no sanity, and no sense to what he was having to live through. When he was released and strong enough to play a round of golf, he went out after so many years of practicing by the hour in his head, and he played the best game of his life.

When we watch professionals do something we can not do, they always make it look so easy. Some will even tell the crowds, something to the effect of” Well all you have to do is - fill in the blank - this, and your results will be just like this. It looks so easy, and finally we feel like a light has come on inside our heads and we can do the very same things.

Until we get home, and things are not working quite like we expected them too. Most of us become frustrated and put away whatever it was we were going to master. A few of us, the ultra stubborn, or ultra patient depending on your viewpoint stick with it until we too are close to mastering that particular goal.

That is the way life is and probably the way life works the best. If we all could master every endeavor with little effort, there would be no challenge in life. There would be no curiosity, and there would be no advancement in our lives and culture. In fact our lives today would probably be the same as they were five thousand years ago.

Thankfully we can not become a master of too many things at one time. We have our little niche of things we do well, and that is about as far as we get for most of our lives. Unless like the POW who played the almost perfect golf game after not touching a golf club for a number of years, we have the need and desire to excel above anything we normally would think we are capable of. Not being able to master more than one or two things at a time keeps life refreshing!

Comments (0) Mar 30 2008