Mastering the Inner Game
par Fred HOROWITZ

"There is always an inner game being played in your mind no matter what outer game you are playing. How aware you are of this game can make the difference between success and failure in the outer game." -Tim Gallwey. In the early 1970’s, I was a golf enthusiast and I reached a point where I was shooting regularly in the high seventies, low eighties- that’s considered to be a high level of proficiency in the sport. Although I had been playing for a number of years, it wasn’t until I took golf lessons (coaching) that I was able to translate my “knowledge” of the game into practice.

Most instruction was and still is “technique”-based, advice-based. If I followed the directions of the golf pro, my game would improve. That’s not necessarily the way things turned out consistently. I found that I had to fit myself into a mould of what was supposedly the “right” way and I felt constricted in playing the game. It also took away from my enjoyment. Playing golf for me was a serious undertaking.

At that time, I came across a couple of books by Tim Gallwey, “Inner Tennis” and “The Inner Game of Tennis.” He distinguished an “outer game,” in which the player plays on an external arena to overcome external obstacles to reach an external goal and an “inner game,” which is played to overcome the self-imposed obstacles that prevent an individual or team from accessing their full potential. The inner game occurs where “Self 1” (our thinking self) is ongoing telling “Self 2” (our natural intuitive self) what to do and makes sure that “Self 2” is invalidated, scolded, “made wrong”, for not performing according to the standards of “Self 1.”

Gallwey introduced the notion of “natural learning”- that increased learning is a function of increased awareness (mindfulness) and that by paying attention to what is actually occurring in the moment, our performance and enjoyment increases. He spoke of the triad- performance-fun-learning. Where most of us our stuck is in our addiction to performance, which actually lessens performance and enjoyment. He found that when his students focused on learning and fun, their performance increased. That’s been my experience in a game like golf or any other endeavour I undertake.

Currently, in the coaching profession, there seems to be a division between two philosophical camps- technique-based coaching and mindfulness-based coaching or more precisely, ontological coaching, where the intention is to support the client in becoming a more powerful observer of themself.

I’ve found that in my own life as well as coaching now for about 25 years, the mindfulness-based approach and playing the “inner game” is more effective, fun and fulfilling.