“What’s In Your Baggage?”

Well, it’s getting to be that time of the year again. The time when I pack up a few pair of shorts, shirts, golf shoes and balls in preparation for the annual golf outing I have with my family in North Carolina. The days are full of golf, laughter, and just plain ol’ fun. The problem is the days are too short (and include about 12 hours of golf), fly by too quickly (although they are still 24 hours in length),  and ends just when “it’s getting good” (not so much the golf, but the “being together-ness”).

The outing is full of joy: My younger brother might even go as far as to say the outing is “joy defined” or even “a bit of heaven on earth”.

The outing is “simple”: We eat breakfast. Golf. Grab a “hotdog all the way” (a hotdog with everything plus chili and coleslaw – about every 2 hours). Eat dinner. Golf a little more. Relax with adult beverages on the porch in rocking chairs and talk. Go to bed. Repeat every day. Simple!

The outing is a chance to live life unencumbered from the things of daily life:  No stress from work or home. It’s just guys being guys doing guy stuff that guys do.

Maybe it “works” because we are family and “know each others’ baggage”. No need to feel or be defensive. Sure, we “poke” at known “sore spots” just to get a reaction from one another, but all-in-all, it’s just a time filled with good clean fun.

Why can’t the other 51 weeks of the year be the same?

Simple answer – “Fear”

We have nothing to fear during the outing. We’ve been going to the same location for 25+ years now, so we “know” the golf course, staff, and surrounding area; which means we are comfortable being who we are, where we are. We “know” what they’ll be serving for breakfast and dinner because “they always have”. In short, we know what to expect because we have learned what to expect from the many prior trips.

That’s why the other 51 weeks are different. We  simply don’t know what to expect; which enables fear to enter and take control of our life.

I was reading a sports column written a few days after the completion of The Masters golf tournament at Augusta National. For those of you that don’t know, the tournament host draws names from the writer’s pool via a lottery. Winning the lottery allows “the chosen few” to play the course on Monday just as it was set for the professionals on Sunday; except it is played from the shorter Member tees, not the lengthy Professional tees. I understand it is quite the privilege.

As I continued reading the article, it became abundantly clear the writer’s golf skills were nominal, so much so that every year he hoped his name would not be drawn. However, his name was drawn this year and as such, he was full of trepidation i.e FEAR before attempting his Monday round.

I won’t share the details of his round, but allow me to share his words in closing:

“Places like Augusta will be around for a long, long time. But we might not be. We’ve all got an Augusta lurking in the back of our minds, something we haven’t done, something we’ve been scared to attempt. Maybe it’s not playing a golf course — maybe it’s singing in public, or cooking for friends, or writing that novel.

But the fear paralyzes us. We dodge, we avoid, we find excuses not to do what we ought to be doing. And once we start it, it’s almost never as bad as we fear … and sometimes, it can be much better. Sometimes, it can even be transcendent.

Find your Augusta. Tee up high. Take a deep breath. And enjoy every swing.