Golf is nature’s greatest metaphor: everything can be connected to something bigger. Golf is a perfect way to make it all come together. If there was ever a better example for the game of life, it’s the game of golf. The first time I ever picked up a club my dad told me, “Golf takes a few minutes to learn, but a lifetime to master.” In other words anyone can play the game, but it takes time, hard-work, and perseverance to reach your full potential. Everyone on this planet is living, but only a select few know what it means to really live.

The first time I went golfing alone I thought to myself, “This is the real world.” I didn’t have any safety net, anyone to bail me out, it was all up to me…for the first time ever, I was alone. During that round I realized that as much as I loved having my dad with me, helping me with my swing, giving me useful tips, I realized that I was only really going to get better on my own. As you grow up you think you learn valuable lessons, but the real game starts the second you walk into the real world. You discover who you are when you’re alone; you can’t be taught how to live your life because no-one else knows how to live your life. That first time I was golfing alone I made a mistake, a mistake I know my dad would have stopped me from making because he had before. He wasn’t there to stop me so I made that fatal error, but I’ve never made it again. Learning lessons on your own is so much harder because there really is no-one to bail you out, no lifeline, and you never learn from your mistakes until you make them, and it’s all on you.

Golf has taught me so much that I never knew about myself. I’ve learned that I make very rash decisions in bad times and they almost always compound into worse situations. I learned that once something becomes somewhat routine to me I stop focusing and I screw up the easy things. Finally I learned the most important lesson of all, no matter how perfectly something goes, not everything is in your control:

I was on the final tee in a match against Catholic Central. I knew that normally I would hit a three wood to the left side of the downhill dogleg and leave myself a pretty good length shot into the scary green surrounded by water, but it had rained the past evening so my plan of attack had to change. I looked over the intimidating finishing hole, took a deep breath and went to my own world. I set up to the ball knowing this was probably the most important shot of the day. “Breathe, focus, turn.” My classic thought process raced through my head like a perfectly timed alarm clock. The amazing ping of perfect contact rang through the sky, truly music to my ears. I hit a beautiful drive down the right side of the fairway, just where I wanted to. I was perfectly set up to go at the pin on a very soft green. But as I walked, and the fairway came into view over the crest of the hill, I noticed something was missing: my ball. I ran down to where it should have been only to have my heart sink as my feet did, into the soggy grass. I realized that the ground was too wet and the ball had become buried in the earth, thus ruining my chances of a good score. I had done everything right and still it went wrong.

That was the day I decided not to blame myself for every little thing. In life I know there will be times that things don’t go as planned: I’ll have a perfect interview for your dream job, but someone else will edge me out. Someone will blow through a red light and cause me to have an accident. I’ll work hard in school, I’ll apply to my favorite college and I won’t get in.

Still I have learned that not everything will work out, but in the end it will all come together. We won our match by one stroke that day, because after my round had been ruined I didn’t give up, I played the hole like the missing ball never happened and brought our team to victory. I didn’t let the bad situation compound on me and make it worse. I recovered. That’s a skill I learned while playing the great game of golf; a skill I know will benefit me in every aspect of my life from here on out, as I continue to try to master the game.