All of us have missed a short putt before. It is frustrating to miss something you know you can make! And most often a missed short putt can cause a chain reaction of bad play. Every golfer will have a tendency to remember a bad shot at a certain hole when he next plays that hole. Think of any short putt as a link on a chain that is a slack and being pulled tight. As the chain tightens each link is influenced by the one in front of it and influences the links behind it. What you must learn to do is break this chain of bad reactions by silencing that inner voice. This inner voice will tell you all manner of ill-advised advice and you must build a new chain based on memories of successful shots, not the failures of previous ones.

Next time, as you approach the green for your putt, do not speculate on what the condition or pace of the green is until you actually get there. Wait until you can physically check the conditions with your sight and touch. Here is where a key principle is at work. As you are consciously checking the grass and the line to the hole, your memory is subconsciously at work, as well, accessing previous experiences with which to compare this one. Much of the time, the images that are being recalled are things that are best forgotten