What Could You Shoot If You Forgot Your Limits?

Your limits are often less physical than they are psychological. Not boundaries of capability, but boundaries of belief.

You tell yourself a story about who you are as a golfer and what you're capable of. You think you know exactly what you can shoot, so you pace yourself accordingly. You set conservative expectations for your driving distance, your iron accuracy, your ability to score under pressure.

You walk through every round based on your measurements that may not be an accurate representation of reality anymore.

And the moment you sense yourself playing a bit too well like when you're three-under your handicap through seven holes, or when you've hit five straight fairways, or when you're putting lights out you silently, subconsciously ease off.

You retreat back into the version of yourself and your capabilities that you've memorized.

But what if that version is outdated? What if you're the golfer from two years ago living in the body and mind of today's golfer?

What if your "measurements" have changed?

The Student Who Didn't Know His Limits

One student came to me convinced she couldn't break 90. She'd been playing for five years and had shot between 91-95 in every single round. That was her range. That was her capability. She knew it.

In our first playing lesson, I deliberately didn't tell her the scorecard total until we finished. I just focused her attention on each individual shot, each individual hole. No running score. No awareness of pace.

She shot 87.

When I told her, she literally didn't believe me. "That's impossible. I don't shoot in the 80s."

"You just did."

"But I've never—"

"I know. That's exactly why you did it today. You didn't know you were doing it, so you didn't get in your own way."

We played again the following week. This time, I let her keep score. She was aware of every shot, calculating her total after every hole, monitoring her pace toward that magical number.

She shot 95.

"What happened?" she asked, genuinely frustrated.

"You remembered your limits," I said. "And the moment you realized you were playing well enough to break 90, you started protecting that score instead of just playing golf. You got scared of what you might accomplish."

The Invisible Governor

I've come to think of these self-imposed limits as invisible governors like the speed limiters on some cars that prevent them from going past a certain RPM.

Your body and skills might be capable of more, but your beliefs about what you can do act as a governor that automatically pulls you back when you start to exceed your self-imposed limits.

I see this manifest in specific, observable ways:

The Front Nine Hero: A golfer shoots 38 on the front nine, well ahead of their typical pace. Then they shoot 46 on the back nine. Not because they got tired or the course got harder, but because they started protecting the good front nine score instead of continuing to play freely.

The Birdie Shutdown: A player makes three birdies in five holes. Then they par the next six holes with conservative play, not because the holes got harder, but because they're subconsciously preserving their good start rather than continuing to attack.

The Distance Limiter: A golfer believes they hit their 7-iron 150 yards. So when they have 165 yards, they automatically reach for a 6-iron and decelerate through impact, never testing whether their 7-iron might actually fly further with a committed swing.

The Handicap Protector: A 15-handicap starts playing like a 10-handicap for a few rounds. Instead of embracing the improvement, they start playing more conservatively because "I'm not really that good" and drift back to their 15-handicap identity.

In every case, the invisible governor kicks in. The moment you sense yourself exceeding your memorized capabilities, you automatically slow down, ease off, or play it safe.

What I've Learned About Breakthrough Rounds

The most common characteristic of breakthrough rounds—the ones where golfers shoot significantly better than their handicap—isn't better swing mechanics or lucky breaks.

It's amnesia.

They forget what they "normally" shoot. They lose track of their score. They stop calculating their pace. They don't realize how well they're playing until it's over.

I've started deliberately creating this amnesia with my students:

With some, I don't let them keep score during playing lessons. They have no idea if they're playing well or poorly—they're just focused on executing each shot.

With a few adventurous ones, I've had them play an entirely different set of tees than they're used to, or use only half their clubs. The disruption to their normal patterns makes them forget their usual limits.

The results are often remarkable. Not because these gimmicks make them better golfers, but because they create temporary amnesia about what they're "supposed" to be capable of.

The Question That Changes Everything

So here's the question I want you to sit with this week, maybe think about during your next round:

What could you shoot if you first forgot you couldn't shoot it?

Not as a fantasy or wishful thinking, but as a genuine inquiry into the gap between your actual capabilities and your believed limitations.

What if you stopped pacing yourself according to your current handicap?

What if you forgot about your "normal" driving distance and just swung freely?

What if you didn't know what you "typically" shoot on the back nine and just played each hole on its own?

What if you approached that pressure putt without the memory of all the pressure putts you've missed before?

Your limits might be less about what you're physically capable of and more about what you've convinced yourself you're capable of.

The Practical Application

I'm not suggesting you just "forget about your limits" and magically play better golf. That's not how this works.

But I am suggesting you deliberately create situations where your memorized limitations can't govern your performance:

Play Without Scoring: For one round, don't keep score. Just play each shot, each hole, with full commitment and see what happens when you're not managing a number.

Change Your Context: Play a course you've never seen before, where you have no expectations about how you "should" score. Or play from different tees than usual.

Focus on Process, Not Outcome: For an entire round, your only goal is to execute your pre-shot routine perfectly on every shot. That's it. No score targets, no handicap expectations.

Remove Your Markers: Don't check your distances against your "normal" yardages. If you have 165 and you think 7-iron, hit 7-iron. Don't second-guess because "I don't normally hit 7-iron that far."

The goal isn't to trick yourself into playing better. The goal is to create space where you can discover whether your believed limitations match your actual capabilities.

What I've Discovered

After more than twenty years of coaching, I've come to believe that most golfers are better than they think they are.

Not because they're being modest or humble, but because they've built an identity around a version of themselves that may no longer be accurate… if it ever was.

They measure themselves against a measurement that's either outdated or was never the right measurement to begin with.

And every time they start to exceed those measurements, they subconsciously pull back. They protect their identity as a "15-handicap" or a "guy who doesn't drive it past 240" or a "player who always struggles on the back nine."

The breakthrough comes when they forget those identities long enough to discover what's actually possible.

So let me ask you: What could you do if you first forgot you couldn't do it?

Your limits might just be the story you've been telling yourself about what's possible. And stories, unlike physical capabilities, can be rewritten.

Think About This

What if the handicap you've been protecting, the driving distance you've accepted, the scores you expect, what if all of those are based on an outdated measurement of a game that's changed? What would you discover about your game if you played one round where you completely forgot what you're "supposed" to be capable of?

Until next time, less swing thoughts, more great shots!

Owen.