Rough Diamonds

What am I going to do with my life? Why am I at university? Is this right for me?

Questions I hear on a weekly basis, and quite rightly, a fair and humanistic reaction to a loss of control and self-belief.

This is not the weekly blog unfortunately for you die-hard fanatics, I’m only talking to three people… yes I know who you are. I have reached the stage with my studying where I know just need to share again, I can only study so much. I haven’t written a proper article in weeks and I honestly just want to spread this message around.

The year was somewhere around 2005, I was at Shooters Hill Golf Club, alongside my fellow junior members in the junior changing room. Now, before you ask why this is relevant, a few things; 1) yes I play golf, and have done from about 2005, 2) I was 8 at the time, and only remember it because it has always helped me when I least expected I needed help, with golf and otherwise.

The junior changing room at Shooters Hill GC was perched at the top of the clubhouse; as you can imagine, quite dangerous for juvenile individuals. Besides the point, we sat down in a circle, as a team, and had a talk from a father of one kid. All these juniors were at least 4 years older than me, except one, just to add further context.

This conversation was about psychology of golf, without going into too much golf-specific jargon, the general premise of the talk was revolved around this diamond. The idea that when we start playing golf, the diamond has just been harvested from…