Golfers...

You are an onion.

No, I’m not saying you smell.
I’m saying your body has layers.

And when something isn’t going the way you want in your golf game, one of the easiest things to do is grab onto the first physical quality you notice and make that the entire story.

Your hips feel tight.

I need more mobility.

You feel weak.
I need more strength.

You can’t feel the position your golf coach is asking for.

I need another cue.

You don’t feel athletic in your swing.

I need to work harder on my technique.

Maybe.

But maybe you’re only looking at:

ONE LAYER OF THE ONION.

Your golf body isn’t one thing.

It’s a collection of different physical qualities that interact with one another.

And sometimes when you work on one of those qualities...
another one becomes easier to see.

​That brings us to today’s:

THE GOLFER MYTH

“THE LAYER I’M FOCUSED ON IS THE ONLY PROBLEM I NEED TO FIX.”

This is where golfers can get stuck.

We identify something.
We label it.

Then we treat that one thing like it explains everything.

“I’m tight.”
“I’m weak.”
“I have bad balance.”
“I’m not athletic.”
“I can’t rotate.”

But those statements don’t tell us much about what is actually happening underneath.

Maybe the range exists passively but you can’t actively create it.

Maybe you can create the position but can’t feel it.

Maybe you can feel it but can’t control it.

Maybe you can control the pieces individually but have trouble putting them together athletically.

Maybe you can do all of that once but don’t have the strength or capacity to keep doing it.

Same golfer.
Same body.
Different layers.

​Which brings us to today’s Golf Nerd Ninja definition.

THE ONION GOLFER

The Onion Golfer

A golfer who realizes their golf body is made up of multiple layers — mobility, awareness, control, athleticism, coordination, strength, and capacity — and understands that focusing on only one layer never tells the whole story.
​
Or said more simply:

​DON’T JUDGE THE WHOLE ONION BY ONE LAYER.

THE GOAL IS AWARENESS — NOT PERFECTION

There’s something important I want to clear up before we start peeling this onion apart.

The goal is not to read this article and think:

“Great. Now I have six more things wrong with me.”

That completely misses the point.

This isn’t a checklist of problems.

It’s a way to become more aware of your body.

You may work on mobility...
and suddenly recognize that you don’t control all of the range you have.

You may improve control...
and now notice that blending that movement into an athletic golf swing is difficult.

You may increase strength...
and suddenly find that certain positions become easier to create or maintain.

Nothing necessarily went wrong.
You may have simply exposed another layer.

Which is why the mindset behind this entire article is:

IF WORKING ON ONE LAYER EXPOSES ANOTHER, DON’T GET FRUSTRATED.
GET CURIOUS.
​
What changed?
What improved?
What became easier?
What still feels difficult?

Those questions give you information.

And information gives you a better place to start.

GOLF ITSELF IS ALREADY AN ONION

Think about golf itself.

You have:

Putting.
Chipping.
Pitching.
Short irons.
Mid irons.
Long irons.
Driver.

Then you have:

Different lies.
Different trajectories.
Different shot shapes.
Different distances.
Different situations.

You could spend an hour practicing your putting and become a better putter.
That doesn’t mean your driver magically improves with it.

Why?

Because they’re different layers of the game.

A putting stroke isn’t a driver swing.

A 20-yard pitch isn’t the same athletic task as hitting a driver as far as you can.

They’re all golf.

They all contribute to your score.

But each requires different skills.

DIFFERENT LAYERS OF THE SAME GAME.

Your body works the same way.

​So let’s start in the center of the onion and work our way out.

THE CENTER OF THE ONION

PASSIVE + ACTIVE MOBILITY

At the center is the relationship between passive and active mobility.

Passive mobility asks:
CAN MY BODY PHYSICALLY GET INTO THE POSITION THROUGH AN OUTSIDE FORCE?

Maybe somebody moves your shoulder for you.
Maybe gravity assists the movement.
Maybe you use a strap to pull yourself farther.

The question is simply:
Is the range available?

This is where golfers often become obsessed with stretching.

Something feels tight?
Stretch it.

Can’t turn?
Stretch farther.

Can’t reach a position?
Pull harder.
Hold longer.

And eventually we create the belief:
More range must mean better movement.

But that’s only one side of the story.

Golf certainly involves passive forces.

Momentum.
Gravity.
Ground reaction forces.
The golf club itself.
​
Your body can be carried into positions during the swing.
But then your muscular system has to deal with those positions.

That brings us to the other half of the center:
ACTIVE MOBILITY.

Active mobility asks:
CAN YOU GET THERE YOURSELF?

No strap.
No trainer moving you.
No outside force pulling you farther.

Can your own muscular system create the position?

That relationship between passive and active motion is where things get interesting.
Imagine I can move your shoulder a long way passively.

Then I take my hands off...

and your active range is nowhere close.
The range exists.
But your ability to actively create and control that range is different.

That gives us a much better question than:

“Am I tight?”

Instead ask:
HOW CLOSELY DO MY PASSIVE AND ACTIVE RANGES MATCH?

They don’t need to be perfectly identical.
What matters is understanding the relationship.

Because having access to a position and having the muscular ability to actively create that position are not the same thing.

And when you begin looking at that relationship...

​you may expose the next layer.

THE NEXT LAYER

BODY AWARENESS → CONTROL

Now assume the movement exists.
Your body can physically get into the position.
And hopefully you can actively create it.

The next question is:
DO YOU KNOW YOU’RE THERE?

Can you feel the position?
Can you recognize what your body is doing?
Can you separate one body part from another?
Can you intentionally reproduce the movement?
​
That is:

BODY AWARENESS.

And awareness starts leading us toward:
CONTROL.

Because if you don’t know where you are...
it’s hard to intentionally control where you’re going.

This becomes especially important in golf because golf instruction is full of feels.

Feel pressure here.
Rotate this.
Turn that.
Move your hip this way.
Get your shoulder here.
Push through the ground.

The golf coach may give you a great cue.

But your body still has to interpret it.

If you can’t feel the area being discussed...
or you can’t recognize the position...

​the cue may not mean much yet.

I’M A FEEL GOLFER
I deal with this in my own golf game.

I’m very kinesthetic.

I’m a:
FEEL GOLFER.

When I can feel the positions I want...
my movement tends to become much more predictable.
When I lose those feels...

I start searching.

That doesn’t mean I suddenly lost all my mobility during the round.

It may simply mean another layer of my onion isn’t giving me what I want at that moment.

I see the same thing with clients.

Sometimes we’ll work through a movement and I’ll ask:
“Can you feel that?”

And the answer is:
“I don’t know.”

That is information.

Because if you can’t recognize the position...

intentionally controlling and reproducing it becomes much harder.

This layer really comes down to three questions:

CAN I FEEL IT?
CAN I CONTROL IT?
CAN I REPRODUCE IT?

Once you can begin controlling the pieces...
​you have to put those pieces back together.

THE NEXT LAYER

ATHLETICISM + COORDINATION

Awareness and control ask:
Can I control the pieces?

Athleticism and coordination ask:

CAN I BLEND THE PIECES TOGETHER?

Can you rotate?
Shift?
Separate?
Balance?
React?
Sequence?

Can your hands, eyes, feet, hips, trunk, and arms work together?

This is where:

Rhythm.
Timing.
Motor control.
Hand-eye coordination.

And eventually speed...

start entering the picture.

Because golf happens fast.

During a real golf swing, you don’t have enough time to think through every piece independently.

Move the hip.
Turn the trunk.
Move the arm.
Push into the ground.
Release the club.

By then...

the golf ball is already gone.

At some point:

THE BODY HAS TO ORGANIZE THE MOVEMENT.

That’s athleticism.
​That’s coordination.

ATHLETICISM CAN HELP — AND SOMETIMES HIDE THINGS.

Playing other sports can be a huge advantage.

Baseball.
Hockey.
Tennis.
Racquet sports.
Throwing.
Hitting.
Rotating.
Reacting.

Those experiences may give you better timing, rhythm, reaction ability, and hand-eye coordination.

But your old movement habits may come with you too.

I played baseball.

Some of the same things I struggled with in baseball...

separation...
turning...
feeling certain positions...
are things I’ve also had to work on in golf.

Playing a rotational sport didn’t automatically make every rotational movement great.
And the opposite happens too.

You can have someone who is incredibly athletic.

Great hand-eye coordination.
Great timing.
Can absolutely crush a golf ball.
But slow them down...
ask them to isolate one movement...
or ask them to separate two body parts...
and suddenly they struggle.

Their athleticism helped them solve the larger task.

That is a skill.

But it can also hide some of the layers underneath.

Again:
​DON’T JUDGE THE WHOLE ONION BY ONE LAYER.

STRENGTH + CAPACITY

Now we get to the outside of the onion.

Strength.

And strength sits on the outside for a reason.

Because strength isn’t simply one more independent physical quality.

STRENGTH ENCOMPASSES EVERYTHING UNDERNEATH IT.

Active movement requires your muscles to create force.
Controlling a position requires muscular force.
Coordinating movement requires muscles to contract in the right sequence.
Athletic movement requires force to be timed and expressed.

And eventually...

golf requires you to repeatedly do those things.

So when I say:
STRENGTH

I’m not simply talking about how much weight you can lift.

Squats.
Deadlifts.
Presses.

Those are certainly forms of strength.

But strength can show up in many different ways.

For the golf body, think about strength as your muscular system’s ability to:

CREATE.
CONTROL.
COORDINATE.
AND REPEATEDLY PRODUCE FORCE.

That’s why strength is the outside layer.
​It surrounds the other qualities.

CAPACITY IS WHAT HELPS YOU KEEP DOING IT

Then we have:

CAPACITY.

Maybe you can create the movement once.

Can you do it again?
Can you reproduce it on the back nine?
Can you maintain it through 18 holes?
Can you tolerate practice?
Can you play several times per week?
Can you maintain those abilities through an entire golf season?

And ultimately...

can you keep doing it year after year?

That’s capacity.

And here’s the interesting part:
You don’t have to be great at every layer to play great golf.

A golfer with exceptional awareness and control might have an incredible short game.
They understand touch.

Feel.
Position.

Another golfer may have tremendous athleticism.

Great rhythm.
Great timing.
Great hand-eye coordination.

They find ways to solve the golf swing even if everything underneath isn’t perfect.
Golfers solve the game in different ways.

But as muscular strength and capacity begin declining...

it can become harder to keep expressing some of those other qualities.
That’s why the outside of the onion becomes so important.

STRENGTH GIVES THE OTHER LAYERS SOMETHING TO WORK WITH.

The goal isn’t simply one good swing today.
The goal is having enough muscular capacity to keep accessing, controlling, coordinating, and expressing movement for a long time.

ONE BODY.
ONE MUSCULAR SYSTEM.
​MULTIPLE EXPRESSIONS OF STRENGTH.

THE LAYERS BLEED INTO EACH OTHER

This is where the onion really starts making sense.

You work on mobility...
and maybe that exposes awareness.
You improve awareness...
and now you notice control.
You improve control...

and now you’re learning to blend those pieces together athletically.
You improve your athletic movement...

and maybe you discover you need more strength and capacity.
Or the process can run in the other direction.

You improve strength...

and suddenly active movement becomes easier.

You gain better control.
You feel positions more clearly.
Your movement starts feeling more athletic.
One layer affected another.

THAT’S THE ONION.

One layer may expose another.
One may support another.
One may change another.

The goal is not to make every layer perfect.
The goal is to understand that:

​THEY ARE CONNECTED.

APPLY IT — GET CURIOUS

Here’s what I want you to do with this idea.

The next time you’re working on something with your body...
and another issue seems to appear...
don’t immediately assume something else is wrong.

Get curious.

Ask:

What changed?
Did gaining more range expose a control issue?
Did better control reveal a coordination problem?
Did slowing the movement down expose something your athleticism had been hiding?
Did getting stronger suddenly make another movement easier?

You don’t need to diagnose yourself.

You’re simply paying attention.

You’re learning more about:
YOUR OWN ONION.

And that brings us back to the most important line in this article:
IF WORKING ON ONE LAYER EXPOSES ANOTHER...
DON’T GET FRUSTRATED.
​GET CURIOUS.

THREE TAKEAWAYS

1. DON’T JUDGE THE WHOLE ONION BY ONE LAYER.
Tight, weak, uncoordinated, or athletic is only one piece of the story.

2. IMPROVING ONE LAYER MAY EXPOSE THE NEXT.
That doesn’t mean something went wrong.
It gives you more information.

3. STRENGTH + CAPACITY SUPPORT THE WHOLE ONION.
The goal isn’t perfect layers.
It’s having enough muscular capacity to keep using them — on the course and over time.
And then I’d transition immediately into your main line:

​If working on one layer exposes another, don’t get frustrated. Get curious.