Stoicism

I didn’t come to Stoicism through golf. I came to it during a very difficult period of my life. I studied it because I wanted to understand myself — my reactions, my habits, the way I handled pressure, frustration, and the parts of life that don’t go the way you planned. It helped. A lot. It made life feel clearer, steadier, less chaotic.It was like discovering a blueprint for living the best life possible and I couldn’t get enough.

When I returned to the game of golf, I immediately abandoned everything I’d learned the second I would step onto a tee box, driving range, or putting green.

I was drowning in swing thoughts, mechanics, tips, drills, and the endless firehose of modern golf instruction. My game wasn’t improving. My enjoyment wasn’t improving. And one day — somewhere between a thin 7‑iron and a lost ball I was sure I saw land — the lightbulb went on.

I realized I wasn’t applying any of the principles I’d been studying for years. Not one. I had the tools, but I wasn’t using them. Golf exposed that gap instantly.

So I started writing.

Not because I had mastered anything, but because I needed to make sense of why the philosophy worked for me everywhere except on the course — and how to change that.

The philosophy itself is old. It started around 300 BCE in Athens with Zeno of Citium, who taught on a painted porch — the Stoa. The early Stoics believed that a good life was built on four things: wisdom, courage, justice, and temperance. Simple ideas, but surprisingly practical.

The Romans carried it forward. Seneca wrote about anger and adversity with a clarity that still holds up. Epictetus, born a slave, taught that freedom comes from focusing on what you can control. Marcus Aurelius wrote Meditations as a private reminder to stay steady while leading an empire.

These weren’t emotionless people. That’s the modern misunderstanding — that being “stoic” means being cold or unfeeling. The real idea is to feel things fully, but not be ruled by them. To have emotions without letting them take the wheel. To stay steady, not numb.

And that’s where golf comes in.

Golf is a practical exam for everything the philosophy teaches. You picture one shot and hit another. You get a bounce you didn’t earn. You lose a ball you were certain you saw land in the middle of the fairway and was likely your best drive of the day. You feel your patience thinning, your expectations rising, your ego chiming in with unhelpful commentary.

The course doesn’t care. It just hands you the next shot and waits to see what you’ll do with it.

That’s where the philosophy fits — not in a dramatic, life‑changing way, but in the quiet discipline of noticing your reactions and choosing not to let them run the show. Golf gives you roughly 72 opportunities to practice that. Over 100 if you’re anything like me. Some days you pass a few of them. Some days you don’t. Either way, you learn something.

I apply this philosophy to golf because the course is honest. It doesn’t flatter you. It doesn’t lie to you. It doesn’t let you hide behind excuses or intentions. It shows you who you are, and then it gives you another shot to become 1% better.

That’s why I’m writing this series.

Over the next several weeks, I’m going to explore the virtues that shape Virtuous Golf — wisdom, courage, temperance, justice — and the practical lessons behind them. Not as theories, but as things you can actually use on the course. Things that make the game lighter, steadier, and a little more meaningful.

As is the case with most things in life, I do not claim to be an authority on Stoicism, Philosopy, or even how to have your shit together. This series will only scratch the surface of this beautiful and historic philosophy. I plan to cover more areas of Stoicism in future writings. In the meantime, if you would like to learn more about stoicism in general, Here are some additional resources by some of the authors I respect the most:

Ryan Holliday: Has multiple published books… Read all them!!

William B. Irvine: Author of A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy,

Donald Roberson: Author of Stoicism & The Art of Happiness