[innercityteacher]

It's great to communicate with your spouse, but you are dealing with someone who knows you and still, for some reason, wishes to listen to you.

In a funny way, that is the opposite of what a professional teacher encounters, esp. during the first few lessons or sometimes, ever. You are better off believing the people you teach have had the worst night before at home, their dog destroyed their home, their elbow is in a sling, and you need to "wow" them every 8 minutes to inspire them and build a level of trust.

In short, as a teacher you are torn between correct instruction and the pupils'abilities to undestand or comprehend your instruction. My own GSEB is very good at content and has a genuine gift for communication, but his lessons are very content heavy. His TGM is so profound and subtle that even throwaway remarks take me to a logical truth! Sometimes, he just buries me with amazingly useful insights, and I am very motivated!

So, OB, you are literate and thoughtful as are most of us on this site (even people in Illinois and original recipe). Assume your students are different, have a seventh grade attention span, acne, raging hormones (I'm not only thinking of Daryl), and their mom is with a different guy every week and that guys likes to put his hand on your left knee for no apparent reason.

What kind of display then, OB, to start to illustrate one simple point would you suggest to such a person or group? Details count! Fun and doing count, peer comprehension and coaching count, visuals count as well as having some competition!

City. You read the half hour lesson I gave my wife I know. Im not a teacher by any means and have nothing but respect and admiration for those guys and what they face with various students. But what I taught her was really a boiled down version of what it was that brought me to TGM in the first place combined with some further revelations provided by Lynn. Which when I look back at now I can see how they relate somewhat to the Three Basic Imperatives!

Let me explain as briefly as I can. After years of pretty advanced golf I had stumbled upon the Frozen Right Wrist and its power, it simplicity. Its a long story about a game of golf in the snow, me taking a call on my cell phone that went on for too long and having to chip with one hand to finish the hole. It was a great chip too. My best of the day and with a practiced frozen and bent right hand. Something I had been working on while waiting for the call to end. It left me to wonder and so I spent some time on the range hitting right handed shots. Something I bet Homer did, not sure but I have a feeling he did. I learned that the bent Right Hand had a profound effect on the shot!

Later I learned that a TGM instructor from my area had a logo that was a bent right hand, that the bent right hand was mantra for him. I called him for a lesson but he was out of town for an extended period of time and so I turned to the net............enter Lynn Blake Golf. Never did make contact with the local guy by the way.

Make a long story short ......it took me decades of self discovery to find the Bent Right Wrist (the companion to the Flat Left Wrist). But in my first lesson with Lynn he shared with me; the On Plane Right Forearm and the #3pp (as well as several other nuggets). Oh the time I wasted!

I still start every warm up and practice session with right arm only chipping. I monitor three things.......bent right hand, on plane forearm, #3pp tracing the Plane Line with an associated feeling of Lag (its the secret to all good shots).

2.0 The Three Basic Imperatives are;

-1. A Flat Left Wrist.
-2. A Clubhead Lag Pressure Point.
-3. A straight Plane Line.

The On Plane Right Forearm doesnt rank as an Imperative but.......its pretty dang close to being one for me.

Only having one arm on the club simplifies things. My wife could see the relationships as did I. How the shot that fails didnt have any Lag Pressure for instance. How the Bent Right Hand needs to be frozen through the shot anyways. How the right Forearm if on Plane adds structure. Its all there.