See the Shot, Then Hit It

This week I’m writing from St Francis, where we’re away with the kids for a friend of Caroline’s 50th at The Links, that magnificent Jack Nicklaus-designed course.

It’s a helluva course. Beautiful, challenging, lots of blind holes, immaculate, and it really forces you to think. To play the hole in your head before you pick up the club. And it took me straight back to being about 14 years old, when my father gave me Jack Nicklaus’s golf instruction book. What stayed with me was not a technical tip about grip or stance. It was something far more powerful: before you hit the shot, see the shot. Step back, imagine it. Then step up, and by the Grace of God, you can execute your vision.

And that idea has followed me everywhere.

In chess, you think three or four moves ahead. In business, you define the winning condition before you build the plan. In life, you ask what “done well” looks like before you start thrashing around with effort.

Stephen Covey called it Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind.

My father taught it in his own way, too, through his famous Sakkie Aartappels story: Apply critical thinking, work the problem, stay three steps ahead. So much wasted effort in life comes not from laziness, but from fog. People are often hardworking. They are just hardworking in the wrong direction.

That is why vision matters. It is not fluff. It is not motivational wallpaper. Vision is practical. Vision tells you what to say yes to, what to say no to, and what pain is worth enduring because it is in service of something bigger. And perhaps that is why I owe Jack Nicklaus such a debt of gratitude.

Because Nicklaus was not just a golfer of staggering accomplishment. He was a master of intention. He understood that performance starts in the mind before it ever shows up in the hands. And… there’s another lesson in Nicklaus, too.

When he emerged, Arnold Palmer was the people’s champion. Palmer had charisma, flair, magnetism. He was loved. Nicklaus was, in many ways, the interloper. But over time, consistency won. Discipline won. Results won. Nicklaus let his actions do the talking, and even the coldest hearts eventually had to respect the body of work. Today, Palmer’s vibe is embodied in Rory and Bryson. In Pollock and Dupont, even. All these guys have the hearts of the audience… but the true champions, the ones that linger in the mind’s eye, are the ones that have endured over time and adversity.

Flair will get attention, but consistency will build trust. Vision, married to consistency, is where greatness lives. And what if you could combine the two? The people’s touch and the relentless follow-through? Charisma and cadence? Inspiration and execution?

Man. Now you’ve got something dangerous.

That, in many ways, is the real challenge of Habit 2. Not merely to dream about the future, but to define it so clearly that your present starts bending toward it.

This theme has been sitting underneath the last few newsletters as well.

With Bryson DeChambeau, we looked at transformation: the capacity to reshape identity and become someone different, not just do something different. With leadership stories like Mandela, Jobs, and Rassie, the pattern was similar: the leaders who matter most are the ones who can see a future that does not yet exist, and then endure the awkwardness, criticism, and discipline required to build toward it. And with Atomic Habits, the lesson was equally clear: habits matter, yes, but habits without a destination can become beautifully efficient drift.

A good system is powerful. A good system pointed at the right end state is life-changing.

But clarity comes first. And vision creates clarity.

Covey gives us the principle: begin with the end in mind. James Clear, in Atomic Habits, gives us the mechanism: small, repeated behaviours are votes for the identity and future you want. Jim Collins, in Good to Great and Great by Choice, reminds us that greatness is not built on drama but on disciplined thought and disciplined action. CEO Excellence shows that exceptional leaders are not merely reactive operators; they are disproportionately effective at setting direction. EOS and Traction force this into operating rhythm: what does the 10-year target look like, what does the 3-year picture look like, what must be true this year, and what are the rocks this quarter? And Scaling Up asks similar questions in a different language: what is the strategy, what is the priority, what is the metric, and what are we building toward?

All of them, in their own way, are saying the same thing:

You do not rise to a hopeful future by accident… You build it by seeing it clearly, naming it specifically, and then reverse-engineering your behaviour. If you want to join my AI-OS workgroup next month and execute your vision, drop me a DM, and I’ll add you to the shortlist.

PG’s Pro Tip:

Most people are far too vague about the future they want.

They say things like:

“I want the business to grow.”

“I want more balance.”

“I want the team to perform better.”

“I want to get fit.”

That is not vision. That is a preference.

Vision becomes useful when it is concrete enough to pull decisions toward it.

So this week, do three things:

1. Write the ending first.

   Pick one area of your life or work and describe what success looks like 12 months from now, in vivid, practical detail. What is true? What numbers have moved? What feels different? What are you no longer tolerating?

2. Define the winning condition.

   Ask: how will I know I’ve won? What would an outside observer see? What evidence would prove this is real?

3. Work backwards to this quarter.

   Once the end state is clear, ask what must be true by the end of the next 90 days for that future to become more likely.

ChatGPT Prompt 

Act as a strategic coach.

Help me “begin with the end in mind” for this goal: [insert goal].

Take me through these steps:

1. Help me define a vivid and specific 12-month end state.

2. Help me describe what success would look like in measurable, observable terms.

3. Help me identify the 3 biggest obstacles likely to stand in my way.

4. Help me reverse-engineer that future into:

   • 3 priorities for the next 90 days

   • 3 habits I need to start

   • 3 habits I need to stop

5. Help me create a simple weekly scorecard to track progress.

6. Challenge my thinking and point out where my plan is vague, unrealistic, or missing key assumptions.

Ask me questions one at a time and help me build the plan interactively.

See the shot.

Then hit it.  

Or, as that man Joe Carberry so eloquently put it: Make the plan. Do the plan.

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