Even if you don't follow golf, read on for an amazing story about the power of normalizing.

Hilary Lunke had been on the professional women's golf circuit for only two years after graduating with a Masters in Sociology from Stanford University. In 2003, she had to play two rounds in the days preceding the US Open just to qualify to play since her cumulative scores didn't automatically qualify her. She qualified by just one stroke.

Amazingly, on July 7, 2003, Lunke became the 2003 US Open winner. She won over $500,000, which was over $225,000 more than the 2nd place finisher, whom she beat by one stroke.

How did she pull this off? In her interviews it seemed the key factor was that she normalized each shot in her mind, taking the pressure off. What is normalizing? It's making a situation or activity seem ordinary rather than extraordinary. If it's something we're familiar with, we're usually less intimidated by it.

So Lunke did not say to herself on every shot that she had to do great since so much was riding on this, don't screw it up, etc. She reported, "I kept tricking my mind saying you're just playing golf, you're just playing golf, another day of golf, the way you always do it." With the power of normalizing, Lunke catapulted herself into the top ranks of women golfers and changed her life forever.

Don't make your next challenge bigger than it is. You've done all kinds of things in your life: normalize it. Keep going, play by play. And someday you'll win your US Open.

Copyright 2005 Anne Alexander

Anne Alexander

Anne Alexander is President of Authentic Alternatives Business Breakthroughs Coaching and since 2002 and has coached hundreds of business owners, executives, managers and independent professionals in the U.S. and Europe as their strategic partner to reach their professional and personal goals.

Anne has over 20 years’ business experience in sales, accounting, operations, customer service, project management and as a business owner. Throughout those positions she coached managers, co-workers and employees. She also worked as a Certified Business Intermediary, helping business owners sell their businesses, where she was privileged to see in-depth the challenges and successes of numerous small businesses and used her business expertise to help owners improve the salability of their businesses.

A graduate of Coach University, the oldest and largest coaching school in the world, Anne also has completed advanced coursework from the Graduate School of Corporate Coaching and the Small Business School of Coaching. She is an Associate with Assessments Now where she has been trained in the Platinum Rule Behavior Style Assessment. Anne’s B.A. (cum laude) in Social Change & Development is from the University of Wisconsin.

Anne gives workshops to professional groups, organizations and clubs including Rotary, Civitan and SCORE on coaching for high performance, time management and other business and success topics. Her e-newsletter, Ordinary Brilliance, goes out to over 4,000 subscribers every month.