I found this thread on a search engine and decided to set up an account specifically to reply with my experience of it.
I played golf very regularly from 2000 to 2015. I was totally into it - played whenever I could, bought expensive gear if I thought it would help, had lessons, joined a club. I thought about the game when I wasn't playing it, bought magazines, went on forums. I entered comps, represented my club, got my UK handicap down to under 7. In short I lived and breathed golf. Only work and a young family got in the way.
Well around 2012 I started to question what I was doing. The only way I'd got my ok handicap was by obsessing over the game. I wasn't maximising my output with my work and more importantly I wasn't being the attentive father I should've been. I was being thoroughly selfish - family life had to fit around club medals etc. I was spending thousands of pounds a year on golf club membership, equipment, clothing and golf holidays with friends. I was hanging around with people who behaved the same.
Gradually the guilt got the better of me. I knew that to even stay on the same handicap my obsession could not waver - I couldn't drop a game here and there, or skip putting practice etc if I wanted my handicap not to go up. I felt trapped by the game. I also noticed that most of the the lower handicap golfers I played with took themselves incredibly seriously. They'd be furious if the had a bad game and would fire blame out at all and sundry. Golf was not making them or me happy.
One day I got home after a particularly annoying experience of one Category 1 golfer having an absolute hissy fit because he'd putted badly. I sat on my sofa and suddenly it hit me - I knew I was never going to play golf again, once I had got my final commitments out of the way. I had two more rounds I couldn't get out of, then I quit totally and for good. That was summer 2015 and my life has improved massively since. I've done much better at work, I put my wife and children first, I almost never see anyone have a hissy fit and certainly never see anyone throwing golf clubs in anger! Post-golf life has been truly fantastic and I'll never return to that treadmill I was on. Sometimes I think people can't picture life without something, even when that something isn't enhancing the quality of their lives.
I now keep fit and have a couple of other interests I can dip in and out of as time allows.
I'm not saying anyone else should quit, I'm just letting you know how much it has improved my life and the lives of my family.
