Sometimes when success comes suddenly it takes time to sort things out. And sometimes that sorting out comes about only after reality disrupts the party, a stark reminder that the top is best appreciated when viewed from down below.
Lexi Thompson knows all about that.
So many good things came to Thompson so quickly that when life started tossing curveballs her way, she felt as if she were the victim of a vast conspiracy. Through help from family, friends and experts, Thompson now sees she simply got caught in the spotlight, growing up in the harsh and often cruel glare of public attention.
But here she is at age 24, standing up there giving all her might, more than willing to start all over again. As good as Thompson has been – 11 LPGA victories including a major championship – it feels as if her massive potential, which looms as large as her 6-foot frame and as long as her booming drives, has only had its surface scratched.
The Irish writer, George Bernard Shaw, said youth is wasted on the young. What he meant is the enthusiasm of youth usually exceeds the understanding that comes only with age. For Thompson, it meant learning she’s not a golfer who happens to be a person but rather a person who happens to be a golfer.
“It’s been a lot to deal with, but growing up, golf was always in my blood. I knew what came with it. Unfortunately there has been a lot of downs, but it makes the ups that much better.”
– Lexi Thompson
In the past couple of years Thompson has been taught some painful lessons by experience. Ideally, such self-discovery leads to figuring out what makes you happy. Bob Jones walked away from tournament golf at 28, as did Lorena Ochoa. Both loved the game, but not the competition. They figured out they were happier without it.
For others, like JoAnne Carner and the late Arnold Palmer, the crowds, the competition, the challenge of perfecting a skill rented but never owned is an endless quest at the core of who they are. They could not live without it. Being in the spotlight is at the essence of their being.
With no small measure of irony, the scene of Thompson’s greatest triumph – the ANA Inspiration, where she won her first major championship in 2014 – was in 2017 the first domino in a tumbling series of incidents that put her on the road to painful self-discovery.