When we are truly engaged in play, progress doesn’t matter. It’s purely exploring the possible and enjoying the experimentation. Learning isn’t the objective; it’s playing, if there even is an objective!

The action while playing is being present to what one does.

There is no concern about what happened or what will happen. The moment is part of the journey and integrates it.

This may lead to the quickest progress possible; however, it depends on the likelihood of those events occurring that are necessary for rapid progress. This may mean that playing is the slowest possible progress; however, if it is, it probably also is the most complete.

Whatever quick progress means is determined by the way results are rewarded. In golf, for example, it is the ability to use fewer strokes during a round of golf than one’s playing mates.

Which is why the different methods available to learn golf will focus on reducing the number of strokes.

Some will approach this objective by teaching a specific swing. Others will approach this objective through teaching techniques that the player can use to experience how their swing is most authentic to themselves. Yet others will use an approach that focuses on the mental approach to the game to develop the best possible awareness of one’s swing.

All can work.

The quickest to learn might be when one is shown exactly what to do. But it also makes it much longer to develop a critical attitude to one’s game. That is the ability to know what didn’t work and what one needs to learn next. Developing exact awareness of one’s swing will be much slower, as it doesn’t come with the necessary details of the physics involved in golf. But awareness provides a clear picture of what is happening and can be completed with the missing information. It is a critical attitude towards one’s game without judgment of oneself.