WiseGirl Golf: Why We Do This—and Why Golf Is Our Mental Health Playground

When I say WiseGirl, I’m talking about a movement: helping girls and women (and anyone else who wants to join us) build brain fitness, confidence, and community—on the course and in life. We use golf as our platform because it’s a built-in lab for mindset, focus, patience, and recovery. And we do it together, because wisdom grows best in community.

What “Wisdom” Means to Us WiseGirls

To us, wisdom isn’t just knowing; it’s applying what we know—especially when things get hard. Wisdom looks like pausing before we react, choosing a better story, and practicing the skills that make confidence repeatable. Or, as Maya Angelou famously taught, when we know better, we do better—a lived definition of wisdom we practice between tee and green and in every conversation afterward.

Why Focus on Girls and Women

Girls who play sports show fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety than girls who don’t. A 2024 Women’s Sports Foundation report found that only 17% of girls who play sports experience moderate-to-high depression vs 29% of girls who never played—sports participation was associated with 1.5–2.5x fewer mental health disorders.

That’s a powerful prevention and resilience story!  

In the workplace, the mental-load story continues. Women are still underrepresented at senior levels (about 29% of the C-suite, with only 7% women of color), and persistent barriers correlate with stress, burnout, and attrition. Leadership pipelines matter for mental health because agency, support, and fair opportunity are protective factors.  

Across the lifespan, movement is medicine. For older women, regular physical activity reduces anxiety and depression, improves sleep, supports brain health, and lowers dementia risk—benefits we can engineer into our weeks through joyful, social movement like golf.   

Why Golf? (and why it’s secretly a mental-fitness studio)

Golf blends fresh air, walking, community, micro-goals, and built-in recovery moments (hello, pre-shot routine). Research from The R&A/University of Edinburgh and subsequent studies links golf with better physical and mental health, greater longevity, and higher personal wellbeing—plus social trust and lower cognitive/somatic anxiety compared to non-golfers. Translation: the game trains both body and brain while giving us a village.     

And because golf is adaptable—walk, ride, 3 holes, 9 holes, range only—it maps perfectly to CDC guidance for older adults: accumulate 150 minutes/week of moderate activity, add strength twice a week, and practice balance. A few nine-hole walks with light strength work checks all three boxes.  

Why We Do This? (our working mission in one sentence)

We create safe, smart, evidence-based spaces where girls and women use golf to practice mental skills—focus, calm, confidence, connection—that transfer to school, work, caregiving, leadership, and aging well.

What shows up on the course shows up at work and home

Even in college sports, women report higher rates of feeling overwhelmed and mentally exhausted than men—improving since the pandemic, but still a gap we can close with better culture and skills training. WiseGirl turns practice rounds into mental-health reps: pre-shot breathing for anxiety, routines for decision fatigue, positive self-talk for the inner critic, and post-shot resets for resilience.   

Three Pillars of WiseGirl Success (and how we train them)

1. Calm the system • Micro-pause: Breathe for 5–6 seconds in, 5–6 out before every shot. Science: Even single sessions of moderate activity can reduce anxiety and improve sleep; regular activity compounds the effect.  

2. Choose your story• Swap “don’t hit it in the bunker” for “start it at the right edge with a smooth finish.” Wisdom in action: awareness → reframing → action. (That’s cognitive behavioral coaching… with a 7-iron.)

3. Build belonging• We design inclusive formats (scrambles, short-course nights, clinic-and-play) to nurture psychological safety. Belonging is a health intervention; golf is our delivery system. Evidence: Golf participation is linked to social trust and personal wellbeing—two antidotes to isolation and burnout.  

Our WiseGirl Commitment

We’ll bring science, soul, and sisterhood. You bring curiosity and a willingness to practice. Together, we’ll turn every round into reps for resilience, every hole into a lesson, and every finish into a celebration of what truly matters: wisdom, wellbeing, and women lifting women.

Play Wise, Stay Wise - Coach Heidi