A Tiger's Dilemma: He Represents Our Better Selves and Our Lower Demons

Tiger is us and we are him. This is true of any athlete or performer we are focused on. Try this experiment. When you watch Tiger settle over a ball on the green, sizing up a line for a hole winning putt, in your mind, this is you. If we are alone at home, some of us will even stand up and go through the motions along with Tiger.

As the ball is banged by the putter face and heads toward the awaiting cup, you may even recoil, pull your legs in, and hold your breath. You also watch in confidence as the sphere rolls toward the target.

It is you putting the ball ever bit as much as Tiger Woods. And who among us hasn't also fist pumped with emotion when the ball slips into the cup. If you are watching with a buddy, fist bumps and high fives ensue.

Here's another experiment. How do you react when watching an NFL game or a heated basketball game and a player gets smashed by an unexpected pick in basketball or an eagerly swift safety's tackle in a football game?

What do you do or exclaim when the player gets hit? Usually there is an outward groan of "ooooooooooOOOOOOOhhhhhh" or "OOOOOOUUUUUCCCCCHHHHHH" or a choice expletive. We feel the hit. In our minds, we also are slow in getting up from the turf.

The joy of watching an athlete the caliber of Tiger Woods is he is us and we are him. It's the same reason that we see ourselves as the hero or heroine in a movie. We become that person.

We feel, we taste, we experience what the main character experiences. We identify with Tiger Woods. In some mystical way, we project ourselves into his skin. When Tiger putts, we putt. When Tiger walks the fairway, we are walking along fist bumping Steve Williams, the caddie, as well.

Tiger's wins are our wins. Tiger's lifting of a trophy is our lifting of that same trophy. We want and even some, probably need, Tiger to win. We have projected that deeply, and to an extreme extent, onto our golf avatar. When he wins, he is our highest selves rising and excelling.

The pendulum does tend to swing like a putter in willing hands. If he is our best, our highest selves, then his weaknesses are ours as well. His demons became our demons.

Some of us haven't experienced the number of affairs that our golf avatar has admitted. But this revelation has cast a light on our weaknesses.

Our anger with Tiger is our anger with ourselves and the demons we wrestle with everyday. Tiger was our place to hide for three or four hours. Tiger was an example of all that is good about being human.

Tiger is handsome. Tiger is fit. Tiger has it all—the perfect smile, the perfect wife and kids, the perfect house, the perfect car, the perfect swing, the perfect life. But the flaw in all this was our own projections onto this man.

Tiger will come back. And so will we. But the past few months have shown us that things are not always what they seem. While he represents our highest selves and our lowest demons all wrapped into one really human golfer, an age of innocence has ended.

What will the next chapter be? Stay tuned. The writing of that chapter begins today at Augusta. And a year from now, three years from now, ten years from now, what will have prevailed in this chapter? Will all the past months' infidelities be forgotten and filed away in the forgiven file? Or will they be a Tiger's final tale, the beginning of our end with this golfer?

The next chapter will depend on which of our selves we allow to prevail. Will it be our inner demons or the angels of our better selves? In this response, we have complete control and dare I say responsibility.