This is not a fulfilling life: golf champ Scheffler
And then?
That's where golf gets a little complicated for Scheffler, who loves his job and all the work it entails, but wonders what it all means.
The short answer: It's not the two Masters green jackets, the Wanamaker Trophy he won at the PGA Championship, the three Jack Nicklaus Awards as PGA Tour player of the year or the FedEx Cup.
"Is it great to be able to win tournaments and to accomplish the things I have in the game of golf? Yeah, it brings tears to my eyes just to think about because I've literally worked my entire life to be good at this sport," Scheffler said ahead of the British Open.
"But at the end of the day, I'm not out here to inspire the next generation of golfers," he said. "I'm not out here to inspire someone to be the best player in the world because what's the point? This is not a fulfilling life. It's fulfilling from the sense of accomplishment, but it's not fulfilling from a sense of the deepest places of your heart."
Scheffler has won 19 times since his first title at the 2022 Phoenix Open. Strictly by his maths, that would be 38 minutes worth of celebrating.
"Sometimes the feeling only lasts about two minutes," he said. "It's pretty exciting and fun, but it just doesn't last that long."
So where does fulfilment come from if it's not winning?
Scheffler is grounded in his faith, in a simple family life with a wife he has been with since high school, a 15-month-old son, three sisters and friends that are not part of the tour community.
"I love the challenge. I love being able to play this game for a living. It's one of the greatest joys of my life," he said. "But does it fill the deepest wants and desires of my heart? Absolutely not."
He often says golf doesn't define him as a person, and he said if it reached a point where the sport ever affected life at home, "that's going to be the last day that I play out here for a living."
"There's a lot of people that make it to what they thought was going to fulfil them in life, and you get there — you get to No. 1 in the world — and they're like, 'What's the point?' I really do believe that because what is the point? Why do I want to win this tournament so bad? That's something that I wrestle with on a daily basis."
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