[12 piece bucket]

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Well, I guess my primary focus is being a better ball striker nad enjoying this game a little more. I don't expect to be Nicklaus and I don't even expect to become scratch, but I do hope that a single digit handicap is possible. When (if) I get there, then I may strive for more.
I don't need to be a GSED and I don't need to become a teacher but it would not be nice to have a better grasp of things and be able to diagnose and correct problems that may arise. I am realistic at this point in my life. I'm 40, not super athletic but not a spaz either. I played sports growing up, (baseball, hockey, and a little touch tackle) and I was average to pretty good, never a superstar. I am setting my expectations low and hoping for the best. I hope this is the correct path?
Either way, thank you for the assistance.

Absolutely a valid path! You can certainly get to single digit . . . to me much of that is simply getting some proper concepts in your mind and applying them. Certainly the biggest component is sustaining and manipulating the line of compression . . . . sounds like something complicated . . . that if you said to a regular cat he'd smack a toof outcha mouth. But basically you have to understand 2 things . . . . how to hit the ball SOLID . . . you're not gonna have fun as you say if you are sticking the club in the ground behind the ball all the time . . . . and then understanding what causes the ball to fly the way it flys . . .

you MUST understand that the FACE is for all intents and purposes totally responsible for the ball's starting direction . . . and the paths RELATIONSHIP to the face determines the direction it curves . . . if your path is RIGHT of where the face is looking then the ball curves LEFT . . . if the path is LEFT of where the face is looking the ball curves RIGHT.

Now we must assume that you can hit the ball reasonably on the sweetspot for the rules to apply . . . and per the above you sound like you ain't no spazz . . . so if you want a ball to start left of your target and then peel back to the right you'd better have the FACE LOOKING LEFT the target to get it to start left and have the path left of the face to put fade spin on it. For a draw . . . face is gonna look right of the target to get it to start right of it and then the path is going to be right of the face to put draw spin on it so she curves to the left.

So if you take the Imperatives and Essentials as defined by Mr. Kelley as the skeleton . . . then you can start hanging meat on it . . . .

Essentials
1. Stationary Head - Mr. Kelley is saying you want a CENTERED pivot. Why? Centered motion results in predictability. OK . . . predictability of what? Hand Path, Plane Angle and Low Point. The club is gonna bottom out where your left shoulder is . . . so if you are moving you head all around you're gonna move low point around as well . . . there's part of your "hitting it solid component." Also if your head Bobbs . . . moves up and down you are going to disrupt your radius and likely shift the plane line and/or angle . . . HANDLE LOCATION . . . just like a side hill lie . . . if you raise the handle the face vector opens . . . if you lower it it shuts . . . tape a tee to the face and see the implications . . . Mr. Kelley said . . . plane shifts are HAZARDOUS . . . .and the become more hazardous the closer you get to the ball (impact). You'll hear talk of educated hands a lot out here . . . but the most educated set of hands can't compensate for a whackjob pivot. If you shift the plane angle through the ball you effectively created a sidehill lie DYNAMICALLY.

2. Balance . . . you want to stay upright . . . you want your machine to have the proper weight distribution TO THE BALL . . . in other words you don't wanna have weight hanging back thru the ball . . . screws up the whole system . . . if your weight is forward it's easier to get your handle forward . . . we want the clubhead LAGGING the handle . . . you want to lean the ENTIRE SHAFT ON THE BALL . . . hard to do that hanging back . . . also weight back makes your clubface want to close fast . . . think of a dog on a chain . . . run outta chain . . . dog get choked . . . in this case clubhead passes handle and face closes FASTER . . . we want uniform predictable motion of the clubface (hinge action).

3. Rhythm . . . first of all you need to know what Rhythm AIN'T . . . and it AIN'T TEMPO . . . Rhythm is the CLUBSHAFT and LEFT ARM staying IN LINE . . . if you don't know about the Tally . . . look it up . . . the key to this is the left wrist motion and it's relation to the pivot as described in #2 above . . . Vertical Motion in the left wrist is GOOD . . . vertical motion is defined by Mr. Kelley as cocking and uncocking . . . think of HAMMERING . . . you hammer nails on a vertical plane . . . you hammer golfballs on an INCLINED plane . . . same motion . . . rotational motion (turn and roll per Mr. Kelly) is good . . . BUT HORIZONTAL LEFT WRIST MOTION is DEATH . . . this would be defined as BENDING your left wrist . . . we don't do that and have Rhythm . . . you start bending your left wrist and the motion of the clubface becomes erratic . . . low point can be compromised . . . so how do you NOT bend your left wrist . . . . 1. you learn how it works 2. you make a pivot in such away that it doesn't lead to a disruption of your left wrist alignment . . .