A BIGGER PURPOSE

BY CARL K. LANGE, M.D.

You've heard the story before, but please indulge me. It serves a bigger purpose. The young music aficionado from the farmlands of Iowa just got off a bus at the Port Authority Terminal in New York City. He walked around Manhattan for quite a while before asking someone who looked like a native New Yorker for directions to his destination. He approached a salty old man, who clutched his bagel in one hand and a paper Greek diner coffee cup in the other.

“Excuse me sir. How do you get to Carnegie Hall?” asked the young man.

“Practice, my son, practice.” the old man replied.

Such was the advice of Andres Fassi to his daughter, Maria, as she experienced an extraordinary metamorphosis from a middling golfer to one of the rising stars

on the Ladies Professional Golf Tour. Originally from Pachuca, Mexico, 50 miles northeast of Mexico City, she was the third child born to Andres and Fabiana Fassi. From the start, Maria seemed genetically programmed to excel in both golf and life in general. Her parents were both physical education teachers intimately involved in both amateur and professional sports. Maria had three brothers, one who is a professional soccer player. The Fassis also had a close relationship with golfing legend, Lorena Ochoa, another Mexican professional golfer who served as yet another role model for Maria. Sports was in her blood, but in an endearing way. Her parents cultivated a loving home environment where sports were woven into their daily family activities. Maria played golf as a child with her brothers, and by her own admission, was not very good. Andres Fassi was a father who encouraged, not demanded excellence in his children. In her words she explained to me, "Excellence was not mandatory, but my father taught me how to work towards it. He gave me the tools for success." Maria was emboldened to pour her very best efforts into whatever endeavor she undertook. At the age of seven, she fell in love with the game of golf. It was here that her father's tutelage in striving for excel

A DRIVE FOR INCLUSION: After her first year on the professional tour, Maria was forced to concede to the fact that something else had been tugging at her soul.