Well, the obvious thing is to relax. But that is no small thing. I'm not sure how we all get wired like we are, but for some reason we are built with this desire to "impress" complete strangers. All I can say is , it does get better with time. I think this may be more isolated to older people learning to play. It seems like the older you are, the more fear a person has of "doing something dumb" in public.

One piece of advice that has helped me some, is to just use a 3 wood or something that you can hit fairly consistently. You have to resign yourself to the fact that if you are playing with others that have a handicap of 30 or less, you are not likely to hit as far or as straight as they do off the tee. Add in the "first Tee Jitters" and you get what I mean.

Have some fun right now looking at all the great drivers and clubs on Ebay below.