Ask Cael: I think I am completely guilty of shaping my kid into a “Head Case”

Story Published Thursday, February 25th, 2010

name: Carman

question: Cael, I recently stumbled across your blog and was completely blown away by the Positive Perfectionist. As a mother I think I am completely guilty of shaping my kid into a “Head Case” He had early success as an 8 year old and we came to expect that and even though I say to my son it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, just wrestle your best and that is always good enough for us. I think he feels my actions when I am visibly more excited when he wins and find myself saying things like if you had not made that mistake in the 2nd round you would have had him. Then I try to cover it up by saying it’s ok that’s how you learn and grow. I guess what I really have is a thank you.
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Carman,
Thanks for the email. My blogs are from a coaches/ athlete’s perspective so it is much easier to look from the outside in. Being a parent is tough. It is easily the toughest thing in the world imo. I have a young son and I have a difficult time even thinking about him stubbing a toe.

I’m sure you are doing a fine job. What’s great is that you realize that you could tweak what you are doing to better help your son. The quality of being coachable is a huge deal. Regardless of where we are in life, being coachable is huge, whether we are a coach, athlete or parent.

The truth is that we put our kids in sports to have fun, exercise, and learn life lessons. It’s not to beat Billy down the street, even though that is pretty fun. Competition is fun but not why we put are kids in sports.

When we remember this and it’s in our hearts, it is much easier to help our kids. Kids are very perceptive and really smart; they pick on the smallest clues. They will figure it out if you are concerned about the results more then the effort. We won’t be able to hide or cover up those feelings. Our kids will know our true intent.

So the first goal I would think would be for the parents to know that they put their kids in wrestling for right reasons. You put them in the sport to learn the life lessons. Of course you want them to win, but you want them to win because you want them to be happy and to see results for their hard work. But you don’t want them to win for you. It is their career and as parents we are just here to help them. You help them by being positive, and encouraging them. As a parent or coach it is our job to find the positives and to exploit them. Coach Cunningham talks about exploiting our kids positives. It is a big deal to do that.

You should expect a lot out of them too, but what you expect is hard work and a great effort. That’s the goal. I could go on and on here so I will write a blog soon. Best wishes and keep up the great work. It’s all about making progress.

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