Thought of the Day 12.17.08

My son, Spencer, plays basketball in a kids league, but he’s not strong enough to shoot the ball the regular way. The low basket is still too high for him, even when he pushes properly with his legs. When he does it underhand, however, he’s actually pretty good. So the other day I told him to just do that in the game. He responded that the coaches don’t want him doing it that way, and I told him not to worry about that and just do what works.

See, I know what the coach has in mind. He wants Spencer to learn sound fundamentals so that he’ll be good in three or four years. But knowing my son as I do, I want him to enjoy playing enough to stay playing that long. So when he finally had a granny-style shot that almost went in the other day, he was so excited…excited enough to keep playing.

Parenting, as a kind of leadership, isn’t always so much about having the right values as it is about knowing which values matter the most right now.
Posted by at

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I get your point about making sure your kid enjoys a sport so he sticks with it, but do you think it is wise to tell him to do something other than the coach tells you. Shouldn't you have first gone to the coach and talked to him, or at the very least told the coach afterwords. What are you teaching your son about leadership and authority?

December 18, 2008 at 7:41 AM
Andrew Tallman said...

Yes, exactly! In fact I plan on talking with him about it at the next game this Saturday.

The issue with authority is an interesting one, because we want our children to honor authority, which usually means obey it, but we also want them to know when not to do so.

In this case, the purpose of this particular thought was to reinforce the notion that, as a parent, I both know my son better and also am obligated to know my son better than anyone else...just as God knows us better than anyone else.

But, yes, the ideal is to get the right result, honor authority in the process, and be sure that the child observes both of these being done.

I love your observation, and I was actually hoping that I would see someone make it. Thank you for doing so. =)

December 18, 2008 at 12:43 PM

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)