Everyone wins

Another problem facing America today is this notion that everyone is a winner and we should teach our children that. Everyone gets a trophy! No one loses! The fact you played makes you a winner!

We should be pressing our youth to strive for victory, not participation. If they don't win we should not punish them, that would be horrible, but we should point them to be the best they can be, and point out when they fall it is perfectly okay but point out what they did wrong and help them get better. This is what a good parent should do. If your child does poorly on a test, sit down with them and try and figure out what the problem is, because there is a problem. If your child misses the winning kick in a soccer game, help them figure out why and practice.

I remember vividly as a youth coming to bat with runners at second and third, one out in the championship game. Dreams of glory came into my mind, down one run all I had to do is make contact and I would tie the game, a base hit surely meant the presige of winning the championship. Up to bat I went, after working a full count, I started figuring that a walk wouldn't be too bad either, I wouldn't be under pressure anymore, yes the pitch was thrown and I watched it go by for strike three. I was upset, I went from visions of heroism in my head to hoping I would just get out of the situation. We lost that game after the next batter struck out as well, I didn't see why I was too busy crying about my misfortune. After the game my father came up to me and said "You lost your focus didn't you? I could see a difference with that last pitch." After his statement I was upset, instead of consoling me and telling me I was still his number one favorite player he told me he saw me do something wrong. How dare he! As I thought for more than one second I realized however he was right, I lost my focus, first before even getting to the plate, dreaming for glory instead of focusing on the task. Next by hoping for a walk, he saw it just as I felt it when I was batting. I looked up to him and just shrugged, what else could I do? He was right. It was then he put his hand on my shoulder and said "Learn from it, we all make mistakes and sometimes it costs us, the fact you were so upset is a good thing, it means you really wanted to try hard, if you learn from this the next time you will do better."

I have learned from that experience and have learned that a loss of focus does cost us things we want. Teaching our children that "You can be anything you want to be" is a load of crap. A proper statement we should teach is, "if you focus on something, work really hard at it you will put yourself in the best postition to succeed."Guaranteeing success to our children causes a lot of anxiety later in life for them and is a disservice to them. I wanted to be the starting first baseman for the Chicago Cubs when I grew up. Under current philosophy I should try and sue for the position that wasn't given to me, forget the fact that I just didn't have what it took to be a mojor league player. Not all dreams come true, that's life. I see it all the time in my job, people are completely at a loss when something bad happens to them, they are shocked, this wasn't the world they were promised from a young age. I am stunned when a person who goes out, drinks to excess and loses their credit cards and then points to me as not doing my job when I can't instantly produce a piece of their property that they could have lost anywhere over the course of the last few hours. Blame someone else, you couldn't possibly be wrong could you? Being wrong is for losers and I'm not a loser because no one ever told me I could be.

Sad things we can do to our children with best intentions.