Your Kid Sucks....Deal with it

"If you're not first you're last"- Ricky Bobby

Today I was at work, and one of the women was selling raffle tickets for the high school baseball team her son plays for.  We started talking about one of the coaches, who happened to be one of my favorite teachers.  She said she didn't like him and thought he was too tough as a coach, her reasoning was she overheard him yelling at the team, saying you scrubs might as well go in as we are getting killed anyway.

I am not saying that is the best thing to say or the best way to say it, but I don't think it is a terrible statement.  Now obviously these kids are on the school team so they do not suck, but what is wrong with knowing you are not the elite player.  If anything it should make you work harder to get better and prove that you can be one of the top players.  This issue however, is becoming too evident in todays America.  This situation with the coach does not happen enough if you ask me.

Growing up me, my friends and other people in or around my grade were not rewarded for mediocrity or last place.  There was no trophy for coming in last, in fact if you weren't in first or second you didn't get anything, and thats how it should have been.  If you wanted a trophy and to be rewarded you needed to practice and bust your ass to earn it.  Now kids are being given ribbons and trophies for every place so that no kid will feel like a loser.  This can not be the way to do things, these kids will think they are great with all the trophies they "earn" and then when they get to a level in sports and in life when they do not just receive rewards what will happen?  How will they deal with failure then?   What happens when they do not get the raise at work, or even get rejected from a school, a job etc.  All of a sudden we have another kid heading to therapy in this country because of "social anxiety" or depression.

What I do not understand is where this started, is it starting with the parents who do not want to deal with their kids disappointment?  Or is it the parents not wanting to push their kids to try harder thus causing more practices and lessons that parents have to drive to and pay for?  Are they afraid to tell the kids that they are not that good?  I sucked at soccer growing up and I knew it.  My parents knew it and they did not come out and tell me I sucked but they pushed me towards other sports.

The bigger problem here is that this is effecting America as a whole.  We are raising a generation of whimps who can not take failure and have so many pills shoved down their throats for their "ADD."  What is going to happen when this generation becomes leaders of our companies and country?  What will our army look like with these type of kids in command?  Will one get shot and everyone cry and run away?  Will the first battle lost be the end of the war?  When our freedom is attacked, what type of people will we be sending in to protect us.  Parents are not doing their kids or this world any justice babying them.  People need to face failure and learn how to accept it and get stronger.  When in their minds these kids think they are already strong how will they improve?  They wont and the people who will be affected....us and the generations of people who have failed, will continue to fail, but will bounce back and get stronger.

Before I go:

Love the comments by everyone keep them coming.  Very creative stuff.

Yesterdays movie was: The Usual Suspects.

Todays Movie: "I had always heard your entire life flashes in front of your eyes the second before you die. First of all, that one second isn't a second at all, it stretches on forever, like an ocean of time... For me, it was lying on my back at Boy Scout camp, watching falling stars... And yellow leaves, from the maple trees, that lined my street... Or my grandmother's hands, and the way her skin seemed like paper... And the first time I saw my cousin Tony's brand new Firebird... And Janie... And Janie... And... Carolyn. I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me... but it's hard to stay mad, when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much, my heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst... And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life... You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry... you will someday."

Question of the day:  If heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates?