YOU AND YOUR CHILD, THE IDIOTS
Raising a champion, in sports or in life, is all about embracing the process of growth and development. It’s about using your child’s experiences today to build, prepare, and equip them in the important areas they’ll need for tomorrow. If you’re serious about helping them reach their full potential, on the playing field and beyond, then there’s a lot of work that’ll need to be done. That’s why you’re here.
As a champion sports parent, you must have a clear vision for who your young athlete can become – of what their full potential looks like. This vision is crucial to your success for many reasons. It helps to clarify for you the gap that exists between who your child is now and who they’re capable of becoming. And not just that a gap exists, but more importantly, where it exists. It helps you see clearly where they’re deficient, and it moves you into action to close that gap.
A clear vision for who your child can become also gives you hope. When it comes to the long, slow, and sometimes painful process of growing or developing anything great in life – like growing or developing a champion athlete, for instance – hope is required. Now don’t get me wrong: hope alone isn’t enough. There must be action taken, too. But without the hope that comes from a clear vision for what’s possible, action is futile.
That’s because hope, coupled with purposeful action, creates a powerful belief that just flat-out refuses to let your dreams die, regardless of the circumstances. Achieving greatness in any area demands that challenges be faced, doubts conquered, and adversity overcome. It’s in these difficult moments that those without a clear vision can easily give up, throw in the towel, or walk away. “It can’t be done,” the weak-minded hopelessly say. “And you’re an idiot for believing otherwise.”
But if you’re a champion, what you see is different. It won’t be quick, easy, or convenient work, but it can get done. If you maintain that clear vision of success, and then use it each day to close the gap on your dream, then you can become a champion in any area of life, including the work it takes to raise a champion of your own, as a player and a person.
Helping your child reach his full potential will require that you help him see for himself the power of a clear vision, too. That’s because for a successful athlete, hope is required. Hope alone isn’t enough, of course. We said it already – action must be taken, too. But hope, coupled with purposeful action, creates that powerful belief that just flat-out refuses to let an athlete’s dream die, regardless of the circumstances. When things get tough, too many athletes give up, throw in the towel, or walk away. “It can’t be done,” they hopelessly say. “And you’re an idiot for believing otherwise.”
Helping your son reach his full potential will require that you help him see for himself the power of a clear vision, too.
The 2004 Boston Red Sox can teach all of us, including our kids, that sometimes there’s value in being labeled an idiot. That season, the Red Sox pulled off what most believe to be the greatest comeback in the history of sports when they overcame a 0-3 games deficit to defeat their arch-rival, the New York Yankees, in the best of seven American League Championship Series. Down a run and facing unhittable Hall of Fame pitcher Mariano Rivera in the ninth inning of game four, the Red Sox were on the verge of being swept. Decades of Boston’s playoff letdowns, along with historically insurmountable odds (26 teams had fallen behind 0-3 in the history of playoff baseball; none had come back to win the series before), seemed to confirm that the final nail in the Red Sox coffin was about to be hammered home.
But Boston’s team was made up of a unique collection of self-proclaimed “idiots.” Despite the seemingly hopeless odds and probably at least some because of their idiot nature, the Red Sox maintained some vision of what was still possible.
The odds of scoring on Rivera, with an all-time postseason record ERA of 0.70, were nearly impossible. But an unlikely walk led to a clutch stolen base, and a big base-hit later, somehow, the score was tied. Winning the game, let alone the series, still seemed preposterous, but the Red Sox kept playing, and kept believing. A few innings later, when David Ortiz hit a walk-off home run in the bottom of the 12th inning, the Red Sox won. Though they were still down three games to one, Boston’s confidence, hope, and belief strengthened. Their vision grew.
The more the Red Sox won, the more their fans and the rest of the sports world believed the impossible could in fact be possible. But how much resolve did it take for the men in that dugout to maintain their hope in the ninth inning of game four, as that final nail was about to be driven home? No one would have blamed them for giving up; most people would have. The Red Sox didn’t, though, and instead made history.
How many other athletes or other teams, in other situations throughout history, could’ve kept believing, would’ve somehow found a way, and should’ve also made history if they’d just been able to maintain that vision?
Maybe more importantly, if – or more likely, when – that opportunity comes someday in the life of your child, who will you have encouraged them to be? The athlete who, despite maybe looking like an idiot, refused to give up on the hope that a comeback requires? The one who, despite all the odds, made history? Or will your child be the one who looks back on their missed opportunities and realize they coulda, woulda, and shoulda done it differently?
As is always the case for a sports parent, what you choose to emphasize is what your young athlete will learn to value. I want to encourage you today, if you haven’t already, to create a clear vision for who your child can be – what does their full potential really look like? Next, get to work on closing the gap between who they are today and who they’re capable of becoming. Lastly, I want to encourage you to set a powerful example for your child by living with an unbridled hope in your own life, and helping them do the same. Of course, you’ve got to put in the work, too, but regardless of the circumstances, never let your dreams die easily – and don’t let theirs, either. Always play it out to the final buzzer, no matter what.
You and your child – idiots there, together – will be glad you did.