Enjoy the ride but remember the purpose.

When my daughter, Chloe Mae was in the 5th grade, I had a coach say to me, “ You will get to sit back and enjoy the ride.” Coach Mike Reed was trying to convince me to let her play football in junior high. (She could throw a pretty good spiral.) We also had a lot of great conversations debating athletics vs. academics along with accountability and where we draw the line with athletes. (I was the school counselor so you probably know where I stood on the life-long debate between sports, academics, and accountability.) Enjoying the ride seemed like a no-brainer and to be honest, I didn’t quite understand what he meant. Over 10 years later – I now get it. I admit, I just wanted her to learn self-discipline, integrity, work ethic, and really just have some fun. Goodness Coach, those conversations seem like a life-time ago and at the same time, just the other day.

I just watched Chloe play her last college volleyball game. Our family has been doing sports with our children for 20 years. Basketball, baseball, softball, volleyball, football, soccer, track, tennis, cross country, and golf. Then throw in all the stockshows, 4-H/FFA competitions, cheerleading, music, dance recitals, choir, plays, playday rodeos, and the list goes on. A lot of miles and a lot of concession stand popcorn. Tip: This helped me keep my mouth shut. It helped most of the time but not always, it is most difficult during basketball season.

I admit, I believe we are all a little too obsessed about sports and there were so many times sitting in the stands thinking,” this is it, we are not doing this anymore.” The cussing, screaming, and the insanity was too much at times for me. But Chloe was determined and alot stronger than me. She loved it. She loved to compete, plain and simple.

People ask me pretty regularly, what have you learned through all the years of competition? If you are a parent and you think you want this for your child, here is my top 10 thoughts and take-aways.

1. Listen to your child and let them lead the way. Let them find what they love, whether it is music, sports, 4-H, FFA, rodeoing, acting, hunting/wildlife or art. Learn to enjoy what they enjoy. Give them the opportunities to be successful and grow in their skills.

2. Don’t go running all over the countryside looking for scholarship money. Yes, we did the travel ball that seems to consume families today. To be honest, I never looked at it as a means to a scholarship. And if you are looking for that in travel ball, just take that money and put it into a savings account. You will end up way ahead and be able to pay for their college and a down payment on their first home. Spend that time as a family making memories. (Side note: I did really love that I knew where my daughter was most weekends, right next to me in a hotel room.)

3. Make sure it is their dream – not yours. We can so easily try to live through our children creating a picture of what we want our child’s life to look like rather than praying for God’s design. Another Side note: Don’t let one child’s dream consume the whole family. We decided early that we would not expect the other children to travel to support their sibling’s passion.

4. Don’t coach or critique. Truly be your child’s support. Don’t lie about their performance and fall prey to the “participation trophy” mentality. Trust me, they know how they did. Stay positive with “I love watching you play.” Your children will have great coaches and they will have terrible coaches but teach your child to respect the authority in their life. That is done by example. These are such great lessons for our children when learning how to manage difficult relationships. As adults, they will work with and for people that they might not “mesh” with but with your guidance, they will learn endurance, patience, and grace. Blaming coaches, referees, or other players only teaches your child to not accept responsibility or any accountability. With this mindset, they will be the victim the rest of their life in all areas. They will never learn from their own mistakes.

5. Be realistic about your child’s ability. Ask yourself, “what do I want my child to learn by participating?” And be realistic of their chances of playing past high school. There are many misconceptions about athletic scholarships. Fewer than 2% of high school student athletes receive some form of scholarship money. Understand head count vs. equivalency sports. Grades matter. Integrity matters.This will hurt a lot of parents – but, either your child has it or they don’t and your child wants it or they don’t. And they must have both.

6. Students need to choose a college that they would attend whether they play sports or not. And don’t ever choose a college based on a coach. They will more than likely not be there long. It is very rare that college athletes have the same coach all 4 years. Choose the college. And the college your child attends matters. It really matters.

7. From a school counselor perspective, so many students that were pushed by parents and coaches beginning travel ball at a young age were burned out by the time they graduated high school. And if they played college ball, they quit after the first season. Burnout is real. Multi-sport athletes have fewer injuries and tend to make it all four years of college.

8. Don’t start travel ball until 7th or 8th grade and ONLY if the child is begging and committed. Don’t waste your money on all of the day camps. Too many athletes and no one-on-one instruction. And they are usually not any fun with a whole lot of standing around. Find an excellent fundamental skills coach for individual lessons during junior high.

9. Don’t allow your own ego to get caught up in your child’s performance. Sorry, but it really has nothing to do with you. Focus on leading your child’s heart back to Christ, seeking His wisdom in how to guide your child through the successes and the failures.

10. You set the tone. Your child will feed off of your attitude. Remember, this is not about you. And I can promise you that in 10 years, they will not remember that a ref made a bad call but they will definitely have learned how to respond and react in challenging situations. Did they learn self-control or learn to blame others?

Questions to Ponder: Where does your child’s identity lie? Do they only know themselves as an athlete, musician, cowboy, singer, scholar, artist, etc.? Or have they been shown that all of those worldly identities will dissipate?

Don’t let Satan hijack our children’s identity. Root it deep in Christ. Playing a sport is not who they are but another way they can honor and glorify God and ultimately give them opportunities to use their spiritual gift. Keep in mind that athletic talent is not a spiritual gift.

Let’s work to prepare ourselves and our children for grace-centered conversations. I still have at least 6 more years of competition with my boys. This will involve more miles and even more what I will consider bad calls. I will need to consistently remind myself to have those conversations of grace. I deeply pray that the people placed in my boys’ lives will direct them right back to Christ. I pray that the men that coach them will not just look for athletic talent to help their program and their coaching career but seek opportunities to develop Godly men. I don’t just mean men of character. I mean men of God. There is a difference.

First and foremost
*Cover, cover, cover your child in prayer.
*Cover, cover, cover your child’s coach in prayer.

Reflection is a beautiful gift from God. I am now able to see how God was at work and it had absolutely nothing to do with volleyball but had everything to do with a way to get her to Lubbock Christian University. We could have never been able to send her to a Christian school without volleyball and God knew that. So he used her talent to help her find her spiritual gift. You see, of all of the things that Chloe Mae has accomplished, this picture right here is what I am most proud of. Leading. Mentoring. Discipling young women. This was God’s plan.

P.S. And if your curious, my response to Coach Mike Reed was, “Uh, no, my baby girl is not playing football.”