- Jun 8, 2016
- 16,118
- 113
I could guess at several morals to that story. Is there a main one for you? Or just a story.
Your view of your self worth should never be based in any way about how good you are at something or how good others think you are. Because of this my happiness was tied to how well I was playing..that should never be. I know it sounds cliche..but that is the reality. I felt like everybody thought a certain thing of me (eg I was good) and then when I failed (as everybody does) I wasn't living up to this expectation. In HS if I had a bad game I would be miserable for days..The only way it would go away was if I went and practiced..it wasn't healthy.
Like I said, my parents did nothing to foster this other than my Dad passing on his love for the game to me. It was a combination of my personality combined with early success combined with hearing and liking (who doesn't...) the praise. It isn't necessarily as easy as saying well the parents can control this by keeping their kids grounded..my brother and sister were both really good athletes (my sister much,much better than me) and never had these issues. Some people are wired differently.
I am sure 95% (eg some high number) of people will deal with all of this fine. In reality I was fine eventually (well depends on whether you think I am fine or not now..debatable). However is whatever benefit these lists give worth the negative effects on some (perhaps small) percentage of people?? I guess the question is how would kid's enjoyment,development, etc be negatively effected if they were to go away?
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