Pick your battles!
As I watched my son in a recent fencing tournament I couldn’t help but be brought back to a childhood memory. Each week we received the local paper and my favorite section was the comics and puzzle section. In that section were two almost identical cartoon pictures side by side where you would have to spot the 10 differences. Another puzzle was a picture where you would have to identify the things that were wrong in it.
Match after match as I watched my son fencing against his opponents I began to take note of the differences between him and every opponent in the gym; much like I had done as a child with the paper. His socks were mismatched, they were of different lengths(not even covering his knee), one had a big tear up the back side of it, and the other he tore last minute so as to make it reach up his leg as far as possible to meet regulation! As I watched him, noticing all these differences and the things that were “wrong” about his appearance, I began comparing. Comparing his appearance to others, his lack of preparedness, his lack of organizational skills, and what I perceived as my lack of “good” parenting skills. All of which resulted in a feeling of frustration and disappointment in both him and myself.
When the tournament was over some matches were won, some matches were lost. No harm was done and he happily shared his joy of participating in the event on the ride home.
As I reflected that night, I remembered the parenting advice I once heard to pick your battles and to not sweat the small stuff. This definitely fit into that category and so I decided to leave this “teaching moment” be!!
But just for fun.
Perhaps you missed the paper this morning so take a look…
See if you can spot what is “different/wrong” with the picture ,then take a deep breath and let it go!!!
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