Sports Parenting content provided by Dan Saferstein from his book "Win or Lose: A Guide to Sports Parenting", published by The Trusted Guide Press. Visit DanSaferstein.com for more information.


FORGIVE THE REF

Granted, the referees can sometimes be so easy to hate, but I challenge you to go a whole tournament weekend without hating anything. Show your kids that someone can be very passionate about something without having an enemy. This will be helpful to your children as young competitors. It will make them so “mentally tough” that they will relate to the referees like the wind and not waste their time getting angry with them. They will learn to accept their own best effort and the best efforts of others, including those of the referees.

As a sports parent, it is ultimately more important to learn to forgive your own child, but focusing on the referee might be a good place to start. You can even imagine what it would be like to be a referee surrounded by intensely involved parents, knowing that within the next hour, you are bound to disappoint some of them. You can try to have compassion for the referee, who might still be a minor; then, after a while, you can switch your focus and try to have compassion for your own child when he doesn’t play up to your expectations. We all know what it feels like to not measure up, to not feel we are good enough. The most critical parents are usually the ones who have suffered the most criticism.

HIDE THE BALLS FOR A WHILE

It could be good for your child to miss her sport, which she might not have the opportunity to do when she’s playing year round. The break might help remind her of her love for the game, remind her that she is playing out of choice and not obligation. Who knows? The break could even prove to be good for your family. There are a lot of different ways to spend your weekend when you don’t have to venture into a neighboring state for a tournament.

Some sports parents are afraid that their children will lose their competitive edge if they’re away from their sport for too long. From my experience, competitive desire is more often suffocated than it is lost. It is suffocated by attitudes that make a young athlete’s sport feel like work instead of play. In the adult world, it is admirable to work hard and not take off much time from work. It is admirable to be constantly busy. But maybe the hearts of athletes have slightly different needs.

While children need structure in their lives, they also need free time in order to express their creativity, even their athletic creativity. One thing I like about the summer is that our children get to play sports on their own, without adult supervision. They play basketball at the park. They juggle a soccer ball in the yard. They invent games with their friends to pass the time. They fall into a slower, less goal-oriented rhythm that seems to rejuvenate them. Then, by the end of July, they start to feel bored and start counting the days until soccer practice begins. I like watching this process. It assures me that their athletic passion is coming from within themselves and not from me.

Dan Saferstein, Ph.D. is a Licensed Psychologist, consulting with individuals, families, coaches and teams in his Ann Arbor-based practice. He is a contributing writer to Soccer Coaching International. You can contact him at dansaferstein@earthlink.net.