Piano vs Basketball

gardenstategal
Thu, 20 Oct 2016 19:02:27 +0000

There is a part of me, OP, that wants to reach through the cyber world and put my hands on your shoulders, look you in the eye, and say STOP NOW! While I understand that the world feels like a place in which the only way to excel in things is to have started before the diapers came off, and that it seems like the college admissions process places a premium on external validation of achievement, there is only a tiny kernel of truth in that and then, only some of the time.

A huge part of growing up involves exploring activities and passions, developing relationships, and pursuing and abandoning goals. The sorts of things we’ll do for the rest of our lives! Your son will learn to discern for himself what he likes and why, and this is at the heart of figuring out how to be happy in life. What you can do is talk this through with him. He can understand that there are only so many hours in a day and that he’ll have to make choices, and he can learn that decisions have consequences – often ones that we won’t know for a long time. You can help him articulate those decisions.

If your son is loving basketball, let him play for the sake of playing. You can offer for him to get additional coaching, either through summer camps, a coach, whatever, if that’s what he wants. But he may simply enjoy the game at the level he’s playing it now, and why spoil that? If he doesn’t want to play the piano, why make him? But you can ask him whether he’d like to play another instrument, or play with a group, or something else. I DO think it’s fair to ask that if he makes a commitment to something that he stick with it for the season or some other period of time to give it a fair chance and to be responsible to teammates.

I understand that as a parent, you want as many doors to be open to your son as possible, and realistically, it can be harder to get involved with new activities in high school. But helping your child build a resume that isn’t the one he wants doesn’t help either. You are clearly caring, so talk with him (regularly) about what matters to him and how he’s making his life reflect that. He’ll be far more likely to be able to know what he wants from college and what he has to offer them when the time comes. And it will happen fast, so make the most of your time together!