<p>YES to OP’s Q. Chasing dreams is a good life.</p>
<p>Recall the parenthetical in my question - if your child isn’t the next Olympic champion. Do you think that this conversation ever happens?</p>
<p>Young adult: “Mom, why did you let me go all the way through school at a 3rd rate ‘private academy’ so I could do gymnastics full time and here I am only a level 9 and I can’t even get into college?”</p>
<p>Mom: “Gymnastics was your passion. I wanted to let you chase your dreams.”</p>
<p>Young adult: “But you knew I wasn’t very good and you knew I wasn’t getting a great education. Somone needed to be the adult and make a good decision.”</p>
<p>In other words, are the kids who were allowed to chase their dreams at great sacrifice always grateful for the opportunity, or do they sometimes blame their parents for not making them be more practical?</p>
<p>Speaking of my own kids, they chased their dreams but also were very good academic students and balanced both their EC interests and academic pursuits. It was not a trade off. They are intellectual and enjoy learning and challenge. They also read for pleasure. I don’t consider their sports and arts endeavors to have been impractical. They were enriching in their lives. For one of my kids, this endeavor has become her career as well.</p>
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<p>I suspect that the type of parents who allow academics to take a back seat to sports or other ECs are not the type of parents who hang out on CC. </p>
<p>I got my head bit off when I made a less than positive reference to homeschooling on the Olympics thread…because I was talking about “homeschooling” [in quotes], where the focus is not on education at all, but is just a way to let the kid train 8 hours a day. Again, the homeschoolers who hang out on CC make sure their kids get a good education. The ones who never quite get around to “doing school” aren’t likely to post on CC or even know it exists.</p>
<p>^ what soozie said. </p>
<p>Awhile back sewhappy raised the concern that some folks chasing their athletic dream is coming at the cost of their academic potential. What about someone chasing their musical dream. chess dream, dance dream, etc? … that focused interest has the same potential issue. For that matter, IMO, overly focusing on intellectual pursuits has the same pitfall. For me the goal is to raise our kids with exposure to a ton of things and if they do find a passion, whatever the passion is, hopefully it is pursued in a balanced way with the other elements of their development as a person.</p>
<p>Given the epidemic of obesity in this country, do we really want to pretend that it is the kids who have “too much” activity in their life who are paying the price, while the kids who don’t are much more “healthy?”</p>
<p>The days of playing in the neighborhood park has gone the way of the neighborhood full of stay at home mom’s and one car families. ALL kids are busy today. Some are just also very good at some of the things they are busy doing.</p>
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<p>Good question. In all honesty, many of the ultra-busy, sports-involved kids my kids were with in middle school and high school were overweight, and it was especially interesting how many of these kids had very overweight parents. I don’t know if it’s just the region I was in at the time or if there is a correlation. The very busy families did not eat well. It was a lot of convenient food, snack food, fast food. And all the running drives stress and decreases sleep, which together often correlate with bad diet.</p>
<p>I don’t want to come off as a radical, keep-the-kids-home proponent. Mine did stuff - basketball, x-country, volleyball, debate, math competitions. But it was more of a dabbler mode than a serious mode. There were lots of seasons of the year where we were able to relax as a family, not be constantly in the car on our way to practice or home from practice, etc. And in the summers our kids always had a least month or so to chill. Not saying we did this right. At the time, I felt kind of bad about my slacker kids. But in retrospect I think they were developing aspects of themselves beneath surface that have served them well. </p>
<p>So I guess I’m just saying that the ultra-athlete kids, the ultra-music, ultra-whatever kids are fantastic to behold and admire – but everything about that pathway isn’t always wonderful. Other kids who get to pause bit, catch their breath, consider their options, step back from the constant motion also have an opportunity to develop themselves in fabulous ways, ways that aren’t as visible to the world as big exploits at the time.</p>
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<p>Of course, some people do not have balanced brains. Some are sort of born for a solitary pursuit. I guess the difficult thing is to recognize that in a kid.</p>
<p>I remember a local kid who got a lot of press for winning some big video game championship. He had a lot of time for video games because he was home schooled so he could devote a lot of time to the violin. At first it seemed to me like such a secluded way to grow up - alone, practicing the violin for hour after hour, then playing video games. But after seeing the kid on TV, he seemed very happy and I think the situtation totally suited him - he might well have been miserable in a traditional high school.</p>
<p>^ I think some of the most extraordinary passions are pursued in a very solitary manner. Emily Dickinson, for example. :)</p>
<p>I kept mine for some sports that I thought potentially could be dangerous. Gymnastic is one, cheerleader is another. Maybe I see too many movies with cheerleaders were throwing up in the air.</p>
<p>I don’t actually care all that much if the things people love to do and be and pursue happen to them as kids or as adults, or preferably, throughout their lifetime. What I do think, however, is that many passionless kids (which is an oxymoron in my opinion) are stuck in a mode of consuming endless hours of passive entertainment and junk. In their bodies as well as their minds.</p>
<p>I think the operative word is “allow” or “let”… Not create or make. I never created my kids’ dreams for them, and when the one lost interest in something she was considered to be top in the country by those who got to make those claims, I honestly didn’t even care. On to the next part of life, is all I thought and all I said to her.</p>
<p>other parents involved were horrified I would “let” her drop this activity. “let” never came into it for me. She either wanted to or did not want to. But, here is the thing. In my house, she was not trading it off for sitting around watching TV. She was trading it off for getting a job. J. O. B. </p>
<p>This is life.</p>
<p>Missypie,
I think the problem is that there are plenty of parents and kids who have totally unrealistic views of their talent/potential, so they are letting the kid pursue the dream as if they’re the next great performer, athlete, etc., when in reality the kid probably has no chance of making that happen. </p>
<p>I would not let a kid pursue a “dream” to the exclusion of academics. I’ve seen the “homeschooling” for an EC and it makes me sad because I think these kids have really had their futures compromised: no real education and no real chance of making a living in music, sports, dance, etc.</p>
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<p>As I said upthread, I know a fair number of these kids. A friend’s child got into both LaGuardia (Music & Art) and one of the “sci Highs” (selective public magnet). Her mother forced her to go to the sci high for 9th grade. The girl ranted and raved for a year that she really wanted to go to LaGuardia. So, for 10th grade, mom let her switch. She blames mom for letting her do that to this day. She knows the rigor of education she got at LaGuardia in academic subjects wasn’t as good as she had been getting at the sci high and she also realized that she didn’t want to be an actress after all. She did well in college but felt that she was unprepared in math and science and that limited her options in life. </p>
<p>There are other LaGuardia grads and non-grads–do good dancers ever finish high school?–who feel the same. </p>
<p>I had a neighbor years ago who spent her childhood training as a figure skater. She did not make the Olympics. Eventually, she became a psychologist. ( I gather that she had a rocky road for quite a few years there.) She specialized in treating adults who had childhoods like hers. Most of them were figure skaters and gymnasts. </p>
<p>I haven’t read Dominique Moceanu’s book, but she rather famously sought legal emancipation from her parents when she was 17–back, I think, when the age of majority was 21. She said her parents did not care about her as a person in the least and were only interested in getting as much $ out of her gold Olympic performance as they could. She apparently did reconcile with them eventually, but at 17 she won and didn’t speak to them for years. </p>
<p>And, of course, there’s the story of Gypsy Rose Lee. She hired bodyguards to keep her mother away from her. She read voraciously, hired someone to tutor her in French, etc. She was truly bitter about her lack of education. Her mother really was the stage mother of all stage mothers.</p>
<p>I also took the OP’s question to refer to a child pursuing in utlra-fashion one passion toward a dream level of accomplishment, when the child seems not to have what it takes to succeed at the dream level. Many CC regulars have children who’ve managed to be great students and also super accomplished in an EC, and usually more than one. But some activities, like gymnastics, require so much time to reach that “ultra” level that there really can’t be academic and family life/social life/life of the mind balance. Even the exceptionally talented and bright child will have to sacrifice something important.</p>
<p>My D was a very successful 3-season varsity athlete in high school, and even participating to that level often disrupted the balance. Participating at a Div.1 top 10 program in college most definitely strains the balance. No one can do it all and if they or their parents say they are, don’t believe them. Some kids get closer to a nice balance than others, and what is sacrificed may change regularly in their life so you might not notice at first what is currently missing, but the top athletes we know are all sacrificing something significant at any given moment. Sometimes it’s sleep, sometimes is emotional health, sometimes it’s physical health, sometimes it’s social life, sometimes it’s intellectual stuff like reading and keeping aprised of current events, sometimes it’s their diet, sometimes it’s their schoolwork.</p>
<p>My D likes to change up what it is she will sacrifice in order to keep up with her sport and everything else. But IMO, the result has been less than stellar, leading to a general mediocrity in all her endeavors vis a vis what she is capable of. The seemingly more overall successful kids on the team also have their skeletons–addictions and eating disorders, emotional pain and psychological instablitiy, dangerously low GPA’s, social isolation, chronic physical ailments, etc. The road to the top is tough and strewn with bodies. I have had cost-benefit discussions with my D at various points along her athletic journey about whether it’s worth it to continue. </p>
<p>However, ordinary humans who aren’t pursuing a dream also struggle with balance. Lots of regular joes don’t have great balance in their lives and that’s without trying to achieve a dream. So…</p>
<p>As much as possible, I support letting the child decide, discussing the pros and cons and letting them own the decision, and agree with poetgrl that passions don’t necessarily have to be life long. When I think about a child with a passion, I am imagining the sort of child who has to be dragged away from “too-much” self-directed practice. The child who wakes up and heads for the piano or the hoop in the drive way or the new & interesting math problems, without any parental prompting. Do children with these sorts of passions willingly continue their pursuits if they don’t achieve significant success? I don’t happen to know any, but that certainly doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Maybe in performing arts? I certainly think it is reasonable to start talking about “day jobs” with very very young artists. Some don’t like the idea of possibly being an impoverished artist and will adjust their focus accordingly. In our homeschooling community we had several families for whom academics were not the focus. They believed once their children had mastered the 3 Rs, they could probably go back to a regular sort of educational experience (even if it was delayed) if the passion project didn’t work out. That seemed perfectly reasonable to me. All this was regularly discussed with the child.</p>
<p>I think dreams may be unrealistic and see them as somewhat different than a “passion”</p>
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<p>And since you’re talking about a D instead of an S, without knowing the sport, odds are that there is a very slim chance of a big financial payout in the pros. Do more female D1 athletes get their degrees than male? Because so few of even the guys actually make a good living in the pros, do females have a more realistic attitude and know they are in college for an education?</p>
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<p>I think some people are just missing this. Gymnastics training at the level BELOW the Olympic level costs $1,000 a month. It’s fine if you have the $, but what if you don’t? What if you can pay, but the only way to do it is to limit the luxuries your other children get.</p>
<p>Years ago, I remember seeing an “upclose and personal” segment about an Olympic ice skater. Her name was Stacey Zacek, or something close to that. With the cameras rolling, her sister basically said she resented the fact that every cent went to Stacey’s training. A pair of ice skates cost some outrageous amount–it was at least $10,000. Stacey went through several pairs a year. She’d asked for $50 to buy shoes for prom–shoes that would probably only be worn once–and her parents said no, they couldn’t afford them. The sister had had a part time job since she was 16 and bought most of her own clothing, make up, etc. She also made it clear that she thought it was incredibly unfair that if Stacey didn’t do well in the Olympics and didn’t get endorsements sis was living at home and going to community college because her parents had saved not one cent. </p>
<p>The mom looked like she was going to choke sis. But, believe me, watching that segment made me wonder whether mom and dad had made the right choice. Is it fair to the other kids in the family if funding a dream means they share in the sacrifice?</p>
<p>I have always felt it is unfair to shower one kiddo with support at the expense of the other kids and spouse. This unfortunately DOES happen more times than we would like to know and think about and I think makes for very unhappy family dynamics and a great sense of entitlement of the hopeful athlete. I’m sure that the sister is not unusual in resenting the family resources being showered on her Olympic sib–even though the sib was one of the few who actually MADE it to the Olympics.</p>
<p>Female athletes tend not to make much money for sponsorships and endorsements or coaching as males and there is so little market for them to play professionally, even beach volleyball champs.</p>
<p>Regarding intellectual opportunity loss, our daughter had none, and I would argue greater opportunity than she might have had in a brick and mortar school and no elite level athletic training. We were able to give her the kind of education we valued and that would not have been available to her anywhere locally–a combination of the Great Books and a classical curriculum. In addition th reading the Great Books, she studied Latin, traditional logic, and rhetoric. She was also able to pursue her interest in languages, studying both French and Russian alongside Latin. I cannot see that her intellectual development was compromised in any way, but, as with any situation, I think it is what you make of it.</p>
<p>Just have to add, I was at a party tonight and SIL pointed out one of the daughters-of-friend who is 11 and very athletic and gymnast and said “she’s like Gabby D - she’s headed for the olympics”. No pressure or anything. No knowledge on the part of SIL as to the relative ability of the girl in question. No saying this girl isn’t the next GD, but it really goes the point.</p>