Sport offers so much to
children psychologically: an opportunity to test themselves, to learn rules, to
cooperate with others, to accept defeat, to celebrate success (hopefully), to
cope with setbacks and much more. The Sports Parent who takes their child to
practice, watches them play and then has to deal with whatever mood their child
is in afterwards has a tough job to do. You face many dilemmas including: How much
should you encourage your child to do the sport? When is your encouragement too
much, at risk of being perceived as coercion or pushing them into it? How do
you help your child cope with mistakes and bad performances? With other
children, coaches, officials who show unfairness? Or cope with other parents
who take a very different approach from you regarding how sport should be
played by kids?
What makes your job as the Sports Parent all the more difficult is the fact that you really care about your
child. You don’t want them to be upset. You don’t want sport to hurt their
development. You don’t want them to leave sport with psychological scars for
life to do with sport, exercise, body image, confidence or other people.
You want sport to be a positive
experience, but how do you ensure this, or maximise the chance that it will be
a positive one?
Well, the reality is that you
can’t control all of your child’s experiences so that they are all positive and
helpful. And actually, if you could do this, I’m not sure if your child would develop
quite as well as one who lives in a world where at least some bad (with reason)
stuff happens, where there is disappointment and challenges. The good news is that
you can be a stable presence who gives consistent messages about them that can
help. For example, your messages can include:
- how they are doing well
- how their performance has positives and negatives which is to be expected and fine
- how their effort is important
- how winning is great but not everything
- how sport and life can offer challenges to persist with
- how they are much more than their last performance
- that they are fine, loved
By giving messages such as
these, consistently, your child is much more likely to absorb and bounce-back
from bad days on the playing field. They will then develop into a more psychologically
robust child, adolescent and adult.
As a Clinical Sports Psychologist I have seen dozens of parents, with their children, who have struggled to help their children navigate the world of sport by a safe and positive route.
Best wishes in sport and life
Victor
www.sportspsychologist.com
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