My kids might not be the next Ronaldo (or Leckie) but a love of sport is about so much more than that
Photograph: John Sibley/ReutersPhotograph: John Sibley/Reutersast week I woke my two eldest children at midnight to watch a soccer match between Japan and Germany in the World Cup. It was a bad idea, and I’m a bad dad. The tiredness-induced meltdowns later that evening were monumental.
So each morning we find ourselves in the small hours, cheering together as a family, knowing full well that each moment that passes will be repaid later with the significant drama only supremely tired children can produce. I’m aware that this is a problem of my own making. I’ve never once suggested any of these activities to them , but I’ve not discouraged them either.There’s no government mandate that forces me to enrol my children into every extra-curricular activity that happens to pop into one of their inquisitive but entirely ridiculous brains but I am, for better or worse, an acolyte of The Cult of Encouragement.
This is the problem with parenting. Our main job is to prepare our children for adulthood, and this constant state of looking forward leaves us fixated on the future. My problem with that is that this is still looking at childhood through the lens of the future – effort now, benefit later.
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