Friday, June 15, 2012

Children and Sports - Avoiding Burn Out

Parents need to be aware of the repercussions associated with living their lives or striving for their goals through their children. In most cases children perform better and stay in their chosen sport longer if coached by a third party not a parent.

Coaches need to be passionate about coaching, but even more passionate about ensuring a well balanced life for all of their athletes. A coaches philosophy should be "athletes first, winning second', coaches need to care about nurturing all of their athletes in their overall wellness, far too many young talented athletes get driven and ultimately suffer the fate of "burn out.

Kids been driven too hard too young and their direction guided solely by their parent/s goals not their own. Then ultimately what happens is those kids who have dominated in their sports in the junior years either drop out, rebel against their parents, or suffer a long term injury.

Starting with the individual in the middle the balanced wagon wheel looks like this:

Sport/s

Studies/school

Social/friends

Hobbies/Relaxation

Family

Occupation/job

Cultural/religion

When you find the right balance between all areas you find the right balance within yourself. Achieving this encompasses optimum levels of emotional, physical and spiritual health allowing everything to work in harmony with each other.

Sport is just one important spoke in the wheel and it is the coaches job (along with many others) to ensure that all children keep a balanced perception of the big picture and not forgo one spoke, the wheel needs all spokes working to keep progressing smoothly.

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