It’s all part of letting kids learn as they grow
Some of the best moments in American history are attached to sports stories:
- A player who was injured during a game but played anyway despite the pain.
- A player who experienced great loss or tragedy right before a game and used all that emotion to play the game of his life.
- A player who faced death due to the discovery of a disease, but went out and played her final game.
There are a million examples—from the major leagues to pee wee football—of guts and glory.
Turn Frustration Into Action
The great Lou Gehrig stepped to the microphone in 1939 and told the stadium full of Yankee fans (and several million others on radio) that he was retiring, fully aware that he was dying. Because of his career and the fans’ support, he believed he was “the luckiest man on the face of the earth.” It took a substantial amount of intestinal fortitude to stand so tall in such a difficult moment.
Perhaps we all see ourselves facing moments like these in our lives and hope we are able to muster such class and composure. The situation may not be sports-related, but it certainly can have the same bite of importance. It takes a great deal of composure to keep oneself together. And who are we to judge whether the issue is “big enough” to truly affect someone and what they may be going through? I remember trying to stand on my toes when my friends were picking sides for basketball in elementary school. You can’t imagine the size of the apple in my throat when a team captain has selected five guys already and then says, “Well, OK, I guess we’ll take Ronnie.” I remember feeling awful.
