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My son is extremely stubborn, he is perhaps the most stubborn kid I have met in my life.
It's a balance, I let my son pursue his own interests in half his life, he bothered me for some time to get into Tae-Kwon-Do, I agreed once he was old enough to take it seriously and it's a sizable cost actually/good school/very good instructor. The only condition, he has to give it 150% every single class, and if not he will hear from me, I am not afraid to confront him/get in his face if I see laziness, he is free to drop out at any time if he wishes and he knows so without any judgement from me. He doesn't because he enjoys it, he is 7 years old and has one belt away from a black belt, he can't dominate yet because he is young and going up against bigger kids , but he is the best version of himself at that moment in time. I don't compare him against other kids only against himself and if there is improvement even if only 1% I am satisfied.
On the other side of the coin, there are other things he has to do which he doesn't like to do, vacuumn our cars, wash them, water plants, clean, pull weeds, etc. He sees me do the same so as I never ask him to do something to I wouldn't do, he knows I give it 100% in almost any area of life, he can see with his own eyes, am I the best absolutely not, but I try to improve everyday also. This is hard work to be congruent most of time, kid's know when you are bullshitting them a mile away, you cannot fool them as they observe behavior and not words. If they see you are congruent with what you say and do, they will respect you and listen to you.
He didn't say anything but he was watching me hobble around last night around the house after going for a crazy mountain run and I pulled/hurt a calf muscle. I used to be a big trail runner but haven't run in about a year or so as I have been switched primarily to weightlifting. I am starting again and ran at a trail which I do not have the conditioning for, I completed it anyway at the cost of hurting myself just via willpower. When they see this stuff, they realize you are serious and in return they get serious themselves, knowing you won't put up with cupcake bullshit.
As boring as Poomsae(forms) are, it does teach memorization and discipline. In fact forms in martial arts reminds me of Military Drills more than anything because both involve uniformity, memorization of movement in patterns. In order to have it memorized you have to do it correctly over and over again.
Also
Modeling is one of the best teachers for kids. Kids are very monkey see monkey do. It's that story where a guy driving on the road tells his kid to never cuss. Somebody slams into his car. He cusses at the driver. He tells his son, "I shouldn't have said that. Never say that to other people." But then his son starts his dad the same thing. I think this was an episode of Friends also. Monica was watching over Ben(Ross son). She hits her head and cusses then Ben starts saying it. So she gets in trouble.
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