On a regular basis, I send out prayer requests for a Christian Experience Weekend community. I recently set up a gmail.com account specifically for doing so instead of my 'normal' email account. I sent out a prayer request today and got a reply back from a contact that shouldn't have gotten the email in the first place. He did because I had imported my list of contacts from my other account and then manually remove personal contacts from the contacts for the CEW community. He shouldn't get any more emails.
My contact sends out a newsletter about parenting and personal responsibility. I followed up the explanation for why he received it in the first place with this story:
The whole idea about kids being held responsible resonates. A few years back, there was a kid on a middle school basketball team. He got called for a foul during the game and the coach took him out. As he sat down on the bench, he was visibly upset. From the stands, some spectator called out "That's okay <name of kid>, it was a bad call anyway." Now, the same kid plays for the varsity basketball team as a freshman. He actually is a fantastic player. Just last week, his team played an away game. He got called for a foul and slammed the ball down and got a technical foul so, very quickly, he fouled out of the game. What did "that's okay..., it was a bad call anyway" teach this kid? That all refs are evil? That comment never should have been made. It taught the kid it is okay to disrespect the ref. Oh, and in the same high school game that I mentioned, a second player got a foul called on him. The coach protested and argued and guess what? He got a technical foul as well! How does that coach then say to the player, "Don't let the bad calls get under your skin?" <grin>
BTW, the kid is the son of a basketball coach in the Big Ten. His father was called for two quick technical fouls in January and then suspended for a game. Did the kid look to his father for anger management advice?
He wrote back:
Great story. Man, lots in there: Modeling, blame, immaturity, victim thinking, not teaching youth the right values …. I could go on and on!
But I won’t. :-)
Thanks for sharing it!!!
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