About a week or so ago, our second son went out snowboarding for the first time this year. He had lessons last year and he was getting pretty good so his confidence level was pretty high.
Then came this year, he had an entire spring summer and fall to get rusty. So, when he went out, he was very rusty. When I picked him and his two friends up from the slope he was complaining a bit about how beaten up he was. His friends were teasing him about how often he had fallen and some of the brutal spills he had taken throughout the evening.
But, like the trooper that he is, he kept on getting up again and again and again. By the end of the evening his friends were telling him that he was quite good and comfortable again and his skills had recovered to last year’s level. Through his perseverance he had improved again.
The next day, he was complaining that his wrist was really hurting him. So, to be a caring mom, my wife took him to the Dr’s office just to be safe. Well to make a long story short, it turns out that his wrist was indeed broken. As he looks back on the evening of snowboarding he thinks he actually broke it on the first fall of the evening. He remembered the fall, the pain and the entire situation.
The thing is, he continued snowboarding for the rest of the evening through the pain. Now I am not bragging that I have such a great kid (which of course I do), my real point here is that life is a lot like this snowboarding experience. Life is all about falling down, getting hurt and then getting back up and persevering even when you hurt. Of course I am hugely proud of my son, but I also need to look at this for a life lesson for me and maybe you can use it for a life lesson for you.
Enjoy your snowboarding!
By Wayne M
Ouch. I’ll bet that hurt. But look at all the fun and improvement he would have missed if he had quit early. Yeah, life hurts sometimes; but it also doesn’t stop just because you do. You can still have a lot of fun and get a lot done even through the pain. Not only that, but your son now has something to draw upon when faced with other challenges later (David was unfazed by the giant because he’d already beaten the lion and the bear).