Yesterday was a thrilling experience! After preparing for over 3 weeks for his school’s maiden sports event, my son was excited to participate in individual and group activities scheduled for the day. Whilst it was a competition amongst his peers and teams in his school, all he told me wanted was have all the medals. I laughed, proud of his mindset. Given that I’ve observed the negative effects on unhealthy competition up close, I made it a principle to celebrate his efforts, determination and discipline regarding a task over coming first being the priority.
Getting to the venue of the event he went straight to his friends and started chatting away excitedly as usual. In less than an hour, the games began and not long after he was called to partake in the balloon race. In this race you put an inflated balloon in between your legs and fast walk to the finish line, careful not to loose the balloon grip and not to squeeze too tightly to burst it. What I saw was the real life application of the phrase, “slow and stead,” as he maintained his composure and glided gracefully to the finish line in 1st position. I was elated about the win and at the same time, impressed with his composure as 2 other kids had busted their balloons whilst another simply gave up trying to keep the balloon between his legs. Lesson numero uno: stay calm, focus on the task and ignore what is happening around you.
The 2nd lessons I learnt yesterday was when his team came forward for the hullahoops competition. In this activity, a team of 5 hold hands like a chain and pass 4 hullahoops rings across along themselves never releasing their hand and breaking the chain. Seeing my son at the start of the chain, I was intrigued to see what strategy he’d come up with and how he would lead his team of 4-6 year olds. He simply started in his calm manner, wrapping both himself and the next partner in the ring and then he stepped out while the partner did the same as she wrapped the ring onto the next child. With such childlike nimbleness, their movements flowed like pure fresh milk. I was in awe, mouth agape. Then he did what I didn’t expect. He did not wait for the first ring to get to the 4th child before he started on the 2ndring, and then the 3rd and finally the 4thring. They finished first and over a minute ahead of the other competitors. This gold medal was even more special to me as unlike the individual effort, this was teamwork! Lesson no 2 – Lead from the front and emulate what your followers should do.
Being a father comes with such humbling moments like these that let you glean life lessons, even from a 5 year old! And yes, he did win all the medals in the activities he participated in – 4 in total, 2 gold and 2 bronze.
The Importance of Teamwork in Achieving Success