In this conversation, Linda H Flanagan and Jessica Hochman explore the complexities of youth sports today, discussing the pressures faced by young athletes, advocating for a more balanced approach to youth athletics. We discuss the importance of exercise, the risks of early specialization, and the mental health implications of competitive sports. The discussion emphasizes the need for free play, the debunking of myths surrounding sports and character building, and the design of an ideal sports curriculum that prioritizes enjoyment and well-being over competition. A really important conversation, especially for parents who have children involved in sports!
About Linda:
Linda is a freelance journalist, researcher, and former cross-country and track coach. A graduate of Lehigh University, Flanagan holds master’s degrees from Oxford University and the Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy and was an analyst for the National Security Program at Harvard University. She is a founding board member of the New York City chapter of the Positive Coaching Alliance and a 2020–21 advisory group member for the Aspen Institute’s Reimagining School Sports initiative, and her writing on sports has appeared in The Atlantic, Runner’s World, and on NPR’s education site MindShift, where she is a regular contributor. A mother of three and a lifelong athlete, Flanagan lives in New Jersey.
Linda's website: click here www.lindaflandiganauthor.com
To read her book, Take Back the Game: How Money and Mania are Ruining Kids' Sports--and Why it Matters: click here
Dr Jessica Hochman is a board certified pediatrician, mom to three children, and she is very passionate about the health and well being of children. Most of her educational videos are targeted towards general pediatric topics and presented in an easy to understand manner.
For more content from Dr Jessica Hochman:
Instagram: @AskDrJessica
YouTube channel: Ask Dr Jessica
Website: www.askdrjessicamd.com
-For a plant-based, USDA Organic certified vitamin supplement, check out : Llama Naturals Vitamin and use discount code: DRJESSICA20
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Tiny Health using code: DRJESSICA
Do you have a future topic you'd like Dr Jessica Hochman to discuss? Email Dr Jessica Hochman askdrjessicamd@gmail.com.
The information presented in Ask Dr Jessica is for general educational purposes only. She does not diagnose medical conditions or formulate treatment plans for specific individuals. If you have a concern about your child's health, be sure to call your child's health care provider.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:00):
Linda Flanagan, I'm so happy to have you here. I think
(00:02):
what you write about is sointeresting, so important. And
let's just start off by askingand talking about what inspired
you to write your book. TakeBack the game. Well,
thank you for having me,Jessica.
It's a pleasure to be here.
Well, let's see, the inspirationhas come from many places, and
it's been enduring, really, forkind of decades, I would say,
(00:22):
since my children were young,and I got involved a little bit,
as most parents do, at somelevel, with their kids,
athletics and confronting whatwas available and what was the
expectation. So that was part ofit. Part of it came from my
experience as a coach. When myyoungest was in kindergarten, I
was asked if I wanted to be arunning coach at a high school.
(00:44):
So I did, and I saw the sportsworld from that point of view.
So from parent angle, the coachangle, and then I'm also a
freelance writer, so I was ableto, like explore some of these
interests, some of the variousdevelopments I saw that kind of
bothered me, and I could kind ofexplore and do some research and
talk to experts, and that allinspired the writing of the
(01:09):
book, and kind of it all cametogether in my book. Take Back
the game.
Reading your book. There are somany interesting statistics, so
many interesting facts that youpointed out, but I found it
interesting what a businesssports for kids has become Can
you talk about that a littlebit? Can you share some of the
statistics in terms of thefinancial investment that
parents are putting into sportsthese days?
(01:30):
Yes. Okay, so the industry isthere's a lot of variation in
the estimates on what the youthsports industry is worth, but
it's somewhere in theneighborhood of $28 billion so
massive if and if you break itdown. You know, there's all
different kinds of ways to breakit down. The Aspen Institute
sports and Society program did astudy and found that, like writ
(01:53):
large, parents spend an averageof $883 per year per child,
which you know is doesn't soundlike an astronomical number for
its prohibitive in some cases.
But when you slice it down evenfurther, and you look at another
study that was done by HarrisPoll, it was a Harris Poll
survey in 2019 it found this wasjust of parents of families who
(02:17):
had kids playing club sports,which is what most middle and
upper class families now do theyinvest in travel or club teams?
They found that in those homes,27% of parents spent $500 a
month per child on the sport,and 7% spent at least $1,000 per
month. So you know, when youtake the aggregate, it's a much
(02:41):
smaller number, but when youlook at the what individual
families who are investing inthe club and travel teams, it's
a lot higher. You know, over$12,000 a year per child, in
some cases. So it's a massivenumber. Something
that I find interesting that youtalk about is how sports has
shifted from becoming more fun,more more about team sports,
(03:05):
learning life lessons, and nowit's become more of a stressful
experience, potentially can bemore intense in nature. Do you
think that this in part, has ledto this shift happening?
Absolutely, in fact, one of theconsequences of the
commercialization of sports, andit makes a lot of sense, if you
think about it, is that when youhave private entities opening
(03:27):
gyms, leagues, teams, andthey're selling sports to kids,
you know, the whole idea of aseason kind of disappears,
because if you own a soccerclub, you don't want you know,
do you have to pay rent? Youhave to pay your employees year
round. You can't just say, well,we're paying you in the fall. So
there's the selling.
Specialization has been sold tofamilies as a way to, you know,
(03:50):
keep the lights on in a lot ofcases, because if you run a
business, you don't only want itto be operating three months of
the year. So as a result,Families are encouraged to
specialize, have their child,their second grader, play
soccer, certainly in the falland the spring, but better
still, year round and thirdgrade and fourth grade. So at
(04:12):
younger and younger ages, kidsare being encouraged to pick one
sport, one sport only, anddevote themselves to it. You
know, we've seen a loss and adegradation of the sort of fun
based play, where everyone canparticipate and where it's
local, and you just, you know,go to the town park if you have
one, and it's low key, and it'sjust about participation and
(04:34):
maybe learning some things andbeing with friends. Now it's
serious, it's competitive, it'sintense, and it this is the
expectation for for mostfamilies that they if you try,
you know, if you have any hopesof your child being a high
school athlete, you better startthem in second grade. Go hard.
Last week,I was talking with a friend of
(04:55):
mine. We were on a walktogether, and she was telling me
how her son, who. Is in eighthgrade. He loves playing soccer,
and the problem she was tellingme is that everybody else
started at the age of two or theage of three, and he, quote,
unquote, missed the boat, andhe's not eligible to play in the
team at school. He's too old,and there's no place for him to
play soccer for fun. And we werejust talking about how it's so
(05:19):
unfortunate, because the wayhe's doing it is the way I wish
kids would do it nowadays,where, yes, they're playing
because they love to play, andthey're getting exercise in a
fun, light hearted, low pressureway. And it's a shame that we
don't see that, that we're notencouraging that more,
right? Even if you don't want todo join in this stuff, like you
(05:40):
don't want to put your secondgrader in a travel team, because
that's insane. You feel like youhave to, or you end up like you
know your eighth grader doesn'thave a shot at playing on a
team. Now I would say that whilethat may be the case in with
this particular family, otherkids who start late and who play
multiple sports, who don'tspecialize into, you know,
(06:04):
through middle school, but playmultiple sports and develop as
an athlete in, you know, theirentire body, or most of their
body, by the time they get tohigh school, all bets are off.
When once they go throughpuberty, things change like
that's when the at the realathletes emerge. And if you have
(06:24):
a coach who is can seepotential, even with a kid who
doesn't have, you know,tremendous soccer skills, they
might see something in that,that kid who has more overall
athletic ability and isn't sonarrowly focused than the kid
who's been playing since he wasfive. Also that kid who started
(06:45):
when he was five might just besick to death of it by high
school, and say, I'm not doingthis anymore. And what? No part
of it. It's all a gamble. Youknow, for parents like, do you
do this in spite of yourself?
Like, I think this, I hate thisidea of travel, but we're going
to do it. We'll in the offchance, you know, if to give
them a spot, or do you take arisk and help them develop their
(07:06):
overall bodies, their overallinterests, for that matter. And
you know, let the chips fallwhere they may and and if the
child has a real interest that,you know kicks in around 12 or
13, that they'll pursue it ontheir own.
(07:27):
Thank you for this reminder,because I think there's such a
feeling amongst us parents thatyou can miss the boat, that if
you don't start your kid at tooearly of an age, if you don't
start them right away frompreschool, from early elementary
school years, that there's nochance for your child to do well
in it, so you might as well justnot participate at all, or not
look for the sport toparticipate in. So this is a
(07:48):
great reminder that you'reright. The right coach will
recognize a child that isinterested, enthusiastic, that
has some natural talent, andthey won't dissuade them from
participating in the team sport.
And there are also sports thatdon't require any kind of
special skill, you know, thatkids can pick up in ninth grade,
running, wrestling, football. Ithink a really good runner by
(08:10):
the you know, could also pick upsoccer fairly well. Like these
are transferable skills. So, youknow, I'd like to, there's so
many quotes I'd like to sharewith you, like Steve Magnus,
who's a coach to Olympicrunners. So he's, you know, he
coaches the very, very bestathletes. He has written, There
is no such thing as an 11 yearold sports star. The game starts
(08:31):
at puberty. So, like, let's justremember that, you know, you
might develop sure that an eightyear old who's been working at
it for four years is going tohave more skills in soccer or
whatever, versus an eight yearold who hasn't, but it really
doesn't matter until afterpuberty. I mean, the very high
skilled sports, there is some ofthat, but the majority of sports
(08:53):
that kids play, you know,they'll have an opportunity, and
if they if they have the chanceto play in some at some level,
and it doesn't become a grind,see, that's it is such a grind
for kids, and I would carve outhere, but some kids love that,
and they want that, and it'sgreat. Okay, there are those
(09:17):
kids, but I think as more andmore parents have felt they have
to do this, whether their kidsare really into it or not. It
just doesn't apply. So the SteveMagnus quote, Nira Jayanthi, he
runs Sports Medicine Research atEmory. He says there is no
advantage to specializing earlyin the majority of sports. There
just isn't in terms of optimalphysical Outlook or their
(09:42):
prospects, they shouldspecialize no sooner than 12 or
13, and later is better.
It's interesting. You say thatbecause I know so many people
that look to the Tiger Woods inthis world, who started from the
age of two or younger. I don'tknow. I remember his
documentary. He started at the.
Very young age. So I think, Ithink it's in a lot of our heads
that to be a great athlete, youhave to start from a younger age
(10:05):
to develop those skills, or tohave an advantage over the other
kids that are participating.
Starting younger is better. Ithink that's really helpful to
realize that that's not thecase.
Another good example is AndreAgassi. He, you know, he wrote
the memoir open about his tennisexperience, and he had a
(10:25):
terrible relationship with hisfather, who compelled him to
play, play, play. It kind of canruin childhood. You know, he's
obviously reaped the rewards,but the overwhelming majority of
kids are not going to be underAgassi or Tiger Woods, they're
just not and that's should befine. You know, it's like you're
not going to win the lotteryeither. But that's okay. What I
(10:48):
think about a lot is I wantchildren to have more of a
quote, unquote, normalchildhood, a childhood where
they are happy, go lucky. Theyplay outside with their friends,
they play sports on the cul desac, they get together with
their peers and play sports forthe sake of having a good time.
And yes, building a skill, yes,getting better at something,
(11:09):
learning how to lose, learningall of those good life values.
But I feel like we're gettinglost, and so I think we're we're
missing it on two ends, somekids, I think, are too active,
too involved. And then there areother kids that are not involved
enough. And for me, as apediatrician and as a mother, I
wish we could get back to thatmore normal, playful childhood.
(11:32):
Yeah. I mean, the way I describeit is feast or famine. You know,
in some neighborhoods, it's likeall sports all the time. Parents
gone all weekends, dividing andconquering, driving kids from
across state lines to their havetheir eight year olds play
soccer tournament. And then oursystem does not encourage late
(11:53):
development, because you can beeasily discouraged if you're not
developing physically. The earlymatures are rewarded because,
oh, that kid has talent. So thenthe kids who are like, maybe
they're a little younger, orthey're just later to mature,
they get discouraged and theyjust want no part of it. So that
is a real, real problem. Andthere's
(12:13):
a lot of there's a lot ofparents I talk to that hold
their kids back intentionally sothat they're older for their
grades, so that they have anedge in sports. I've
heard that, and I think that'sshocking to me. That's shocking
that you would do that forsports. I mean, it's one thing
if it's for academics. I mean, Iguess I'm naturally inclined to
think that academic success is,is more important. I think doing
(12:35):
it for athletic reasons is issomewhat misguided.
I think it came from MalcolmGladwell wrote a book called
outliers, and he was looking atbirthdays amongst hockey
players, and he noticed thatthere was definitely a
statistical significance thatprofessional hockey players had
birthdays such that they wereolder in their grade school
(12:55):
years. And he hypothesized thathaving a birthday that made you
older for your grade gave you anedge, gave you an advantage, and
I've noticed that since then, ormaybe it's, you know, a
multitude of factors, but theywant their kids to be on the
older side for their grade. Butin reality, how many kids end up
actually being professionals atthe sports that they play? Okay,
(13:15):
so I think it's always good tobe reminded of what the data
say. Okay, so you can just lookat high school sports, so six to
7% of high school athletes,that's not even the whole high
school population. High schoolathletes, go on to play in
college. So it's a very smallnumber who even go on to play in
college, let aloneprofessionally. From college,
(13:38):
about 2% go on to playprofessionally. So, I mean, it's
a very, very small number ifyou're if you're banking on
that, you know, you might aswell start buying a lot of
lottery tickets, because to sayit's not a shirt, that is an
understatement. Sowhy do you think it is, then
that parents become so involvedand potentially obsessed with
their kids sports? Well, I see,I
(14:00):
think there's a lot of factors,and part of it is the the
college question that you knowmaybe they'll get recruited, the
prestige associated with gettingrecruited, the fact that
colleges are there is a it'sthey relax their standards with
Athletes, with the admissionsprocess, it's easier to be
(14:22):
admitted with lower academicstandards. So I think in the
back of most parents minds, Ishouldn't say I'm speculating.
But you know, when your childdoes really well, you think, and
people are telling you, I'd saya little Johnny could play in
college, and he's only nineyears old. You know that plants,
that coach or that performancemight plan to see that this is a
(14:45):
possibility. So then you want tokeep pursuing it. So I think
part of it is the draw ofcollege. I think there's also
just the and this is somethingthat I don't think we talk about
enough as parents. It's that,you know. So none of us knows
what we're doing, right? Allparents are just making it up as
we go along. Nobody knows whatthey're doing. We follow our
(15:06):
parents or we disregard what ourparents did. We read things, we
hear things, we listen to whatour parent or friends are doing.
You just kind of make it up asyou go I mean, with sports, when
kids are out there performingand they do well, when your
child does well, it is just sucha wonderful feeling. It's like,
wow, I'm I've done somethingright. Look at, you know, it
(15:27):
makes you feel like you've donea good job. Because, look, my
child scored the winning goal,or, you know, got the foul shot
that won the game. It just makesyou feel great as a parent. And
I think it's, you know the youthsports system, which is so many
games, so many competitions,there are all these
opportunities for you know,parents get their little
(15:49):
dopamine hits from their child'sathletic performance, and I know
that. I mean, I felt that withmy son, like disproportionate
pride and delight,and I think it's partly because
we really don't know what we'redoing, and we're all sort of
doing it alone, raising kids,and it's a public demonstration
of your child's success andtherefore your ability as a
(16:10):
parent. And I think that is atthe root of a lot of it. And I
don't again, I don't thinkthere's anything wrong with
feeling proud of your kids. Youknow, there's enough heartache
with children. It's just that itcan tip over into an unhealthy
kind of reason for playingsports, like it's more important
to the parents that their childplays than that the child wants
(16:32):
to play, and the parents mightbe devastated if the child wants
to quit, because it becomes soimportant to them, which I
totally understand. I think it'snatural, but I also think it
ought to be resisted, because weneed to let kids have their own
games, their own experiences.
Yes, I can see that it's allabout having a healthy
(16:53):
moderation, keeping it inperspective. I can, you know,
picture a parent after theirchild loses or wins. You want
to, you know, discuss it, butyou don't want to perseverate on
the win or the loss. Yeah, andit was an experience that
happened, but it shouldn'treally become more than that.
Yes, I think about myself. I wasnever a natural athlete, but I
(17:14):
always tried my hardest. So asyou pointed out at the
beginning, when we were talking,that running is a great is a
great sport to participate in ifyou don't have any earlier
training or skills. So I was oneof those students in high school
where I joined the cross countryteam, and I remember thinking
that my parents really didn'tcome to that many of my track
meets, which was fine, because Iwasn't that great and I was
(17:36):
always on the junior varsityteam. My mom came to a couple of
meets. She came and watched me,but I think she was at the bake
sale most of the time. I don'tthink she was there at the
finish line or knew what my timewas, which was fine, but I have
to say that now I'm 44 yearsold, and I still like to run. I
ran this morning a couple ofmiles. I do run most days of the
(17:57):
week, and I enjoy it, and I dofeel, as I've gotten older,
grateful that they weren't soinvested in my athletic prowess
or lack thereof, because I wasalways able to keep it light and
fun. And now it's, you know, itreally is a stress relief for
me, whereas I wonder if it wasintense in high school, maybe
that would have taken the funaway from the sport, and maybe I
(18:19):
wouldn't love it so much today.
So I do think that's somethingimportant to keep in mind for
parents, that a lot of this isabout building habits so that
kids enjoy they learn. Maybeit's a skill that as they go
through their adulthood, they'llbe able to lean back on it and
enjoywell. And I think that's why
those of us on the youth sportslike reform side of things
really emphasize the importanceof fun, because that's the
(18:42):
number one reason why kids saythey want to play sports. And if
it's fun, they'll want to keepdoing it. And if you fit, if you
believe, as I do, that thepurpose of youth sports is to
develop those healthy habits,you know, get into a frame of
mind of being active, likethat's just a part of life,
(19:03):
learning how to work withothers, all those sorts of
things we attribute to being ona team. Then, you know, it
doesn't have to be then thissuper competitive nature of
youth sports does notnecessarily contribute to that
fun. It can for some kids, butyou know, if it's too intense,
(19:23):
too young in age, it's not fun.
And kids, that's why kids giveit up. They're sick to death of
it. They're tired of the ratrace. They're tired of the
relentless grind, the summersand the vacations spent on these
activities that ought to be fun.
And, you know, there's thisinteresting study I wanted to
point out by a woman namedAmanda visit from GW University.
(19:46):
She had looked at what theattributes of fun are, you know,
because I think there's thisnotion among many parents like
to serve to have a goal of how.
When the kids sports be fun iskind of not serious. You know,
you're not it shouldn't be aboutfun. It should be about learning
(20:07):
hard things. And you know, whenyou're eight years old. And what
she found in her research isthat fun for kids, and across
all different levels, was havinga positive team environment, a
positive coach and working hard.
So it's like those threeingredients, not goofing off
and, you know, just sittingaround and, you know, playing
playing games. It's working hardfor something together in a
(20:32):
positive environment with apositive coach. That's what
across the spectrum all thesekids said was what made it fun.
So I really think we need to,like reframe what we mean by fun
when we talk about it in sports,that it's like that is what kids
like to do, and that shouldalways be the goal.
(20:53):
What do you think about coachesthat are very intense? I talked
to a mom last week who wasreally upset because a coach
yelled at her child reallyintensely, and she felt really
upset because her kid, whousually has a great attitude,
came home in tears, and shereally even thought about maybe
switching schools or talking tothe coach. How do you think
(21:15):
parents should handle coachesthat take it too far?
Yeah, well, I think it dependson the child's age, for one, if
the child is in high school, Ithink as much as possible, a
parent should encourage thechild to try to work it out with
the coach, which can be reallyhard. And I know that's really
hard for kids, especially if thecoach is an ogre. I
(21:38):
think the coach really wascoming down on the child, saying
that this needs to be the onlything that they do in their
life, that all day, on theweekends, Saturday, Sunday, this
needs to be what they live andbreathe. And the mother can't
tell if it's coming from thehigher ups at the school, if
there's pressure on the coach todo well from the school's
perspective, or if it's thecoach himself. So I think it's a
(22:00):
sad situation, because here youhave a kid who's very talented,
very motivated, but he's a 14year old and he doesn't want to
make it his life, which I thinkis so normal, which we should be
encouraging. So I guess what I'msaying is, there's, it seems
like there's many reasons andmany levels for why kids are
feeling stress and pressure,that it's yes in part, possibly
the parents in part, possiblythe culture, but also the coach
(22:22):
themselves may be maybe playinga role in the stress.
Absolutely,no question about it. I mean, my
experience has been that schoolswant the kids to have a good
experience, and they want thecoaches to be good people, that
it's not about winning at allcosts. You know, certainly there
are some that are like that, butso that I think college is a
different story, like, if thecoaches, coaches have to win in
(22:44):
order to keep their jobs. But inhigh school, you know, some
schools, yes, but most schoolsknow. And I so I, with that
being said, I think thatparticular coach may have that
perspective, that this has to beyour entire life. I have
to tell you as so I'm a motherof three kids, and none of my
kids play in any sport thattakes more than one day a week.
(23:07):
And sometimes I feel bad aboutit because my husband played in
multiple sports in high school.
We all we both believe thatsports are really important. But
I look at children that, forexample, play baseball, and it
seems to be every weekend, itseems to be so encompassing for
the families, for their life.
And I'm intimidated by that. Idon't, I don't really, I don't
(23:27):
want to encourage that for mychildren, which I feel bad
about. So I wish there was someway, and maybe you have some
advice on this, to think about asport where it doesn't become
all encompassing. I wish thatwas more prevalent today.
I do too. But let me just askyou, why do you feel bad about
that, that you don't want to bepart of that? Because I think
that's what people parents needto interrogate their thinking on
that, like, Why do Ifeel bad that? You know,
(23:49):
I I worry that they're missingout on making friends, that
they're missing out on learningthe lessons of how to lose, how
to be happy when they win, howto share, exercising more. I
think all of these factors thatI believe are healthy about
sports, I worry that they'remissing out on
but it sounds like your kids areplaying sports. They're just not
playing as intensely. Oneday a week they do rock
(24:10):
climbing. I'mall for activity like I what? I
think we confuse sports withexercise like because you can
get the benefits, the benefitsthat we think of going with
sports, the teamwork, thediscipline that can come from
other activities, getting a jobafter school, for example, being
in debate club, being in atheater production. There's all
(24:33):
kinds of things that requireother activities, that require
discipline and teamwork andgetting along and all of that.
But exercise is important too.
And I think, you know, there areways to encourage that as
parents, without saying you needto join the tribal baseball
team.
And we do do that. I have to saywe do make sure our kids are
(24:55):
active, that we you know, we'refrequently taking them on hikes.
We took them to all the nationalparks. So. For spring break last
year. We like to get our kidsmoving. So I You are making me
feel better. So I appreciatethat, because while they're not
in sports, our kids areadmittedly active well.
And I think I guess Jessica, youknow, my view is, if they really
want to play sports, great, butkind of, you know, kicking them
(25:18):
out the door and making themwith their teenagers, or, you
know, I don't know. I think thatkind of usually backfires. Yes,
they are definitely not askingfor it, and I and I mention it
to them, I say, Would you guyslike to play? Would you like to
play a sport? What do you thinkabout basketball? What do you
think about swimming? Andnothing's really catching their
(25:39):
tent, their attention. It wasonly the only rock climbing did
they ask for. And so that's whatwe're having them do. Well, and
I don't know how old are yourkids? My kids are 911, and 14,
so when the younger to get intohigh school, they might decide,
if their friends say are on ateam, that they want to join the
cross country team like you did,and then they'll have that
(26:00):
opportunity. You know, it's,it's not like the door is
slammed shut because they didn'tstart playing travel T ball at
five. You know, they can pickthese things up. And it also, I
think, what is your long termgoal? I think sometimes we get
caught up in the short term. Ithink if you want your kids to
be active throughout theirlives, it's not necessarily by
(26:21):
being in a travel sport at ayoung age. You know, when those
kids burn out. We haven't eventalked about injuries. You know,
the injury issue is a massiveproblem in the kids who
specialize early and playaround.
I agree with this. The rate ofoveruse injuries has
dramatically increased withchildren. This is so true, yes.
And, you know, I spoke aboutneurogyn. He heads Sports
(26:44):
Medicine Research at Emory. Hesaid that they've, what he sees
is they've advanced injury typesby four years. So what they used
to see in 20 year olds, they nowsee in 16 year olds. What they
used to see in 16 year olds,they now see in 12 year olds. So
all the early specialization andyear round play. Yes, your nine
year old is going to be a betterlacrosse player than the nine
(27:06):
year old who didn't pick playlacrosse year round, but that
nine year old is also more aptto get a potentially serious
injury, to be derailed from hisor her sport and to have a
vacuum of other interests. See,that's the other problem, in my
view, one of the biggest issueswith early specialization and
(27:27):
the intensification of youthsports is that it it sort of
leeches out the rest of lifethat might be important to you.
Maybe you want to be able to goaway in the summer, go to the
national parks. You want yourchildren to be able to go to,
you know, a museum every now andthen, to go to their
grandmother's 80th birthdayparty, to spend time with their
(27:47):
cousins, to be on the theater,to club. It just leeches out the
rest of life when children, inmy view, ought to be
experiencing a lot of things asthey grow up.
Yes, we want them to be wellrounded. We want them to be well
adjusted. And you bring up sucha good point, what if a child
gets injured, which they do, andtheir whole life is defined by,
(28:11):
let's say, their soccer and thenthey tear their Achilles. I
mean, we're setting our kids upto be depressed and sad because
that was the only thing in lifethat define them?
Yes, and you know, I shouldpoint out that it's especially
hard for girls, because girlsare much more apt to get those
catastrophic injuries that can,like, derail them for at least a
(28:33):
year, and that's like ACL tears.
So you know, the anteriorcruciate ligament in the knee,
girls get those four times therate of boys in comparable
sports. So like basketball,soccer, lacrosse, girls are much
more apt to tear their ACLs, andyou're going to tear you more up
to tear your ACL if you'replaying year round, and if you
started at a young age, and ifyou've been doing that, it makes
(28:58):
it all the more important toyour life, because that's your
life. So then when you lose it,it can be like a catastrophe,
just catastrophic emotionally,because your whole life, who are
you if you can't play lacrosse?
So you know, it's all of theseintertwined factors, the
injuries and the mental healthand and meanwhile, I always want
(29:20):
to say sports are good becausethey really they promote mental
health, they assuage depression,they can kind of put the tamp
down on anxiety. It's soexercise is important and
it keeps kids off screens. Ifind, yes, the kids that play
sports, they don't have time tobe on their screens all day,
which I think this day and ageespecially, is so important.
Yes, that's right, they're noton their phones when they're
(29:42):
playing a sport. You know, withany luck, Jonathan heights
efforts to, you know, eliminatesocial media for kids, or
seriously limit it will have,will also have that effect,
because there's no question thatscreens are terrible disruptor
and destroy. Action and justeven pernicious influence in
(30:03):
kids lives.
I completely agree. I think thisis the key here is, how do we I
think what I'm struggling withso much is, how do we help our
kids get back to that childhoodwhere they're not on their
screens all day, they're notoverly stressed in competitive
sports, but they're justenjoying their childhoods where
they're getting back to thatpure childhood of playing their
(30:24):
sports for enjoyment, where it'snot so serious, that things
aren't so stressful, yeah, andso I think one of the first
steps in getting back to that isrecognizing the points that you
make in your book, that we don'twant it to be that stressful for
kids, and that we as parentsneed to keep perspective to help
our kids keep the sports at alevel that that makes sense for
(30:45):
your individual family andchild,
and for the long term, you know,like, if you think about what do
you want in the long term, doesit really matter if they win the
soccer game in fifth grade? Youknow, for their travel team, it
really doesn't matter, but it'sreally it's so hard to keep
perspective when you're watchingan emotional game and your child
is doing something great orsomething terrible, and you get
(31:08):
wrapped up in it, which Iunderstand, but, you know, I do
think parents need to fortifytheir backbones a little bit
about, like, what am I doinghere and why and who's driving
this? If the child is drivingit, that's a different story,
but who's driving this and totry to reclaim some of those
values that you're talkingabout. And I, you know, if
(31:28):
you've heard of Peter Gray,I love Peter Gray. He was a
guest on the podcast maybe abouta year ago.
Okay, so he, I asked him thisquestion, like, what are parents
to do? You know, you can say,great, go out and play, but
everyone's inside, or everyone'soff doing their, you know, club
sport, or whatever it is, orKumon lessons, or whatever the
(31:49):
particular intensive parentingexample is. And he said he's
going to take a littleinitiative, but in your
neighborhood, go find some otherneighbors who have kids, talk to
them about the benefits of freeplay, which is all about like
kids are having this mentalhealth crisis. Here's an is one
of the antidotes, or one of thecorrections to that, talk to the
(32:12):
neighbors about the benefits offree play, and carve out, say,
Saturday afternoons and taketurns. He said, Take turns.
Being like an old fashionedparent, those kids come over, no
phones, mixed age groups, gofigure it out. And I think, you
know, it does take someinitiative, so you're going to
have to find ways in your ownhomes, I think, in your own
(32:34):
neighborhoods. And maybe it'llcatch on, you know, so you have
a bunch of kids coming over, andyou take turns, and, you know,
Let's carve out, even if youcan't do it all the time, carve
out half a day on the weekend,or a whole day where you have,
okay, we're gonna go be oldfashioned parents.
I have to tell you that thestruggle feels real because
(32:55):
Lenore skin easy, who was aguest on the podcast about a
year ago, she said, why don'tyou go on next door app and tell
parents I'm going to be home onFriday from two to four o'clock.
Just bring your kids over. So Idid do that a couple of times,
and nobody came over. So it'sdefinitely something I'm going
to keep working on. But I dofeel like it's harder this day
and age, hopefully books likeJonathan heights the anxious
(33:16):
generation and getting the wordout about how detrimental social
media can be for kids and howimportant it is for kids to get
free play. Hopefully that wordkeeps spreading so that it
becomes easier, yeah, but it iswell, it is tricky. I mean, it
just seems like the solution isright there, which is better for
parents and better for kids tohave more free time, to have
(33:40):
time where they can just beplaying amongst themselves and
not have adults jumping in tofix things. Maybe the case has
to be made more proactivelythat, you know, let's do this in
our neighborhood, you know, goaround and talk to other
neighbors and kind of make itreally. Try to make it happen.
Parents that are listening,please be this parent, try to
(34:01):
get together with other kids inyour neighborhoods. Talk to
other parents and make a pactthat you put the phones away,
that the kids get together,maybe bring some sports
equipment so they can playoutdoors together, you know,
with the understanding that ourkids benefit from having free
play time, being outside,playing sports in the light
hearted, fun, stressless way.
Yes, well, and because one ofthe causes of parent anxiety is
(34:24):
worry about their children'smental health. You know this
free play is it's from what Iunderstand, conducive to mental
health, conducive to good mentalhealth, because kids figure
things out. They developautonomy. They kind of work
their friendships out, and theyhave agency. They're not like
(34:46):
relying on an adult to do thingsfor them or tell them what to
do, which is what all they getin youth sports, is follow these
directions if they have tofigure it out it's good for
their own growth and emotionaldevelopment. So it just seems
like. A win, win. But I know, Iknow it's hard. It's going to
take some persuasion.
Can you speak to the myth thatplaying sports builds character?
(35:09):
Yes, this was a kind of a, well,it's, it's sort of a an article
of faith, I think, in people whoare sports advocates, that
playing sports builds character.
And of course, how you definecharacter is kind of nebulous.
Does it mean being honest? Doesit mean, you know, if the ball
is out, you call the ball out,you know, it's up to you to be
(35:29):
honest. Or is it about are thereattributes, like discipline,
just developing good likephysical habits, like, what does
it even mean when we talk aboutcharacter? But there is a study
of 40 years of the research onthe effects of playing sports on
character, and this study foundthat there was no indication
(35:51):
that kids who played sports werebetter at working in teams. We
attribute these things to sportssort of out of thin air, but
there isn't evidence that that'swhat's happening, and that the
young people who grow up to be,you know, fine, upstanding
people, maybe they playedsports. So we think it's because
they played sports well, maybeit had something it was entirely
(36:14):
unrelated to sports. They had ajob too, or their parents had a
particular philosophy, or thisis just the way they are born?
You know? They just so we don'tknow, but we like to attribute
all these things to sports. Infact, there are some character
traits that sports can bring outthat aren't so desirable, like
(36:34):
aggression. There's higher ratesof physical abuse partners in
young people are and adults whoplay the football and wrestling
even there's more drinking amongathletes in high school who play
sports than there are in thosewho don't. So you know, we just
have to be a little more nuancedin how we think about it, the
(36:55):
pros and cons about sports andand I say that as an athlete
myself, high school player, arunner for most of my life, and
a high school running coach likeI see, there are, there are
wonderful things that can comefrom playing sports, but it's
not just by definition. It's alldependent on the environment.
(37:16):
Yeah, I mean, we both agreethere, and I'm sure everybody
listening can agree that thereare definite, tremendous values
in playing sports, but it soundslike you wanted to be coming
from the child themselves. Wewant to we want to keep the
sport in moderation, in terms oftheir life balance. And it's so
important that we as parentskeep perspective on what we're
looking for to come from theirparticipation in sports,
(37:37):
yes, and tonot make it about ourselves,
which is what you know when youare like, just on cloud nine,
because your child played wellon the sport. I get it, but it
shouldn't really, you know you Ithink it's probably wise to try
to acknowledge that that's not agreat thing, because you don't
want your child's athleticperformance to dictate how you
feel about them. SoI'm just curious if Linda
(37:58):
Flanagan was in charge ofdesigning the perfect sports
curriculum for middle school,for high school. How would you
design it? What age shouldchildren start? How much time
should they spend in the sport?
How many sports should theyplay? What would it look like to
you?
Well, I think the biggest thingis that there would be more
(38:19):
options. So there would be youstill have varsity sports at the
high school level and middleschool level, though their
middle schools are all over themap with that stuff, but they
would also offer both moreintramurals, more intramural
sports programs, so that say inbasketball, which is five, there
are five starters in abasketball Team, and hundreds of
(38:41):
kids play basketball, but onlyfive start, so teams are
typically like 12 or 13 players.
So have you know, intramural,more intramural so you don't
have to be as having played AAUbasketball in order to play in
high school. And again, with thegoal being that more kids can
play, so that it doesn't have tobe super intense, that you get
(39:02):
more kids playing and moving offtheir phones, also more club
kinds of programs after school,or something where there is that
option for more kids. I thinkyou know, Lenore skin azi has
this idea of the play clubsafter school and the elementary
school level. So let's, let'slower the temperature of the
(39:23):
elementary school level so andgive parents another more of a
break. So after school for anhour three days a week, there's
a play Club Kids of all group,all ages, loosely supervised.
Throw them out in the field withballs and jump ropes or
whatever, and let them figure itout for an hour like I would
have loved that as a you know,when my kids were little,
(39:44):
yes. And for parents listening,you can find more information
about that at let grow.org It'sa brilliant concept, and I hope
more schools implement it. Sojust more options, more low key
options, and so. And also, I'mnot saying you shouldn't have
those travel and club programs.
You. For some kids, they'reappropriate. At my high school,
I think there are the veryserious who want more, but it
(40:08):
shouldn't that shouldn't be theexpectation for everyone that
you have to join a club teamthat devours all you know, your
waking moments, for the entirefamily, just because you want to
have the option to play in highschool like it's fine to have
those programs for the veryserious but the norm, it
shouldn't be the norm thatfamilies have to do this. So
(40:30):
that's how my perfect sportsworld will look. And
it's and to your point, earlier,I've seen so many people pick up
pickleball at all ages of life.
So it's never too late to starta sport.
That's right. And you know thisidea that, Oh, you're you're
missing out, your child's gonnamiss out, like, with any luck,
life is long. And I think, youknow, it's one friend of mine
(40:51):
said that she I thought it wassuch a great quote, that the her
whole community was conspiringto make her think that sports
were more important than theyare. They're just really not
that important. I mean, it'sgood to be active, it's nice to
have these experiences, but it'snot, it's not life or death, and
it can just seem alot more important than it is.
Very,very wise words of wisdom. Now,
(41:12):
before we wrap up, any finalthoughts that you have that
you'd like to share, before wewrap up,
well, you had asked me earlierabout a question about a
personal experience that shaped,helped shape my views on sports.
It was in one of your writtenquestions, and I was thinking
about it, and it kind of, it's agood way to end it with the idea
(41:33):
that, you know, it really has tocome from the child that you
really want your children to be,determining, deciding what
sports they want to play. Youknow, give them a lot of
options, but let them it has toin. The motivation has to come
from them. And I think about myown experience growing up, my
parents were tennis players, andthey really wanted me to play
tennis, so I begrudginglylearned how to play tennis, and
(41:54):
I really wasn't very good. Imean, I was okay. And at my last
match in high school, I waslike, I'm done with this. I
didn't want to play anymore. Andfor always, my parents would be
like, Oh, Linda, have youthought about planning tennis?
Would you like to come hit, hitaround and be like, no, because
I didn't like it. On the otherhand, I took up running on my
(42:16):
own tone, and it's something Ienjoyed, like you without a lot.
I just like the feeling of it. Ilike the feeling of being
active. I like the feeling ofbeing fit. I loved how I felt
afterwards, and I pursued it,joined teams, competed. It's
became central to my life, andmy parents had absolutely
(42:37):
nothing to do with it. It'sbecause I wanted it. And I do
think it's really hard whenyou're the parent, because when
you want things for your kids,and you think they'll love it,
but ultimately, really has tocome from them. You can expose
them and introduce them to allthese different things, but if
they don't want to do it,there's nothing you can do. So
that's how I would end it.
(42:58):
What you're saying, I completelyagree with, I believe, for us as
parents are our job is to exposethem. That's how we can help our
kids in the best way, exposethem to everything as much as we
can, and then see what sticks.
Because something will stick. Itmight not be a sport, but
something will stick, somethingand thank goodness it's not just
a sport. We need all kinds ofpeople, you know. We need
artists and writers and, youknow, data analysts, we need all
(43:20):
kinds of people, like, it's fineif you're not an athlete, as
long as you're, you know,reasonably healthy and you get
some exercise, it doesn't matterthat much. Thank
you so much, Linda. I can't tellyou how much I enjoyed this
conversation. You gave me somuch to think about, and I
really appreciate your time. Andthank you so much for being here
today,my pleasure. It was nice talking
to you. Jessica.
Linda Flanagan, I'm so happy to have you here. I think
(00:02):
what you write about is sointeresting, so important. And
let's just start off by askingand talking about what inspired
you to write your book. TakeBack the game. Well,
thank you for having me,Jessica.
It's a pleasure to be here.
Well, let's see, the inspirationhas come from many places, and
it's been enduring, really, forkind of decades, I would say,
(00:22):
since my children were young,and I got involved a little bit,
as most parents do, at somelevel, with their kids,
athletics and confronting whatwas available and what was the
expectation. So that was part ofit. Part of it came from my
experience as a coach. When myyoungest was in kindergarten, I
was asked if I wanted to be arunning coach at a high school.
(00:44):
So I did, and I saw the sportsworld from that point of view.
So from parent angle, the coachangle, and then I'm also a
freelance writer, so I was ableto, like explore some of these
interests, some of the variousdevelopments I saw that kind of
bothered me, and I could kind ofexplore and do some research and
talk to experts, and that allinspired the writing of the
(01:09):
book, and kind of it all cametogether in my book. Take Back
the game.
Reading your book. There are somany interesting statistics, so
many interesting facts that youpointed out, but I found it
interesting what a businesssports for kids has become Can
you talk about that a littlebit? Can you share some of the
statistics in terms of thefinancial investment that
parents are putting into sportsthese days?
(01:30):
Yes. Okay, so the industry isthere's a lot of variation in
the estimates on what the youthsports industry is worth, but
it's somewhere in theneighborhood of $28 billion so
massive if and if you break itdown. You know, there's all
different kinds of ways to breakit down. The Aspen Institute
sports and Society program did astudy and found that, like writ
(01:53):
large, parents spend an averageof $883 per year per child,
which you know is doesn't soundlike an astronomical number for
its prohibitive in some cases.
But when you slice it down evenfurther, and you look at another
study that was done by HarrisPoll, it was a Harris Poll
survey in 2019 it found this wasjust of parents of families who
(02:17):
had kids playing club sports,which is what most middle and
upper class families now do theyinvest in travel or club teams?
They found that in those homes,27% of parents spent $500 a
month per child on the sport,and 7% spent at least $1,000 per
month. So you know, when youtake the aggregate, it's a much
(02:41):
smaller number, but when youlook at the what individual
families who are investing inthe club and travel teams, it's
a lot higher. You know, over$12,000 a year per child, in
some cases. So it's a massivenumber. Something
that I find interesting that youtalk about is how sports has
shifted from becoming more fun,more more about team sports,
(03:05):
learning life lessons, and nowit's become more of a stressful
experience, potentially can bemore intense in nature. Do you
think that this in part, has ledto this shift happening?
Absolutely, in fact, one of theconsequences of the
commercialization of sports, andit makes a lot of sense, if you
think about it, is that when youhave private entities opening
(03:27):
gyms, leagues, teams, andthey're selling sports to kids,
you know, the whole idea of aseason kind of disappears,
because if you own a soccerclub, you don't want you know,
do you have to pay rent? Youhave to pay your employees year
round. You can't just say, well,we're paying you in the fall. So
there's the selling.
Specialization has been sold tofamilies as a way to, you know,
(03:50):
keep the lights on in a lot ofcases, because if you run a
business, you don't only want itto be operating three months of
the year. So as a result,Families are encouraged to
specialize, have their child,their second grader, play
soccer, certainly in the falland the spring, but better
still, year round and thirdgrade and fourth grade. So at
(04:12):
younger and younger ages, kidsare being encouraged to pick one
sport, one sport only, anddevote themselves to it. You
know, we've seen a loss and adegradation of the sort of fun
based play, where everyone canparticipate and where it's
local, and you just, you know,go to the town park if you have
one, and it's low key, and it'sjust about participation and
(04:34):
maybe learning some things andbeing with friends. Now it's
serious, it's competitive, it'sintense, and it this is the
expectation for for mostfamilies that they if you try,
you know, if you have any hopesof your child being a high
school athlete, you better startthem in second grade. Go hard.
Last week,I was talking with a friend of
(04:55):
mine. We were on a walktogether, and she was telling me
how her son, who. Is in eighthgrade. He loves playing soccer,
and the problem she was tellingme is that everybody else
started at the age of two or theage of three, and he, quote,
unquote, missed the boat, andhe's not eligible to play in the
team at school. He's too old,and there's no place for him to
play soccer for fun. And we werejust talking about how it's so
(05:19):
unfortunate, because the wayhe's doing it is the way I wish
kids would do it nowadays,where, yes, they're playing
because they love to play, andthey're getting exercise in a
fun, light hearted, low pressureway. And it's a shame that we
don't see that, that we're notencouraging that more,
right? Even if you don't want todo join in this stuff, like you
(05:40):
don't want to put your secondgrader in a travel team, because
that's insane. You feel like youhave to, or you end up like you
know your eighth grader doesn'thave a shot at playing on a
team. Now I would say that whilethat may be the case in with
this particular family, otherkids who start late and who play
multiple sports, who don'tspecialize into, you know,
(06:04):
through middle school, but playmultiple sports and develop as
an athlete in, you know, theirentire body, or most of their
body, by the time they get tohigh school, all bets are off.
When once they go throughpuberty, things change like
that's when the at the realathletes emerge. And if you have
(06:24):
a coach who is can seepotential, even with a kid who
doesn't have, you know,tremendous soccer skills, they
might see something in that,that kid who has more overall
athletic ability and isn't sonarrowly focused than the kid
who's been playing since he wasfive. Also that kid who started
(06:45):
when he was five might just besick to death of it by high
school, and say, I'm not doingthis anymore. And what? No part
of it. It's all a gamble. Youknow, for parents like, do you
do this in spite of yourself?
Like, I think this, I hate thisidea of travel, but we're going
to do it. We'll in the offchance, you know, if to give
them a spot, or do you take arisk and help them develop their
(07:06):
overall bodies, their overallinterests, for that matter. And
you know, let the chips fallwhere they may and and if the
child has a real interest that,you know kicks in around 12 or
13, that they'll pursue it ontheir own.
(07:27):
Thank you for this reminder,because I think there's such a
feeling amongst us parents thatyou can miss the boat, that if
you don't start your kid at tooearly of an age, if you don't
start them right away frompreschool, from early elementary
school years, that there's nochance for your child to do well
in it, so you might as well justnot participate at all, or not
look for the sport toparticipate in. So this is a
(07:48):
great reminder that you'reright. The right coach will
recognize a child that isinterested, enthusiastic, that
has some natural talent, andthey won't dissuade them from
participating in the team sport.
And there are also sports thatdon't require any kind of
special skill, you know, thatkids can pick up in ninth grade,
running, wrestling, football. Ithink a really good runner by
(08:10):
the you know, could also pick upsoccer fairly well. Like these
are transferable skills. So, youknow, I'd like to, there's so
many quotes I'd like to sharewith you, like Steve Magnus,
who's a coach to Olympicrunners. So he's, you know, he
coaches the very, very bestathletes. He has written, There
is no such thing as an 11 yearold sports star. The game starts
(08:31):
at puberty. So, like, let's justremember that, you know, you
might develop sure that an eightyear old who's been working at
it for four years is going tohave more skills in soccer or
whatever, versus an eight yearold who hasn't, but it really
doesn't matter until afterpuberty. I mean, the very high
skilled sports, there is some ofthat, but the majority of sports
(08:53):
that kids play, you know,they'll have an opportunity, and
if they if they have the chanceto play in some at some level,
and it doesn't become a grind,see, that's it is such a grind
for kids, and I would carve outhere, but some kids love that,
and they want that, and it'sgreat. Okay, there are those
(09:17):
kids, but I think as more andmore parents have felt they have
to do this, whether their kidsare really into it or not. It
just doesn't apply. So the SteveMagnus quote, Nira Jayanthi, he
runs Sports Medicine Research atEmory. He says there is no
advantage to specializing earlyin the majority of sports. There
just isn't in terms of optimalphysical Outlook or their
(09:42):
prospects, they shouldspecialize no sooner than 12 or
13, and later is better.
It's interesting. You say thatbecause I know so many people
that look to the Tiger Woods inthis world, who started from the
age of two or younger. I don'tknow. I remember his
documentary. He started at the.
Very young age. So I think, Ithink it's in a lot of our heads
that to be a great athlete, youhave to start from a younger age
(10:05):
to develop those skills, or tohave an advantage over the other
kids that are participating.
Starting younger is better. Ithink that's really helpful to
realize that that's not thecase.
Another good example is AndreAgassi. He, you know, he wrote
the memoir open about his tennisexperience, and he had a
(10:25):
terrible relationship with hisfather, who compelled him to
play, play, play. It kind of canruin childhood. You know, he's
obviously reaped the rewards,but the overwhelming majority of
kids are not going to be underAgassi or Tiger Woods, they're
just not and that's should befine. You know, it's like you're
not going to win the lotteryeither. But that's okay. What I
(10:48):
think about a lot is I wantchildren to have more of a
quote, unquote, normalchildhood, a childhood where
they are happy, go lucky. Theyplay outside with their friends,
they play sports on the cul desac, they get together with
their peers and play sports forthe sake of having a good time.
And yes, building a skill, yes,getting better at something,
(11:09):
learning how to lose, learningall of those good life values.
But I feel like we're gettinglost, and so I think we're we're
missing it on two ends, somekids, I think, are too active,
too involved. And then there areother kids that are not involved
enough. And for me, as apediatrician and as a mother, I
wish we could get back to thatmore normal, playful childhood.
(11:32):
Yeah. I mean, the way I describeit is feast or famine. You know,
in some neighborhoods, it's likeall sports all the time. Parents
gone all weekends, dividing andconquering, driving kids from
across state lines to their havetheir eight year olds play
soccer tournament. And then oursystem does not encourage late
(11:53):
development, because you can beeasily discouraged if you're not
developing physically. The earlymatures are rewarded because,
oh, that kid has talent. So thenthe kids who are like, maybe
they're a little younger, orthey're just later to mature,
they get discouraged and theyjust want no part of it. So that
is a real, real problem. Andthere's
(12:13):
a lot of there's a lot ofparents I talk to that hold
their kids back intentionally sothat they're older for their
grades, so that they have anedge in sports. I've
heard that, and I think that'sshocking to me. That's shocking
that you would do that forsports. I mean, it's one thing
if it's for academics. I mean, Iguess I'm naturally inclined to
think that academic success is,is more important. I think doing
(12:35):
it for athletic reasons is issomewhat misguided.
I think it came from MalcolmGladwell wrote a book called
outliers, and he was looking atbirthdays amongst hockey
players, and he noticed thatthere was definitely a
statistical significance thatprofessional hockey players had
birthdays such that they wereolder in their grade school
(12:55):
years. And he hypothesized thathaving a birthday that made you
older for your grade gave you anedge, gave you an advantage, and
I've noticed that since then, ormaybe it's, you know, a
multitude of factors, but theywant their kids to be on the
older side for their grade. Butin reality, how many kids end up
actually being professionals atthe sports that they play? Okay,
(13:15):
so I think it's always good tobe reminded of what the data
say. Okay, so you can just lookat high school sports, so six to
7% of high school athletes,that's not even the whole high
school population. High schoolathletes, go on to play in
college. So it's a very smallnumber who even go on to play in
college, let aloneprofessionally. From college,
(13:38):
about 2% go on to playprofessionally. So, I mean, it's
a very, very small number ifyou're if you're banking on
that, you know, you might aswell start buying a lot of
lottery tickets, because to sayit's not a shirt, that is an
understatement. Sowhy do you think it is, then
that parents become so involvedand potentially obsessed with
their kids sports? Well, I see,I
(14:00):
think there's a lot of factors,and part of it is the the
college question that you knowmaybe they'll get recruited, the
prestige associated with gettingrecruited, the fact that
colleges are there is a it'sthey relax their standards with
Athletes, with the admissionsprocess, it's easier to be
(14:22):
admitted with lower academicstandards. So I think in the
back of most parents minds, Ishouldn't say I'm speculating.
But you know, when your childdoes really well, you think, and
people are telling you, I'd saya little Johnny could play in
college, and he's only nineyears old. You know that plants,
that coach or that performancemight plan to see that this is a
(14:45):
possibility. So then you want tokeep pursuing it. So I think
part of it is the draw ofcollege. I think there's also
just the and this is somethingthat I don't think we talk about
enough as parents. It's that,you know. So none of us knows
what we're doing, right? Allparents are just making it up as
we go along. Nobody knows whatthey're doing. We follow our
(15:06):
parents or we disregard what ourparents did. We read things, we
hear things, we listen to whatour parent or friends are doing.
You just kind of make it up asyou go I mean, with sports, when
kids are out there performingand they do well, when your
child does well, it is just sucha wonderful feeling. It's like,
wow, I'm I've done somethingright. Look at, you know, it
(15:27):
makes you feel like you've donea good job. Because, look, my
child scored the winning goal,or, you know, got the foul shot
that won the game. It just makesyou feel great as a parent. And
I think it's, you know the youthsports system, which is so many
games, so many competitions,there are all these
opportunities for you know,parents get their little
(15:49):
dopamine hits from their child'sathletic performance, and I know
that. I mean, I felt that withmy son, like disproportionate
pride and delight,and I think it's partly because
we really don't know what we'redoing, and we're all sort of
doing it alone, raising kids,and it's a public demonstration
of your child's success andtherefore your ability as a
(16:10):
parent. And I think that is atthe root of a lot of it. And I
don't again, I don't thinkthere's anything wrong with
feeling proud of your kids. Youknow, there's enough heartache
with children. It's just that itcan tip over into an unhealthy
kind of reason for playingsports, like it's more important
to the parents that their childplays than that the child wants
(16:32):
to play, and the parents mightbe devastated if the child wants
to quit, because it becomes soimportant to them, which I
totally understand. I think it'snatural, but I also think it
ought to be resisted, because weneed to let kids have their own
games, their own experiences.
Yes, I can see that it's allabout having a healthy
(16:53):
moderation, keeping it inperspective. I can, you know,
picture a parent after theirchild loses or wins. You want
to, you know, discuss it, butyou don't want to perseverate on
the win or the loss. Yeah, andit was an experience that
happened, but it shouldn'treally become more than that.
Yes, I think about myself. I wasnever a natural athlete, but I
(17:14):
always tried my hardest. So asyou pointed out at the
beginning, when we were talking,that running is a great is a
great sport to participate in ifyou don't have any earlier
training or skills. So I was oneof those students in high school
where I joined the cross countryteam, and I remember thinking
that my parents really didn'tcome to that many of my track
meets, which was fine, because Iwasn't that great and I was
(17:36):
always on the junior varsityteam. My mom came to a couple of
meets. She came and watched me,but I think she was at the bake
sale most of the time. I don'tthink she was there at the
finish line or knew what my timewas, which was fine, but I have
to say that now I'm 44 yearsold, and I still like to run. I
ran this morning a couple ofmiles. I do run most days of the
(17:57):
week, and I enjoy it, and I dofeel, as I've gotten older,
grateful that they weren't soinvested in my athletic prowess
or lack thereof, because I wasalways able to keep it light and
fun. And now it's, you know, itreally is a stress relief for
me, whereas I wonder if it wasintense in high school, maybe
that would have taken the funaway from the sport, and maybe I
(18:19):
wouldn't love it so much today.
So I do think that's somethingimportant to keep in mind for
parents, that a lot of this isabout building habits so that
kids enjoy they learn. Maybeit's a skill that as they go
through their adulthood, they'llbe able to lean back on it and
enjoywell. And I think that's why
those of us on the youth sportslike reform side of things
really emphasize the importanceof fun, because that's the
(18:42):
number one reason why kids saythey want to play sports. And if
it's fun, they'll want to keepdoing it. And if you fit, if you
believe, as I do, that thepurpose of youth sports is to
develop those healthy habits,you know, get into a frame of
mind of being active, likethat's just a part of life,
(19:03):
learning how to work withothers, all those sorts of
things we attribute to being ona team. Then, you know, it
doesn't have to be then thissuper competitive nature of
youth sports does notnecessarily contribute to that
fun. It can for some kids, butyou know, if it's too intense,
(19:23):
too young in age, it's not fun.
And kids, that's why kids giveit up. They're sick to death of
it. They're tired of the ratrace. They're tired of the
relentless grind, the summersand the vacations spent on these
activities that ought to be fun.
And, you know, there's thisinteresting study I wanted to
point out by a woman namedAmanda visit from GW University.
(19:46):
She had looked at what theattributes of fun are, you know,
because I think there's thisnotion among many parents like
to serve to have a goal of how.
When the kids sports be fun iskind of not serious. You know,
you're not it shouldn't be aboutfun. It should be about learning
(20:07):
hard things. And you know, whenyou're eight years old. And what
she found in her research isthat fun for kids, and across
all different levels, was havinga positive team environment, a
positive coach and working hard.
So it's like those threeingredients, not goofing off
and, you know, just sittingaround and, you know, playing
playing games. It's working hardfor something together in a
(20:32):
positive environment with apositive coach. That's what
across the spectrum all thesekids said was what made it fun.
So I really think we need to,like reframe what we mean by fun
when we talk about it in sports,that it's like that is what kids
like to do, and that shouldalways be the goal.
(20:53):
What do you think about coachesthat are very intense? I talked
to a mom last week who wasreally upset because a coach
yelled at her child reallyintensely, and she felt really
upset because her kid, whousually has a great attitude,
came home in tears, and shereally even thought about maybe
switching schools or talking tothe coach. How do you think
(21:15):
parents should handle coachesthat take it too far?
Yeah, well, I think it dependson the child's age, for one, if
the child is in high school, Ithink as much as possible, a
parent should encourage thechild to try to work it out with
the coach, which can be reallyhard. And I know that's really
hard for kids, especially if thecoach is an ogre. I
(21:38):
think the coach really wascoming down on the child, saying
that this needs to be the onlything that they do in their
life, that all day, on theweekends, Saturday, Sunday, this
needs to be what they live andbreathe. And the mother can't
tell if it's coming from thehigher ups at the school, if
there's pressure on the coach todo well from the school's
perspective, or if it's thecoach himself. So I think it's a
(22:00):
sad situation, because here youhave a kid who's very talented,
very motivated, but he's a 14year old and he doesn't want to
make it his life, which I thinkis so normal, which we should be
encouraging. So I guess what I'msaying is, there's, it seems
like there's many reasons andmany levels for why kids are
feeling stress and pressure,that it's yes in part, possibly
the parents in part, possiblythe culture, but also the coach
(22:22):
themselves may be maybe playinga role in the stress.
Absolutely,no question about it. I mean, my
experience has been that schoolswant the kids to have a good
experience, and they want thecoaches to be good people, that
it's not about winning at allcosts. You know, certainly there
are some that are like that, butso that I think college is a
different story, like, if thecoaches, coaches have to win in
(22:44):
order to keep their jobs. But inhigh school, you know, some
schools, yes, but most schoolsknow. And I so I, with that
being said, I think thatparticular coach may have that
perspective, that this has to beyour entire life. I have
to tell you as so I'm a motherof three kids, and none of my
kids play in any sport thattakes more than one day a week.
(23:07):
And sometimes I feel bad aboutit because my husband played in
multiple sports in high school.
We all we both believe thatsports are really important. But
I look at children that, forexample, play baseball, and it
seems to be every weekend, itseems to be so encompassing for
the families, for their life.
And I'm intimidated by that. Idon't, I don't really, I don't
(23:27):
want to encourage that for mychildren, which I feel bad
about. So I wish there was someway, and maybe you have some
advice on this, to think about asport where it doesn't become
all encompassing. I wish thatwas more prevalent today.
I do too. But let me just askyou, why do you feel bad about
that, that you don't want to bepart of that? Because I think
that's what people parents needto interrogate their thinking on
that, like, Why do Ifeel bad that? You know,
(23:49):
I I worry that they're missingout on making friends, that
they're missing out on learningthe lessons of how to lose, how
to be happy when they win, howto share, exercising more. I
think all of these factors thatI believe are healthy about
sports, I worry that they'remissing out on
but it sounds like your kids areplaying sports. They're just not
playing as intensely. Oneday a week they do rock
(24:10):
climbing. I'mall for activity like I what? I
think we confuse sports withexercise like because you can
get the benefits, the benefitsthat we think of going with
sports, the teamwork, thediscipline that can come from
other activities, getting a jobafter school, for example, being
in debate club, being in atheater production. There's all
(24:33):
kinds of things that requireother activities, that require
discipline and teamwork andgetting along and all of that.
But exercise is important too.
And I think, you know, there areways to encourage that as
parents, without saying you needto join the tribal baseball
team.
And we do do that. I have to saywe do make sure our kids are
(24:55):
active, that we you know, we'refrequently taking them on hikes.
We took them to all the nationalparks. So. For spring break last
year. We like to get our kidsmoving. So I You are making me
feel better. So I appreciatethat, because while they're not
in sports, our kids areadmittedly active well.
And I think I guess Jessica, youknow, my view is, if they really
want to play sports, great, butkind of, you know, kicking them
(25:18):
out the door and making themwith their teenagers, or, you
know, I don't know. I think thatkind of usually backfires. Yes,
they are definitely not askingfor it, and I and I mention it
to them, I say, Would you guyslike to play? Would you like to
play a sport? What do you thinkabout basketball? What do you
think about swimming? Andnothing's really catching their
(25:39):
tent, their attention. It wasonly the only rock climbing did
they ask for. And so that's whatwe're having them do. Well, and
I don't know how old are yourkids? My kids are 911, and 14,
so when the younger to get intohigh school, they might decide,
if their friends say are on ateam, that they want to join the
cross country team like you did,and then they'll have that
(26:00):
opportunity. You know, it's,it's not like the door is
slammed shut because they didn'tstart playing travel T ball at
five. You know, they can pickthese things up. And it also, I
think, what is your long termgoal? I think sometimes we get
caught up in the short term. Ithink if you want your kids to
be active throughout theirlives, it's not necessarily by
(26:21):
being in a travel sport at ayoung age. You know, when those
kids burn out. We haven't eventalked about injuries. You know,
the injury issue is a massiveproblem in the kids who
specialize early and playaround.
I agree with this. The rate ofoveruse injuries has
dramatically increased withchildren. This is so true, yes.
And, you know, I spoke aboutneurogyn. He heads Sports
(26:44):
Medicine Research at Emory. Hesaid that they've, what he sees
is they've advanced injury typesby four years. So what they used
to see in 20 year olds, they nowsee in 16 year olds. What they
used to see in 16 year olds,they now see in 12 year olds. So
all the early specialization andyear round play. Yes, your nine
year old is going to be a betterlacrosse player than the nine
(27:06):
year old who didn't pick playlacrosse year round, but that
nine year old is also more aptto get a potentially serious
injury, to be derailed from hisor her sport and to have a
vacuum of other interests. See,that's the other problem, in my
view, one of the biggest issueswith early specialization and
(27:27):
the intensification of youthsports is that it it sort of
leeches out the rest of lifethat might be important to you.
Maybe you want to be able to goaway in the summer, go to the
national parks. You want yourchildren to be able to go to,
you know, a museum every now andthen, to go to their
grandmother's 80th birthdayparty, to spend time with their
(27:47):
cousins, to be on the theater,to club. It just leeches out the
rest of life when children, inmy view, ought to be
experiencing a lot of things asthey grow up.
Yes, we want them to be wellrounded. We want them to be well
adjusted. And you bring up sucha good point, what if a child
gets injured, which they do, andtheir whole life is defined by,
(28:11):
let's say, their soccer and thenthey tear their Achilles. I
mean, we're setting our kids upto be depressed and sad because
that was the only thing in lifethat define them?
Yes, and you know, I shouldpoint out that it's especially
hard for girls, because girlsare much more apt to get those
catastrophic injuries that can,like, derail them for at least a
(28:33):
year, and that's like ACL tears.
So you know, the anteriorcruciate ligament in the knee,
girls get those four times therate of boys in comparable
sports. So like basketball,soccer, lacrosse, girls are much
more apt to tear their ACLs, andyou're going to tear you more up
to tear your ACL if you'replaying year round, and if you
started at a young age, and ifyou've been doing that, it makes
(28:58):
it all the more important toyour life, because that's your
life. So then when you lose it,it can be like a catastrophe,
just catastrophic emotionally,because your whole life, who are
you if you can't play lacrosse?
So you know, it's all of theseintertwined factors, the
injuries and the mental healthand and meanwhile, I always want
(29:20):
to say sports are good becausethey really they promote mental
health, they assuage depression,they can kind of put the tamp
down on anxiety. It's soexercise is important and
it keeps kids off screens. Ifind, yes, the kids that play
sports, they don't have time tobe on their screens all day,
which I think this day and ageespecially, is so important.
Yes, that's right, they're noton their phones when they're
(29:42):
playing a sport. You know, withany luck, Jonathan heights
efforts to, you know, eliminatesocial media for kids, or
seriously limit it will have,will also have that effect,
because there's no question thatscreens are terrible disruptor
and destroy. Action and justeven pernicious influence in
(30:03):
kids lives.
I completely agree. I think thisis the key here is, how do we I
think what I'm struggling withso much is, how do we help our
kids get back to that childhoodwhere they're not on their
screens all day, they're notoverly stressed in competitive
sports, but they're justenjoying their childhoods where
they're getting back to thatpure childhood of playing their
(30:24):
sports for enjoyment, where it'snot so serious, that things
aren't so stressful, yeah, andso I think one of the first
steps in getting back to that isrecognizing the points that you
make in your book, that we don'twant it to be that stressful for
kids, and that we as parentsneed to keep perspective to help
our kids keep the sports at alevel that that makes sense for
(30:45):
your individual family andchild,
and for the long term, you know,like, if you think about what do
you want in the long term, doesit really matter if they win the
soccer game in fifth grade? Youknow, for their travel team, it
really doesn't matter, but it'sreally it's so hard to keep
perspective when you're watchingan emotional game and your child
is doing something great orsomething terrible, and you get
(31:08):
wrapped up in it, which Iunderstand, but, you know, I do
think parents need to fortifytheir backbones a little bit
about, like, what am I doinghere and why and who's driving
this? If the child is drivingit, that's a different story,
but who's driving this and totry to reclaim some of those
values that you're talkingabout. And I, you know, if
(31:28):
you've heard of Peter Gray,I love Peter Gray. He was a
guest on the podcast maybe abouta year ago.
Okay, so he, I asked him thisquestion, like, what are parents
to do? You know, you can say,great, go out and play, but
everyone's inside, or everyone'soff doing their, you know, club
sport, or whatever it is, orKumon lessons, or whatever the
(31:49):
particular intensive parentingexample is. And he said he's
going to take a littleinitiative, but in your
neighborhood, go find some otherneighbors who have kids, talk to
them about the benefits of freeplay, which is all about like
kids are having this mentalhealth crisis. Here's an is one
of the antidotes, or one of thecorrections to that, talk to the
(32:12):
neighbors about the benefits offree play, and carve out, say,
Saturday afternoons and taketurns. He said, Take turns.
Being like an old fashionedparent, those kids come over, no
phones, mixed age groups, gofigure it out. And I think, you
know, it does take someinitiative, so you're going to
have to find ways in your ownhomes, I think, in your own
(32:34):
neighborhoods. And maybe it'llcatch on, you know, so you have
a bunch of kids coming over, andyou take turns, and, you know,
Let's carve out, even if youcan't do it all the time, carve
out half a day on the weekend,or a whole day where you have,
okay, we're gonna go be oldfashioned parents.
I have to tell you that thestruggle feels real because
(32:55):
Lenore skin easy, who was aguest on the podcast about a
year ago, she said, why don'tyou go on next door app and tell
parents I'm going to be home onFriday from two to four o'clock.
Just bring your kids over. So Idid do that a couple of times,
and nobody came over. So it'sdefinitely something I'm going
to keep working on. But I dofeel like it's harder this day
and age, hopefully books likeJonathan heights the anxious
(33:16):
generation and getting the wordout about how detrimental social
media can be for kids and howimportant it is for kids to get
free play. Hopefully that wordkeeps spreading so that it
becomes easier, yeah, but it iswell, it is tricky. I mean, it
just seems like the solution isright there, which is better for
parents and better for kids tohave more free time, to have
(33:40):
time where they can just beplaying amongst themselves and
not have adults jumping in tofix things. Maybe the case has
to be made more proactivelythat, you know, let's do this in
our neighborhood, you know, goaround and talk to other
neighbors and kind of make itreally. Try to make it happen.
Parents that are listening,please be this parent, try to
(34:01):
get together with other kids inyour neighborhoods. Talk to
other parents and make a pactthat you put the phones away,
that the kids get together,maybe bring some sports
equipment so they can playoutdoors together, you know,
with the understanding that ourkids benefit from having free
play time, being outside,playing sports in the light
hearted, fun, stressless way.
Yes, well, and because one ofthe causes of parent anxiety is
(34:24):
worry about their children'smental health. You know this
free play is it's from what Iunderstand, conducive to mental
health, conducive to good mentalhealth, because kids figure
things out. They developautonomy. They kind of work
their friendships out, and theyhave agency. They're not like
(34:46):
relying on an adult to do thingsfor them or tell them what to
do, which is what all they getin youth sports, is follow these
directions if they have tofigure it out it's good for
their own growth and emotionaldevelopment. So it just seems
like. A win, win. But I know, Iknow it's hard. It's going to
take some persuasion.
Can you speak to the myth thatplaying sports builds character?
(35:09):
Yes, this was a kind of a, well,it's, it's sort of a an article
of faith, I think, in people whoare sports advocates, that
playing sports builds character.
And of course, how you definecharacter is kind of nebulous.
Does it mean being honest? Doesit mean, you know, if the ball
is out, you call the ball out,you know, it's up to you to be
(35:29):
honest. Or is it about are thereattributes, like discipline,
just developing good likephysical habits, like, what does
it even mean when we talk aboutcharacter? But there is a study
of 40 years of the research onthe effects of playing sports on
character, and this study foundthat there was no indication
(35:51):
that kids who played sports werebetter at working in teams. We
attribute these things to sportssort of out of thin air, but
there isn't evidence that that'swhat's happening, and that the
young people who grow up to be,you know, fine, upstanding
people, maybe they playedsports. So we think it's because
they played sports well, maybeit had something it was entirely
(36:14):
unrelated to sports. They had ajob too, or their parents had a
particular philosophy, or thisis just the way they are born?
You know? They just so we don'tknow, but we like to attribute
all these things to sports. Infact, there are some character
traits that sports can bring outthat aren't so desirable, like
(36:34):
aggression. There's higher ratesof physical abuse partners in
young people are and adults whoplay the football and wrestling
even there's more drinking amongathletes in high school who play
sports than there are in thosewho don't. So you know, we just
have to be a little more nuancedin how we think about it, the
(36:55):
pros and cons about sports andand I say that as an athlete
myself, high school player, arunner for most of my life, and
a high school running coach likeI see, there are, there are
wonderful things that can comefrom playing sports, but it's
not just by definition. It's alldependent on the environment.
(37:16):
Yeah, I mean, we both agreethere, and I'm sure everybody
listening can agree that thereare definite, tremendous values
in playing sports, but it soundslike you wanted to be coming
from the child themselves. Wewant to we want to keep the
sport in moderation, in terms oftheir life balance. And it's so
important that we as parentskeep perspective on what we're
looking for to come from theirparticipation in sports,
(37:37):
yes, and tonot make it about ourselves,
which is what you know when youare like, just on cloud nine,
because your child played wellon the sport. I get it, but it
shouldn't really, you know you Ithink it's probably wise to try
to acknowledge that that's not agreat thing, because you don't
want your child's athleticperformance to dictate how you
feel about them. SoI'm just curious if Linda
(37:58):
Flanagan was in charge ofdesigning the perfect sports
curriculum for middle school,for high school. How would you
design it? What age shouldchildren start? How much time
should they spend in the sport?
How many sports should theyplay? What would it look like to
you?
Well, I think the biggest thingis that there would be more
(38:19):
options. So there would be youstill have varsity sports at the
high school level and middleschool level, though their
middle schools are all over themap with that stuff, but they
would also offer both moreintramurals, more intramural
sports programs, so that say inbasketball, which is five, there
are five starters in abasketball Team, and hundreds of
(38:41):
kids play basketball, but onlyfive start, so teams are
typically like 12 or 13 players.
So have you know, intramural,more intramural so you don't
have to be as having played AAUbasketball in order to play in
high school. And again, with thegoal being that more kids can
play, so that it doesn't have tobe super intense, that you get
(39:02):
more kids playing and moving offtheir phones, also more club
kinds of programs after school,or something where there is that
option for more kids. I thinkyou know, Lenore skin azi has
this idea of the play clubsafter school and the elementary
school level. So let's, let'slower the temperature of the
(39:23):
elementary school level so andgive parents another more of a
break. So after school for anhour three days a week, there's
a play Club Kids of all group,all ages, loosely supervised.
Throw them out in the field withballs and jump ropes or
whatever, and let them figure itout for an hour like I would
have loved that as a you know,when my kids were little,
(39:44):
yes. And for parents listening,you can find more information
about that at let grow.org It'sa brilliant concept, and I hope
more schools implement it. Sojust more options, more low key
options, and so. And also, I'mnot saying you shouldn't have
those travel and club programs.
You. For some kids, they'reappropriate. At my high school,
I think there are the veryserious who want more, but it
(40:08):
shouldn't that shouldn't be theexpectation for everyone that
you have to join a club teamthat devours all you know, your
waking moments, for the entirefamily, just because you want to
have the option to play in highschool like it's fine to have
those programs for the veryserious but the norm, it
shouldn't be the norm thatfamilies have to do this. So
(40:30):
that's how my perfect sportsworld will look. And
it's and to your point, earlier,I've seen so many people pick up
pickleball at all ages of life.
So it's never too late to starta sport.
That's right. And you know thisidea that, Oh, you're you're
missing out, your child's gonnamiss out, like, with any luck,
life is long. And I think, youknow, it's one friend of mine
(40:51):
said that she I thought it wassuch a great quote, that the her
whole community was conspiringto make her think that sports
were more important than theyare. They're just really not
that important. I mean, it'sgood to be active, it's nice to
have these experiences, but it'snot, it's not life or death, and
it can just seem alot more important than it is.
Very,very wise words of wisdom. Now,
(41:12):
before we wrap up, any finalthoughts that you have that
you'd like to share, before wewrap up,
well, you had asked me earlierabout a question about a
personal experience that shaped,helped shape my views on sports.
It was in one of your writtenquestions, and I was thinking
about it, and it kind of, it's agood way to end it with the idea
(41:33):
that, you know, it really has tocome from the child that you
really want your children to be,determining, deciding what
sports they want to play. Youknow, give them a lot of
options, but let them it has toin. The motivation has to come
from them. And I think about myown experience growing up, my
parents were tennis players, andthey really wanted me to play
tennis, so I begrudginglylearned how to play tennis, and
(41:54):
I really wasn't very good. Imean, I was okay. And at my last
match in high school, I waslike, I'm done with this. I
didn't want to play anymore. Andfor always, my parents would be
like, Oh, Linda, have youthought about planning tennis?
Would you like to come hit, hitaround and be like, no, because
I didn't like it. On the otherhand, I took up running on my
(42:16):
own tone, and it's something Ienjoyed, like you without a lot.
I just like the feeling of it. Ilike the feeling of being
active. I like the feeling ofbeing fit. I loved how I felt
afterwards, and I pursued it,joined teams, competed. It's
became central to my life, andmy parents had absolutely
(42:37):
nothing to do with it. It'sbecause I wanted it. And I do
think it's really hard whenyou're the parent, because when
you want things for your kids,and you think they'll love it,
but ultimately, really has tocome from them. You can expose
them and introduce them to allthese different things, but if
they don't want to do it,there's nothing you can do. So
that's how I would end it.
(42:58):
What you're saying, I completelyagree with, I believe, for us as
parents are our job is to exposethem. That's how we can help our
kids in the best way, exposethem to everything as much as we
can, and then see what sticks.
Because something will stick. Itmight not be a sport, but
something will stick, somethingand thank goodness it's not just
a sport. We need all kinds ofpeople, you know. We need
artists and writers and, youknow, data analysts, we need all
(43:20):
kinds of people, like, it's fineif you're not an athlete, as
long as you're, you know,reasonably healthy and you get
some exercise, it doesn't matterthat much. Thank
you so much, Linda. I can't tellyou how much I enjoyed this
conversation. You gave me somuch to think about, and I
really appreciate your time. Andthank you so much for being here
today,my pleasure. It was nice talking
to you. Jessica.
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