If you push someone, be prepared to get pushed.
In Charles Dicken’s A Tale of Two Cities, Dickens Writes:
“It is likely enough that in the rough outhouses of some tillers of the heavy lands adjacent to Paris, there were sheltered from the weather that very day, rude carts, bespattered with rustic more, snuffed about by pigs, and roosted in by poultry. which the Farmer , Death, had already set apart to be tumbrils of the Revolution.”
In short, if you are abusive and totalitarian to those beneath you, you are due for a fall, a retaliation, or a revolution.
Examples of this ideal are scattered through the rich history of our world.
In the works of Old English Literature, we see the punishment for cruel and abusive leadership in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, and we also see the works of a real Revolution as the French peasantry revolted against the corrupt and indifferent reign of Louis XVI in the French Revolution.
But to me, this ideal is no more obvious than looking in a mirror.
I’m a boy of pure heart and passion. I don’t commit to many things, but if I do, I put the very essence of who I am into that particular task, group, or goal. And I care a lot about the things I do and the people I do it with.
Its just who I am.
But not everyone is like me, of course.
Some people aren’t passionate.
Some people don’t care.
And that’s fine, but because I care and I’m passionate, they feel the need to try and bring me down, so as to not feel guilty about how much less they are doing and merely chalk it up to me being:
“Too energetic.”
“Too passionate.”
“Too idealistic.”
They tell me I need to “calm down”, because they lack the heart to care as much as I do, so they don’t want to see someone want it more than they do.
The insults and banter are daily and are repeated to me both ad nausea and verbatim. And in the past, I’d build up these feelings of anger and resentment, and explode every few months. But now I’m a much more mature person, and the fact that I know that I make these people uncomfortable with their own lack of heart and passion is a satisfying feeling for me, as I know I’ll inspire some of them to actually start infusing their heart and passion into the things they do and as I’ve aged I have toned down the passion so as to not be over exuberant, but still have a fire within me to be successful.
Not Me. And I don’t play the violin.
But I must keep my own story in mind when it comes to Crew. He’s not like me, he can’t bottle up emotions, or let things go yet. He’s just a kid, and I need to watch my words and actions towards him because there’s a fine line between being tough and being a jerk. At the smallest criticism or comment, Crew gets defensive and offended and I need to make sure I’m pushing him to success, but not pushing so hard so as to make him believe that I’m trying to be hurtful or offensive.
Through the quote by Dickens, I realized that he reason Crew was so rebellious in our practices for the last two weeks was because he was in constant trouble with our parents, and when they punished him, he didn’t think it was fair and wanted to push back against them by being rebellious with not only them, but with me as well.
As his brother and trainer, I cannot afford to have him thinking that I’m the enemy or that I’m a jerk that he needs to try and push back against. I need to be his supporting figure who is tough and push him towards his own expectations so that instead of pushing me away, he leans on me for support.
And so to do this I’ve cut out the following words and phrases from any dialogue I have with Crew when it comes to his own performance:
Dumb
Stupid
What were you thinking?
What are you doing?
How in the world….!
What?!
Worst
Disgusting
Atrocious
Bad
Lazy
Hopefully, I can find more negative words to exhume from my training vocabulary, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be tough on Crew as sometimes he needs that as a developing kid. But I’ve got to balance any negative thing I say with a positive thing so to make sure Crew doesn’t think I’m focusing on the negative.
Right now, Crew’s a kid, he’s new to this game we call Life. Sometimes, He doesn’t understand that I have his best interest at heart.
And that’s ok, as long as I try to make sure that in the end he understands that I truly support him and even though I’m pushing him, he doesn’t need to push back.
He Wanted The Ball 