Believe in your OWN ways and CELEBRATE the attempts along the way!

I am certain that for many of us, this past week was filled with play dates, game arcade trips, play station games and plenty of attempts at hiding or at least rationing the amount of sweet consumption in the household- school holidays for many parents I know conjour feelings of anxiety and trepidation as parents contemplate exactly how will they be filling the 7 or 21 days of the kids being home 24/7. While for other parents like myself, the holidays are opportunity to really connect with my kids, try out new spots, nourish friendships with other parents and actually step into my children's world.

A big theme for us these holidays was a trip to the bowling alley and game arcade with my boys - it was our 5-year-old, 12-year-old and Dad. Bowling is a fiercely competitive sport and actually has a technique to it. The size of the ball and the power you exert on to the ball have a direct correlation to the number of bowling pins you will strike - something I really noticed about halfway through the game. What made the bowling session really interesting for me was noticing how my 5-year-old was responding to the way we played, you see for someone of his age, he had to use the ball assisting thrower to strike the pins, his age doesn't allow him to throw the ball full force on his own. You would have thought the pressure of Dad knocking the pins in totality and Mum trailing behind would have created some level of pressure on the boys, I assure you it wasn't so.

I then observed how his brother the 12 year old was throwing the ball -while he didn't need a ball assisting thrower, he wasn't actually inserting his fingers in the three ball holes to get a strong grip of the ball, he was almost throwing it like a soccer ball, holding onto the exterior surface only- at times their respective approaches gave them a good yield in the form of the pins they would strike and other times it would be a definite miss as the ball slid through the outer edges of the lane.

With every attempt, be it a hit or a miss, I watched with glee as my 5-year-old was just exceptionally excited and yelled ever so wildly "yaaay we did it"!!! What I observed from my 5-year-old is that, he had unwittingly conditioned himself to seeing victory in attempt and not just in outcome. To find joy in the process and simply participating and not caring really who wins. He was able to play the game his way and find joy from the outcomes he yielded from his own kind of participation. With his brother, I observed how he was totally convicted of his approach and was not persuaded to have to play the game how he was expected to play by others.

This observation had me thinking about the parallels of their approach and often how we participate in the game of life, of work and our goals. The obsession we have with winning at all costs, or the pressure to participate in ways we are told to and expected to participate. How we seldom celebrate just the attempts and the try's because even they have weight and contribute to the outcome.

I mean I remember just smiling to myself and thinking but this is precisely why I enjoy spending time with these little human beings, there is just so much to learn from the simple activities and episodes we experience with them. From this experience I have made a pact with myself to celebrate every effort (it really does count), to participate and plan my goals my own way (not every goal has to be SMART, some goals are small and have meaning like playing bumper cars with the kids and enjoying candy floss afterwards) and also to refute to yield to external pressures by tapping deeper into my own intuition and style of doing things- as we press on with the week ahead, may this article move you to operate differently and in your own way.